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South African Journal of Science
versión On-line ISSN 1996-7489
versión impresa ISSN 0038-2353
S. Afr. j. sci. vol.105 no.9-10 Pretoria sep./oct. 2009
Application of Numenta® Hierarchical Temporal Memory for land-use classification
A.J. PereaI, *; J.E. MeroñoII; M.J. AguileraI
IDpto. Física aplicada, Edificio Einstein, University of Cordoba, Campus Rabanales, 14071 Spain
IIDpto. Ingeniería Gráfica y Geomática, Edificio Gregor Méndel, University of Cordoba, Campus Rabanales, 14071 Spain
The aim of this paper is to present the application of memory-prediction theory, implemented in the form of a Hierarchical Temporal Memory (HTM), for land-use classification. Numenta®HTM is a new computing technology that replicates the structure and function of the human neocortex. In this study, a photogram, received by a photogrammetric UltraCamD® sensor of Vexcel, and data on 1 513 plots in Manzanilla (Huelva, Spain) were used to validate the classification, achieving an overall classification accuracy of 90.4%. The HTM approach appears to hold promise for land-use classification.
Key words: memory-prediction theory, NuPIC®, UltraCamD® sensor, Hierarchical Temporal Memory
Vision is the primary sensory modality for humansand most other mammalsby which they perceive the world. In humans, vision-related areas occupy about 30% of the neocortex.1 Light rays are projected upon the retina, and the brain tries to make sense of the world by means of interpreting the visual input pattern. The sensitivity and specificity with which the brain solves this computationally complex problem cannot yet be replicated on a computer. The most imposing of these problems is that of invariant visual pattern recognition.
Recently it has been said that the prediction of future sensory input from salient features of current input is the keystone of intelligence.2 The neocortex is the structure in the brain which is assumed to be responsible for the evolution of intelligence. Current sensory input patterns activate stored traces of previous inputs which then generate top-down expectations, which are verified against the bottom-up input signals. If the verification succeeds, the predicted pattern is recognised. This theory explains how humans, and mammals in general, can recognise images despite changes in location, size and lighting conditions, and in the presence of deformations and large amounts of noise. Parts of this theory, known as the memory-prediction theory (MPT), are modelled in the Hierarchical Temporal Memory or HTM technology developed by a company called Numenta®;3 the model is an attempt to replicate the structural and algorithmic properties of the neocortex.3 Spatial and temporal relations between features of the sensory signals are formed in an hierarchical memory architecture during a learning process. When a new pattern arrives, the recognition process can be viewed as choosing the stored representation that best predicts the pattern. Hierarchical Temporal Memory has been successfully applied to the recognition of relatively simple images,4 showing invariance across several transformations and robustness with respect to noisy patterns.
We have applied the concept of HTM, as implemented by Numenta®, to land-use recognition, by building and testing a system to learn to recognise five different types of land use.
Overview of the HTM learning algorithm
Hierarchical Temporal Memory can be considered a form of a Bayesian network, where the network consists of a collection of nodes arranged in a tree-shaped hierarchy.4 Each node in the hierarchy self-discovers a set of causes in its input, through a process of finding common spatial patterns and then detecting common temporal patterns.4 Unlike many Bayesian networks, HTMs are self-training, have a well-defined parent/child relationship between each node, inherently handle time-varying data and afford mechanisms for covert attention. Sensory data are presented at the bottom of the hierarchy. To train an HTM, it is necessary to present continuous, time-varying, sensory inputs while the causes underlying the same sensory data persist in the environment. In other words, you either move the senses of the HTM through the world, or the objects in the world move relative to the HTM's senses. Time is the fundamental component of an HTM, and can be thought of as a learning supervisor. Hierarchical Temporal Memory networks are made of nodes; each node receives as input a temporal sequence of patterns. The goal of each node is to group input patterns that are likely to have the same cause, thereby forming invariant representations of extrinsic causes.
An HTM node uses two grouping mechanisms to form invariants (Fig. 1). The first mechanism is called spatial pooling, in which raw data are received by the sensor; spatial poolers of higher nodes receive the outputs from their child nodes. The input of the spatial pooler in higher layers is the fixed-order concatenation of the output of its children. This input is represented by row vectors, and the role of the spatial pooler is to build a matrix (the coincidence matrix) from input vectors that occur frequently. There are multiple spatial pooler algorithms, e.g. Gaussian and Product. The Gaussian spatial pooler algorithm is used for nodes at the input layer, whereas the nodes higher up the hierarchy use the Product spatial pooler. The Gaussian spatial pooler algorithm compares the raw input vectors with the existing coincidences in the coincidence matrix. If the Euclidean distance between an input vector and an existing coincidence is small enough, the input is considered to be the same coincidence, and the count for that coincidence is incremented and stored in memory.
The Product spatial pooler is always part of a node higher up the hierarchy, and receives the concatenation of the outputs of its child nodes. This vector is divided into N portions, with N being the number of children of the node. The Product spatial pooler sets the highest value in each of these N distributions to 1, while the other values are set to 0. These new vectors are stored in the coincidence matrix, and the counts of the coincidences that already exist are incremented.
The second mechanism is called temporal pooling, by which patterns that are temporally close are grouped together. In this way, patterns that are very different, but that have a common cause, can be in the same group.
Both the spatial and temporal poolers switch from learning to inference mode at some point. In the case of the spatial pooler, its output is a vector of length equal to the number of patterns pooled by the node, and the ith position in this vector corresponds to the ith pattern inside this spatial pooler. This output is a probability distribution of the similarity between the input pattern and the stored patterns, measured in terms of Euclidean distances. An assumption commonly made by the designers of HTM is that the probability that a pattern is closest to another pattern falls off as a Gaussian function of the Euclidean distance, therefore it can be calculated as proportional to in a node, and the outputs of the spatial pooler are the inputs of the temporal pooler. As mentioned before, the temporal pooler forms groups of patterns that are likely to follow each other in time, since it would indicate that they are likely to have the same cause in the world.
The designers of HTM used a time adjacency matrix partitioned with a 'greedy' algorithm. This algorithm creates groups by finding the most connected pattern that is not part of a group, and picking the N most connected patterns to this pattern recursively.4 For every input from the spatial pooler, the temporal pooler outputs a probability distribution over its groups, propagating the uncertainties in the hierarchy in a Bayesian belief propagation manner. The ambiguous information propagated from the bottom of the hierarchy is resolved higher in the hierarchy.
Materials and methods
The study area was located in the central plains of Huelva Province, Spain (Fig. 2), in the subregion known as Manzanilla (37º23'N; 6º25'W).
Digital aerial photograph
The dataset used in this research was a photogram received by a photogrammetric UltraCamD® sensor of Vexcel on 23 October 2007, with dimensions of 7 500 × 11 500 pixels. Its band combination was formed by red, green and blue. The digital aerial photographs had a special resolution of 30 cm. The photogram was segmented in small images of 128 × 128 pixels, as the HTM platform classifies only small images which contain only one pattern.
Map of crops and exploitation
A map of crops and exploitation of the region of Huelva (2007) was used to carry out the 'training' of the classification and its subsequent validation. The land use in this area is classified as: Vitis vinifera L. (vineyards), Olea europaea L. (olive groves), fallow land, irrigated land and built-up surface (Fig. 3). Table 1 shows the number of training and test images for the architecture demonstration.
We used NuPIC® (Numenta® Platform for Intelligent Computing) software developed by Numenta® for implementing HTMs to implement our HTM network. The company provides examples of how to create and use HTMs in various scenarios. One of these examples trains an HTM to recognise black and white pictures (one bit per pixel) with different levels of deformations. Another example uses an HTM to classify fruit images (greyscale, eight bits per pixel). We adapted these examples to solve problems related to the classification of different land uses using small greyscale images (128 × 128 pixels), because HTMs classify only these kinds of images. To implement an HTM, two steps have to be undertaken: creating the architecture and training the architecture with a set of training patterns. After we created an architecture and trained the network on the digital aerial photographs, we tested the HTM with a test set.
