Source: www.northwestohio.com --- Sunday, June 30, 2013
The first ever Soap-A-Thon was held today at University Church, in Toledo today. ...
Source: http://www.northwestohio.com/news/story.aspx?id=916061
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JOHANNESBURG (AP) ? Inspired by Nelson Mandela's struggles in South Africa, a young Barack Obama joined campus protests in the U.S. against the racist rule that kept Mandela locked away in prison for nearly three decades.
Now a historic, barrier-breaking figure himself, President Obama arrived in South Africa Friday to find a country drastically transformed by Mandela's influence ? and grappling with the beloved 94-year-old's mortality.
It was unclear whether Mandela's deteriorating health would allow Obama to make a hospital visit. The former South African leader is battling a recurring lung infection and is said to be in critical condition at a hospital in the South African capital of Pretoria.
Speaking to reporters on Air Force One as he made his way to Johannesburg, Obama said he would gauge the situation after he arrived.
"I don't need a photo-op," he said. "And the last thing I want to do is to be in any way obtrusive at a time when the family is concerned about Nelson Mandela's condition."
Obama's visit to South Africa is seen as something of a tribute to the man who helped inspire his own political activism. The president will pay homage to Mandela at Robben Island, the prison where he spent 18 of his 27 years in prison. And with South Africa's ruling party, the African National Congress, facing questions about its effectiveness, Obama will urge the government and the South African people to live up to the democratic example set by their first black president.
"He's a personal hero, but I don't think I'm unique in that regard," Obama said during a news conference Thursday in Senegal, the first stop on his weeklong Africa trip. "I think he's a hero for the world. And if and when he passes from this place, one thing I think we'll all know is that his legacy is one that will linger on throughout the ages."
Obama and Mandela have met just once, a hastily arranged meeting in a Washington hotel room in 2005 when Obama was a U.S. senator. A photo of the meeting hangs in Obama's personal office at the White House, showing a smiling Mandela sitting on a chair, his legs outstretched, as the young senator reaches down to shake his hand. A copy of the photo also hangs in Mandela's office in Johannesburg.
Since then, the two have spoken occasionally by telephone, including after the 2008 election, when Mandela called Obama to congratulate him on his victory. The U.S. president called Mandela in 2010 after the South African leader's young granddaughter was killed in a car accident. Obama also wrote the introduction to Mandela's memoir, "Conversations With Myself."
Despite the two men's infrequent contact, people close to Obama say his one-on-one meeting with Mandela left a lasting impression.
"He is one of the few people who the president has respected and admired from afar who, when he met him, exceeded his expectations," said Valerie Jarrett, Obama's senior adviser and close friend.
Obama's own political rise has drawn inevitable comparisons to the South African leader. Both are Nobel Peace Prize winners and the first black men elected to lead their countries.
But their paths to power have been vastly different. While Mandela fought to end an oppressive government from the confines of a prison cell, Obama attended elite schools and rose through the U.S. political system before running for president.
"President Obama would believe that the challenges he has faced pale in comparison to those faced by President Mandela," Jarrett said.
Mandela had already shaped Obama's political beliefs well before their first encounter. As a student at Occidental College in Los Angeles, Obama joined protests against the school's investments during South Africa's apartheid era. In 1981, Obama focused his first public political speech on the topic.
"It's happening an ocean away," Obama said, according to a retelling of the story in his memoir "Dreams From My Father." ''But it's a struggle that touches each and every one of us. Whether we know it or not. Whether we want it or not."
More than 30 years later, as he traveled through the African continent, Obama recalled the influence Mandela had had on him during that period of his life.
"I think at that time I didn't necessarily imagine that Nelson Mandela might be released," Obama said Thursday. But the president said he had read Mandela's writings and speeches and understood him to be a man who believed in "treating people equally and was willing to sacrifice his life for that belief."
Following his release from prison, Mandela was elected president in 1994 during South Africa's first all-races elections. He served just one term, focusing in large part on racial reconciliation in the post-apartheid era, and retreated from public life several years ago.
The most recent images of him depict a frail man apparently approaching the end of his life. While South Africans have long been loath to talk about Mandela's inevitable death, there is now a growing sense in the country that the time is near. Well-wishers have delivered flowers and messages of support to the Pretoria hospital where he is being treated, and prayer sessions have been held around the country.
___
Follow Julie Pace at http://twitter.com/jpaceDC
Source: http://news.yahoo.com/obamas-ties-mandela-loom-over-africa-visit-173837509.html
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Posted on: 9:57 pm, June 28, 2013, by Megan Noe, updated on: 09:58pm, June 28, 2013
Storm damage in Muscatine 6-24-13 photo from Brad Walker via Facebook
Just four days after a deadly tornado struck Muscatine, Iowa, a community came together to support the family of the man who died.
The National Weather Service confirmed that a tornado with max wind speeds of 110 miles per hour struck Muscatine on Monday afternoon, June 24, 2013.
The most intense damage happened in the business district along Highway 61 in northern Muscatine, where a car dealership, a church, a hotel and several other businesses were damaged.
Among the badly damaged was Calvary Church. The main church building, which housed an auditorium, common areas and offices, is now uninhabitable, and repairs could take up to a year to complete.
?There are a lot of people that are like, ?Oh, it?s so bad.? But at the same time, it?s been really cool to see a lot of people coming together, which I haven?t really seen in a while here,? said church member Mark Cochran.
Friday night, Calvary Church hosted a garage sale with a duel purpose. The first goal was to empty the church?s warehouse, which was filled with unused, donated items, ranging from pool tables to Christmas decorations.
The warehouse needed to be emptied in order to become Calvary?s temporary worship center while repairs to the main building take place.
?Here we are again, being reminded that the church is not the building. It?s about the people,? said Pastor Dan Schoepf.
The sale?s second purpose, though, was all about giving back. Next door at Krieger?s Collision Center, Wayne Haury was killed in the tornado, and all proceeds from the event went to Haury?s family.
?You know, this whole community wants to come behind this guy who?s worked here for 35 years. Many people know him because he?s worked on their cars? and they just want a chance to come alongside and help,? said Schoepf.
A line formed outside even before the doors opened at 5 p.m., and the eager buyers proved that a whole town wanted to help out the Haury family, too.
?It?s wonderful. It?s huge, I mean, look at all the stuff they have. It?s great, and there?s a lot of people here, so hopefully they raise a lot for them,? said shopper Rhiannon Pharr.
To donate to the Haury family, checks are still being accepted at Calvary Church. Please make them out to Vicki Haury.
Source: http://wqad.com/2013/06/28/garage-sale-benefits-muscatine-tornado-victim/
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CAIRO (AP) ? Egyptian security officials say that one person was killed in street fighting between supporters and opponents of Egypt's Islamist president, bringing to at least five who had died in violence in recent days.
Clashes have broken out repeatedly between the two sides that past three days ahead of massive protests the opposition plans for Sunday, aimed at forcing the removal of President Mohammed Morsi.
Security officials say the latest death came in clashes Friday in the Nile Delta city of Mansoura, where two other people were killed in previous days. They say two have also died in the Delta province of Sharqiya.
The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to the press.
