asthmatic freestyle: 2013

Monday, April 15, 2013

Column: Compromise key to legacy Obama desires (The Arizona Republic)

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British university attacks BBC over covert North Korea trip

By Michael Holden

LONDON (Reuters) - A leading British university criticised the BBC on Sunday for arranging an academic trip to North Korea to make an undercover documentary, saying it had put students who were unaware of the plans in danger.

The London School of Economics (LSE) said three BBC journalists - including the respected reporter John Sweeney - joined a student society trip at the end of March, posing as tourists to make a film about the secretive state.

The university said the students had been told "a journalist" would accompany them, but it had not been made clear the BBC's aim was to use the visit to record an undercover film for "Panorama", a current affairs programme.

"This was not an official LSE trip," Craig Calhoun, the Director of the LSE, wrote on Twitter. "Non-students & BBC organised it, used the society to recruit some students, & passed it off."

Tensions on the Korean peninsula have escalated in recent weeks, with North Korea threatening nuclear war against the United States and South Korea.

Alex Peters-Day, general secretary of the LSE's student union, told Sky News the students were only told of the BBC's intentions to make an undercover film at a very late stage, with one saying she was only informed when they were on the plane to North Korea.

She said the BBC had used the students as "human shields".

The university said Sweeney, who graduated from the LSE in 1980, had posed as a history PhD student at the university to gain entry to the country even though he currently had no connections with the institution.

"BBC staff have admitted that the group was deliberately misled to the involvement of the BBC in the visit," the LSE said in an email to staff and students released to the media.

"It is the LSE's view that the students were not given enough information to enable informed consent, yet were given enough to put them in serious danger if the subterfuge had been uncovered prior to their departure from North Korea."

"STUDENTS WARNED"

It said the LSE's chairman had asked the BBC to pull the documentary, which is due to be shown on Monday, but the broadcaster's director-general had refused.

Sweeney admitted he had lied to the North Korean government agency that helped organise the visit, but defended the BBC's actions.

"What the LSE has been doing is putting out stuff which is factually inaccurate in our view," Sweeney told BBC TV. "They're putting words into the students' mouths. The majority of students support this programme."

Ceri Thomas, the Head of BBC News Programmes, said the students had been told twice about the possible dangers of having a journalist on the trip, but were not informed about the broadcaster's plans to make an undercover film because it would have put them in a worse position had the BBC team been found out.

"They had the information we think to make informed consent," he told BBC TV. He said he could not categorically rule out students' lives were put at risk but stated there was an "overwhelming" public interest in making the documentary.

"It's vital that we get in... because the public in this country on mainstream television on tomorrow night has a very, very strong interest ... particularly at this moment in seeing what's going on inside North Korea," he said.

Panorama's website said Sweeney had spent eight days undercover "inside the most rigidly-controlled nation on Earth".

"Travelling from the capital Pyongyang to the countryside beyond and to the De-Militarised Zone on the border with South Korea, Sweeney witnesses a landscape bleak beyond words, a people brainwashed for three generations and a regime happy to give the impression of marching towards Armageddon," it said.

The LSE said aspects of North Korea were legitimate objects of study in several academic disciplines but said the BBC may have seriously damaged the university's reputation, and jeopardised future visits to North Korea and other countries.

"BBC story put LSE students at danger but seems to have found no new information and only shown what North Korea wants tourists to see," Calhoun wrote.

(Editing by Sonya Hepinstall)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/british-university-attacks-bbc-over-covert-north-korea-141125944.html

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Changes to your SEO Service Provider in Birmingham ...

Author Bio:- My Name is Oliver Simpson; I am an Internet Marketing Consultant working on behalf of MyWebDesigners.co.uk
I aim is to give readers an insight into the variable trends and topics of Web Design and Online Marketing; as well as industry specific tips and techniques that I hope will serve anyone that is just beginning their venture into the Online industry. If you wish to hear more from me; my blogs and featured articles will be available to view at http://mywebdesigner.com

At MyWebDesigner, as well as continuing to provide Website Design in Birmingham, we are launching a new range of SEO packages and services that we believe will significantly improve your SEO rankings. In previous years, like all other companies, our SEO services have been a two-way collaboration between ourselves and our customers. By this I mean; while our team handle all the back-linking, the customer has had to supply the relevant ?key-worded? content in order to maintain fresh information for the Google-bots to read.
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In summary, all these areas and tools combined are the complete Search Engine Optimisation solution. As we have said many times before; ?Content is Key?? Not only do the correct backlinks need to be put in place, but Google and the other major search engines will not reward you with higher rankings unless you have the fresh content and page activity to justify it.
As we have explained previously in other blogs, put simply, Google works on a popularity basis. When the Google bots realise that your site and its content is appearing all over the web, with relevant keywords that you have submitted, it will begin recognising that your site, and your company, is a ?happening place? on the web . The increased activity, and matched keywords displayed around the internet, is the infrastructure that must be in place for a truly successful Search Engine Optimisation campaign. This is where you will see your SEO results begin to really take off!
We are offering several different SEO packages to suit all budgets and requirements; so if you?re looking to upgrade your existing package, or if you want to find out why we provide the best Website Design in Birmingham, then don?t hesitate to fill out a contact form at http://mywebdesigner.com or call 08450 030 732 to speak to one of our Online Marketing and Web Design professionals.

Source: http://blog.mywebdesigner.com/changes-to-your-seo-service-provider-in-birmingham/

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Sunday, April 14, 2013

Two hikers missing in Washington state after avalanche

By Karen Brooks

(Reuters) - Two hikers were missing after at least one avalanche struck the mountains in Washington state on Saturday in an area east of Seattle that is a popular location for winter sports, a King County sheriff's spokeswoman said.

Sergeant Katie Larson said that a 60-year-old man who had been hiking with two companions went missing at around noon local time after an avalanche struck near Snoqualmie Pass in the Cascade Mountains, about an hour east of Seattle.

A second hiker received a non-life-threatening shoulder injury after the incident, she told Reuters.

In an apparent separate incident nearby, another person who had been among a group of 13 people hiking at the Alpental Ski Area was also reported missing, although Larson said the nature of that incident was not immediately clear.

"At some point something happened; we're not sure if it was an avalanche or an accident," Larson said, citing the remote location and communication difficulties with the hikers, who did not speak fluent English.

One hiker from that group suffered hypothermia and was being brought out of the mountains by rescuers, who have a two-and-a-half hour hike to where the group is located, Larson said.

"Obviously right now we're trying to (get) there as quickly as we can we before the weather conditions worsen and before nightfall," she said, adding that more heavy snowfall was expected in the area.

The King County Sheriff's Office had said earlier on social media that three people were missing in two avalanches, but Larson indicated that the number of missing had since been reduced to two.

