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Everything you should know AFTER THE WEDDING.
Now you have to do something for me… :) you have to pay the invoice.
When payment is done, I'll send your proofbook and your digital negatives (USB & DVD) out to you.
If you like to order Thank You Cards, just follow this link:
Turnaround time: 2-3 weeks
Get an idea of your album included in Plan B:
Turnaround time: 6-8 weeks
If you have any other questions, please send a mail


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Locking in an awards-season push, Entertainment One has set a Nov. 1 U.S. opening for "Diana," the Princess Diana movie starring Naomi Watts, from Embankment Films and Ecosse Films.
"Diana," which focuses on the last two years of the British monach's life, is produced by Ecosse Films' Robert Bernstein and Douglas Rae. "Diana," directed by "Downfall" helmer Oliver Hirschbiegel, is currently in post-production.
Written by Stephen Jeffreys, the movie explores the Princess Diana's relationship with heart surgeon Dr. Hasnat Khan, portrayed by Naveen Andrews ("Lost").
eOne acquired U.S. rights to "Diana" during Cannes. It's also handling the U.K. releases.

subset: commoncrawl


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In my last post, I asked you to consider "turning down the noise" in your business so you could make some space for creativity, growth, awareness. If you're anything like me, you're thinking, "Then what the hell am I going to listen to?" I, too, rely on that noise to keep me comfortable, distracted, busy.
And though I'm not trying to be super-literal here, it was an interesting coincidence that in the middle of thinking about all of this stuff I heard an interview with Don Campbell about his new book (written with Alex Doman), Healing at the Speed of Sound. In the book, Campbell, who wrote the groundbreaking (and, ultimately, controversial) The Mozart Effect, puts forth the theory that by "using" music and silence, you can become more efficient, productive, relaxed, and healthy.
Um, yeah. Sign me up for that.
I realized after hearing the interview how little I actually listen to music these days. When the iPal is on in the kitchen, it's tuned to public radio. When I hike each morning, I listen to Howard Stern. Sometimes in the evening, I'll put on Pandora and have a dance party in the living room with my four-year-old daughter, but "Let's Get It Started" isn't exactly listening music for me.
During the day, I listen to my ever-spinning brain, filling it up on 30-second snippets of noise from the internet in between bouts of writing. Now it's not to say that everything I listen to is noise and junk. It's just that I haven't been very mindful about what I've been listening to.
I thought I'd do an experiment to see if Campbell's theory is right. I downloaded the "Focus & Vitality" soundtrack that he put together to accompany his book. The sales copy for it says that it will "sharpen your mental abilities by stimulating your brain through specially chosen frequencies, tempos, and musical structure."
So every day for the last week, I've listened to it through my headphones off-and-on during my workday. It's mostly classical music—though no composers are mentioned, so it must be original?—with a bit of new age-y stuff tucked in at the end.
I've probably listened to the whole thing about a dozen times since the experiment started, and I have to report that it makes a difference. I don't know how much I can attribute to Campbell's music specifically, but I do feel that having something lovely playing through my headphones keeps me focused on the matter at hand rather than feeling the need to skitter off and go look at whatever amazing video someone's just tweeted about or read another Top Ten Ways to Transform Your Business in a Week!!!!!! post that someone's just tweeted about or, basically, lurk around on Twitter at all.
I'm very happy doing things like, well, writing this post for the Story House blog. I've been promising myself I needed to post more regularly for a long time, and lo and behold, after listening to the soundtrack, I've written two in two weeks.
Now I'm branching out. Have loaded up the Symphonic Classical Period Radio station over on Pandora, though it seems that some of the less allegro-y pieces don't have quite the same "focus & vitality" effect. I'm hoping to create my own Story House soundtrack that will be kind of like the green smoothies I've started making every morning—energizing and good for you.
So a question: What do you listen to when you're being your most productive?


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Welcome to the family and Merry Christmas Nick
JANINE: The last 2 Christmas Eve's we have gone to Philadelphia to save a dog set to be euthanized... and this year we are keeping the tradition alive.
I emailed the shelter this morning asking for a dog that truly needed a Christmas Miracle to survive.
I said that I didn't care who it was. Whether it has behavioral or medical issues . Young or old. Male or female..... and they responded about a dog that frankly surprised me....
This dog doesn't have behavioral issues. He doesn't have medical problems that need addressed- he's a healthy 3 year old male pit mix that was surrendered to the shelter because his family had a baby....
He has sat in a kennel for the past week or so. Stressed. Confused. And depressed.
Needless to say we are heading back to the rescue- with a 65 pound pibble in the back seat of my car - sound asleep. And snoring.
Welcome to the first day of the rest of your life .
Merry Christmas , Nick


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Nick's Lime Tree (Plant Portrait XI*)
On 20 December 2014, musician and writer Nick Cave planted a lime tree on Picnic Point, beside the Ornamental Lake, in Royal Botanic Gardens Melbourne. It was our 103rd commemorative planting, and the first for over a century that didn't involve a governor general, governor, queen, duke, countess, marquis...(you get the idea)...or associate of the botanic gardens.
Even then, in the early twentieth century, there were usually links to title. Opera singer Nellie Melba was a Dame when she planted a Poplar (Populus) in 1903, which has since died, and the pianist and composer Ignacy Paderewski was the third Prime Minister of Poland when in 1904 he planted a Buckeye (Aesculus), still living.
We have a plan now to celebrate people associated with Melbourne who have made a major contribution to the cultural life of Australia and beyond, with or without honorifics. Names on our list include Ron Barrassi, Cate Blanchett, Nick Cave, Barry Humphries, Michael Leunig and Geoffrey Rush (at the moment the gender balance is a bit like the first Federal Coalition Cabinet).
Many Melburnians of my age have grown up, or not, with Nick Cave (pictured here in the Royal Botanic Gardens with a mature Lime Tree). His music has been, almost literally, the soundtrack to our lives: from the The Boys Next Door/The Birthday Party's Mr Clarinet and Zoo Music Girl at student parties or live at the Prince of Wales in St Kilda, through the bands Bad Seeds and Grinderman, to recent musical masterpieces such as Higgs Boson Blues. Along the way there were films, books and other collected materials.
Nick Cave started performing in Melbourne but soon became a musician of the world, and resident of Germany, Brazil and now the UK. His lyrics and novels have been the subject of workshops and academic scrutiny. Earlier this year Gerard Elson, in the magazine Island, compared him to Bob Dylan, Leonard Cohen and the American poet John Berryman. In The Monthly, Robert Forster places Nick Cave at the top of his list of Australian 'rock stars', ever.
Nick's writing and music is by any standard clever, evocative and fun. At its peak it's goose-bumps inducing, whether mellow or murderous. While there are plenty of plant references dotted through Nick's lyrics - he was perhaps the first Australian 'rock' artist to reference nature in this songs - the selection of tree planters is not about plants, and mostly it never has been. It's part of the Royal Botanic Gardens celebrating its place in the cultural life of Melbourne, as well as attracting visitors to a place (for whatever reason) so we can drench them in the beauty and importance of plants.
Nick Cave's significant contribution to art and to Melbourne make him an obvious first choice in this reinventing of the commemorative tree planting program. While others on the list may be better known, we felt it was important with this first choice to pick someone less conventional and a little provocative. Someone who has extended the culture of Melbourne geographically and creatively. Someone who reflects modern Melbourne.
We won't rush the next planting and I expect we'll do one or two a year. I like the idea of linking the tree, at least tangentially, to the person doing the planting but it needs to be a tree we want and to fit into the Gardens landscape.
The tree this time is a Lime, a connection to one of Nick's most moving songs where he says 'I put my hand over hers, down in the Lime Tree Arbour'. This particular lime is called Henry's Lime, Tilia henryana, again a nod to one of Nick's creations, the 1992 album Henry's Dream.
This is the first time we've grown Tilia henryana. It's an Ernest Wilson collected species from China, introduced to the West around 1901 and named after another prolific plant collector, Augustine Henry. The leaves are described as 'sea-green' when mature, glossy above and silvery below. But the new leaves, which you can see now (and pictured at the top of the post), are silvery-pink or copper-coloured, and produced in mid to late summer as well as spring.
So this flush of growth is expected, although perhaps not the best thing to do this time of year in Australia. In his recent book on Henry, Seamus O'Brien describes this species as 'the largest of all the lime trees from western and central China, and without a doubt the most beautiful'.
Thanks Nick. Not quite a Lime Tree Arbour, but a beautiful Henry's Lime to celebrate a major contribution to world culture, from Melbourne.
Notes: I held back on posting this story having already pasted most of the photos in my Facebook page, and with the Sunday Age running a photo story the day after, but the tree is doing so well, and the new growth is so pretty, I can't resist.
*Occasional posts are called Plant Portraits (in brackets after the blog title and marked with an asterisk). These are usually about things other than, but including at least passing reference to, plants. Often they will be inspired by a book or something else in my cultural life. The idea is borrowed (very loosely and with due deference) from Milan Kundera's 'Novels, Existential Soundings', in his Encounters. These essays were as much, or more, about things other than the book being reviewed.
*Occasional posts are called Plant Portraits (in brackets after the blog title and marked with an asterisk). These are usually about things other than, but including at least passing reference to, plants. Often they will be inspired by a book or something else in my cultural life. The idea is borrowed (very loosely and with due deference) from Milan Kundera's 'Novels, Existential Soundings', in his Encounters. These essays were as much, or more, about things other than the book being reviewed.


