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Parental smoking puts nearly half a million UK children into poverty
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May 29, 2015
BioMed Central
Smoking is not only bad for your health; it also puts 400,000 children in poverty in the UK alone. Smoking places a financial burden on low income families, suggesting that parents are likely to forgo basic household and food necessities in order to fund their addiction.
Smoking is not only bad for your health; it also puts 400,000 children in poverty. Smoking places a financial burden on low income families, suggesting that parents are likely to forgo basic household and food necessities in order to fund their addiction, according to UK research published in the open access journal BMC Public Health.
This is the first UK study to highlight the extent to which smoking exacerbates child poverty. The findings are based on national surveys which estimate the number of children living in poverty by household structure. In 1999, the UK government announced a target to abolish child poverty by 2020, though this target is unlikely to be met. It is therefore crucial to identify avoidable factors that contribute to and worsen child poverty.
"Smoking reduces the income available for families to feed, clothe and otherwise care for their children living in low-income households. This study demonstrates that if our government, and our health services, prioritized treating smoking dependence, it could have a major effect on child poverty as well as health," says lead author, Dr Tessa Langley from the UK Centre for Tobacco and Alcohol Studies at the University of Nottingham.
Smoking is an expensive habit and one that impoverishes millions of people around the world. In the US, smokers spend less on housing than non-smokers and recent research in India showed that smoking cuts spending on food, education, and entertainment.
This new study estimates that 1.1 million children in the UK, almost half of all children in poverty, were living with at least one parent who smokes. A further 400,000 would be classed as being in poverty if parental tobacco expenditure were subtracted from household income.
In July 2014, the weighted average price of 20 cigarettes in the UK was £7 (GB). Although many smokers save money by opting for budget brands or switching to hand rolling tobacco, the cost of their smoking is still a substantial drain on the budgets of families living on low incomes. "The poverty threshold income level for a two parent household with two children is £392. If both parents are smokers, these households will be spending an average of £50 on tobacco per week, which is a big drain on an already tight budget," says Tessa Langley.
This is a key opportunity for the UK Government to take action to improve the lives of millions of children. "Tobacco control interventions to encourage low income smokers to quit, would not only improve health but also alleviate poverty," says Tessa Langley. Future studies are needed to determine what families sacrifice to sustain their habit, whether they do without fresh fruit or food in general; heating bills or clothing. This would provide a better picture on the burden of smoking in poor households.
Story Source:
The above story is based on materials provided by BioMed Central. Note: Materials may be edited for content and length.
Journal Reference:
- Charmaine Belvin, John Britton, John Holmes, Tessa Langley. Parental smoking and child poverty in the UK: an analysis of national survey data. BMC Public Health, 2015; 15 (1) DOI: 10.1186/s12889-015-1797-z
Source: BioMed Central. "Parental smoking puts nearly half a million UK children into poverty." ScienceDaily. ScienceDaily, 29 May 2015. <www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2015/05/150529083538.htm>.
Little-known quake, tsunami hazards lurk offshore of Southern California
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May 29, 2015
American Geophysical Union
While their attention may be inland on the San Andreas Fault, residents of coastal Southern California could be surprised by very large earthquakes — and even tsunamis — from several major faults that lie offshore, a new study finds.
While their attention may be inland on the San Andreas Fault, residents of coastal Southern California could be surprised by very large earthquakes — and even tsunamis — from several major faults that lie offshore, a new study finds.
The latest research into the little known, fault-riddled, undersea landscape off of Southern California and northern Baja California has revealed more worrisome details about a tectonic train wreck in the Earth's crust with the potential for magnitude 7.9 to 8.0 earthquakes. The new study supports the likelihood that these vertical fault zones have displaced the seafloor in the past, which means they could send out tsunami-generating pulses towards the nearby coastal mega-city of Los Angeles and neighboring San Diego.
"We're dealing with continental collision," said geologist Mark Legg of Legg Geophysical in Huntington Beach, California, regarding the cause of the offshore danger. "That's fundamental. That's why we have this mess of a complicated logjam."
Legg is the lead author of the new analysis accepted for publication in theJournal of Geophysical Research: Earth Surface, a journal of the American Geophysical Union. He is also one of a handful of geologists who have been trying for decades to piece together the complicated picture of what lies beyond Southern California's famous beaches.
The logjam Legg referred to is composed of blocks of the Earth's crust caught in the ongoing tectonic battle between the North American tectonic plate and the Pacific plate. The blocks are wedged together all the way from the San Andreas Fault on the east, to the edge of the continental shelf on the west, from 150 to 200 kilometers (90 to 125 miles) offshore. These chunks of crust get squeezed and rotated as the Pacific plate slides northwest, away from California, relative to the North American plate. The mostly underwater part of this region is called the California Continental Borderland, and includes the Channel Islands.
By combining older seafloor data and digital seismic data from earthquakes along with 4,500 kilometers (2,796 miles) of new seafloor depth measurements, or bathymetry, collected in 2010, Legg and his colleagues were able to take a closer look at the structure of two of the larger seafloor faults in the Borderland: the Santa Cruz-Catalina Ridge Fault and the Ferrelo Fault. What they were searching for are signs, like those seen along the San Andreas, that indicate how much the faults have slipped over time and whether some of that slippage caused some of the seafloor to thrust upwards.
What they found along the Santa Cruz-Catalina Ridge Fault are ridges, valleys and other clear signs that the fragmented, blocky crust has been lifted upward, while also slipping sideways like the plates along the San Andreas Fault do. Further out to sea, the Ferrelo Fault zone showed thrust faulting — which is an upwards movement of one side of the fault. The vertical movement means that blocks of crust are being compressed as well as sliding horizontally relative to each other-what Legg describes as "transpression."
Compression comes from the blocks of the Borderland being dragged northwest, but then slamming into the roots of the Transverse Ranges — which are east-west running mountains north and west of Los Angeles. In fact, the logjam has helped build the Transverse Ranges, Legg explained.
"The Transverse Ranges rose quickly, like a mini Himalaya," Legg said.
The real Himalaya arose from a tectonic-plate collision in which the crumpled crust on both sides piled up into fast-growing, steep mountains rather than getting pushed down into Earth's mantle as happens at some plate boundaries.
As Southern California's pile-up continues, the plate movements that build up seismic stress on the San Andreas are also putting stress on the long Santa Cruz-Catalina Ridge and Ferrelo Faults. And there is no reason to believe that those faults and others in the Borderlands can't rupture in the same manner as the San Andreas, said Legg.
"Such large faults could even have the potential of a magnitude 8 quake," said geologist Christopher Sorlien of the University of California at Santa Barbara, who is not a co-author on the new paper.
"This continental shelf off California is not like other continental shelves — like in the Eastern U.S.," said Sorlien.
Whereas most continental shelves are about twice as wide and inactive, like that off the U.S. Atlantic coast, the California continental shelf is very narrow and is dominated by active faults and tectonics. In fact, it's unlike most continental shelves in the world, he said. It's also one of the least well mapped and understood. "It's essentially terra incognita."
"This is one of the only parts of the continental shelf of the 48 contiguous states that didn't have complete … high-resolution bathymetry years ago," Sorlien said.
And that's why getting a better handle on the hazards posed by the Borderland's undersea faults has been long in coming and slow to catch on, even among earth scientists, he said.
NOAA was working on complete high-resolution bathymetry of the U.S. Exclusive Economic Zone — the waters within 200 miles of shore — until the budget was cut, said Legg. That left out Southern California and left researchers like himself using whatever bits and pieces of smaller surveys to assemble a picture of what's going on in the Borderland, he explained.
"We've got high resolution maps of the surface of Mars," Legg said, "yet we still don't have decent bathymetry for our own backyard."
Story Source:
The above story is based on materials provided by American Geophysical Union. Note: Materials may be edited for content and length.
Journal Reference:
- Mark Legg, Monica D. Kohler, Natsumi Shintaku, Dayanthie Weeraratne.High-resolution mapping of two large-scale transpressional fault zones in the California Continental Borderland: Santa Cruz-Catalina Ridge and Ferrelo faults. Journal of Geophysical Research: Earth Surface, 2015; DOI: 10.1002/2014JF003322
Source: American Geophysical Union. "Little-known quake, tsunami hazards lurk offshore of Southern California." ScienceDaily. ScienceDaily, 29 May 2015. <www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2015/05/150529131822.htm>.
May 27, 2015
University of Sheffield
Breast cancer is a disease that commonly spreads to other areas of the body; the most common site for the disease to spread is the bone. Leading scientists have identified a possible key to preventing secondary cancers in breast cancer patients, after discovering an enzyme that enhances the spread of the disease. They also report that an existing class of drugs for osteoporosis could stop the spread of the disease.
Leading scientists from the University of Sheffield and University of Copenhagen have identified a possible key to preventing secondary cancers in breast cancer patients, after discovering an enzyme which enhances the spread of the disease.
Secondary (metastatic) breast cancer is the main cause of the 12,000 deaths which occur from breast cancer in the UK every year.
The most common site for the disease to spread is the bone — occurring in around 85 per cent of secondary breast cancer patients.
The new research, which was conducted at The Institute of Cancer Research, London, found that the enzyme LysYl Oxidase (LOX) released from the primary tumor causes holes in bone and prepares the bone for the future arrival of cancer cells.
The findings suggest that identifying LOX in estrogen receptor negative (ER negative) breast cancer patients early, could allow doctors to block the enzyme's activity, preventing bone damage and the spread of tumor cells to the bone (metastasis), halting the progression of the disease.
The researchers also showed that treatment with bisphosphonate, an existing class of drug which prevents the loss of bone mass and is already used to treat diseases such as osteoporosis, was able to prevent the changes in the bone and the spread of the disease in mice.
The pioneering research, co-led by Dr Alison Gartland at the University of Sheffield's Department of Human Metabolism, could lead to a better prognosis for cancer patients in the longer term.
Dr Gartland said: "This is important progress in the fight against breast cancer metastasis and these findings could lead to new treatments to stop secondary breast tumors growing in the bone, increasing the chances of survival for thousands of patients.
"We are really excited about our results that show breast cancer tumors send out signals to destroy the bone before cancer cells get there in order to prepare the bone for the cancer cells' arrival.
"The next step is to find out exactly how the tumor secreted LOX interacts with bone cells to be able to develop new drugs to stop the formation of the bone lesions and cancer metastasis. This could also have implications for how we treat other bone diseases too."
Study co-leader Dr Janine Erler, formerly Team Leader in Cancer Biology at The Institute of Cancer Research, London, who now is Associate Professor at the Biotech Research & Innovation Centre (BRIC) at the University of Copenhagen, said: "Once cancer spreads to the bone it is very difficult to treat. Our research has shed light on the way breast cancer cells prime the bone so it is ready for their arrival. If we were able to block this process and translate our work to the clinic, we could stop breast cancer in its tracks thereby extending patients' lives."
The research, funded by Breast Cancer Campaign, Cancer Research UK, Novo nordisk foundation, Danish cancer society, lundbeck foundation, and both universities, is published in the journal Nature.
Katherine Woods, Senior Research Communications Manager at Breast Cancer Campaign and Breakthrough Breast Cancer, said: "By unveiling the role that the protein LOX is playing, these results open up a whole new avenue for research and treatments that could stop breast cancer spreading to the bone. The research also adds weight to the growing body of evidence supporting the role of bisphosphonates in stopping secondary breast cancer in its tracks.
"The reality of living with secondary breast cancer in the bone is a stark one, which leaves many women with bone pain and fractures that need extensive surgery just when they need to be making the most of the time they have left with friends and family."
She added: "Secondary breast cancer kills 1,000 women each and every month in the UK alone and yet we still don't know enough about how and why breast cancer spreads to stop it.
"Our newly-formed charity is determined that by 2050, no one will lose their life to breast cancer and we'll do this by ramping up our research efforts, in this area in particular, doing everything possible to achieve that goal."
Story Source:
The above story is based on materials provided by University of Sheffield.Note: Materials may be edited for content and length.
Journal Reference:
- Janine T. Erler et al. The hypoxic cancer secretome induces pre-metastatic bone lesions through lysyl oxidase. Nature, May 2015 DOI: 10.1038/nature14492
Source: University of Sheffield. "Scientists identify key to preventing secondary cancers." ScienceDaily. ScienceDaily, 27 May 2015. <www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2015/05/150527133953.htm>.
Supernovas help 'clean' galaxies
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May 26, 2015
Michigan State University
Astronomers have found that the black holes located at the cores of galaxies launch fountains of charged particles, which can stir up gas throughout the galaxy and temporarily interrupt star formation. But unless something intervenes, the gas will eventually cool and start forming stars again.
Supernovas just might be the maid service of the universe. It seems these explosions that mark the end of a star's life work hand-in-hand with supermassive black holes to sweep out gas and shut down galaxies' star-forming factories.
Recent research, led by Michigan State University astronomers, finds that the black holes located at the cores of galaxies launch fountains of charged particles, which can stir up gas throughout the galaxy and temporarily interrupt star formation.