(Reporting by Karen Brooks; Editing by Cynthia Johnston and Eric Walsh)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/two-hikers-missing-washington-state-avalanche-001004491.html

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Reactivating memories during sleep

Apr. 12, 2013 ? Why do some memories last a lifetime while others disappear quickly? A new study suggests that memories rehearsed, during either sleep or waking, can have an impact on memory consolidation and on what is remembered later.

The new Northwestern University study shows that when the information that makes up a memory has a high value (associated with, for example, making more money), the memory is more likely to be rehearsed and consolidated during sleep and, thus, be remembered later.

Also, through the use of a direct manipulation of sleep, the research demonstrated a way to encourage the reactivation of low-value memories so they too were remembered later.

Delphine Oudiette, a postdoctoral fellow in the department of psychology at Northwestern and lead author of the study, designed the experiment to study how participants remembered locations of objects on a computer screen. A value assigned to each object informed participants how much money they could make if they remembered it later on the test.

"The pay-off was much higher for some of the objects than for others," explained Ken Paller, professor of psychology at Northwestern and co-author of the study. "In other words, we manipulated the value of the memories -- some were valuable memories and others not so much, just as the things we experience each day vary in the extent to which we'd like to be able to remember them later."

When each object was shown, it was accompanied by a characteristic sound. For example, a tea kettle would appear with a whistling sound. During both states of wakefulness and sleep, some of the sounds were played alone, quite softly, essentially reminding participants of the low-value items.

Participants remembered the low-value associations better when the sound presentations occurred during sleep.

"We think that what's happening during sleep is basically the reactivation of that information," Oudiette said. "We can provoke the reactivation by presenting those sounds, therefore energizing the low-value memories so they get stored better."

The research poses provocative implications about the role memory reactivation during sleep could play in improving memory storage," said Paller, director of the Cognitive Neuroscience Program at Northwestern. "Whatever makes you rehearse during sleep is going to determine what you remember later, and conversely, what you're going to forget."

Many memories that are stored during the day are not remembered.

"We think one of the reasons for that is that we have to rehearse memories in order to keep them. When you practice and rehearse, you increase the likelihood of later remembering," Oudiette said. "And a lot of our rehearsal happens when we don't even realize it -- while we're asleep."

Paller said selectivity of memory consolidation is not well understood. Most efforts in memory research have focused on what happens when you first form a memory and on what happens when you retrieve a memory.

"The in-between time is what we want to learn more about, because a fascinating aspect of memory storage is that it is not static," Paller said. "Memories in our brain are changing all of the time. Sometimes you improve memory storage by rehearsing all the details, so maybe later you remember better -- or maybe worse if you've embellished too much.

"The fact that this critical memory reactivation transpires during sleep has mostly been hidden from us, from humanity, because we don't realize so much of what's happening while we're asleep," he said.

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The above story is reprinted from materials provided by Northwestern University, via EurekAlert!, a service of AAAS.

Note: Materials may be edited for content and length. For further information, please contact the source cited above.

Journal Reference:

D. Oudiette, J. W. Antony, J. D. Creery, K. A. Paller. The Role of Memory Reactivation during Wakefulness and Sleep in Determining Which Memories Endure. Journal of Neuroscience, 2013; 33 (15): 6672 DOI: 10.1523/JNEUROSCI.5497-12.2013

Note: If no author is given, the source is cited instead.

Disclaimer: This article is not intended to provide medical advice, diagnosis or treatment. Views expressed here do not necessarily reflect those of ScienceDaily or its staff.

Source: http://feeds.sciencedaily.com/~r/sciencedaily/top_news/~3/otYtwfVMsl8/130412132428.htm

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Dot Earth: Will Synthetic Biology Benefit or Threaten Wild Things?

Please look below for a ?Your Dot? missive on an emerging force that will, in ways both direct and indirect, shape the face of what we used to call ?nature? or ?wildlife.? The post was sent by?Cristi?n T. Samper, the president of the Wildlife Conservation Society, from a meeting held this week at Cambridge University to examine this question: ?How will Synthetic Biology and Conservation Shape the Future of Nature??

There?s a superb and detailed framing paper for the meeting posted here.

Here?s the note from Samper, which accurately notes that this meeting was the beginning of a long and important conversation, in which more questions were raised than answered:

Will synthetic biology help or hinder conservation efforts?

This was the question asked at a symposium organized by the Wildlife Conservation Society at Cambridge University this week, attended by about 80 synthetic biologists and conservationists. ?These are two communities that have never come together and, like a first date, we were examining each other and building some trust.

It was clear that synthetic biology ? which involves the engineering of life ? was advancing rapidly and inevitably could impact the world?s biodiversity ? and could be either a positive or negative. ?The conservationists from WCS, The Nature Conservancy, WWF, Fauna & Flora International, and other leading groups and academic institutions, all wanted to know more.

There were a lot of questions flying: Could genetic manipulation allow species to adapt to climate change or control an invasive species? Could scientists change the biology of an organism to be more productive or enable it to grow in new environments? Could we manufacture wildlife products like ivory in a lab? Could this emerging science bring back species that have gone extinct like the passenger pigeon?

When the synthetic biology experts spoke, they focused on how their field is currently addressing the potential needs for food, energy and medicine. These could all have major impacts on conservation, improving agricultural yields or reducing the demand for wood, thus reducing deforestation. None of that has a direct impact on conservation but all could have an indirect effect. For example, what if there was an unintentional release of a synthetic organism and it destroyed all the fauna in an ecosystem? The scenarios are endless.

As a tropical biologist, the symposium became my first lesson in synthetic biology. The field was not around when I was a graduate student, and engineers approach the world very differently from scientists. I could easily see how the current focus of the synthetic biologists will affect our lives as humans very directly, but how will it evolve and affect the rest of the species on our planet?

When the conservationists left the meeting, we could see the potential of synthetic biology to help conservation. We left, however, with questions and hopes that this new science might ultimately be another one of the tools that we could use to save our threatened natural world ? which some surmise is approaching its sixth episode of extinction. Could we pool our intelligence with this new group of colleagues to finally turn back the clock on the demise of Earth?s great diversity of life?

Ed Yong, who blogs on science for National Geographic, has filed ?Can We Save the World by Remixing Life?? ? a great post surveying this nascent field and offering insights from those who attended the meeting.

The meeting was largely conceived by Kent Redford, a biologist who until recently was at the?Wildlife Conservation Society?and now is an independent consultant on conservation strategies.?Redford was the lead author of a new paper in?PLoS Biology?that laid the groundwork for the meeting, which ended Thursday. [Here's a link to the open-access paper:?Synthetic Biology and Conservation of Nature: Wicked Problems and Wicked Solutions,?Kent H. Redford, William Adams, and Georgina M. Mace].

You can learn more from him in a fascinating podcast (part 1,?part 2) posted earlier this month by Scientific American.