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International Decision: Situation in the Republic of Kenya No. ICC-01/09-19: Decision on the Authorization of an Investigation
American Journal of International Law, Vol. 105, No. 3, pp. 540-447, 2011
U. of Pittsburgh Legal Studies Research Paper No. 2011-18
Florida International University Legal Studies Research Paper No. 17-32
10 Pages Posted: 19 Aug 2011 Last revised: 13 Oct 2017
Date Written: August 17, 2011
On March 31, 2010, in its first ever decision authorizing a prosecutorial proprio motu investigation, the Pre-Trial Chamber of the International Criminal Court (ICC) granted the ICC Prosecutor permission to investigate the shocking violence which followed Kenya's December 2007 Presidential elections under Article 15 of the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court. The majority of the Chamber ruled that both the contextual and underlying requirements of crimes against humanity had been fulfilled, including that they were committed as part of a state or organizational policy as required by Article7(2)(a) of the Rome Statute. According to the majority, the latter requirement can be satisfied by any non-state actors capable of widespread and systematic attacks against a civilian population that infringes on basic human values. In contrast, in a lucid dissent, Judge Hans Peter-Kaul determined that the state or organizational policy requirement can only be met by organizations bearing state-like qualities. As the prosecution evidence had failed to show the existence of such organizations, he would deny the ICC Prosecutor permission to investigate the alleged crimes against humanity committed in Kenya. This case note summarizes this seminal ICC decision. It sets out why the decision is not only important for any future discussion of the legal elements of crimes against humanity in the ICC, but why it also goes to the very heart of the debate about the role of the fledgling permanent court in the emerging international criminal justice system.
Keywords: International Criminal Court, Pre-Trial Chamber II, decision on the authorization of an investigation in Kenya, proprio motu prosecutorial investigations, crimes against humanity, Article7(2)(a) of the Rome Statute, contextual elements of crimes against humanity, state or organizational policy
JEL Classification: K14, K33, K32, K19, N40
Suggested Citation: Suggested Citation


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Winter Décor Tips
A change of season is the perfect reason to switch up your interior décor and try something new! When the cold and darkness of winter set in, making a few small adjustments can not only brighten up the room, but also keep things feeling cozier! Seasonal adjustments are also very versatile. Adding little budget friendly accessories can be a quick way to give the room a wintery feel just for that season, while bigger investment pieces can be used to change the atmosphere of your home every year. Try some of these decorative tricks to let the charm of winter in, while still keeping the cold out!
A cozy fireplace
On chilly winter nights, nothing beats the warmth of a fireplace at home. For some people, the ability to lounge in front of a real flame any time they like is worth the price, effort and risk of installing an actual fireplace. Those seeking a lower maintenance option but still hoping for that permanent warm center piece might prefer a large electric fireplace. These are an investment that can be used each year without restructuring the room or increasing the risk of house fire quite as high as a real open fire. For a more temporary and cost effective option, try a smaller portable electric fireplace. This way, the warmth can be moved throughout the home or stored away when the weather warms up, but the heat provided is more authentic than that of a cheap space heater. Any of these options offers a seasonally stylish way of keeping a little warmer than usual.
Warm rugs on cold surfaces
Stepping onto wooden or tile floors on a cold winter morning is enough to wake anyone up too quickly! Adding thick, comfortable rugs to these surfaces is both fashionable and functional for the winter months. Not only is a rug an opportunity for some new texture and color in order to update your interior decor, but it also insulates the room and decreases the number of cold, bare surfaces that you'll have to walk on before the house warms up each morning. Try placing rugs of different colors, materials, and weights in the entry way, bathroom and kitchen for easy but diverse looks throughout the house. Choose a neutral, hand woven wool rug for a more classic investment piece, or a brightly colored rug made of simpler material for a trendy, more affordable accent piece. When the mornings get less bitter and the floors feel less icy, roll the rugs up and store them away for next winter's brisk mornings!
Stylish throw blankets
Once again, fashion and function can be balanced throughout the house by using throw blankets as both a temporary solution for the chills and a seasonal change in aesthetic. Place blankets of different thicknesses, materials, and colors throughout the house, draped stylishly across chairs, hung on the backs of sofas, or folded nicely on foot stools and ottomans. Not only will the blankets give a cozy, cabin-like feel, but they'll also be handy to curl up in for visiting guests or whoever might feel a chill. Try placing a thicker blanket in a warm winter color on the end of a bed for the guest who gets cold in the night or laying a large blanket in more a cheerful hue on the couch to brighten up the room while you share it with a loved one during a movie. When the weather gets warmer, pack the blankets away for next year!
Insulate with drapes
Even in new homes with good seals, heat can escape through big windows and cold air can make its way into your home. One stylish way to control this is to swap your light curtains for thick winter drapes. This will both help keep cold air at bay, and also provide an opportunity for yet another winter décor accent. Choose a heavy textured material in a deep purple, green, or burgundy to physically and aesthetically warm up the room, or thick smooth fabric in an accent color that coordinates with the rest of your scheme. With such a visible adjustment, try not to choose something too bright in the middle of winter, or the drapes will look out of place and out of season. When things begin to thaw, you can choose to simply draw back the drapes to let in air but keep the color, or switch them completely for an airier spring fabric and shade!
Balance colors, textures, and materials
Each of these decorative techniques has involved choosing seasonal colors or fabric weights and textures. Even if you're not adding or changing noticeable pieces like large rugs and living room drapes, playing with small bits of color, texture, and material can be a simple way to make subtle décor changes for a new season. Choosing different combinations can enable you to incorporate a wintery atmosphere into your room without letting it feel cold like the weather outside. For example, placing comfortable white throw pillows that are reminiscent of the snow adds a nice season-appropriate touch, but the décor can still be kept warm by placing a decorative bowl made of dark wood on the coffee table flanked by deep burgundy candles that give a slight cinnamon scent. The colors and textures balance the look somewhere between letting the season in, and keeping the cold out.
Lights for decoration and function
During the darkest time of the year, changing the lights in a room can, once again, be both functional and fashionable. Darkness comes earlier in the winter, so the actual need for more light in most rooms is increased. Lights for decoration, however, don't have to just be for Christmas! Try a small new table lamp with a warmly colored shade that matches your other winter décor, or a string of small, subtle icicle lights framing the bed's headboard or wound around the stand of a tall lamp. Adding a bit of new light will literally brighten up the room without changing your décor too drastically or expensively for one season.
Combine techniques!
These are just a few methods of changing your interior décor for the winter months! Changes in color, light, and texture will do wonders for keeping the atmosphere in your home warm and bright throughout the winter, without blocking out the beauty of the season.