But unless something intervenes, the gas will eventually cool and start forming stars again.
One mega-outburst from the black hole, though, could heat the gas surrounding the galaxy enough to let supernovas take over and mop up the mess. A celestial cleaning partnership might help astronomers understand why some massive galaxies stopped forming stars billions of years ago.
"Our previous research had shown that black-hole outbursts can limit star formation in massive galaxies, but they can't completely shut it off," said team leader Mark Voit, MSU professor of physics and astronomy in the College of Natural Science. "Something else needs to keep sweeping out the gas that dying stars continually dump into a galaxy, and supernova sweeping appears to work perfectly for that."
Other members of the research team are Megan Donahue, MSU professor of physics and astronomy; Brian O'Shea, MSU associate professor of physics and astronomy; Greg Bryan, Columbia University professor of astronomy; Ming Sun, University of Alabama in Huntsville assistant professor of physics; and Norbert Werner, Stanford University research associate.
Story Source:
The above story is based on materials provided by Michigan State University. Note: Materials may be edited for content and length.
Journal Reference:
- G. Mark Voit, Megan Donahue, Brian W. O'Shea, Greg L. Bryan, Ming Sun, Norbert Werner. SUPERNOVA SWEEPING AND BLACK HOLE FEEDBACK IN ELLIPTICAL GALAXIES. The Astrophysical Journal, 2015; 803 (2): L21 DOI: 10.1088/2041-8205/803/2/L21
Source: Michigan State University. "Supernovas help 'clean' galaxies." ScienceDaily. ScienceDaily, 26 May 2015. <www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2015/05/150526155720.htm>.
DNA double helix does double duty in assembling arrays of nanoparticles
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May 25, 2015
Brookhaven National Laboratory
In a new twist on the use of DNA in nanoscale construction, scientists put synthetic strands of the biological material to work in two ways: They used ropelike configurations of the DNA double helix to form a rigid geometrical framework, and added dangling pieces of single-stranded DNA to glue nanoparticles in place.
In a new twist on the use of DNA in nanoscale construction, scientists at the U.S. Department of Energy's (DOE) Brookhaven National Laboratory and collaborators put synthetic strands of the biological material to work in two ways: They used ropelike configurations of the DNA double helix to form a rigid geometrical framework, and added dangling pieces of single-stranded DNA to glue nanoparticles in place.
The method, described in the journal Nature Nanotechnology, produced predictable clusters and arrays of nanoparticles–an important step toward the design of materials with tailored structures and functions for applications in energy, optics, and medicine.
"These arrays of nanoparticles with predictable geometric configurations are somewhat analogous to molecules made of atoms," said Brookhaven physicist Oleg Gang, who led the project at the Lab's Center for Functional Nanomaterials, a DOE Office of Science User Facility. "While atoms form molecules based on the nature of their chemical bonds, there has been no easy way to impose such a specific spatial binding scheme on nanoparticles. This is exactly the problem that our method addresses."
Using the new method, the scientists say they can potentially orchestrate the arrangements of different types of nanoparticles to take advantage of collective or synergistic effects. Examples could include materials that regulate energy flow, rotate light, or deliver biomolecules.
"We may be able to design materials that mimic nature's machinery to harvest solar energy, or manipulate light for telecommunications applications, or design novel catalysts for speeding up a variety of chemical reactions," Gang said.
The scientists demonstrated the technique to engineer nanoparticle architectures using an octahedral scaffold with particles positioned in precise locations on the scaffold according to the specificity of DNA coding. The designs included two different arrangements of the same set of particles, where each configuration had different optical characteristics. They also used the geometrical clusters as building blocks for larger arrays, including linear chains and two-dimensional planar sheets.
"Our work demonstrates the versatility of this approach and opens up numerous exciting opportunities for high-yield precision assembly of tailored 3D building blocks in which multiple nanoparticles of different structures and functions can be integrated," said CFN scientist Ye Tian, one of the lead authors on the paper.
Details of assembly
This nanoscale construction approach takes advantage of two key characteristics of the DNA molecule: the twisted-ladder double helix shape, and the natural tendency of strands with complementary bases (the A, T, G, and C letters of the genetic code) to pair up in a precise way.
First, the scientists created bundles of six double-helix molecules, then put four of these bundles together to make a stable, somewhat rigid building material–similar to the way individual fibrous strands are woven together to make a very strong rope. The scientists then used these ropelike girders to form the frame of three-dimensional octahedrons, "stapling" the linear DNA chains together with hundreds of short complementary DNA strands.
"We refer to these as DNA origami octahedrons," Gang said.
To make it possible to "glue" nanoparticles to the 3D frames, the scientists engineered each of the original six-helix bundles to have one helix with an extra single-stranded piece of DNA sticking out from both ends. When assembled into the 3D octahedrons, each vertex of the frame had a few of these "sticky end" tethers available for binding with objects coated with complementary DNA strands.
"When nanoparticles coated with single strand tethers are mixed with the DNA origami octahedrons, the 'free' pieces of DNA find one another so the bases can pair up according to the rules of the DNA complementarity code. Thus the specifically DNA-encoded particles can find their correspondingly designed place on the octahedron vertices" Gang said.
The scientists can change what binds to each vertex by changing the DNA sequences encoded on the tethers. In one experiment, they encoded the same sequence on all the octahedron's tethers, and attached strands with a complementary sequence to gold nanoparticles. The result: One gold nanoparticle attached to each of octahedron's six vertices.
In additional experiments the scientists changed the sequence of some vertices and used complementary strands on different kinds of particles, illustrating that they could direct the assembly and arrangement of the particles in a very precise way. In one case they made two different arrangements of the same three pairs of particles of different sizes, producing products with different optical properties. They were even able to use DNA tethers on selected vertices to link octahedrons end to end, forming chains, and in 2D arrays, forming sheets.
Visualization of arrays
Confirming the particle arrangements and structures was a major challenge because the nanoparticles and the DNA molecules making up the frames have very different densities. Certain microscopy techniques would reveal only the particles, while others would distort the 3D structures.
To see both the particles and origami frames, the scientists used cryo-electron microscopy (cryo-EM), led by Brookhaven Lab and Stony Brook University biologist Huilin Li, an expert in this technique, and Tong Wang, the paper's other lead co-author, who works in Brookhaven's Biosciences department with Li. They had to subtract information from the images to "see" the different density components separately, then combine the information using single particle 3D reconstruction and tomography to produce the final images.
"Cryo-EM preserves samples in their near-native states and provides close to nanometer resolution," Wang said. "We show that cryo-EM can be successfully applied to probe the 3D structure of DNA-nanoparticle clusters."
These images confirm that this approach to direct the placement of nanoparticles on DNA-encoded vertices of molecular frames could be a successful strategy for fabricating novel nanomaterials.
Story Source:
The above story is based on materials provided by Brookhaven National Laboratory. Note: Materials may be edited for content and length.
Journal Reference:
- Oleg Gang et al. Prescribed nanoparticle cluster architectures and low-dimensional arrays built using octahedral DNA origami frames.Nature Nanotechnology, May 2015 DOI: 10.1038/nnano.2015.105
Brookhaven National Laboratory. "DNA double helix does double duty in assembling arrays of nanoparticles." ScienceDaily. ScienceDaily, 25 May 2015. <www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2015/05/150525115925.htm>.
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Meeting on Sustainable Development Healthcare Delivery: Nutraceuticals & Natural Products
On June 1, 2015, the Institute for Life Sciences Collaboration is having a conference – Sustainable Development Healthcare Delivery: Nutraceuticals & Natural Products – as part of the "United Nations at 70" NGO Series. The event will take place at the Church Center for the United Nations, 777 United Nations Plaza (44th St at 1st Avenue), Plaza Room (second floor), New York, NY 10017. The conference will cover global challenges, traditional medicine, regulatory issues, natural products and complementary medicine, and oncology therapy and prevention. In particular, Dr. Jules T. Mitchel, PhD, MBA, President of Target Health Inc., will be leading a panel on regulatory issues. Please note that admission is free and open to the public with advance registration. For detailed information and to register, please visit: http://ilscollaboration.org/news/. Please let us know if you will be attending.
Springtime in Central Park (NYC)
Winter was cold this year so Springtime is welcome.
Springtime in Central Park©Target Health Inc. 2015
ON TARGET is the newsletter of Target Health Inc., a NYC-based, full-service, contract research organization (eCRO), providing strategic planning, regulatory affairs, clinical research, data management, biostatistics, medical writing and software services to the pharmaceutical and device industries, including the paperless clinical trial.
For more information about Target Health contact Warren Pearlson (212-681-2100 ext. 104). For additional information about software tools for paperless clinical trials, please also feel free to contact Dr. Jules T. Mitchel or Ms. Joyce Hays. The Target Health software tools are designed to partner with both CROs and Sponsors. Please visit the Target Health Website.
Joyce Hays, Founder and Editor in Chief of On Target
Jules Mitchel, Editor
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Red Blood Cells
Red blood cells are also known as RBCs, red cells, red blood corpuscles (an archaic term), haematids, erythroid cells or erythrocytes (from Greek erythros for red and kytos for hollow vessel, with -cyte translated as cell in modern usage). RBCs are the most common type of blood cell and the vertebrate organism's principal means of delivering oxygen (O2) to the body tissues – via blood flow through the circulatory system. RBCs take up oxygen in the lungs or gills and release it into tissues while squeezing through the body's 1) ___. The cytoplasm of erythrocytes is rich in hemoglobin, which is an iron-containing biomolecule that can bind oxygen and is responsible for the 2) ___ color of the cells. The cell membrane is composed of proteins and lipids, and this structure provides properties essential for physiological cell function such as deformability and stability while traversing the circulatory system and specifically the capillary network. In humans, mature red blood cells are flexible and oval biconcave disks. They lack a cell 3) ___ and most organelles, in order to accommodate maximum space for hemoglobin.
Approximately 2.4 million new erythrocytes are produced per second in human adults. The cells develop in the bone 4) ___ and circulate for about 100-120 days in the body before their components are recycled by macrophages. Each circulation takes about 20 seconds. Approximately a quarter of the cells in the human body are red blood cells. Packed red blood cells (pRBC) are red blood cells that have been donated, processed, and stored in a blood bank for blood5) ___.
As a result of not containing mitochondria, these RBCs use none of the oxygen they transport; instead they produce the energy carrier ATP by the glycolysis of glucose and lactic acid fermentation on the resulting pyruvate. Because of the lack of nuclei and organelles, mature red blood cells do not contain DNA and cannot synthesize any RNA, and consequently cannot divide. They have limited repair capabilities. This also ensures that no virus can evolve to target mammalian red blood 6) ___. When erythrocytes undergo shear stress in constricted vessels, they release ATP, which causes the vessel walls to relax and dilate so as to promote normal blood 7) ___. When their hemoglobin molecules are deoxygenated, erythrocytes release S-nitrosothiols, which also act to dilate blood vessels, thus directing more blood to areas of the body depleted of 8) ___. Erythrocytes can also synthesize nitric oxide enzymatically, using L-arginine as substrate, as do endothelial cells. Exposure of erythrocytes to physiological levels of shear stress activates nitric 9) ___ synthase and export of nitric oxide, which may contribute to the regulation of vascular tonus. Erythrocytes can also produce hydrogen sulfide, a signaling gas that acts to relax vessel walls. It is believed that the cardioprotective effects of garlic are due to erythrocytes converting its sulfur compounds into hydrogen sulfide. Erythrocytes also play a part in the body's immune response: when lysed by pathogens such as bacteria, their hemoglobin releases free 10) ___, which break down the pathogen's cell wall and membrane, killing it. Sources: WebMD; Wikipedia; ScienceDaily
ANSWERS: 1) capillaries; 2) red; 3) nucleus; 4) marrow; 5) transfusions; 6) cells; 7) flow; 8) oxygen; 9) oxide; 10) radicals
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Elizabeth Holmes, Youngest to Make History in Medicine
Elizabeth Holmes (1984-Present)
American Founder and CEO of Theranos, Elizabeth Holmes, is interested in the importance of enabling early detection of disease through new diagnostic tools and empowering individuals to make educated decisions about their healthcare.
I don't want to make an incremental change in some technology in my life. I want to create a whole new technology, and one that is aimed at helping humanity at all levels regardless of geography or ethnicity or age or gender. – Elizabeth Holmes
Theranos, is a health technology and medical laboratory services company, which Holmes founded in 2003 at age 19 while she was at Stanford University as a chemical engineering major. The company was based on her invention and patent for a way to run 30 lab tests on one drop of blood. By 2014, the company offered 200 tests and was licensed to run in every state of the US. As of 2014, Holmes had 18 US patents and 66 non-US patents in her name and is listed as a co-inventor on over a hundred patent applications. She is the youngest self-made female billionaire on the Forbes 400 list, with an estimated net worth of $4.6 billion.
Holmes was born in February 1984 in Washington, D.C. Her father, Christian Holmes IV, worked in the United States, Africa and China as part of government agencies such as USAID. Her mother, Noel Anne (Daoust), worked as a Congressional committee staffer. She has a brother, Christian Holmes V, who is the director of product management at Theranos. One of her ancestors was a founder of the Fleischmann's Yeast company. She is related to actress Katherine MacDonald who was married to Christian Rasmus Holmes II (1898-1944).
