Sunday, April 28, 2013

New era of music which allures all the listeners? - Artipot

Music has many meanings. If you ask people to define music, it is quite possible that you won't get any two people giving the same answer. It is a contrivance to relax for some while a method to express thoughts for the others. It can be considered science as it is exact, specific and it requires clear-cut acoustics. It is a universal language in which the ideas are represented by symbols. Music can go on to have different meanings for different individuals but all and all it is a pure form of art.

Music has come across a lot of transformations, modifications to reach the form it is in today. From ancient ways of singular creation to the modern day electronic transfusion, music has seen it all. Music also has traditional connections. Different civilizations of the world are known to have characteristic music forms. From Carnatic music of southern India to Galician music of Spain, music has a vast variety regarding different traditions.

Music industry has changed a lot. In previous days listening to music was not a matter of pressing a few buttons neither was the creation and recording was cheap. There used to be huge gramophones with records of the size of a car tire. But now, due to the digitization of music, it has become immensely easy to record and distribute. Music has developed different genres like pop, rock, jazz etc. furthermore; every now and then a new genre comes into picture being a collaboration of existing ones. People now have access to the albums and records of different genres, countries, styles slating back to decades.


Music collaboration has gained huge popularity. It basically involves two or more musical forms, merged into one. Music goer's ever increasing hunger of rejuvenating fresh music gave birth to this fashion. People are connecting with this new trend instantly. Due to the development of internet and latest musical instruments, a song with catchy lyrics and attractive collaboration of different tunes gets clamant acclaim. When a song gets hit or is liked by public, soon its collaborations in different genres, known as remixes, start coming out. A smooth romantic song is converted into a high energy dance number by addition of beats and thumps.

Music collaboration is also getting acceptance because people with a particular taste of music can enjoy the amalgamation of different genres. Artists of different categories have come together and produced brilliant piece of music. Cloud collaboration has helped in bringing together various music producers across the world to combine their styles. This gives listeners an opportunity to develop a liking in other genres as well. People are trying very innovative things on this concept. With the help of social networking platforms and video sharing websites, they record their own version of a song in distinct genres and share them with the whole world. Remixes have given people a way to enjoy their favorite song on different occasions, in refreshing style and with unique approaches by different artists.

Source: http://www.artipot.com/articles/1564313/new-era-of-music-which-allures-all-the-listeners.htm

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Living with Google Glass, Day Three: Security Checkpoint

You might be inclined to think that airport security is not the best place to wear Google Glass. You'd probably be right, but given the amount that I travel it was pretty-well inevitable that I'd cross through some security checkpoint before the course of this testing would be through.

I'm honored to be part of the X-Prize Visioneering conference this week, a gathering of incredible minds putting their considerable brainpower behind the creation of competitions to make the world a better place. But, to take part I'd have to get out to California, and that meant yet another long flight across the country -- and another trip through the full-body scanner. The question is, how would the folks at airport security react to it?

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Source: http://feeds.engadget.com/~r/weblogsinc/engadget/~3/Dbje8CQyl-I/

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Thursday, April 25, 2013

Here's EA's Internal Memo On The Layoffs Today

Screen Shot 2013-04-25 at 3.01.38 PMEA, the game maker in the midst of a big transition from the console era of gaming to the free-to-play world, confirmed widespread reports of layoffs today. The company did not disclose the size of the layoffs, but several other outlets are reporting either hundreds of layoffs or figures that are as high as 10 percent. The downsizing, which comes on the heels of other layoffs in Montreal and Los Angeles earlier this year, is happening as EA is expected to have a weak earnings report on May 7. EA CEO John Riccitiello recently stepped down over “shortcomings” in the company’s financial performance?for the most recent quarter after a six-year stint at the helm of the company. We have an internal memo from executive chairman Larry Probst, which sheds light on some of the changes. Core marketing functions, which were spread out between EA’s five different labels, are getting consolidated under COO Peter Moore. Origin, EA’s online distribution platform, is moving under EA’s President of Labels, Frank Gibeau, who is considered one of the few plausible internal candidates for taking EA’s helm once the CEO search is over. Here’s Probst: As we begin the new fiscal year, I want to provide you with a brief update on some important changes to our organization. As Executive Chairman, my focus is to ensure EA is delivering high quality games and services to our consumers, while helping the executive team develop a FY14 operating plan that drives growth, rationalizes headcount and controls costs. In recent weeks, the executive team has been tasked with evaluating every area of our business to establish a clear set of priorities, and a more efficient organizational structure. This process has led to some difficult decisions about the number of people and locations needed to achieve our goals. The workforce reductions which we communicated in the last two weeks represent the majority of our planned personnel actions. We are extremely grateful for the contributions made by each of these individuals ? they will be missed by their colleagues and friends at EA. We are also taking action to streamline our organization, including changes in two key areas: ? Core marketing functions have been consolidated under our COO, Peter Moore. The combined group will bring together our Label marketing teams, Global Acquisition Marketing and Marketing Analytics into one multi-talented team under Todd Sitrin?s leadership. The development and marketing teams will

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Techcrunch/~3/o7boE3d9LxY/

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Clashes suggest Sunni anger boiling over in Iraq

The body of Maad Hammad is taken for burial in Kirkuk, 180 miles (290 kilometers) north of Baghdad, Iraq, Wednesday, April 24, 2013. Hammad was killed when Iraqi security forces backed by helicopters raided a Sunni protest camp before dawn Tuesday, April 23, 2013, prompting clashes that killed scores of people in the area and significantly intensified Sunni anger against the Shiite-led government. (AP Photo/ Emad Matti)

The body of Maad Hammad is taken for burial in Kirkuk, 180 miles (290 kilometers) north of Baghdad, Iraq, Wednesday, April 24, 2013. Hammad was killed when Iraqi security forces backed by helicopters raided a Sunni protest camp before dawn Tuesday, April 23, 2013, prompting clashes that killed scores of people in the area and significantly intensified Sunni anger against the Shiite-led government. (AP Photo/ Emad Matti)

Mourners chant slogans against Iraq's Shiite-led government as they take bodies of slain protesters for burial in Kirkuk, 180 miles (290 kilometers) north of Baghdad, Iraq, Wednesday, April 24, 2013. Iraqi security forces backed by helicopters raided a Sunni protest camp before dawn Tuesday, April 23, 2013, prompting clashes that killed scores of people in the area and significantly intensified Sunni anger against the Shiite-led government. (AP Photo/Emad Matti)

Electoral workers count ballots at a counting center in Baghdad, Iraq, Wednesday, April 24, 2013. Iraqis have begun counting votes from the first provincial elections since the last U.S. troops withdrew in December 2011. (AP Photo/ Karim Kadim)

(AP) ? With Sunni gunmen beginning to confront the Shiite-led government's security forces head-on in northern and western Iraq, fears are growing fast of a return to full-scale sectarian fighting that could plunge the country into a broader battle merged with the Syrian civil war across the border.

