Ohio beaches among the dirtiest

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A national report paints a dismal picture of Ohios beaches, ranking them among the dirtiest in the country.

The Natural Resources Defense Council report says Ohios beaches rank 29th in cleanliness, among 30 states.

In 2011, about 22 percent of the samples taken from designated beach areas in Ohio exceeded national standards, according to the report.

The report does not mention heavy rainfall made 2011 a particularly bad year for polluted rainwater runoff in Ohio. Flood waters overwhelmed sewage treatment systems in Sandusky, Port Clinton and other communities along the lake last year.

That high runoff contributed to last years harmful algal bloom in Lake Erie the worst in many years.

So far, 2012 has seen much less rainfall, and the harmful algal bloom in the lake is expected to be much smaller.

The resources council pegs a beach in Vermilion as perhaps the worst in the state.

Stated the report: The beaches with the highest percent exceedance rates of the state standard in 2011 were Edson Creek in Erie County (52 percent); Lakeview Beach in Lorain County (51 percent); and Villa Angela State Park (50 percent), Edgecliff Beach (50 percent), Moss Point Beach (47 percent), and Sims Beach (47 percent) in Cuyahoga County.

The resources council has said its report analyzes contamination from animal and human waste.

Beaches in Ohio, Illinois, Wisconsin and New York were among the top 15 repeat offenders, with high bacteria counts for many years, the council stated in a release.

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Ohio beaches among the dirtiest

Indian astronomy satellite to study universe at multi-wavelengths

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Calcutta News.net Monday 16th July, 2012

Astrosat, the $50 million astronomy satellite India will put in polar circular orbit in 2013, will study the universe at multi-wavelengths for the first time, a senior space agency official said.

"The Astrosat mission will study for the first time the cosmic sources of the vast universe at optical, ultraviolet and X-ray wavebands simultaneously," state-run Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) scientific secretary V. Koteshwar Rao told IANS here.

The 1.6-tonne satellite will be launched from the Sriharikota spaceport off the Bay of Bengal coast in Andhra Pradesh, about 90km northeast of Chennai, onboard a 300-tonne rocket with five scientific instruments to study at multiple wavelengths.

The instruments include a soft X-ray telescope, an ultraviolet imaging telescope, an imager and a sky scanning monitor.

"Unlike astronomical satellites of other countries, Astrosat will study visible to high-energy X-ray emissions from celestial objects on a single platform, take the highest angular resolution imaging in ultraviolet and measure short-term variation of X-ray emissions," Rao said at a space summit here, about 150 km from Karnataka capital Bangalore.

A five-year delay has escalated the mission cost to Rs.270 crore (nearly $50 million), including the satellite to Rs.180 crore and the rocket Rs.90 crore.

A wavelength is a unit of measurement indicating the distance between the peak of one wave and the next. As forms of electromagnetic radiation, they make unique patterns in shapes and lengths as they travel through space.

"Most astronomical objects emit radiation spanning the electromagnetic spectrum from long wavelength radio waves to very short wavelength gamma rays. Simultaneous observation of the multi-wavelengths will enable us to understand the physical processes behind the phenomenon," Rao pointed out.

Orbiting at 650 km from the earth with a five-year lifespan, the satellite will conduct major investigations across visible, UV, soft and hard X-ray bands to find out the source of radiation, study magnetic fields on neutron stars, search for sources of black holes and scan the farthest regions of the universe.

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Indian astronomy satellite to study universe at multi-wavelengths

Roger A. Bell, astronomy professor

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He played key role in developing University of Maryland's astronomy program into its own department Roger Alistair Bell, a University of Maryland professor of astronomy who specialized in the discovery of physical properties and compositions of stars, died July 1 of complications from Alzheimer's disease at the Dove House in Westminster. The Ashton resident was 76.

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Roger A. Bell, astronomy professor

BAFacts: Halfway there! | Bad Astronomy

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On January 4, 2012, I posted my first BAFact: a short astronomy fact that was brief enough to put on Twitter but informative enough to be interesting. I posted the first one on perihelion the point in Earths orbit when its closest to the Sun and the last one will be a year later.

Because 2012 is a leap year with 366 days, July 5th was the 184th day: the first day of the second half of the year. That means Im more than halfway done!* Appropriately enough, heres the July 5 BAFact:

I post the BAFacts on Twitter, Google+ (where I can flesh them out a bit more and add pictures since theres no character limit), and have a complete archive of them on the blog as well. With 180+ already in the bag, reading those should keep you busy for a while!