There?s much more on synthetic biology here on Dot Earth and over at The Loom, the National Geographic blog of science writer Carl Zimmer.

11:43 a.m. | Addendum | Just one of the many secondary issues in this arena is ?de-extinction? ? the prospect of bringing vanished species ? say, the passenger pigeon ? back to life now that we know better. A recent Nature news article provides a good start.

And don?t miss Stewart Brand?s TED talk from earlier this year, titled, ?The dawn of de-extinction. Are you ready??

Are you?

Source: http://dotearth.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/04/12/will-synthetic-biology-benefit-or-threaten-wild-things/?partner=rss&emc=rss

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Saturday, April 13, 2013

AAP reports e-books now account for over 22 percent of US publishers' revenue

It's well off the triple year-over-year growth that e-books saw a few years ago, but the latest report from the Association of American Publishers shows that e-books did inch up even further in 2012 to account for a sizeable chunk of overall book sales. According to its figures, e-books now represent 22.55 percent of US publishers' total revenue -- up from just under 17 percent in 2011 -- an increase that helped push net revenue from all book sales up 6.2 percent to $7.1 billion for the year. As the AAP notes, this report also happens to mark the tenth anniversary of its annual tracking of e-book sales; back at the beginning in 2002, their share of publishers' net revenue clocked in at a mere 0.05 percent. The group does caution that the year-to-year comparison back that far is somewhat anecdotal, however, given changing methodologies and definitions of e-books.

Comments

Via: The Next Web

Source: AAP

Source: http://feeds.engadget.com/~r/weblogsinc/engadget/~3/GYiJjZF2JoA/

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Tuesday, April 9, 2013

Structured reflection improves team performance

Apr. 8, 2013 ? Maybe the boss' staff meeting shouldn't be such a boring snooze, but rather a more structured event to improve the performance of the team, new basic research at The University of Alabama in Huntsville indicates.

With the word "team" ubiquitous to the point of clich? in the business world, the new research indicates that teams improve their performance when they meet in a structured environment in which each member reflects on his or her role and how it relates to the overall performance of the team.

Communication is essential in this reflexivity phase so that each team member develops greater situational awareness, which is the perception of their environment and what it may mean now and in the future, and better transactive memory, which is the ability to recall which team members have expertise in various roles.

The study of the reflexivity phase and communication by UAHuntsville graduate student Kristin Weger organized 40 virtual teams of four members each, connected to each other only by computer. "No team member knows who the other team members are," Weger said. "For this study, they could only communicate via a chat system."

The study was conducted through the UAHuntsville Psychology Department's Social Cognition and Teamwork Laboratory. "In our research in the lab, we try to identify when and under what conditions the best teamwork occurs," said Dr. Sandra Carpenter, a psychology professor and Weger's collaborator. "What we do is experimental work that typically uses college students to work on projects for a specific period of time, or we study college students as they do their own course projects. The results are applicable to the military, managers and team leaders of all types."

Weger's teams played a German-created video game designed for experimental and training purposes called NetOpFeuer 2.0, or Network Operations Fire, a computer simulated fire rescue. Weger, who is German, began her nine-month project by translating the game into English. The purpose of the game is for each team to save as much of a burning village and forest as possible, and team members are each assigned to a different role in the effort. The 20 reflexivity teams were all given the goal of improving their performance.

"Nobody has really done it before, looking at the reflexivity phase and its impact on communication," said Weger, whose resulting thesis will earn her a master's degree in experimental psychology with a specialization in industrial organizational psychology. Her work was awarded as the Psychology Department's outstanding thesis. She hopes to continue her studies as a doctoral candidate at the University of Bamberg in Germany.

Study teams were composed of volunteers and students. Each followed the same protocol. They trained on the video game to gain confidence in the task. Weger found that the 20 teams engaging in reflexive phases after the first game improved their subsequent performance by a statistically significant margin, in terms of the percentage of the village and forest they saved from being burned, compared to the 20 control teams who did not reflect on their performance.

In the first scenario, after playing the video game teams in the guided reflexivity condition next reflected for 10 minutes and discussed specific guiding questions on their strategy and how they'd change it for future rounds. Teams who received a guided reflexivity intervention had an initial performance of 59.88 percent of the village and forest saved from fire.

The second scenario was like the first, but the game layout was reversed so that it provided a new environment. "That enabled us to measure if their performance had improved," Weger said. After the guided reflexivity intervention, during the second scenario team performance increased to 68.38 percent saved.

"Giving them guidance in what to talk about influences their ability to communicate together and perform together," Weger said.

Control teams went through the same exercise but instead of the guided reflexivity phase, they discussed how to be more successful at their careers, an unrelated subject. "The control condition had an initial higher performance with 63.88 percent in scenario one," Weger said, "but did not increase their performance in scenario two, which was 63.80 percent."

The study found that communication among team members flourished during the discussion phase that happened after the first scenario, when teams that received a guided reflexivity intervention sent on average 21.15 chat messages about situation awareness events, whereas teams in the control condition sent on average 10.85 messages.

During the discussion phase, teams that received a guided reflexivity intervention sent on average 37.60 messages about reflexivity.

Donated by maker IABG, the video game calculated the performance of each team using an algorithm. Also under study was the degree to which each individual team member developed situational awareness and transactive memory.

"Each team member had a task, like one would operate the fire engine and one would run the helicopter," Weger said. "For teams in the guided reflexivity condition, knowledge and awareness of all aspects increased during the reflective discussion." Team members increased their awareness of their own roles, the knowledge base of their peers and how everything fit together to make a unit.

During the discussion phase, teams who received a guided reflexivity intervention sent on average 31.35 messages related to the transactive memory system, whereas teams in the control condition sent on average 15.50 messages.

Interestingly, Weger found in the control groups that there was a degree of voluntary reflexivity that also slightly increased their cohesiveness as a team. Teams in the control condition sent on average nine messages, indicating that teams do voluntarily reflect to a certain degree.

"Some research says that teams do not actually voluntarily reflect ," she said, "but I found that groups to some degree did reflect."

More research needs to be done, and Weger hopes to be the one doing it, but "if it goes along the same lines as we have done, then if you are previewing prior performance, developing new strategies and implementing new strategies, it can improve team performance."

The take-home point for your boss is the guidance aspect. "If you call them together to discuss their performance in a guided environment, it will improve," Weger said. "You have to put more training into communication."

"Other research has shown that if you intervene early and get the team to discuss what the task is and what their goals are, it improves their performance," said Dr. Carpenter.

But then there are always some slackers who mimic Wally from the comic strip Dilbert. One of Weger's teams decided during its reflexivity period not to save anything from the flames in thevideo game, so essentially it was doing no work. "I had to talk to them then and explain that they had a goal that had been set to improve their performance," she said.

So even though your boss might see an improvement in the team by employing reflexivity periods in a guided environment, and you might find staff meetings more engaging, it's still good to make sure everyone is indeed working toward the goal.