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Business Columns & Blogs
Post-attack updates for Windows XP
Q: With the recent ransomware attacks, I was wondering if Microsoft will once again have security updates for Windows XP. There are millions of people who are still using XP, and it is one way hackers can use to infect newer computers, especially if XP is no longer secure.
A: The global WannaCry ransomware attack that hit unpatched Windows systems in May and spread rapidly around the world over the course of several hours did prompt Microsoft to issue a security update for its retired Windows XP system; that fix also blocks last week's Petya worm. Do not expect regular updates, however.
According to Microsoft, the decision to release updates for Windows XP was an exception based on threat risks and the potential effect on its customers, and does not signal a change to its policy. The company recommends that customers upgrade to the latest version of Windows.
Perhaps the safest way to still use an old XP machine is to disconnect it from the internet and relegate it to being a PC gaming console or an offline word processor directly connected to a local printer. As the years go on, finding programs for the outdated system (first introduced back in 2001) will be difficult, as most companies stopped developing software for Windows XP years ago.
For example, Mozilla Firefox is one of the few major web browsers that still support Windows XP, although the company says it will provide Firefox security updates only until September. If you want to keep using a Windows XP machine on the internet, third-party security software may be the only shield you have left from online threats. Avast and Kaspersky are two companies that still offer XP-compatible programs.
Find My Friends App and Android Phone
Q: Can an Android phone work with the iPhone's Find My Friends app?
A: By using the iOS location services feature, Apple's free Find My Friends app displays the whereabouts of participating friends and family on a map, but it is not really a cross-platform program. The app is designed to work with iPhones, iPads and iPod Touch devices running iOS 8 or later, as well as Apple Watches with watchOS 3 and browsers logged into iCloud.com.
You may be able to view iPhone users from an Android phone by requesting the desktop version of iCloud.com and logging in with an Apple ID, but things can be easier. Third-party apps that work on both Android and iOS are one solution — Familonet Family Locator and Safety, Glympse, GeoZilla and Life360 are among the free or inexpensive programs; all offer real-time location sharing, messaging and other features. Snapchat recently introduced its Snap Map tool for its users to find each other, but make sure you understand the privacy implications before using it.
This year, Google announced it had added real-time location sharing to its Google Maps app for Android and iOS, as well as for desktop and mobile web browsers. If all the users involved have Google accounts (even if they do not use Android hardware), make sure their Gmail addresses are in your Google Contacts list. Then open the Google Maps app, select the menu button in the upper-left corner and tap Share Location.
Add the people you want to include, select the amount of time you wish to be visible to them and tap the Share button. (If your friends and family do not have Google accounts, you can send them a temporary map link instead.) To see the shared locations, open the Google Maps menu again, select Share Location and choose the name of the person in your sharing list.


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We aim to make parents, children and young people welcome and provide for their needs.
During services
There is a space near the door where infants can be taken if needed. This is resourced with colourful books and other resources.
Play and Praise
Play and Praise is held on the 3rd Tuesday each month, between 10:00am and 10:45am. Service of songs, stories and prayer for babies and children up to school age with their carers. Followed by coffee, juice and biscuits.
Messy Church
2nd Sunday each month at 4:00pm
We begin with cake and a drink. Activities follow at 4:30pm and we end with an informal act of worship in the church.
A group for young people in school years 4 to 9, where friendships can be made and the Christian faith explored. We meet in the Church Hall on the 2nd and 4th Sundays of the month between 5:30pm and 6:45pm. Young people do not need to be accompanied by an adult.
Safeguarding Children and Vulnerable Adults
For more information on our Safeguarding policies, please see our dedicated page.


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We've been talking about the new Disney 3D movie A Christmas Carol since the first poster came out during Cannes earlier this year. With Robert Zemeckis (Polar Express) directing and Jim Carrey (Ace Ventura) starring as Ebenezer Scrooge, the Charles Dickens' classic tale is sure to be a hit with audiences.
Today we bring you the official teaser trailer for A Christmas Carol as well as the first TV spot and a new still for you to enjoy.
Enough talking, let's watch the trailer.
And now the TV spot:
And finally, the new still from A Christmas Carol:
There is no denying that the imagery used is glorious and will look outstanding on an IMAX screen but we can only hope that the use of 3D technology is the same as in UP and helps enhance the movie and not make it gimmicky. I admit that I was a bit hesitant at first to be excited for this film for that very reason but I'm slowly coming around.
The details of the characters on screen, especially Scrooge, are astounding and amazingly high in places. Although there is still work to be done with some of the other human faces, it would appear that the majority of the work was spent Carrey's motion capture of Scrooge (or the other 7 characters he plays in this movie!). Makes sense, it is after all, a part written for him.
What do you think of the new trailer for A Christmas Carol? Does it sway you into watching it in theaters or are you still "Bah! Humbug!" about it?
Disney's A Christmas Carol haunts theaters November 6th, 2009.


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The loss of sensation in your feet that is attributed to diabetic neuropathy may not only cause discomfort and difficulty maintaining a full and active life, but can also be quite dangerous, leading to serious complications, and even amputation.
Without feeling in your foot, you can sustain an injury and not even realize it. Even the smallest of wounds has the potential to become a major problem when you consider that poor blood flow, also associated with diabetes, can further stall the healing process and invite a dangerous ulcer to develop.
In addition, you could break a bone in your foot without being aware of it and continue to walk on the injury, causing even further damage. This could lead to Charcot foot, a condition in which bones in your foot collapse.
Unnoticed, and therefore untreated, situations such as these can result in lengthy hospital stays and even the loss of a limb. Knowing the dangers that come from diabetic neuropathy is the first step in avoiding them, and taking precautionary measures is vital.
- Stay diligent with daily foot inspections and make an appointment immediately if you notice anything out of the ordinary.
- Always check inside your shoes before putting them on to ensure there is nothing inside them that could cause irritation or injury.
- Make sure shoes fit properly so they do not rub or irritate feet, and wear them all the time to protect your feet from harm.
- Stay on top of good hygiene. Keep feet clean and dry. Trim nails straight across and even with tips of toes. Moisturize skin to avoid dryness and cracks.
- Make good lifestyle choices. Don't smoke! Manage your weight and blood sugar levels with a healthy diet. Exercise daily to keep your blood flowing and reduce risk of infection.
- Finally, schedule regular checkups with Dr. Brian McDowell to ensure early detection and prompt treatment, keeping small issues from turning into big problems.
Dial (916) 961-3434 to reach our Carmichael, CA office, or use our contact form online to ask us any questions or to schedule a visit. Diabetic neuropathy holds many dangers, but we can help you stay safe and live a healthy life.


text: leff321 2 Posted October 31, 2013 I am so lucky to have the dream rig :-) I just bought the external cab to my combo dt25 and wow!!... Its running so much smoother with to cabs rather than one. Much more headroom too! This must be because of the 4 ohm? So much richer sound and louder :-) I am using pod hd 500x, jtv-69 (korean) and dt25. But there is somethings I dont like... its the the emulated sounds on the jtv-69... When I use the magnetic picups it sound so much better. They only sounds ok with overdrive. What do you think? For me the sound is glassy or dull like behind some curtains, and the hollow body is not possible to use at all. Could it be something wrong? (I know this should be asked in the variax forum, but this post was originaly about the dream rig :-)) Share this post Link to post Share on other sites


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Better than Crouching Tiger?? I've
Better than Crouching Tiger??
I've had Hero on my list of anticipated films for a while, and
James just sent me a big Time article which has raised my
expectations even further. For one thing, the film's title
has been solidified. Early reports indicated that it was titled
Heroes, but now it's just plain Hero.
Why the hype?
The director is Zhang Yimou, the man behind Raise the Red
Lantern, Ju Dou, To Live, and The Road Home, among other
classics. It's his first martial arts film, but that didn't stop
Ang Lee from achieving success. And Yimou is ambitious:
like Lee, he aims to reinvent the genre.
The cast reads like the Asian Ocean's Eleven cast:
Jet Li, Maggie Cheung, Tone Leung, Zhang Ziyi, Donnie
The cinematographer is Christopher Doyle, who has done amazing
work with Wong Kar Wai, most recently on In the Mood for Love.
What's more, he gets the chance to film in 3 different thematic
colors, red, white, and blue, to represent the views of 3 different
Emi Wada, who won an Oscar for Ran, is providing costumes.
Tan Dun, Oscar winner for Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, will
score the film.
For those who are not familiar with these vets of
Asian cinema, it's as if the entire group of celebrities who
did the Sept. 11 Tribute to America got together to make
a movie directed by Steven Spielberg.
The stable of talent in Asia at all levels of the film industry is
thinner, and perhaps that's the reason that we fans of the genre
are fortunate enough to see many collaborations b/t the stars
of that industry. It's much tougher in the United States to get
a whole bunch of big stars together on a film because of salary
and schedule constraints. And ego. In Asian films, we've seen
just about every combination possible. Well, Jet Li and Chow Yun
Fat haven't done anything together. Maybe we'll see that
someday too.


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Allergy and Immunology Patient Services
At Mount Sinai, our experts provide comprehensive care to pediatric and adult patients, suffering from various allergies and immune disorders. Some of our specialized services and programs include:
- Primary Immune Deficiency Program
- Jaffe Food Allergy Institute
- Therapeutic Infusion Center for immune diseases
Additionally, our immunologists remain on the cutting edge of research. They have participated in the study of new treatments for many conditions, including Crohn's Disease and rheumatoid arthritis. They are also investigating the root causes of primary immune deficiency disease, inflammatory bowel disease, food hypersensitivity, food-related anaphylaxis, and allergic dermatitis.
Members of the AI-FPA are also developing new strategies for treating food allergies, including working with recombinant protein engineering and plasmid DNA.


