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Ever since town and recreation officials decided that there was a need to return to Little League baseball, after nearly two decades of playing under the banner of Amateur American Baseball Congress' Bambino baseball, the town has gone out of its way to promote the game and help the local youngsters develop their skills in the national pastime.
The latest example of that dedication to baseball comes over the next few weeks, when the newly formed North Bergen Little League will hold its first-ever Little League MVP baseball camp at the facility on 76th Street.
The camp, which will be under the guidance of professional instructor Joe Mauro, will have three sessions, Aug. 9-12, Aug. 16-19 and Aug. 23-26, daily from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. The Fridays of each week are reserved as rain dates.
Mauro, who runs the All-Pro Baseball Academy in Lyndhurst and has tutored hundreds of aspiring local baseball players over the last seven years, is excited to get the chance to bring his coaching and teaching expertise to North Bergen.
"I was asked if I could be a part of North Bergen's Little League moving in the right direction," said Mauro, who was a professional catcher for the Evansville Otters of the Frontier League for two years. "I've worked with Rafael [Madieros, one of the organizers of the Little League camp] and his son Alex for the last two years. He asked if I could do him a favor and run a camp in North Bergen. I've done them before in Newark and Wallington, so I had no problem with it. I think a camp like this will be a good stepping stone for North Bergen, as they get back to Little League baseball."
North Bergen Little League President Julian Cosma feels that offering the camp to the youngsters will be a positive thing.
"Our main goal is to keep kids interested in playing baseball," Cosma said. "Even with our Little League season over, we felt that this camp would give the kids of North Bergen and neighboring towns a chance to learn about the game from professional instructors and players. The camp directors have been very helpful to give us the opportunity to hold the camp here."
Another positive aspect of the baseball camp has been the generosity of the businesses in the community. Madieros has been getting commitments from many different merchants in North Bergen and Guttenberg that have donated money in order that some underprivileged youngsters could attend the camp. Tuition for each week's session is $140, with discounts for multiple sessions.
"The businesses have been very helpful, donating money for the kids who can't afford the camp," Cosma said. "They're really going out of their way to help us out. Rafael did all the legwork in meeting with the merchants. As soon as they heard what we were doing, they were very pleased to be a part of it and wanted to get involved to help the kids."
Some of the North Bergen merchants donating money to sponsor youngsters to attend the camp include the Coach House Diner, the Jagged Edge Spa and Salon, DiClemente Contractors, the Moose Lodge and Vainieri Funeral Home.
Manhattan Jewelers in Union City and the Green Kitchen restaurant in Guttenberg have also been supportive of the MVP baseball camp.
Mauro said that the camp will feature instruction on all baseball fundamentals for youngsters ages 8 through 12.
"I've worked with a few kids from North Bergen, and I know that there are talented kids there," Mauro said. "I'm looking forward to the chance to work with those kids."
Cosma said that the initial Little League camp took a while to get started, but the response has been positive.
"Like everything else we've done, we're in the beginning stages," Cosma said. "It's basically been done on a short notice. But we really felt the need to give our kids more instruction. In terms of baseball, the township is still growing. I think this is something we will be able to offer our youngsters every summer."
Cosma said that the North Bergen Little League will also offer a fall baseball league for the first time, beginning in September. The new league will be offered to either North Bergen or Guttenberg residents, ages 9 through 11, and will have games on weekends from September through November. Registration for the new Fall Ball league will take place next month.
For more information about registration for either the MVP Little League camp or the Fall Ball League, call (201) 868-5181. For registration for the MVP Little League camp, you can also call the All-Pro Baseball Academy at (201) 935-0550.


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Hayden Christensen: Rachel Bilson is a Great Stylist
Rachel Bilson covers up in a pair of shades and fedora as she catches a departing flight out of LAX airport on Monday (May 17) in Los Angeles.
When her fiance Hayden Christensen was recently asked if he has a personal stylist, he told a Brazilian publication, "No, and I think I never will. But my fiancee [Rachel] is a great personal stylist, and she's all mine! She loves to buy things for me."
For video of Hayden playing soccer and pulling up his pants, visit MSN.com!
FYI: Rachel is wearing an Autumn Cashmere French Sailor Boatneck Sweater and a Louis Vuitton "Antheia" bag.

subset: commoncrawl


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Want to remind yourself or a friend about this program? Fill out this simple form and klru will email you a reminder on the day that it will air.
Germany's Romantic Rhine And Rothenburg
series: Rick Steves' Europe
air date: 8/15/13 9:30 PM
Cruising the Rhine River, we dodge riverboat traffic and the legendary siren, Lorelei. After climbing castles and descending into dungeons, we relax with Rhine wine. We tour Burg Eltz-a lived-in castle where the noble lady still puts out fresh flowers. Then we enter the walled town of Rothenburg for Germany's best wood carving, a vivid dose of medieval punishment, and a tour with the night watchman of the town's lamp-lit ramparts.
WARNING: Email reminders for this program have already been sent out. Your reminder may not reach the intended address in time for this program's airing.
Back to TV Schedule


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University News
T-shirt Making Sessions and Display Planned at WIU for The Clothesline Project
March 28, 2013
MACOMB, IL - The Clothesline Project Display, a tribute to victims and survivors of sexual and domestic violence, will visit the Western Illinois University campus in Macomb from 10 a.m. - 3 p.m. Friday, April 19, on the east lawn of the Multicultural Center (rain location: Multicultural Center, first floor).
The Women's Center will hold several t-shirt-making sessions for groups and organizations prior to the day of the display. In addition, five open sessions will be held in the Women's Center Conference Room in the Multicultural Center 209: noon – 2 p.m. on Monday, April 1; noon – 2 p.m. on Friday, April 5; 7 – 9 p.m. on Tuesday, April 9 and 11 a.m. – 1 p.m. and 6 – 8 p.m. on Wednesday, April 17. It takes about 30 minutes to make a shirt.
T-shirts will be decorated by those who are survivors of sexual abuse, rape, incest, sexual assault, battery, violence perpetrated because of one's sexual orientation or perceived sexual orientation, physical assault and stalking. Shirts also may be made in memory of family members or friends who have died as a result of any of these crimes.
The shirts will be added to the Victim Services' Clothesline Project collection for display throughout April, which is Sexual Assault Awareness Month and Child Sexual Abuse Prevention Month in the five-county region served by WIRC-CAA.
According to Women's Center graduate assistant and Feminist Action Alliance graduate adviser Katie Mey, The Clothesline Project allows survivors to come together to express their experiences, show their respect to others and heal themselves.
"Please mark your calendar and plan to stop by the Multicultural Center to view the display on April 19, and help us spread the word and encourage students and members of our campus and local community to join us for this powerful and empowering event," Mey said.
The Women's Center is scheduling t-shirt making sessions for groups and organizations who would like to set up a program or come to their meeting for members to make shirts for the display. To schedule a t-shirt-making session for a group or organization, call the Women's Center at (309) 298-2242 or e-mail email@example.com.
Additional information is available at wiu.edu/wc.
The event is sponsored by the WIU Women's Center and Feminist Action Alliance student organization, in collaboration with the Western Illinois Regional Council-Community Action Agency's Victim Services and the University Counseling Center.
Posted By: WIU News (email@example.com)
Office of University Relations


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Nintendo has said that it sells the Wii U console at a loss and hopes the shiny new hardware will become profitable in itself next year, but how much does it lose on each sale? Not too much, it turns out, as Wii U owners buying one single game is enough to push the whole shebang into profit.
Asked by Mercury News how selling at a loss, unconventional for Nintendo, shakes things up, Nintendo of America president Reggie Fils-Aime replied, "The business model doesn't change dramatically, in that as soon as we get the consumer to buy one piece of software, then that entire transaction becomes profit positive."
He explained, "In the end, the business model is still to drive the install base of hardware, and then to drive a strong tie ratio with all of the other software and experiences for the consumer. And if we're able to do that, then we will create significant profit for the company." And of course, Nintendo plans for future hardware profitability to come from decreased manufacturing costs.
Console warriors, scrawl this fact down in your notebook for future foolish arguments.


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For to use RMAN, i am trying create a catalog. I am using oracle8.1.7 for windows2000, as for document i need to run 'catrman.sql' file, but the avilable file is 'catrm.sql' while running this file it throws lot of errors. any body can help me
thanks in advance
With regards


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Saturday, October 06, 2007
It's really not that complicated
6 comments:
- Jessica said...
"This is too hard for us, eh."
- October 05, 2007 2:04 AM
- Crazyswordsman said...
Whenever I hear the Owahoo...Oh--hee--oh...well, the University of the state to the south of Michigan's marching band play their fight song, I always want to think they stole the chord progression from The Victors (and knowing that particular marching band, they have a history of stealing things).
- October 05, 2007 3:45 AM
- intellidouche said...
So that's how you sing tOSU's fight song with a tuning fork in your ass.
- October 05, 2007 11:33 AM
- Andy said...
Come one guys... this happens at every school.
- October 05, 2007 11:50 AM
- boarderpd287 said...
oh c'mon...i understand that in posts like this you're just making fun, but now you're just trying to hard. the guy lives in new mexico and probably didn't even go to ohio state.
- October 05, 2007 4:05 PM
- chris said...
I am an OSU grad and former band member, and...yikes. That is pretty bad. And crazywomansworld - OSU's primary fight song (Fight the Team Across the Field) is actually based on the chord progression of another Big Ten Fight Song, but that song is On Wisconsin.
- October 08, 2007 12:18 PM


