Scientists give star treatment to lesser-known cells crucial for brain development – Seacoastonline.com

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After decades of relative neglect, star-shaped brain cells called astrocytes are getting their due. To gather insight into a critical aspect of brain development, a team of scientists examined the maturation of astrocytes in 3-D structures grown in culture dishes to resemble human brain tissue. The study, which confirms the lab-grown cells develop at the same rate as those found in human brains, was published in Neuron and funded in part by the National Institutes of Healths National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke.

This work addresses a significant gap in human brain research by providing an invaluable technique to investigate the role of astrocytes in both normal development and disease, said NINDS program director Jill Morris, Ph.D.

In 2015, a team directed by Dr. Sergiu Pasca, an assistant professor of psychiatry and behavioral science at Stanford University in California, and Dr. Ben Barres, Ph.D., a Stanford professor of neurobiology, published a method for taking adult skin cells, converting them to induced pluripotent stem cells, and then growing them as 3-D clusters of brain cells called human cortical spheroids (hCSs). These hCSs, which closely resemble miniature versions of a particular brain region, can be grown for many months. The cells in the cluster eventually develop into neurons, astrocytes, and other cells found in the human brain.

One of the challenges of studying the human brain is the difficulty of examining it at different stages of development, Dr. Pasca said. This is a system that tries to simulate brain development step by step.

In the new study, Steven Sloan, a student in Stanfords M.D./Ph.D. program, led a series of experiments comparing astrocytes from hCSs to those found in tissue from the developing and adult human brain. The team grew the hCSs for 20 months, one of the longest-ever studies of lab-grown human brain cells.

The results verified that the lab-grown cells change over time in a similar manner to cells taken directly from brain tissue during very early life, a critical time for brain growth. This process is considered critical for normal brain development and deviations are thought to cause a variety of neurological and mental health disorders, such as schizophrenia and autism. Creating hCSs using cells from patients could allow scientists to uncover the underlying developmental biology at the core of these disorders.

The hCS system makes it possible to replay astrocyte development from any patient, Dr. Barres said. Thats huge. Theres no other way one could ever do that without this method.

The current study showed that hCS-grown astrocytes develop at the same rate as those found in human brains, in terms of their gene activity, their shapes, and their functions. For example, astrocytes taken from hCSs that were less than six months old multiplied rapidly and were highly engaged in eliminating unnecessary connections between neurons, just like astrocytes in babies growing in the womb. But astrocytes grown in hCSs for more than nine months could not reproduce and removed significantly fewer of those connections, mirroring astrocytes in infants 6 to 12 months old. On the other hand, just like astrocytes from developing and adult brains, the early- and late-stage astrocytes from hCSs were equally effective at encouraging new connections to form between neurons.

Astrocytes are not just bystanders in the brain, Dr. Pasca said. Theyre not just there to keep neurons warm; they actually participate actively in neurological function.

Since astrocytes make up a greater proportion of brain cells in humans than in other species, it may reflect a greater need for astrocytes in normal human brain function, with more significant consequences when they dont work correctly, added David Panchision, Ph.D., program director at the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH), which also helped fund the study.

The researchers caution that hCSs are only a model and lack many features of real brains. Moreover, certain genes that are active in fully mature astrocytes never switched on in the hCS-grown astrocytes, which they could conceivably do if the cells had more time to develop. To address this question, the researchers now hope to identify ways to produce mature brain cells more quickly. hCSs could also be used to scrutinize precisely what causes astrocytes to change over time and to screen drugs that might correct any differences that occur in brain disease.

These are questions that are going to be very exciting to explore, Dr. Barres said.

The study was funded by NINDS, the National Institute of Mental Health, the National Institute of General Medical Sciences, the National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences, the California Institute of Regenerative Medicine, the MQ Fellow Award, and Stanford University.

The NINDS is the nations leading funder of research on the brain and nervous system. The mission of NINDS is to seek fundamental knowledge about the brain and nervous system and to use that knowledge to reduce the burden of neurological disease.

The mission of the NIMH is to transform the understanding and treatment of mental illnesses through basic and clinical research, paving the way for prevention, recovery and cure. For information, visit the NIMH website.

The National Institute of General Medical Sciences supports basic research that increases understanding of biological processes and lays the foundation for advances in disease diagnosis, treatment and prevention. For information, visit the NIGMS website.

The National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences (NCATS) was established to transform the translational process so that new treatments and cures for disease can be delivered to patients faster. For information, visit the NCATS website.

The National Institutes of Health, the nation's medical research agency, encompasses 27 Institutes and Centers and is a component of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. NIH is the primary federal agency conducting and supporting basic, clinical, and translational medical research, and is investigating the causes, treatments, and cures for both common and rare diseases. For information about NIH and its programs, visit http://www.nih.gov.