As a child, she read the biography of her great-great-grandfather Christian R. Holmes, who was a surgeon, engineer, inventor, and a decorated World War I veteran. He was born in Denmark in 1857 and was the dean of the University of Cincinnati College of Medicine, where a hospital is named after him. The career of her ancestor inspired Elizabeth to take up medicine, but she soon found that she had a fear of needles. She later described this fear as one of her motivations to launch Theranos. Intrigued by their father's work in China, Elizabeth and her brother learned Mandarin Chinese at a young age. She spent her teenage years in China, and while still in school, started a business selling C++ compilers to Chinese universities. After graduating from St. John's School in 2002, Holmes enrolled at Stanford University to study chemistry. As a freshman, she was named one of the President's Scholars and given a stipend of $3,000 to pursue a research project. She persuaded her chemical engineering professor, Channing Robertson, to use the money for a project in his lab. Holmes supplemented her childhood knowledge of Mandarin with summer language programs at Stanford. This helped her obtain an internship at the Genome Institute of Singapore. The Institute was working on developing new methods to detect the SARS coronavirus in blood or nasal swabs. After her return to the US, she wrote a patent application on a wearable patch that would administer a drug, monitor variables in the patient's blood, and adjust the dosage to achieve the desired effect. She showed her application to Professor Robertson, and told him they could put a cellphone chip on this patch for telemedicine. She filed the patent application in September 2003, as Medical device for analyte monitoring and drug delivery. Holmes proposed establishing a company to Professor Robertson in the fall of 2003, while she was a 19-year old sophomore at Stanford. She used money that her parents had saved for her education, to establish Real-Time Cures in Palo Alto. Later, she changed the company's name to Theranos (an amalgam of therapy and diagnosis), because she believed that many people had a cynical reaction to the word cure. Initially, she worked out of a basement of a group college house. A semester later, she dropped out to pursue her business career full-time. Professor Robertson served as a director of the company.
Over the next decade, the company grew gradually, raising $400 million from Draper Fisher Jurvetson and Larry Ellison, among others. During this time, Theranos operated in stealth mode, remaining highly secretive to avoid potential competitors and investors who could fund a competitor. In 2007, it took three former employees to court, accusing them of misappropriating trade secrets. By 2014, the company offered 200 tests and was licensed to run in every state of the US. It had 500 employees and was valued at more than $9 billion. Holmes retained control of more than 50% of the company's equity. As of 2014, Holmes has 18 US patents and 66 non-US patents in her name and is listed as a co-inventor on over a hundred patent applications. Holmes is the youngest self-made female billionaire on the Forbes 400 list, where she is #111 with an estimated net worth of $4.6 billion.
Click to read what the New Yorker magazine, has to say about Elizabeth Holmes
More About Theranos
A number of startups are selling portable diagnostic laboratories that require just a drop of the patient's blood, made possible by advances in the field of microfluidics. But perhaps lab tests can be made faster, easier and more accurate with a turn-of-the-last-century technology: automation. That's the bet the Silicon Valley company Theranos is making, and the company recently sealed a deal with Walgreen's Pharmacy to deliver on-site laboratory services to many of its stores. Henry Ford would recognize the principle that allows Theranos to complete accurate lab tests within four hours: Consistency and automation increase speed and bring price down. Even so, Theranos's selling point is much smaller than a Model T: a capsule-sized lab vial, and just one needs to be filled for the company to run nearly any standard lab test.
Courtesy Theranos
Here's how it works: Blood is drawn with a finger stick, rather than a needle in the arm. (It can also run urine tests with just a drop of that.) There are no botched sticks ? of course, there are no phlebotomists, only machines, in Therenos labs. The bad news for workers may be good news for accuracy because human handling of samples accounts for the lion's share of variation among results. Automation eliminates spills, tests done in error and other mishandling of the sample. In a few cases, Theranos has designed new diagnostic methods to shave time from the process. The machines mete out bits of the micro-sample for each test a doctor has ordered. In conventional testing, each test requires a dedicated vial, which adds dramatically to the amount of blood required. Theranos is even able to save some of the tiny sample in case the doctor requests further tests after seeing the initial results. All of the diagnostic technology is integrated, which increases precision. Each machine in a conventional lab may calibrate differently, and the mix of brands and ages means results come with an implied or so at the end. Plotting results over time is therefore mostly useless. Theranos offers a full range of laboratory tests for a consistently lower cost than most labs do now, and its prices are readily available through a mobile app and on the company's website. While a deal with Walgreen's may not be a Silicon Valley dream, laboratory tests are a big lever in the health care system. In the U.S., they are the industry's single highest volume activity, with over 5 billion tests performed every year according to a new Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center study. Access to Walgreen's will help Theranos get quick-and-painless testing close to most Americans. Singularity Hub, a cutting edge website for innovative technology, is betting that the military will use the instant lab tests. The reason? The list of the company's board of directors reads like a who's who guide to recent American military history.
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Microchip Captures Clusters of Circulating Tumor Cells
Circulating tumor cells (CTCs) are cells that break away from a tumor and move through a cancer patient's bloodstream. Single CTCs are extremely rare, typically fewer than 1 in 1 billion cells. These cells can take up residence in distant organs, and it is believed that this is one mode by which cancer spreads. Even less common than single CTCs are small groups of CTCs, or clusters. While the existence of CTC clusters has been known for more than 50 years, their prevalence in the blood as well as their role in metastasis has not been thoroughly investigated, mostly because they are so elusive. However, recent advances in biomedical technologies that enable the capture of single CTCs have renewed interest in CTC clusters, which are occasionally captured along with single CTCs.
According to an article published online in Nature Methods Researchers (18 May 2015) a microfluidic chip has been developed that can capture rare clusters of circulating tumor cells from unprocessed blood, which could yield important new insights into how cancer spreads. The work was funded by the National Institute of Biomedical Imaging and Bioengineering (NIBIB), part of the National Institutes of Health. The new technology — called Cluster-Chip — was developed with support from a Quantum Grant from NIBIB, which funds transformative technological innovation designed to solve major medical problems with a substantial disease burden, such as preventing cancer metastasis or precisely tailoring therapeutics to an individual's cancer cell biology. When the authors recently used Cluster-Chip to capture and analyze CTC clusters in a group of 60 patients with metastatic breast, prostate, and melanoma cancers, CTC clusters-ranging from two to 19 cells were found in 30-40% of the patients. According to the authors, the presence of these clusters is far more common than was thought in the past and the fact that clusters were seen in this many patients is remarkable.
The chip is designed to slowly push blood through many rows of microscopic triangle-shaped posts. The posts are arranged in such a way that every two posts funnels cells towards the tip of a third post. At the tip, single cells — including blood cells and single CTCs — easily slide to either side of the post and continue through the chip until reaching the next tip; however CTC clusters are left at the tip, hanging in the balance due to forces pulling them down the post in opposite directions. To determine the efficiency of Cluster-Chip, the authors introduced fluorescently tagged cell clusters (ranging from 2-30 cells) into the chip and counted the number of clusters that were captured and the number that flowed through undetected. At a blood flow rate of 2.5ml/hr, the chip captured 99% of clusters containing four or more cells, 70% of three-cell clusters, and 41% of two-cell clusters. Comparison of the clusters under a microscope before and after capture found that the chip had no negative effects on the integrity of the clusters as a whole. The authors next compared the efficiency of their novel chip to two currently-used methods that have had some success capturing CTC clusters. They found that at similar blood flow rates, the Cluster-Chip was significantly more efficient than a filter-based method, which pushes blood through a membrane with pores only large enough to let single cells pass through. The chip was also more efficient than a different microfluidic chip that isolates CTCs and occasionally clusters using antibodies that stick to special proteins found on the surface of some tumor cells. The results highlight the importance of the unique Cluster-Chip capture technique, which is based on the structural properties of CTC clusters rather than their size or the presence of surface proteins. This latter property makes the Cluster-Chip well-suited for capturing CTC clusters from a range of cancer types, including those that lose surface proteins during metastasis and those that never express them, such as melanoma.
The authors tested the Cluster-Chip in a small trial of 60 patients with metastatic cancer. In this study, the chip captured CTC clusters in 11 of 27 (40.7%) breast cancer patients, 6 of 20 (30%) melanoma patients, and 4 of 13 (31%) prostate patients. The large number of clusters found in the patient samples suggests a possibly greater role for clusters in the metastatic cascade. To characterize the biology of the clusters, the authors measured a marker of tumor cell proliferation — an indicator of increased invasiveness and poor outcomes — in one breast cancer patient with high numbers of both single CTCs and clusters. Approximately half of the cells in the patient's clusters were positive for the proliferative marker, demonstrating that clusters can contain both actively proliferating and quiescent cells. The authors also noted the rare presence of non-tumor cells within clusters in less than 5% of patients.
About the National Institute of Biomedical Imaging and Bioengineering: NIBIB's mission is to improve health by leading the development and accelerating the application of biomedical technologies. The Institute is committed to integrating the physical and engineering sciences with the life sciences to advance basic research and medical care. NIBIB supports emerging technology research and development within its internal laboratories and through grants, collaborations, and training. More information is available at the NIBIB website.
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Animals' Presence May Ease Social Anxiety in Kids with Autism
Autism spectrum disorders (ASDs) affect the structure and function of the brain and nervous system. People with these conditions have difficulty communicating and interacting with other people. They also have restricted and repetitive interests and behaviors. According to a study published online in Developmental Psychobiology (27 April 2015), companion animals — like dogs, cats or the guinea pigs in the study — may prove to be a helpful addition to treatment programs designed to help children with ASDs improve their social skills and interactions with other people. While previous studies suggest that in the presence of companion animals, children with autism spectrum disorders function better socially, the current study provides physiological evidence that the proximity of animals eases the stress that children with autism may experience in social situations. This study is among several funded under a public-private partnership established in 2008 between NICHD and the WALTHAM Centre for Pet Nutrition, a division of Mars Inc., to establish a human-animal interaction research program to support studies relevant to child development, health, and the therapeutic use of animals.
For the current study, the authors measured skin conductance, the ease at which an unnoticeable electric charge passes through a patch of skin, in children with ASDs and in typically developing children. The study design divided the 114 children, ages 5 to 12 years old, into 38 groups of three. Each group included one child with ASD and two of their typically developing peers. Each child wore a wrist band fitted with a device that measures skin conductance. When people are feeling excited, fearful, or anxious, the electric charge travels faster through the skin, providing an objective way for researchers to gauge social anxiety and other forms of psychological arousal. For the first few minutes, the children read a book silently, giving researchers a baseline measure of skin conductance while carrying out a non-stressful, familiar task. Next, each child was asked to read aloud from the book in the presence of the two peers in their group, a task designed to measure their level of apprehension during social situations. The study staff then brought toys in the room and allowed the children 10 minutes of free play time. These situations may be stressful for children with ASDs, who may have difficulty relating socially to their typically developing peers. Finally, the study team brought two guinea pigs into the room and allowed the children to have 10 minutes of supervised play with the animals. The researchers chose guinea pigs because of their small size and docile nature — much easier to manage in a classroom than larger animals.
Results showed that, compared to the typically developing children, the children with autism had higher skin conductance levels when reading silently, reading aloud, and in the group toy session. These higher levels are consistent with reports from parents and teachers, and from other studies, that children with ASDs are more likely to be anxious in social situations than typically developing children. However, when the session with the guinea pigs began, skin conductance levels among the children with ASDs dropped significantly. The authors speculated that where human counterparts inherently pass social judgment, animals are often perceived as sources of unconditional, positive support, and offer unqualified acceptance and their presence makes the children feel more secure. For reasons the authors cannot explain, skin conductance levels in the typically developing children rose during the session with the guinea pigs. The researchers believe that these higher readings may indicate excitement at seeing the animals, rather than any nervousness or apprehension. The authors added that earlier studies have shown that children with ASDs were less likely to withdraw from social situations when companion animals are present. These studies, along with the current findings, indicate that animals might play a part in interventions seeking to help children with autism develop their social skills. However, the authors cautioned, however, that the findings do not mean that parents of children with ASDs should rush to buy an animal for their children, but that further research is needed to determine how animals might be used in programs aimed at developing social skills. The authors added that the study was conducted in a supervised setting, by researchers experienced in working with kids with ASDs who understand the needs and requirements of the animals, and that careful supervision was provided during the study, to ensure the welfare of the children as well as the animals.