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Dazzling diamonds are encrusted in a prong setting and soldered onto a delicate gold chain.
This personalized necklace is great for layering or can be worn alone.
(M initial shown. Please specify the initial desired in the comment box upon checkout)
Customize your own crew necklace with various initials or a word and choose their placement. $350 per additional pavé letter. Please specify the initials desired in the comment box upon checkout.
Letter measures approximately 6mm long
Diamond carat weight 0.05
Necklace measures 16" long with adjustment at 15" and 14"
14k yellow Gold
Every item over $500 comes packaged in our high quality Anzie Jewelry box customized to the shape of the piece you order.
Returns will be accepted for exchange, anzie.com credit or refund for up to 14 business days from the date of receipt. If an item is returned after 14 days but prior to 30 business days, only an exchange or merchandise credit will be granted. Shipping and duty charges will not be credited upon return of merchandise. *Exceptions may apply. View Terms & Conditions for full details.
Enjoy free standard shipping & returns on orders of $100 or more before taxes. Returns are accepted within 14 days of receipt (exclusions may apply). For more details, please refer to our return policy.


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Methods ARTICLE
Use of high resolution 3D diffusion tensor imaging to study brain white matter development in live neonatal rats
- 1 Department of Radiology, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Chapel Hill, NC, USA
- 2 Biomedical Research Imaging Center, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Chapel Hill, NC, USA
- 3 Department of Psychology, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Chapel Hill, NC, USA
- 4 Department of Psychiatry, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Chapel Hill, NC, USA
High resolution diffusion tensor imaging (DTI) can provide important information on brain development, yet it is challenging in live neonatal rats due to the small size of neonatal brain and motion-sensitive nature of DTI. Imaging in live neonatal rats has clear advantages over fixed brain scans, as longitudinal and functional studies would be feasible to understand neuro-developmental abnormalities. In this study, we developed imaging strategies that can be used to obtain high resolution 3D DTI images in live neonatal rats at postnatal day 5 (PND5) and PND14, using only 3 h of imaging acquisition time. An optimized 3D DTI pulse sequence and appropriate animal setup to minimize physiological motion artifacts are the keys to successful high resolution 3D DTI imaging. Thus, a 3D rapid acquisition relaxation enhancement DTI sequence with twin navigator echoes was implemented to accelerate imaging acquisition time and minimize motion artifacts. It has been suggested that neonatal mammals possess a unique ability to tolerate mild-to-moderate hypothermia and hypoxia without long term impact. Thus, we additionally utilized this ability to minimize motion artifacts in magnetic resonance images by carefully suppressing the respiratory rate to around 15/min for PND5 and 30/min for PND14 using mild-to-moderate hypothermia. These imaging strategies have been successfully implemented to study how the effect of cocaine exposure in dams might affect brain development in their rat pups. Image quality resulting from this in vivo DTI study was comparable to ex vivo scans. fractional anisotropy values were also similar between the live and fixed brain scans. The capability of acquiring high quality in vivo DTI imaging offers a valuable opportunity to study many neurological disorders in brain development in an authentic living environment.
High resolution non-invasive imaging on live neonatal rodents is a highly desirable tool in neurological development studies, as it can provide full representation of 3D neuroanatomy and allow for longitudinal studies. The spatio-temporal maturation pattern of the rodent brain obtained using such neuroimaging methods affords valuable information in the identification of normal, as well as abnormal, brain developmental features. Magnetic resonance (MR) diffusion tensor imaging (DTI) is a quantitative and non-invasive imaging technique reflecting the magnitude and direction of water molecule diffusion in tissues. DTI offers a unique non-invasive window into the process of brain maturation (Le Bihan et al., 1986; Basser and Pierpaoli, 1996) using a set of water diffusion related parameters, including fractional anisotropy (FA), radial diffusivity (RD), axial diffusivity (AD), and mean diffusivity (MD). FA reflects water diffusion anisotropy due to the differences among diffusitivities along the three principal directions. As a result of the presence of orderly arranged axon and myelin sheaths within white matter fiber tracts, FA values are usually higher in white matter structures than surrounding brain regions. MD is an averaged measure of local water diffusivity.
Due to the presence of myelin sheaths and microstructural components of axons in white matter, water molecules move more freely along than perpendicularly to the long axis of the white matter fiber. This phenomenon is known as anisotropic diffusion. Though anisotropic diffusion can still be detected in a white matter dysmyelination mouse model (shiverer mice), it is significantly lower in the fixed brains of shiverer mice than that of wild-type (Tyszka et al., 2006). It has been suggested that both myelination and intact axon structures contribute to diffusion anisotropy (Mori et al., 2001; Neil et al., 2002; Zhang et al., 2003; Tyszka et al., 2006). Thus, data gleaned from DTI is directly linked to the anatomic organization and microstructural features of white matter fiber tracts (Basser et al., 1994); information that cannot be obtained through conventional MRI T1 or T2 images.
Aside from traditional DTI techniques, 3D high resolution DTI MRI (Adolph, 1948) on intact rodent brains provides a 3D characterization of tissue samples in a non-destructive way and therefore is free from sectioning-related artifacts (Mori et al., 2001) when compared to histological methods. Moreover, unlike the labor intensive histological methods, high resolution 3D DTI of the whole brain is obtained during one scan session and can be "sliced" in any orientation desired. Therefore, it potentially plays an important role in neonatal developmental studies (Neil et al., 1998; Mori et al., 2001; Zhang et al., 2003; Bockhorst et al., 2008). Since DTI MR imaging utilizes strong magnetic gradients to generate imaging contrast based on small water molecule diffusion, it is inherently extremely sensitive to motion induced artifacts. Furthermore, in order to acquire high resolution DTI images, historically, long acquisition times (>10 h) have to be utilized for both diffusion and spatial encoding. These two major limitations make 3D DTI imaging difficult for live animals (Schick, 1997; Mori and van Zijl, 1998; Xue et al., 1999; Mori et al., 2001).
Thus far, most studies have been performed in ex vivo fixed brain specimen (Zhang et al., 2003, 2005; Verma et al., 2005; Tyszka et al., 2006; Huang et al., 2008; Aggarwal et al., 2010; Jiang and Johnson, 2010). DTI imaging on live neonatal rodents offers many advantages over fixed brain specimen scans. First, it provides information in an authentic physiological environment without the effects of brain fixation. Second, it allows for a longitudinal follow-up study to probe the temporal change of brain development or disease progress in the same animals, leading to more statistical power without the need of sacrificing a large number of animals.
Currently, efforts have been made toward DTI imaging of live rodents. However, most of these studies are multi-slice 2D DTI imaging-based, using either conventional spin echo or echo planar imaging (EPI) spin echo sequences (Sun et al., 2003, 2005; Chahboune et al., 2007, 2009; Bockhorst et al., 2008; Kim et al., 2009). Compared with 3D acquisition mode, it is difficult to achieve less than 0.5 mm through-plane resolution in such images, due to the limitation of the radio-frequency (RF) excitation slice profile in 2D acquisition. For perspective, it has been demonstrated that 0.5 mm is in the range of the width of corpus callosum (from 0.327 to 0.751 mm) of 3-month Purdue-Wistar rats (Fitch et al., 1990). Many studies have shown that spatial resolution can affect the accuracy of FA calculation (Kim et al., 2006). Additionally, partial-volume-effects can lead to an underestimation of FA, and thus inaccurate assessment of spatio-temporal changes of white matter. This problem, which is exacerbated particularly in the neonatal rodent brain due to its small size, can be mitigated by high resolution 3D imaging. Thus far, only a few studies have successfully performed 3D DTI imaging in live adult rodent brains using a DTI rapid acquisition relaxation enhancement (RARE) based approach (Xue et al., 1999; Aggarwal et al., 2010). Due to the high respiratory rates of neonatals, it is even more challenging to achieve high resolution DTI in neonatal rat pups.
In this study, we have investigated tactics which may facilitate the acquisition of high resolution 3D DTI imaging in neonatal rats. We have found that an optimized 3D DTI RARE method, with motion and eddy current artifacts correction using twin navigator echoes phase correction strategy (Xue et al., 1999), can allow for a 3D DTI acquisition within a few hours (∼3 h). It has been suggested that mammalian neonatal can tolerate mild-to-moderate hypothermia and hypoxia when compared to their adult counterparts (Adolph, 1969; Singer, 1999). Thus, we used mild-to-moderate hypothermia to minimize motion artifacts in MR images by carefully suppressing the respiratory rate to 15/min for postnatal day 5 (PND5) and 30/min for PND14. In this paper, we explored the feasibility of acquiring high resolution 3D DTI images in live neonatal rats at two different ages using these strategies. Image quality and various DTI parameters of the live neonatal rat scans were compared with those of postmortem fixed brain scans at the same ages.
Materials and Methods
MRI Pulse Sequence
Conventional 3D Stejskal–Tanner spin echo DTI acquisition can achieve high resolution images. However, the long acquisition time (10 h or more) and highly motion-sensitive nature limit its usage mainly on postmortem imaging. Two major DTI acquisition approaches, diffusion weighed EPI/SPIRAL (DW–EPI/SPIRAL) and diffusion weighed rapid acquisition relaxation enhancement (DW–RARE) methods, can be employed to accelerate the acquisition time by a factor of 2–10 when compared to the conventional diffusion weighed spin echo pulse sequence (Turner and Lebihan, 1990; Muller et al., 1994; Schick, 1997; Mori and van Zijl, 1998; Pipe et al., 2002; Liu et al., 2004; Frank et al., 2010). By refocusing the echoes using a series of 180° RF pulses, the advantage of DW–RARE over the DW–EPI/SPIRAL pulse sequence is that it is less sensitive to signal loss and image distortion caused by the field inhomogeneity, a feature that is critically important for small-animal high resolution 3D DTI study using high magnetic fields (Pipe et al., 2002; Deng et al., 2008; Sarlls and Pierpaoli, 2008). However, motion artifacts augmented by the diffusion sensitizing gradients may degrade image quality through the different magnetization pathways generated by multiple 180° RF pulses for the DW–RARE method. Proper strategies need to be taken to minimize such artifacts.
Similar to the approach proposed by Mori and van Zijl (1998), a 3D DTI RARE sequence with twin navigator echoes was implemented on a Bruker horizontal bore 9.4 T scanner (BioSpec 9.4/30 USR, Bruker Biospin, Billerica, MA, USA). A pair of diffusion gradients was applied around the first 180° RF pulse. The strength and direction of diffusion gradients were set according to the input b value and diffusion directions. Moreover, to remove the stimulated echo pathways that did not have correct diffusion encoding, crusher gradients with varying magnitudes and polarities were applied around each 180° refocusing RF pulse. The bandwidth of the 180° refocus RF pulse was set at two to three times larger than that of the excitation 90° RF pulse to minimize the stimulated echoes induced by the imperfect refocus pulse. Two navigator echoes were acquired after the imaging echoes to correct for motion and eddy current artifacts (Mori and van Zijl, 1998). The acquisition parameters were: TR = 700 ms; the first RARE echo was assigned to the k-space center, effective TE = 23.662 ms; RARE echo spacing = 11.9 ms.
The total imaging time is inversely proportionate to the RARE factor. However, we cannot use a very high RARE factor in this DTI RARE sequence due to the fact that the stimulated echo pathway in high RARE factor readout becomes more complex and difficult to be removed, leading to the poor image quality. Using phantom studies, we empirically determined that a RARE factor of three yields a good trade-off between acquisition speed and sharpness of images for in vivo neonatal animal scans.
Diffusion gradient duration δ = 6.5 ms, diffusion gradient separation Δ = 12.72 ms, field of view (FOV) = 27 mm × 19.2 mm × 11 mm, matrix size = 180 × 128 × 55, the resolution = 0.15 mm × 0.15 mm × 0.2 mm, readout direction: H–F, phase encoding direction: L–R, slab encoding direction: A–P. The twin navigator echoes were used to correct for the phase incoherence between the odd and even echoes to alleviate the motion and eddy current effects (Mori and van Zijl, 1998). A 72-mm volume coil and a surface coil were used for RF transmission and signal receiving, respectively, under an actively decoupled cross-coil routine mode. Finally, the data was interpolated to the final matrix size 360 × 256 × 128 to achieve a nominal spatial resolution around 0.075 mm × 0.075 mm × 0.1 mm.
In vivo Animal Scan
This methods described were designed for a study (P01DA022446) to determine how the effect of prenatal cocaine exposure may affect a rat pup's brain development. The animal scanning protocol was approved by Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee (IACUC) of University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Twelve Sprague-Dawley PND5 (average weight 9.6 ± 1.1 g) and 30 PND14 (average weight 32.3 ± 2.3 g) rats were studied. Male and female subjects were in pairs from the same litter. Anesthesia was induced using 3% isoflurane mixed with oxygen. For maintaining anesthesia in neonatal rats, isoflurane level was adjusted in the range of 0.6–1.5 to keep the respiratory rate within a target range. The body surface of PND5 pups was covered in 100% pure petroleum jelly (Vi-Jon Laboratories, Inc, St. Louis, MO 63114, USA) to prevent skin dehydration during image acquisition. The lower jaw of PND5 pups was secured to reduce the bulk of the motion, and reinforced by padding around the head. The room temperature of the MR scanner room was set at 22°C. Animal respiration and surface body temperature were continuously monitored using a MR compatible small-animal monitoring system SAII 1025L (SAII Instruments, Inc, Stony Brook, NY 11790, USA). In this study, body surface temperatures were obtained from abdomen region, and maintained in the range of 24–26°C and 33°C for PND5 and PND14 pups, respectively, using a circulating water heating system. Thus, since the normal body surface temperature of rat pups ranges from 35 to 37°C, the PND5 and PND14 pups were under moderate and mild hypothermic conditions, respectively. Respiratory rates were maintained at about 15/min and 30/min in PND5 and PND14 pups, respectively. A mouse head surface coil and a rat head phase array surface coil were used for imaging PND5 and PND14 rat pups, respectively. Six non-collinear diffusion encoding directions with b = 1000 s/mm2 images and one baseline reference b = 0 image were acquired for the in vivo DTI scans. The diffusion b values were set to 1000 s/mm2 for the in vivo scans. The total scan time was 3 h 10 min, which is reduced by a factor of three compared to conventional DW–SE pulse sequences used to acquire the same resolution DTI images.
Postmortem Fixed Brain Scan
Tissues were collected from both PND5 and PND14 rats following standard cardiac puncture perfusions while under anesthesia [150 g/kg sodium pentobarbital (sigma)], first with 1.5 mL/min phosphate-buffered saline (PBS) followed by 1.5 mL/min 4% paraformaldehyde. The intact head was then excised and placed in 4% paraformaldehyde. The specimens were placed in PBS solution and stored at 4°C at least 12 h before MR imaging. All fixed tissue was equilibrated to room temperature for several hours prior to imaging of the whole head. The sample temperatures were measured to be 21 ± 0.2°C. Similar acquisition parameters of 3D DTI RARE pulse sequence were used for DTI acquisition in fixed brain specimen. In total, one baseline reference scan and 21 diffusion encoding directions were utilized. Since the paraformaldehyde fixation reduces water mobility in tissue (Sun et al., 2003, 2005), a higher b value (b = 1600 s/mm2) was utilized for the postmortem fixed brain DTI. The fixed brains were scanned at room temperature and the total image acquisition time was about 10 h.