With more than 100 people killed over the past two days, it's shaping up to be the most pivotal moment for Iraq since U.S. combat troops withdrew in December 2011.

"Everybody has the feeling that Iraq is becoming a new Syria," Talal Younis, the 55-year-old owner of a currency exchange in the northern city of Mosul, said Wednesday. "We are heading into the unknown. ... I think that civil war is making a comeback."

A crackdown by government forces at a protest site in the northern town of Hawija on Tuesday triggered the latest unrest. It has enraged much of the country's restive Sunni Arab minority, adding fuel to an already smoldering opposition movement and spawning a wave of bold follow-up clashes.

It is too soon to say whether the rage will lead to widespread insurrection in the largely Sunni cities of Mosul and Ramadi or, more significantly, spiral into open sectarian warfare in the streets of Baghdad.

The Iraqi capital is far more tightly controlled by security forces than the remote towns hit by the latest unrest, but insurgents continue to launch regular, well-coordinated waves of attacks inside Baghdad. Outright threats that all but disappeared as the last bout of sectarian fighting waned in 2008 are making a comeback too, like the leaflets signed by a Shiite militant group that began turning up on the doorsteps of Sunni households in Baghdad earlier this year.

The exact circumstances of the Hawija bloodshed remain murky, but there is outrage over the government's handling of the unrest and the fact that most of the 23 killed at the site were among the Sunni demonstrators.

Talal al-Zobaie, a Sunni lawmaker from the opposition Iraqiya bloc, described this week's events as a pivotal moment for the country.

"The crime in Hawija clearly shows that people have lost faith in their armed forces, which have been turned into a tool in the hands of the prime minister," he said. "Some people now think that the only way to protect themselves is to take up arms."

The raid in Hawija sparked clashes and a spate of other attacks, mostly targeting Sunni mosques, that killed at least 56 people on Tuesday. Raids by Sunni gunmen on army checkpoints broke out in the hours following the protest camp raid and continued into Wednesday.

In the most dramatic incident, armed tribesmen sealed off approaches to the Sunni town of Qara Tappah, about 120 kilometers (75 miles) northeast of Baghdad. When Iraqi troops backed by helicopters arrived to try to clear the makeshift roadblocks, fierce clashes erupted. Police say 15 gunmen and seven soldiers were killed.

Sunni tribesmen also battled soldiers throughout Wednesday in the town of Suleiman Beg, about 150 kilometers (95 miles) north of Baghdad. Four soldiers and 12 others, including gunmen, were killed.

The sense that violence could be spreading from a local dispute to other parts of the country is particularly worrying to many Iraqis.

"This could open the door for broader clashes if things are not contained soon," said Mahmoud Othman, a Kurdish lawmaker. "Hawija is a small town and it can be controlled, but the real problem will arise if Mosul or Ramadi decide to enter the armed struggle," he said.

Three gunmen were killed Wednesday when they attacked a security checkpoint near the former al-Qaida stronghold of Mosul, about 360 kilometers (225 miles) northwest of Baghdad.

Later, a car bomb struck a police patrol north of Baghdad, killing a policeman and two civilians. Another car bomb exploded after sunset near a bus stop in Baghdad's mostly Shiite neighborhood of Husseiniyah, killing seven people and wounding 23.

Hospital officials confirmed the casualty figures. All officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to release the information to reporters.

Human Rights Watch urged Iraqi authorities to ensure that any investigation into the Hawija killings Tuesday take into account allegations that security forces used excessive force. The rights group noted that there have been reports that security forces attacked demonstrators without provocation.

Iraq's Defense Ministry said it entered the protest area to try to make arrests over an attack on a nearby checkpoint several days earlier, and its forces came under heavy fire from several types of weapons, as well as from snipers.

"This is one of those cases where ... a singular spark escalates tensions and mobilizes the population for renewed conflict," said Ramzy Mardini, an analyst at the Beirut-based Iraq Institute for Strategic Studies.

"War fatigue in Iraq is losing its pacifying effects and the rationale to pick up arms and fight again is finding fertile ground in Sunni land(s)."

The increasingly sectarian lines drawn in the Syrian civil war and the rise of Sunni Islamists in the region in the wake of the Arab Spring is also having an effect on the Sunni protest movement playing out in Iraq, he noted.

Syrian President Bashar Assad's regime is fighting against largely Sunni rebels who draw support from Turkey and Sunni Gulf states. Assad's Alawite sect is a branch of Shiite Islam, and his regime is backed by Shiite powerhouse Iran.

"Given what's happening at the regional level, there's a dangerous mixture of Sunni hubris and Shiite fear. These emotions coupled with political volatility and uncertainty renders an environment where miscalculations are most likely to occur," Mardini said.

At the same time, recent local elections ? which have not yet been held in two largely Sunni provinces ? have put Iraqi politicians of all stripes in campaign mode, and playing up their sectarian credentials is a way to rouse voters.

"You're not going to find Sunnis urging for calm," Mardini said. "Most ... are still in the mode of rabble-rousing and throwing the reddest of meats to a discontent and frustrated electorate."

Tuesday's bloodshed followed four months of largely peaceful protests staged by Iraq's Sunni minority against the government.

Many Sunnis are angered over what they see as an effort by Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki to sideline members of their sect within the power-sharing government. They say they face discrimination, particularly in the application of a tough anti-terrorism law that they believe unfairly targets them. The government frequently carries out arrests in Sunni areas on charges of ties to al-Qaida or the deposed Baathist regime of Saddam Hussein, a Sunni.

Emma Sky, a key civilian policy advisor for U.S. Army Gen. Ray Odierno when he was the top U.S. military commander in Iraq, said the events in Hawija exacerbate concerns that the conflicts in Syria and Iraq are merging.

"The fear is that the post-World War I settlement is unraveling," she said, referring to the agreement between Britain and France that divided up the heart of the Middle East and drew the modern borders of Syria and Iraq.

"The way to inoculate Iraq against all of this is national unity," she said. "If Iraq had wise politicians who actually came together for the good of the country, it could go in a different direction."

___

AP writers Sameer N. Yacoub and Sinan Salaheddin contributed reporting.

___

Follow Adam Schreck on Twitter at http://twitter.com/adamschreck

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/3d281c11a96b4ad082fe88aa0db04305/Article_2013-04-24-Iraq/id-e6b185ff478e45bb9b61b86c4744bad2

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National Air Traffic Controllers Association representative says staff ...

Tom Rizzardo, the Dallas-Fort Worth facility representative of the National Air Traffic Controllers Association, says the weather would not have made a difference in yesterday?s diverted flights from Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport if there had been enough air traffic controllers working.