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Marion County unemployment is easing and home sales are up, but the atmosphere is less than rosy in the local landscaping trade.
Marion County unemployment is easing and home sales are up, but the atmosphere is less than rosy in the local landscaping trade. Lawn service companies and nurseries are still struggling to regain their financial footing following the recession.
Lawn care-related businesses say they face tough competition and a reluctance of consumers to spend at pre-recession levels.
David Frederick of B&B Nursery and Garden Shop said that before the recession business was much better. And despite economic improvement during the past few years, he hasn't witnessed any trickle-down effect.
"It's way off," he said of revenues.
In the past, the parking lot was full from morning to closing. During a Monday afternoon telephone interview, a Star-Banner reporter asked how many cars were in his parking lot.
"None," Frederick replied.
For the past few years, Frederick said, sales have fallen about one-third. As for customer habits, Frederick said he's seen an across-the-board decline in what people are buying.
"I don't know how I can go through another four years of this," he said.
Alex Arsneault, owner of Showcase Lawn Care in Ocala, said the lawn care business remains competitive. The trade swelled a few years ago, with former construction workers offering to maintain lawns at cut-rate prices.
"There's always someone who will do it cheaper," Arsneault said.
Arsneault mows both residential and commercial lawns with his son. Although local unemployment levels have improved, fuel prices have stabilized for now and home sales are up, Arsneault said the small lawn care companies that got into the business during the recession remain his biggest competition.
And those upstarts don't look to be getting out anytime soon.
Still, customers recognize quality work at reasonable prices, he said. And customers who go for the lowest price often return to him when they see poor quality work or get frustrated with no-show mowers.
On the bright side, he said, customers are now beginning to spend a little more for additional services such as a little more landscaping and mulching.
And during spring, when the rain comes more regularly, Arsneault said his business picks up a modest bit.
Keith Brackett, owner of Keith's Lawn Care, agreed that competition is fierce. The problem is that while he has several employees and pays for worker compensation coverage and business insurance, the small, owner-operator lawn services do not.
"I'm bidding on jobs and competing against people just supplementing their unemployment (benefit) checks," he said angrily.
Brackett said he's watched small company owners mow lawns for half what he charges.
"And I still see new people coming up (into the business)," he said. "I don't know how they do it."
Some of these upstarts run cash-only businesses and hire some employees just four hours a day, Brackett said.
Brackett said his profit margin has slimmed, and he wins fewer bids on new jobs.
As for spring bringing rain and motivating customers to hire a lawn care company, Brackett said business hasn't picked up enough to tell a difference.
There's also less customer loyalty, especially residential clients. And if he doesn't pick up the phone when a potential new customer calls, the customer will have phoned five other lawn care companies by the time he calls back.
Laurie Williams, manager of Bob Wines Camellia Gardens, said she's seen a modest improvement over the past few years.
"You have to keep up (the lawn) to keep up home values," she said.
Williams said that when the recession hit Ocala, customers scaled back. They still buy trees, but smaller than the ones they favored in years past. Customers also cut back on flowering plants to save money, she said.
For the past few weeks, Williams said, sales are improving. Some customers are again buying flowering plants, and a few are again investing their money by planting larger trees.
Williams said that for the financial investment, customers get satisfaction and pleasure from doing yard work again and take pride in their yards.
And as spring approaches, hopefully business will come back, she said.
Contact Fred Hiers at 867-4157 or email@example.com.


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The Office of Recreation Services has several opportunities for student involvement through employment. The office is always accepting applications from interested individuals.
These positions with the Office of Recreation Services can offer a Bucknell University student an array of skills and mechanics that can be carried over into real world applications. Many employers today are looking for people who can operate in a team environment, effectively communicate with consumers, manage programming, and can learn to identify and resolve disharmony in a situation. All of these skills will be learned by an individual who seeks to become a part of the Bucknell University Intramural Program.
No experience is necessary; we will provide all the training! You can work and play. We schedule around your schedule. Work-study students are encouraged to apply. The following positions are available:
The following links are virtual breadcrumbs marking the 27 most recent pages you have visited in Bucknell.edu. If you want to remember a specific page forever click the pin in the top right corner and we will be sure not to replace it. Close this message.


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Discussions about eggcorns and related topics
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Registrations are currently closed because of a technical problem. Please send email to
The forum administrator reserves the right to request users to plausibly demonstrate that they are real people with an interest in the topic of eggcorns. Otherwise they may be removed with no further justification. Likewise, accounts that have not been used for posting may be removed.
Thanks for your understanding.
Chris -- 2018-04-11
This one is apparently new to the Eggcorn Forum: "$9 Million Added to GREEN LANTERN Budget; More VFX Houses Recruited as Film Hurdles Towards Release Date" (from a website about movies).
I think it's probably a real eggcorn; both the similarity in sound and the meaning connection (hurdling in the sense of clearing hurdles toward some goal) are there. My only doubt has to do with the fact that, in the context of this quote, "hurdles" could easily be a purposeful pun instead of an eggcorn.
So I googled "hurdles toward" to look for less ambiguous eggcorns. Most of the hits are not eggcornish, and most of the ones that, in principle, could be are in the context of articles about track and field, thus likely purposeful puns instead. But I did find quite a few that seem like the real McCoy, e.g.:
"Earl Hurdles Toward East Coast" (Headline from a news item about tropical storm Earl)
"Green avoids injury when broken bat hurdles toward him as he tries to field ground ball"
"Note the large glass chunk that hurdles toward the camera."
"The second exciting installment in this series will continue the story of the rise of the Antichrist and the journey of the other main characters as time, unknown to them, hurdles toward the Rapture."
"America hurdles toward Neo-Feudalism."
And note the two different uses of "hurdle(s)" side-by-side in this one:
"Transit Authority Clears Senate Hurdle; Hurdles Toward House Vote." (This one may be a pun.)
My best estimate from the sample of Google pages I looked at is that there are somewhere near 300 unique examples of an unambiguous hurdle/hurtle eggcorn listed in the Google "hurdles toward" lists. I want this one to go onto the list!
Hard to believe that, lo these many years, we've overlooked such a common switch. Under our noses.
Hatching new language, one eggcorn at a time.
Just came across this yesterday from New York Magazine. I don't believe that it is intentional, that is to say, some sort of pun….
When President Obama and members of the Senate get back to work on Thursday, there will be a new player in their last ditch effort to prevent the country from hurdling over the fiscal cliff.
Still there at NYMag. The bigger they are…
Hatching new language, one eggcorn at a time.
Hurtling over a cliff is probably worse than hurdling over it, which might be possible if it's not too tall.
Is the physical cliff a metaphorical cliff? And if it's metaphorical, why are we calling it physical?
Commenter: This is just sad…
http://www.z-answers.com/question/vmusp … cliff.html
A look at the central metaphors: "hurtling'"off of a cliff suggests: a sort of out-of-control frenzy, quickly occurring, and resulting in serious damage, such as death. ""Hurdling" over the cliff suggests a very different action: going up, instead of down, being more controlled, and, of course, being close to impossible: one cannot jump over a cliff. Cliffs, by definition, are high. (A curb is not a cliff, except to an ant.} But the action is safe, and won't result in catastrophe: only failure. Which is not the same thing…. Like tilting at windmills. Of course both make a sort of sense in a political context…or perhaps, then again, maybe not….


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Linked by Thom Holwerda on Mon 1st Oct 2012 22:55 UTC
"Everyone seems to have a replacement for JavaScript - Google even has two. Now Microsoft has revealed that Anders Hejlsberg has been working on a replacement and it has released a preview of TypeScript. TypeScript is open source - Apache 2.0 license - and a superset of JavaScript. As you would expect from a Hejlsberg language it incorporates type checking, interfaces and lots of syntactic sugar."
Permalink for comment 537347
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RE[3]: Another optionally typed language
by butters on Tue 2nd Oct 2012 15:47 UTC in reply to "RE[2]: Another optionally typed language"
CoffeeScript is syntactic sugar for JavaScript. TypeScript is optional static type checking for JavaScript. Dart is optional static type checking plus various incompatible semantic cleanups and a standard module system for JavaScript.
TypeScript is definitely closer to Dart than CoffeeScript, but it doesn't go so far as to break JavaScript compatibility like Dart does. CoffeeScript-like syntactic sugar could be implemented as a pre-compiler for either language. LawnDart, if you will.


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In 2006 the AIA set forth an architecture challenge to create 'A House for an Ecologist'– a home base from which a US Fish and Wildlife Service Ecologist in Residence could live and conduct field research. Raphaelle and Alfredo Maul, of Maul Dwellings in San Sebastian, Spain, answered the call with The Landscape House - a site-sensitive, passive solar dwelling designed to fuse environmental performance with aesthetic integrity, building science with architectural excellence.
Meant to be oriented along an east-west axis on the highest elevation of the rural West Virginia site, The Landscape House takes advantage of prevailing winds with a double roof system that improves air circulation around the structure and generous, adjustable openings on the north and south façades. Passive solar heating and natural daylighting are controlled by a system of operable louvered shutters which incline on the north and revolve on the south. On the roof, a highly efficient Sphelar (3D cell) photovoltaic system collects sunlight for on-site energy.
The Landscape House is an exercise in water conservation. Water usage is clustered within the dwelling to minimize material consumption. The kitchen and bathroom are equipped with low-flow fixtures, dry-compost toilet, recycling area and compost unit. Rainwater is harvested and stored under the solar roof providing grey water to fixtures, thermal mass and a source of heat in winter through circulation in a radiant floor system. A solar dehumidifier draws moisture from inside and outside the building to produce potable water for drinking.
Although meant to pass through many seasons, The Landscape House's locally-sourced, recycled and renewable materials are easily disassembled for reuse at a different site. The AIA competition jury from the Architecture of Sustainability conference took note saying, "We like the pre-fab-ness of it—from prefabricated elements. We also had a lot of discussion about 'touching lightly'—what a small footprint means. It could be totally non-physical, the footprint."
The Landscape House won the 2006 AIA Committee on Design Ideas Competition. Although it exists only in concept we'd certainly like to see it built.