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The North Yungas Road (also Grove's Road, Coroico Road, Camino de las Yungas, El Camino de la Muerte, Road of Death, and Death Road) is a 61 to 69 km road (depending on source) leading from La Paz to Coroico, 56 km (35 miles) northeast of La Paz in the Yungas region of Bolivia. It is legendary for its extreme danger and in 1995 the Inter-American Development Bank christened it as the "world's most dangerous road". One estimate is that 200-300 travelers were killed yearly along the road. The road includes crosses marking many of the spots where vehicles have fallen.
A South Yungas Road (also Chulumani Road) exists that connects La Paz to Chulumani, 64 km (40 miles) east of La Paz, and is considered to be nearly as dangerous as the north road. The road was built in the 1930s during the Chaco War by Paraguayan prisoners. It is one of the few routes that connects the Amazon rainforest region of northern Bolivia, or Yungas, to its capital city. Upon leaving La Paz, the road first ascends to around 4,650 meters (15,256 ft) at La Cumbre Pass, before descending to 1,200 meters (3,937 ft) at the town of Coroico, transiting quickly from cool Altiplano terrain to rainforest as it winds through very steep hillsides and atop cliffs.
Because of the extreme dropoffs of at least 600 meters (1,969 ft), single-lane width — most of the road no wider than 3.2 meters (10.5 ft) — and lack of guard rails, the road is extremely dangerous. Further still, rain and fog can make visibility precarious, and the road surface muddy, and can loosen rocks from the hillsides above. One of the local road rules specifies that the downhill driver never has the right of way and must move to the outer edge of the road. This forces fast vehicles to stop so that passing can be negotiated safely. Also, vehicles drive on the left, as opposed to the right like the rest of Bolivia. This gives the driver in a left-hand-drive vehicle a better view over their outside wheel, making passing safer.