Hierarchical Temporal Memory networks are built and configured by writing Python scripts. While the majority of the scripts follow a standard pattern, each network requires customisation. One must leverage in-depth knowledge of the data to design and configure the hierarchy of nodes. Each node algorithm needs to be customised based on the input values it is encountering. Because of the large number of node parameters, node configuration values will most likely be 'tweaked' after each iteration, in order to improve accuracy. The network structure usually remains the same, reducing the amount of code that must be changed.
Our HTM model consisted of three levels (Fig. 4): Level 1 (the input level) consisted of 16 nodes, each receiving a feature and the corresponding delta; Level 2 consisted of four nodes, each receiving the output of four input level child nodes; and Level 3 consisted of one top level node.
The parameters of the HTM network used were as follows:
Level 1:
levelSize = 64
pooler algorithm: gaussian; sigma = 0.4
maxDistance = 5
maxGroupSize = 1 435
grouper algorithm: sumProp
Level 2:
levelSize = 4
pooler algorithm: product
maxGroupSize = 1 435
grouper algorithm: sumProp
Level 3:
levelSize = 1
pooler algorithm: product
mapper algorithm: sumProp
'maxDistance' on the first level defines the minimum value that the squares of the Euclidean distances between an input (x) and all the previously memorised inputs (yi) have to take in order for x to be considered novel. 'maxGroupSize' sets an upper limit for the number of quantised inputs that can form a group in the temporal pooler. The pooler algorithm used by the spatial pooler of higher levels is 'product', which means that the belief that an input during inference is similar to a given vector (previously memorised by the spatial pooler) is calculated as follows:
where n children is the number of children the node has, x is the input vector, yi are the vectors previously stored by the spatial pooler, and a[childn] is the part of vector a that is received from the nth child.
Finally, the temporal pooler at each level uses the 'sumProp' algorithm, which takes the highest belief from each group to generate a distribution of beliefs over temporal groups during inference.5
This type of hierarchical network structure is analogous to the hierarchy of the visual region in human neocortex, which also is organised as a hierarchy of cortical regions. The receptive field size in the cortical regions also gradually increases in the higher levels of the hierarchy. The neural structures in higher regions of the cortex represent increasingly complex structures and the structures in the top visual region represent visual objects, just as they do in this model.
Accuracy evaluation and validation
The accuracy evaluation is a general term to compare the generated classification with known geographical information. Its main aim is therefore to determine the veracity of the classification process. A true-terrain image from the information contained in the crop maps and exploitations of the region of Huelva was prepared. The statistics used were: producer's accuracy, user's accuracy, overall accuracy and Kappa statistic.
The Kappa statistic is a measure of the difference between the observed accuracy and the random possibility of chance agreement between the reference data and the classification.6 When the total number of correctly classified pixels in a class is divided by the total number of pixels that should have been classified in that class, it is known as the producer's accuracy.7 If the total number of correctly classified pixels in a class is divided by the total number of pixels that were actually classified in that class (both correctly and incorrectly), the result is a measure of the user 's accuracy.7 The overall accuracy is the percentage of correctly classified pixels. We used Numenta® Vision Test App® software to validate our HTM network.
Results and discussion
The methodology proposed was applied to the region of study obtaining a final classification of land use. Table 2 shows the accuracy of classification in the digital aerial photograph according to its boundary analysis. The highest producer's accuracy was achieved for the 'built-up surface', having a value of 100%, while the lowest producer's accuracy was for 'Vitis vinifera L.' (81.33%).
In the case of the user's accuracy, the highest value again was obtained for the 'built-up surface' class (100%), while the lowest corresponded to 'Olea europaea L.' (73.03%). The HTM classification thus gave an high overall accuracy of 90.4%, and the Kappa statistic had a value of 0.80, showing that the classification was 80% better than a random one.
We also verified the capability of the model to learn invariant representations from visual patterns and to store these patterns in the hierarchy and recall them auto-associatively. During the study, we varied many internal constants affecting the learning process, and also made modifications to the algorithms and data structures themselves. Figures 58 illustrate the main recognition capabilities of the system, trained to recognise five categories of images. One of the two original training images in the category 'Olea europaea L.' is shown in Fig. 5. The system easily recognised the shifted version of the original image, shown in Fig. 6.
Note that the number of the 'Olea europaea L.' and their arrangement were the only invariants that the system was explicitly exposed to during the training; hence the other invariants described below were discovered automatically by the system.
The system can function as an auto-associative memory, as demonstrated in Fig. 7. Given a part of the original image, the missing information was reconstructed and the category was correctly predicted. This resembles a capability of the brain to recall missing information given only partial input. The system can also tolerate a substantial amount of noise of various types and still discern and correctly recognise the category, as shown in Fig. 8.
We observed that the system performed better overall while recognising complex images, which have more discernible features, such as corners and line intersections. For example, images of 'fallow land' and 'irrigated land' were not recognised as easily as 'built-up surface' or 'Vitis vinifera L.'. The system also sometimes tended to confuse categories sharing many similar shapes, such as 'Vitis vinifera L.' and 'Olea europaea L.'. We also observed that the recognition performance was slowly degraded when more categories were introduced in training, arising from the same confusion between similar images. For example, we tried to classify different irrigated crops (Phaseolus vulgaris L., Triticum aestivum L., Vicia faba L. and Pisum sativum L.), but the analysis and result showed a small overall accuracy of 69.65% and a Kappa Statistic of 0.72.
It is also useful to note the relative strength of beliefs of the ten best-predicted categories that is displayed by the system as a bar graph. When input image is not heavily distorted, and resembles its true category more than any other categories, we see a graph similar to the one shown in Fig. 9. We can judge from the graph that the winning prediction is very confident. When the input image is not readily recognisable, or seems similar to several categories, the graph would look like the one in Fig. 10.
The images from the digital aerial sensors in our model may be an extremely useful tool in the agriculture field, providing an accurate result for the use of land in a fixed area under certain conditions. By contrast, traditional classification techniques, basically pixel-based approaches, are limited in that they typically produce a characteristic 'salt and pepper' effect, and are unable to extract objects of interest. An HTM network considers spatial and temporal relations between features of the sensory signals which are formed in an hierarchical memory architecture during a learning process. The methods are not, however, actually comparable because HTM classifies only small greyscale images with only one pattern. In the future, we expect that the platform will be able to classify more than one pattern, and the 'salt and pepper' effect could be eliminated.
This model shares many common ideas with traditional neural networks. The hierarchy consists of many relatively simple units (subregions) that do the same basic operation and can be made to run in parallel. It solves problems by using cooperation between subregions without a centralised algorithm. The knowledge and beliefs in the system are distributed between the subregions in various hierarchical levels. The system learns its skills by training and is able to generalise. The memory-prediction framework, however, is an inferential system that uses beliefs for learning and recognition. Nevertheless, due to their similarities, the model shares a number of advantages with neural networks; it clearly can function as an associative memory, can tolerate noise and can generalise training images.
Finally, this model offers a greater promise of understanding what intelligence is by closely modelling the overall structure of the human neocortex.