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"…the nation's leadership in technology and innovation depends on a 'deep veining of creativity' and people who can…write books, build furniture, make movies, and imagine new kinds of software that will capture people's imagination…" -- Reinvesting in Arts Education, Winning America's Future Through Creative Schools
All young people deserve access to arts and culture whether in school or out of school. High quality arts education can play a critical role in the achievement of educational and socioeconomic objectives. Arts education approaches such as standards-based, arts integration and teaching artists' programs are very powerful tools that can work collaboratively to ensure and maximize impact and equitable access.Arts and cultural artists, educators, administrators, organizations and agencies along with business, school and community stakeholders can work together to increase student productivity, strengthen teachers and principals, and generate a more highly engaged community.From "The Arts Education Field Guide," Americans for the Arts (www.artsusa.org):
Visual Art ExhibitionPresented by: VSA Florida Hand 'n Hand School Residencies ProgramHand 'n Hand is a three-part program comprised of classroom instruction, collaborative creativity and public exhibition. This school residency program pairs a teaching artist with an artist with a disability. The program provides an opportunity for the artist with a disability to work in their field, to be a mentor for their audience and to showcase teaching strategies for the inclusion of all. Art works from these residencies are highlighted in a final exhibition in their respective county. Residency availability is based on funding.PerformanceMusic of the Andes Ulises Pineda Teaching Artist MemberBroward Cultural Division Arts Education DirectoryExperience Andean music and its main flute instruments as an essential part of the large and diversified Latin community.Panel Discussion Arts Education Policy, Equity + Action Panelists include:
PresentationSFL Teaching Artist Certification ProjectPresenters:
Arts for Learning (A4L) is an arts-in-education nonprofit organization dedicated to advancing teaching and learning through the arts and community cultural resources. As one of Miami's leading sources of arts-in-education services, A4L provides quality arts-based programs that connect the arts to other core-curriculum subjects to support academic achievement and child development. All A4L programs teach life and communication skills, support literacy and problem solving skills, foster self-discovery, and build self-esteem. Their comprehensive services include teacher professional development, multimedia classroom resources, and community arts instruction and programming. These services are delivered to over 13,000 students in more than 100 schools, early learning centers, after-school programs and summer camps throughout Miami-Dade County. Arts Education Partnership HighlightsArts and Anti-Bullying - Weight of Words Presenters:
Arts Integration in Parks and RecreationPresenters:
PerformanceBak Middle School of the Arts Dance Program with the American Dance Legacy Initiative
Wednesday, May 14, 2014
Time: 2–5 p.m.
(Followed by the Cultivating South Florida's Dance Community convening from 5:30-8 p.m.)
ArtServe – Auditorium, 1350 E. Sunrise Blvd., Fort Lauderdale, FL
Grace Kewl-Durfey, Arts Administrator, Broward Cultural Division information
email@example.com | (954) 357-7869RSVP
Arts Education Policy, Equity + Action
SFL Teaching Artist Certification ProjectPresenters:
Bak Middle School of the Arts Dance Program with theAmerican Dance Legacy Initiative


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The big storm threatening the East Coast and a final jobs report before Election Day loomed large as US President Barack Obama and Republican challenger Mitt Romney headed into the final full week of campaigning in a race that polls show is extraordinarily close.
Democrats claim math is on the US president's side. Republicans insist Romney's got the momentum.
Obama is banking on his get-out-the-vote efforts in the most competitive states. He is also making personal appeals as he encourages Americans to stick with him for a second term.
In pursuit of the 270 electoral votes needed for victory, each candidate is starting to make his closing arguments. The goal is to win over the narrow slice of undecided, independent voters, moderates and, especially, women, as well as to persuade supporters to vote on Nov. 6, if not earlier in the many states where voting is already under way. Roughly one-third of the electorate will have voted before Election Day.
Presidents are not elected by national popular vote, but in state-by-state contests that allocate electoral votes. Each state gets one electoral vote for each of its representatives in the US House of Representatives and the US Senate. The winner needs a majority of the 538 electoral votes.
Obama is ahead in states and the District of Columbia representing 237 electoral votes; Romney has a comfortable lead in states with 191 electoral votes. There are nine contested battleground states — which are not reliably Democratic or Republican — that are too close to call.
The question now is whether the momentum Romney picked up after the first presidential debate on Oct. 3 is growing and can overcome the US president's strong voter-identification and early voting efforts in the most competitive states.
The campaigns are scrambling to tweak schedules, shift manpower and pump millions more dollars into TV ads in battleground states that will determine the outcome.
Total campaign spending has exceeded US$2 billion, making this presidential race the most expensive in the history of electoral politics.
Any number of factors still could shift the race.
A massive weather system bearing down on the East Coast threatens to complicate the final days of campaigning and early voting across at least four pivotal states: New Hampshire, North Carolina, Ohio and Virginia.
Hurricane Sandy had both campaigns ripping up carefully mapped-out itineraries as they worked to maximize voter turnout.
Romney scrapped plans to campaign in Virginia yesterday, and switched his schedule to Ohio.
Romney, who has been striking a more moderate tone as he courts women and independents in the campaign's home stretch, campaigned across Florida on Saturday with a pledge to "build bridges" with the other party.
However, he coupled that message with digs at Obama for "shrinking from the magnitude of the times."
Romney held three events across Florida on Saturday, timed to coincide with the first day of in-person early voting in a state where 29 electoral votes are up for grabs.
Obama hauled his campaign to New Hampshire, where he accused Romney of making life more expensive for the middle class during his term as Massachusetts governor.
"All he's offering is a big rerun of the same policies," Obama told a crowd of 8,500 gathered at an outdoor rally in Nashua.
The US president said Romney even raised fees in Massachusetts on obtaining a birth certificate, "which would have been expensive for me."
It was a veiled reference to opponents of the US president who have incorrectly said he was born outside the US.
Both sides acknowledge that Obama has a larger campaign organization on the ground in most states and that Democrats have an edge in the push to get supporters to the polls early.
Obama advisers insist the US president is leading or tied in all nine of those states, though strategists in both parties say North Carolina has shifted toward Romney in recent days. Romney aides insist that state-based polling underestimates the former Massachusetts governor's popularity with independents.
Obama aides say they expect the demographics of the electorate to look similar to the 2008 election, with slight increases in black and Hispanic voters.
While Romney and Obama are deadlocked in national polls, there were signs that the burst of momentum Romney got from the debates had waned in Ohio, Virginia and elsewhere. Because Obama starts with more states and votes solidly in his expected win column, Romney's team has fewer ways to reach the 270 electoral votes.


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10. OpenStack Stands On Its Own Two Feet
In April, Rackspace transferred control of OpenStack, the open-source, cloud development project, to the OpenStack Foundation, which quickly added scores of vendors as members, including tech heavyweights IBM, Red Hat, Hewlett-Packard and Dell.
By becoming a full-fledged foundation apart from Rackspace, the OpenStack Foundation can go forward with the development of open, interoperable technology without lock-in from one or two vendors and should give cloud services developers and customers more choice in building clouds.
OpenStack rivals Eucalyptus and CloudStack are also offering open-source platforms to create cloud infrastructure services and are quickly building out services.


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Skip to page content
There are two large olive trees nearby (3–4m). The olive is not listed on the iPad drop down list and there is not an 'other' listing. How do I enter this?
Please try The Royal Horticultural Society http://www.rhs.org.uk/ or the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew http://www.kew.org/
Which iPad drop-down list?
...What app are you using?
If it is not an app from the NHM (I don't even know if there are any), then you need to contact whomever made the app.


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NEW YORK (AP) - Michael Vick was ordered by NFL commissioner Roger Goodell to stay away from the Atlanta Falcons' training camp until the league reviews the dogfighting charges against him.
Goodell said in a letter to the quarterback that although it is up to the criminal justice system to determine guilt or innocence, it is Goodell's responsibility as commissioner to determine whether Vick's conduct violated league policies, including the Personal Conduct Policy.
The NFL said Vick will still get his preseason pay and Goodell told the Falcons to withhold any disciplinary action of their own until the league's review is completed.
Goodell told Vick the league will complete its review as quickly as possible and that he expects full cooperation.
The Falcons open camp on Thursday, the same day Vick is scheduled to be arraigned in Richmond on charges of sponsoring a dogfighting operation.
Vick waas he Number One overall pick in the 2001 draft. Last season, he became the first quarterback ever to rush for more than a thousand yards.
After his indictment last week, the NFL's position was that it would monitor developments and allow the legal process to "determine the facts." Since then, pressure has been mounting on the league and the Falcons, particularly from animal-rights groups.
The People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals demonstrated at Falcons' headquarters in Flowery Branch Monday and did the same outside NFL offices in New York last week. At the same time, Goodell was meeting with officials from the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals.
The league and the ASPCA are working on a program to educate players about the proper treatment of animals.
(Copyright 2007 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)


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by ESchorcho - 11/18/2013 1:38 PM
I could use some help with a name for the Marvel Bimbotech storyline. Right now the Black Widow is in a body-modification tank and a bimbofied Emma Frost is messing with her mind. Here is the latest chapter:
I am looking to brainstorm a bimbofied name for Natasha Romanoff.
An example would be Lana Lang being converted into Lusty Love from the old Bimbotech in Smallville storyline. Does anyone have any ideas?