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Scientists give star treatment to lesser-known cells crucial for brain development - Seacoastonline.com

MU director of astronomy Angela Speck consumed by eclipse for three years – Columbia Daily Tribune

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Rudi Keller @CDTCivilWar

Stardust has a magical appeal for poets.

Hoagy Carmichaels 1927 song of that name has been recorded more than 1,500 times. Hello Poetry has a seemingly endless page of entries online devoted to it.

And in 1969, Joni Mitchell wrote we are stardust, we are golden, we are million year old carbon in her ode to the music festival at Woodstock.

Angela Speck, the University of Missouris director of astronomy, is StardustSpeck on Twitter and when shes not cheering for the public to look up at 1:12 p.m. Monday to see the total solar eclipse, she studies the stuff that poets prize.

My work is on determining what dust forms, trying to understand why that sort of dust forms and then what is the knock-on effect once youve got that sort of dust, Speck said.

Unfortunately, she said, shes neglected that research.

I really havent done any of my own research for quite some time, Speck said. It will be a relief to get back to it.

For more than three years, Specks time has been consumed by the eclipse. She is a co-chair of the American Astronomical Societys Solar Eclipse Task Force. In November 2015, she predicted Columbia should prepare for 400,000 visitors. The estimates have fallen but she still expects the city to double in population or more on Monday.

That number of visitors would be almost double the largest crowdto see a football game at Memorial Stadium.

Im exhausted. I am so exhausted, Speck said. I am excited. I am waiting for it to come but I would like it to be tomorrow. I want to see it. It is going to be awesome.

Just for the record, the total solar eclipse on Monday will be the first visible in the continental United States since 1979 and the first to cross the continent since 1918. At Broadway and Providence Road in Columbia, the eclipse will begin at 11:45 a.m. as the moon and sun begin to come into alignment. It will reach totality at 21 seconds past 1:12 p.m. The sun will be covered by the moon for 2 minutes and 36 seconds, covering the land in darkness. The eclipse will conclude at 2:40 p.m.

Speck grew up in Yorkshire, England, and attended Queen Mary University in London for undergraduate studies and received her doctorate from University College London.

Specks interest in space began in her childhood, her parents said. Alan Speck, visiting for the eclipse, said he recalls a ride with a friend to Queensbury one day.

It was one of those days when the moon was in the sky at daylight and she explained to us the physical properties as to why the moon was shining in the daylight sky, he said. She was 5 years old.

Her mother, Wendy Speck, attributed the interest to watching a lot of science fiction movies.

Angela Speck said her ambition at that age was to be an astronaut.

It was post Apollo but before the Voyagers were launched, she said. The space mission stuff was still kind of big. I have no recollection of why but I said this is what I am going to do.

Specks career trajectory veered off course for space travel into research and teaching. And it is almost a random occurrence that shes on the MU faculty. She and her husband Alan Whittington applied at several universities.

She was hired as a spousal accommodation when Whittington, now chair of the geology department, was hired.

We both got offered jobs, but Mizzou was the place where we both got to be faculty, Speck said.

Much of Specks time is spent alternately warning that huge crowds would flock to see total eclipse and debunking ridiculous claims and predictions.

Actually an eclipse day is no different from any other day, in terms of what the sun and the moon are doing, Speck said. Theyve got it in their head that this is doing something weird to the earth. No, not really.

There is an eclipse of the sun almost every year, somewhere on earth, Speck said. But the occurrence of a total solar eclipse at any particular location is rare.

The area today called Boone County has not experienced a total solar eclipse since July 7, 1442, and will not see another until June 3, 2505. The next total solar eclipse visible in Missouri will cross the Bootheel on April 8, 2024.

During a news conference for NASA, Speck was asked if animals needed special protection from the eclipse. She replied that animals dont look at the sun when it is not in eclipse and she didnt expect that to change.

Youre sure we dont need to protect animals? she recalled being asked. Im like yeah, I am pretty sure. If you have got a beastie that is particularly sensitive, they dont like it when you switch the light off in the house, then they probably wont like it when the sun gets in the way.

An internet search on Specks name reveals 430 entries in Googles news category. Shes a colorful speaker and journalists love a good quote.

Eclipses are usually in places that are hard to get to, Speck told Wired, just because most of the planet is places that are hard to get to.

She told Space.com that the crowded conditions could resemble a zombie apocalypse. There will hopefully be less bloodshed, but zombies don't need regular food, or sleep, or toilets," Speck said.

Her sons, 10 and 13, havent taken much notice of their mothers celebrity, she said.

They have had a couple of my mom is talking to my class, moments, she said.

On Monday, Speck will do color commentary for KMIZ-TVs eclipse broadcast. She may just be silent when the big moment finally arrives, she said.