I generally link them to previous blog posts dealing with the topic in question, but not always. Ive actually been surprised at how difficult it can be to reduce a topic to 100 or so characters (leaving room for the leading "#BAFact: " and shortened link, plus room for retweets), and how that limits some topics. I have also been surprised to find out I havent written about some topics! For example, I was thinking recently of making a BAFact about the nearest known black hole, Cygnus X-1, and discovered I had literally never even mentioned it in a blog post! Thats weird but by coincidence that got fixed just this last weekend.

So this exercise in brevity has given me new things to write about. Ill note that there have been arguments over the accuracy of some of the BAFacts, too. Sometimes thats just due to having to be so brief that the description might be misleading if you dont click the link; I struggle with those but usually make them as clear as possible, and hope people actually read the post to clarify. And once I really did just make a mistake; as I recently mentioned I didnt know that recent research had found that zodiacal light is mostly from comet dust and not asteroid collisions, and had to post an immediate correction! But thats OK; I love learning new things, too.

So as we enter the second half of these, I hope you keep up with them and enjoy them. And if you have a beef with them, find a mistake, have something to add, or know of a good picture or story relating to them, follow it up with a tweet of your own! The whole point here is to have fun and learn things. Which, when it comes to science, are exactly the same.

* Well, kinda. Perihelion is actually on January 2, 2013, roughly a day earlier than usual because we have an extra calendar day this year. The Earth orbits the Sun not caring at all for our calendrical contrivances, so when the time comes Ill decide whether to post the last BAFact based on the Earths orbit our roughly-hewn measurement of it.

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BAFacts: Halfway there! | Bad Astronomy

Artificial Intelligence Becoming Fantasy Football Reality

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University of Southampton researchers are fine-tuning an artificial intelligence system they say will give them a leg up in the English Fantasy Football League when the Premier League soccer season kicks off in August.

RELATED: Tech of the Future, Today: Breakthroughs in Artificial Intelligence

In tests at the university's Electronics and Computer Science program, the researchers' artificial soccer team manager has ranked on average in the top 1% of 2.5 million players. The AI system, outlined in a paper that is being presented at an AI conference in Toronto this month and based on Ph.D. student Tim Matthews' dissertation, gets its smarts from algorithms that analyze players' weekly and season stats.

The researchers plan to use the AI system in tandem with human insights (their own) to compete in the Premier League fantasy game.

"Our previous tests have shown that a machine working on its own will perform better than millions of humans. But a machine can't take into consideration if a player is injured (and still plays), has low morale or has personal issues and may not perform at his best," says Sarvapali Ramchurn, lecturer in computer science.

Also in the works: a Web app that will share its wisdom with other players and allow them to compete against it.

AI has been used by other researchers to predict sports results. For example, Georgia Institute of Technology researchers annually tout their Logistic Regression Markov Chain system for making NCAA men's basketball tournament picks.

Bob Brown tracks network research in his Alpha Doggs blog and Facebook page, as well on Twitter and Google +.

Read more about data center in Network World's Data Center section.

For more information about enterprise networking, go to NetworkWorld. Story copyright 2011 Network World Inc. All rights reserved.

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Artificial Intelligence Becoming Fantasy Football Reality

ERP Software Woes Ding Aerospace Company's Profits

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Aerospace and energy system components manufacturer Woodward is the latest company to see its profits hurt by costs associated with an ERP (enterprise resource planning) software project, according to an announcement it made.

Woodward issued preliminary numbers for its fiscal third quarter on Monday, warning investors that profits would fall short of expectations, in part due to "ERP system-related issues that have been addressed."

The company expects to deliver profits of $0.40 per share in the quarter and US$460 million in revenue, according to the announcement. Analysts polled by Thomson Reuters on average had predicted $0.60 per share and roughly $491 million in revenue. Woodward will issue full third-quarter results on July 23.

Woodward's aerospace division's performance was hurt by the ERP system problems, as well as by "lower defense sales, and a lower growth rate than anticipated in commercial aftermarket sales," the company said.

The division "has been awarded a substantial number of significant new system programs," it added. "Many of the programs have expanded more than anticipated in both content and complexity, requiring increased new product development and production process investments. This increased investment coupled with lower sales volumes created unanticipated earnings pressure."

Woodward's stock fell 5.83 percent to $33.95 in midday trading on Monday.