1. Douglas R.J. and Martin K.A.C. (2004). Neuronal circuits of the neocortex. Annu. Rev. Neurosci. 27, 419451. [ Links ]
2. Hawkins J. and Blakeslee S. (2004). On Intelligence, chap. 4, pp. 83104. Henry Holt & Company, New York. [ Links ]
3. Hawkins J. and George D. (2007). Hierarchical Temporal Memory: Concepts, Theory, and Terminology. Numenta Inc., Redwood City, California. Online at: http://www.numenta.com/Numenta_HTM_Concepts.pdf [ Links ]
4. George D. and Jaros B. (2007). The HTM Learning Algorithms. Numenta Inc., Redwood City, California. Online at: http://www.numenta.com/for-developers/education/Numenta_HTM_Learning_Algos.pdf [ Links ]
5. Csapó A. and Baranyi P. (2007). VFA-driven Hierarchical Temporal Memory input for object categorization. In Proceedings of the 8th International Symposium of Hungarian Researchers on Computational Intelligence and Informatics, Hungary. Online at: http://bmf.hu/conferences/cinti2007/3_CsapoAdam.pdf [ Links ]
6. Lillesand T.M. and Kiefer R.W. (1994). Remote Sensing and Image Interpretation, 3rd edn, pp. 616617. John Wiley & Sons, New York. [ Links ]
7. Chuvieco E. (1990). Fundamentos de teledetección espacial. Ediciones Rialp, Madrid. [ Links ]
Received 11 May. Accepted 27 August 2009.
* Author for correspondence E-mail: email@example.com


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Maybe you saw the seven-minute film Sterlings Special Love Holds last week, and, maybe, if you werent paying close attention, you were perplexed.
Who is this Sterling kid, you queried, and what makes him a star?
This is a story about a lovable, strong-willed kid. Or maybe its about parents desperately battling his rare condition. Or its about films that celebrate a childs indomitable spirit. Take your pick its all here.
The 11-year-old with a slow-growing tumor in his skull is the leading man in a short film that was shown at Durango Film. The movie is called Sterlings Special Love Holds perhaps because The Love Bug was already taken.
To get a sense of what Sterling Bachmans all about, it helps to know why hes called The Love Bug.
Because I have lots of love in me, he answers, in a manner thats anything but boastful.
Hes got seven marriage proposals already, says his father, Bob Bachman, because hes genuinely interested in other people. And people can sense that instantly.
On the morning after a long day of travel from their home in Connecticut, the Bachmans Cindy (mom), Bob and Sterling are sitting in the lobby of General Palmer Hotel for an interview. Theyre embarking not only on a weekend of movies and panel discussions involving the festival, but its their first real vacation together. Ever.
The reason for that, and the reason that Sterling became a movie star, is not only empathy for his fellow man, but his physical condition.
He has neurofibromatosis, a genetic disorder that causes tumors to grow in the nervous system. In his case, a tumor developed where the optic nerves cross.
Doctors discovered the tumor after Sterling had his first seizure when he was 18 months old. Dozens of seizures would follow and trips to doctors and emergency rooms, and 53 MRIs.
At 20 months, Sterling lost his vision, except for an ability to detect shadows. Off and on for the next nine years, he endured chemotherapy in a constant battle to keep the tumor from growing. About a year ago, the tumor eased up, and hes been off chemo since. Also, after a 40 percent boost in one medication, he hasnt had a seizure in four years.
The Bachmans have been presented with many possible treatments, tried some, and had some actually work.
Any parent whos been down this road will exactly understand what Im talking about, Bob Bachman says. You end up making decisions for which you have no preparation ... and so what do you go by? Its a strange land to live in.
Recently, they connected with Stephanie Angel, a New York-based filmmaker who, three years ago, created a unique niche with her Angelight Films. The 31-year-old collaborates with children who have brain and spinal-cord tumors. When Angel was 7, her 5-year-old sister died of a brain tumor.
The films are a method of self-expression for the children, and a way of warding off the feeling of being a victim, Angel says in a phone interview from Connecticut, where, she says, shes freelancing for her day job. She makes the Angelight films when time and money allow. Three of the films screened at last years Durango festival.
The kids have the ideas, and with her 10 years of experience, she makes them reality. Sterling, for example, came up with the films themes music, eating pizza with friends, typing in Braille.
Sterling gets to help toss dough at a local pizzeria, then pick toppings. When the pizza arrives, his friends are stunned to see there are marshmallows baked on.
I didnt even try it, Sterling says with a laugh.
In the final scene, Sterling and his music instructor, Billy Ayres, are singing about a train, and about toot, toot, which in this case refers to body-noise humor. They can barely finish the song theyre laughing so hard.
Theres another purpose for the Angelight films, Cindy says.
Its a gift for parents that they will always have, she says. The film is just an amazing way of doing that.
The easing of the seizures gave the Bachmans enough confidence to get on a plane with Sterling for the first time. They call it a series of amazing miracles that, with their now-middle-school-aged boy, they are attending a film festival in Durango.
To understand him even further, it helps to know why they also call him The Tank.
Given all the things hes been through, Bob says, he has never complained about anything once. Ever. Hes just unstoppable.
But youll remember him more as The Love Bug for his ability to smile, and most of all, his empathy. The clerk at the hotel, the person walking past, the journalist pestering him with questions he finds it important to reach everyone around him in a meaningful way.
He often does this thing where he says, Group hug, Cindy says. Sterling gathers everyone in the vicinity, including strangers. Hes a very loving soul.
One of Sterlings favorite sayings came to him when he woke up one morning. He sings it more than speaks it:
Another new day come my way, I cant wait to see the people today.
email@example.com. John Peel writes a weekly human-interest column.


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SAN ANTONIO -- A Halloween party ended with violence after police said a man dressed as Freddy Krueger opened fire on a large crowd.
The shooting happened on the 2900 block of Aspen Meadow around 5 a.m. on Sunday. One of the residents who did not want to go on camera said he was throwing the party with his housemates and was taking fees at the door.
He said several men he did not know showed up to the home and started a fight with his friends. He said the argument escalated into a shooting.
He said several people who attended the party captured part of the fight on Snapchat. This later reportedly helped police identify that there were two shooters involved. He said one man had a shotgun and the second man had a hand-gun.
There were five people who were injured in the shooting. Police said that one injured woman tried to drive to the hospital, but wrecked her car along the way. Jasmine De Hoyos, who attended the party, said there were more than a hundred people at the home. She said she helped one of the victims who got shot in the arm.
"I kind of applied pressure to the wound to make sure he didn't bleed out. A couple of his friends were there with us. So, we were trying to keep him calm," said De Hoyos.
No arrests have been made and police are still searching for the shooters.
"I'm kind of sad that this happened in this neighborhood because I like living here. It's a really good neighborhood. It is what it is, and we're just going to keep an eye out and try to keep each other's back," said Jeremy Collins, another neighbor.
The resident of the home who did not want to go on camera said one of his friends who got shot in the stomach is still in critical condition.


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Usually each pokemon league has multiple weaknesses that are shared eg. Sinnoh Ice= 2 Aran, 5 Bertha, 3 Cynthia What are other ones for this league and every other one.
Here's a more concise answer ;)
Electric mostly takes care of Lorelei, plus a few others. Psychic covers half of Bruno's team and all of Koga's. Ice covers the dragons and various others.
Similar to the original Kanto but includes Dark & Psychic instead of Ice & Ghost. Bug and Fighting will do well here plus Psychic and Ice for the reasons above.
Fighting covers LOADS here so is essential. You'll need Ice or Dragon for the dragons and maybe Dark.
Water covers all of Berta's and Flint's pokemon. Fire and Dark cover a lot too.
Fighting and Dark get the best coverage, then either Flying or Psychic for Marshal.
Okay.. Why don't you just look this up yourself?
I'm going to do the FR/LG Pokemon League instead of the original due to it being more easily accessed, and them using I'm pretty sure, The same pokemon.
Lorelei - 4 of her 5 pokemon Go out with Electric, So this is a Definite Type to carry for her, and Anything Physical Takes out Jynx.
So, One Electric Type Move with Decent PP for this Battle.
Bruno - We're in a Generation where Psychic is Always Special.
All of his Fighting Types are weak to Psychic, and both of his Onix's Have Horrible Special Defense, but beastly Physical Defense, but for the Most part, You can just use a Strong Psychic move for this Guy's whole team.
Bertha - Everything in her Team Is Weak to Psychic, So Aslong as you are high enough over Gengar and Crobat to outspeed everything, Psychic Takes this battle Down.