But I am loud, so theres a good chance I will want to go, Ooh, look at that, look at that, look at that.

rkeller@columbiatribune.com

573-815-1709

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MU director of astronomy Angela Speck consumed by eclipse for three years - Columbia Daily Tribune

Pioneering ESA mission aims to create artificial solar eclipses – Astronomy Now Online

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Due to launch together in 2020, the two satellites making up Proba-3 will fly in precise formation to form an external coronagraph in space, one satellite eclipsing the sun to allow the second to study the otherwise invisible solar corona. Credit: ESA

As skywatchers and scientists converge on a transcontinental band of totality for Mondays solar eclipse in the United States, engineers in Europe are building a unique pair of satellites to create artificial eclipses lasting for hours a feat that that could be a boon for solar physicists but will escape the view of Earth-bound spectators.

The European Space Agencys Proba-3 mission, scheduled for launch in late 2020, is made possible by two satellites, one about the size of a refrigerator, and another slightly smaller spacecraft with the rough dimensions of a coffee table.

The basic idea is to fly the smaller satellite directly between the sun and the field-of-view of cameras and instruments mounted on the bigger spacecraft, blocking the sunlight and revealing the glow of the Suns corona, or super-hot atmosphere, and filament-like eruptions called solar flares.

The light coming from the surface of the Sun is a million times brighter than the corona, requiring special measures to see the solar atmosphere.

The concept of obstructing the brightest light emanating from the sun to study activity around it is not new. Scientists have made observations of the corona for centuries during solar eclipses, and there are other space missions that carry coronagraphs, light-blocking discs buried inside telescopes used to make the relatively dim solar atmosphere visible.

But coronagraphs mounted inside telescopes are prone to stray light, a common problem in optics. Light escaping around the coronagraph disc can distort or mask views of the corona.

One simple way to think of the stray light problem is to compare an image of a total solar eclipse, a spectacular phenomenon where the faint corona suddenly springs into view. Holding your thumb over the sun at arms length does not produce the same result because sunlight has already been scattered by particles in Earths atmosphere.

One of the science goals of Proba-3 is to reproduce the conditions of a total solar eclipse as much as possible, said Andrei Zhukov, principal investigator for Proba-3s coronagraph at the Royal Observatory of Belgium, in response to questions from Astronomy Now.

In general, the longer the distance between an observer or a camera and the object obscuring the sun, the better the result. Scientists also do not have to worry about atmospheric distortions in space.

This problem can be minimised by extending the coronagraph length, the distance between the camera and the disc, as far as possible but there are practical limits to coronagraph size, Zhukov said in an ESA press release.

Instead, Proba-3s coronagraph uses two craft: a camera satellite and a disc satellite, Zhukov said. They fly together so precisely that they operate like a single coronagraph, 150 metres (492 feet) long.

The duo will launch together into an highly elliptical, oval-shaped orbit around Earth taking the satellites as high as 37,611 miles (60,530 kilometres) and as low as 372 miles (600 kilometres).

In that orbit, the satellites will complete one lap around the planet every 19.6 hours. For six of those hours, cameras on Proba-3s larger satellite will have an artificial eclipse.

Proba-3 will see the features down to 34,500 miles (55,600 kilometers) from the sun about 8 percent of the solar radius resolving activity closer to the solar limb than any current space mission. Zhukov said ground-based observers looking at a total solar eclipse can still see more of the corona than Proba-3, but the advantage of a space mission is the eclipses longevity.

During two years of its nominal mission, Proba-3 will provide around 1,000 hours of coronal observations, Zhukov wrote in an email to Astronomy Now. This has to be compared with several minutes of duration of natural eclipses during the same time.

Proba-3 will also be free from disturbances produced by the Earths atmosphere in all astronomical observations, Zhukov wrote.

ESA is developing the Proba-3 mission as an experimental demonstration, with scientific observations of the sun a secondary goal.

Engineers want to test out technologies for autonomous formation flying on Proba-3, which will use ranging measurements with the help of GPS navigation signals and optical sensors.

The two spacecraft will be connected with an inter-satellite radio link, and the so-called occulter satellite the smaller of the pair will carry low-power micro-thrusters for fine maneuvers, keeping the two vehicles positioned with millimetre precision.

Proba-3 will create an eclipse when the satellites are farthest from Earth. The satellites will passively drift apart during the rest of each orbit, a fuel-saving measure to minimise consumption of the missions limited supply of propellant.

The capabilities to be proved out on Proba-3 could be used on future missions to repair satellites in orbit or return samples from Mars, according to ESA.

Already approved for development as a tech demo mission, Proba-3 won the backing of ESAs science programme committee earlier this year. The agencys scientific division will pay for Proba-3s science operations center to ensure astronomers get the most out of the project.

Proba-3 was scheduled for launch in 2019, but officials recently pushed back the missions liftoff to the fourth quarter of 2020.