by LesLes - 11/18/2013 2:24 PM
How about the obvious "Merry Widow"? It's a type of lingerie after all, and would probably describe both her new costume and outlook on life
by LesLes - 11/18/2013 4:58 PM
Another option might be to change Romanov to Onatoppov (on-a-top-of) similar to the James Bond villainess http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OI3-YslbFi4
Hell, a split personality or code phrase and she could be both the submissive Merry Widow and the dominatrix Natalia Onatoppov.
by ESchorcho - 11/19/2013 7:55 PM
I do like Onatopppov for a last name. I'll have to think it over. Now that we're brainstorming what about Maria Hill?
by LesLes - 11/20/2013 1:30 AM
What is it they say about brainstorming? You have to consider every idea no matter how stupid? Here's a lot of stupid then!
Let's start with Maria Hill's first name. All I can get that sounds even a little like 'Maria' is Marrier. Which isn't much good unless she's in a bizarre wedding and aftermath roleplay scenario with the "Merry Widow". Moving on. One letter substitution
gives us 'Moria'. I can't help feeling that there's a joke in "delved too deep and too greedily" but I doubt Bimbotech are going to transform her into a sexy Tolkien nerd. Or a dwarf!
'Hill' looks like it ought to be better but just rhyming it I get nothing. But for synonyms there's "mounds". If Bimbotech goes all out on her tits they could produce 'Maria Mounds'.
Finally there's her job. She's always Director or Deputy Director of SHIELD. How about if she's an Agent of SLUT instead?
Best I've managed is thus: Maria Mounds, Director of S.L.U.T.
by ESchorcho - 11/30/2013 10:54 AM
Very much off-topic, but I loved your work on the Miss Frost chapter, LessLess. I am going to try to get a Bimbotech chapter out this week so definitely look for that. Keep up the good work writing!
by LesLes - 12/7/2013 3:38 PM
If you like it put a ring rating on it ;) And thanks for the kind words!
Looking forward to the next chapter of Bimbotech and finding out which, if any, of my crazy ideas made the cut.
Bringing this sort-of back on topic, how much should I be avoiding


text:
The company's railroad ties are now installed in Class 1, shortline and industrial customers' tracks in the U.S., Mexico, Canada and India.
IntegriCo's Chief Executive Officer Scott Mack, said, "We are proud to have been selected by another major railroad customer seeking to improve their track infrastructure. We are especially pleased to see the growing awareness amongst the municipal railroads that IntegriCo's recycled plastic ties will meet their fiscal and environmental objectives."


text:
Next time, install HyperCube with 1-click
Learn how MacUpdate Desktop can install apps on MacUpdate with the simple click of the icon. Plus, keep all your apps updated.
HyperCube is an application specifically directed to the analysis and display of multi- and hyperspectral imagery. This includes the static and dynamic display of the image cube and the generation of spectral classifications using both imagery and spectral libraries. In addition, HyperCube contains functions to filter, warp, mosaic, reformat, calibrate, combine, photogrammetrically project and to perform arithmetic on imagery and data.
What's New
Version 10.80:
- The ability to load TIFF files containing LZW compression has been added. This includes 8 bit gray, 8 bit true color, 16 bit gray, 16 bit component color and 32 float images. It is not possible to save TIFF files with LZW compression.
- Bug fix: It's now possible to enable/disable a contiguous interval of spectral bands in menu Windows -> Show Band -> List -> Options.
RequirementsOS X 10.5 or later
Similar Software
Suggest other similar software


text:
Visit the Utah Lt. Governor's Elections web page for helpful voter information.
To register to be a voter in the State
of Utah YOU MUST:
Voter ID is REQUIRED to vote in Utah. Need to obtain a copy of your Voter Registration Card? Contact your local County Clerk at http://elections.utah.gov/voterregistrationcard.htm for the office nearest to you.
For more information on Absentee Voting go to http://elections.utah.gov/absenteevoting.html
Military and Overseas Voter Information can be obtained at https://www.overseasvotefoundation.org/ http://www.utahcountyonline.org/Dept/ClerkAud/Elections/VoterReg.asp
Civic Engagement
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text:
The schedule will see two of this year's opponents, the Springboks and the Wallabies return to Cardiff next year as part of Wales' preparation for the 2015 Rugby World Cup.
The matches against New Zealand, Australia and Fiji will be part of the IRB autumn window with South Africa confirmed as the fourth game of the series.
The fixtures are subject to final International Rugby Board (IRB) approval and dates and kick off times will be confirmed at a later date. All four games will be live on BBC.
"We have consistently said, if you want to be the best, you have to play the best and the 2014 autumn schedule reconfirms that commitment," said WRU Group Chief Executive Roger Lewis.
"We have just witnessed another exhilarating, tough autumn series and next year will be ideal preparation for the squad ahead of the 2015 Rugby World Cup.
"We will only have 12 matches in total in the run-up to our opening game at the tournament, so we must secure every opportunity to test ourselves at the highest level."