subset: commoncrawl


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IHTM: I Tried a Skincare Product That Jacked Up My Skin Barrier So Here's How I Handled It
I basically called my mom for help. Except when I say mom, I mean an esthetician.
Since I returned to Singapore, my office had a big move. We relocated to the heart of Orchard Road in Singapore, which is highly convenient for my colleagues and me when it comes to lunch and shopping options, but unfortunately, our permanent space that we're supposed to move into isn't ready yet.
Instead, we've all been plonked in a workspace that is not only devoid of any windows or sunlight, it has vents with holes in them, carpets with suspicious stains on them, and a complete lack of ventilation.
If I didn't know better, I'd think somebody is trying to kill us.
Of course, with my billion-and-a-half allergies, I have been complaining about the space more than anyone else. I'm convinced that nobody has vacuumed or cleaned the place in 20 years, which is why my eyes get itchy the moment I step in and I end up with swollen eyes every single night. My colleagues' eczema has been acting up too, and another colleague got hives.
It's not fun.
I've been trying to make the situation better for me until we move to our permanent space in February. It includes disinfecting my desk on an almost-daily basis, and to my delight, I found the most adorable humidifier in the shape of a donut.
I admit I was a little skeptical. Can something that tiny help?
Turns out it does. All I have to do is put it in a mug of water and plug the device into my USB port, and I'm set.
I pour a little bit of my favourite Hadanomy Collagen Mist into the water and it plumps up my skin even more.
It doesn't help my eyes, of course. They're still incredibly itchy. But at least my skin looks great?
Twenty more days before we move. Wish me luck!


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Imperial's du Maurier Concert Stage entertainment series, named for the du Maurier cigarette brand, launched in early February with a contest where entrants can win a trip to Canada's top ski resort to see a special rock concert.
"You must be over 19 and a smoker to enter," say newspaper ads promoting the contest.
"It's a concern that they're doing this," says Rob Cunningham, senior policy analyst with the Canadian Cancer Society. "A message is being sent to potential smokers: 'If you're going to become a smoker, here's another potential benefit,' " he says.
New government restrictions on tobacco-related sponsorship advertising will be phased in later this year, and Mr. Cunningham suggests Imperial"is trying to exploit a loophole" before the rules begin to tighten.
Physicians for a Smoke-Free Canada and the Canadian Cancer Society, among other groups, say they'll complain to the federal government about the contest, promoted through radio and newspaper creative in major centers.
Bates Canada, Toronto, created the contest ads.
Imperial Tobacco argues that the contest is completely legal and says the company can't satisfy anti-smoking groups no matter how it handles its marketing.
"I'm very surprised at this so-called controversy," says Imperial spokesman Michel Descoteaux in Montreal. "It's completely artificial."
Tobacco marketing is often criticized as targeting non-smokers, says Mr. Descoteaux, but now these latest complaints are over an effort thataddresses smokers only.
Contests that restrict entry based on age, geography and other factors arecommonplace, says Mr. Descoteaux, who's confident any challenge to Imperial's effort will fail.
Copyright February 2000, Crain Communications Inc.


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1st joint Congress of the INS European Chapters
|Neuromodulation: Technology to improve patients lives
September 19 - 22, 2018
Nijmegen, The Netherlands
Dear colleagues,
It is a great pleasure for the local organizing committee, in close collaboration with the European chapters of the INS, and under the auspice of the INS, to invite you to participate in the 1st joint Congress of the INS European Chapters.
This 1st European congress on neuromodulation is programmed on Thursday September 20 and Friday 21, at the van der Valk hotel, Nijmegen-Lent, the Netherlands. Furthermore, on Wednesday September 19 a cadaver course and a workshop (specifically for nurses) are scheduled. Saturday, September 22 the chapters can organize their own national meeting.
A joint meeting of the European INS chapters will provide more efficiency and will hopefully facilitate networking, increase collaboration and improve the exchange of knowledge.
The European congress will alternate with the INS world congress (every odd year) and planned at the end of the year to prevent conflicts with other meetings.
|Latest news
- Cadaver Course: Still some places available. read more


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After having made some Za'atar infused vegan meatballs with the Vegetarian 'sausage' mix that I got from Suma Wholefoods D suggested that I make some vegetarian Scotch eggs with the remainder of the packet. Oh what a smarty pants I thought, then it dawned on me, sneaky man - You like them, but that is okay as I was more than happy to make them for him and some for me. But they were not going to be plain Vegetarian Scotch Eggs, these were going to be enhanced further, this time with some Jamaican flavours - namely thyme, all spice, scotch bonnet and limes.
Oh my, they were super super tasty and zesty too. I would so so make these again. Of course you can make everything from scratch and I often do, but there are times when convenience suits. These Vegetarian Jerk Spiced Scotch Eggs were really easy to put together and quick to make if you use some ready made products: Vegetarian 'sausage' mix . You can even buy ready made Jerk paste, but I actually did make my own as I have found some shop bought ones ridiculously salty.
My homemade jerk paste was sweet and fiery, I also loved the kick not just from the Scotch Bonnet, but the black peppercorns too. The only fiddly part of this recipe was removing the egg shells and moulding the eggs with the mixture, but the more you practice the easier it gets.
So what was D's verdict - nom nom nom...what more can I say. He is already hinting that I should make some mores, especially as I have been boasting that they are so easy to knock up.
Home-made Jerk Paste
Good handful of fresh thyme, woody stems removed
Small handful of fresh coriander
1 teaspoon coriander seeds
2 tablespoons black peppercorns
1 large cinnamon stick, broken into pieces
3 generous teaspoons allspice
1 teaspoon nutmeg
4 - 6 garlic cloves, minced
2 teaspoons fresh ginger, minced
Sea salt to taste
3 - 4 Scotch Bonnet chillies, optional remove seeds
Juice from 2 limes
120ml vegetable oil
Put all the ingredients into Optimuum 9400, food processor or blender and blitz to a smooth paste. Use as required or scrape into a glass jar. Refrigerate.
This Jerk Paste will keep for a couple of weeks if covered with little oil.
Vegetarian Jamaican Jerk Spiced Scotch Eggs
Makes 6
6 (small) free-range hard boiled eggs, shells removed
1/2 Packet (175g) of Suma vegetarian Sausage mix
2 generous teaspoons home-made Jerk Paste or from a jar
In a large bowl, stir in 1/2 packet of Suma Sausage mix and the Jerk Paste. Then carefully pour in 300ml cold water, stir well to combine and then let it stand for a few minutes to thicken.
Divide the vegetarian sausage meat mixture into six equal portions and then using your hands begin moulding the mixture around the egg, squeezing gently to hold and bind it together, ensuring that there are no gaping holes. Mould gently until you have a nice firm and well covered egg.
For outer crisp coating and deep frying
80g panko crumbs (or 100g fresh breadcrumbs or dry equivalent)
Vegetable oil for deep frying
When ready to deep fry, roll gently into the crumbs until well coated, then deep fry in vegetable oil until golden all over.
Serve immediately or at room temperature.


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CHICAGO – When it comes to an infamous number for Cubs fans, usually one that comes quickly to mind: 108.
That is the amount of years in which the franchise has gone since last winning a World Series on October 14, 1908. That number is so high that the refrain "Wait 'Till Next Year" became a slogan of the franchise as the frustration continued.
Another "Tragic Number" for Cubs fans might be 71 – the number of years since the Cubs last won the National League pennant in 1945. Those two numbers can't be taken to zero for at least another couple of weeks but the team can get rid of another streak of theirs before the playoffs even begin.
That's 81 – the number of years since the Cubs last won 100 or more games in a single season. Right now the team is at 99 victories after a 3-1 triumph in the regular season home finale against the Cardinals on Sunday.
Not since the 1935 season have the Cubs finished a year with 100 or more wins. In a 154-game schedule the Cubs finished right at the century mark to win the National League pennant and haven't gotten to that mark since. The 1945 Cubs (98 wins) were the closest before this year's team eclipsed them this weekend at Wrigley Field.
Should the Cubs win one game this week they would be come the 99th team in Major League Baseball history to win 100 games in a season. It would be the sixth time in franchise history that the Cubs would finish with triple digits in wins.
So does 100 wins indicate a better shot for postseason success? Yes and no.
That 1935 Cubs team along with three others (1906, 1907, 1910) went to the World Series but only the 1907 squad went onto win a championship. The other three World Series seasons the Cubs lost to a team that had fewer wins.
In 1909 the Cubs had the misfortune of winning 104 games but finished six games behind the pennant-winning Pirates who went onto win the World Series.
Oddly enough the Cubs' only postseason success since winning the World Series in 1908 came against teams that won 100 or more games. In 2003 the Cubs knocked off the 101-win Braves in five games in the National League Division Series while last year the team beat a 100-win Cardinals clubs in the NLDS.
Of the 98 previous teams to win 100 games, 34 went onto win the World Series but the trend hasn't been common lately. Of the last 17 teams to win 100 or more games, only the 2009 Yankees went onto win the World Series.
Kyle Hendricks gets the first crack at win No. 100 Monday night when the Cubs start a four-game series with the Pirates at PNC Park. That will guarantee that at least one long Cubs' streak will disappear in a memorable 2016 season.