The Federal Aviation Administration attributed the diverted flights to ?a combination of weather and staffing shortages? as a result of automatic federal spending cuts. The agency on Sunday began furloughing employees.

Yes, Rizzardo said, the airport and airlines faced a combination of factors yesterday, but a staffing shortage in the D/FW Approach Control tower ?began the domino effect? of flight diversions. Some air traffic control shifts in the tower cabs have been operated with as few as four people instead of seven controllers.

?When the arrival rate [of airplanes] has to be cut to 75 percent or 50 percent of normal due to staffing restrictions that causes aircraft to be sequenced into lengthier streams and ? forces them into holding pattern,? Rizzardo wrote today in an email. ?In this case, we anticipated a 30-minute delay because we were unable to run triple approaches to the D/FW Airport due to the lack of staffing.?

However, when weather conditions forced a runway change, the planes could not withstand a longer delay and needed to divert, Rizzardo said. If full staffing had been in place, the planes either would have landed or their delay time would have been shorter, he added.

Rizzardo expects flight delays and other issues to get worse in the coming weeks ?as mandatory vacation time? puts more demands on staff.

Source: http://aviationblog.dallasnews.com/2013/04/national-air-traffic-controllers-association-representative-says-staff-shortage-created-domino-effect-yesterday-at-dfw-airport.html/

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lern2play Resources and Information. This website is for sale!

By using our site, you consent to this privacy policy: This website allows third-party advertising companies for the purpose of reporting website traffic, statistics, advertisements, "click-throughs" and/or other activities to use Cookies and /or Web Beacons and other monitoring technologies to serve ads and to compile anonymous statistics about you when you visit this website. Cookies are small text files stored on your local internet browser cache. A Web Beacon is an often-transparent graphic image, usually no larger than 1 pixel x 1 pixel that is placed on a Web site. Both are created for the main purpose of helping your browser process the special features of websites that use Cookies or Web Beacons. The gathered information about your visits to this and other websites are used by these third party companies in order to provide advertisements about goods and services of interest to you. The information do not include any personal data like your name, address, email address, or telephone number. If you would like more information about this practice and to know your choices about not having this information used by these companies, click here.

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Wednesday, April 24, 2013

Boston bombing investigators looking for clues abroad (CNN)

Share With Friends: Share on FacebookTweet ThisPost to Google-BuzzSend on GmailPost to Linked-InSubscribe to This Feed | Rss To Twitter | Politics - Top Stories Stories, News Feeds and News via Feedzilla.

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Transworld Business Advisors Expands in ... - Franchising.com

Transworld Business Advisors Expands in Louisville Area. David Pierce, CPA, has opened an east end office at 10200 Forest Green Blvd., and Joseph MacDonald has joined the downtown office, 909 E. Market St.

Louisville, KY, April 22, 2013 - (PR.com) - Transworld Business Advisors, a national company that facilitates buying and selling businesses, is expanding their presence in Louisville.

David Pierce, CPA, has opened an east end office at 10200 Forest Green Blvd., and Joseph MacDonald has joined the downtown office, 909 E. Market St., as a registered representative and business adviser.

Maggie Harlow, owner of the Market St. office, said, ?With a more vibrant ? but still fluctuating ? economy and boomers seeking to reinvent their careers, we are finding increased interest in our services. The two Louisville offices are under separate ownership but we are working collaboratively to create a larger footprint in this area.?

Harlow said Transworld?s services include business brokerage, franchising, mergers and acquisitions. She pointed out that the company?s 200 brokers nationwide and 2,000 listings at any one time give local buyers and sellers a wide network of opportunity to make successful connections whether they want to list a business, franchise their current enterprise or buy a business or franchise operation.

David Pierce said, ?We are trained to help entrepreneurs find the ideal investment for their interests, talents and lifestyle. And, we advise sellers on the correct sales price and preparation of the necessary documentation. Then we become matchmakers and deal builders to market those businesses.?

Pierce said he feels uniquely qualified for his new venture after a career as a CPA with Price Waterhouse Coopers for 10 years, followed by 23 years with Porter Bancorp, Inc. where he served as CFO.

Joseph MacDonald of the downtown office worked for 15 years as the Metro Louisville development officer where he provided strategic leadership and business consulting services for companies of all sizes. He is a U.S. Army veteran officer.

?With our strong local team and our national network,? said Harlow, ?We are well positioned to serve our clients throughout the Louisville area and beyond.?

For more information about Transworld Business Advisors, visit www.tworld.com. The downtown office phone number is 502-649-4094; the east Louisville office number is 502-515-3341.

Transworld Business Advisors is a member of the United Franchise Group.

About United Franchise Group: The Global Leader for Entrepreneurs.

United Franchise Group (http://www.unitedfranchisegroup.com) is a $500-million franchising expert with 30 years of experience and 1,400 franchise locations in over 50 countries. Brands include SIGNARAMA, EmbroidMe, IZON Global Media, SuperGreen Solutions, Plan Ahead Events, and Transworld Business Advisors. Information on franchising opportunities is available at 800-286-8671 (U.S.) or 001-561-640-5570 (international).

Contact:

United Franchise Group
Mary Mills
561-640-5570
www.unitedfranchisegroup.com

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Source: http://www.franchising.com/news/20130423_transworld_business_advisors_expands_in_louisville.html

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Australia Wasn't Found By Accident, Study Suggests

Australia's colonization may have been an organized affair rather than an accident, a new analysis suggests.

Some 50,000 years ago, aboriginal human settlers arrived on the continent, but how many people it took to found Australia's population is unknown. The new study, published Tuesday (April 23) in the journal Proceedings of the Royal Society B, suggests that about 1,000 to 3,000 individuals originally landed on Australia's shores.

"This is largely speculative, but I think this suggests something more than accidental colonization by a small group on a raft of vegetation or other unplanned voyage," study researcher Alan Williams, a doctoral candidate at The Australian National University, wrote in an email. "For me, this suggests a deliberate attempt at exploration (if not migration) more akin to those we see in the recent past from Hawaii and other Pacific islands." [Gallery: One-of-a-Kind Places on Earth]

Arriving in Australia

Europeans did not discover Australia until 1606, when Dutch navigator Willem Janszoon spotted the Cape York Peninsula in Far North Queensland. A few landings and mapping expeditions followed, but the indigenous people of the continent remained largely undisturbed until the British colonized it in the late 1700s, setting up a penal colony in New South Wales in 1788.

Even the indigenous, or aboriginal, population in 1788 is a bit of a mystery, with estimates of the population ranging from 250,000 to 1.2 million. Further back, the story of Australia's human population is shrouded, though gene studies suggest a relatively large founder population would have been necessary to result in the genetic diversity seen today. It's not clear whether the original inhabitants of Australia multiplied and spread across the continent rapidly or remained small in number until the last 5,000 years or so, Williams told LiveScience.?