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Inadequate sample sizes in studies of athletic performance at the 2012 ACSM annual meeting.
|Featured Highlights with David Pyne: the best athletes, talent ID, exercise for aging, menstrual cycle, monitoring training, marathoners' immune systems, beetroot juice, statistical bloopers, modeling performance, London Olympics and Paralympics, hydration status, central fatigue. Noteworthy Abstracts with Will Hopkins: sample sizes, poor abstracts, cool and quirky strategies, accessing and using the abstracts. Acute Effects: pre-conditioning ischemia, stretching, post-activation potentiation, pre-cooling, warm-up, Cialis, transcranial stimulation, psych stress, recovery between sprints; clothing. Correlates of Performance: underpowered inconclusive studies, performance-enhancing genes. Injury and Illness: functional mobility tests, injury-prevention program, p-glucan for colds. Nutrition: spinach juice, beetroot juice, arginine and citrulline, garlic, p-alanine and bicarbonate, amylomaize, mouth rinsing, chocolate milk, deepsea water, Sustamine, nicotine, caffeine, niacin, green tea, echinacea, tart cherry juice, HMB, creatine, betaine, vitamin D, colostrum, whey protein. Tests and Technology: Rotor Q-rings, optimum sprint cadence, active drag, shoe accelerometers, volleyball sprint test, rowing ergs, endurance hazard score. Training and Overtraining: reciprocal-action resistance, intervals, periodization of resistance, altitude, vision, PNF, heart-rate guided, heart-rate variability, cytokine markers, coach-crew collaboration. KEYWORDS: anabolic, elite athletes, ergogenic aids, nutrition, overtraining, tests, training.
|Article Type:
|Conference notes
Sports sciences
Sports (Analysis)
Sports (Australia)
Pyne, David B.
Hopkins, Will G.
|Pub Date:
|Name: Sportscience Publisher: Internet Society for Sport Science Audience: Academic Format: Magazine/Journal Subject: Health Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2012 Internet Society for Sport Science ISSN: 1174-9210
|Date: Annual, 2012 Source Volume: 16
|Organization: American College of Sports Medicine
|Geographic Scope: Australia Geographic Code: 8AUST Australia
|Accession Number:
|Full Text:
This year's annual meeting of the American College of Sports
Medicine was held in San Francisco, May 29 to June 2. Your usual
Sportscience conference reporter, Will Hopkins, did not attend the
meeting, but he has summarized the abstracts from the conference site
for this report. A colleague who did attend the meeting, David Pyne, has
coauthored the report by providing first-hand accounts of keynote and
other featured presentations, none of which have abstracts.
Featured Highlights with David Pyne
Sunny skies but cool conditions greeted delegates at the 59th ACSM Annual Meeting, back in the Bay area of San Francisco for the first time since 2004. The trend towards physical activity and Exercise is Medicine continues, but there is still plenty on offer for those interested in exercise sciences and sports medicine. Another apparent trend is the inclusion of more feature events, forums, symposia and tutorial lectures rather than long sessions of short free communications. It is nice to hear from the invited experts, even if some recycling of older material and repetition of dogma rather than new insights is inevitable. The newer initiatives in online access to programs and abstracts worked very well, and the free wireless internet at the convention center worked seamlessly. The days of carrying the heavy abstract book appeared to the numbered-just as well with a total of almost 3600 abstracts on offer!
Of key interest to sports scientists was the special event on Performance: What does it Take to be Better than the Best? This session was chaired by the inimitable Dave Martin, with a panel of experts in sport science and sports medicine. Some novel ideas were promoted, including single arm and single leg exercise, weight-supported treadmill running and plyometrics (hopping). Illness prevention was deemed a high priority around competition with strategies centering on eating, hydration, sleep, hygiene and reduced exposure-the notable case of the Norwegian Olympic team being discouraged from shaking hands was highlighted. Dietitians are promoting the need for strategic eating around training and competition, and they are evaluating the true cost-benefit analysis of supplementation programs. In terms of endurance sports there was no getting away from the importance of consistent aerobic training, well targeted high-intensity interval training based on Seiler's concept of polarized training (Seiler and Tonnessen, 2009), and a high motivation to succeed. In summary, it is crucial for the sport scientist to balance coaching requirements, source and deploy resources, and build coach rapport while focusing on performance outcomes. All these points made common sense although there was still some yearning to identify those interventions and strategies (individually or in combination) that have the biggest impact on competitive performance.
The perennial interest in What Creates a Sporting Genius-New Concepts in Talent ID was examined in a tutorial lecture. Some folk characterize elite athletes as very fit obsessive compulsive sociopaths. Jack Raglin contended that self-awareness as both a disposition and a skill can be developed in athletes, and emotions can be used to help performance. Elite athletes push themselves harder than the rest of us, as the natural human condition is for comfort and stability. Zig St Clair Gibson summarized the key requirements for talent as the need for good physique, good physiology, angry spirit and an overachiever. His presentation focused on case studies of top athletes: Cavendish, Armstrong, Wiggins. Whether these attributes hold up in other outstanding performers remains to be established.
Mark Tarnopolsky gave a very impressive president's lecture on Exercise as a Counter measure for Aging. For those who love science and knowledge discovery and appreciate hard work, this was a smorgasbord of high-quality research. Much of his work has used a mouse model to characterize aging and muscle loss as a predominantly mitochondrial disease and to study the effects of exercise in reversing mitochondrial dysfunction. He presented some initial work investigating the optimal sequencing of endurance and resistance exercise: it appears that resistance training should be undertaken first then endurance training to best maintain mitochondrial function. Although this recommendation is for the broader context of aging and physical activity, it probably tallies with anecdotal reports in the strength and conditioning community on preparing elite athletes.
Despite long-standing interest in the question of menstrual cycle-based training there is a paucity of studies. The physiology of the follicular and luteal phases have been well studied and perturbations observed in some highly trained athletes. Petra Platen summarized some of her laboratory's work and practical experience with these recommendations: periodize strength and endurance training during the follicular phase, taking an oral contraceptive should not have a large effect on coordinating different types of training within- and between menstrual cycles, and the ubiquitous take home message that more studies are needed.
One of the father figures in application of rating of perceived exertion (RPE), the indefatigable Carl Foster outlined his thoughts on the popular topic of monitoring training. He favors a keep-it-simple approach to monitoring internal and external load, and the benefit of visualizing data by way of figures or plots. The take home messages were "see the pattern of the training load not just the details", and identify and implement effective matching of the prescription and execution of the training plan or program. Oliver Faude indicated the utility of using stress, recovery and total stress scores in managing fatigue in football. High match exposure is tolerable provided training is periodized and recovery methods are implemented. Accumulated fatigue towards the end of the season is more problematic, and other internal and external stressors at an individual player level need to be considered. Maintaining fitness over the whole season was also seen as important.
Nutritional supplementation gets a lot of exposure at the annual meeting. David Nieman gave a spirited account of methods for protecting the immune system of marathon runners. Carbohydrate, polyphenols and flavonoids like quercetin have proven efficacy; colustrum, probiotics and p-glucan showing promise; but other supplements including vitamins, minerals, multi-vitamins, glutamine, fish oil, and ginseng lack support in well-controlled studies. A key message was the interest in potentiation effects using a mixture of flavenoids, the so-called cocktail approach. Nieman also addressed the common concern about interventions interfering with the signaling mechanisms that underpin adaptations to training. He considers that aggressive supplementation might partially block some adaptations by taking the edge off the effectiveness of training, which opens the way for a periodized approach: loading blocks with no supplements then performance blocks with supplements. But he was still of the view that nutrition targeted at the immune system was an important means of supporting athletes in heavy training.
The contribution of the late Brian Whipp to exercise science (and respiratory physiology in particular) was recognized in a featured science session on the oxygen cost of exercise. The prolific group at Exeter University in the UK delivered a series of presentations on various effects of nitrate-rich beetroot juice supplementation. The detrimental effects of hypoxia can be attenuated by dietary nitrate, although the effects of nitrate diminish in healthy older individuals. Pacing, short-term training, nutritional interactions and exercise performance can all be influenced by nitrate supplementation via alterations in oxygen kinetics and cost. Although there is substantial interest in beetroot juice, there is a need for some basic chemistry to assist non-experts navigate their way through the nitrate to nitrite to nitric oxide pathway, and conversion of L arginine to nitric oxide.
On the statistical front (close to the heart of this journal!), Alan Batterham gave an informative and entertaining tutorial on statistical bloopers in reviewer comments. Well, we have all been there. Alan outlined three common reviewer bloopers: confusing measurement error with minimum important difference, calling for the post-hoc observed power, and the perennial "is it significant or not?" The strategies he suggesting for reducing incidence of such bloopers were: improving the training of reviewers and editors; implementing an open review process; implementing a reviewer reward structure; and appointing statistical advisors and editors to journals. Alan recommended that authors include an up-front statement outlining the benefits of a more progressive analytical approach in the methods section and/or cover letter with submission or grant application. There are lots of supporting studies of contemporary approaches (and the shortcomings of hypothesis testing) in a range of disciplines from biomedicine, psychology, sports performance, and econometrics. Getting in first with the heavy artillery might be more effective than wrestling with reviewers and editors after the first review.
The balance between modeling and experimental work in exercise and sports science was addressed by Jos de Koning using pacing related to speed skating. The concept of the hazard score-the product of perceived exertion and the relative percentage of distance remaining-may be useful for studying pacing. Jos was happy to concede that experienced athletes self-select a pacing strategy close to the theoretical optimum, so perhaps the education and upskilling on pacing is best directed towards the younger and more inexperienced athletes. Although models relating air and ice resistance are useful, more work is needed to quantify the effects of fatigue.
Given the close proximity of the annual meeting to the London Olympic and Paralympic Games, it was appropriate to hear about forward planning in a conversational forum chaired by the highly regarded Randy Wilber. The audience heard about the planning and attention to detail of the US Olympic Committee, particularly the work of Bill Moreau and his team in the area of sports medicine. Athlete location for doping control, stem-cell therapy and measles are issues occupying the attention of the US officials and staff. The conversation on the Paralympics was focused, as it often is, on the contentious issue of athlete classification. Some spirited questions from the floor highlighted the challenges facing the Paralympic organization, national teams, as well as individual athletes and their coaches.
New insights in the assessment of hydration status were addressed in a tutorial lecture presented by Neil Walsh and Larry Armstrong. Recent experimental work is evaluating the utility of using salivary and tear osmolality as alternative markers to the traditional measures of urine and plasma osmolality. Plasma osmolality is not the gold standard measure of hydration status that many believe it is, owing to substantial error variance. Methodological shortcomings in the saliva collection procedures in many studies may be masking some of the true effects of interventions. Sample flow rates, swallowing, oral stimulants, and mastication or orofacial movements (including conversation) need to be well controlled. Ocular measures of hydration may be more useful in the research laboratory than the field, but new methods for intraocular pressure, tear osmolality, tear breakup time, and tear secretion might have some application in the future. The presenters finished with the idea that selection of hydration markers should reflect the nature of the activity and setting rather than pinning one's hope on a single marker.
The enigmatic title of Back to the Soup and Sparks introduced the issue of central fatigue. The leading figures of Romain Meussen and Zig St Clair Gibson did the honors on neurotransmitters and electrical activity respectively. Although studies have described extensively both brain and CNS outputs, the regulation of complex activities such as cognition and emotion is still poorly understood. Current measurement techniques have limitations and multiple definitions of fatigue muddy the waters. A detailed understanding of factors influencing central fatigue and how to measure them is still emerging.
Noteworthy Abstracts with Will Hopkins
My biggest complaint this year is the woefully inadequate sample size in so many studies. No matter what the design, in my view you need a minimum sample of 10 to be confident about applying the effect to other similar subjects. A sample size of 10 in a crossover will also give adequate precision if the effect is big enough or the dependent variable has an error of measurement smaller than the smallest important effect. Most of the time, though, effects are small or trivial, and the error of measurement is large, so you need many more than 10 subjects. And if the design is a parallel-groups controlled trial, you need at least twice as many subjects in both groups. If the design is cross-sectional (one observation per subject), you will usually need ~10x as many subjects again. Furthermore, these are the sample sizes required for magnitude-based inferences; that is, for adequate precision in relation to smallest important positive and negative (or beneficial and harmful) effects. If instead you stay with the traditional 80% power for 5% significance with the smallest effect, you will need another three times as many subjects. See my article and spreadsheet on sample-size estimation (Hopkins, 2006) and the article/slideshow on research designs (Hopkins, 2008) for more. Little wonder, then, that conference delegates and eventually manuscript reviewers can't be bothered with studies involving groups of less than 10 subjects, especially cross-sectional studies.