The exact nature of the ERP system difficulties, as well as the brand of software being used, wasn't immediately clear on Monday. A Woodward spokeswoman didn't reply to a request for additional information.

However, the project seems to have been substantial in scope. Between Sept. 30, 2010 and Sept. 30 of last year, Woodward recognized roughly $13.5 million in costs linked to the system's development, according to the company's 2011 annual report.

ERP systems are generally put in place with the goal of saving money over time. But companies often experience a range of problems during projects, including cost and time overruns and difficulties stabilizing the new software once it goes live.

The software itself isn't always to blame. Problems can result from factors such as inadequate testing before the new system is turned on, ineffective employee training, inexperienced project consultants and changes to the scope of the project after it is begun.

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ERP Software Woes Ding Aerospace Company's Profits

Sooner Nutrition celebrates one year anniversary

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July 15, 2012 Sooner Nutrition celebrates one year anniversary

Jessica Lane, Staff Writer, jlane@chickashanews.com The Express-Star The Chickasha Express Star Sun Jul 15, 2012, 04:49 PM CDT

Sooner Nutrition celebrated their one your anniversary on June 12, showcasing their state of the arts detox room which includes an ozone whirlpool, a dry sauna and a detox foot bath.

For $50 a month, patrons can use the ozone whirlpool, dry sauna and detox foot bath. To just use the foot detox, the price is $30, according to Cindy Grissom.

Ozone is a natural purifier that has many benefits on the human body including killing bacteria and viruses.

The benefits of using a sauna include profound relaxation, alleviation of skin problems, detoxification, improved circulation, enhanced physical conditioning and weight reduction to name a few.

There are mental and physical benefits to using the detox foot bath including better mental clarity and relaxation, weight loss, easing of joint and head pain and more.

Sooner Nutrition is a full line health food store, carrying an extensive line of all-natural J.R. Watkins products. While many people are familiar with the brand's vanilla extract, J.R. Watkins also makes spices, soaps, salves, household cleaners and more. And they've been doing it since 1868.

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Sooner Nutrition celebrates one year anniversary

DNA tests fail to clear man convicted of old felonies in Norfolk

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Authorities say recent DNA testing does not clear a person convicted of old violent felonies in Norfolk, because it was performed on evidence in two other crimes for which no one was ever convicted.

Gail Jaspen, chief deputy director of the Virginia Department of Forensic Science, said Friday that the confusion resulted because the person in question was convicted of similar crimes against different victims during the same period.

"The Norfolk Commonwealth's Attorney's Office was able to pair police records with indictment information to clarify this issue," Jaspen said. She said the department will not release the DNA test results that would disclose the identity of the person.

A spokeswoman for the Norfolk Commonwealth's Attorney's Office, citing the decision by the Department of Forensic Science, also declined to identify the man. In an Associated Press story last week, Norfolk authorities said he was serving life for sexual-assault convictions and was a suspect in the crimes for which the testing was performed.

Olga Akselrod, an attorney with the Innocence Project, said that because the crimes for which he was and was not convicted are said to be similar and happened during the same time frame, it raises many questions and his name should be released.

"If he is innocent and all of these crimes were committed by the same person, the DNA results excluding him from some of these crimes could be a critical lead in proving his innocence in all of the crimes," she said.

Akselrod said, "It is possible that the DNA testing may be of no relevance and that the person is not claiming innocence, but unless his identity is released we can't be sure." At minimum, she said the state should notify the defendant about the exclusion and tell him how to obtain counsel.

This month, the Department of Forensic Science disclosed test results in more than 70 old cases where the DNA profiles of convicted people were not found in crime scene evidence collected from 1973 to 1988.

Commonwealth's attorneys in Norfolk and Carroll County asked the department to withhold four such reports involving four people three in Norfolk and one in Carroll because they were deemed critical to ongoing investigations.

As part of its landmark post-conviction DNA project begun in 2005, the Department of Forensic Science was to conduct DNA testing of biological evidence found in old criminal case files that resulted in convictions in an effort to identify innocent people.

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Soyuz rocket blasts off for space station

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A Russian Soyuz craft has launched into the morning skies over Kazakhstan, carrying three astronauts on their way to the International Space Station (ISS), where they will quickly start preparing for a frenzy of incoming traffic.

NASA astronaut Sunita Williams, Russian cosmonaut Yury Malenchenko and Japan's Akihito Hoshide are set to travel for two days before joining three colleagues already at the permanent space outpost.