Williams approached the question by using 4,575 radiocarbon dates from 1,750 sites around the continent. Radiocarbon dating works by measuring variations in carbon called isotopes that change predictably with age.

Williams assumed that more sites dating to a certain time reflected a larger population at that time. (It's possible, Williams said, that this assumption is flawed; though he doesn't believe it himself, some researchers have suggested that a small group of highly mobile people might account for spikes in the number of archaeological sites seen in a given time, without any population growth.)

Climate and colonization

Using this large database of dates, Williams reconstructed a timeline of Australia's population in prehistory. Assuming a single wave of colonization 50,000 years ago, he found that Australia stayed sparsely populated until about 11,000 years ago. The population then started increasing gradually to reach a peak of about 3 million individuals 500 years ago. (Today, 23 million people live in Australia.)

The data then show a decline to about 700,000 to 1 million individuals at the time of European contact. The reason for the drop is still unclear: It could be due to a quirk in the database, or it might reflect a real decline. In the 1700s ? before major European intrusion into Australia ? Indonesian sailors, known as Macassans, ventured to Australia to hunt sea cucumber, and that cultural contact may have brought disease that hit the indigenous population hard, Williams said.?

Australia?s population history shows a number of dips and spikes, some of which correspond with known climate changes, Williams said. Among the most pronounced population changes is a major decline from 21,000 years ago to 12,000 years ago, when the population dropped by 60 percent. This decline may have been due to the Last Glacial Maximum, when ice sheets were at their most extensive point and Australia cooled and dried, Williams said. (This is also when the current Great Barrier Reef formed.) It?s likely that fewer than 500,000 people lived in Australia at that time, so the effect wasn?t quite as pronounced as it would be today, when a 60 percent decline in population would correspond to the loss of 14 million Australians today, he said.

The results raise new questions, Williams said, including what prompted the gradual increase in population about 11,000 years ago. Given that the founding population would have numbered in the thousands, the results also require a look at what might have motivated an organized exploration and colonization effort 50,000 years ago.

"Was it climatic? Was it cognitive?" Williams said. "It looks less like an accidental discovery."

Follow Stephanie Pappas on Twitter?and Google+. Follow us @livescience, Facebook?& Google+. Original article on LiveScience.com.

Copyright 2013 LiveScience, a TechMediaNetwork company. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/australia-wasnt-found-accident-study-suggests-230817420.html

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'Red line': Chemical weapons in Syria

By Maayan Lubell

JERUSALEM (Reuters) - Syrian government forces have used chemical weapons - probably nerve gas - in their fight against rebels trying to force out President Bashar al-Assad, the Israeli military's top intelligence analyst said on Tuesday.

Brigadier-General Itai Brun made the comments at a Tel Aviv security conference a day after U.S. Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel said on a visit to Israel that U.S. intelligence agencies were still assessing whether such weapons had been employed.

U.S. President Barack Obama has called the use of chemical weapons a "red line" for the United States that would trigger unspecified U.S. action.

"To the best of our understanding, there was use of lethal chemical weapons. Which chemical weapons? Probably sarin," Brun said in the most definitive Israeli statement on the issue to date.

Photos of victims showing foam coming out of their mouths and contracted pupils were signs deadly gas had been used, he said.

Forces loyal to Assad were behind the attacks on "armed (rebels) on a number of occasions in the past few months, including the most reported incident on March 19", Brun said.

The Syrian government and rebels last month accused each other of launching a chemical attack near the northern city of Aleppo.

On Monday, Hagel said the use of chemical weapons by Assad's forces would be a "game changer" and the United States and Israel "have options for all contingencies".

Hagel met Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Jerusalem on Tuesday, a day after flying in an Israeli military helicopter over the occupied Golan Heights on the edge of the fighting in Syria that has entered its third year.

"This is a difficult and dangerous time, this is a time when friends and allies must remain close, closer than ever," Hagel, in remarks to reporters before his talks with Netanyahu, said about the United States and Israel.

IMPASSE

Discussions between Syria and the United Nations on a U.N. investigation of possible use of chemical weapons have been at an impasse due to the Syrian government's refusal to let the inspectors visit anywhere but Aleppo, diplomats and U.N. officials said last week.

U.N. diplomats said Britain and France had provided Ban's office with what they believed to be strong evidence that chemical weapons also had been used in the city of Homs.

Israel, which has advanced intelligence capabilities that it shares with its Western allies, has voiced concerned that parts of Syria's chemical arsenal would end up in the hands of jihadi fighters or the Lebanese guerrilla group Hezbollah, with which it waged a 2006 war.

Israel leaders have cautioned they will not allow that to happen. In an attack it has not formally confirmed, Israeli planes bombed an arms convoy in Syria in February, destroying anti-aircraft weapons destined for Hezbollah.

Brun, who was speaking at the annual security conference of The Institute for National Security Studies at Tel Aviv University, said Israel's military was studying a number of future scenarios facing Syria.

"More likely, as time goes by, are the scenarios of chaos and anarchy, or that of (Syria) breaking up into cantons. These pose major challenges for Israel. The chance of a different central government still exists, but it is growing less likely with time," Brun said.

(Additional reporting by Jeffrey Heller and David Alexander; Editing by Jeffrey Heller and Alison Williams)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/israeli-general-says-syria-government-forces-used-chemical-074330220.html

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Kobo Aura HD review: a high-end e-reader with 'niche' written all over it

Kobo Aura HD review: a high-end e-reader with 'niche' written all over it

What do you get when you ask 10,000 rabid bookworms to help build a better Kobo? The Cadillac of e-readers, naturally: a bigger, beefier and generally higher-end device than we're used to. The Aura HD is a rare thing in this space, built specifically with power users in mind. And for those very reasons, this 6.8-inch, $169 slate isn't long for this world. Announced roughly half a year after the company's flagship Glo (and, it turns out, just in time for Mother's Day), the Aura HD isn't slated to make it beyond the end of the year. "This is something that is designed for this most passionate, voracious reader," the company's CEO Mike Serbinis told us in an interview conducted around the announcement, "and as much as I wish everyone was like that -- it would make us a lot bigger business right away -- that is not the case."

It's a strange move for a relatively small company that's currently offering up two 6-inch readers, a 5-inch model and 7-inch tablet. That, and company is convinced such a product isn't destined to ever become anything but a niche device, particularly in a race dominated by two main players. But is there a chance devoted fans might pay the premium? Let's find out.

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Source: http://feeds.engadget.com/~r/weblogsinc/engadget/~3/Vh8aRauNTPM/

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Bail hearing set for 2 men in Canada terror plot

TORONTO (AP) ? Two men face a bail hearing Tuesday after their arrest on charges of plotting a terrorist attack against a Canadian passenger train with support from al-Qaida elements in Iran, authorities said. The case has raised questions about Shiite-led Iran's murky relationship with the predominantly Sunni Arab terrorist network.