Yes, yes, I know: research students are more likely to get funding to attend the conference if they present something, and of course ACSM and other major conferences provide young researchers with valuable inspirational experiences. But what wrong message do these impressionable young people get from poster after poster with small sample sizes? These sample sizes must be OK.
My other complaints about the abstracts are the usual ones...
* Non-significance in grossly underpowered studies is almost always misinterpreted as no effect. The correct interpretation depends on the confidence interval in relation to smallest important effects: unclear if the interval overlaps substantial positive and negative, clear otherwise. That's a start, anyway; a full interpretation depends on probabilities the effect is substantial.
* Conclusions are often incorrectly based on a difference in significance rather than a significant difference. Extreme example: p=0.04 in the experimental group vs p=0.06 in the control group is misinterpreted as significant! The p value for the comparison would be close to 1.00, very non-significant.
* Use of p-value inequalities is unforgivable these days, but let's get rid of p values and statistical significance entirely.
* Use of confusing author-defined abbreviations seems to be based on the mistaken notion that it's cool and scientific. The word limit is no excuse for writing an incomprehensible abstract.
* Also annoying: typographical errors, missing words, and omission of vital information, including sometimes the complete absence of any effect statistics.
If the conference organizers continue to accept substandard abstracts without feedback for improvement (understandable with such a large conference), perhaps they should include a checklist that the authors have to tick off on line before the abstract is able to be submitted. The policy of automatically accepting abstracts co-authored or sponsored by a fellow of ACSM may also need revising, or maybe the fellows need more guidance.
The reviewer (Dave Martin) "wondered if it would be worthwhile to highlight one or two abstracts that get a Will Hopkins gold star-a statement that some competent researchers are out there and there is hope." I checked only my picks in the next two paragraphs, and the best I can award is a bronze star to the study of the effects of tart cherry juice on sleep. It wasn't done on athletes, baseline data are not reported, and there are no magnitude-based inferences, but it had the acceptable minimum sample size, and outcomes are reported with confidence intervals.
Here is my pick of cool performance-enhancing strategies you can apply immediately: the findings in the meta-analysis of post-activation potentiation; use of precooling after the warm-up; the right clothing for hot humid conditions; a warm-up program to reduce injuries in females; p-alanine plus bicarbonate for anaerobic performance, especially with the arms; vitamin D supplements for sprint performance of athletes deficient in vitamin D; whey protein for long-term strength development; Rotor Q-rings for cyclists; altitude camps ending no less than 3-4 weeks before a competition; and collaboration between coach and support crew for reducing injuries and enhancing performance. And don't forget caffeine and the right kinds of carbohydrate!
And here are a few quirky or promising strategies to watch closely or research yourself: pre-conditioning ischemia in both arms prior to leg performance; a yeast extract to reduce upper-respiratory symptoms; spinach juice for exercise lasting at least half a minute; green tea acutely for endurance; tart cherry juice for sleep; optimum cadence for sprint cyclists; medium-term reciprocal-action resistance training for strength; and PNF stretching for ballet dancers.
You can access the conference abstracts in three ways. First, this page has a menu of links to separate PDFs for the different types of session, and this link downloads the entire conference proceedings (20 MB). Secondly, register on-line via this link and use the advanced search form to create and download a PDF of your own "itinerary". The keyword search is a hit-and-miss affair, because it uses keywords provided by the authors, but you can use the search form to find abstracts featured in this report via the number in brackets [...]. Finally, the abstracts are published in the May supplement of Medicine and Science in Sports and Exercise, where you can browse the sessions from the Table of Contents. Find an abstract by clicking on the Advanced Search link, putting the abstract number into the Keywords box, limiting the search to Titles, entering the volume number (44) and issue number (5), then clicking Search.
Use one or more of the PDFs of abstracts to review the conference in the following manner, as recommended in previous conference reports ... Get a small group together with an interest in a specific sport or topic, set up the PDF on a big screen, search for the sport or other keyword (using the full Acrobat search form via Shift+Ctrl+F), then skim each resulting hit skeptically. For those abstracts summarized below, see if you agree with the critiques. (I have provided some longer critiques than in previous reports, for this purpose.) You will find this exercise entertaining and valuable if and only if you are a good sport scientist.
Acute Effects
In a seemingly bizarre study prompted by research on heart surgery, ischemia (cutting off the blood supply) in one arm before an incremental cycling test with the legs produced a non-significant 2.2% enhancement in peak power in a crossover with 9 highly trained male cyclists [2157] at sea level (but a 0.8% impairment at a simulated high altitude). Naturally we got the usual conclusion of no effect, but the authors did suggest trying ischemia in more muscle, presumably both arms. Well worth trying, but how can you eliminate the placebo effect (which has a similar magnitude and which is problematic in studies where you can't conceal the treatments)? Tell the athletes you're investigating fatigue signals from hypoxic muscles?
Static stretching and proprioceptive neuromuscular facilitation (PNF) continue to have harmful effects on performance, here on knee peak torque in female athletes [997].
In a meta-analysis of 141 effects of post-activation potentiation in 31 studies, the biggest improvements in explosive or sprint power came from multiple sets of moderate-intensity conditioning exercise followed by 3-7 min of rest before the performance test [593]. "Biggest" means a standardized change of ~1.0 (i.e., one baseline between-subject standard deviation, which is moderate on my scale) compared with some kind of control, presumably generally a steady warm-up. Hopefully the authors will present the effect in percent units in the full paper.
I found two original studies of post-activation potentiation. In one, effects of various protocols on various measures of performance had no significant effect with or without vibration [599]. Unfortunately there were no data for me to make a better assessment in this cross-over study of 15 male athletes. The protocols looked OK, so some of the effects might have been clinically significant. In the other, there was a 1.5% benefit for sprint speed in a cross-over with 7 collegiate football players [3273].
The title states that "precooling does not improve 2000-m rowing performance of females in hot, humid conditions", but the 8 physically active females went 1.6% faster after 20 min of precooling with a lower body cold-water shower compared with passive rest [1952]. The authors even tried to explain "the lack of performance enhancement" by invoking skin and core temperature changes.
A warm-up could offset the benefits of precooling, hence this crossover study of effects of precooling+warmup, warmup+precooling (i.e., reversing the order), and control (no precooling or warmup) on performance of 7 trained runners in a 5-km time trial in unspecified environmental conditions [995]. Compared with control, subjects ran 1.1% faster with warmup+precooling and 0.3% slower with precooling+warmup. Wow! Obviously you should precool after the warmup. Now we need to see whether it's worth even bothering with the warmup when you precool, in a sample size of at least 10 please, and don't show those pointless between-subject standard errors next time.
Don't warm up with lighter or heavier softball bats: subsequent swing speed is slower than with normal bats in female varsity softball athletes [2267].
Warming up was beneficial for 16 modestly trained cyclists completing a 5-km time trial in a crossover of a short warmup, a long warmup, and a control of no warmup [996]. Both warmups showed similar enhancements of ~4% in time and mean power output. The effects were not significant ("p>0.05"), but they should have been, with a sample of that size in a crossover, especially with a familiarization trial. Something must have been wrong with the ergometer: for p>0.05 I calculate a typical error of >5.3%, which is way too high. In any case, the ergometer was not simulating bike riding properly, because the percent effects on time should have been less than half those on mean power.
An enigmatic cooling product enhanced mean power in a 30-km time trial by a useful but unsurprisingly non-significant 1.4% (0.4% for time) compared with control in this crossover study of 7 male cyclists exercising at 30 [degrees]C and 60% humidity [3374]. Given the increasing recognition that perceptions of effort and discomfort of various kinds have on performance, this result is believable, but... blinding for this sort of treatment is impossible, and placebo effects are of similar magnitude.
If anything, the vasodilator tadalafil (sold as Cialis, a drug like Viagra) impaired peak power output in an incremental test in a placebo-controlled crossover of 12 men [1828], so don't count on it enhancing every kind of physical performance, guys.
Transcranial direct-current stimulation increased incremental peak power by a clear 1% in a crossover with 10 national-level cyclists (but peak power was only 300 W) [1896]. I wonder if you can build secret electrodes into a bike helmet.
There were no data in the abstract-not even a sample size-but in this crossover study of psychological stress on ball serving in tennis, "intriguingly, surveillance by a famous tennis star [compared with a normal spectator] has no effect for elite players but appears to be stimulatory in ball serving performance for ordinary tennis players" [1882]. I would like to see an analysis for individual responses.
Should swimmers recover in or out of the water between repeated sprints, if they want to get the best out of each sprint? Unfortunately you can't tell from this abstract, because the researchers reported the mean sprint times only for the group that showed significant changes, and the times (~5 s for 50 m, presumably free style) are impossible [1341]. If they had done the study as a crossover, they might have got a clear outcome with a proper inferential comparison.
There were several studies of physiological effects of cold-water immersion, but I could find nothing on use of this recovery strategy for performance.
In this crossover study, 8 average runners had lower skin temperature during a 45-min submaximal pre-load run at 30[degrees]C and 50% humidity with clothing designed for low air resistance and high "overall moisture management capacity" than with control clothing (not described). The runners then went 8.3% faster in a 1.5-km time trial [1951]. Note that the gain in a time trial without the pre-load would be a lot less.
Apparently it was double blind, so we have to give some credence to the claim that a T-shirt made from a " nanobionic" textile, which apparently reflects far-infrared rays back into the body, enhanced VO2max by 4.3% in this crossover study of 11 female and 11 male active subjects [3377]. There's a substantial proofreading error in the abstract, adding to my suspicion that this study will be one for the Journal of Irreproducible Results.
Last and definitely least, EnergyCare bands worn around the ankles (?) had little apparent effect on various measures of short-term performance in an evidently well-designed but seemingly pointless crossover study of 13 college-age males [3378]. From the manufacturer's website: "Our durable Sports Band contains Atraxlite[TM] technology, [which] facilitates the molecular alignment process ... "I wouldn't waste my time researching something so obviously fake.
Correlates of Performance
Several potentially interesting studies of performance predictors were done with sample sizes that were woefully inadequate for their cross-sectional design. If you are going to measure athletes on only one occasion, you need hundreds of them for adequate precision of the inevitably small effects. You can get somewhere with 10-20 subjects in monitoring studies, in which you have repeated measurements of the athletes and you investigate relationships between change scores of predictors and performance using within-subject or mixed-model analyses. The resulting outcomes are more applicable to individual athletes, too.
Here is a selection of such underpowered inconclusive correlational studies relating parameters and performance: joint range of motion and either incremental or 30-s Wingate peak power in 9 cyclists [1559]; aerobic parameters and 10-km running performance in 31 subjects [2895]; an incremental test plus accelerometry and running performance in 7 cross-country runners [2896, 2897]; cycling economy and 3-km track time in 11 cyclists [3000]; turn parameters and turn speed in 6 elite freestyle swimmers [2980]; various novel measures of within-subject variability in running speed, stride length and stride frequency measured with an "accelerometric device" during a race and race time in 21 half-marathon runners [1438]; principal components analysis of various measures and sprint performance in 22 soccer players [2262].
The correlational studies of performance-enhancing genes were more conclusive, but the differences in frequencies of the allelic variants between athletes and controls are probably not high enough to make testing for such genes a useful component of talent identification, not yet anyway. The I allele of the ALP gene (which codes for a muscle protein that interacts with alpha-actinins in muscle) is relatively less prevalent in controls than in athletes of various sports, especially track & field, cycling and rowing [1810]. A polymorphism of one of the actinin genes itself is more prevalent amongst elite Japanese track and field athletes specializing in sprint or power, but not endurance [1815, 1821], and there are athlete-related associations with some single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) [1816]. Polymorphisms of the actinin and other genes explained some differences in strength among elite Italian soccer players [1819]. Several SNPs are associated with physical performance in children [1811].
Injury and Illness
The popular functional movement screen and a novel basketball-specific set of functional mobility tests were poor predictors of injury risk and performance in 119 collegiate basketball players [1216]. The functional movement screen was also ineffective with 122 collegiate athletes [2890].
"Pre-season fitness and musculoskeletal screening measures were found to be [trivial] predictors of time to injury" in 118 male and 143 female athletes in various sports, but females had twice the risk (incidence rate) of males in this simple uncontrolled prospective monitoring study [1217].
"Eight sessions of a 20- to 30-min warm-up injury-prevention program improved player jumping biomechanics by increasing knee width and flexion when landing" in this uncontrolled underpowered study of 23 young female soccer players, but there was a promising absence of injuries over a season [1218].
A [beta]-glucan supplement extracted from baker's yeast reduced the number of days of upper-respiratory symptoms following a marathon in a randomized placebo-controlled trial of 184 runners, but this sample was only 57% of those asked to complete the questionnaire, and no data are shown [1376].