Source: http://news.yahoo.com/egyptian-killed-nile-delta-clashes-122838727.html
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Cicadas' odd life cycle poses evolutionary conundrums
By Susan Milius
Web edition: June 28, 2013
Print edition: July 13, 2013; Vol.184 #1 (p. 26)
Credit: Tom Siegfried
After 17 years underground, throngs of ruby-eyed cicadas clawed up through the soil this year to partake in a once-in-a-lifetime, synchronized mating frenzy. Except it wasn?t one big insect orgy: It was three.
The insects that unearthed themselves to breed in 2013 belong to three distinct species. You need only flip them over to see some differences, written in the varieties of their orange markings.
You can hear the differences too, says Chris Simon of the University of Connecticut in Storrs. The tymbals on either side of a male?s abdomen vibrate to make the racket for which cicadas are famous. A chorus of courting Magicicada cassini males sounds like an electric carving knife revving up. M. septendecula coughs out a series of? rasps. And M. septendecim serenades with the whistling drone of a B-movie spaceship.
The various thrums and buzzings may mingle in the same neighborhood, but the last time ancestors of these species mated with each other was almost 4 million years ago, Simon says. That?s the conclusion of the most detailed genetic studies yet of periodical cicada evolutionary history, which Simon and colleagues published in April in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. With DNA plus episodic field observations, the scientists are getting an idea about the odd family tree of periodical cicadas, how the insects synchronize their life cycles and why they breed side-by-side with others unsuitable for mating.
The three species of Brood II that emerged this year are (left to right) Magicicada cassini, M. septendecula, and M. septendecim. The males sing species-specific songs to ensure that they attract the appropriate females.
Credit: Courtesy of John Cooley/Univ. of Conn.
Biologists have named a few thousand cicada species worldwide, all within the families Cicadidae and Tettigarctidae. Cicadas nestle on the evolutionary tree of life among planthoppers and related botanical vampires that suck plant fluids ? not with locusts as is commonly thought. But only the seven named species that make up the genus Magicicada live underground for more than a decade and then burst forth to breed in multi-species masses. These periodical cicadas live in eastern and central North America, where biologists and spring-wedding planners alike keep tabs on the 15 different cohorts, or broods. The broods are identified according to the years in which they cycle into frantic reproduction.
From then to now
On an evolutionary family tree, the periodical cicadas branch and then fan into species sets with patterns that echo each other. And since this is biology and not mathematical theory, odd anomalies show up here and there.
For example, consider the origins of the 13- and 17-year cyclers. A biologist from another planet might hypothesize that such a dramatic difference in life cycles arose once when ancient ancestors of today?s 17-year species diverged from 13-year counterparts. Logical enough, but not what happened, Simon says.
Life underground
View larger image | Billions of noisy bugs may attract all the attention, but the cicadas' mass emergence is just the final blip in the long life of the periodical species. All seven species spend the majority of their lives buried in the soil. Then, on cue, they surface to find a mate and reproduce.Credit: Nicolle Rager Fuller
The big, new family tree confirms that a common ancestor first split into three lineages (called Cassini, Decula and Decim) and then each lineage independently evolved 17-year and 13-year forms. So this year?s cicada brood, designated by the Roman numeral II, comprises a 17-year species from each of the three ancient lineages. And the closest sister species of this year?s breeders are not each other but 13-year cyclers locked in with different broods.
Safety in numbers
What preserves the multi-species broods may be cicada predators, says Rick Karban of the University of California, Davis. Cicadas haven?t evolved the common insect defenses of camouflage or nimble flight. These are big, noisy bugs without many escape skills. ?You can pick them off a tree,? Karban says. ?They?re just seemingly ? dumb.?
But with thousands, millions or billions living conspicuously for the same brief period of time, each individual has a better chance of surviving. Predators can?t eat the whole generation. There?s safety in extreme numbers, so synchronizing with a different species beats coming out with just your own in smaller numbers and getting picked off by hungry birds. As segments of different species overlap in their reproductive timing, they ?get sucked into a brood,? Simon says. Only one brood, VII, consists of just one species.
Mix and match
View larger image | Almost any year, periodical cicadas burst from the ground in mating frenzies in the eastern United States. A single cohort, Brood II, emerged in 2013, but in 2014 and 2015, both 13- and 17-year cicada broods will emerge. (Color-coded dots show observed or expected locations.) Most broods include a mix of what are considered separate Magicicada species, which evolved from a common ancestor almost 4 million years ago (family tree, left). Those ancestors branched into three main lineages: Decula, Cassini and Decim. Now each lineage has its own 13-year species (?tre? prefix) and 17-year species (?septen? prefix, not used in M. cassini). Species from each lineage live in all regions (east, middle and west) where cicadas are found. The genetics of the regional populations mirrors their geographic distribution (shown on tree).Credit: T. Sota et al/PNAS 2013 and Magicicada.org; Map: E. Otwell
Surging forth in great numbers to thwart predators is not some special cicada thing, Karban notes. Cicadas get the headlines, but mayflies transforming from their aquatic to aerial forms synchronize, and oak trees drop occasional bumper crops of acorns.
How the cicadas manage to synchronize may be trickier to explain, though. In fact, cicadas in the same brood grow idiosyncratically. Karban has dug up samples of periodical cicadas during their underground years and found all kinds of out-of-sync stages of development. Those that race through the five stages of underground life end up waiting for the signal to emerge, giving the laggards time to catch up.
What that signal might be is also in question. Soil temperature probably cues the right calendar day for the neighborhood mass emergence, but how the cicadas choose the right year is a puzzle. They could ?count? the years with seasonal changes in the tree sap they feed on, Karban speculates. To test this idea, he dug up cicadas with two years yet to go underground and moved them onto roots in a colleague?s research set of peach trees. The colleague coaxed the trees to flower twice in one year, and cicadas emerged as if two years had passed instead of one.
But why so long underground? Karban?s answer is basically, why not? A long immature period may have more advantages than disadvantages. Again he has gone digging. His samples of cicadas from underground don?t show much evidence of premature death by predator attack. And spending more time growing may mean bigger bodies with the power to have more offspring. The 17-year cicadas he unearthed in the Midwest were in the process of forming more eggs than 13-year ones living nearby.
A long development time could also have been a big boon for surviving the ice ages, says geologist Randy Cox of the University of Memphis, who has analyzed how climate affects the pattern of cicada emergences. During ice ages, he points out, even southern refuges had chilly years, and a really cold spell could wipe out a population. The longer a cicada?s cycle, the fewer times populations would have to play climate roulette.
If big numbers are good for cicada life cycles, he and other researchers suspect that big, prime numbers (divisible only by one and themselves) are even better. Predator populations can rise and fall in cycles too. If cicadas had a 12-year cycle instead of a 13-year one, for example, they would coincide more frequently with big years of any predators on two-, three- or four-year cycles.
Those big, prime numbers might also minimize unfortunate hybridization between cicadas timed to breed on different cycles, Cox suggests. When such cicadas? reproductive years coincide, any cross-breeding could doom offspring. Their half-brood genes could lead them to reproduce in some intermediate year between mom?s and dad?s regular cycle. Without the company of millions of pure-broods, hybrids would be easy pickings for predators and reproductive dead-ends for their family lineages. But with life spans of 13 and 17 years, the simultaneous emergence of broods on different schedules happens only once every 221 years.