Chiheb Esseghaier, 30, and Raed Jaser, 35, had "direction and guidance" from al-Qaida members in Iran, though there was no reason to think the planned attacks were state-sponsored, Royal Canadian Mounted Police Assistant Commissioner James Malizia said Monday. Police said the men did not get financial support from al-Qaida, but declined to provide more details.

"This is the first known al-Qaida planned attack that we've experienced in Canada," Superintendent Doug Best told a news conference. Officials in Washington and Toronto said it had no connections to last week's bombings at the finish line of the Boston Marathon.

Charges against the two men include conspiring to carry out an attack and murder people in association with a terrorist group. Police said the men are not Canadian citizens and had been in Canada a "significant amount of time," but declined to say where they were from or why they were in the country.

The arrests in Montreal and Toronto bolstered allegations by some governments and experts of a relationship of convenience between Iran and al-Qaida.

Bruce Riedel, a CIA veteran who is now a Brookings Institution senior fellow, said al-Qaida has had a clandestine presence in Iran since at least 2001 and that neither the terror group nor Tehran speak openly about it.

"The Iranian regime kept some of these elements under house arrest," he said in an email to The Associated Press. "Some probably operate covertly. AQ members often transit Iran traveling between hideouts in Pakistan and Iraq."

U.S. intelligence officials have long tracked limited al-Qaida activity inside Iran. Remnants of al-Qaida's so-called management council are still there, though they are usually kept under virtual house arrest by an Iranian regime suspicious of the Sunni-/Salafi-based militant movement. There are also a small number of financiers and facilitators who help move money, and sometimes weapons and people throughout the region from their base in Iran.

Last fall, the Obama administration offered up to $12 million in rewards for information leading to the capture of two al-Qaida leaders based in Iran. The U.S. State Department described them as key facilitators in sending extremists to Iraq and Afghanistan. The U.S. Treasury Department also announced financial penalties against one of the men.

Alireza Miryousefi, spokesman for the Iranian mission to the United Nations, said the terrorist network was not operating in Iran.

"Iran's position against this group is very clear and well known. (Al-Qaida) has no possibility to do any activity inside Iran or conduct any operation abroad from Iran's territory," Miryousefi said in a statement emailed to the AP late Monday. "We reject strongly and categorically any connection to this story."

The investigation surrounding the planned attack was part of a cross-border operation involving Canadian law enforcement agencies, the FBI and the U.S. Department of Homeland Security.

The attack "was definitely in the planning stage but not imminent," RCMP chief superintendent Jennifer Strachan said Monday. "We are alleging that these two individuals took steps and conducted activities to initiate a terrorist attack. They watched trains and railways."

Strachan said they were targeting a route, but did not say whether it was a cross border route. Best said the duo had been under investigation since last fall. Their bail hearing was scheduled in Toronto on Tuesday.

Via Rail said that "at no time" were passengers or members of the public in imminent danger. Via trains_Canada's equivalent of Amtrak passenger trains in the U.S. ?carry nearly four million passengers annually.

In Washington, Amtrak president Joe Boardman said the Amtrak Police Department would continue to work with Canadian authorities to assist in the investigation. Via Rail and Amtrak jointly operate trains between Canada and the U.S.

Canada's Public Safety Minister Vic Toews said the arrests show that terrorism continues to be a real threat to Canada.

"Canada will not tolerate terrorist activity and we will not be used as a safe haven for terrorists or those who support terrorist activity," Toews said in the House of Commons.

U.S. Rep. Peter King, a New York Republican, said in a statement praising Canadian authorities for the arrests, that the attack was intended "to cause significant loss of human life including New Yorkers."

Muhammad Robert Heft, who runs an outreach organization for Islamic converts, and Hussein Hamdani, a lawyer and longtime advocate in the Muslim community, said one of the suspects is Tunisian and the other is from the United Arab Emirates. Heft and Hamdani were part of a group of Muslim community leaders who were briefed by the RCMP ahead of Monday's announcement.

Authorities were tipped off by members of the Muslim community, Best said. Hamdani said the police said they were very thankful to Muslim community leaders for that.

"It was sort of a thank you moment," Hamdani said. "This tip, this lead, came from the Muslim community. But for the Muslim community we would not be talking about an arrest today. This is evidence and proof that the Canadian Muslim community, rather than a community that should be seen as suspect, is in fact partners for peace and here is the proof of it."

Hamdani said he did not know if anybody in the room for the briefing knew the suspects. He called the al-Qaida connection to the Shiite theocracy of Iran "very strange.

He noted that police said al-Qaida didn't provide material support and that it was more guidance.

"What does that mean exactly?" Hamdani wondered. "It could be words of support or inspiration. It could be 'Here's the idea I think you should use it.'"

The Canadian Council on American-Islamic Relations, a national Muslim civil liberties organization, planned to hold a news conference in Toronto Tuesday afternoon to comment on the terror-related arrests.

A spokeswoman for the University of Sherbrooke near Montreal said Esseghaier studied there in 2008-2009. More recently, he has been doing doctoral research at the Institut national de la recherche scientifique, a spokeswoman at the training university confirmed.

Julie Martineau, a spokeswoman at the research institute, said Esseghaier began working at the center just outside Montreal in 2010 and was pursuing a Ph.D. in nanotechnology.

"We are, of course, very surprised," she said.

A LinkedIn page showing a man with Esseghaier's name and academic background said he helped author a number of biology research papers, including on HIV and cancer detection. The page says he was a student in Tunisia before moving to Canada in the summer of 2008.

The page carries a photo of a black flag inscribed with the Muslim declaration of faith: "There is no god but Allah and Muhammad is his prophet." The same flag was used by al-Qaida in Irag and then started being used by ultraconservative Islamic groups in Egypt, Tunisia, Mali and elsewhere across the region.

In Markham, Ontario, north of Toronto, police tape cordoned off half of a duplex, with officers remaining at the scene well into the night. Sanjay Chaudhary, who lives in the other half of the duplex with his family, said the RCMP questioned him about his neighbor Jaser, asking whether he knew him or spoke to him often.

Chaudhary said he didn't know his neighbor or the woman he believes is the man's wife but added "every day, we see them going out."

Monday's raid on the house stunned Chaudhary, who said the neighborhood is otherwise "peaceful."

The arrests came just a few months after two Canadians were discovered among militants killed in a terrorist siege at a gas plant in Algeria. At least 38 hostages and 29 militants were killed in the siege, including Ali Medlej and Xristos Katsiroubas, two high school friends from London, Ontario.