Lance - Remember your Electric type from Lorelei? Pull him back out.
Gyrados and Aerodactly Go down with Electric Easy, Now a Simple Ice Beam takes out the Rest.
Gary - He has a well balanced team that you just need to hit with your Best Shot.
Kanto League's main Weakness - Its weakest to Psychic which takes down Bruno and Bertha, 2nd Weakness is Electric That takes down 4 of Lorelei and 2 of Lance. You can Carry a Starmie who knows,
Ice Beam( Lance ) - Thunderbolt ( Lorelei + Lance ) - Psychic ( Bruno + Bertha ) and Surf ( STAB for Rival )
And pretty much demolish the Pokemon League if you're slightly over Leveled.
HG/SS Style.
Will - immediatly Goes down With Dark, ALL of his pokemon are weak to it, So just carry a Strong and hard hitting Dark Move.
Koga It says Poison, but he likes bugs Too.
Fire takes all of his Bugs Down, Not Pull out a Hard hitting Psychic type to Take Out Muk and Crobat.
You basically need Fire and Psychic.
Bruno - You just need Psychic for his whole battle again, Just need Psychic.
Karen - Psychic Takes down Gengar and Vileplume, Rock For Houndoom and Murkrow, and Hit Umbreon with Fighting,
My Suggestion would be a Fighting Type with a Rock move on it, And your Psychic type from Koga and Bruno.
Lance - Everyone in his team has a Rock Weakness, So this is a Definite, Since you already Get good use of it from Karen.
Johto League biggest disadvantages - I Think the best type with the most effectiveness and essentialness in this Pokemon League, Is Psychic, And the second most use Full being Rock.
No Hoenn Remakes :'(
Sidney - All of His Pokemon go down with Fighting In R/S or E.
Phoebe - Dark takes out everyone but Sableye, and with Sableye having no Weaknesses, Just hit him with the Strongest STAB move you can whip up.
Glacia - Her Whole Team goes down With Fighting.
Drake - In R/S His whole team is taken down with Ice, Although in Emerald He has a Kingdra who you just Have to hit with Strong STAB or a Dragon Move.
Champion Steven - Water hits everyone in his Team for Neutral or Super Effective, Same with Fire so This is the most beneficial types to use on him, Perhaps your Starter?
Champion Wallace - If you're playing emerald you face him instead of Steven here.
Electric Takes everyone but Whiscash, He needs a Grass move to be taken Down, While Ludicolo is Neutral on both but will go down with a Strong STAB move.
Biggest Type Threat - I think Fighting, Being able to take down the Dark and Ice Team Elite four Trainer, is the most needed type for this league.
I'm doing D/P not Platinum here.
Aaron - Hit him with Fire to take down 4 of 5 of his Guys, and Drapion goes down With Ground, or Strong STAB.
Bertha - All of her pokemon are weak to Grass.
Flint - Water Takes Down His Fire types ( 2 ) And his Steelix. Ice Takes Drifblim ( Most water types can get a hold of it ) And Lopunny goes down with Any Decent STAB Move.
Lucian - Only 3 of 5 have a Dark weakness, but that helps, and Fire It super Effective on Bronzong, and can Probably Take Medicham if its STAB.
Cyntha - Has a Rather Well balanced team, hit her with all you've got.
Type Threat - I'd Say fire does the biggest Damage here, Although in Platinum Ice Works best.
Finally, I'm almost done, I'm doing to before Elite Four pokemon League.
Shauntal - Goes down with Dark
Grimsley - Goes down with Fighting
Caitlin - Goes down with Dark
Marshal - Goes down with Psychic
Weakness - Dark is the biggest Weakness of this pokemon League, Even though I'm doing the before you battle N and Ghetisis Pokemon League, These are still base weaknesses that will take out a large amount of pokemon Afterwards, Biggest Threat is Dark Taking Down Caitlin and Shauntal


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Work, ugh. Quick roundup of good druid posts from other sites since I don't have the time to do my own:
Bears: Kalon at Thinktank has updated his gear guide to include Ony and PVP gears. Basically: Top-tier PVP gear (Relentless) is close to BIS, just behind 25-man heroic gear. PVP gear = more survivability; PVE gear = more threat. An invaluable resource as always.
Cats: Not much new here; so I'll take the opportunity to tout FeralByNight again. FBN is a DPS rotation tool that continually analyzes several factors (your buffs and their time remaining, # of CP's, energy, boss HP, positioning) to give you the "best-choice" solution for maximum DPS. It's not perfect, and you won't get your max DPS until you learn when to go against its reccomendations, but it's perfect for learning feral priorities.
Moonkin: Graylo and others have talked about WiseEclipse, the addon that can increase your dps considerably by maximizing your Eclipse uptimes. Read Graylo's post at Gray Matter for more details.
Trees: Some discussion about the nerf to Rejuvenation in 3.3 at Restokin. Blizzard seems to be gently but firmly pushing us into the "support healer" role by nerfing our ability to heal burst raid damage. I might expand this into a full post later, if I get a chance.
Bear guide to continue soon(TM).


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I was diagnosed with castleman's disease in 2007 and told they do not know what type i have and there is no treatments for this disease. I want to know how i can find out what kind of treatments are available.
As is the case with so many questions cramming their way into my "inbox," the information you desire is already waiting for you in the archives! See below.
Dr. Bob
castlemans disease Aug 13, 2008
my son is hiv pos. and he has castlemans disease with kaposi sarcoma.can the virus be spread through kissing from the saliva?ihave grandchildren who he makes a fuss off.should i be concerned?
Response from Dr. Frascino
Castleman's disease and Kaposi's sarcoma are two different illnesses, but both are caused by human herpes virus type 8 (HHV-8). HHV-8 is present in saliva. The mode of transmission of HHV-8 remains a topic of debate. I'll reprint some information about Castleman's disease below that addresses your concerns.
Dr. Bob
Click here to view the below article on TheBodyPRO.com and listen to a podcast of the interview.
Incidence Is Rising Among HIV-Infected Patients An Interview With Mark Bower, Ph.D., F.R.C.P.
By Terri Wilder
August 4, 2008
This is Terri Wilder with The Body, and I've just finished watching a presentation by Professor Mark Bower of Chelsea and Westminster Hospital in the United Kingdom. He presented information on Castleman's disease in persons living with HIV.
Could you please tell us what Castleman's disease is
Castleman's disease is a rare lymphoproliferative disorder, which is monotypic -- that is, lambda light chain restricted -- but is not monoclonal. So it's a polyclonal illness. It's really a form of pre-lymphoma, if you like, driven by the human herpesvirus-8 [HHV-8], the same virus that causes Kaposi's sarcoma.
How is it diagnosed?
This is the real problem with Castleman's disease. Even in the best centers, it often takes many months before the diagnosis is made, because people who have HIV and Castleman's disease present with very nonspecific symptoms and signs. They usually have intermittent high fevers and night sweats. They usually have lymph gland enlargement and splenomegaly, and they often have anemia, low albumens and polyclonal hypogammaglobulinemia. None of these individual signs or symptoms is sufficient to establish the diagnosis, and there's a wide differential diagnosis. The only way that you can really make the diagnosis is by doing either a lymph node excisional biopsy, or a splenectomy, if that's the only site of disease. That's why it so frequently takes a long time for the diagnosis to be established in people with HIV.
What is the treatment plan for the person who has been diagnosed with Castleman's disease and HIV?