The complexity in the development of the formation flying technology does not allow the launch in late 2019 as was planned earlier, Zhukov said. The project schedule is now consolidated, and the launch in the fourth quarter of 2020 is the new baseline. That does look feasible.

Email the author.

Follow Stephen Clark on Twitter: @StephenClark1.

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Pioneering ESA mission aims to create artificial solar eclipses - Astronomy Now Online

Astronomy buffs traveling for eclipse, viewing events to take place across region – Rockford Register Star

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Adam Poulisse Staff writer @adampoulisse

ROCKFORD Duane Ingram has seen, and been a part of, some pretty impressive science in his lifetime.

TheLoves Park resident taught astronomy and physics at Rock Valley College, owns Ingram Scientific Consultants and has studied the Large Hadron Collider in Geneva, Switzerland, through the University of Iowa.

But at 79 years old,he's still not seen atotal solar eclipse. On Monday, that will change.

Ingram and his wife are traveling to Columbia, Missouri, to get an unobstructed view of "The Great American Eclipse" when the moon will pass between the Sun and Earth, casting a 70 mile-wide shadow that will move from coast to coast.

The rare celestial event marks the first total solar eclipse that can be viewed from the contiguous U.S. since Feb. 26, 1979. Along the path of totality that covers a swath ofthe country from South Carolina to Oregon, the sun will be completely blocked by the moon for about 2 1/2 minutes. It mirrors the path the solar eclipse of June 1918 took from Florida to Washington.

"There were a couple that I thought Id see but didnt," Ingram said. "This time, Im retired; its my time. Im going to see it.

Ingram is traveling to Missouri to be in the path of totality. TheRockfordregion is just outside the path, so wewon't get a full eclipse. But with 88 percent of the sun covered,residents can expect aneat show providing the weather is clear, according to Jim Dole, director of the Doug Firebaugh Observatory in Freeport, 2892 W. Stephenson St., andastronomy teacher at Highland Community College. The National Weather Service is calling for partly sunny skies with a chance of afternoon thunderstorms.

The eclipse will begin around 11:45 a.m. and last until about 2:40 p.m. Maximum coverage, when the area will be the darkest,will happen around 1:15 p.m.

"You should be able to step outside and there should be an eerie, silvery gray look in the sky," Dole said. "The birds and animals will be changing a bit, thinking it's nighttime."

Don'tplan to view the space event at any of the area observatories though, nobody will be there to operate them.

Dole and the eight-person volunteerstaff are traveling across the countryto experience the full solar eclipse. Dole is traveling to Beatrice, Nebraska, a prime viewing spot about an hour south of Lincoln that is expecting thousands of people, including NASA officials and Bill Nye the Science Guy.

But many people plan to view the eclipse right here, partaking in family-friendlyviewing parties and other activities.

"There are solar eclipses around the year, but with three-fourths of the planet being covered in water, a majority of them fall over the oceans," Dole said. "This path of totality is fantastic."

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Events galore

Boone County Conservation District and Ida Public Library will host a Solar Eclipse Viewing Partybeginning at 11:30 a.m. Monday inSpencer Park, 899 N. Appleton Road in Belvidere. Food trucks, crafts, a NASA livestream from other parts of the country and other activities are planned. Solar eclipse viewing glasses will be given to the first 500 guests. Solar eclipse handouts and free commemorative buttons will be distributed.

Nature at the Confluence Learning Center, 306 Dickop St. in South Beloit, in partnership with the South Beloit and Beloit libraries, is hosting a celebrationat 11:30 a.m. There will be arts and crafts, treats, a fire-starting competition using the sun's rays and more.

The eclipse also marks the first day of the new school year for Rockford Public Schools, and some classes will be participating in eclipse-related learning activities.

Communities in southern Illinois havebeen deemed a prime viewing spot and will have plenty of events planned to celebrate the phenomenon. About 200,000 visitors are expected to travel to the region over the weekend. The eclipse's greatest duration will happen in Carbondale and the village of Makanda, at 2 minutes, 42 seconds. Several events are planned including:

The four-day Moonstock Music Festival in Carterville headlined by the Prince of Darkness himself, Ozzy Osbourne.

A canoe trip down the cypress swamp on the Cache Riverduring totality.

Bald Knob Cross in Alto Pass will provide an unobstructed view of the eclipse.

The Adler Planetarium of Chicago, the Louisiana Space Consortium and NASA will host a viewing event at Saluki Stadium at Southern Illinois University.

Jeff Carpenter of Roscoe has a campsite reserved in Carbondale, but declined to say exactlywhere so he doesn't give away his prime viewing spot.

"Itll be nice to see and add to the list of things Ive seen in the universe," he said. "Ive seen so many pictures (of total solar eclipses), I need to see one for myself.

Dole said he chose to travel west because there's a higher chance of visibility in Nebraska than in southern Illinois.

While some are traveling, others are looking forward to seeing the 88 percent solar eclipsein Rockford.