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AT&T Galaxy S3 device can be updated to Android 4.2.1 with the AOKP Jelly Bean MR1 build 3 ROM. This is a monthly release of AOKP JB and you will get tons of new features that will also improve the overall stability and performance of your device.
AOKP JB MR1 build will bring three new UI mode selectors: Phablet, Tablet and Phone. Also you will get the LastApp toggle, transparency for all UI sections, Car Home, Quick Unlock and multiple others. In order to make sure that you successfully install this ROM on your device, you will first need to read the guidelines listed before the 'how-to' guide.
Here's what you need to know in order to make sure that you can install AOKP JB MR1 Build 3 ROM on your AT&T Samsung Galaxy S3 device. These guidelines should help you flash the custom ROM at your first attempt:
- Don't use this tutorial on any other smartphone. Use it only for the AT&T Samsung Galaxy S3s device, as it won't work for any other Android device.
- The AT&T Samsung Galaxy S3 device should be on an unlocked bootloader, rooted and running a CWM Recovery image. Without these you won't be able to flash any customization files on your device.
- Before you can get to the tutorial you will have to create a NANDROID backup of your current ROM. This will act as a restore point for your device in case the guide doesn't complete successfully and your phone is unable to boot with the new ROM.
- The tutorial will tell you to wipe data and factory reset your smartphone in order to flash the new OS, but you will delete only the system partition and the Internal SD card will remain intact. Now, since you will reset the system partition, you will lose the apps, call logs, SMS and other similar data which is why you should use the following tools in order to backup such data: SMS backup & restore | Call Logs backup & restore | APN Settings Backup & Restore | AppBack for Android application. Root access is needed by some of these tools.
- Sync your People / Contacts app with your Gmail account. Remember to enter the same Google Account after installing the new ROM.
- Enable the USB debugging option.
- Charge the phone's battery until its power level goes over 5o%. This will prevent the device from powering off during the update.
- Use this guide only if you're an advanced Android user and don't skip any steps listed below.
- Note that we cannot be blamed in case something goes wrong and you brick the phone nor in case you lose any data files. Make sure to read the entire tutorial.
- If you're having problems completing the install then you should ask for more help in our comments section.
These were all the instructions that you had to go over. Now you can get to the tutorial and learn how to successfully flash the new AOKP build OS.
How to update AT&T Samsung Galaxy S3 with AOKP JB MR1 build ROM:
- Download the ROM from HERE. Save the file on your PC and don't unzip.
- Download the Gapps for Android 4.2.1 from HERE. This is the tool that you will have to flash in order to get all Google-based applications. Do not unzip this file and save it on your PC.
- Connect your device to your PC.
- Move the AOKP JB MR1 build 3 ROM and Gapps files on your device's internal SDcard. Disconnect the device when the files are copied. Power off the device.
- Now, boot your device into Custom Recovery mode. It can be done if you press at the same time Volume Up, Home and Power. Release the buttons when the custom Recovery menu appears.
- Select 'wipe data/ factory reset' option. Confirm this process. NOTE: If you're already running an Official AOKP JB rom then you can skip this step.
- Select 'install zip from sdcard' and then 'choose zip from sdcard'. Find the 'AOKP JB MR1 build 3 ROM and confirm its installation.
- Select again 'choose zip from sdcard' and then flash the Gapps zip. Confirm.
- Get back to the main menu of the Recovery mode.
- Select 'reboot system now'.
- The first boot process of this new ROM will now start. It shouldn't take more than 5 minutes to complete.
- Enter your Google Account and take control over your device once again. Test the new ROM and tell us in comments which are its best new features.
These were all the steps that you had to take. Now you can use the AOKP JB MR1 build 3 ROM on your AT&T Galaxy S3.
In case the update isn't installed at your first attempt then you should retry until you manage to complete it. The second time you should make sure that you apply the step 6 as that might be the reason why your phone cannot be updated. For more tips use the comments section.


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Loyal customers are said to be worth up to 10 times their first purchase. Yet, delivering exceptional service can be a challenge, especially if you have tight budget constraints.
A cloud phone system can help you to create a highly efficient, yet cost-effective, customer service process. How? Consider these four ways a cloud phone service can raise the bar on customer loyalty.
1. Faster Response Times
One bad experience is all it takes for your customers to switch to a competitor. With the cloud, everyone in your organization has access to the same IP phone system, regardless of where they're located. This means speedier answers to customer questions. With features such as presence, instant messaging and four-digit dialing, you can swiftly transfer customers to the right subject matter expert, even if that expert is sitting in a hotel lobby, thousands of miles away.
2. Personalized Service
The more call center agents know about a caller and their history with your company, the better they can resolve issues to the customer's satisfaction. A cloud phone system can integrate with your existing business intelligence software, which enables agents to quickly assess each caller's unique situation and tailor their response accordingly.
3. More Time with Customers
For companies with two or more locations, phone system support and maintenance can be a challenge, especially if each location operates its own set-up. But a cloud-based VoIP phone system enables employees in all locations to access the same services. Thus, it's easier and faster to implement, and reduces training needs across the organization. That means everyone can spend less time learning how to use the phone system and more time working directly with customers.
4. Never Miss a Customer's Call, Ever
The fastest way to lose loyal customers is to let them down when they need you the most. That's why your business phone system can't be down for a single moment. Cloud phone services can often be more reliable than traditional phone systems because redundant cloud architectures can provide back up during peak call times or emergencies. Your customers can be confident you'll answer their calls – each and every time.
Since customers are more likely to favor businesses who are sensitive to their needs, investing in tools and processes that help you consistently exceed their expectations makes smart business sense. With a cloud phone system, companies can build a loyal customer base that rivals even their largest competitors.Learn more about this topic at scansourcecommunications.com >


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By Robbie Blakeley, Senior Contributing Reporter
RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – Flamengo drew 1-1 with Cruzeiro last night in the final round of the 2013 Campeonato Brasileiro at the Maracanã Stadium. The Rubro-Negro were particularly grateful to young goalkeeper Cesar, who made a succession of important saves to keep Mengão's point in tact.
Over 40,000 Flamenguistas attended their side's final game of a turbulent season, which was buoyed by the club's third Copa do Brasil title ten days ago. Now the fans are looking forward to next year and their Copa Libertadores campaign.
Flamengo started the game on the front foot and opened the scoring after thirteen minutes. Hernane converted Nixon's cross to net his sixteenth goal of an impressive Brasileirão campaign, and 35th strike in all competitions this year.
Yet the side's creativity was affected enormously when playmaker Paulinho left the field just eight minutes later through injury. From then on Cruzeiro dominated in midfield and created the more dangerous chances.
Both sides were reduced to ten men on 38 minutes when the referee dismissed Cruzeiro's Everton and Flamengo's Carlos Eduardo for an altercation seemingly started by the Carioca player. Cruzeiro went close to an equalizer through Mayke but the first half ended with Fla clinging onto their slender advantage.
The visitors started the second half as they ended the first, forcing Flamengo to camp in their own half. The inevitable leveler came on 64 minutes, when the 21-year-old Cesar was finally beaten by a long range effort from Souza.
Cruzeiro continued to press but the game ended with honors even. Now both clubs will look to strengthen squads over the summer break before launching their Copa Libertadores campaigns early in the new year.
Read more (in Portuguese).
* The Rio Times Daily Updates feature is offered to help keep you up-to-date with important news as it happens.


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What's the Latest Development?
Using ARM processors, analog computer chips similar to those found in mobile phones, a team of British computer scientists hope to create the best-ever electronic simulation of the human brain. Called SpiNNaker, "the machine will consist of 57 600 custom-designed chips, each of which contains 18 low-power ARM9 processor cores. ... As with most other brain models, SpiNNaker's operation is centered on the 'spike'—an idealization of the electrical impulse sent out by firing neurons. The information needed to model a spike is tiny: You can condense it down to a single packet containing just 40 bits."
What's the Big Idea?
By making alternations to how the analog chips communicate with each other, compared with a traditional supercomputer, the team of researchers expects their machine to model brain activity with speeds matching those of biological systems. "When it's finished, SpiNNaker will be able to simulate the behavior of 1 billion neurons. That's just 1 percent as many as are in a human brain but more than 10 times as many as are in the brain of one of neuroscience's most popular test subjects, the mouse." The project will shed further light onto new computing methods as well as provide insights into brain diseases and how to treat them.
Photo credit: Shutterstock.com