Following the establishment of a diagnosis of Castleman's disease, there is, as yet, no gold standard best-established treatment. There are no head-to-head, randomized studies of what are the best and most effective agents in the treatment of HIV-associated multicentric Castleman's disease, and the majority of the information on the management comes from relatively small published series from two or three centers, to be honest.1
It does appear, though, if you talk to most of the clinicians treating a sizable number of patients with Castleman's disease, that the optimal treatment involves a combination of single-agent chemotherapy, usually with an agent called etopocide, and monoclonal antibody therapy with anti-CD20 monoclonal antibody, known as rituximab [brand name: Rituxan]. In addition, there is also some data to suggest that where the spleen is massively enlarged, removing the spleen surgically improves the outcome.2,3
Following that sort of treatment, the patient should achieve a clinical remission, where all their symptoms have gone. There is some debate as to whether additional treatment at that time can reduce the risk of relapse. Some centers have tried using maintenance rituximab monoclonal antibody therapy,4 and other centers have tried using anti-HHV-8 (anti-herpesvirus) agents, like ganciclovir [brand name: Cytovene] and valganciclovir [brand name: Valcyte], both as treatment and, more recently, as maintenance therapy.5 But really, there's no established best treatment at present.
What is the percentage of people living with HIV who have been diagnosed with Castleman's disease?
All I can tell you about is the incidence of Castleman's within our cohort at Chelsea and Westminster Hospital.6 That's the only data there is about incidence of Castleman's disease. That's a prospective cohort of 11,000 patients, 52,000 patient-years of follow-up. So it's probably the second largest, or perhaps the largest, HIV single-center cohort in Europe. We have looked at the incidence of Castleman's disease in that cohort over the last 25 years, and the overall incidence is 4 per 10,000 patient-years. Now, let's just compare that so that you've got an idea: That's about 1/50 of the incidence of Kaposi's sarcoma, which is the disease caused by the same virus.
What is the prognosis for patients living with HIV when they are diagnosed with Castleman's disease?
Until perhaps the turn of this millennium, the best data on that was from Eric Oksenhendler's group in Paris, which suggested that the median survival following a diagnosis of HIV-associated Castleman's disease was 14 months.7 However, there have been recent dramatic improvements in the therapy of Castleman's with the recognition of the need to give chemotherapy and immunotherapy. In most more recent studies, the survival rates are very, very much higher than that. For example, there is a study that we published recently in the Annals of Internal Medicine, of 20-ish patients treated with rituximab at the first diagnosis of Castleman's disease, and the two-year survival was 95%.8 Only a single patient had passed away, and actually, that patient was already on intensive care by the time the diagnosis was established.
What I suspect, although I cannot quote you a manuscript showing it, is that the majority of patients who achieve a remission of their Castleman's disease will, at some point in the future, relapse. So unlike most HIV-associated cancers, this is a disease that keeps coming back and will need retreatment. Often the treatment-free intervals are several years, but I think these patients need very careful monitoring, particularly with HHV-8 viral loads, to look for early relapses, so that we don't spend six months establishing the diagnosis of relapse, in the way that we spend six months establishing the initial diagnosis.
Is Castleman's disease sexually transmitted?
The transmission of the virus, Kaposi's sarcoma herpesvirus, between individuals, is an area of some debate. If you look at studies from Africa, it's clear that a small percentage of infants under the age of 3 have acquired this virus, and it is suggested that some of that may be vertical transmission, mother-to-child transmission, of HHV-8.9,10 There's then some horizontal nonsexual transmission, particularly amongst young children and, later on, one suspects, sexual transmission.11
Now, then, let's look at which body fluids this virus is most prevalent in. By far, the highest levels are present in the saliva. A bit like Epstein-Barr virus, this is a virus that's probably transmitted in nurseries and crèches, what with children dribbling and all the rest, and also, subsequently, through saliva exchange in kissing. So just like Epstein-Barr virus. Yes, you could say that kissing was a sex act, but not always, perhaps.
Thank you so much for your time.
This transcript has been lightly edited for clarity. \ References
Newlon JL, Couch M, Brennan J. Castleman's disease: three case reports and a review of the literature. Ear Nose Throat J. July 2007;86(7):414-418.
Waterston A, Bower M. Fifty years of multicentric Castleman's disease. Acta Oncol. December 2004;43(8):698-704.
Lerza R, Castello G, Truini M, et al. Splenectomy induced complete remission in a patient with multicentric Castleman's disease and autoimmune hemolytic anemia. Ann Hematol. April 1999;78(4):193-196.
Gérard L, Bérezné A, Galicier L, et al. Prospective study of rituximab in chemotherapy-dependent human immunodeficiency virus-associated multicentric Castleman's disease: ANRS 117 CastlemaB Trial. J Clin Oncol. August 1, 2007;25(22):3350-3356.
Stebbing J, Pantanowitz L, Dayyani F, Sullivan RJ, Bower M, Dezube BJ. HIV-associated multicentric Castleman's disease. Am J Hematol. June 2008;83(6):498-503.
Krell J, Tuthill M, Campbell V, et al. The incidence of HIV-associated multicentric Castlemans disease. In: Program and abstracts of the XVII International AIDS Conference; August 3-8, 2008; Mexico City, Mexico. Abstract MOAX0102.
Oksenhendler E, Duarte M, Soulier J, et al. Multicentric Castleman's disease in HIV infection: a clinical and pathological study of 20 patients. AIDS. January 1996;10(1):61-68.
Bower M, Powles T, Williams S, et al. Brief communication: rituximab in HIV-associated multicentric Castleman disease. Ann Intern Med. December 18, 2007;147(12):836-839.
Malope BI, Pfeiffer RM, Mbisa G, et al. Transmission of Kaposi sarcoma-associated herpesvirus between mothers and children in a South African population. J Acquir Immune Defic Syndr. March 1, 2007;44(3):351-355.
Mbulaiteye S, Marshall V, Bagni RK, et al. Molecular evidence for mother-to-child transmission of Kaposi sarcoma-associated herpesvirus in Uganda and K1 gene evolution within the host. J Infect Dis. May 1, 2006;193(9):1250-1257.
Pica F, Volpi A. Transmission of human herpesvirus 8: an update. Curr Opin Infect Dis. April 2007;20(2):152-156.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------- This article was provided by The Body PRO, and is a part of the publication The XVII International AIDS Conference.


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Yoga Mats for Studio & Home Practice
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Never overlook the importance of your yoga mat. While many studios offer yoga mats, having your own is important for hygiene, balance and consistency in your training.
Make the most of your time in the studio with the right size, padding and material. Consider the following before purchasing your mat:
- Thickness: A mat that is too thick can make you unstable as you attempt poses such as sirsasana, while a mat that's too thin can leave you uncomfortable post-workout and won't provide enough support for many exercises. For more support, shop thick yoga mats that are 5mm and above as well as extra-thick yoga mats that are 6mm and above.
- Grip: Yoga mats come with a variety of surface textures and patterns. If you're practicing hot yoga, for example, look for a mat that offers slip resistance and traction. For extra grip, grab a pair of yoga socks to increase traction as you're mastering poses on the mat.
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There are a variety of yoga accessories that can enhance your yoga training. Browse yoga socks, yoga accessories, and more from DICK'S Sporting Goods. Transporting your mat to and from the studio is a breeze with yoga mats that come with straps that allow you to roll and store your mat. If you don't have straps, choose from a variety of stylish and convenient yoga bags, so you can carry your mat with ease.


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We're settling in for a long winter's nap after Friday's release of the PlayStation's signature driving sim Gran Turismo 6. After that, well, there'll be news this weekend from the Video Game Awards, but it'll concern stuff well down the road. Not much cooking until February, so here is your week—or month—in games.
Friday, Dec. 6
- Gran Turismo 6 (PS3)
Recently Released and Reviewed:
- The Xbox One
- The PlayStation 4
- Turducken
- Dead Rising 3
- Crimson Dragon
- Lococycle
- Tearaway
- NBA Live 14
- Ryse: Son of Rome
- Killer Instinct
- Super Mario 3D World
- The Legend of Zelda: A Link Between Worlds
- Need For Speed Rivals
- Resogun
- Contrast
- Knack
- Killzone Shadow Fall
Coming Soon:
Jan. 14: Assassin's Creed Liberation HD (PS3, PC)
Sources: Amazon; Steam; GameStop
To contact the author of this post, write to email@example.com or find him on Twitter @owengood.