Comparison between in vivo and ex vivo Scans
Since the postmortem scans were free of physiological motion-related artifacts, these scans were used to quantitatively evaluate the image quality of the in vivo scans. Two independent raters performed their evaluation by examining the extent of motion artifact, signal loss in images, overall noise, and other artifacts in multiple brain regions. Using the fixed brain specimen DTI scans as references, in vivo DTI images with very little motion artifact, negligible ringing artifact, and little or no signal loss were rated good, or otherwise rated poor. Scan successful rate was defined as the ratio of good data set to total data set.
The signal to noise ratio (SNR) in the b = 0 reference and diffusion scans was computed and compared between images acquired from the in vivo and ex vivo scans. The chemical fixation procedure changed many tissue MR properties, including T1, T2, and ADC, leading to altered MR signal intensity in the images of the fixed postmortem brains (Sun et al., 2003, 2005; Yong-Hing et al., 2005; Shepherd et al., 2009). Taking these factors into consideration in the SNR comparison, we computed the adjusted SNR for the ex vivo fixed brain as SNRadjusted = Sadjusted/σ, where σ is the SD of the background Gaussian noise, and Sadjusted is the adjusted MR signal. The adjust MR signal is computed as
where S is the measured MR signal from the postmortem brain, and the subscripts "fixed" and "live" refer to the MR properties for the fixed and live tissues, respectively.
Assuming a Dlive of 1 × 10−3 mm2/s, a T1live of 1800 ms, a T2live of 40 ms and a proton density M0live of 1.0 for the in vivo scans, and a Dfixed of 0.3 × 10−3 mm2/s, a T1fixed of 1400 ms, a T2fixed of 32 ms and a proton density M0fixed of 0.85 for the ex vivo scans using previously published literature values (de Graaf et al., 2006; Shepherd et al., 2009), we computed SNRadjusted for the ex vivo images. A two tail t-test was used to compare FA, MD, and SNR between the in vivo and ex vivo scans.
All DTI data were processed using DTI Studio software (www.mristudio.org). MD and FA were computed using ROIs ranging from 20 to 24 pixels (0.0113–0.0135 mm3), placed in the genu of corpus callosum (gcc), body of corpus callosum (bcc), splenium of corpus callosum (scc). DTI tractography was performed using the gcc ROI as the seed point, and the tracking algorithm was terminated when the FA value was below 0.25. The allowed maximum turn angle for adjacent voxels was set to 70° to minimize the occurrence of spurious fiber orientations caused by noise.
All PND5 and PND14 rat pups recovered 10–30 min after MR scans (∼3.5 h) with a zero mortality rate. Representative in vivo images and ex vivo brain DTI images are demonstrated in Figure 1 and the computed diffusion indices, such as FA and MD are shown in Figure 2. The two independent raters had the same ratings in 40 out of a total of 42 scans (a 95.2% agreement). For the two cases that two raters initially disagreed, consensus was reached after discussion. After reaching consensus, images acquired from 10 out of 12 PND5 and 27 out of 30 PND14 rats were rated as "good," resulting in success rates of 83 and 90% for the PND5 and PND14 pups, respectively. Though the overall image quality of the in vivo scans was comparable to that of the ex vivo scans, more ringing artifacts were observed in the b = 0 and diffusion weighted raw images as demonstrated in Figure 1. However, these remaining artifacts have very little effect on DTI indices as shown in Figure 2.
Figure 1. The comparison of b = 0 and diffusion weighted images between the ex vivo scan and the in vivo scans. (A) Ex vivo baseline b = 0 image; (B) ex vivo diffusion weighted image; (C) in vivo baseline b = 0 image; (D) in vivo diffusion weighted image. The axial, sagittal, and coronal plane images are shown clockwise.
Figure 2. The comparison of FA and MD maps between the ex vivo and the in vivo scan. (A) Ex vivo baseline image. (B) Ex vivo diffusion weighted image (C) in vivo baseline image (D) in vivo diffusion weighted image. The axial, sagittal, and coronal plane images are shown clockwise.
As shown in Figure 2, major white matter fibers depicted in the FA maps were similar between the in vivo and the ex vivo scans. Conversely, the contrast between gray and white matter was more pronounced in the ex vivo than in the in vivo MD images, suggesting that MD had a greater reduction within white matter during the chemical fixation.
Figure 3 demonstrates the efficacy of motion correction using the twin navigator echoes. Due primarily to respiration and pulsatile motion of large blood vessels near the ventral side, it was expected that more motion artifact might occur in slices close to the ventral side (Figure 3C) when compared to the dorsal side of the head (Figure 3A). After the twin navigator echo motion correction, signal loss was recovered, and the background noise was reduced as marked by the arrows in Figures 3B,D. Though DTI image quality has been improved after the dual echo navigator correction, some residual motion artifacts can still be observed.
Figure 3. The comparison before and after twin navigator echo correction. (A) A slice of the dorsal side before (A) and after (B) correction; (C) a slice of the ventral side before (C) and after (D) correction. Motion artifacts were minimized after the twin navigator echo correction as marked by the arrow.
Tables 1 and 2 shows the FA and MD values from the in vivo and ex vivo scans in several anatomical regions: gcc, bcc, scc. There was no statistically significant difference in the FA value between the in vivo and the ex vivo scans, while MD values were significantly lower (P < 0.05) in the ex vivo scans, in agreement with previous findings (Sun et al., 2003, 2005). Moreover, there was no significant difference between the SNR of the in vivo scans and the adjusted SNR of the ex vivo scans for both the baseline and diffusion weighted images, as shown in Table 3.
Table 1. Fractional anisotropy comparison between the in vivo and the ex vivo scans for PND5 and PND14 rat pups.
Table 2. Mean diffusivity (unit: 10−3 mm2/s) comparison between in viv o and ex vivo scans for PND5 and PND14 scans.
Figure 4 shows the fiber tracking results in live and postmortem fixed brain DTI images. The major fiber bundle of corpus callosum can be readily obtained in PND5 and PND14 live DTI images. The tracked fibers showed very similar patterns between the in vivo and the ex vivo scans for both the PND5 and PND14 groups.
Recent studies have shown that a Periodically Rotated Overlapping ParallEL Lines with Enhanced Reconstruction (PROPELLER) and its recent modified form with split acquisition of fast spin echo signal for diffusion imaging (SPLICE) pulse sequence techniques (Schick, 1997; Deng et al., 2008) are intrinsically motion insensitive because these methods are self-navigated. These techniques have been successfully applied for abdominal DTI study. Though this is a very promising technique, it has several limitations. First, 1.5 times longer image acquisition time is needed for PROPELLER acquisition compared with conventional sampling for a 2D acquisition (Pipe et al., 2002). To achieve a high resolution 3D DTI, blade sampling needs to be performed on a 3D sphere, resulting in a dramatically increased image acquisition time. Second, non-Cartesian k-space sampling is utilized in PROPELLER and SPLICE methods. The k-space regridding is usually required for image reconstruction and any system imperfection will cause image blurring by degrading the point spread function of k-space. In contrast, the DTI RARE sequence uses multiple 180° pulses to refocus the signal and a Cartesian k-space sampling is obtained. This approach is not sensitive to geometric distortion and signal reduction caused by background susceptibility artifacts. The image reconstruction is straightforward and rapid. The disadvantage of DTI RARE is its sensitivity to motion artifacts. By physically suppressing the respiratory motion using hypothermia together with twin navigator echo motion correction, we have demonstrated that high quality DTI images can be obtained in vivo from rat pups. In our study, the experimentally measured SNR of in vivo scans is only slightly lower than that of the ex vivo scans, further indicating that the image quality of the in vivo rat pup scans are comparable to that of the postmortem fixed ex vivo brain scans.
Diffusion Encoding Directions
In this study, we used 21 and 6 non-collinear diffusion gradient directions for the ex vivo and in vivo scans, respectively. More diffusion encoding directions could be used for the in vivo study if a longer DTI image acquisition time was possible. Six diffusion encoding directions is the least number of directions for DTI computation assuming a simple ellipsoid tensor model. It does not provide sufficient information to resolve fiber crossing in DTI. The high angular resolution diffusion imaging (HARDI) approach has been proposed to overcome this problem by using a large number of diffusion encoding directions at an expense of increasing the imaging acquisition time (Tuch et al., 2002). We only performed a six diffusion encoding acquisition for in vivo scans due to the following reasons. First, we needed to obtain high resolution 3D DTI images with a time constraint of a few hours to reduce the risk of damaging the very young rat pups. Second, based on the established white matter atlas in both human and rodents (Chuang et al., 2011; Nowinski et al., 2011), the white matter tracks in rodent brain do not have as many fiber crossing regions as those in human brain. Third, our study mainly focused on major white matter regions in which fiber crossing is less likely to be found. We qualitatively compared the tracked fiber within major white matter regions such as corpus callosum between the in vivo and the ex vivo scans. We have found that major white matter fibers in both PND5 and PND14 pups can be readily obtained from the in vivo scans using less than one-third of the data acquisition time/diffusion encoding directions when compared to the ex vivo fixed brain scans. This suggests that the imaging acquisition tactics developed in this study can be utilized to acquire DTI images in live rat pups reliably and consistently.
Motion Correction
We adopted the twin navigator echo navigator method developed by Mori and van Zijl (1998) to alleviate the motion effect in our 3D DTI RARE sequence. This approach assumes a constant phase variation between the odd and even echoes induced by motion or eddy current. As demonstrated in Figure 3, image quality has been improved with recovered signal and reduced noise after the correction. However, since the assumption of constant phase variation between odd and even echoes did not always hold true in the in vivo scans, residual motion artifacts were still observed, as shown in Figure 3. To further minimize the motion artifacts, 2D navigator correction (Porter and Heidemann, 2009) may be explored in the future.
We did not use respiratory gating to minimize motion effects for several reasons. The TR of the 3D DTI RARE sequence was kept relatively short (700 ms) to achieve a 3-h total acquisition time and respiratory gating may lengthen image acquisition quite substantially. The respiratory rate of a neonatal rat pup may change during the 3-h acquisition window, leading to variations in the effective TR. If TR is short (as in our study), these variations are not negligible, and can result in signal variations and inaccurate calculation of DTI indices. In our study, we found that respiration gating did not yield good quality images if the respiratory rate is high. On the other hand, suppressing respiratory rates without gating was adequate to achieve virtually motion artifacts free images.
It is more challenging to acquire high quality 3D DTI images in live PND5 pups compared to PND14 rats. It has been suggested that mammalian neonatal can tolerate severe hypoxia and hypothermia for a longer time compared to their adult counterparts (Adolph, 1969; Singer, 1999). In a study investigating the survival rate of neonatal rats in a pure nitrogen environment (Adolph, 1969), Adolph demonstrated that 0 to 5-day-old rats could survive in such an environment for 1–2 h when the colonic temperature was cooled down to 8–10°C, while in 11 to 16-day-old rats, the optimal body temperature for survival increased to 20°C and endurance time decreased to 0.5 h. These findings provided the base of utilizing hypothermia for PND5 DTI. The neuroprotective effects of the mild-to-moderate hypothermia have been firmly established (Adolph, 1969; Blackmon and Stark, 2006). Additionally, hypothermia reduces the metabolic rate and further minimizes physiological motion. In our study, we found that a low level of isoflurane (0.6–0.8%) in conjunction with hypothermia was sufficient to keep most PND5 pups under anesthesia and to maintain a respiratory rate around 15/min.
Other Issues
The direct advantage of improving the resolution is to reduce the partial volume effect, making the diffusion indices calculation more accurate. Lee et al. (2006) reported much lower FA values in major white matter using low resolution DTI images (∼1 mm in plane and 0.5 through-plane resolution) at 1.5 T. They correctly ascribe it to the partial volume effect. The mean FA values of corpus callosum in our study are higher than those in a brain development study to investigate the temporal change of DTI indices from PND0 to PND56 rats reported by Bockhorst et al. (2008) using a spatial resolution of 0.27 mm × 0.27 mm × 0.5 mm.
A higher RARE factor could further increase the speed of image acquisition. However, the stimulated echo pathway becomes more complex and more difficult to be removed along with an increase of RARE factor, leading to the poor image quality. In an empirical phantom study, we found that a RARE factor of three was a good trade-off between acquisition speed and sharpness of images for in vivo neonatal animal scans (data not shown). To further improve the speed of the image acquisition, a 3D diffusion weighed gradient and spin echo (3D DW–GRASE) could be implemented. The GRASE sequence is a combination of segmented EPI and fast spin echo, interleaving the short EPI echo readout train with RF refocusing pulses. A 3D DW–GRASE provides a compromise between signal loss due to the field inhomogeneity in gradient echoes and the interference of stimulated echoes by refocus RF pulses in spin echoes. Aggarwal et al. (2010) have explored a DW–GRASE approach that yields a four times acceleration using two refocus pulses and two gradient echoes.
In this study, we have demonstrated that an optimized 3D DTI RARE approach and an appropriate animal setup minimizing respiration motion are the keys to achieving high quality 3D DTI images in live animals. Taking advantage of the distinct physiological characteristic that neonatal rats can survive low body temperatures, we have demonstrated that mild-to-moderate hypothermia can be utilized to suppress physiological motion artifacts to achieve good quality DTI images.
Conflict of Interest Statement
The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest.
The work described was supported in part by awards P01DA022446 (Josephine M. Johns) and F31DA026251 (Martin A. Styner) from the National Institutes on Drug Abuse. The content is solely the responsibility of the authors and does not necessarily represent the official views of the National Institutes on Drug Abuse or the National Institutes of Health. We thank Drs. Susumu Mori and Jiangyang Zhang for their valuable suggestions regarding the MR pulse sequence. NICHD P30 HD03110 awarded to J. Piven.
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Keywords: magnetic resonance imaging, diffusion tensor imaging, brain development, white matter, neonatal rats
Citation: Cai Y, McMurray MS, Oguz I, Yuan H, Styner MA, Lin W, Johns JM and An H (2011) Use of high resolution 3D diffusion tensor imaging to study brain white matter development in live neonatal rats. Front. Psychiatry 2:54. doi: 10.3389/fpsyt.2011.00054
Received: 26 February 2011;
Accepted: 21 September 2011;
Published online: 10 October 2011.
Edited by:Sheryl Moy, University of North Carolina, USA
Reviewed by:Istvan Pirko, Mayo Clinic, USA
Copyright: © 2011 Cai, McMurray, Oguz, Yuan, Styner, Lin, Johns and An. This is an open-access article subject to a non-exclusive license between the authors and Frontiers Media SA, which permits use, distribution and reproduction in other forums, provided the original authors and source are credited and other Frontiers conditions are complied with.
*Correspondence: Hongyu An, Department of Radiology, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, 106 Mason Farm Road, CB#7515, Chapel Hill, NC 27599, USA. e-mail: firstname.lastname@example.com