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Story Source:

The above story is reprinted from materials provided by University of Alabama Huntsville, via Newswise.

Note: Materials may be edited for content and length. For further information, please contact the source cited above.

Note: If no author is given, the source is cited instead.

Disclaimer: This article is not intended to provide medical advice, diagnosis or treatment. Views expressed here do not necessarily reflect those of ScienceDaily or its staff.

Source: http://feeds.sciencedaily.com/~r/sciencedaily/living_well/~3/lB3ZhS3Occ8/130408103229.htm

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CA-BUSINESS Summary

U.S. stock index futures signal higher Wall Street open

LONDON (Reuters) - U.S. stock futures pointed to a higher open on Monday after Friday's sell-off, mirroring gains in Japan and Europe, with futures for the S&P 500, the Dow Jones and the Nasdaq 100 rising 0.1 to 0.2 percent. Earnings forecasts have been scaled back heading into first-quarter reports, due to start on Monday with Alcoa . S&P 500 earnings are expected to have risen just 1.6 percent from a year ago, according to Thomson Reuters data, down from a 4.3 percent forecast in January.

Yen falls on BoJ bond buys, while shares, oil recover

LONDON (Reuters) - The yen tumbled against the euro and the dollar on Monday as the Bank of Japan embarked on its massive stimulus drive, while the lingering impact of weak U.S. jobs data limited gains in oil and equity markets. The euro climbed to a three-year peak of 128.44 yen, while the dollar gained 1.5 percent to sweep past 99 yen after the BoJ conducted its first bond purchases since announcing the new monetary easing steps last week.

Airbus seen close to BA deal, adding pressure for Boeing revamp

PARIS (Reuters) - A potential $7 billion order from British Airways for Airbus A350 jets is set to hand Boeing Co its next major challenge as it nears the end of a three-month crisis over the grounding of the 787 Dreamliner, analysts said. If confirmed, the order would strike a blow inside one of Boeing's most loyal wide-body customers and may hike pressure on the U.S. planemaker to defend future profits by formally offering a revamped version of its successful 777 mini-jumbo.

Greece's NBG-Eurobank merger suspended, official says

ATHENS (Reuters) - National Bank's plan to absorb Eurobank to form Greece's biggest banking group will be suspended until both are recapitalised, and a state bank support fund will decide if the they should merge, a Finance Ministry official said on Sunday. National acquired 84.3 percent of Eurobank via a share swap in February with a view to absorbing it as part of broader consolidation in the banking industry to cope with fallout from Greece's debt crisis and deep recession.

In China, off-balance-sheet lending risks lurk in the shadows

SHANGHAI (Reuters) - China's banks are feeding unwanted assets into the country's "shadow banking system" on an unprecedented scale, reinforcing suspicions that bank balance sheets reflect only a fraction of the actual credit risk lurking in the financial system. Banks' latest earnings reports only added to concerns. Despite the slowest economic growth in 13 years in 2012, the banking system's official non-performing loan (NPL) ratio actually declined, renewing a debate about how reliable those figures are.

Luxembourg says willing to ease banking secrecy: paper

BERLIN (Reuters) - Luxembourg is prepared to ease its banking secrecy rules and work more closely with foreign tax authorities, Finance Minister Luc Frieden told a paper, in a comment welcomed by Germany which wants to crack down on tax havens. Frieden told the Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung there was an international trend towards automatically exchanging information about depositors, adding; "We no longer strictly reject this, in contrast to before."

Canada to probe report that RBC outsourcing work

TORONTO (Reuters) - Canada is investigating a report that its largest bank is using temporary foreign workers hired by an outsourcing company to effectively replace existing staff, a situation the government said it would not accept. A Conservative government minister revealed the probe on Saturday after a report from the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation. The CBC story said Royal Bank of Canada was planning to eliminate about 50 employees in its investor services division in Toronto and have the work done by outsourcing company iGate Corp .

UPS appeals EU rejection of $6.7 billion TNT Express bid

NEW YORK (Reuters) - United Parcel Services Inc has appealed the European Union regulator's decision to block its 5.16 billion euro ($6.7 billion) bid for Dutch competitor TNT Express NV , a UPS spokeswoman told Reuters on Sunday. U.S.-based UPS, the world's No. 1 package delivery company, dropped its bid to buy the Dutch firm on January 14, on the expectation of an EU veto of the merger.

UK firms see more jobs but no economic growth: survey

LONDON (Reuters) - British businesses expect to increase hiring over the next six months but given falling confidence among manufacturers, they do not anticipate overall growth in the nation's economy, a survey showed on Monday. An optimism index from accountancy firm BDO, which measures business performance expectations two quarters ahead, rose to 92.2 in March from 90.6 in February.

Hong Kong nets only small fry for laundering illegal Chinese money

HONG KONG (Reuters) - Luo Juncheng, a delivery man and school dropout from China's Guangdong province, was 19 years old when he opened an account at Bank of China subsidiary Chiyu Bank in Hong Kong in mid-2009. Over the next eight months, he moved more than HK$13 billion ($1.7 billion) through the account, making nearly 5,000 deposits and more than 3,500 withdrawals in the largest money laundering case on record in the territory.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/ca-business-summary-001252902--finance.html

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Gulf of Mexico has greater-than-believed ability to self-cleanse oil spills

Apr. 8, 2013 ? The Gulf of Mexico may have a much greater natural ability to self-clean oil spills than previously believed, an expert in bioremediation said on April 8 in New Orleans at the 245th National Meeting & Exposition of the American Chemical Society (ACS).

Terry C. Hazen, Ph.D., said that conclusion has emerged from research following the 2010 Deepwater Horizon disaster, which by some estimates spilled 4.9 million barrels (210 million gallons) of oil into the Gulf of Mexico. His research team used a powerful new approach for identifying microbes in the environment to discover previously unknown bacteria, naturally present in the Gulf water, that consume and break down crude oil.

"The Deepwater Horizon oil provided a new source of nutrients in the deepest waters," explained Hazen, who is with the University of Tennessee in Knoxville. "With more food present in the water, there was a population explosion among those bacteria already adapted to using oil as a food source. It was surprising how fast they consumed the oil. In some locations, it took only one day for them to reduce a gallon of oil to a half gallon. In others, the half-life for a given quantity of spilled oil was 6 days. This data suggests that a great potential for intrinsic bioremediation of oil plumes exists in the deep sea and other environs in the Gulf of Mexico."

Hazen spoke at a symposium, "Environmental Fate of Petroleum Oils and Dispersants in the Marine Environment," that included other reports relating to the Deepwater Horizon spill.

Oil-eating bacteria are natural inhabitants of the Gulf because of the constant supply of food. Scientists know that there are more than 600 different areas where oil oozes from rocks underlying the Gulf of Mexico. These oil seeps, much like underwater springs, release 560,000-1.4 million barrels of oil annually, according to the National Research Council.