Cicadas may even somehow influence predator cycles, suggests ornithologist Walt Koenig of Cornell University. Decades of nationwide citizen-science surveys of breeding birds show that cicadas tend to show up during dips in numbers of seven cicada-eating birds, including American crows and blue jays. This may not be coincidence. That feast of easy-to-catch cicadas may somehow set bird populations on rise-and-fall trajectories that miss big cicada years, he and Andrew Liebhold of the USDA Northern Research Station in Morgantown, W.Va., proposed in the January American Naturalist. ?Even we think this is kind of weird,? he says, ?but it fits the data.?
However the brood emergences came to be, they?re worth seeking out. ?Cicadas are one of the big natural spectacles of North America,? Karban says. For those who missed the show this year, he promises, one of the 15 periodical broods will break out loud and dumb somewhere almost any year.
Source: http://www.sciencenews.org/view/feature/id/351285/title/Mystery_in_synchrony
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SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) ? Several members of Congress representing coastal states are voicing concern about a proposed federal regulation that could pre-empt state bans on buying or selling shark fins.
Democratic Rep. Jared Huffman of California is being joined by representatives of New York, Florida and Guam in seeking changes to a proposal they say would take away a state tool to protect shark populations.
California, Hawaii, New York and several other states have passed regulations on the sale and trade of shark fins, which are used in a soup considered an Asian delicacy. California's ban on the sale, trade and possession of shark fins will go into effect Monday after a compromise allowed time for restaurants and businesses to use up their existing supplies.
A letter from the members of Congress and the representative of Guam states that a proposed rule by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's fisheries management division, the National Marine Fisheries Services, would undermine those laws. California state lawmakers were also circulating an opposition letter.
"If we are to address the problem of shark-finning head on, we must allow state and territorial statutes to complement the federal regulations and further the U.S. leadership in global shark conservation," states the letter, which has not yet been sent to the fisheries service but was given in advance to The Associated Press.
In addition to Huffman, it is to be signed by Democratic Reps. Sam Farr of California and Grace Meng of New York, Florida Republican Rep. Vern Buchanan and Democratic Delegate Madeleine Bordallo of Guam. Their letter is dated July 8, which is when the public comment period on the proposed rule is scheduled to end.
A request for comment was left with a press officer for the National Marine Fisheries Services.
The proposal under consideration says state and territory shark fin laws are pre-empted if they are found to be inconsistent with federal fishery management plans or regulations.
Conservation groups have begun circulating petitions against the proposal, but representatives of the fishing industry have argued that federal pre-emption is necessary to maintain fishing of commercially viable shark species.
Congress passed and President Barack Obama signed the Shark Conservation Act of 2010 in an effort to strengthen federal laws against shark finning in U.S. waters and require that sharks be landed with their fins still attached. Since then, the fisheries service has been working to craft regulations to implement the act.
Conservation and animal advocacy groups said fishermen have been able to sidestep the rules by taking only the fins of sharks and dumping the carcasses back into the sea.
Jill Hepp, director of shark conservation at The Pew Charitable Trusts, said states should have the right to go beyond federal rules in protecting shark populations.
"If this goes forward as they are proposing, this has the potential to undermine the states' shark fin trade ban and it would be a considerable setback for global shark conservation," Hepp said.
But John Whiteside, an attorney for Sustainable Fisheries Association, a Massachusetts nonprofit founded by four seafood processors, said the federal government should have the final say over regulations, especially fish caught in federal waters.
Not doing so would violate trade laws and run afoul of treaties the federal government has with governments around the world, he said. Commercial fishing groups were successful at getting exemptions in some states for certain species of sharks, such as the dogfish, a small shark also used for fish and chips that is sustainably harvested.
However, California provides no such exemption.
"You're building a wall around the state of California from which the free flow of legal goods is forbidden," he said. "If you have these states around the country that build these little islands, you can't have the free flow of commerce and that's what this country needs."
Jennifer Fearing, California state director for the Humane Society, said California drafted its bill specifically to ban the sale of shark fins, no matter where the shark was caught.
"It's not California sharks being finned," she said. "It's dried processed shark fins arriving here already processed and dried. We have no idea where those sharks come from and the only way California can protect sharks globally is if they were not selling."
California, Delaware, Hawaii, Illinois, Maryland, New York, Oregon and Washington have passed laws banning the buying and selling of shark fins, according to The Humane Society of the United States. Similar bans are in effect in three U.S. Pacific territories ? Guam, American Samoa and the Northern Mariana Islands.
Source: http://news.yahoo.com/federal-rule-could-upend-states-shark-fin-bans-203717163.html
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The Commerce Commission has rejected Labour's concerns that a failed industry effort to broker a deal over the price Chorus could charge for copper broadband amounted to collusion.
It was reported last month that major telecommunications companies had suggested Chorus should be allowed to charge just under $14 a month each for its 1 million wholesale broadband connections, but that Chorus had rejected the compromise. ?
Labour communications spokeswoman Clare Curran said a letter she had received from Commerce Commission chairman Mark Berry confirmed the nature of the negotiations.
"What really concerns me is [Communications Minister Amy Adams] was fully complicit," she said.
Berry said the commission understood that telecommunications companies had had discussions about the wholesale price of copper broadband and was "currently confirming our understanding of the situation".
But he said the commission did not believe the talks breached the Commerce Act, since pricing was regulated and the discussions were "limited to encouraging the Minister for Communications and Information Technology to legislate for a different regulated [wholesale broadband] price".
"As such, telecommunications companies cannot themselves fix, control or maintain the regulated ... price," he said.
The talks were brokered by the Telecommunications Forum and Adams was kept abreast. She had made it clear that had a final industry agreement been reached, it would then have been put out broadly for consultation.
Curran wrote to the commission asking it to investigate and to take action, saying there was ?"serious concern that collusion may have occurred between telecommunication
companies in order to determine a price that may have been acceptable to Chorus".
"This is a fundamental issue which cuts to the heart of price fixing behaviour for which the
Commerce Commission was established to prevent," she said.
Even though no deal was done, Curran said the issue mattered because the talks were an attempt to bypass the Commerce Commission. She questioned how consumers' interests would have been represented.
Berry promised her a "more fulsome reply once we have confirmed our understanding of the situation".
Since the commission recommended a regulated price of less than $9 in a draft document and ultrafast broadband is not expected to fully replace copper for two decades, the rejection of the attempted industry compromise amounted to a billion-dollar gamble by Chorus.
- ? Fairfax NZ News
Source: http://www.stuff.co.nz/business/industries/8853563/Watchdog-rejects-Labours-concerns
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Astronomers say the Kepler mission found two mini-Neptune planets orbiting stars in a stellar cluster that would have been a most inhospitable environment at the time they were born.
In the star cluster NGC 6811, astronomers have found two planets smaller than Neptune orbiting Sun-like stars.
Michael Bachofner
EnlargeIn a cosmic episode of "Survivor," astronomers say they have found two mini-Neptunes, each orbiting its own star in a stellar cluster that would have been a very rough neighborhood when the planets were born.
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The discovery addresses a longstanding question: "What is the effect of the stellar environment on the process of planet formation?" writes astronomer Soren Meibom, who led the team announcing the find, in an e-mail.
The find suggests that planet formation is a more robust, insistent process than previously thought. Planets appear to form at about the same rate in dense, open clusters as they do in far more benign ones, writes Dr. Meibom, a researcher at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics in Cambridge, Mass. The team is publishing a formal report of its results in Thursday's issue of the journal Nature.
Four other planets have been found previously orbiting stars in clusters, but they have been Jupiter's size or larger. These two new planets represent the smallest yet found in a once-dense cluster.