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Film Title Origin & Setting
NYOGON is set in the dry Sahel lands of the southern region of the storied nation of Mali in West Africa. It will feature three languages: English, French, and Bambara, the main tongue of southern Mali. In this language, "nyogon" (written as "ɲɔgɔn" in Bambara and pronounced "nee-yo-gawn") means "together". Coincidentally, "nyo" means "millet/grain". This film features a type of sorghum grain variety that has manifested and spread through the power of community, so it is only fitting that the film's title reflect the relationship between seed and community. As the Malian adage attests, "One finger cannot lift a stone."
N'PAN, who founded the rural southern Mali village of Dissan as a settler hundreds of years ago, guides us in spiritual form in this story of individuals who seek to find a seed that can save Dissan from climate change and hunger.
Dr. SCOTT LACY, the ardent American anthropologist born and raised in rural Ohio, joins in on this fight against hunger, by fate rather than choice, as he sees it. He teams up with local scientists and local leading farmer and two-decade long friend BURAMA SANGARÉ. After being forced to evacuate after becoming gravely ill during a Peace Corps stint in Dissan in 1994, Scott vows to return with skills to aid those who gave his life purpose. He obtains a PhD and returns years later to find his beloved friends facing serious food supply problems.
After years of painstaking trial and error, the collaborative plant‐breeding model that Burama and Scott implement together produces a drought‐resistant seed whose harvests save the households of Dissan. Burama and Scott conclude that this self‐sustaining model of knowledge-exchange between plant breeders and farmers could represent the future of agriculture.
Moreover, it just may in fact be able to serve and save communities in other regions of the world within the contexts of those regions' ecologies and cultures. This includes the United States, a nation already dealing with the challenges produced by climate change: unpredictable heavy storms, irregular seasonal temperatures, and massive drought in California. We can learn from what is happening in Dissan.
Success with Burama and Scott's work comes with a price, however, and the future of farmers like Burama still hangs in the balance. Current intellectual property rights agreements for plant variety protection exclude farmers from the right to own, grow, save, and distribute "protected" varieties. Farmers like Burama need to be granted ownership of such varieties to ensure long‐term food security without becoming dependent on culture‐eroding global markets, transnational corporate interference, and government‐funded farming programs, especially in the current politically turbulent atmosphere in today's Mali.
Scientific Background of the Film
The endemic poverty and climate change experienced in rural southern Mali are not unique in today's developing world. In Dissan, a village consisting of a community of farming households founded in the 17th or 18th century, elders have seen local annual rainfall decline by over 25% (total rainfall and duration of rainy season), resulting in crop varieties they once relied on to feed their families to become food staples of the past. "We used to grow sorghum that was as thick as your arm!" says village elder Sanba Sangaré. Sorghum was domesticated in Africa and today is a main dry‐land cereal crop that is relatively heat and drought resistant. Studies confirm Sangaré's observations, as the uncertainty of rainfall in the Sahel region has increased since the 1980's. This highly variable rainfall has contributed to marginal soil fertility in the region as well. As a result, these problems have noticeably reduced food security in Dissan and surrounding areas.
The mid‐20th century movement known as the Green Revolution failed in sub‐Saharan Africa, as the lab‐created seeds require less variable soil conditions than seen in regions like Mali and several inputs such as fertilizer and pesticides that the poorest of the poor cannot afford. Clearly, mass‐produced and expensive homogenized seed production is not a realistic solution in more arid world regions like sub‐Saharan Mali.
Individually, neither scientists nor farmers have yet to significantly reduce endemic hunger and poverty in Mali, but more recently these two distinct groups have joined forces through an innovative approach known as participatory plant breeding (PPB). Participatory plant breeders argue that the controlled conditions of the lab (research station) creates crop varieties incapable of adapting to the dynamic and challenging growing environments facing poor rural farmers in places like Mali. Over the past decade, PPB has produced compelling and successful case studies, for both farmers and plant breeders. By involving local farmer "seek seekers" like Burama Sangaré of Dissan, a main actor in this film, plant breeders from the International Crops Research Institute for the Semi‐Arid Tropics (ICRISAT) utilize local knowledge and farming expertise to create seed varieties that farmers actually will want to plant, harvest, and eat. The farmers then save such seed and share it using local traditional market systems of exchange; conversely, other GMO forms of agriculture yield seeds do not reproduce, thereby forcing farmers to become dependent on outside market mechanisms, contributing to losing ownership in the process and their traditional forms of livelihood and culture.
Why this film and why now? Why does this film matter?
Nyogon: together (pronounced "Nee‐yo‐gawn") intends to show how Burama Sangaré and the village of Dissan are already successfully dealing with climate change and hunger issues and how its farmers, plant‐breeding collaborators, and local knowledge can teach and prepare the rest of us in the developed world, who may very well be approaching an unpredictable future on a grander scale in scope and populations affected, as many predict could happen by the 2040's and 2050's in the West. Moreover, all of this can be done independently from transnational corporate agribusiness influence and invasive global markets.
Despite such successes, looming issues remain pertaining to the intellectual property rights (IPR) of seeds and plant variety protection (PVP) produced through the PPB system. American anthropology professor Scott M. Lacy, a main character in the film who has conducted agricultural research in Dissan for two decades, reasons that this collaborative process (along with international intellectual property rights agreements) raises new questions about the ownership of "collaborative seed" and the distribution of risk and benefits among impoverished farmers and their scientist partners. Lacy's research describes how formal bodies such as International Union for the Protection of New Varieties of Plants (UPOV) take ownership of seed and the means of production out of the hands of farmers like Burama Sangaré while increasing the rights of breeders. On the contrary, farmer systems of PVP are more in line with actual biological principals in plant breeding and seed production and "open source" local traditions. In the latter system, farmers own the seeds produced through the PPB method in order to own the means of production and thus be the primary agents in their work life agenda and can feed themselves. Under the UPOV system, however, such farmers would lose their status as producers and thus be subject to global markets and consumers of expensive and aggressively protected seed, having to pay royalties to breeders and/or obtain a grower's license. The UPOV farmer's act of 1979, which allowed farmers to save and exchange seed for their own use, was nullified in 1991. As a result, many areas of the world have become victims to the current paradigm, such as in México, Perú, or India.
The recent political coup d'tat and revolution in Mali has rendered previous negotiations with UPOV on alert for revision or dismissal, so the future of PVP policies in Mali hang in the balance and the future of rural farmers like Burama Sangaré are unclear and the very methods that he deploys so effectively are at risk of being deemed "illegal". Overall, Nyogon confronts all these issues head on and offers a possible solution as to how to deal with the often neglected food security crisis plaguing sub-Saharan Africa.


