NZ Millennium Cup heading to Bay of Islands

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The New Zealand Millennium Cup, the highly regarded sailing regatta for superyachts, will next be contested as part of the Bay of Islands Sailing Week in January 2015.

This years Bay of Islands Sailing Week included over 70 yachts contesting three days of intense racing across several divisions and four race courses utilising the inner harbour between Paihia and Russell and the outer bay toward Cape Brett.

Peter Montgomery officially announced the link-up between the New Zealand Millennium Cup and the Bay of Islands Sailing Week at the prize-giving for this years regatta on Friday 24 January.

Peter Busfield, CEO of the New Zealand Marine Export Group which hosts the New Zealand Millennium Cup, says creating a dedicated superyacht race series within the Bay of Islands Sailing Week offers superyacht owners a fantastic opportunity to enjoy this increasingly popular regatta in one of New Zealands most attractive and popular marine playgrounds.

"For owners, guests and crew, the opportunity to sail a series of five races across three days in their own superyacht division within the well-run Bay of Islands Sailing Week regatta will be a lot of fun and have a real Kiwi vibe," Busfield says.

"The regattas outer race courses offer deep water, great breezes and the splendour of racing past beautiful coves and islands in the third week of January, the height of the New Zealand summer."

Busfield says, as New Zealand Millennium Cup hosts, the NZ Marine Export Group will ensure the focus is on superyacht owners, guests and crew being able to enjoy a fun, relaxed and competitive regatta.

"The timing, being mid-late January, works well for many superyachts who head to New Zealand for summer cruising, working their way down country from the Bay of Islands to Auckland and further south. Many often have maintenance and refit work completed with one of the many expert suppliers around New Zealand.

"Incorporating the New Zealand Millennium Cup in a vibrant and well-run regatta offers another attraction for a superyacht to visit New Zealand and maybe stay longer," says Busfield. "We also envisage a flow-on benefit to Auckland and beyond from a larger number of superyachts and other cruising yachts visiting the Bay of Islands."

New Zealand Customs recently extended the temporary import entry (TIE) period for visiting superyachts and cruising yachts to New Zealand from 12 months to 24 months, a decision which is expected to make New Zealand as a destination much more appealing, especially for vessels based in the Mediterranean and the United States which will now have greater flexibility to plan journeys down-under.

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NZ Millennium Cup heading to Bay of Islands

MARINE PARKS: Tap Pulau Payar’s vast potential

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25 January 2014| last updated at 10:54PM

Pulau Payar marine park in Kedah is one of these designated islands. Located 19 nautical miles south of Langkawi island and 15 nautical miles west of Kuala Kedah, the island has been protected from overdevelopment and this can be seen from the condition of the coral reefs there.

I recently had the opportunity to be part of a scuba-diving excursion there.

The island is under the jurisdiction of the Langkawi Development Authority while the marine park is managed by the Marine Parks Department.

I observed that while the local authorities have done a commendable job in preserving the natural ecology of the island and the surrounding marine life despite limited funding, manpower and coping with the increasing number of tourists, I believe more can be done.

First, there must be renewed efforts to promote awareness among the locals, especially the younger generation, on the importance of marine ecology.

Programmes being carried out must be on managing sustainability of the island and engaging in activities to that effect.

These programmes must also be able to reach the target masses.

Through scuba-diving, one can experience hands-on the beauty of the marine ecology and understand the need to preserve it.

Nothing is more educational than being underwater and witnessing the splendour of the submerged world.

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MARINE PARKS: Tap Pulau Payar's vast potential

Islands Restaurants and Volcom Launch Get2NorthShore Sweepstakes

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Carlsbad, CA (PRWEB) January 24, 2014

In celebration of the 2014 Volcom Pipe Pro Surf Contest, Islands Restaurants is launching the Get2NorthShore Sweepstakes, giving Islands guests the chance to win a five night, six-day trip for two to the North Shore of Oahu.

Were thrilled to once again partner with Volcom on the Pipe Pro, said Renee Junge, vice president of marketing for Islands Restaurants. Islands loves surfing and the beach lifestyle, and were looking forward to giving a guest this once-in-a-lifetime trip to one of the most beautiful surf spots on earth.