Terri Carpenter of Machesney Park is getting off work at noon just in time to watch theeclipse at its highest point.

"Hopefully it'll bring good energy with everything happening in the world," she said.

Safe specs

Scientists and astronomers are warning spectators to be safe when viewing the eclipse because, while it's neat to behold, staring at the sun can cause permanent eye damage.

"Without special filters, even if it's 99 percent of the sun is covered, you need eye protection; we're going to be at about 90 percent coverage," Dole said. "You're not going to feel (damage) until the next few days when your vision is fuzzy and distorted."

Eclipse glasses have been handed out at local libraries and observatories to allow viewers to safely look at the event. Glasses and hand-held viewers should meet the ISO 12312-2 international standard. No. 14 arc welder's glass can also be used to safely view the eclipse directly.

UTC Aerospace Systems Rockford's Space Business and Community Leadership Club is donating about 1,000 pair of safety glasses to Maud E. Johnson and A.C. Thompson elementary schools as part of its effort to support STEM education in local communities, spokesman Tim Schmeling said.

"The Rockford employees are currently working on life support systems and thermal control systems for NASAs Orion vehicle, intended for deep space missions like Mars, and thought the glasses donation would be a good way to share their passion for space exploration with the students," he said. "The glasses themselves are not manufactured by the business."

And don't forget about the family pets.

Though they won't be as inclined to look directly at theeclipse as we will be, revelries such as fireworks and other commotion to celebrate the event could stress them out, said Kari Kobus, a veterinarian at Hillcrest Animal Hospital on Alpine Road.

"The biggest issue with pets, in any event, is how we react," Kobus said. "If we're stressed and overly excited, they're going to get stressed and overly excited."

Domesticated animals won't react like wildlife will during the eclipse since they operate on a similar schedule as us. Since it'll get pretty dark during maximum coverage, Kobus said, "It'll look like a horrible thunderstorm is passing over the area." It's important to keep pets close and make sure they don't have away to escape if any sudden noises spook them.

If you miss this eclipse, you can catch the next one on April 8, 2024.

"For not seeing one in my life, then seeing two in seven years, that's fantastic," Dole said. "Millions of people going to see first at least onefor the first time in their lives. It's really been a boost for astronomy."

Adam Poulisse: 815-987-1344; apoulisse@rrstar.com; @adampoulisse

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Astronomy buffs traveling for eclipse, viewing events to take place across region - Rockford Register Star

Aztecs, Mayans marveled at eclipses and predicted them with precision – MyStatesman.com

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Astronomers across the ages have looked up to the skies and marveled at eclipses.

Using different numerical systems, the Aztecs and the Mayans observed eclipses and could predict with precision when the next one would occur. In fact, they could have predicted Mondays solar eclipse with small margins of error, experts say.

DONT MISS THE ECLIPSE: Where to watch it in Central Texas

Anthony Aveni is a retired professor from Colgate University and author of many books on archaeoastronomy, including In the Shadow of the Moon: The Science, Magic, and Mystery of Solar Eclipses. According to Aveni, the Aztecs used to say they designed the founding of the city of Tenochtitln where modern-day Mexico City now sits to coincide with an eclipse in 1325.

Its a way of saying, Thats when our empire began, connect that with the beginning. (Its) probably not true, he said, but saying the citys foundation coincided with an eclipse helped give it more importance.

The Aztecs registered many eclipses, and its possible their calendar stone depicts the death of the sun god Tonatiuh at the hands of an eclipse monster, said Susan Milbrath, curator emeritus of the Museum of Natural history in Florida, in a recent New York Times special section about eclipses.

The Mayans also left a record of their astronomical knowledge in books known as codices, especially in the Dresden Codex. The book now resides in Germany and is one of only four codices to survive Spanish colonial officials burning of the books, Aveni said.

This codex has a famous chart of eclipses that suggests the Mayans were watching the sky every bit as carefully as the Babylonians, who might have been the first to keep a record of a total solar eclipse, Aveni said.

DONT STARE: Some tips when watching the eclipse over Austin

Religion, everyday life and science were deeply connected for the Mayans, who used a vigesimal or 20-based numerical system for their calculations. Instead of seven days, for instance, the Mayan week had 20, which corresponded to the number of fingers and toes a person has. They used this system to calculate everything from child gestation to the movement of celestial bodies.

This is an example of scientific cultural diversity, Aveni said. The Mayans had this religious, ritual dictate that any cycle in heaven had to fit perfectly with the cycles of the human body, and other cycles that we dont pay attention to.

The Mayans were way ahead of their time, Aveni said, and we tend to put them down, to say its superstition, but they were doing things quite comparable to what we say we know about eclipses.

Something most of us can agree on, Aveni said, is that when watching an eclipse, we all stop what were doing, we see something unusual and we remember that we all did it at the same time.