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Some may vaguely remember.
EVERYWHERE (Rixstep) — He's sitting quietly at an embassy in London. Most people don't even think of him from day to day. But this Australian Huckleberry Finn has done more to open our world and to open our minds than anyone. Our world is different today, and it wouldn't be what it is today without the contribution he made.
Some people may vaguely remember the book 'Underground' put online by Suelette Dreyfuss. They may remember that cool opening with the 'WANK' worm perpetrated on NASA. Hopefully their funny bones were tickled!
\__ ____________ _____ ________ ____ ____ __ _____/
\ \ \ /\ / / / /\ \ | \ \ | | | | / / /
\ \ \ / \ / / / /__\ \ | |\ \ | | | |/ / /
\ \ \/ /\ \/ / / ______ \ | | \ \| | | |\ \ /
\_\ /__\ /____/ /______\ \____| |__\ | |____| |_\ \_/
\ /
\ Your System Has Been Officially WANKed /
You talk of times of peace for all, and then prepare for war.
They might remember the concluding chapters where the corruption in the Australian courts was exposed.
Most will not have remembered the name of Suelette's friend, the technical consultant on that book.
The name reemerged in 2010, a watershed year for humans on the planet. In the ultimate 1-2-3 punch, a scarcely known and mostly anonymous organisation known as WikiLeaks gave the world the horrific video Collateral Murder, then 75,000 documents on the US war in Afghanistan, and then hundreds of thousands of documents on the US war in Iraq.
Then, as a finishing touch, after having suffered the slings and arrows of the bullies exposed as liars, they splatted on the world hundreds of thousands of US diplomatic cables. The tyrants of the world were not only exposed as liars and murderers, they were now embarrassed.
It was fitting, it was sweet, and it was well deserved.
All through that autumn, those who spent time online learned about the new topology of the 'web' and 'civilisation'. They used WikiLeaks to get the truth, they used it to learn how to dig up the truth on their own, and they used 'social media' to share that truth with others. Rick Falkvinge's idea of 'lateral information sharing' became a reality.
Suelette's friend won every conceivable award that year, save the Nobel Peace Prize and TIME's POTY. People soon learned why he wasn't to get the NPP and why TIME would override public opinion to give theirs to - Mark Zuckerberg? And so they learned of the shadowed vested interests who were the enemies of the people.
There have been considerable scraps since then. People have seen incompetence replaced by outright evil. They've seen the pathological liar DDB and the calculated liars of the Guardian. They've seen the grovelers like Bill Keller. And they've learned that their world isn't that simple, and they've learned that they have to fight and persist to get the world they so desperately want.
But they know they're in the right place. They can see the finish line now. And that's a great step forward.
Suelette's friend's birthday is 3 July. That's a long way off. But he's got a lot to celebrate, and so do we. Perhaps we should celebrate with him, and thank him for being so incredibly gutsy.
See AlsoJustice4Assange.comAssange Defence Fund
WikiLeaks: Support WikiLeaks
The Police Protocol (Translated)
Rixstep: JA/WL (Assange/WikiLeaks)
Rixstep: Assange/WikiLeaks RSS Feed
Radsoft: Assange/WikiLeaks RSS Feed