Families and colleagues watched the launch on Sunday from an observation platform in the Russian-leased cosmodrome in the dry southern steppes of this sprawling Central Asian nation.

Lift-off took place at the scheduled time of 8.40am local time (12.40pm AEST), sending a deafening roar as the craft gained height.

Despite intense G-force pressure, the three astronauts looked relaxed in televised footage as they performed a series of routine operations.

The Soyuz jettisoned three rocket booster stages as it was propelled into orbit, which takes just over nine minutes.

At that stage, a doll given to Malenchenko as a mascot by his daughter and suspended over the three astronauts floated out of view on television footage, indicating the craft had escaped the Earth's gravitational pull.

The shell that surrounds the capsule during the launch phase also peeled away, soaking the astronauts in bright yellow sunshine pouring through the viewing hatches.

The solar arrays that deployed on the Soyuz after orbital entry will provide the craft with the power it needs during its two-day trip.

Williams, tightly squeezed into the cramped craft, gave a thumbs-up sign and waved to onboard cameras as Russian space agency chief Vladimir Popovkin congratulated the crew over radio control.

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Soyuz rocket blasts off for space station

NASA Announement for Partnering Opportunities for Delivery of NASA Content To The Public

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Synopsis - Jul 13, 2012

General Information

Solicitation Number: NNH12NG001O Posted Date: Jul 13, 2012 FedBizOpps Posted Date: Jul 13, 2012 Recovery and Reinvestment Act Action: No FedGrants Posted Date: Jul 13, 2012 Application Due Date Explanation: Responses to this announcement are due by 5 p.m. EST on August 3, 2012. Classification Code: A -- Research and Development NAICS Code: 518210

Grant Specific Information

Funding Instrument Type: Other CFDA Number: 43.009 Cost Sharing or Matching Required: No Estimated Total Program Funding: not available Expected Number of Awards: not available Ceiling Amount: none Floor Amount: none Funding Activity: Other (O) We will be awarding Space Act Agreements from this announcement not contracts or grants and there will be no funding provided. Eligible Applicants: 99 - Unrestricted Unrestricted Link to Full Announcement: http://www.nasa.gov/news/highlights/partnership.html

Contracting Office Address

NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center, NASA Headquarters Acquisition Branch, Code 210.H, Greenbelt, MD 20771

Description

STATEMENT OF PURPOSE

NASA is releasing this announcement to identify potential partners who may benefit from the delivery of the Agency's web videos, both live and on-demand, and other web content to support increased public access and awareness of NASA activities.

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NASA Announement for Partnering Opportunities for Delivery of NASA Content To The Public

New dean for NTU's Lee Kong Chian School of Medicine

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Published on Jul 16, 2012

By Kezia Toh

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New dean for NTU's Lee Kong Chian School of Medicine

Harvard Medical School, MGH researcher honored for Alzheimer’s studies

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Photo by David W. Johnson, courtesy of the Alzheimers Association

Dr. Bradley T. Hyman, director of the Massachusetts Alzheimers Disease Research Center at Massachusetts General Hospital and a professor of neurology at Harvard Medical School, received the Henry Wisniewski Lifetime Achievement Award Sunday from Kristine Yaffe, a University of California, San Francisco professor at the Alzheimers Association International Conference in Vancouver, Canada.

By Gal Tziperman Lotan, Globe Correspondent

A Massachusetts General Hospital and Harvard Medical School neurologist received a lifetime achievement award at an Alzheimers Association conference in Vancouver, Canada Sunday.

Dr. Bradley T. Hyman, director of the Massachusetts Alzheimers Disease Research Center at Massachusetts General Hospital and a professor of neurology at Harvard Medical School, received the Henry Wisniewski Lifetime Achievement Award, The Alzheimer's Association said in a statement.

Its an extremely nice recognition, especially because the award is named after one of the giants of neuropathology, Hyman said in a phone interview from Vancouver Sunday.

Hyman has studied changes in patients brains and nervous systems, as well as genetic changes that underlie dementia, the statement said.

His research helps describe brain lesions in Alzheimer's patients, the statement said.

Hyman recently worked on imaging amyloid protein fragments that are broken down in healthy brains but accumulate and form amyloid plaques in Alzheimer's patients; and tau tangles, created when tau proteins that keep the brains cell transport system in working order die and collapse the system.