These are not the kind of planets that would set an astrobiologist to tingling with delight. Each planet is about three times the size of Earth. Each orbits a 1-billion-year-old, sun-like star every 16.8 days for one planet and 15.7 days for the other. These planets would be baking.
Even so, they represent the galaxy's miracle babies.
They appeared in data gathered by NASA's ailing Kepler mission. Kepler is a craft designed to orbit the sun at Earth's distance and stare at one patch of sky continuously, taking in views of some 170,000 stars. The craft detects the slight wink a planet imparts to starlight as it transits in front of its host star. The goal is to develop a planetary census, with a particular eye to estimating the number of Earth-mass planets orbiting sun-like stars at earth-like distances.
The two new planets are the first to be found orbiting stars in a cluster in Kepler's data.
The stars, Kepler 66 and 67, appear in an open cluster dubbed NGC6811, some 3,600 light-years away in the constellation Cygnus. The cluster contains about 70 stars. The stars are loosely bound by their collective gravity and so disperse over time, hence the moniker "open."
Nearly all stars form in open clusters as they condense out of common clouds of gas and dust, researchers say. Most of these open clusters are relatively sparsely populated ? perhaps forming fewer than 100 stars for each cubic parsec of space ? a cube roughly 3 light-years on a side. Even that is overpopulation by the standard's of today's sun. Its closest neighbor is Proxima Centauri, about 4 light-years away.
These less-dense clusters, such as the one that gave birth to the sun, are relatively peaceful planetary nurseries and tend to disperse quickly.
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Osborne: "Local communities should get, for example, at least ?100,000 for every fracking well that is created"
UK shale gas resources may be far greater than previously thought, a report for the government says.
The British Geological Survey estimates there may be 1,300 trillion cubic feet of shale gas present in the north of England - double previous estimates.
Meanwhile the government has announced measures to enable shale gas drilling as part of its infrastructure plans.
Energy Minister Michael Fallon described shale gas as "an exciting new energy resource".
The BGS said its estimate for shale gas resources in the Bowland Basin region, which stretches from Cheshire to Yorkshire, represented potential resources, but "not the gas that might be possible to extract".
"Shale gas clearly has potential in Britain but it will require geological and engineering expertise, investment and protection of the environment," it said.
Drilling companies have previously estimated that they may be able to extract around 10% of this gas - equivalent to around 130 trillion cubic feet.
'Early days'If the estimates are proved correct, that would still suggest recoverable reserves of shale gas far in excess of the three trillion cubic feet of gas currently consumed in the UK each year.
Shale gas is extracted through "fracking" - the controversial process of freeing trapped gas by pumping in a mixture of water, sand and chemicals.
Continue reading the main storyThe truly massive shale gas resource of the north of England may bring tax revenues and possibly - not definitely - lead to lower bills, but it won't help the environment.
This week the government's climate change advisers warned that the UK was failing to keep pace with legally binding cuts in the CO2 emissions that are disrupting the climate.
The Environment Agency warns that if we want to keep burning gas we will have to rely on unproven technology to capture the carbon emissions in order to meet climate change targets.
It also warns that gas escaping from fractured wells may increase climatic disruption.
Meanwhile the International Energy Agency warns that the world can only burn a third of its existing fossil fuel reserves without a serious risk of de-stabilising the climate.
Shale gas plans will meet local environmental opposition too.
The process has helped boost the domestic energy industry in the US in recent years, where oil production has risen and gas prices have plummeted.
In a statement, the Department of Energy and Climate Change said: "Though it is early days for shale in the UK, it has the potential to contribute to the UK's energy security, increase inward investment and growth."
The government has unveiled a package of reforms to encourage development in the industry.
They include new planning guidelines to make the process of approving new drilling sites more streamlined, and a consultation on tax incentives to encourage exploration.
Communities affected by shale gas drilling are also expected to receive ?100,000 in "community benefits" and 1% of production revenues, should sites start producing gas.
"Shale gas represents an exciting new potential energy resource for the UK, and could play an important part in our energy mix," said Energy Minister Michael Fallon
"Development must be done in partnership with local people. We welcome the commitments from industry on community benefits.
"This will provide a welcome boost for communities who will host shale exploration and production as well as offering strong assurances that operators will engage with them and work to the highest health, safety and environmental standards."
He said communities hosting shale gas drilling could benefit from cheaper bills, regeneration schemes and new community facilities like playgrounds and sports halls.
The incentives are designed to overcome significant scepticism surrounding the process of fracking, which has generated environmental concerns.
Critics argue that it can cause earth tremors and pollute water supplies, and that shale gas wells could blight the countryside and affect house prices.
They also want investment in green energy sources, rather than fossil fuels.
Power warningThe report for the government comes as energy regulator Ofgem warned that the risks of power blackouts has increased because excess capacity in the power industry has fallen in the UK.
The watchdog has twice warned in recent months that the amount of spare power is shrinking, partly due to some gas generators being taken out of service.
Centrica has already withdrawn two of its gas plants from operation. In April, SSE confirmed that it too would mothball gas plants and put off investments in new ones.
Adam Scorer, of the lobby group Consumer Futures, said: "Projections of ever-tighter capacity margins understandably raise fears of higher electricity prices.
"Government and regulator need to agree on the most realistic capacity scenarios, the least-cost ways of reducing demand and, where necessary, of incentivising new generation capacity."
Announcing further details of the government's spending review to parliament, Treasury Secretary Danny Alexander said the government had agreed "strike prices" in an effort to boost investment in renewable forms of energy.
The prices mean the government will guarantee to pay a certain price for energy generated through on-shore and off-shore wind, tidal, wave, bio-mass and solar power.
Source: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-23069499#sa-ns_mchannel=rss&ns_source=PublicRSS20-sa
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PARK RIDGE, N.J. (AP) ? A private viewing for James Gandolfini is scheduled for Wednesday in a small northern New Jersey town.
The invitation-only wake for family and friends will be held at the Robert Spearing Funeral Home in Park Ridge between 3 p.m. and 9 p.m.
The 51-year-old star of "The Sopranos," who grew up in nearby Westwood, died last Wednesday in Italy.
Broadway theaters will dim their marquee lights at 8 p.m. in memory of the actor, who earned a Tony Award nomination in 2009 for his role in the award-winning "God of Carnage."
Gandolfini's funeral will be held Thursday at the Cathedral Church of Saint John the Divine in New York City.
Source: http://news.yahoo.com/private-viewing-scheduled-gandolfini-nj-131715870.html
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4 hours ago
It's never a dull moment with Sandra Bullock in the TODAY studio, and an interview that aired Tuesday was no exception as the actress discussed her new film "The Heat" (with Melissa McCarthy).
But before getting to "The Heat," Bullock recalled her last visit to the show in 2011 when she was on to talk with Matt Lauer about her film "Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close."
What ensued was a goofy banter worthy of, well, a Bullock comedy:
"We were here for 'Extremely Loud,'" she reminded him.
"That's right, I do remember that," he said.
"But apparently, I got very upset with you, and then you sent me flowers to apologize," she said, and put on a sassy tone: "I got no flowers."
"I didn't know you were upset with me," said Lauer.
"I didn't either, but apparently you sent flowers," she said.
"Is that what they wrote about us?" he asked. "Do we have a feud?"