It unifies cultures, he said.

Watching the eclipse in Central Texas

Mondays solar eclipse, dubbed the Great American Eclipse, will be seen from Oregons coast near Salem to Charleston, S.C. The next one in the U.S. will not occur until April 8, 2024, when one is expected to start in Mexico, passing through Texas and Maine, and reaching Canada.

Austin will only get to view a partial eclipse Monday.

Several places in Central Texas will hold eclipse viewing parties Monday from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. Visit statesman.com/eclipse for a list of tips, locations and other information.

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Aztecs, Mayans marveled at eclipses and predicted them with precision - MyStatesman.com

How Astronomers Use Eclipses to Discover Alien Worlds – Space.com

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Artist's illustration of the star system Kepler-444, whose five planets were discovered by the Kepler space telescope as they passed in front of their star, dimming its light. All five orbit the star within less than 10 days.

Paul Sutter is an astrophysicist at The Ohio State University and the chief scientist at COSI science center. Sutter leads science-themed tours around the world at AstroTouring.com. Sutter contributed this article to Space.com's Expert Voices: Op-Ed & Insights.

As we prepare for the upcoming total solar eclipse set to cross the continental United States on Aug. 21, the mechanics of the event are pretty straightforward to explain: Occasionally the sun, moon and Earth end up in straight line, and when they do, the moon casts its shadow on the Earth. Voila: eclipse!

From our perspective here on the surface of the Earth, it appears as if the disk of the moon covers the face of the sun. You have to be near or at totality when the sun is fully covered to notice the sun's dimming with your unaided eyes. However, sophisticated light-measuring instruments can easily pick up even the slightest hint of reduction in sunlight no matter the extent of the eclipse.

Now let's play a game. Let's say you attached these keen instruments to a telescope and you rocketed a few light-years away from the solar system. And instead of observing the sun-moon eclipse, you stared at the sun as the Earth meandered in its orbit. If you lined everything up just right and stared long enough, eventually you would get to see the tiny planet cross the face of its massive sun. [Total Solar Eclipse 2017: Here Are the Best Live-Video Streams to Watch]

With enough dedication to your astronomical duties, you could conceivably measure a dip in brightness as the Earth entered the edge of the sun, and a return to normalcy as the planet moved on.

Let's take it to the extreme: You're so far away that you can't even see a tiny dot representing the Earth. Could you still measure the telltale dip in brightness? Well, measuring the light output of a star is much easier than hunting for an insignificant speck of a rocky world, so I suppose with enough technological progress one could achieve it.

And imagine this: What if we did this all the time? Well, we do. This hunting for subtle eclipses is our primary method for detecting exoplanets planets outside the solar system, orbiting their own host stars. Of course, astronomers don't call it "subtle eclipse method," but rather the "transit method."

This method allows us to find exoplanets big and small orbiting stars of all sizes and ages. Over 4,000 planets and counting! We haven't found an exact match for Earth yet but we're getting closer to finding a match with every new planet detected.

The transit method isn't perfect, of course; it relies on a chance alignment among the star, the exoplanet and us. If that planet just happens to orbit perpendicular to our line of sight, we're out of luck. Thankfully, there are, to put it mildly, many stars out there, even within our nearby galactic neighborhood, so enough coincidences occur to give us a solid census of our celestial cousins.

So, as you're feasting your eyes on the upcoming solar eclipse, you might wonder if some distant observer is also enjoying the event.

Follow Paul @PaulMattSutter and facebook.com/PaulMattSutter. Follow us @Spacedotcom, Facebook or Google+. Originally published on Space.com.

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How Astronomers Use Eclipses to Discover Alien Worlds - Space.com

Astrophysicist to speak at museum – Hastings Tribune

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An astrophysicist with ties to MIT, one of the largest telescopes in the world and Inland, Nebraska will be speaking in Hastings this weekend.

Astrophysicist Megan Donahue will share her insights at the Hastings Museum both Saturday and Sunday in anticipation of Mondays total solar eclipse.

I knew the eclipse was going over the farm I grew up on and I thought, Wouldnt it be cool to go back home to see the eclipse? Its going to be one of the better places to see the eclipse, Donahue said in a recent phone interview.

Donahue grew up on a farm near Inland and graduated from Hastings St. Cecilias High School in 1981. She earned a physics degree from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1985 and earned her doctorate in astrophysics from the University of Colorado Boulder in 1990.

I had no clue about what it meant to be a physicist or a scientist, Donahue said going back to her youth. I was really interested in the topic of physics. I was really excited about science fiction and science.

Donahue grew up in the days of the Star Trek and the space program and while she didnt have any direct scientific role models as a child, she found them at MIT.

Donahue said she came to her specialty in astrophysics after realizing how much time and energy she would put into the study of that area.

It was the one thing that would capture my attention and I would lose track of time. That was a sign, she said.