Hazen's team used a powerful new approach for identifying previously recognized kinds of oil-eating bacteria that contributed to the natural clean-up of the Deepwater Horizon spill. In the past, scientists identified microbes by putting samples of water into laboratory culture dishes, waiting for microbes to grow and then using a microscope to identify the microbes. The new approach, called "ecogenomics," uses genetic and other analyses of the DNA, proteins and other footprints of bacteria to provide a more detailed picture of microbial life in the water.

"The bottom line from this research may be that the Gulf of Mexico is more resilient and better able to recover from oil spills than anyone thought," Hazen said. "It shows that we may not need the kinds of heroic measures proposed after the Deepwater Horizon spill, like adding nutrients to speed up the growth of bacteria that breakdown oil, or using genetically engineered bacteria. The Gulf has a broad base of natural bacteria, and they respond to the presence of oil by multiplying quite rapidly."

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The above story is reprinted from materials provided by American Chemical Society (ACS).

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Note: If no author is given, the source is cited instead.

Disclaimer: Views expressed in this article do not necessarily reflect those of ScienceDaily or its staff.

Source: http://feeds.sciencedaily.com/~r/sciencedaily/most_popular/~3/4gqfyIGoEdg/130408152733.htm

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Monday, April 8, 2013

CA-NEWS Summary

Five die in Christian-Muslim clashes in Egypt

EL KHUSUS, Egypt (Reuters) - Five Egyptians were killed and eight wounded in clashes between Christians and Muslims in a town near Cairo, security sources said on Saturday, in some of the worst sectarian violence in Egypt for months. Christian-Muslim confrontations have increased in Muslim-majority Egypt since the overthrow of former president Hosni Mubarak in 2011 gave freer rein to hardline Islamists repressed under his rule.

Powers and Iran fail to end nuclear deadlock in Almaty

ALMATY (Reuters) - World powers and Iran failed again to end the deadlock in a decade-old dispute over Tehran's nuclear program in talks that ended in Kazakhstan on Saturday, prolonging a standoff that could yet spiral into a new Middle East war. No new talks were scheduled but big power negotiators, who earlier this year were insisting that time was running out, were at pains to say the diplomatic process would continue.

China asks North Korea to ensure safety of its nationals

BEIJING/SEOUL (Reuters) - China deplored rising tension on the Korean peninsula on Sunday, but said its embassy was operating normally in the North Korean capital and asked authorities there to ensure its diplomats and other citizens were kept safe. North Korea, angry at new sanctions imposed on it for testing nuclear weapons, has made increasingly strident warnings of an imminent war with South Korea and the United States.

Rights concerns overshadow trade ties on Putin's European trip

MOSCOW/BERLIN (Reuters) - Growing Western concerns about Vladimir Putin's record on human rights and democracy could mean a chilly reception for the Russian president on a trip to Germany and the Netherlands, Moscow's biggest trade partners in Europe. The nations need Russia for energy and as a market for exports ranging from Volkswagen Touaregs to tulips, but are uneasy about the influence its oil and gas give it and about Putin's treatment of opponents and activists in his new Kremlin term.

Afghan attacks kill U.S. diplomat, soldiers, others

KANDAHAR, Afghanistan (Reuters) - A car bomb blast killed five Americans, including three U.S. soldiers and a young diplomat, on Saturday, while an American civilian died in a separate attack in the east. The diplomat and other Americans were in a convoy of vehicles in Zabul province when the blast occurred, Secretary of State John Kerry said in a statement.

Kerry to press Turkey on Israel ties, Syrian border, Iraq

ISTANBUL (Reuters) - U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry will press Turkey on Sunday to quickly normalize relations with Israel, keep its border with Syria open to refugees and improve ties with Iraq, a senior U.S. official said. Kerry arrived in Istanbul some two weeks after U.S. President Barack Obama brokered a rapprochement between Turkey and Israel, whose relations were shattered by the killing of nine Turkish citizens in a 2010 Israeli naval raid on a Gaza-bound flotilla.

China to let tourists visit disputed South China Sea islets

BEIJING (Reuters) - China will this month start allowing tourists to visit the Paracel Islands, one of a group of disputed islets and reefs in the South China Sea, state news agency Xinhua said, a move likely to irk rival claimant Vietnam. A cruise ship that can accommodate 1,965 passengers is ready for sailing to the Paracels, known in Chinese as Xisha, Xinhua reported, citing ship owner Haihang Group Corp.

Two new bird flu cases in China amid poultry crackdown

SHANGHAI (Reuters) - Two more people have contracted bird flu in Shanghai, China's health ministry said on Saturday, as authorities closed live poultry markets and culled birds to combat a new virus strain that has killed six people. State-run Xinhua news agency said authorities planned to slaughter birds at two live poultry markets in Shanghai and another in Hangzhou after new samples of the H7N9 virus were detected in birds at the three sites.

Air strike kills 15 in Aleppo, Assad warns of regional turmoil

BEIRUT (Reuters) - A Syrian government air strike killed 15 people on Saturday, including nine children, in a district of the northern city of Aleppo where Kurdish fighters have been battling forces loyal to President Bashar al-Assad, a violence monitoring group said. The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said a warplane had bombarded the western edges of the Sheikh Maqsoud district of Aleppo, Syria's biggest city, where Assad's forces have been battling rebels for nine months.

Chavez prot?g? invokes Venezuelan curse on opposition voters

CARACAS (Reuters) - Venezuelan acting President Nicolas Maduro said on Saturday a centuries-old curse would fall on the heads of those who do not vote for him in next week's election to pick a successor to late leader Hugo Chavez. Maduro's invocation of the "curse of Macarapana" was the latest twist in an increasingly surreal fight between him and opposition leader Henrique Capriles for control of the South American OPEC nation of 29 million people.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/ca-news-summary-013955994.html

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New link between heart disease and red meat: New understanding of cardiovascular health benefits of vegan, vegetarian diets

Apr. 7, 2013 ? A compound abundant in red meat and added as a supplement to popular energy drinks has been found to promote atherosclerosis -- or the hardening or clogging of the arteries -- according to Cleveland Clinic research published online this week in the journal Nature Medicine.

The study shows that bacteria living in the human digestive tract metabolize the compound carnitine, turning it into trimethylamine-N-oxide (TMAO), a metabolite the researchers previously linked in a 2011 study to the promotion of atherosclerosis in humans. Further, the research finds that a diet high in carnitine promotes the growth of the bacteria that metabolize carnitine, compounding the problem by producing even more of the artery-clogging TMAO.