In 2006, Canadian police foiled the so-called Toronto 18 home grown plot to set off bombs outside Toronto's Stock Exchange, a building housing Canada's spy agency and a military base. The goal was to scare Canada into removing its troops from Afghanistan. The arrests made international headlines and heightened fears in a country where many people thought they were relatively immune from terrorist strikes.

___

Associated Press writers Benjamin Shingler in Montreal, Peter James Spielmann and Maria Sanminiatelli in New York, and Pete Yost and Kimberly Dozier in Washington contributed to this story.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/bail-hearing-set-2-men-canada-terror-plot-063001608.html

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Tuesday, April 23, 2013

Hundreds of tiny untethered surgical tools deployed in first animal biopsies

Apr. 23, 2013 ? By using swarms of untethered grippers, each as small as a speck of dust, Johns Hopkins engineers and physicians say they have devised a new way to perform biopsies that could provide a more effective way to access narrow conduits in the body as well as find early signs of cancer or other diseases.

In two recent peer-reviewed journal articles, the team reported successful animal testing of the tiny tools, which require no batteries, wires or tethers as they seize internal tissue samples. The devices are called "mu-grippers," incorporating the Greek letter that represents the term for "micro." Instead of relying on electric or pneumatic power, these star-shaped tools are autonomously activated by the body's heat, which causes their tiny "fingers" to close on clusters of cells. Because the tools also contain a magnetic material, they can be retrieved through an existing body opening via a magnetic catheter.

This image depicts an mu-gripper near the opening of an endoscopic catheter. Image credit: Evin Gultepe, Gracias Lab, Johns Hopkins University.

In the April print edition of Gastroenterology, the researchers described their use of the mu-grippers to collect cells from the colon and esophagus of a pig, which was selected because its intestinal tract is similar to that of humans. Earlier this year, the team members reported in the journal Advanced Materials that they had successfully inserted the mu-grippers through the mouth and stomach of a live animal and released them in a hard-to-access place, the bile duct, from which they obtained tissue samples.

"This is the first time that anyone has used a sub-millimeter-sized device -- the size of a dust particle -- to conduct a biopsy in a live animal," said David Gracias, an associate professor of chemical and biomolecular engineering whose lab team developed the microgrippers. "That's a significant accomplishment. And because we can send the grippers in through natural orifices, it is an important advance in minimally invasive treatment and a step toward the ultimate goal of making surgical procedures noninvasive."

Another member of the research team, physician Florin M. Selaru of the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine, said the mu-grippers could lead to an entirely new approach to conducting biopsies, which are considered the "gold standard" test for diagnosing cancer and other diseases.

This photo shows dozens of dust-sized surgical grippers in a vial. Image credit: Evin Gultepe, Gracias Lab, Johns Hopkins University

The advantage of the mu-grippers, he said, is that they could collect far more samples from many more locations. He pointed out that the much larger forceps used during a typical colonoscopy may remove 30 to 40 pieces of tissue to be studied for signs of cancer. But despite a doctor's best intentions, the small number of specimens makes it easy to miss diseased lesions.

"What's the likelihood of finding the needle in the haystack?" said Selaru, an assistant professor in the Division of Gastroenterology and Hepatology. "Based on a small sample, you can't always draw accurate inferences. We need to be able to do a larger statistical sampling of the tissue. That's what would give us enough statistical power to draw a conclusion, which, in essence, is what we're trying to do with the microgrippers. We could deploy hundreds or even thousands of these grippers to get more samples and a better idea of what kind of or whether a disease is present."

Although each mu-gripper can grab a much smaller tissue sample than larger biopsy tools, the researchers said each gripper can retrieve enough cells for effective microscopic inspection and genetic analysis. Armed with this information, they said, the patient's physician could be better prepared to diagnose and treat the patient.

This approach would be possible through the latest application of the Gracias lab's self-assembling tiny surgical tools, which can be activated by heat or chemicals, without relying on electrical wires, tubes, batteries or tethers. The low-cost devices are fabricated through photolithography, the same process used to make computer chips. Their fingerlike projections are made of materials that would normally curl inward, but the team adds a polymer resin to give the joints rigidity and to keep the digits from closing.

Prior to a biopsy, the grippers are kept on ice, so that the fingers remain in this extended position. An endoscopy tool then is used to insert hundreds of grippers into the area targeted for a biopsy. Within about five minutes, the warmth of the body causes the polymer coating to soften, and the fingers curl inward to grasp some tissue. A magnetic tool is then inserted to retrieve them.

Although the animal testing results are promising, the researchers said the process will require further refinement before human testing can begin. "The next step is improving how we deploy the grippers," Selaru said. "The concept is sound, but we still need to address some of the details. The other thing we need to do is thorough safety studies."

Further development can be costly, however. The team has applied for grants to fund advances in the project, which is protected by provisional patents obtained through the Johns Hopkins Technology Transfer Office. Biotechnology investors might also help move the project forward. "It is more a question of money than time as to how long it will take before we could use this in human patients," Selaru said

Along with Gracias and Selaru, the Johns Hopkins researchers who contributed significantly to the two journal articles were Evin Gultepe, Sumitaka Yamanaka, Eun Shin and Anthony Kalloo. Additional contributors were Kate E. Laflin, Sachin Kadam, Yoosun Shim, Alexandru V. Olaru, Berkeley Limketkai, Mouen A. Khashab and Jatinder S. Randhawa. The researchers are affiliated with the School of Medicine, the Whiting School of Engineering and the Johns Hopkins Institute for NanoBioTechnology.

Funding for this research has come from the National Institutes of Health, the National Science Foundation, the Flight Attendants Medical Research Institute and the Broad Medical Research Institute.

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Story Source:

The above story is reprinted from materials provided by Johns Hopkins University.

Note: Materials may be edited for content and length. For further information, please contact the source cited above.


Journal References:

  1. Evin Gultepe, Sumitaka Yamanaka, Kate E. Laflin, Sachin Kadam, YooSun Shim, Alexandru V. Olaru, Berkeley Limketkai, Mouen A. Khashab, Anthony N. Kalloo, David H. Gracias, Florin M. Selaru. Biologic Tissue Sampling With Untethered Microgrippers. Gastroenterology, 2013; 144 (4): 691 DOI: 10.1053/j.gastro.2013.01.066
  2. Evin Gultepe, Jatinder S. Randhawa, Sachin Kadam, Sumitaka Yamanaka, Florin M. Selaru, Eun J. Shin, Anthony N. Kalloo, David H. Gracias. Biopsy with Thermally-Responsive Untethered Microtools. Advanced Materials, 2013; 25 (4): 514 DOI: 10.1002/adma.201203348

Note: If no author is given, the source is cited instead.

Disclaimer: This article is not intended to provide medical advice, diagnosis or treatment. Views expressed here do not necessarily reflect those of ScienceDaily or its staff.