Donahue spent some time as a Carnegie fellow in Pasadena, California, at the Carnegie Observatory. That was back when they were still operating the 200-inch Hale telescope, which at the time was one of the largest in the world.

That was a prestigious thing to have, especially back then, she said.

Donahue was there for three years before going to Baltimore where she worked for several years. Since 2003, she has served as a professor in the physics and astronomy department at Michigan State University.

While she no longer has family ties in this area, Donahue thought coming back to Nebraska for the eclipse would be a great opportunity.

She said there are certainly places out west that might have clearer skies that day but the time to drive from place to place in those mountainous areas might be more of a challenge.

I thought at least in Nebraska I would have free range to go east or west a couple hours if I needed to. I also I thought this would be a good place to stage out of, she said of Hastings. Im crossing my fingers it will be a great place to hang out and watch it.

While in the area, Donahue will be speaking three times at the Hastings Museum:

At 10 a.m. Saturday and 2 p.m. Sunday, Donahue will be speaking about the solar eclipse in Black Hole Sun: Views from the Dark Side of the Moon.

She will use NASA images and animations to give a basic overview of solar eclipses and their distinct stages.

I have some pretty good animation of why we have eclipses and how often we have them and where is there going to be the next one cause youre going to want to know, Donahue said. You see this one youre going to want to see another one. That is for sure.

At 2 p.m. Saturday, Donahue will also give the talk Galaxies Galore! which will delve deeper into her research and work at Michigan State including her work with the Hubble Space Telescope.

When it comes to the solar eclipse, Donahue has a bit of advice for all gazers.

During that two minutes of the full eclipse, Donahue said people will see colors that she can hardly name and that can only really be captured with the human eye. Thats why she said to leave the camera down.

Ive always been told for your first eclipse just look at it. Just watch it, she said. Let the pros take the pictures because you have to set the exposure time and getting the dynamic ring is tough but your eyes will immediately get it.

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Astrophysicist to speak at museum - Hastings Tribune

America Can’t Afford to Lose the Artificial Intelligence War – The National Interest Online

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Today, the question of artificial intelligence (AI) and its role in future warfare is becoming far more salient and dramatic than ever before. Rapid progress in driverless cars in the civilian economy has helped us all see what may become possible in the realm of conflict. All of a sudden, it seems, terminators are no longer the stuff of exotic and entertaining science-fiction movies, but a real possibility in the minds of some. Innovator Elon Musk warns that we need to start thinking about how to regulate AI before it destroys most human jobs and raises the risk of war.

It is good that we start to think this way. Policy schools need to start making AI a central part of their curriculums; ethicists and others need to debate the pros and cons of various hypothetical inventions before the hypothetical becomes real; military establishments need to develop innovation strategies that wrestle with the subject. However, we do not believe that AI can or should be stopped dead in its tracks now; for the next stage of progress, at least, the United States must rededicate itself to being the first in this field.

First, a bit of perspective. AI is of course not entirely new. Remotely piloted vehicles may not really qualifyafter all, they are humanly, if remotely, piloted. But cruise missiles already fly to an aimpoint and detonate their warheads automatically. So would nuclear warheads on ballistic missiles, if God forbid nuclear-tipped ICBMs or SLBMs were ever launched in combat. Semi-autonomous systems are already in use on the battlefield, like the U.S. Navy Phalanx Close-In Weapons System, which is capable of autonomously performing its own search, detect, evaluation, track, engage, and kill assessment functions, according to the official Defense Department description, along with various other fire-and-forget missile systems.

But what is coming are technologies that can learn on the jobnot simply follow prepared plans or detailed algorithms for detecting targets, but develop their own information and their own guidelines for action based on conditions they encounter that were not initially foreseeable in specific.

A case in point is what our colleague at Brookings, retired Gen. John Allen, calls hyperwar. He develops the idea in a new article in the journal Proceedings, coauthored with Amir Husain. They imagine swarms of self-propelled munitions that, in attacking a given target, deduce patterns of behavior of the targets defenses and find ways to circumvent them, aware all along of the capabilities and coordinates of their teammates in the attack (the other self-propelled munitions). This is indeed about the place where the word robotics seems no longer to do justice to what is happening, since that term implies a largely prescripted process or series of actions. What happens in hyperwar is not only fundamentally adaptive, but also so fast that it far supercedes what could be accomplished by any weapons system with humans in the loop. Other authors, such as former Brookings scholar Peter Singer, have written about related technologies, in a partly fictional sense. Now, Allen and Husain are not just seeing into the future, but laying out a near-term agenda for defense innovation.

The United States needs to move expeditiously down this path. People have reasons to fear fully autonomous weaponry, but if a Terminator-like entity is what they are thinking of, their worries are premature. That software technology is still decades away, at the earliest, along with the required hardware. However, what will be available sooner is technology that will be able to decide what or who is a targetbased on the specific rules laid out by the programmer of the software, which could be highly conservative and restrictiveand fire upon that target without any human input.