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Flag Ranch - we provide lifetime care.
- Date of Birth: 1995
- Sex: Mare
- Breed: Argentine Criollo
- Color: Dark Bay
- Markings: Crescent moon-shaped star
Turra is a polo pony who came to us in 2014 from the same loving family who placed Manteca with us. A sweet and fun-loving mare, she pranced off the trailer to begin her new life. She can often be spotted trotting from hay pile to hay pile with a "kerchief" of hay trailing from her mouth.


text:
Monthly Archives: April 2011
Getting real about rhino conservation
We all know that rhinos are seriously threatened with extinction in the wild. Rhinos are poached for their horns, which are sold to Asian consumers.
About Michael 't Sas-Rolfes
Message from the author
I have been passionate about wildlife conservation and ecology for more than 30 years. Instead of following the usual career path…
Common Myths
Rhino horn is used as an aphrodisiac
This is a Western media myth! Rhino horn is used for various medicinal and ornamental purposes in Asia, and this use is deeply entrenched…


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If you intend to secure a payday loan, you are going to need to have your employment record in shape. Most lenders in Bristol require a minimum of three months continuous employment for a loan. The lender will need you to provide solid evidence that you have a job and will be able to cover your debt.
The best way to handle payday loans is not to have to take them. Do your best to save a little money every week, so that you have a something to fall back on in an emergency. You will eliminate the need for using a payday loan service if you can save the money for an emergency.
If you are applying for a payday loan online, make sure that you call and speak with an agent before entering any information into the site. Many scammers pretend to be payday loan agencies in order to get your money, so you want to make sure that you can reach an actual person.
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Make sure you can pay your payday loan back within three weeks. If your desired loan amount is higher than what you can repay in three weeks, you should consider other loan alternatives. You may be able to locate other lenders in Bristol to work with, and you may also find that your current creditors might be willing to be more flexible about your repayment obligations.
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Ask those you know and trust for help before turning to payday lenders in Bristol for a hand. Even if you can't borrow all you need from friends and family, you might lower the amount of your payday loan. You can save some cash on the interest rate so you will not be on the hook for as much money.
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It could be a convenient tool in some situations if you understand the concept of using a payday loan. You should be sure to read the loan contract thoroughly before signing it, and if there are questions about any of the requirements ask for clarification of the terms before you sign it.
Are you Interested in getting a payday loan as soon as possible? Either way, now you understand that getting a payday loan is an option for you. You do not have to worry about not having enough money to take care of your finances in the future again. If you decide to take out a payday loan, and you should be fine, just remember to play it smart.
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Since Riley has graduated to being off leash, we haven't used the long training lead in a long time. I almost forgot we had it. Now Grace has joined our family, and she isn't quite trusted off leash yet, so it's back! We have a nice grassy area outside our place (our complex has a tiny dog park, but most the time there's a lot of poop, because the lazy people we live around can't pick it up...grumpy?... just a little). So I gathered the dogs, toys and camera and went outside to play!
*Side note* In the past Riley has shown very little interest in fetch, maybe 3-4 throws and he loses interest. Grace on the other hand loves to play fetch, so now what does Riley like to do? FETCH! Silly dogs! LOL
"I got the toy mom!"
Look at that focus!
How high can you fly!?
"Hey, whatcha got there?"
Hover dogs are Hovering!
"I is a rabbit!"
Some advice from Grace
Sometimes you just need to stop and have a good roll in the grass.
"I'll show you how it's done!"
It's good for the body....
mind .....
and soul!
"See, now don't you feel better?"
It brings out your inner beauty!
"I haz a happy"
"Same here"