The research team was led by Stanley Hazen, M.D., Ph.D., Vice Chair of Translational Research for the Lerner Research Institute and section head of Preventive Cardiology & Rehabilitation in the Miller Family Heart and Vascular Institute at Cleveland Clinic, and Robert Koeth, a medical student at the Cleveland Clinic Lerner College of Medicine of Case Western Reserve University.

The study tested the carnitine and TMAO levels of omnivores, vegans and vegetarians, and examined the clinical data of 2,595 patients undergoing elective cardiac evaluations. They also examined the cardiac effects of a carnitine-enhanced diet in normal mice compared to mice with suppressed levels of gut microbes, and discovered that TMAO alters cholesterol metabolism at multiple levels, explaining how it enhances atherosclerosis.

The researchers found that increased carnitine levels in patients predicted increased risks for cardiovascular disease and major cardiac events like heart attack, stroke and death, but only in subjects with concurrently high TMAO levels. Additionally, they found specific gut microbe types in subjects associated with both plasma TMAO levels and dietary patterns, and that baseline TMAO levels were significantly lower among vegans and vegetarians than omnivores. Remarkably, vegans and vegetarians, even after consuming a large amount of carnitine, did not produce significant levels of the microbe product TMAO, whereas omnivores consuming the same amount of carnitine did.

"The bacteria living in our digestive tracts are dictated by our long-term dietary patterns," Hazen said. "A diet high in carnitine actually shifts our gut microbe composition to those that like carnitine, making meat eaters even more susceptible to forming TMAO and its artery-clogging effects. Meanwhile, vegans and vegetarians have a significantly reduced capacity to synthesize TMAO from carnitine, which may explain the cardiovascular health benefits of these diets."

Prior research has shown that a diet with frequent red meat consumption is associated with increased cardiovascular disease risk, but that the cholesterol and saturated fat content in red meat does not appear to be enough to explain the increased cardiovascular risks. This discrepancy has been attributed to genetic differences, a high salt diet that is often associated with red meat consumption, and even possibly the cooking process, among other explanations. But Hazen says this new research suggests a new connection between red meat and cardiovascular disease.

"This process is different in everyone, depending on the gut microbe metabolism of the individual," he says. "Carnitine metabolism suggests a new way to help explain why a diet rich in red meat promotes atherosclerosis."

While carnitine is naturally occurring in red meats, including beef, venison, lamb, mutton, duck, and pork, it's also a dietary supplement available in pill form and a common ingredient in energy drinks. With this new research in mind, Hazen cautions that more research needs to be done to examine the safety of chronic carnitine supplementation.

"Carnitine is not an essential nutrient; our body naturally produces all we need," he says. "We need to examine the safety of chronically consuming carnitine supplements as we've shown that, under some conditions, it can foster the growth of bacteria that produce TMAO and potentially clog arteries."

This study is the latest in a line of research by Hazen and his colleagues exploring how gut microbes can contribute to atherosclerosis, uncovering new and unexpected pathways involved in heart disease. In a 2011 Nature study, they first discovered that people are not predisposed to cardiovascular disease solely because of their genetic make-up, but also based on how the micro-organisms in their digestive tracts metabolize lecithin, a compound with a structure similar to carnitine.

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The above story is reprinted from materials provided by Cleveland Clinic, via EurekAlert!, a service of AAAS.

Note: Materials may be edited for content and length. For further information, please contact the source cited above.

Journal Reference:

Robert A Koeth, Zeneng Wang, Bruce S Levison, Jennifer A Buffa, Elin Org, Brendan T Sheehy, Earl B Britt, Xiaoming Fu, Yuping Wu, Lin Li, Jonathan D Smith, Joseph A DiDonato, Jun Chen, Hongzhe Li, Gary D Wu, James D Lewis, Manya Warrier, J Mark Brown, Ronald M Krauss, W H Wilson Tang, Frederic D Bushman, Aldons J Lusis, Stanley L Hazen. Intestinal microbiota metabolism of l-carnitine, a nutrient in red meat, promotes atherosclerosis. Nature Medicine, 2013; DOI: 10.1038/nm.3145

Note: If no author is given, the source is cited instead.

Disclaimer: This article is not intended to provide medical advice, diagnosis or treatment. Views expressed here do not necessarily reflect those of ScienceDaily or its staff.

Source: http://feeds.sciencedaily.com/~r/sciencedaily/top_news/top_science/~3/Gv4Dbnq_NVI/130407133320.htm

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Reoccuring thoughts, ugh. - Empty Closets - A safe online ...

Soooo, I went out on a date with this girl the other night. Things went really well. I like her quite a bit.

Problem is....
I still have this fear in the back of my mind that I'm gonna be wrong. I'm afraid of liking her a whole lot then realizing I'm straight and hurting her.

I know, sounds totally irrational, but it's somehow stuck in my mind :\

Can anyone relate? Or just knock some sense into me?

Source: http://emptyclosets.com/forum/family-friends-relationships/90430-reoccuring-thoughts-ugh.html

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Saturday, April 6, 2013

Material turns 'schizophrenic' on way to superconductivity

Apr. 5, 2013 ? Rice University physicists on the hunt for the origins of high-temperature superconductivity have published new findings this week about a material that becomes "schizophrenic" -- simultaneously exhibiting the characteristics of both a metallic conductor and an insulator.

In a theoretical analysis this week in Physical Review Letters (PRL), Rice physicists Qimiao Si and Rong Yu offer an explanation for a strange series of observations described earlier this year by researchers at the Stanford Linear Accelerator Center in Menlo Park, Calif. In those experiments, physicists used X-rays to probe the behavior of electrons in superconducting materials made of potassium, iron and selenium. The material becomes superconducting at extremely cold temperatures, and the experiments revealed that at a slightly higher temperature, the material exhibited a "schizophrenic" electronic state in which some electrons in the iron atoms became frozen in place while electrons in neighboring orbitals continued to move.

"We have proposed a uni?ed phase diagram for the alkaline iron selenides in which this schizophrenic phase connects between the lower-temperature, superconducting phase at one extreme and a higher-temperature insulating phase at the other," said Si, Rice's Harry C. and Olga K. Wiess Professor of Physics and Astronomy.

Flowing electrons power all the world's energy grids, and a significant amount of power in those grids is lost to electrical resistance -- a kind of electronic friction that occurs when electrons move through metallic wires. Superconducting materials, which were discovered more than a century ago, conduct electricity without any loss of power, but they only operate at extremely cold temperatures. Since the 1980s, scientists have discovered a number of new materials that become superconducting at temperatures that, while still cold, are above or close to the temperature of liquid nitrogen -- an important threshold for engineering applications. The hope is that these "high-temperature" superconductors may one day be used to revolutionize power transmission and other technologies, but physicists have yet to develop a clear-cut understanding of how high-temperature superconductors work.