The sweepstakes kicks off Sunday, Jan. 26 in conjunction with the surf contest and runs through Sunday, Feb. 23. Guests can sign up in-store or online via the Islands Facebook page or website for a chance to win round trip airfare for two, five nights at the exclusive Turtle Bay Resort, a rental car, $500 cash and a $100 Islands gift card.

With simple, flavorful ingredients, friendly service and a laid back atmosphere, Islands is the go-to spot for no worries moments reminiscent of a great day at the beach. Whether conquering post-surf hunger with a burger and fries or catching happy hour after a busy day at the office, Islands specialty burgers, freshly made fries and ice-cold drinks are the perfect end to a hard day of work or play.

For more information, please visit islandsrestaurants.com or volcompipepro.com. Like Islands on Facebook at facebook.com/islandsrestaurants, or follow Islands on Twitter and Instagram, @IslandsBurgers.

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Islands Restaurants and Volcom Launch Get2NorthShore Sweepstakes

NZ Millennium Cup heads to Bay of Islands in 2015

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NZ Millennium Cup heads to Bay of Islands in 2015

The New Zealand Millennium Cup, the highly regarded sailing regatta for superyachts, will next be contested as part of the Bay of Islands Sailing Week in January 2015.

This years Bay of Islands Sailing Week included over 70 yachts contesting three days of intense racing across several divisions and four race courses utilising the inner harbour between Paihia and Russell and the outer bay toward Cape Brett.

Peter Montgomery officially announced the link-up between the New Zealand Millennium Cup and the Bay of Islands Sailing Week at the prize-giving for this years regatta on Friday 24 January.

Peter Busfield, CEO of the New Zealand Marine Export Group which hosts the New Zealand Millennium Cup, says creating a dedicated superyacht race series within the Bay of Islands Sailing Week offers superyacht owners a fantastic opportunity to enjoy this increasingly popular regatta in one of New Zealands most attractive and popular marine playgrounds.

For owners, guests and crew, the opportunity to sail a series of five races across three days in their own superyacht division within the well-run Bay of Islands Sailing Week regatta will be a lot of fun and have a real Kiwi vibe, Busfield says.

The regattas outer race courses offer deep water, great breezes and the splendour of racing past beautiful coves and islands in the third week of January, the height of the New Zealand summer.

Busfield says, as New Zealand Millennium Cup hosts, the NZ Marine Export Group will ensure the focus is on superyacht owners, guests and crew being able to enjoy a fun, relaxed and competitive regatta.

The timing, being mid-late January, works well for many superyachts who head to New Zealand for summer cruising, working their way down country from the Bay of Islands to Auckland and further south. Many often have maintenance and refit work completed with one of the many expert suppliers around New Zealand.

Incorporating the New Zealand Millennium Cup in a vibrant and well-run regatta offers another attraction for a superyacht to visit New Zealand and maybe stay longer, says Busfield. We also envisage a flow-on benefit to Auckland and beyond from a larger number of superyachts and other cruising yachts visiting the Bay of Islands.

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NZ Millennium Cup heads to Bay of Islands in 2015

How Old Is Adam? Scientists Claim Earliest Male Ancestor Emerged 209,000 Years Ago

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According to a new study, published in the European Journal of Human Genetics, the most recent common male ancestor to humans existed 209,000 years ago 9,000 years earlier than scientists had previously thought. The findings place the earliest female ancestor, "Eve," within the same timeframe as her male counterpart.

"We can say with some certainty that modern humans emerged in Africa a little over 200,000 years ago," Eran Elhaik of the University of Sheffield said in a statement.

The latest findings contradict a recent study that suggested Adam was twice as old as Eve on the basis that the Y chromosome originated in a different species through interbreeding. They also debunked a separate study that said the discovery of the Y chromosome predated humanity.

"We have shown that the University of Arizona study lacks any scientific merit. In fact, their hypothesis creates a sort of 'space-time paradox,' whereby the most ancient individual belonging to Homo sapiens species has not yet been born, Elhaik said. "Think of the movie 'Back to the Future,' when Marty was worried that his parents would not meet and as a result he wouldnt be born -- its the same idea.