"Can I just get some flowers, just for the heck of it, before this weekend?" she asked.
Which led Lauer to bounce up and try to retrieve a large potted flower arrangement over by the windows. A gentlemanly gesture, but unfortunately he splashed water on himself and gave up.
"That is amazing, thank you so much!" gushed Bullock.
The fact is, it seems hard to get the Oscar-winning actress riled up; after all, she's now promoting an R-rated comedy that's full of "F-bombs," as she put it.
"I let loose," she admitted. But is she like that in real life? "Are you joking me? All the time."
Still, whatever might come out of Bullock's mouth in the film, it's nothing compared to what McCarthy said. "She opens her mouth and you have no idea what offensive and hurtful things are going to come out of it about you personally," said Bullock, very subtly tongue-in-cheek.
"Do not lump me in with that sailor potty mouth Melissa McCarthy," she added.
No chance, and just in case an offense was being taken, one of the crew walked on set with another, more portable bouquet of flowers for Bullock. "Now," she asked, "who's got the jewelry?"
"The Heat" opens in theaters on June 28.
Source: http://www.today.com/entertainment/sandra-bullock-i-let-loose-f-bombs-new-film-heat-6C10441570
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Sharp has just revealed the Aquos Ultra at CE Week, a 70-inch Ultra HDTV the company says is the only THX-certified 4K model on the market. Calling it the company's "best designed TV ever," Sharp said that it put the model through "four hundred rigorous performance tests" to gain the THX nod, which is meant to assure that programming is reproduced as closely as possible. On top of the 3,840 x 2,160 pixel count, the model features advanced HD upscaling tech via a dual-core signal processor, pre-calibrated THX Movie viewing modes, a dual subwoofer system with 35 watts of sound output, Sharp's SmartCentral Smart TV platform and a flash-enabled web browser. You'll also be able to change channels or send video directly from your smartphone via the Beam app, and watch 3D films at 4K with the set's passive technology. If you're not dissuaded by the $8,000 price tag, it'll be up for grabs in mid-August -- check the PR after the break for more.
Filed under: Home Entertainment
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KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) ? A Taliban attack at the gates of the Afghan presidential palace cast a cold light Tuesday on the course of a war that Washington remains committed to ending.
A week after NATO forces handed all security operations to the Afghans, local forces fought off the attackers on their own, killing all eight militants without calling in any coalition help. But the assault also made clear that the Taliban's fighting spirit remains unbroken and demonstrated their ability to bluff their way past two checkpoints and storm a highly fortified zone of the capital.
The firefight took place in Ariana square, about 500 meters (yards) and several more checkpoints away from the presidential palace, where President Hamid Karzai was apparently preparing for a speech later in the morning.
The attack could complicate American efforts to try to get Karzai's government to sit down with the Taliban to talk peace. U.S. President Barack Obama later talked with Karzai in a video conference that lasted more than an hour and covered issues including the peace process and the newly opened Taliban political office in the Gulf nation of Qatar, Karzai's office said without giving further details.
The Taliban have said they would continue fighting even as they pursued peace talks, and the attack served to drive that home, said Moeen Marastial, a political analyst and former member of the Afghan parliament.
"The main point is the Taliban wants to show to the government of Afghanistan and to the world and to the powers who are working for the peace process that they are in power," Marastial said. "They can come close to the palace, they can come close to the places where NATO is, where American forces are ? they wanted to show to the world that 'we can do it.'"
The gunbattle started about 6:30 a.m. near the east gate leading to the palace next to the Afghan Ministry of Defense and the former Ariana Hotel, which former U.S. intelligence officials have confirmed is used by the CIA. One carload of Taliban fighters dressed in military-style camouflage uniforms emerged from their black Land Cruiser and started shooting. Another got stuck between two checkpoints and detonated their explosives-laden vehicle.
The Taliban said all eight of its fighters died in the attack, while the Interior Ministry said three security guards were killed and another wounded.
Taliban spokesman Zabiullah Mujahid claimed responsibility, saying in an emailed statement that "eight of our suicide bombers were able to reach the most secure area of Kabul," identifying them by name and saying they were carrying hand grenades, a machine gun and rocket-propelled grenades.
"The brave mujahedeen, with special tactics and help from inside, were able to reach their target with their weapons and cars," he said. He said their targets were the CIA building, the palace and the Defense Ministry and claimed "a number of foreign invaders were killed and wounded in the attack."
Karzai reacted sharply, saying that the Taliban cannot on one hand open an office for peace in Qatar and on the other hand kill people in Afghanistan.
"The enemies of the people of Afghanistan once again proved with their failed attack that they are against peace, stability and progress in Afghanistan," he said.
The Taliban have refused to negotiate with Karzai's government in the past, saying the U.S. holds effective control in Afghanistan, but the Americans are hoping to bring the two sides together. Long-stalled negotiations have become more urgent with Afghan presidential elections and the withdrawal of most U.S. and other foreign combat troops looming in 2014.
The Americans announced last week that they planned to begin formal talks with the Taliban in Doha, which would be followed by talks between the Taliban and the Afghan government.
But when the Taliban opened the Doha office under the name "Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan" and the flag it used while ruling Afghanistan, Karzai and other Afghans reacted sharply, saying that agreements had been violated and that the office was more akin to a rival embassy than a bureau for peace negotiations.
The Taliban have since been forced to remove the offending flag and sign but no peace talks have yet begun and the incident served to highlight the tensions between the various sides.
After Tuesday's attack, U.S. Ambassador James Cunningham urged an end to the violence and again pushed for the Taliban to open peace negotiations.
"All of the attackers were killed, without success in achieving their goals ? This again demonstrates the futility of the Taliban's efforts to use violence and terror to achieve their aims," he said in a statement. "We again call on the Taliban to come to the table to talk to the Afghanistan government about peace and reconciliation."
The palace is in a large fortified area of downtown Kabul that also includes the U.S. Embassy and the headquarters for the NATO-led coalition forces, and access is heavily restricted. Some Kabul residents initially thought the gunfire was a coup attempt because the idea of a Taliban attack within the security zone seemed so unlikely.
A group of journalists, including from The Associated Press, were waiting to enter the palace grounds for a news event with Karzai when they witnessed the start of the attack. The journalists took cover behind a religious shrine, pulling a young boy off the street who had been caught in the open on his way to school.
Kabul police chief Gen. Mohamad Ayub Salangi said the gunmen jumped out of their SUV and opened fire after the second vehicle was stopped by security forces while trying to use fake documents to get through a checkpoint. The second vehicle's car bomb then exploded.
Smoke could be seen coming from the area of the hotel where the CIA is said to be located, but there was no immediate indication any of the buildings were hit in the attack.
Also early Tuesday, in the southern province of Kandahar, a minibus hit a bomb buried in the road, killing 11 members of a groom's family on their way to an engagement party, said Kandahar governor's spokesman Ahmad Jawed Faisal. Faisal said the dead included eight women, two children and a man, and two other men were also wounded.
In Oruzgan, the province north of Kandahar, provincial governor's spokesman Abdullah Hemat said Tuesday that six Afghan national police were killed the day before when their patrol was attacked with a roadside bomb.
And a NATO convoy was hit with a roadside bomb in the province of Ghazni, southwest of Kabul, destroying a vehicle but causing no casualties.
_____
Associated Press Amir Shah contributed to this report.