At its international conference, the Alzheimers Association also gave a lifetime achievement award to Lennart Mucke of the Gladstone Institute of Neurological Disease and the University of California, San Francisco, Monique M.B. Breteler of the German Center for Neurodegenerative Diseases and the University of Bonn in Germany, and Ronald Petersen of the Mayo Alzheimers Disease Research Center in Rochester, Minn.

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Harvard Medical School, MGH researcher honored for Alzheimer’s studies

UC Riverside makes rare second attempt to add medical school

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UC Riverside's long-held dream to have a full medical school was badly battered last year when the state refused to pay for it and then national accreditors wouldn't allow it to open. Those denials were a blow to the UC system's proud tradition of adding campuses and programs to serve a growing state.

Now, UC Riverside is making what national experts say is a rare second attempt to gain approval for a medical school. Campus officials say they have obtained alternative financial backing, worth about $10 million a year for a decade, from private donors, local government and the UC system in hopes that the medical school can enroll its first 50 students in fall 2013.

"We have so much riding on the school being successful, we just can't accept that it can't be done," said G. Richard Olds, a tropical-disease expert who is the founding dean of the UC Riverside medical school. The goal, he said, is to ease the shortage of doctors in the Inland Empire.

The medical school would be UC's sixth and its first to open since the late 1960s. The school would be the only one in UC without its own hospital, vastly cutting down on costs. UC's medical centers and its health education programs constitute about half of the system's $22-billion annual budget.

Some skeptics say that UC is in a new era of limits and that even noble causes must be put on hold to preserve the academic quality of its 10 campuses at a time of rising tuition and cutbacks in undergraduate course offerings.

But UC Riverside medical school supporters insist that progress still must be pursued, albeit cautiously.

For three decades, UC Riverside has operated a joint medical school program with UCLA. Its entering classes of about 25 students spend their first two years in Riverside and finish in Westwood.

A full four-year program at UC Riverside would offer clinical training at community medical centers. The emphasis would be on basic fields, including family medicine, pediatrics, gynecology, general surgery and psychiatry, not on more exotic and expensive specialties.

The expectation is that young doctors educated there more likely would practice in the underserved Inland Empire, officials said. Such is the case for Regina Inchizu, who recently finished her first year of medical studies at Riverside and wants to work in the area in family medicine andwomen's healthafter she graduates from UCLA. "There is a huge need for doctors in Riverside," she said, adding that she wants to work in such a high-need area.

John Stobo, the UC system's senior vice president for health sciences and services, expressed strong support. "This is not starting from scratch. This is expanding a program that's demonstrated success," he said. "This is not taking money and taking a gamble and seeing if it is going to work."

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UC Riverside makes rare second attempt to add medical school

The Solovetsky Islands decreases the number of terns (Arkhangelsk region)

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Ornithologists have presented the first results of the field season 2012 at the Solovetsky Islands. Correspondent reports BakuToday, during the month of the Solovki branch of the White Sea biological station of the Moscow State University. Lomonosov was on the islands of the archipelago and adjacent territories ornithological monitoring. The results of the expedition everybody could see at a public lecture held by Vladimir Semashko, Alexander reviem and B.e. erenkovym in the Conference Hall of the St. Petersburg hotels Solovki Museum-reserve.

During the breeding period, most favorable for learning disorder, studies have been conducted on the Solovetsky Islands in the archipelago, as well as on Zhizhgin island. During the expedition revealed that the population of solovetsk birds remains stable, and in some species there is a positive trend: the number of birds even increases. On the General background of the not-so-favorable optimistic situation of terns: largest colony on the islands of Maly Zayatsky, Malaya Muksalma and Cape of Kolguev. Unser decreased significantly. Scientists have been slow to sound the alarm, believing that such changes may represent a natural cyclical process, although not precluded and the influence of anthropogenic factors. In connection with this proposal to resume visits to these islands until the limit of 15 July, before the bird breeding period.

Ornithological studies are conducted at the Solovetsky Islands regularly for over 20 years. Since 1996, the monitoring is carried out mainly by the Solovki branch of BBSING. They have been a description of all bird species, their number, size, description of nests, ringing, etc. Over the years research has about 570 Islands in the White Sea, 250 species of birds, including 220 solovetsky (from constantly 120 nesting in the archipelago), BakuToday Solovki Museum.

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The Solovetsky Islands decreases the number of terns (Arkhangelsk region)