In classical superconductors, frictionless conduction is achieved when electrons pair up in a way that allows them to flow effortlessly, without the bumping and jostling that normally leads to electrical resistance. Electron pairing is uncommon because the rules of quantum mechanics typically make electrons loners. Under normal circumstances, electrons repel one another, and the mechanism that causes them to pair up in classical superconductors doesn't account for their behavior in high-temperature superconductors.

Iron-based high-temperature superconductors were discovered in 2008. Si and collaborators, including UCLA physicist Elihu Abrahams, were among the first to propose a way in which superconductivity might arise in the iron-based materials due to a phenomenon known as "correlated electron" behavior. In correlated-electron systems, the behavior of electrons in a material can only be understood by viewing the electrons as a collective system rather than many individual objects.

Si and Yu's new paper focuses on experiments with an alkaline iron selenide, one family of materials that is included in the larger class of iron-based superconductors. Prior experiments had found that alkaline iron selenides exhibited odd electronic behaviors at temperatures above the critical temperature in which they transition to the superconducting state.

In the PRL paper, Si and Yu describe a new electronic state, or phase, marked by electronic traffic congestion. They show that electrons in different quantum states, or orbitals, react differently to the bad traffic situation. In particular, the new phase is marked by electrons in selected orbitals becoming locked in a place -- a phenomenon known as a Mott insulating state.

"In a theoretical model containing several orbitals, we identified an 'orbital-selective Mott phase,'" said Yu, a postdoctoral research associate at Rice. "In this phase, electrons in some orbitals behave like an insulator, while those in the other orbitals act as a metal."

Si and Yu said they saw the first hints of the new phase in a 2011 model they designed to study a different family of iron-based superconductors. In that model, the orbital-selective Mott phase ultimately proved to be unstable, so they were somewhat surprised when the phase appeared and proved stable in the model for the alkaline iron selenides.

"This is the first time anybody has identified an orbital-selective Mott phase in any model for the iron-based superconductors," Yu said.

Si said characterizing the schizophrenic phase in the alkaline iron selenides provides more clues about the fundamental origins of superconductivity.

"Ultimately, our goal is to understand superconductivity and the conditions to optimize superconductivity," Si said.

The premise is that this kind of bad traffic situation -- the schizophrenic phase where electrons are in conflict as to whether they should freeze or move -- is good for superconductivity.

"Our results provide evidence that electron correlations play a vital role in the superconductivity of the iron-based superconductors," he said.

The research was funded by the National Science Foundation and the Robert A. Welch Foundation.

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The above story is reprinted from materials provided by Rice University.

Note: Materials may be edited for content and length. For further information, please contact the source cited above.

Journal Reference:

Rong Yu, Qimiao Si. Orbital-Selective Mott Phase in Multiorbital Models for Alkaline Iron Selenides K_{1-x}Fe_{2-y}Se_{2}. Physical Review Letters, 2013; 110 (14) DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevLett.110.146402

Note: If no author is given, the source is cited instead.

Disclaimer: Views expressed in this article do not necessarily reflect those of ScienceDaily or its staff.

Source: http://feeds.sciencedaily.com/~r/sciencedaily/matter_energy/electricity/~3/LdzL4ZEJ7yU/130405104818.htm

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Symposium highlights epigenetic effects of milk

Public release date: 5-Apr-2013
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Contact: Madeline McCurry-Schmidt
madelinems@asas.org
217-689-2435
American Society of Animal Science

Drinking milk early in life could change how certain genes are expressed

It seems the ads were right. A milk mustache is a good thing to have. Animal and dairy scientists have discovered that drinking milk at an early age can help mammals throughout their lives.

But understanding exactly how milk affects the body is a complicated story of hormones, antibodies and proteins, as well as other cells and compounds researchers have not yet identified.

Learning how milk affects offspring was the subject of the Lactation Biology Symposium, held as part of the 2012 Joint Annual Meeting in Phoenix, AZ. The presentations were summarized in a recent paper in the Journal of Animal Science.

The presentations focused on epigenetics, or how gene expression changes based on factors like environment or diet. Epigenetic changes modify when or how certain traits are expressed.

The first presenter, Dr. Frank Bartol from Auburn University, explained how certain hormones, called lactocrines, in pig's milk affect gene expression in piglets. Bartol said lactrocrines could modify gene expression in the reproductive systems; however, Bartol said the specific effects of lactocrines are still being studied.

In the next presentation, Dr. Harald Hammon, from the Leibniz Institute for Farm Animal Biology, explained how drinking milk affects future nutrition. According to Hammon, the milk produced in the first few days after birth, called colostrum, contains growth factors that help young calves better digest and absorb lactose and glucose. Hammon called for more research into identifying these factors and better describing their effects.

Studying milk is important not just for studying future fertility and nutrition, but future milk production as well. Dr. Paul Kenyon, from Massey University in New Zealand, suggested that either underfeeding or overfeeding milk could reduce milk production in the offspring. Though the differences in milk yield were small, there could still be an economic difference for dairy farmers.

The research presented at the Lactation Biology Symposium could have implications for human health as well. Dr. Katie Hinde, from Harvard University, revealed how the components of mother's milk could alter infant behavior and cell development through epigenetic mechanisms. In Hinde's studies of rhesus monkeys, infants who had mothers producing milk higher in milk energy and cortisol were more active, playful, exploratory and bold.

"Milk is, therefore, not merely food that allows the body to grow but it contains constituents that help build the brain and provide the energy that allows infants to be behaviorally active," wrote K. M. Daniels et. al. in a review of the Lactation Biology Symposium.

Research into milk could help researchers better understand farm animals, the dairy industry and human health. Figuring out which compounds are found in milk and how they affect gene expression in offspring could advance knowledge in body development at all stages of life.

"At present there are far more questions than answers," Bartol said in an interview. "However, we are making progress."

###

The full symposium summary is titled, "Lactation Biology Symposium: The long-term impact of epigenetics and maternal influence on the neonate through milk-borne factors and nutrient status." It can be read in full at http://www.journalofanimalscience.org.

Media contact:

Madeline McCurry-Schmidt
ASAS Scientific Communications Associate
217-689-2435 / madelinems@asas.org

[ | E-mail |

Share ]

AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.

Symposium highlights epigenetic effects of milk

Public release date: 5-Apr-2013
[ | E-mail |

Share ]

Contact: Madeline McCurry-Schmidt
madelinems@asas.org
217-689-2435
American Society of Animal Science

Drinking milk early in life could change how certain genes are expressed

It seems the ads were right. A milk mustache is a good thing to have. Animal and dairy scientists have discovered that drinking milk at an early age can help mammals throughout their lives.

But understanding exactly how milk affects the body is a complicated story of hormones, antibodies and proteins, as well as other cells and compounds researchers have not yet identified.

The presentations focused on epigenetics, or how gene expression changes based on factors like environment or diet. Epigenetic changes modify when or how certain traits are expressed.

"At present there are far more questions than answers," Bartol said in an interview. "However, we are making progress."