Source: http://news.yahoo.com/taliban-attack-shows-militant-spirit-unbroken-202634065.html
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June 25, 2013 ? A team of scientists with the Wildlife Conservation Society, BirdLife International, and other groups have discovered a new species of bird with distinct plumage and a loud call living not in some remote jungle, but in a capital city of 1.5 million people.
Called the Cambodian tailorbird (Orthotomus chaktomuk), the previously undescribed species was found in Cambodia?s urbanized capitol Phnom Penh and several other locations just outside of the city including a construction site. It is one of only two bird species found solely in Cambodia. The other, the Cambodian laughingthrush, is restricted to the remote Cardamom Mountains.
Scientists describe the new bird in a special online early-view issue of the Oriental Bird Club?s journal Forktail. Authors include: Simon Mahood, Ashish John, Hong Chamnan, and Colin Poole of the Wildlife Conservation Society; Jonathan Eames of BirdLife International; Carl Oliveros and Robert Moyle of University of Kansas; Fred Sheldon of Louisiana State University; and Howie Nielsen of the Sam Veasna Centre.
The wren-sized gray bird with a rufous cap and black throat lives in dense, humid lowland scrub in Phnom Penh and other sites in the floodplain. Its scientific name ?chaktomuk? is an old Khmer word meaning four-faces, perfectly describing where the bird is found: the area centered in Phnom Penh where the Tonle Sap, Mekong and Bassac Rivers come together.
Only tiny fragments of floodplain scrub remain in Phnom Penh, but larger areas persist just outside the city limits where the Cambodian Tailorbird is abundant. The authors say that the bird?s habitat is declining and recommend that the species is classified as Near Threatened under the IUCN?s Red List. Agricultural and urban expansion could further affect the bird and its habitat. However, the bird occurs in Baray Bengal Florican Conservation Area, where WCS is working with local communities and the Forestry Administration to protect the Bengal florican and other threatened birds.
This same dense habitat is what kept the bird hidden for so long. Lead author Simon Mahood of WCS began investigating the new species when co-author Ashish John, also of WCS, took photographs of what was first thought to be a similar, coastal species of tailorbird at a construction site on the edge of Phnom Penh. The bird in the photographs initially defied identification. Further investigation revealed that it was an entirely unknown species.
?The modern discovery of an un-described bird species within the limits of a large populous city ? not to mention 30 minutes from my home ? is extraordinary,? said Mahood. ?The discovery indicates that new species of birds may still be found in familiar and unexpected locations.?
The last two decades have seen a sharp increase in the number of new bird species emerging from Indochina, mostly due to exploration of remote areas. Newly described birds include various babbler species from isolated mountains in Vietnam, the bizarre bare-faced bulbul from Lao PDR and the Mekong wagtail, first described in 2001 by WCS and other partners.
Colin Poole, Director of WCS Singapore and a co-author of the Forktail study said, ?This discovery is one of several from Indochina in recent years, underscoring the region?s global importance for bird conservation.?
Co-Author Jonathan C. Eames of BirdLife International?s OBE said: ?Most newly discovered bird species in recent years have proved to be threatened with extinction or of conservation concern, highlighting the crisis facing the planet?s biodiversity.?
Steve Zack, WCS Coordinator of Bird Conservation, said, ?Asia contains a spectacular concentration of bird life, but is also under sharply increasing threats ranging from large scale development projects to illegal hunting. Further work is needed to better understand the distribution and ecology of this exciting newly described species to determine its conservation needs.?
Source: http://feeds.sciencedaily.com/~r/sciencedaily/most_popular/~3/u0kHirkZXe4/130625172210.htm
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June 25, 2013 ? Tobacco smoke, diesel exhaust and oil combustion carry polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons -- PAHs that are known to cause cancer. But of these PAHs, the obviously dangerous high-molecular-weight PAHs like benzo[a]pyrene (BaP) have received the vast majority of research attention. Their low-molecular-weight cousins have been largely overlooked, in part because studies have shown that these compounds alone aren't very successful at mutating genes in cancer-causing ways.
A University of Colorado Cancer Center study published in the journal PLoS One explores two of these low-molecular-weight (LMW) PAHs -- 1-methylanthracene (1-MeA) and 2-methylanthracene (2-MeA) -- and shows that while they don't necessarily cause cancer, 1-MeA promotes conditions that will likely allow cancer to grow.
"There's a big distinction between initiating cancer and promoting it," says Alison Bauer, PhD, CU Cancer Center investigator and assistant professor at the Colorado School of Public Health. Her study showed that in a mouse cell model using a progenitor cell of lung cancer, the LMW 1-MeA promoted inflammation and increased mitogenic pathways, both of which are linked to tumor promotion. 2-MeA, while nearly structurally identical, did not.
"These LMW PAHs have been considered less of a concern," Bauer says, "but we're finding evidence that's not the case. They're not likely initiating the cancer, but it looks as if they could promote it."
Among other effects, Bauer and colleagues found that 1-MeA disrupts communication between cells, affecting the "gap junctions" across which adjoining cells pass information. 1-MeA also upregulates the gene COX2, which has been shown in other studies to create an over-aggressive inflammatory response -- and this inflammation in turn can promote tumor growth.
"There are many different PAHs in secondhand smoke," Bauer says. "Some are obviously dangerous like BaP, which directly mutates genes. Others, like 1-MeA, we known very little about. Think about all these PAHs like chess pieces -- first you have to know how each piece moves and then you can start looking at how they all work together."
Bauer points to these PAH mixtures as the next step in research. Eventually, knowing the effects of these mixtures could help evaluate the risks of different combustion products. The work could also lead to new therapy targets if, perhaps, some of the changes promoted by these LMW PAHs prove preventable or reversible by medicines.
"With smoking rates decreasing, we think this problem is going away, but high levels of secondhand smoke still exist in the U.S., for example in some apartment buildings," Bauer says. "And around the world, in China, Russia, Poland and many other countries, secondhand smoke is still a major issue. Knowing the effects of these LMW PAHs like 1-MeA could help us prevent or treat cancers associated with them."
Source: http://feeds.sciencedaily.com/~r/sciencedaily/~3/k-LDtzBAM60/130625150940.htm
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June 24, 2013 ? The 'computer nerd' is a well-known stereotype in our modern society. While this stereotype is inaccurate, it still has a chilling effect on women pursuing a qualification in computer science, according to a new paper by Sapna Cheryan from the University of Washington in the US, and colleagues. However, when this image is downplayed in the print media, women express more interest in further education in computer science. The work is published online in Springer's journal, Sex Roles.
Despite years of effort, it has proven difficult to recruit women into many fields that are perceived to be masculine and male-dominated, including computer science. The image of a lone computer scientist, concerned only with technology, is in stark contrast to a more people-oriented or traditionally feminine image. Understanding what prevents women from entering computer science is key to achieving gender parity in science, technology, engineering and mathematics.
Cheryan and team sought to prove that the shortage of women in computer science and other scientific fields is not only due to a lack of interest in the subject matter on the part of women. In a first study, 293 college students from two US West Coast universities were asked to provide descriptions of computer science majors. The authors wanted to discover what the stereotypical computer scientist looks like in students' minds.
Both women and men spontaneously offered an image of computer scientists as technology-oriented, intensely focused on computers, intelligent and socially unskilled. These characteristics contrast with the female gender role, and are inconsistent with how many women see themselves.