Source: http://feeds.sciencedaily.com/~r/sciencedaily/most_popular/~3/gvhbrYrLy98/130423135845.htm

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Nest Energy Services link home cooling to utilities' cloud data

Nest Energy Services link thermostats with utilities through the cloud

As clever as the Nest Learning Thermostat can be, its intelligence only extends as far as the front door: it hasn't really been aware of how neighbors or the seasons affect our power bills. Nest Labs is improving that connection to the outside world through Nest Energy Services, a new program that links its device to the collective, cloud-based knowledge of utility companies. When owners are with an Energy Services-aware provider, the thermostat will know when to brace for an energy "rush hour" and automatically limit its cooling during peak (read: expensive) periods. It also gives a heads-up for seasonal discounts that fine-tune the temperature schedule over the course of a few weeks. Unlike previous utility-guided approaches, Nest users can always retake control if they genuinely can't stand the heat.

Only Austin Energy, Green Mountain Energy, Reliant and Southern California Edison have lined up for the synced climate control so far, although Nest is sweetening the deal by expanding utility-based discounts for the thermostat itself. Customers of National Grid can get an immediate $100 rebate through Nest, while those who sign up with Reliant can still receive their thermostats for free with certain plans. The deals are calculated tradeoffs for companies likely to recoup their investment down the road, but they could represent big wins for homeowners still jittery about paying up front to save money later.

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Source: Nest (1), (2), (3)

Source: http://feeds.engadget.com/~r/weblogsinc/engadget/~3/iImYZePdreE/

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Monday, April 22, 2013

Feds halt funding for $361M pipeline

BOX ELDER, Mont. (AP) ? Federal officials have temporarily stopped funding a $361 million water pipeline for a Native American reservation in Montana after learning that millions of project dollars went missing.

Michael Ryan of the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation says Chippewa Cree tribal leaders have replaced the missing money. But he says federal funding for the pipeline won't resume until they show they have permanently fixed accounting and other problems.

Congress approved the project to bring reliable drinking water to the poverty-stricken reservation in northern Montana.

It's unclear what effect the funding delay will have on pipeline construction, which is nearly a quarter complete.

Tribal officials said in a statement Saturday that they are actively working with the federal agency on the issues raised by Ryan.

Kenneth Blatt St. Marks, a former tribal chairman, said the irregularities are among several alleged corruption issues on the Rocky Boy's reservation.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/apnewsbreak-feds-halt-funding-361m-pipeline-161203080.html

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Kelly Osbourne Sunburn PHOTO

Kelly Osbourne posted this picture of her awful sunburn on her Instagram account. I am going to say it is a pretty bad burn – but damn girlfriend looks good. I didn’t realize Kelly worked it like that!! She has a teeny tiny waist! Goo girl!     Amy Grindhouse – Detective Humphries Says Kim Kardashian Kept Up The Charade Until Someone Yelled ?CUT!?. Bitten & Bound – New CMT Series ?Dog and Beth on the Hunt? Airs Tonight. The Amazing Race RECAP 4/21/13: Season 22 Episode 9 – Celebrity Dirty Laundry. Bumpshack – Kris Humphries Responds to Divorce Settlement. The Great Monkey Suit – Bradley Cooper and Julian Edelman Visit Boston Marathon Victim. Pop On The Pop – Jennifer Aniston: Awkward Run-In with John Mayer. RHOA Nene Leakes Gets new Spin off Show ?I Dream of Nene: The Wedding? – Diva Artist. Cotten Kandi - A Recovered Rihanna Resumes Diamonds World Tour In Tampa, Florida In Time For 420!

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/RightCelebrity/~3/Y200HQEfa4Y/

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Avocado, Tomato and Chicken Wrap Recipe - A Mom's Impression

Avocado Tomato and Chicken Wrap

I love sitting down with my kids and eating lunch together. ?Most of the time I eat what I make for them, but today I wanted something a little bit more ?grown up.? ?My son?s favorite lunch is Tyson Chicken Fries. ?He is a very picky eater, so he asks for these often. ?I personally like to jazz it up a little bit so I made myself an avocado, tomato and chicken wrap, it was delicious!

Avocado, Tomato and Chicken Wrap

Author:?

Recipe type:?Lunch

Cuisine:?American

Prep time:?

Total time:?

?

An easy wrap using Tyson Chicken Fries

Ingredients

  • Tyson Chicken Fries
  • Mixed Greens
  • Avocado
  • Tomato
  • Cheddar Cheese
  • Light Italian Dressing
  • Whole Wheat Tortillas

Instructions

  1. Cook Chicken Fries according to package directions.
  2. Melt cheddar cheese over fries onto tortilla.
  3. Add mixed greens, diced tomato, diced avocado and about a tablespoon of light Italian dressing.
  4. Wrap and enjoy!

3.2.1199

Tyson Chicken Fries

This post is sponsored by Tyson and Social Fabric.

For the kids I made a fry sauce. ?Where I am from in the Pacific Northwest, we have fry sauce everywhere. ?When I moved to the Midwest, every looked at me strange when I mentioned it. ?Apparently I would have to make my own. ?It is really very simple. ?Mix ketchup with some mayonnaise for a kid friendly version. ?When I make it for myself and my husband I will use?sriracha to spice it up a bit. ?I also add sweet relish when I make it for myself because I am the only one who likes pickles in the family.

Chicken Fries Boy

It is nice that I can count on chicken fries for a tantrum free lunch. Those are rare things these days. ?It is going to be a long summer trying to get my son to eat new foods!

Tyson Chicken Fries and Sauce

We eat a lot of ?Tyson chicken fries so we buy them at our local Sam?s Club. ?You can check out my latest shopping experience on my Google + album. ?Click on the photo below to see everything that we purchased, I found an amazing deal on the cute little Carter?s outfits!

Sams Club Shopping Trip

Be sure to visit Tyson on Facebook?where you can win free tickets to Six Flags for you and your family!

Enjoy the summer with your family.

I am a member of the Collective Bias? ?Social Fabric? Community. ?This shop has been compensated as part of a social shopper insights study for?Collective Bias? ?and?Tyson?#cbias #SocialFabric

Source: http://amomsimpression.com/2013/04/20/avocado-tomato-and-chicken-wrap/

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Sunday, April 21, 2013

Samsung Galaxy Mega 6.3 hits the FCC, sports AT&T compatible HSPA+

Samsung Galaxy Mega 63 hits the FCC, sports AT&T compatible HSPA

Samsung's Galaxy Mega 6.3 still doesn't have an exact launch date, but it has made its way to the FCC. While the Mega was announced with LTE and HSPA+ radios, it appears that this version, model I9200, only has the latter onboard (I9205 is the LTE-equipped variant) -- the Galaxy slightly-less Mega, it seems. It's a safe bet that this particular model won't officially make it stateside, but the reports seem to indicate that it'll play nice with AT&T's HSPA+ bands. In case you're thinking of importing this 1.7Ghz device down the line, you can have a look at our hands-on here. Otherwise, you can have a look at the filing by heading to the source link.