###

Media contact:

Madeline McCurry-Schmidt
ASAS Scientific Communications Associate
217-689-2435 / madelinems@asas.org

[ | E-mail |

Share ]

AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.

Source: http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2013-04/asoa-she040513.php

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Friday, March 29, 2013

Crisis hotlines turning to text to reach teens

NEW YORK (AP) ? They stream in a couple of dozen times a week, cries for help in bursts of text to DoSomething.org, a nonprofit more used to texting out details to teens on good causes and campaigns than receiving them from young people in crisis.

"I feel like committing suicide," one text read. "What's the suicide hotline number?" Another asked: "How do you tell a friend they need to go to rehab?"

DoSomething isn't a hotline, but its CEO, Nancy Lublin, decided to, well, do something. She's leading an effort to establish a 24/7 national text number across trigger issues for teens in the hope that it will become their 911, perhaps reaching those who wouldn't otherwise seek help using more established methods of telephone talking or computer-based chat.

"Most of the texts we get like this are about things like being bullied," Lublin said. "A lot of things are about relationships, so we'll get texts from kids about breakups, or 'I like a boy, what should I do?' But the worst one we ever got said, 'He won't stop raping me. It's my dad. He told me not to tell anyone. Are you there?'"

Lublin hopes the Crisis Text Line, due to launch in August, will serve as a New York-based umbrella, shuttling texts for help to partner organizations around the country, such as The Trevor Project for gay, lesbian, bisexual and questioning youth or other groups already providing hotlines on dating and sexual abuse to bullying, depression and eating disorders.

As more teens have gone mobile, using their phones as an extension of themselves, hotline providers have tried to keep up. Fewer seem to operate today than in decades past. A smattering reach out through mobile text, including Teen Line in Los Angeles, though that service and others offer limited schedules or are "siloed," as Lublin put it, specializing in narrow areas of concern when multiple problems might be driving a teen to the brink.

Some text providers operate in specific towns, counties or regions and-or rely on trained teen volunteers to handle the load across modes of communication. Several agreed that text enhances call-in and chat options for a generation of young people who prefer to communicate by typing on their phones, especially when they don't want parents, teachers, friends or boyfriends to listen in.

"We've had people who are walking and they just needed to get out of their house because they had an argument with their parent, so they're texting us as they're calming down," said Jennifer James, who supervises chat and text outreach for Common Ground, which also serves adults from its base in southeastern Michigan.

Katie Locke, 26, in Philadelphia was one of those teens in 2006, when she found herself in a suicidal panic after a fight with an old friend.

At 18, she said she grabbed her phone, left her college dorm room and headed out in the cold to sit on a bench to talk with a worker on a crisis phone line she knew from one of her favorite blogs. The number was the only one she had handy and it didn't offer text, which she would have preferred.

"People don't always have the (mobile phone) minutes or aren't in a position where they can speak aloud if they're in danger from somebody around them," Locke said. "I know for me there were other times when I probably should have called a crisis hotline and didn't because of the anxiety about calling. That was such an enormous barrier, to have to dial a phone number."

Brian Pinero, director of the National Dating Abuse Helpline run by a nonprofit called Love is Respect, knows that lesson well.

The organization launched phone and computer-based chat in 2007, and chat quickly grew to the more heavily used method of contact. The Austin, Texas-based group launched text in 2011 and it's now about 20 percent of the operation, Pinero said.

"Many times the phone is actually the most powerful computer in the home, but also for people who are of lower socio-economic status, they may not have the ability to engage in chat. Text messaging is something that is even offered on pay-as-you-go phones."

According to research from the Pew Internet & American Life Project, one in four teens is a "cell-mostly" Internet user. Texting among teens increased from about 50 texts a day in 2009 to about 60, with the number running into hundreds for some.

"Phone calls are not the way young people express themselves," said Danah Boyd, a senior researcher at Microsoft Research and an assistant professor of media, culture and communication at New York University.

"And one of the big problems that's emerged is hotlines are splintered across a ton of different phone numbers. Young people don't know them," said Boyd, who sits on the board of Crisis Text Line.

Comparisons of text hotline volume and efficiency are hard to come by. Researcher Deb Levine, executive director and founder of the nonprofit ISIS, for Internet Sexuality Information Services, said it's clear the number of hotlines of all kinds has declined significantly since a heyday in the Just Say No 1980s.

But chat and text help have been on the rise for more than two years, she said. Most are small-scale operations serving specific communities, said Levine, who lives in the San Francisco Bay area.

"Hotlines are always going to serve a purpose for some teens. Some of them are going to pick up the phone and call, some of them are going to text. I do believe that there's only so much you can do in 160 characters," she said. "There is a power to voice."

The Planned Parenthood Federation of America is in its second year of running one of the largest text and chat outreach operations for people ages 15 to 24, targeting African-American and Latino youth through promotional campaigns on MTV, websites and mobile providers, social media, wallet cards, video and Seventeen magazine.

Through February, nearly 185,000 conversations ? 22,447 via text ? were recorded, according to Planned Parenthood. About a third of conversations on health-related topics ? including birth control, abortion and pregnancy tests ? were with users both under 25 and African-American or Latino.

And nearly all chat and text users ages 15 to 24 agreed or strongly agreed that they were satisfied with their conversations, indicating significantly decreased levels of worry afterward.

"What we've seen from our online chat and text-messaging program is that they appreciate a real answer, in real time, from a real person," said Leslie Kantor, Planned Parenthood's vice president of education.

Evie Priestman, 14, an eighth-grader in Arlington, Va., has called hotlines as recently as a month ago, when she reached out for information on fending off suicidal thoughts, but she hasn't tried text.

"I think teens would definitely use a hotline if they could text to it. I know I would," she said. "Most teens keep their feelings to themselves."

Debbie Gant-Reed sees the need every day. She's the crisis lines coordinator at a 24-hour help line in Reno, Nev., called the Crisis Call Center. The center has been providing 24-hour text help for two and a half years, fielding about 500 text conversations a month.

"We're now taking texts from all over the country," she said. "You can chat all you want but you're going to get older people. Young people don't chat. They text."

___

Follow Leanne Italie on Twitter at http://twitter.com/litalie

___

Online:

http://www.crisistextline.org/ (text service scheduled to launch in August)

Planned Parenthood Federal of America text line video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qYj4TF4c42Y (text PPGO to 774636)

National Dating Abuse Helpline: http://www.loveisrespect.org/about-national-dating-abuse-helpline

National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: http://www.suicidepreventionlifeline.org/ (phone and chat service only)

Crisis Call Center: http://www.crisiscallcenter.org/crisisservices.html (text ANSWER to 839863)

Teenlineonline.org: Teen Line in Los Angeles (text TEEN to 839863)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/crisis-hotlines-turning-text-reach-teens-160806045.html

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