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|North Sea Oil and Gas Industry
Mr. Salmond: Will the Minister give way?
Mr. Wilson: No. I should like to dwell on the Norwegian point in detail.
Mr. Salmond: On a point of order, Mr. Hood. Is it in order for a Minister to arrive late, miss part of the opening speech, and then refuse to give way to interventions that would enlighten him on the bits that he missed?
The Chairman: The hon. Gentleman is well aware that interventions are a matter for the Minister.
Mr. Wilson: Some things never change. The bogus Banff and Buchan point of order is alive and well—and tedious.
In the North sea, Norway is the other side of the same coin. The SNP has droned on since time immemorial that we should be more like Norway, but I have never found it to be a conclusive argument. What is the equivalent tax rate in Norway? It is not
Column Number: 03940 per cent., 50 per cent., 60 per cent., 70 per cent., or even 80 per cent., but somewhere around 85 to 88 per cent. Should we be more like Norway or not?
The hon. Member for West Aberdeenshire and Kincardine labours under a delusion if he thinks that Angola is different because the fuels are bigger. The figures compare like with like, and I am happy to supply them to the hon. Gentleman for his enlightenment. Tax take in most other countries is far higher than in the UK. The following figures are from IHS Energy Group consultants, and are based on a typical 100 million barrel oil field and on an oil price of $18 per barrel: Norway is 88 per cent.; US Gulf of Mexico is 66 per cent.; Canada is 70 per cent.; Angola is 80 per cent.; and Brazil is 65 per cent. The UK has gone up from 35 to 40 per cent. Those are comparative figures. If Liberal Democrat Members think that the UK tax regime is unreasonable, we must agree to disagree. There are no tricks in those figures; they compare like with like.
Sir Robert Smith: Does the Minister accept that those figures are from before the Budget? Two countries have changed their tax regime upwards: Venezuela and Argentina. They are not great examples for the UK economy. Russia has cut its tax to attract more investment. The UK has increased its tax, which must alter the differential investment climate.
Mr. Wilson: The hon. Gentleman is struggling. My point is that those figures compare like with like, so any response should do the same.
I turn to what the hon. Member for Banff and Buchan said about the licensing round, which he went out of his way to denigrate. It was a classic contribution from him because superficially he sounded authoritative and weighty. In fact, it was pure rubbish. His implication was that all previous licensing rounds had been great successes in relation to this one. That is simply untrue. In the latest licensing round, the 20th, the number of blocks initially applied for in the North sea represented about 13 per cent. of those offered. If, as the hon. Gentleman claimed, that is a disaster compared with the previous licensing round in the North sea, what must the figure have been for that round; 40 per cent., 50 per cent. or 60 per cent.? Not a bit of it. The answer is 10 per cent. It was lower than in this round, at the stage of initial applications.
Mr. Salmond: Why was there no press release? [Laughter.]
Mr. Wilson: Even at this advanced stage in his career, the hon. Gentleman must learn that some politicians do not live by press release alone.
Mr. Salmond: It is interesting that, for the first time ever, there was no DTI press release on the licensing round.
I gave the Committee the figures on exploration and appraisal drills. Does the Minister dispute that 112 wells were drilled in 1996 and only 51 last year? Will he shrug that off or accept it as a matter for concern? Will he now respond to the three positive suggestions that I
Column Number: 040made, which, within the changes to the tax regime, could preserve jobs in Scotland?
Mr. Wilson: With due respect, we must be careful with words. I have not brushed off the hon. Gentleman's argument about the licensing round, but exposed it as utterly fallacious. Everyone knows that there is less exploration going on because the North sea is a mature province and the opportunities are becoming fewer. That is why Pilot is seeking to maximise those opportunities and is working so hard in the fallow fields initiative. There is no surprise in those statistics; all we must do is work better.
I turn to the argument that was made about affairs being moved from London, which was the exact opposite of the truth. When the Aberdeen office opened in 1994, 40 staff were located there. There are now 84 staff located there—[Interruption.]
The Chairman: Order. I must ask the hon. Member for Banff and Buchan not to interrupt the Minister.
Mr. Wilson: Everybody in the oil industry believes that there should be two locations for the DTI oil and gas directorate, because some functions are better carried out in Aberdeen and others in London. On the point about shifting the balance, one thing that I have done, and taken pride in, in this job has been to create an organisation called Renewables UK, which will serve the whole country, feed off the synergies with the oil and gas industry and, hopefully, create many thousands of jobs in the new renewables industry. Where is it located? Not in London, but in Aberdeen, as part of the oil and gas directorate. Again, there has been no mention of that.
Angus Robertson: Will the Minister give way?
Mr. Wilson: No.
Moving on to investment, Opposition Members did not mention everything else that was in the Budget. They did not mention the package on first-year allowances, which will potentially lead to increased, not decreased, investment in the North sea. They did not mention consultation or the abolition of royalties. As a whole, and as many people in the oil industry have said, the package is balanced and, for some companies—particularly the independents—it could be beneficial.
We heard from the hon. Member for Galloway and Upper Nithsdale about the fall in the BP share price. Again, that is selective information because although it did go down, it then went back up again and has now come down slightly. It is quite evident that what has affected the BP share price is not the Budget, but the fluctuating price of oil in world markets and the current instability there. I discussed that in Pamplona the other day, where I had a good conversation with Lord Browne. His view on that is much more balanced than some that we have heard today.
On the new developments taking place, hon. Members will be familiar with the importance of BP's Magnus enhanced oil recovery project in the northern North sea. Under that, gas from BP's Foinaven and Schiehallion fields west of Shetland will be pumped to the Sullom Voe terminal in the Shetlands. I am delighted to say that that will result, in
Column Number: 041the next 10 days, in gas from west of Shetland being brought ashore to Sullom Voe for power generation. That will be the first gas to come onshore from west of Shetland. This is the first stage of the project. It will provide a valuable new source of indigenous UK gas, which will be routed through Sullom Voe and it will deliver environmental benefits through being available for use in power generation. That is further evidence of the major infrastructural investments being made in the UK Continental Shelf under the Government's regime.
I want to say something about the fabrication industry. Renewables UK feeds off the experience of the Offshore Supplies Office, which was established by a Labour Government in the 1970s when there was virtually no supply chain in the UK: unless the Government acted proactively, we would not obtain the manufacturing benefits of the North sea. The extraordinary success of the Offshore Supplies Office was achieved by raising the UK content in the hardware of the oil and gas industry to over 70 per cent. That is what I want to do with renewables too.
We cannot guarantee that every order will come to the UK, but we can ensure that our yards can compete, that they are aware of opportunities and that there is a level playing field. However, they must be competitive and able to win those orders, just as we would expect other countries to say that our companies can compete in their markets too—which they do.
Angus Robertson: The Minister makes a reasonable point that Governments cannot fix orders for companies, but can he give the people closely associated with the yard at Nigg an idea of the efforts that the Government are making to help them in the way that he has outlined to win contracts and stay in business?
Mr. Wilson: We have worked closely with BP to ensure—for instance in the Clair field—that there is complete fairness in assessing bids and throughout the process. However, we cannot direct a company to place an order at a particular yard. I think that everybody understands that. The advice that I receive from my officials is that we are satisfied with the way in which BP is conducting the competition for the Clair orders. I have no doubt that a substantial proportion of the work relating to Clair will stay in the UK. I cannot say which yards will get the work, but I am sure that UK companies will win a substantial share of the work associated with Clair.
In summary, I believe that there is a good story to tell. I do not believe that the doom and gloom merchants will be right. When companies make investment decisions they must take into account a range of considerations. There is no doubt that it is a hugely competitive market for investment. Many provinces in the world offer major reserves that can be exploited more cheaply than the North sea, but the North sea also has the attractions of a mature province. People know what is there and how to exploit it and I believe that they will continue to invest in the way that was proposed. I do not see the downturn in this industry predicted by Opposition Members.
Column Number: 042We must also ensure that we maintain the skills base in this industry. One problem that Pilot is also addressing is the ageing work force. We must send out messages that this is an attractive industry with good rewards and working conditions that have been transformed in recent years, and that it offers a long-term stable future to the young people coming into it. That in turn depends on ensuring that investment levels are maintained and new investments made. I assure the Committee that, through Pilot and our work with the industry, we shall continue to ensure that the climate exists to attract investment into the North sea.
I thank my hon. Friends, particularly my hon. Friend the Member for Aberdeen, Central for his measured remarks and his intelligent approach to the Budget and the environment that it will create.
Opposition Members should stop looking for doom and gloom, and stop looking five, 10 or 15 years ahead to find bad news stories for which they cannot be held accountable. They should look at the present and the positive achievements that have been made in the North sea, and they should draw their conclusions accordingly.
It being One o'clock, the motion for the Adjournment of the Committee lapsed, without Question put.
|©Parliamentary copyright 2002
|Prepared 8 May 2002


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Kcal 11 Fat 0.4g Carbs 1.6g (per 2.3g stick)
Well I never!!! Never did I envisage there would be a day where I would be writing the following ... 'allow me to introduce a flavour of Pocky/Mikado that the Japanese DON'T currently have'!! Yes folks, in what is a complete turn-up for the books the UK has defied the odds and has managed to find a flavour of these moreish crunchy biscuit sticks that they aren't currently offering in the Far East (to my knowledge anyway haha). These new Daim flavoured Mikado caught me totally unawares sitting on the snacks shelf in Tesco - a nice surprise I have to say.
Although I'm someone who obviously checks the snacks shelves quite often in the supermarkets I visit, I have to congratulate the folks at Kraft foods/LU Frances for creating a pack with great stand out. The pack for me does a great job of communicating the Daim influence on the product and does so without drawing away too much focus from the original Mikado branding - good work chaps! The biscuit sticks themselves could have perhaps done being in two smaller packets rather than just the one larger one, though lets be honest with ourselves these didn't last five minutes once opened anyway :D
This 70.0g pack cost me just £1.00 thanks to an introductory deal and I took advantage of the situation filling my basket assuming I would like them. This assumption was made on two rather simple factors: Daim "gooooooood" - Mikado "gooooooood" ... surely a combination that couldn't go wrong? Surely indeed :D These were fantastic - there's no other way of putting it. The caramel flavoured milk chocolate coating was nothing short of delicious and the and the caramel flavours were more of the buttery, toffee sort rather than an over powering sugary sweetness. This caramel sweetness perfectly matched the shortbread biscuit and the slight saltiness of the sticks proved a perfect contrast. As ever I did get very little fulfillment from these as a snacking option, I don't think there is an office person alive who could make a pack last all day on their desk - they are just the ultimate grazing snack.
Overall I was expecting good things from these and boy they didn't let me down. The Mikado and Daim link up here has been executed nigh on perfectly. I think the only possible improvement they might have been able to make is if they were to have made the sticks perhaps double the size - Mikado XL if you will :D That grievance aside I honestly don't think they could have done better with these, I just loved everything about them. Just like Kraft did with the Milka and Daim bar, the Daim influence was incorporated sensationally and to great effect taking the depth of flavour of the original milk chocolate Mikado onto a whole new level. I needn't bother telling you if these carry a JCM recommendation :D I think you can probably all have a good guess at that.
8.6 out of 10