The latest research used conventional biological models to date the most common male ancestor. The research team calculated the age of the Y chromosome by multiplying data on the average age fathers have their first child with the number of mutations they found. This number was then divided by the mutation rate of the Y chromosome.

Of course, we can manipulate each one of these variables to make a finding look younger or older, Elhaik told The Daily Mail. In our paper, we showed the previous study manipulated all these variables to predate the Y chromosome.

While the study challenges other conclusions, it raises more questions concerning the behavior of ancient humans.

"It is obvious that modern humans did not interbreed with hominins living over 500,000 years ago. It is also clear that there was no single 'Adam' and 'Eve' but rather groups of 'Adams' and 'Eves' living side by side and wandering together in our world, Elhaik said. The question to what extent did our human forbearers interbreed with their closest relatives is one of the hottest questions in anthropology that remains open.

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How Old Is Adam? Scientists Claim Earliest Male Ancestor Emerged 209,000 Years Ago

Human Muscle Growing in Mice Provides a New Research Tool for FSH Muscular Dystrophy

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Lexington, Mass. (PRWEB) January 24, 2014

As published online today in Human Molecular Genetics, support from the FSH Society, a patient-driven nonprofit, has enabled people with facioscapulohumeral muscular dystrophy (FSHD) to donate muscle tissue, which scientists have succeeded in grafting into mice, providing a new tool for conquering this devastating muscle-wasting disease. Among the most common forms of muscular dystrophy, FSHD affects an estimated 500,000 people around the world.

Since the discovery of FSHDs genetic mechanism in 2010, scientists have been forging ahead to find drugs and genetic therapies that could block this mechanism. But there remain major obstacles in the path to a treatment. One of the most significant roadblocks is the lack of a preclinical research model that can be used to study the disease in depth and to evaluate new therapies.

Building an FSHD model has proven to be a substantial challenge. The genetic mechanism of FSHD is extraordinarily complex, with components that do not exist in mice. To overcome this difficulty, a multi-institutional team led by Kathryn Wagner, MD, PhD, Director of the Center for Genetic Muscle Disorders at the Kennedy Krieger Institute and The Johns Hopkins School of Medicine decided to transplant human muscle into mice, grafting tissue taken surgically from the biceps of FSHD patients into the leg muscles in living mice.

The grafted muscles received a blood supply and nerve signals from the host mice, which were bred with defective immune systems to prevent rejection of the foreign tissue. The grafts survived for more than 40 weeks, during which time they regenerated. The grafted muscles could contract like normal muscle, and retained the cellular and genetic characteristics of muscle from a human with FSHD.

Most potential novel therapies fail to successfully translate from animals to humans, says Wagner. Growing human tissues in animals (xenografts) has previously led to the successful development of therapies for multiple cancers and now, with this new muscle xenograft model, we are hopeful that new therapies for muscular dystrophy will emerge.

The studys authors thanked the FSH Society for its invaluable help recruiting FSHD patients to participate in the research. The disease is inherited, though it can be caused by a spontaneous mutation, and strikes young and old, both male and female. It melts away skeletal muscle, with symptoms usually noticeable by young adulthood. It is progressive, chronic and there is no cure or treatment. The name comes from the areas of the body where it often is first seen the face, shoulders and upper arms but it weakens muscles throughout the body. About one third of patients end up in a wheelchair.

Study co-authors came from the Kennedy Krieger Institute, Baltimore, Maryland; University of Massachusetts Medical School, Worcester, Massachusetts; Harvard Medical School, Boston, Massachusetts; University of Maryland School of Nursing, Baltimore; University of Maryland School of Medicine, Baltimore; and Childrens National Medical Center, Washington, D.C.

The research was supported by the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and the Muscular Dystrophy Association. This work was also made possible by the National Center for Research Resources (NCRR) a component of the NIH, and NIH Roadmap for Medical Research.

Reference: Yuanfan Zhang, Oliver D. King, Fedik Rahimov, Takako I. Jones, Christopher W. Ward, Jaclyn P. Kerr, Naili Liu, Charles P. Emerson, Jr., Louis M. Kunkel, Terence A. Partridge, Kathryn R. Wagner. Human skeletal muscle xenograft as a new preclinical model for muscle disorders. Human Molecular Genetics.