The way a social group is represented in the media also influences how people think about that group and their relation to it. In a second study, the researchers manipulated the students' images of a computer scientist, using fabricated newspaper articles, to examine the influence of these media on women's interest in entering the field. A total of 54 students read articles about computer science majors that described these students as either fitting, or not fitting, the current stereotype. Students were then asked to rate their interest in computer science.
Exposure to a newspaper article claiming that computer science majors no longer fit current preconceived notions increased women's interest in majoring in computer science. These results were in comparison to those of exposure to a newspaper article claiming that computer science majors do indeed reflect the stereotype. Men, however, were unaffected by how computer science majors were represented.
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Source: http://feeds.sciencedaily.com/~r/sciencedaily/top_news/~3/qI0OhTpgkEc/130624141414.htm
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By Khaled Yacoub Oweis
AMMAN (Reuters) - Syrian rebels battled President Bashar al-Assad's forces in and around the northern city of Aleppo on Sunday, seeking to reverse gains made by loyalist forces in the commercial hub over the last two months, activists said.
The fighting, by a variety of insurgent groups, happened as France urged moderate rebels to wrest territory back from radical Islamists whose role in the fight to topple Assad poses a dilemma for Western countries concerned that arms shipments could fall into the hands of people it considers terrorists.
The 11 Western and Arab countries known as the "Friends of Syria" agreed on Saturday to give urgent military support to the rebels, channeled through the Western-backed Supreme Military Council in a bid to prevent arms getting to Islamist radicals.
But radical forces showed they remained formidable on Sunday when the Islamist Ahrar al-Sham brigade detonated a car bomb at a roadblock at an entrance to Aleppo killing at least 12 loyalist soldiers, according to the opposition Aleppo News Network and other activists in the city.
Aleppo, 35 km (20 miles) south of Turkey, has been contested since July last year, when rebel brigades entered the city and captured about half of it. In recent weeks, Assad has focused his military campaign on recapturing rebel-held areas.
He has also been expanding control of the central province of Homs after capturing a strategic town on the border with Lebanon, and has used heavy bombardment and siege warfare to contain rebels dug in around the capital, according to opposition sources and diplomats monitoring the conflict.
Firas Fuleifel, with the moderate Islamist al-Farouq Brigade, said six rebel fighters were killed in fighting in Aleppo in the last day.
WIN BACK CONTROL
French President Francois Hollande, whose country has been at the forefront of Western efforts to re-organize and back the opposition, said moderate rebels must take territory held by radical Islamists whose involvement in the conflict, he said, gives Bashar al-Assad a pretext for more violence.
"The opposition needs to win back control of these areas ... they have fallen into the hands of extremists," Hollande told a news conference in the Doha a day after the Friends of Syria met in the Qatari capital.
"If it seems that extremist groups are present and tomorrow they could be the beneficiaries of a chaotic situation, it will be Bashar al-Assad who will seize on this pretext to continue the massacre," Hollande said.
In Damascus, the Ahrar al-Sham and the Islamist Tawhid al-Asima brigades detonated a car bomb in an area known as Mezze 86, inhabited by members of Assad's Alawite sect, an offshoot of Shi'ite Islam that has controlled Syria since the 1960s. Two people were killed, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights monitoring group said.
Rebels also attacked two security compounds in Damascus, killing at least five people, sources in the capital said.
In regional repercussions of the increasingly sectarian Syrian conflict, four Lebanese soldiers were killed in clashes with followers of a Sunni Islamist cleric who is a critic of the role of Hezbollah - the Shi'ite Lebanese group - in giving military support to Assad.
Sources in the city said the fighting broke out when a follower of Sheikh Ahmed al-Assir was arrested at an army roadblock in Sidon, 40 km (28 miles) south of Beirut.
The clashes were followed by fighting between Hezbollah members based in the mostly Sunni city and Assir's followers in which automatic weapons and shoulder fired rockets were used, the sources said.
(Additional reporting by Laila Bassam in Beirut and Yara Bayoumy in Doha; Editing by Robin Pomeroy and Kevin Liffey)
Source: http://news.yahoo.com/syrian-rebels-renew-fight-aleppo-104545195.html
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Public release date: 24-Jun-2013
Share ] Contact: Teresa Herbert
teresa_herbert@dfci.harvard.edu
617-632-4090
Dana-Farber Cancer Institute
BOSTON -- A new study by an international team led by Dana-Farber Cancer Institute scientists provides the first statistically-based guidelines for determining whether a stem cell transplant is appropriate for older patients with myelodysplastic syndromes (MDS) the most common blood disorders in people over 60 years of age, and frequently a precursor for leukemia.
Using mathematical models to analyze hundreds of MDS cases from around the world, the researchers found reduced intensity transplants of donor stem cells are advisable for patients aged 60-70 who have higher-risk forms of MDS that are likely to turn into leukemia in the near future. For patients with lower-risk MDS, non-transplant treatments are preferable, the model indicates.
The research was reported online today in the Journal of Clinical Oncology.
"Our study helps inform older MDS patients and their doctors whether a stem cell transplant is preferred or whether it makes more sense to pursue other options," says John Koreth, MBBS, DPhil, medical oncologist in the Division of Hematologic Malignancies at Dana-Farber, who is the study's lead author and co-principal investigator (with Joseph Pidala, MD, MS, of the H. Lee Moffitt Cancer & Research Institute, and senior author Corey Cutler, MD, MPH, of the Division of Hematologic Malignancies at Dana-Farber). "Until now, there haven't been statistically-quantified guidelines for making these decisions for older patients, who are most impacted by the disease."
MDS arises in the blood-forming cells of the bone marrow, causing a drop in the number of healthy white and red blood cells and of platelets needed for blood clotting. Depending on which type of cells are in short supply, the result can be fatigue, shortness of breath, easy bruising and bleeding, or infection and fever. An estimated 12,000 people in the United States are diagnosed with MDS each year, and more than 80 percent of whom are over age 60. (Some researchers believe MDS to be widely under-diagnosed, so the number of people affected may be much larger.)
In some cases, MDS produces only mild symptoms that don't worsen for years. In others, the symptoms can be severe, leading to the development of a fast-growing form of leukemia. The most common tool for predicting the course of MDS is the International Prognostic Scoring System (IPSS), which is based on a patient's blood counts, percentage of immature "blast" cells in the blood or bone marrow, and occurrence of chromosomal abnormalities in these cells. Based on IPSS scores, the disease is classified as low risk, intermediate-1 or -2 risk, or high risk.
Patients in the first two categories, with lower-risk disease, usually receive treatments such as antibiotics, transfusions, blood cell growth-promoting agents, or other supportive therapies to alleviate their specific symptoms. Patients in the latter two categories, with higher-risk disease, often receive chemotherapy.
While these treatments are often helpful, they cannot cure the disease. The only potentially curative treatment is a donor stem cell transplant, which can, in principle, be used for patients with any stage of MDS. But because even reduced-intensity transplants are fatal in a significant minority of cases, there has been some uncertainty over the use of transplantation for older patients with MDS.
"It hasn't been clear for which older patient groups the benefits of transplant outweigh the risks," Koreth says. To find out, researchers collected data on 514 patients, age 60-70, who were newly diagnosed with MDS. For both lower- and higher-risk groups, they built separate mathematical models to compare treatment outcomes in patients who received reduced-intensity donor stem cell transplants with outcomes in patients who received non-transplant therapies. They analyzed not only length of survival but also the quality of life of patients in those groups.