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Depression Support Group
Depression is a real and debilitating condition that is often misunderstood by family and friends. Its meaning can range from a prolonged period of sadness to an actual mental illness with specific symptoms. Find and share experiences with others who are going through the same struggles.
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Is there anybody out there? I am so alone, and i am sick and tired of it.
im here if you need to talk...im alone most of the time too...even in a crowd of people. noone understands me
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it's spring at last daffodil temptress tying the water with a blue rope old and rare books patience Les Trois Rois Melbourne City seen from Brighton Beach at dusk Brighton Beach at dusk Red planter rain, night, big city grazing at dusk I mean it! you makin' me blush don't worry, you're with me robo-chick what's up? I mean it 2 ! yellow dog what's up? #2 arrrgh melancholy proud the colour of the good ol' age yet another office sunset... setting the waters on fire nice nail colour quiet despair ashore the river of time the trees between the cracks nail over its head into colour rêve de jour d'automne i'm slipping out! the colour of aging
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New Second Edition! Was $24.95, now just $9.95 (paperback) and $4.75 (Kindle). Thanks to everyone who made the first edition a success! I look forward to hearing from even more readers.
A Kindle Best Seller!
Religions evolve, not metaphorically, but in a very real way. By applying survival-of-the-fittest principles to religion, we can finally understand how religion became incredibly infectious to the average human.
The Religion Virus will show you how infectious ideas like the loving father-figure God, the promise that death is not the end, the attraction of heaven, the threat of hell, and many others evolved from prehistoric to modern times. You will finally understand why today's religions survived while thousands of other religions and sects died out. Like biological life, over ninety-nine percenty of the world's religions are extinct, but the ones that remain are quite remarkable. They are the strongest and best. More importantly, "survival of the fittest" does not necessarily mean survival of the truth, but rather the survival of the things people want to believe, whether true or not.
- Why do you worship Abraham's God instead of Zeus, Pelé or Thor?
- Why is a single all-purpose god far better than a bunch of special-purpose gods?
- Why is religion necessarily hostile to science?
- Why can't polytheism compete with monotheism?
- Why do heaven and hell have to co-exist?
- Why is "shunning" (casting out non-believers) so critical to religion's survival?
You'll find answers to these and many more fascinating questions in The Religion Virus. Buy it today and get started!
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Recovering Christians
"Science never cheered up anyone. The truth about the human situation is just too awful." -- Kurt Vonnegut, Timequake
This quote illustrates one of the most difficult parts of leaving religion behind. For millenia, religion provided us with very appealing and soothing answers to life's difficult and perplexing questions. Nature is harsh, we all face death in the end, and during our short lives we are plagued by disease, natural disasters and by fellow humans who prey on our good nature.
Religion (Christianity in particular) has evolved remarkable answers that help us cope with these harsh realities. However difficult life is, there will be a reward: loved ones who die aren't really lost forever, evil people will be punished eventually, good will be rewarded, and when natural disasters strike, God has a purpose (even though we can't always understand it). Whatever happens here on Earth, it will all be OK in the end.
If you're like most people, abandoning these reassuring answers was (or will be) one of the hardest parts of losing your faith.
The Religion Virus won't magically make it all better again. But it will help you to understand why religion evolved these incredibly infectious ideas, and why it is so very difficult for you to leave religion behind.
"I feel so much better now!" – Carolyn, after reading The Religion Virus
Carolyn is a real person, born in 1930 in the Central Valley of California. In fact, you'll read her story in The Religion Virus. After years of soul searching and study, and witnessing a tragic natural catastrophe, Carolyn made the difficult decision to leave religion behind forever. But lingering doubts and fears remained. She knew her decision to leave Christianity was the right one, but Christianity had planted its incredibly infectious concepts of guilt, heaven, hell, and original sin deep in Carolyn's brain.
The Religion Virus showed Carolyn exactly why the two-thousand-year-old infectious ideas in her head were so hard to leave behind, and why she'd been plagued by uncertainty, doubt and regret for so long. When she finally got to the end of the book, all of Carolyn's uncertainty had evaporated, leaving her free to pursue life on her own terms.
The histories of Christianity and Judaism are absolutely fascinating, yet many (perhaps most) believers know very little about the true history of their own religion. Take this for example:
God standeth in the congregation of the mighty; he judgeth among the
gods. ... I have said, Ye are gods; and all of you are children of the most
High. But ye shall die like men, and fall like one of the princes.
– Psalm 82
Who is like unto thee, O Lord, among the gods?
–Exodus 15:11
Did you know that in the early history of Judaism and Christianity, most followers of Yahweh (the one you now call God) were polytheists? They swore their loyalty to Yahweh, but did not believe He was the only god.
The God you worship today is dramatically different than the Yahweh that Moses and Abraham worshipped. In fact, if Abraham could come forward in time to sit beside you in your church, he would barely even recognize your almighty, omniscent God, creator of the universe. Abraham thought of Yahweh as more of a flesh-and-blood god of wars, just one of many gods that Abraham's people worshipped.
How did this happen? Why was Abraham's and Moses' understanding of God so different from yours?
In The Religion Virus you'll learn why your God has changed so much in the eyes of His believers, and why the God you worship today is a better God.
And the story of God Himself is just the beginning. Just about every aspect of Christianity and Judaism – Genesis, the afterlife, heaven and hell, original sin, the divinity of Jesus Christ – has changed dramatically over the centuries. It's a fascinating story.
Although the title "The Religion Virus" sounds anti-religious, it is actually something quite different: it will teach you about religion's history, but from a completely new perspective. You'll learn where Christianity and Judaism came from, how they changed and evolved over the centuries, and most importantly, why your religion has taken its modern form.
Atheist or Agnostic
As an atheist or agnostic, you've either rejected the concept of gods, or perhaps you never were infected with those ideas in the first place. Or maybe you realize the question of God's existence is unanswerable. Yet you look at the religions of your friends, neighbors and family, and are baffled. How can they believe things that to you are so clearly wrong? These are smart, thoughtful people ... how is it that many consider the Bible, written over two thousand years ago, to be one hundred percent accurate in every respect? How is it they believe in miracles and magic, angels and demons?
And why is religion so incredibly tenacious?
The Religion Virus answers these questions with the new field of study called cultural evolution, or memetics.
Darwin's Theory of Evolution revolutionized our understanding of biology, turning it from a science that could merely categorize into a science that predicted and explained the amazing variety of life on this wonderful planet of ours. By applying these same principles to culture itself, we can predict and explain the evolution of religion.
Most religion books focus on the what or when of religion. Like the biologists of Darwin's time, all they can do is describe and categorize. But in The Religion Virus, you'll learn why religions evolved to their present-day form. The new science of cultural evolution – applying Darwin's principles to the flow of ideas (memes) as they move across society and down through history – has revolutionized our understanding of our culuture.
A number of excellent books have been written about memes, but all of them have skirted the biggest meme of all: religion. The Religion Virus tackles religion head on, showing how and why religions evolved to their present-day forms. With this new understanding of how cultures evolve (not metaphorically, but in a very real way), you'll see why religion is an almost-inevitable part of human culture.
You'll finally understand its tenacity, and why people are so incredibly attached to the set of ideas collectively called "religion."
Deist and Unitarian Universalists
Deism and Universal Unitarianism share a central idea: there are no simple answers, and each person's theology is the result of a search for truth and meaning rather than something handed down by an authority.
Within this framework of inquisitiveness, The Religion Virus gives new insights into how and why the major religions arose. Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, along with the many branches of Eastern religions, provide very satisfying answers to the deep questions of life. Are these answers right, or are they just the answers that people want to hear? Or (as some suggest), are they answers that keep the major religious institutions in business and in power? These are difficult questions that have been asked for centuries, with much heated opinion but very little progress.