In a placebo-controlled crossover study of 7 males inspired by Popeye the Sailorman, 6 d of supplementation with spinach juice enhanced 30-s Wingate mean power by 6.9%, submaximal work to exhaustion by 42% (about 3% in a time trial, by my estimation), and the last three of a set of five 6-s sprints an unspecified amount, but had little effect of maximum isometric torque [1823]. The researchers suggested nitrate as the agent responsible, but made no mention of any Popeye-style acute muscle hypertrophy!
Beetroot juice enhanced performance time in a 50-mile time trial by a statistically non-significant but usefully small 0.8% compared with nitrate-depleted placebo juice in 8 trained male cyclists [1824]. In a similar study with 14 elite male rowers, the effect on mean time for six 500-m sprints was a marginally clear beneficial 0.4%, but much clearer in the last three sprints (1.7%) [1829].
A supplement combining the amino acids L-arginine and L-citrulline might work via the nitric oxide system like nitrate supplements, but it had trivial effects acutely when 12 student participants tried it before an incremental test [1843].
Massive consumption of garlic for a week could have enhanced endurance performance in hypoxia (e.g., at altitude) by improving blood oxygenation via dilatation of arterioles in the alveolae of the lungs, but there was little effect in this crossover study of 10 males [2147].
Supplementation separately with [beta]-alanine and bicarbonate enhances sprint performance (probably via increased intracellular and extra-cellular buffering), but are their effects additive? They were in this study of 30 athletes randomized blindly to either, both or neither (control), with unspecified performance (presumably total work) in four upper-body Wingate sprints assessed pre and post an unspecified period of supplementation [1837]. The effects were much greater than the usual 1-3% seen with lower-body performance: 7% for either treatment and 17% for both, with control only 0.3%. In a similar study of cycling performance with 14 active students, the effects weren't nearly as large or clear, but the reporting of results is deficient [1836]. Buffer boosting may be more effective in the arms than in the legs.
Carbohydrate in the form of "amylomaize-7" ingested prior to a preloaded ~15-min time trial produced a statistically non-significant enhancement in performance time equivalent to 2.3% in mean power relative to no-carbohydrate placebo, whereas dextrose (glucose) produced a 1.2% impairment in this crossover study of 10 trained cyclists [2328]. You guessed it: amylomaize "did not offer an additional performance advantage". I'd use it on the strength of this evidence.
"Consuming a novel, carbohydrate-free recovery beverage for 18 days prior to high intensity resistance exercise can significantly reduce muscular fatigue and ratings of perceived exertion" in this parallel groups trial of 40 subjects [2348, 2349]. The beverage in this company-funded research is not described.
Mouth rinsing with carbohydrate does [2351] and does not [2352] enhance endurance performance in active subjects and cyclists respectively. Swallowing it is better, anyway [2352 amongst others].
Serum creatine kinase (a marker of muscle damage) was lower following muscle-damaging exercise in a crossover when the 8 recreational male athletes consumed fat-free chocolate milk vs a chocolate whey protein drink [1854]. There were "no differences" in performance. The study is notable for the development of an exercise protocol that induced muscle damage reproducibly with an unspecified period between tests.
Chocolate milk was only as good as other non-dairy chocolate drinks and milk for recovery of endurance performance of cyclists and active women after glycogen-depleting exercise [2344, 2360, 2362].
With the exception of some extraordinary claims for the effects of deep ocean-based desalted mineral water on oxidative damage, rehydration and performance [3013, 3015], I could find nothing unusual in the abstracts on sweating and fluid imbalance.
The authors don't say how L-alanyl-L-glutamine ("Sustamine") is supposed to enhance performance when you add it to your water bottle. The company's website claims that this dipeptide enhances water and electrolyte absorption, glycogen synthesis and protein synthesis. Hmm... Anyway, the promising outcomes in this crossover study with 10 female basketball players were too inconsistent to get excited about [1841].
In a crossover study of 9 active males, nicotine chewing gum improved isometric and eccentric leg extensor force, but peak power in a 30-s Wingate test was impaired [3083]. No data, just p-value inequalities.
Relative to decaffeinated coffee and placebo, coffee and caffeine (5 mg/kg) had similar effects (~4%) on time in a time-trial time lasting ~40 min following a 30-min preload in a crossover with 8 trained male cyclists [2781]. In other studies coffee has been less effective than caffeine.
In a study of the effects of caffeine (6 mg/kg) on diurnal changes in strength of 12 highly resistance-trained men, caffeine taken before testing at 10:00 am enhanced performance by 56%, effectively equaling the enhancement of 58% normally seen at 6:00 pm [2793]. The researchers did not study the effects of caffeine at 6:00 pm.
The proportion of successful tennis strokes increased from 89% with placebo to 91% with caffeine (6 mg/kg) in this crossover study of 18 female and male collegiate players [2774]. Polymorphism of a particular gene modified the effect of caffeine a little here and in cycling performance [2778].
Caffeine (6 mg/kg) was more effective in AA homozygotes than in those with one or two C alleles of the CYA1P2 gene: 4.6% vs 2.6% in 40-km time-trial time of male cyclists [2778].
I guess I have to report a study showing a harmful effect of a caffeinated commercial energy drink on performance: the 6 runners were 2.3% slower in a 5-km time trial on Organic Energy Shot (140 mg caffeine) than on an unspecified placebo [2788]. Is there something nasty in this drink? The runners were a bit slower on Red Bull (80 mg caffeine), too, although it was ergogenic in another study [2789]. There were several other studies showing positive effects of caffeine [2786, 2787, 2794].
Niacin (vitamin B3) had the opposite effects of caffeine on fatty-acid metabolism and endurance performance in this crossover study of 17 untrained males [3160]. This finding might make you think twice about taking multivitamin supplements.
Once again statistical non-significance could be hiding a beneficial effect from researchers brain-washed with traditional inferential statistics. Here 14 d of supplementation with green-tea extract vs placebo produced a valuable 2.8% enhancement in performance of a 10-km run following 1 h of a preload at 50% of VO2max in a crossover with 9 reasonably fit competitive runners. The authors wrongly reported the outcome as "similar" time-trial times and "no difference in performance" [1368].
Echinacea supplementation didn't act like EPO (as it has in previous studies) in this randomized controlled trial of 24 males [1379]. Well, the only result is p>0.05, so who really knows?
Tart cherry juice vs placebo consumed for 7 d resulted in a clear increase of 39 min in sleep time and improvement in a measure of sleep efficiency in a randomized parallel-group trial of 20 volunteers [1390]. Melatonin might still be better for acute jet lag.
The potentially anabolic amino-acid HMB (P-hydroxy P-methylbutyrate) had mainly non-significant effects (no data shown) on various measures of strength in this parallel-groups randomized controlled trial of only 14 athletes (7 in each group is not enough) [1845]. I am worried that the only non-significant effect, on Wingate peak power, was a Type I error. Also, only post-test means are shown in the abstract. Didn't the authors analyze change scores?
Of the two creatine studies directly relevant to performance, one was positive [2381] and one was not reported well enough for me to decide [2615].
In my report on the 2007 ACSM meeting I got excited about the amino-acid betaine, which mimicked creatine and had similar positive effects on strength and power following 14 d of loading. Alas, any such ergogenic effect did not translate into an anabolic effect when betaine was consumed during 8 wk of resistance training in a randomized controlled trial with 11 college-age males [3552]. At least twice as many subjects next time, please.
In a randomized controlled 4-wk trial with 36 male endurance cyclists, half of whom were vitamin-D deficient, the 9 cyclists who received the highest dose of vitamin D had the greatest increases in 1RM leg strength and Wingate peak power, but there was apparently little effect on a 1-h time trial [3557]. There aren't enough data in the abstract for me to assess percent effects.
The 12 males who received bovine colostrum after training sessions for 8 wk edged ahead of the 12 who received isocaloric control for increases in squat strength (40% vs 36%), but there was little difference for other measures of strength, body composition and muscle damage [1856]. Type I error?
In this really tidy parallel-groups study, 41 previously non-resistance-trained men and women randomized to whey protein supplementation for 9 months of resistance training gained more lean mass (3.3 kg) than those who received soy protein (1.8 kg) [1853]. It's reasonable to conclude whey is more anabolic than soy for already trained individuals.
Tests and Technology
The Rotor Q-ring is a non-circular chain-ring that alters the transmission of force to the chain during the pedal cycle. In this uncontrolled study, 8 male cyclists were tested with usual cranks before switching to Rotor Q-rings for 4 wk of testing and training. The cyclists performed a 1-km time trial ~2% faster throughout the 4 wk, and performance returned to baseline when they switched back to a circular chain-ring [3579]. Conclusion: switch to Rotor Q-rings!
Does the pedaling cadence that produces maximum power output in sprinting depend on whether you sit or stand on the bike? To find out, these researchers modeled the power-cadence relationship with 8 junior elite cyclists at a velodrome [1931]. Maximum power output was obviously higher (by 17%) when standing on the pedals, but more importantly, optimum cadence was lower (113 [+ or -] 11 vs 120 [+ or -] 7 rpm, mean [+ or -] SD). Now, how closely do top cyclists keep to their optimum?
I can't understand the description, but it looks like a new method of measuring active drag with swimmers has less error of measurement than the usual method [1907].
There's no need to change the protocol for the 7x 200-m swimming incremental step test [1908].
The validity of accelerometers attached to a running shoe (the Adidas Micoach and Nike+ Sports Kit) for monitoring speed and distance was reported in terms only of significance of mean differences from true values [2087, 2088, 2089, 2090]. What about the random errors? These devices may be really noisy.
A sprint test specific for beach volleyball has good reliability and convergent validity [2275].
In a comparison of performance in an incremental test and a 4-min time trial by 13 male rowers on a Concept II and Rowperfect rowing ergometer, it looks like the ergs display different power output and distance traveled for the same physiological intensity [3477]. No data, just p-value inequalities.
Tweaking perceived effort by multiplying it by the percent of distance remaining made its appearance as the hazard score in several studies of endurance performance [1433, 1437, 1563].
Neural-net analyses were noteworthy for their absence from studies of athletic performance, but they were applied successfully to categorizing physical activity in the stream of data coming from accelerometers [1031,2899].
Training and Overtraining
They were presumably only 29 untrained young men, but it's a novel finding about a kind of medium-term potentiation: when they were randomized to three days of control (no training), usual concentric resistance training, and reciprocal-action resistance training (legs moving in opposite directions), the reciprocal-action group showed greatest gains in peak torque [594].
How come researchers in a top lab led by Jens Bangsbo are still reporting standard errors rather than standard deviations? What's even worse, the outcomes were reported as a difference in significance in the two groups, not the significance of the difference: 5-km performance time improved by 3% in the 10 male+female runners who did interval training for 7 wk, whereas "no changes were observed" in the 8 control runners doing normal training [1538]. Sigh ... Anyway, we already knew interval training works, here presumably in the build-up, but the new finding is that changes in blood cholesterol appeared to be better in the interval group.
Not surprisingly, 10 wk of interval training improved maximum oxygen uptake better than steady running in a controlled trial with 27 recreational endurance runners [1107]. But surprisingly, 10 wk of high-intensity interval training was only as good as usual training for various measures of performance in high-school soccer players [2258]. The findings are inconclusive, because more than half the subjects dropped out.
In a study of weekly periodization of resistance training, hypertrophy, power and strength sessions on Monday, Wednesday and Friday might have been better than hypertrophy, strength and power for increasing maximal strength in already well-trained powerlifters, but there were only 9 and 6 subjects in the two groups [592].
On Days 9-10 following a 28-d live-high train-low altitude camp, performance of 6 elite male distance runners over an unspecified distance dipped 0.4% below their pre-altitude best, but on Day 26 they were 0.6% faster, which fits with anecdotal experience of coaches [2158].
Vision training in collegiate female softball players "did not appear to translate into enhanced batting capabilities" [2283]. No data.
Eight weeks of proprioceptive neuromuscular facilitation (PNF) added to the training sessions of 34 ballet dance students produced significantly greater active range of motion than occurred in a control group of 23 dancers [3508]. P values only.
Use of Polar heart-rate monitors and software to guide training load apparently reduced training intensity with "no significant differences in any performance marker" in this 8-wk parallel-groups controlled trial with 11 female and 11 male cyclists [1557], but no relevant data are provided.
I was beginning to think that a decrease in resting heart-rate variability might be a reasonable marker of incipient overtraining or at least lots of training stress, but here's a study of 11 elite swimmers showing just the opposite [2990]. Are there any useful markers of overtraining?
In comparison with 24 controls (mainly elite rowers), 24 elite overtrained athletes (mainly rowers, runners and soccer players) had plasma concentrations of two inflammatory cytokines IL-1[beta] and TNF[alpha] that were moderately elevated (by approximately one between-subject standard deviation) [1132]. Interesting, but is it worth testing for these cytokines in a suspected case of overtraining? Would dietary antioxidants or anti-inflammatories help?
It's only a case study of one collegiate baseball team, but the authors attributed a reduction in injuries and increase in wins over a 5-y period to "a collaborative effort between sport coaches, sport medicine and sport science departments" [3070]: a great positive note on which to end this report.
Acknowledgements: High Performance Sport NZ commissioned a report from WGH. DBP received an institutional travel grant. Thanks to the reviewer, Dave Martin, for various insightful comments and useful additions to this report.
Hopkins WG (2006). Estimating sample size for magnitude-based inferences. Sportscience 10, 63-70
Hopkins WG (2008). Research designs: choosing and fine-tuning a design for your study. Sportscience 12, 12-21
Seiler S, Tennessen E (2009). Intervals, thresholds, and long slow distance: the role of intensity and duration in endurance training. Sportscience 13, 32-53
Published June 2012. [C]2012
David B Pyne (1), Will G Hopkins (2)
(1) Australian Institute of Sport, Canberra, ACT 2617, Australia; Email. (2) Sport Performance Research institute NZ, AUT University, Auckland 0627, New Zealand; Email. Reviewer: David T Martin, Australian Institute of Sport, Canberra, ACT 2617, Australia.
|Gale Copyright:
|Copyright 2012 Gale, Cengage Learning. All rights reserved.