Patients in the lower-risk groups who underwent transplant lived an average of 38 months after treatment, less than the 77 months for those who were treated without transplant. For patients in the higher-risk groups, by contrast, average life expectancy was 36 months for those receiving transplants, better than the 28 months for those receiving non-transplant therapies. Adjusting for patients' quality of life did not change the conclusions regarding the relative merits of the treatments.
"The clear result is that, on balance, reduced-intensity stem cell transplantation offers a survival benefit for patients with higher-risk MDS, but not for those with lower-risk disease," Koreth says. "The findings should offer useful guidance for older patients with MDS on deciding the best course of treatment."
###
Study co-authors include Waleska Perez, MPH, and Mary Horowitz, MD, CIBMTR Statistical Center; H. Joachim Deeg, MD, and Stephanie Lee, MD, Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center; Guillermo Garcia-Manero, MD, M.D. Anderson Cancer Center; Luca Malcovati, MD, and Mario Cazzola, MD, University of Pavia Medical School, Italy; Sophie Park, MD, PhD, Universite Paris V, France; Raphael Itzykson, MD, Lionel Ades, MD, and Pierre Fenaux, MD, Universite Paris 13, France; Martin Jadersten, MD, PhD, and Eva Hellstrom-Lindberg, MD, PhD, Karolinska Institutet, Sweden; C. L. Beach, PharmD, Celgene Corp.; Robert Peter Gale, MD, PhD, Celgene Corp. and Imperial College, London, U.K.; Peter Greenberg, MD, Stanford University School of Medicine; Martin Tallman, MD, Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center; John DiPersio, MD, PhD, Washington University School of Medicine, St. Louis; Donald Bunjes, MD, of University Hospital Ulm, Germany; and Daniel Weisdorf, MD, University of Minnesota.
Koreth is a Leukemia and Lymphoma Society Scholar in Clinical Research. Cutler is supported by the Stem Cell Cyclists of the Pan Mass Challenge.
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Public release date: 24-Jun-2013 Share ] Contact: Teresa Herbert
teresa_herbert@dfci.harvard.edu
617-632-4090
Dana-Farber Cancer Institute
BOSTON -- A new study by an international team led by Dana-Farber Cancer Institute scientists provides the first statistically-based guidelines for determining whether a stem cell transplant is appropriate for older patients with myelodysplastic syndromes (MDS) the most common blood disorders in people over 60 years of age, and frequently a precursor for leukemia.
Using mathematical models to analyze hundreds of MDS cases from around the world, the researchers found reduced intensity transplants of donor stem cells are advisable for patients aged 60-70 who have higher-risk forms of MDS that are likely to turn into leukemia in the near future. For patients with lower-risk MDS, non-transplant treatments are preferable, the model indicates.
The research was reported online today in the Journal of Clinical Oncology.
"Our study helps inform older MDS patients and their doctors whether a stem cell transplant is preferred or whether it makes more sense to pursue other options," says John Koreth, MBBS, DPhil, medical oncologist in the Division of Hematologic Malignancies at Dana-Farber, who is the study's lead author and co-principal investigator (with Joseph Pidala, MD, MS, of the H. Lee Moffitt Cancer & Research Institute, and senior author Corey Cutler, MD, MPH, of the Division of Hematologic Malignancies at Dana-Farber). "Until now, there haven't been statistically-quantified guidelines for making these decisions for older patients, who are most impacted by the disease."
MDS arises in the blood-forming cells of the bone marrow, causing a drop in the number of healthy white and red blood cells and of platelets needed for blood clotting. Depending on which type of cells are in short supply, the result can be fatigue, shortness of breath, easy bruising and bleeding, or infection and fever. An estimated 12,000 people in the United States are diagnosed with MDS each year, and more than 80 percent of whom are over age 60. (Some researchers believe MDS to be widely under-diagnosed, so the number of people affected may be much larger.)
In some cases, MDS produces only mild symptoms that don't worsen for years. In others, the symptoms can be severe, leading to the development of a fast-growing form of leukemia. The most common tool for predicting the course of MDS is the International Prognostic Scoring System (IPSS), which is based on a patient's blood counts, percentage of immature "blast" cells in the blood or bone marrow, and occurrence of chromosomal abnormalities in these cells. Based on IPSS scores, the disease is classified as low risk, intermediate-1 or -2 risk, or high risk.
Patients in the first two categories, with lower-risk disease, usually receive treatments such as antibiotics, transfusions, blood cell growth-promoting agents, or other supportive therapies to alleviate their specific symptoms. Patients in the latter two categories, with higher-risk disease, often receive chemotherapy.
While these treatments are often helpful, they cannot cure the disease. The only potentially curative treatment is a donor stem cell transplant, which can, in principle, be used for patients with any stage of MDS. But because even reduced-intensity transplants are fatal in a significant minority of cases, there has been some uncertainty over the use of transplantation for older patients with MDS.
"It hasn't been clear for which older patient groups the benefits of transplant outweigh the risks," Koreth says. To find out, researchers collected data on 514 patients, age 60-70, who were newly diagnosed with MDS. For both lower- and higher-risk groups, they built separate mathematical models to compare treatment outcomes in patients who received reduced-intensity donor stem cell transplants with outcomes in patients who received non-transplant therapies. They analyzed not only length of survival but also the quality of life of patients in those groups.
Patients in the lower-risk groups who underwent transplant lived an average of 38 months after treatment, less than the 77 months for those who were treated without transplant. For patients in the higher-risk groups, by contrast, average life expectancy was 36 months for those receiving transplants, better than the 28 months for those receiving non-transplant therapies. Adjusting for patients' quality of life did not change the conclusions regarding the relative merits of the treatments.
"The clear result is that, on balance, reduced-intensity stem cell transplantation offers a survival benefit for patients with higher-risk MDS, but not for those with lower-risk disease," Koreth says. "The findings should offer useful guidance for older patients with MDS on deciding the best course of treatment."
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Study co-authors include Waleska Perez, MPH, and Mary Horowitz, MD, CIBMTR Statistical Center; H. Joachim Deeg, MD, and Stephanie Lee, MD, Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center; Guillermo Garcia-Manero, MD, M.D. Anderson Cancer Center; Luca Malcovati, MD, and Mario Cazzola, MD, University of Pavia Medical School, Italy; Sophie Park, MD, PhD, Universite Paris V, France; Raphael Itzykson, MD, Lionel Ades, MD, and Pierre Fenaux, MD, Universite Paris 13, France; Martin Jadersten, MD, PhD, and Eva Hellstrom-Lindberg, MD, PhD, Karolinska Institutet, Sweden; C. L. Beach, PharmD, Celgene Corp.; Robert Peter Gale, MD, PhD, Celgene Corp. and Imperial College, London, U.K.; Peter Greenberg, MD, Stanford University School of Medicine; Martin Tallman, MD, Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center; John DiPersio, MD, PhD, Washington University School of Medicine, St. Louis; Donald Bunjes, MD, of University Hospital Ulm, Germany; and Daniel Weisdorf, MD, University of Minnesota.
Koreth is a Leukemia and Lymphoma Society Scholar in Clinical Research. Cutler is supported by the Stem Cell Cyclists of the Pan Mass Challenge.
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Source: http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2013-06/dci-ssg062013.php
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