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Source: http://www.engadget.com/2013/04/21/samsung-galaxy-mega-6-3-hspa-att-fcc/?utm_medium=feed&utm_source=Feed_Classic&utm_campaign=Engadget

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Strong Winds Postpone New US Rocket's Launch Debut

The launch debut of a new privately built rocket will have to wait at least one more day after strong winds thwarted an attempted liftoff on Saturday (April 20).

The unmanned Antares rocket was poised to launch into orbit Saturday afternoon from a new seaside pad at NASA's Wallops Flight Facility along Virginia's Eastern Shore when the foul weather intervened. The rocket's next chance to launch occurs Sunday (April 21) at 5 p.m. EDT (2100 GMT).

Orbital Sciences had hoped to launch Antares at 5 p.m. EDT on Saturday, but unacceptably strong winds in the upper atmosphere ? which could pose a risk to the rocket in mid-flight ? prompted them to delay liftoff by an hour at first, then call off the attempt altogether. [LaunchPad Photos: 1st Antares Rocket Ready to Fly]

It is the second delay in three days for Antares' debut launch. A minor equipment glitch led Orbital officials to call off a launch try on Wednesday (April 17) when a data cable at the pad separated from the rocket earlier than planned.

Built by the Dulles, Va.-based spaceflight firm Orbital Sciences Corp., the Antares rocket is a 13-story booster designed to launch the company's unmanned Cygnus spacecraft on cargo delivery missions to the International Space Station. Orbital has a $1.9 billion contract to provide at least eight cargo delivery flights to the station using Cygnus and Antares.?

For this first flight, the Antares rocket will not be carrying an active Cygnus spacecraft into orbit. Instead, the rocket is topped with a cylindrical "mass simulator" that mimics the shape and weight of an actual Cygnus vehicle, officials said. The mockup is also equipped with 70 sensors to measure the effects of launch on an Antares vehicle.

Orbital has also added three tiny NASA satellites ? coffee-cup-size Phonesats ? and a small commercial cubesat called Dove-1 to the mass simulator for this test flight. The miniature satellites will be deployed in orbit after launch, Orbital officials said.

NASA's Phonesats are experiments designed to test how well commercial smartphones can be used as the main computers on cheap satellites.

Orbital Sciences is one of two American spaceflight companies with NASA contracts for? commercial resupply missions to the International Space Station. The other firm is Space Exploration Technologies (SpaceX) of Hawthorne, Calif., which has a $1.6 billion contract to fly at least 12 cargo delivery missions to the space station using its Falcon 9 rockets and robotic Dragon space capsules.

SpaceX launched its first test flight to the station in May 2012 and has flown two official cargo deliveries since then. NASA retired its space shuttle fleet in 2011 and is relying on private spacecraft to keep the space station stocked with supplies. The space agency also plans to begin flying American astronauts to the station on commercial spacecraft by 2017.

Email Tariq Malik at tmalik@space.com or follow him @tariqjmalikand Google+. Follow us @Spacedotcom, Facebookand Google+. Original article on?SPACE.com.

Copyright 2013 SPACE.com, a TechMediaNetwork company. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/strong-winds-postpone-us-rockets-launch-debut-205323747.html

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Friday, April 19, 2013

UnitedHealth's 1Q profit falls 14 percent

UnitedHealth Group's first-quarter earnings sank 14 percent, as medical costs dulled enrollment-fueled revenue gains for the nation's largest health insurer, which also expects federal budget cuts will pressure its performance the rest of the year.

Shares of the Minnetonka, Minn., company dropped almost 6 percent in morning trading Thursday.

UnitedHealth said it still backs a forecast it made last November for 2013 earnings to range between $5.25 and $5.50 per share, but the automatic federal budget cuts, which will hit the government's Medicare program for the elderly and disabled people, will make the top end of that range harder to reach.

UnitedHealth is the largest provider of Medicare Advantage plans, which are subsidized, privately run versions of the government's Medicare program for the elderly and disabled people.

Analysts had labeled UnitedHealth's 2013 earnings forecast conservative after it came out last fall, and the insurer normally raises it several times through the year, but so far it has just backed the initial projection. The insurer said last fall it expected growth this year, but it anticipated challenges from high unemployment and costs tied to the health care overhaul, which imposes fees and coverage restrictions on insurers.

The overhaul also is expected to bring new business to the industry when it expands coverage to millions of people largely starting next year. But investors are still wary about how the law will ultimately affect insurers.

UnitedHealth also said Thursday it expects less revenue in 2013 because a very large client switched its insurance to a self-funded approach, where it pays the claims and the insurer just administers the policy. These plans bring in less revenue for insurers. UnitedHealth now expects revenue of about $122 billion, compared to its previous projection for $123 billion to $124 billion.

For the full year, analysts expect earnings of $5.51 per share on $123.83 billion in revenue.

In the first quarter, UnitedHealth earned $1.19 billion, or $1.16 per share. That figure doesn't count a portion of earnings that went to shareholders of Amil Participacoes SA, a Brazilian health benefits and care provider that UnitedHealth is in the process of buying for about $4.9 billion.

The performance was down from $1.39 billion, or $1.31 per share, a year ago. Revenue rose 11 percent to $30.34 billion in the three months that ended March 31.

Analysts expected earnings of $1.14 per share on $30.54 billion in revenue.

Much of the earnings drop can be tied to an accounting adjustment UnitedHealth made due to leftover insurance claims.

The insurer booked a $280 million gain in the quarter because claims left over from previous quarters came in lower than expected, which allowed it to release money held in reserve. That compares to a $530 million gain in last year's quarter. The lower total means actual claims came in closer to what the insurer projected.

The insurer's enrollment soared 18 percent compared to last year's quarter and topped 42 million people, as it gained more than 4 million customers from the Amil deal and also saw growth in several other categories.

But medical costs, which are by far UnitedHealth's largest expense, climbed 13 percent to $22.57 billion in the quarter.

UnitedHealth shares dropped $3.53, or 5.7 percent, to $58.50 in early morning trading. They have traded in a 52-wek range of $50.32 to $63.95.

UnitedHealth is the first major U.S. health insurer to announce earnings every quarter. Many analysts and investors see it as a bellwether for the managed care sector.

WellPoint Inc., the nation's second-largest insurer, reports earnings April 24, and Aetna Inc. follows on April 30.

Health insurance is UnitedHealth's largest business, but it also operates segments that sell information technology services and pharmacy benefits management.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/unitedhealths-1q-profit-falls-14-percent-103439241--finance.html

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