text:
Clearly what you need is glasses!
we're near a thin rock? what? whaaaat?
Apple will release it standard with the iPhone 7
This thing vs regular hearing aid:
1) battery? Either the battery has to last 10 years or you have to be able to replace it.
2) amplification curve? Hearing loss typically has different attenuation at different frequencies, so modern aids amplify different frequencies differently, and some even shift the frequencies around.
3) programming? Okay, if it just makes things louder, it doesn't need to be programmed but typically you need to have some way to adjust the configuration of the aid, and if it is instal
For 1, my best guess is that energy comes from an external transducer, coupled to a coil of the implant that can drive the actuator. Cochlear implants use this strategy (except they drive electrical impulses, not mechanical vibration)
Both 2 and 3 are handled by an external dsp. The implant piece is just the final acoustic amplifier / transducer; it is not driven by acoustical energy entering the ear, but by the signal being sent to it by the external device.
It's still interesting news, and good news. I knew an early cochlear implant user who had become deaf as a result of meningitis. He was stuck with a poor first generation implant - they were not exactly easy to upgrade.
I was implanted with implants in both ears just over a year ago. Overall, it is awesome - http://ihearnow.blogspot.com. The biggest complaint is that my processors are not wireless and I have occasional bouts of vertigo... It sure beats utter silence and my family/friends don't have to put up with the depression that happens when you lose your hearing...
your blog doesn't give me the impression that they are great. Not to mention it seems like it'll look like you have grey pads attached to your skull, roughly?
Audio does not sound as good as it did before the implants. I deleted about 2/3 of all my favorite mp3 songs. They were just not enjoyable anymore... Listening to music on TV is not as good either - so watching American Idol and XFactor is not the same now. These processors can only process sounds to something like 300 Hz (don't quote me on that),
These processors can only process sounds to something like 300 Hz (don't quote me on that), but a cello is something like 65 Hz.
A above middle C is 440 Hz. Two octaves down is 110 Hz. That's the lowest A on a cello. Just posting this to support your claim that the lowest note (C two octaves below middle C) is in fact 65.4... Hz.
I agree with you on some points. Hearing aids are definitely an improvement over not, but the problem is that hearing aids are designed and focus on "people talking" which ignores:
people singing
anything outside the normal range of people talking, which includes pitches people talk at when they're speaking softly.
frequencies which you may be basically deaf for regardless of hearing aids because they just don't amplify them.
So they're really not "hearing aids" in the broad sense of the phrase which is w
Are you talking about hearing aids or cochlear implants here? Obviously there's a lot of work being put into both, but CIs arguably have a more difficult set of challenges to face if you want to talk about sounds signals other than speech, which is relatively well represented in the field for good reason. Music is always going to be a huge challenge with current CI technology due to the inherent limit of how many independent frequency channels you can stimulate (it's usually around 8, which is abysmal when
As a musician, I wish I had more background in formant research but I digress. Singing does not *entirely* match the frequencies and thus formants of people talking, and music doesn't necessarily match the formants of people singing. Meanwhile, frequency range vs true functionality/accurate reproduction of audio on even the highest end models of hearing aids from today's companies are fairly poor and tend to handle a very limited range of frequencies (by design). This is a problem. Whether it's BTE, ITC, i
What? All I hear is ringing!
You should have answered that ringing. It was opportunity calling telling you that your ship had come in.
Here's an odd thing about tinnitus -- I've been deaf in my left ear since age 5 from the mumps. As I understand it, the swelling suppressed the blood supply long enough to damage or kill the auditory nerve. The ear mechanism is probably fine but I'm deaf for lack of a communication link to the brain. I have tinnitus horribly. Weird thing is, I perceive hearing it in BOTH ears. Go figure. Make me wonder if it's a phenomena of the brain center rather than damaged receptors.
Having severe hearing loss in one ear, this is very interesting to me, but honestly I would rather wait for results on current studies looking into regenerating damaged hair cells before pursuing this. The headline "Regaining Proper Hearing at Last" is in my opinion not quite correct; from what I can tell, they're just tickling whatever cells are left to stimulate harder than before, as opposed to restoring the full capability of input. Then you've still got signal processing issues like phase discrepancies, gaps in frequency coverage that need to be made up by transposing or saturating neighbor/harmonic frequencies, and all sorts of related hairy business. A big advantage here is you can break out the processing to a box with beefier DSP than you could fit in a BTE device, with batteries that last longer.
Definitely a step in the right direction, and by far better than similar solutions in the past, but still a long way from perfect.
They're baby steps, but at least in the right direction.
This is how they say it every time, unfortunately. Just like how every medical breakthrough is a cure for cancer, etc etc. "we'll restore your hearing!" "you'll hear perfectly!"
the reality: not so much. Many brands (and audiologists) are terrible at helping people hear.
I'm happy to see this move forward, but this solution doesn't sound as rosy as is proclaimed.
Especially when it was pointed out to him that this was a different kind of pinhead.
Even though the transducer is tiny, it can reach volumes of up to 120 decibels.
We've found our next form of torture.
Some people can find the cloud inside every silver lining.
This is dangerous technology. When a hearing aid goes wrong (and they often do), you can just take it off and turn it off. When this machine goes wrong, you lose your remaining hearing in a rather painful way.
TWhen a hearing aid goes wrong (and they often do)
[Citation needed]
You'll probably be able to take it off just like any other device. The implant will be driven by an external transmitter. Remove it, or switch it off, and no more sound.
....of Zippy crammed in my cochlea and shouting non-sequiturs at my eardrum.
The article certainly lacks a clear definition of what is meant by "it can output volumes of up to 120 decibels". I assume they mean something equivalent to a 120 dB SPL sound measured at the entrance to the ear canal.
Here's the thing. It's an implant placed on the round window of the cochlea. So we're talking acoustic/mechanical coupling of solids, not spherical wave radiation. Talking about placing this unit in the ear canal doesn't make sense and implies that you didn't RTFS...say it isn't so , Slashdot.
Not quite direct to the auditory cortex, there are a lot of nerves and synapses between the auditory nerve and the auditory cortex. But this is just from someone who's been studying the peripheral auditory pathways for the past however long, so I may care a little more about those details than most
Our business in life is not to succeed but to continue to fail in high spirits. -- Robert Louis Stevenson