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Human Muscle Growing in Mice Provides a New Research Tool for FSH Muscular Dystrophy

Real Men Get Checked 2011 Health Fair – Produced by JupiterLeo.com – (646) 450-9169 – Video

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Real Men Get Checked 2011 Health Fair - Produced by JupiterLeo.com - (646) 450-9169
Produced by http://www.JupiterLeo.com - (646) 450-9169 Get Checked 4 Life (GetChecked4Life.com) (GC4L) is a non profit organization created by a concerned ph...

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Real Men Get Checked 2011 Health Fair - Produced by JupiterLeo.com - (646) 450-9169 - Video

Health care top priority at the polls: Survey

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Jessica Hume, Parliamentary Bureau Jan 24, 2014

, Last Updated: 5:33 PM ET

OTTAWA Health care is the biggest issue for Canadian voters, a new poll suggests.

In a national survey conducted this month by Abacus Data, polled Canadians regardless of age or voting intention listed health care as their top priority at the polls, at 19%.

It was followed by taxes (13%), job creation (13%) and accountability and trust (12%).

"Even though federal politicians are not talking much about health care, it remains the most important issue for Canadians," Abacus Data CEO David Coletto said.

Only surveyed Canadians between 30-44 listed something other than health care as a top concern 46% said taxes were their the primary issue as opposed to health care, at 44%.

After health care, Canadians 60 years and older were most concerned about retirement security, at 41%, and accountability, at 33%.

Fewer than 5% of respondents listed the environment or natural resource development as a top priority.

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Health care top priority at the polls: Survey

Cutting health care for refugee claimants expensive in long-run, Ont. Health Minister says

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A federal government decision to cut health care coverage for some refugee claimants is actually more expensive in the long-run than simply paying for their benefits upfront, Ontario Health Minister Deb Matthews is warning in the latest salvo in the back-and-forth turf battle between the province and Ottawa.

In 2012, Ottawa clawed back health care funding for refugee claimants from 37 democratic countries people who, the federal government says, are likely to be making bogus claims. Asylum seekers whose claims are turned down are also cut off.

To the federal governments chagrin, Ontario decided to reinstate health coverage for all refugee claimants and pick up the tab itself. Ms. Matthews said Friday it is less expensive to allow these people full access to the health care system where they can get preventative treatment than to only give them care in emergencies.

Lets just pause for a moment and think about what the implementation of [the federal cut] means for frontline providers. It means that they have to say sorry, pregnant woman about to deliver baby, youre not covered, were not going to care for you, Ms. Matthews said at a health promotion event in Toronto. Do you really think our health care professionals will do that? Of course they will not, they should not, they cannot. So in the end, we were paying anyway but we were paying more than we would have had we provided better early care.

In the case of a child with a fever, for instance, Ms. Matthews said, it is cheaper for the system if that child is checked by a doctor early on than if it waits until the condition is so bad, it must visit an emergency room.

But federal Immigration Minister Chris Alexander fired back, arguing that providing health care for all refugees will only encourage those without legitimate claims to come to Canada.

It will force Ontario taxpayers and their families to line up for care behind failed asylum seekers, and it will make Canada and Ontario in particular a bigger magnet for bogus asylum seekers in the future, he said in a statement.

Earlier this week, Mr. Alexander said the money spent on benefits for refugee claimants without valid claims would be better used to help people with legitimate asylum claims travel to Canada.

Were very conscious of the fact that the most vulnerable, the most needed, the most impoverished, dont make it on our shores. They dont get a ticket on Air Canada. They dont even have a passport to make it, and they certainly dont show up in our airports. Those are the people we want to dedicate most of our resources to, he said in an interview. We were not able to do that in this pre-reform era because so much of our resources were absorbed by bogus claimants.

The health change is part of a larger overhaul of immigration policy designed to reduce the number of false claimants. Asylum seekers from the 37 countries also face fast-track hearings designed to eject as many people with bogus claims as possible, to clear the way for legitimate refugees.

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Cutting health care for refugee claimants expensive in long-run, Ont. Health Minister says