The Religion Virus takes a new approach. Instead of asking, "Is this idea right or wrong?", it asks, "Does this idea appeal, whether it is right or wrong?" A new branch of study called memetics, parallel to genetics, treats ideas very much like genes: they spread, they mutate, and they compete against each other for survival. Ideas live in your mind, not your cells, but otherwise behave remarkably like genes. And like genes, it turns out that ideas evolve – not metaphorically, but in a very real way.
Using the insights provided by memetics, The Religion Virus will take you on a tour of the Abrahamic religions' histories. You'll learn the real history of each of the major tenets of these religion: monotheism, Biblical infallibility, heaven and hell, morality, and many more. Each of these ideas is traced through history as the inexorable forces of "survival of the fittest" shaped it into the most appealing idea of all. You'll learn why it's not truth that counts when it comes to the spread of ideas, only whether the idea survives better than its competitors in the "ideosphere."
As one reviewer explained, "... The Religion Virus can facilitate a wholesale change in the way we think about religion." In your search for truth, morality and purpose in life, an understanding the origin and appeal of today's religions is a good foundation.
Meme Geek
Memes and cultural evolution are nothing new to you, you get it. You've read Dawkins and Distin, and maybe even Brodie and Aunger. You watch with fascination as the Fifth Avenue marketing gurus spin their memetic webs, YouTube videos "go viral" (a term that you actually understand), fads sweep the country, urban legends get retold ad nauseum, and a dozen copies of the next viral meme pile up on Twitter, spread across Facebook, and clog your Inbox.
But there's a piece missing ... why haven't any of these authors writing about memes taken a serious look at religion? Religion is by far the biggest, most intricate, and most pervasive memeplex in the world's history. So why has religion been almost completely ignored by the memetics community?
The Religion Virus takes this controversial topic head-on, and there is plenty of material to study: God, death, heaven and hell, anti-rationalism, anti-science, Jesus' divinity ... the list goes on and on. Each of these memes has a fascinating history, some stretching back over ten thousand years.
For example, why did monotheism supplant paganism? It's a hard question for historians, because without an evolutionary approach, there's no real reason to expect one form of religion to dominate over another. But a memetic view makes it obvious: using well-understood population dynamics, one can easily see why a single, all-purpose god-mem will be more successful than a host of lesser (often squabbling) god-memes. Moreover, monotheism is a direct result of three other memes whose evolution was almost inevitable: the All-Purpose God meme (one god who can answer all prayers), the Intolerance meme (suppress or kill those who don't believe in your god), and the Globalization meme (God is universal, he can answer your prayers even if you leave Israel).A memetic analysis completely explains religion's fascinating history, and furthermore actually predicts the features of religion that we see around the world today.
Most Christians, Jews and Muslims are amazed to learn that the modern God they worship today bears very little resemblence to the God of the Israelites two thousand years ago. Historians can show what happened to God in those two millenia, but only memetics can explain why.
Copyright © 2014 Craig A. James


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Military, Products, Public Service
By Steve Colby | August 1, 2008
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This article focuses on composite materials and their contribution to survivability in combat aircraft applications.
Composite materials, specifically fiber-reinforced polymers, provide manufacturers with amazing improvements producing structural strength and flexibility. These composite panels vary from cowlings and integral structural members to all-composite rotor blades replacing formerly all-metal components. Composites offer strength increases, weight reductions (depending on compounds and thicknesses), and flexion tolerance for bending, compression, tension, and shear loads that would work-harden or fatigue-weaken metals in the same application. Their manufacture is often complex, costly, and time-consuming, but well worth the investment for the survivability benefits derived.
In combat there are four structural "kill" modes that affect aircraft: pressure overload, penetration, structure or area removal, and thermal weakening.
Composite structures and panels allow manufacturers to design and build passive protection into panels and cowlings using the inherent provision for integral armor plating. In fact, the most common seat armor, ceramic-Kevlar, is a composite. Integral armor provides built-in protection for penetration prevention or ballistic-velocity reduction. Strength and component life is enhanced through fiber-weave patterns designed with layering and bias techniques to reduce harmonic vibrations and to distribute vibration and flexion loads in ways that can make component life unlimited.
When combined into a structural panel, this produces structure and armor in one panel that protects occupants and systems from pressure overload and penetration. One can see the benefits for all-composite rotor blades, which eliminate the older metal laminate design and associated fatigue limits of solid-metal parts in a highly repetitive flexing and twisting environment.
When structure is removed by kinetic or explosive force, strength is also removed. The difference is that composites are layered, woven materials whose ply biases are multidirectional (much as plywood grain is alternated 90 deg for each layer). Composites spread the stress loading around the damaged, missing material in a way that allows the surrounding, fiber-reinforced material to absorb the loads uniformly. In solid materials like metal, damage like this tends to propagate cracks from the damage area under load and can cause catastrophic failure starting at the hole. However, composites aren't a panacea. If structural material is removed from a key joint or edge, strength can be reduced to failure. The likelihood that composites will catastrophically fail in this way, though, is significantly lower than solid metals. Thermal weakening is a condition in which fire or intense convective heat causes material to soften and weaken. Metals, with a few high-tech exceptions, are adversely affected by this vulnerability. Composites can be designed to tolerate extreme heat without melting or softening. Phenolics are the resins most commonly used in these applications due to their low heat-transfer rate. Designers often choose composites tolerant of high heat for structure surrounding fuel cells to provide both ballistic protection (and thus prevent hydraulic-ram effects inside fuel tanks) and thermal. In this way, penetration, overpressure and thermal protection are provided.
Composites that are ignited in combat can pose problems if they support or promote combustion or release toxic chemicals as they burn. The U.S. FAA Office of Aviation Research's report "Health Hazards of Combustion Products From Aircraft Composite Materials" (DOT/FAA/AR-98/34) expands on these issues. "The primary fire hazards of interior and secondary composites used in aircraft cabin and fuselage components are the heat-release rate and the toxicity of the gaseous combustion products from the burning polymer matrix. The aircraft cabin occupants are exposed to this hazard during an impact-survivable accident."
Are the vulnerability-reduction benefits of structural redundancy, flexion tolerance and load distribution worth these risks? Absolutely, if the materials keep the aircraft structure from catastrophically failing in flight.
Today's composites are designed for relatively simple battlefield damage repair. Field kits include vacuum-formed membranes to emulate the surrounding surface and help blend repairs using room-temperature curing resins. To learn about these repair techniques, readers may contact SURVIAC at 937-255-4840 or DSN 785-4840. For U.S. military units, the video "Battle Damage Repair of Composite Structures" is available for $75. Requests from non-U.S. agencies must be forwarded to the air attaché's office in their country's embassy in Washington.
Composites are a promising and ever-developing technology that are pushing performance and survivability to previously unimaginable levels. Future combat aircraft will likely use predominantly composite structures for all of the benefits mentioned above.
Lt. Col. Steve Colby, USAF (retired), is the former commander of the 34th Weapons Sqdn at Nellis AFB, Nev., which trains combat search-and-rescue helicopter instructor pilots. He can be reached at email@example.com.


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Naperville, IL -- (SBWIRE) -- 02/12/2013 -- Analysts forecast the Global Modular Instrument market to grow at a CAGR of 12.20 percent over the period 2012-2016. One of the key factors contributing to this market growth is the increasing need for cost-effective automated test equipment. The Global Modular Instrument market has also been witnessing increasing R&D activities across industries. However, the increasing price war among vendors could pose a challenge to the growth of this market.
Global Modular Instrument Market 2012-2016, has been prepared based on an in-depth analysis of the market with inputs from industry experts. The report covers the Americas, and the EMEA and APAC regions; it also covers the Global Modular Instrument market landscape and its growth prospects in the coming years. The report also includes a discussion of the key vendors operating in this market.