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Digimon Adventure! (OOC+SU)
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August 10th, 2013 (1:41 PM). Edited August 17th, 2013 by Yamagi Sosuke.
Yamagi Sosuke
Hope & Ambition
Join Date:
Jan 2009
North Carolina
" I fight for those that need me. Not for the thrill of the battle. "
Shizuka "Shou" Ryouga
Shou, as he likes to call himself was born with a girl's name. This has somehow spawned a very innate reaction to those that attempt to call him by such. Immediately before they can he often shouts out to them that his name is Shou and not Shizuka. It can be quite terrifying considering that he often can tell their about to say it before they end up saying it. Besides this Shou can be quite the adventurous young lad, his knack for getting into trouble is one of the many reasons his mother worried about so fervently.
He, as of late has begun to show an increasingly growing compassion towards others. Its to the point that he often interferes during jokes in school and more than he'd like to admit, is scolded by the kids when they reveal that they were only joking. In return he'd usually formerly apologize and back away. Though these traits have severely lessened his chances at being popular it has given him amazingly loyal friends. They would stand up and fight with him and he would like-wise with them. Among them they tend to look to him for leadership, something that he often says he "wings". He acts with his guts and heart, relying on them to guide him through the harsh world. Overall he is naive, stubborn, kind, and somewhat charismatic. But he's still a kid none the less.
Shizuka or Shou, is the fifth child of his family, with two older brothers, an elder sister, and a young sister he is often the medium between the opposing sides. His mother was Japanese while his father was Greek, an odd combination right ? But he mostly came out looking like his mother. His family had always been pretty popular even when he had entered high school for the first time, it was obvious that his sister was pretty popular. In retrospect he probably owed her an apology for having her step in the way of bullies whenever he got out hand with his meddling. Anyway, his father was a powerful government ambassador but he somehow made enough time to parent them and his mother worked at a local florist shop, so she often left him, his elder sister, and younger sister at home.
It wasn't until his sixteenth birthday had his life taken a weird turn. Before his birthday party, Shou had decided to go get his friends from their houses. But on the way their a mysterious kid had stepped in the way, his maroon-colored hair was a bit spiky and he had goggles on his head. He didn't speak much besides telling him " Yea, you have the right stuff kid. " After that he had given him a weird toy and told him to keep it. Against his better judgement he had. His party went off without a hitch and his life continued as if everything was normal. Still, Shou couldn't shake the creepy feeling that something wasn't right about that kid from earlier.
Sol (Coronamon)
Sol wears a black headband on his upper arm and he wears black goggles.
Sol is an aggressive digimon that is often the first to attack. He refuses to take orders from anyone that he considers weaker than himself, so its been pretty hard to find a tamer for him. He attacks enemy digimon with a ruthlessness that's said to burn from his inner flame and enthusiasm. Even his friends call him a digi-hazard to himself (albeit jokingly) When it comes to his friends however Sol is easily capable of inspiring them and is very protective over them. He won't even allow his own friends to bag on each other too hard.
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Building a future for the railway and the region
The latest train and bus timetables.
Learn more about our great group travel offers.
Only £10 for 12 months
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Learn more about our great group travel offers
If you've seen all the coverage of the Settle-Carlisle line on the national media this week and would like to travel in style behind a steam locomotive, there are more opportunities coming up.
The 'Fellsman' is an enduringly popular, scenic, steam-hauled journey over the Settle-Carlisle line. Following 2016's landslide, the closure of the line put an abrupt halt to these well-loved excursions but Statesman Rail will be operating them again in summer 2017.
The trains are steam-hauled throughout and the locomotives are chosen from the historic pool of engines based at Carnforth including: LMS Royal Scot 46115 'Scots Guardsman', LMS Jubilee 5690 'Leander', LMS Stanier Black Five 44932 and LMS Jubilee 45699 'Galatea'.
To celebrate the full re-opening of the line on 31st March – and the long-awaited return of steam – we are giving away four First Class tickets for the Fellsman on Tuesday 25th July! The excursion will depart from Lancaster and call at Preston, Blackburn, Clitheroe and Long Preston to take on passengers.
The winners will enjoy the stunning vistas offered by the Settle-Carlisle railway from the comfort of the First Class carriage, which benefits from additional legroom, wide cushioned seats, curtains and large picture windows. A complimentary service of tea/coffee and biscuits is included in the price and a buffet bar is available throughout most of the journey for the purchase of hot and cold beverages, sandwiches, snacks and alcoholic drinks. (The usual price for these tickets would be £480).
To enter the competition, just visit our Facebook page now (@setcarrailway). Taking part is really simple. Entries close on Sunday 2nd April and the lucky winner will be drawn at random on Tuesday 4th April.
For more information about the Statesman Rail, the Fellsman and other steam excursions, visit www.statesmanrail.com.
Easiest of all, find your way straight to our Facebook page by clicking on the window below…
Sign up below to receive exclusive product promotions from Settle to Carlisle Railway.
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Sydney Mozart Society
Affiliated with the Mozarteum, Salzburg
Sydney Mozart Society brings you Mozart and much more from the 'Golden Age' of Chamber music.
Save in the suburbs with an annual membership
The Sydney Mozart Society is a volunteer-run enterprise, we do not have paid staff. Our major expenses are venue hiring fees and artist professional fees, which we pay at market rates. We aim to offer concerts with low, affordable prices so that as many people as possible can enjoy fine music played by leading musicians.
2018 Pro rata annual membership
Now that the concert season is underway, you can join the Society or renew your membership to enjoy all 3 concerts remaining in the 2018 season at a pro rata cost that is significantly lower than buying single concert tickets.
$84 - new member
$78 - renewing member
$24 - full time student
You can find a membership application form in our 2018 season brochure. Or you can download a pro rata membership application form. Payment options are on the form. Complete the form and post, together with your payment details and a stamped self-addressed envelope (for the return of your concert tickets) to:
Membership Secretary
Sydney Mozart Society
8 Lincoln Street
Eastwood NSW 2122
When you become a member of the Society, the Society will provide you with a packet of admission tickets, one for each concert in the season. Just present the appropriate ticket at the Concert Hall door for a wonderful evening of music.
Membership enquiries
Phone 9876 3815 or 9498 4700
Email email@example.com
Alternatively, come along to our next concert in The Concourse Concert Hall, Chatswood and meet our Membership Secretary at the Membership Desk located in the foyer near the Concert Hall.
Prefer to attend individual concerts?
We understand that you might prefer to attend individual concerts before or instead of taking out annual membership. Non-members are welcome to enjoy our concerts. Tickets to the individual concerts in our concert seasons are very reasonably priced.
|Full-time student
Children under 13 years of age are admitted free.
Individual concert tickets can be purchased in advance:
- In person from the Concourse Box Office or from Ticketek agencies.
- By phoning the Ticketek Theatre & Arts Line 1300 795 012.
- Online through the Concourse website or the Ticketek website.
A Ticketek service delivery fee applies when tickets are booked by phone or online.
With your help
When you take out membership of the Society, you are doing more than just buying admission to a great concert series. You are helping to keep chamber music alive and vibrant, helping to provide performance opportunities for exceptional musicians and helping to bring the joy of chamber music to a wide audience.


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Every life requires a spiritual foundation.
"Grandfather, you left this..." Julio lifted the leather-bound journal and stepped toward the old man.
"It is yours now," said Antonio, with a gleam in his eye. "I've lived my life according to the twelve principles recorded in it. And if you will apply its principles as I did, your success will be greater than you could ever imagine."
Be a minister in the marketplace.
Terry Felber has written a parable that will transform your life and your business. Many years ago, this ago book helped Dave Ramsey rediscover the marketplace as a mission field--and merchants as ministers. Now let it open your eyes to the opportunities for service and leadership all around you.
Are you ready for a change?
The Legend of the Monk and the Merchant will change the way you see yourself, your job, and your purpose.
Now includes personal and small group study guide.
|Terry Felber
|About the Contributor(s)
|Terry Felber
Terry Felber speaks regularly to business groups of 15,000 people. Felber has been on the International Board of Advisors for Amway Corporation.
|Release Date
|Jan 1, 2013
|Weight (lbs)
|Length Unit
|Thomas Nelson
Customer Reviews
- Review by Ritika
Overall Rating
The book also has scripture references and a comprehensive study guide that allows small groups and even individuals to reflect deeply on the legend and what significance and meaning each of the twelve principles hold.
It quotes popular books and authorities on business and living with an approach to help the Christians understand better how the lessons would apply to their life and its people.
Me? The legend was enough.
Terry Felber has one message coded in the middle of this book: God wants your soul to prosper. (Posted on 1/23/2013)
- Review by Ryan
Overall Rating
I first heard of this book from Dave Ramsay. Ramsay was talking on his radio show about five or so books that he makes all of his staff members read within the first few months under his employ. This book was on the list, and Ramsay said great things about it. (Don't bother finding the radio broadcast, he repeats the rave things he said in the preface.) When I found out the book was available for review, I was very excited to get to read it.
The book really shines in how it uses scripture to debunk certain Christian myths about the evils of business and wealth. It is also interesting how it emphasizes the importance of a partnership between the merchants (busnessmen) and monks (ministers) for the kingdom of God. Beyond those two topics, the book reinforces principles about working hard, living within your means, and rebounding from tragedies very effectively.
There is one thing I would change in this book: The books heroes are Roman Catholics working for the advancement of the Roman Catholic church. It seemed to me that the author was not a catholic, if he was, he quoted a lot of scripture for a catholic. So why use them as the analogy? Don't get me wrong, this isn't a pro-catholic book. The catholic church was probably used because it was nescessary for the central anology of the story. But as a Baptist pastor who believes we should be trying to win people from the Catholic church, I wish another analogy was used.
Disclosure of Material Connection: I received this book free from the publisher through the BookSneeze®.com <http://BookSneeze®.com> book review bloggers program. I was not required to write a positive review. The opinions I have expressed are my own.
(Posted on 12/28/2012)
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