The key vendors dominating this market space are Agilent Technologies Inc., EADS North America Defense Test and Services Inc., National Instrument Corp., and Aeroflex Holding Corp.
The other vendors mentioned in the report are VTI Instruments Corp., Giga Tronics Inc., Rohde and Schwarz GmbH and Co KG, Guzik Technical Enterprises Inc., Phase Matrix Inc., Tabor Electronics Ltd., and United Electronic Industries, Inc.
Key questions answered in this report:
What will the market size be in 2016 and what will the growth rate be?
What are the key market trends?
What is driving this market?
What are the challenges to market growth?
Who are the key vendors in this market space?
What are the market opportunities and threats faced by the key vendors?
What are the strengths and weaknesses of the key vendors?
You can request one free hour of analyst time when you purchase this report. Details provided within the report.
Research portfolio in the Engineering series includes reports on the CAM Market, GIS Market, CAD Market, Construction Equipment Market, MES Market, PLM Market, CAE Market, FEA Market, PDM Market, AEC Software Market
To view table of contents for this market report please visit:


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Snapshots: John McWilliams
By CHELSEY PLETTS In 1968, John McWilliams was on the road with his pregnant wife to California. He had just earned his Ph.D. from Harvard University and was on his way to teach at the University of California in Berkeley. The day was July 14, a holiday celebrated by the French called Bastille Day. It's significance bled through the centuries as the anniversary of the storming of the Bastille fortress-prison, a symbol of new ideas pressing against an old regime. Just arriving in town, McWilliams and his wife met friends at a burger joint on Telegraph Avenue, a street that begins in the midst of the historic downtown district of Oakland, Calif., and ends at the southern edge of the University of California, and known for its hippy-hangers-on. On Bastille Day in 1968, masses gathered in the street, first delivering speeches, then throwing rocks through windows and lighting trash piles at intersections. And as the defenders of the Bastille, who fought to preserve royal authority, battled against those who wished to change it, so did the Oakland police. The "blue meanies," as McWilliams said they were called, descended upon the street with billy clubs and tear gas. In seconds a blue meanie was on McWilliams with a billy club as he jumped in front of his pregnant wife to protect her, and took a 20-second beating to the head, which was enough to send him to the hospital with an open skull, emerging 20 stitches later. For a man who grew up in a privileged suburb in Cleveland, Ohio, this was an unexpected turn of events if ever there was one. Here, McWilliams experienced a shift away from his suburban upbringing toward an unfamiliar counterculture. Cleveland was a prosperous but segregated community when McWilliams was born in 1940. People with money lived in the eastern suburbs while those with less, generally African Americans, lived in slums down the hill. As time went on, Cleveland became one of the prime rustbelt cities with factories and heavy manufacturing plants shutting down and failing. But McWilliams' family felt little in the way of poverty and he was offered the best education from the get-go. He graduated in a class of 11 from an all-male elementary school, only two of which still exist in Cleveland."And that was a sad business because these were the privileged and hopefully the really competent leaders of the next generation," McWilliams said. "And the whole culture was one that encouraged them to get out. The assumption was that if you were a successful person, lawyer, doctor, businessman in Cleveland at that time, you lived in the suburbs outside the city because the building of the suburbs and the big American cities was just wide open at that time. Cleveland is a salient example of it." McWilliams referenced Jane Jacob's book "The Death and Life of Great American Cities" when he spoke of his Cleveland suburb. In the book, Jacob argues that suburbia is a death sentence for inner city culture. A suburb is calm and controlled, whereas the city is writhing and chaotic and layered with human complexity. Deerfield Academy, where McWilliams attended high school, didn't provide much of an escape for McWilliams from a suburban cookie-cutter life. McWilliams quickly gave up on becoming a "Deerfield boy" during his years at the famous Massachusetts preparatory school. A Deerfield boy exemplified good citizenship, strove toward civic duty and took command of the athletic field. A Deerfield boy stood firmly on the pedestal of privilege. Headmaster Frank Boyden, who was a national legend at the time, resolutely refused to modernize, said McWilliams. "We were allowed off campus two weekends a year, there were two times when you could have any contact with young women and you were checked on 17 to 20 times per day," he remembered. "I was sent to the school because it was so famous, but it was a very bad fit, as far as I was concerned. I was marginalized by the time I was a senior, and I was glad to be marginalized because I had given up on ever becoming a 'Deerfield boy.'" It wasn't until McWilliams attended Princeton that he gained a different perspective than that of the typical Deerfield boy. "To a person with a hammer, everything is a nail and to a person with a computer, everything is data," said McWilliams. "When I was growing up, your awareness of the outside world when you were 15 or 20 years old was very much more limited than it is now." Princeton, "an oasis in New Jersey," as McWilliams said, was an eye opening experience. The idea was not to learn about facts from textbooks, but to soak up ideas from people and primary sources. He went to school with one African American student in his class of about 500 and didn't know, until years later, the unconscious effect his suburban upbringing had on his interaction with the young man. "He was a terrific guy and while he was there, he did very well, was very friendly, never showed any chip on his shoulder at all," McWilliams said. "I'm sure no one consciously treated him with any racial attitudes at all, but I think many of us did it unconsciously. And about 15 or 20 years later, he wrote a blistering letter to the Princeton Alumni Weekly about what it had been like to be the only black student."McWilliams' quiet suburban childhood gave way to the turbulent 1960s when he graduated. He finished college in 1962, and to many of the students at the university, the world seemed safe. But just a year later Kennedy was assassinated. This moment, for so many people, blew the world apart, said McWilliams."And the world changes very quickly then, because television was just developing to the point where you still only had three channels, but you could turn on the television and you could follow along, in black and white, through the events of the next three days," he remembered. Footage from the Vietnam War leaked onto American screens and the safe suburban façade was shred to pieces with the images of the outside world. "The Vietnam War eroded the faith of people my age in politicians, the truth of the news, the legitimacy of public institutions, so we became a lot more questioning," said McWilliams.But life at the university didn't change much, he said. "The changes were going on in people's minds," he said. "But there wasn't a lot of street action." Another blow was dealt when Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated that same year and McWilliams moved to Berkeley. At this time Berkeley was the center of the counterculture movement, the center of student protest, drugs, free thought, experimentation and defiance of politics and the law. Ronald Regan was the governor and was hated by the whole Berkeley left.Today, McWilliams spends most of his time in the classroom at Middlebury College, where he has been teaching for 31 years. His office is in the new Axinn Center at Starr Library on campus, where his shelves are stocked with literature of the greats, and pictures of his six children punctuate the collection.Looking back, though, it's Berkeley where McWilliams can pinpoint the shift in his life from a time of quiet privilege in suburbia to becoming aware of the counterculture that surrounded him."Here I was coming from this rather sheltered environment," said McWilliams. "Coming to Berkeley was a remarkable experience."


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Bourbon Baroque Joins BUSTER VS CHARLIE 6-Month Film Series, 2/8-10
Bourbon Baroque teams up with the Louisville Film Society and Dreamland Film Center in their second installment of "Buster Vs Charlie" an ongoing 6-month series that profiles two of the great silent era comedians. This program contains short films by Buster Keaton and Charlie Chaplin featuring live music by Bourbon Baroque with selections specifically programmed for each film including the compositions of Handel, Rameau, Couperin, and Telemann.
The showings take place on Friday, February 8th @ 8:00 p.m.; Saturday, February 9th @ 8:00 p.m.; and Sunday, February 10 @ 2:00 p.m. at Dreamland Film Center, 810 East Market St. (Across from Mayan Cafe), Louisville, KY. Cost: $12 general admission ($10 for Louisville Film Society Members).
Films shown each performance: The Pale Face (Keaton - 1922), A Day's Pleasure (Chaplin - 1919), The Haunted House (Keaton - 1921).
SOURCE: Louisville Culture Vulture