To see why outright bans on AI activities would not make sense, consider a simple analogy. Despite many states having signed the Non-Proliferation Treaty, a ban on the use and further development of nuclear weapons, the treaty has not prevented North Korea from building a nuclear arsenal. But at least we have our own nuclear arsenal with which we can attempt to deter other such countries, a tactic that has been generally successful to date. A preemptive ban on AI development would not be in the United States best interest because non-state actors and noncompliant states could still develop it, leaving the United States and its allies behind. The ban would not be verifiable and it could therefore amount to unilateral disarmament. If Western countries decided to ban fully autonomous weaponry and a North Korea fielded it in battle, it would create a highly fraught and dangerous situation.

To be sure, we need the debate about AIs longer-term future, and we need it now. But we also need the next generation of autonomous systemsand America has a strong interest in getting them first.

Michael O'Hanlon is a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution.Robert Karlen is a student at the University of Washington and an intern in the Center for Twenty-First Century Security and Intelligence at the Brookings Institution.

Image: Reuters

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America Can't Afford to Lose the Artificial Intelligence War - The National Interest Online

Merging big data and AI is the next step – TNW

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AI is one of hottest trends in tech at the moment, but what happens when its merged with another fashionable and extremely promising tech?

Researchers are looking for ways to take big data to the next level by combining it with AI. Weve just recently realized how powerful big data can be, and by uniting it with AI, big data is swiftly marching towards a level of maturity that promises a bigger, industry-wide disruption.

The application of artificial intelligence on big data is arguably the most important modern breakthrough of our time. It redefines how businesses create value with the help of data. The availability of big data has fostered unprecedented breakthroughs in machine learning, that could not have been possible before.

With access to large volumes of datasets, businesses are now able to derive meaningful learning and come up with amazing results. It is no wonder then why businesses are quickly moving from a hypothesis-based research approach to a more focused data first strategy.

Businesses can now process massive volumes of data which was not possible before due to technical limitations. Previously, they had to buy powerful and expensive hardware and software. The widespread availability of data is the most important paradigm shift that has fostered a culture of innovation in the industry.

The availability of massive datasets has corresponded with remarkable breakthroughs in machine learning, mainly due to the emergence of better, more sophisticated AI algorithms.

The best example of these breakthroughs is virtual agents. Virtual agents (more commonly known as chat bots), have gained impressive traction over the course of time. Previously, chatbots had trouble identifying certain phrases or regional accents, dialects or nuances.

In fact, most chatbots get stumped by the simplest of words and expressions, such as mistaking Queue for Q and so on. With the union of big data and AI however, we can see new breakthroughs in the way virtual agents can self-learn.

A good example of self-learning virtual agents is Amelia, a cognitive agent recently developed by IPSoft. Amelia can understand everyday language, learn really fast and even gets smarter with time!

She is deployed at the help desk of Nordic bank SEB along with a number of public sector agencies. The reaction of executive teams to Amelia has been overwhelmingly positive.

Google is also delving deeper into big data-powered AI learning. DeepMind, Googles very own artificial intelligence company, has developed an AI that can teach itself to walk, run, jump and climb without any prior guidance. The AI was never taught what walking or running is but managed to learn it itself through trial and error.

The implications of these breakthroughs in the realm of artificial intelligence are astounding and could provide the foundation for further innovations in the times to come. However, there are dire repercussions of self-learning algorithms too and, if werent too busy to notice, you may have observed quite a few in the past.

Not long ago, Microsoft introduced its own artificial intelligence chatbot named Tay. The bot was made available to the public for chatting and could learn through human interactions. However, Microsoft pulled the plug on the project only a day after the bot was introduced to Twitter.

Learning at an exponential level mainly through human interactions, Tay transformed from an innocent AI teen girl to an evil, Hitler-loving, incestuous, sex-promoting, Bush did 9/11-proclaiming robot in less than 24 hours.

Some fans of sci-fi movies like Terminator also voice concerns that with the access it has to big data, artificial intelligence may become self-aware and that it may initiate massive cyberattacks or even take over the world. More realistically speaking, it may replace human jobs.

Looking at the rate of AI-learning, we can understand why a lot of people around the world are concerned with self-learning AI and the access it enjoys to big data. Whatever the case, the prospects are both intriguing and terrifying.

There is no telling how the world will react to the amalgamation of big data and artificial intelligence. However, like everything else, it has its virtue and vices. For example, it is true that self-learning AI will herald a new age where chatbots become more efficient and sophisticated in answering user queries.

Perhaps we would eventually see AI bots on help desks in banks, waiting to greet us. And, through self-learning, the bot will have all the knowledge it could ever need to answer all our queries in a manner unlike any human assistant.

Whatever the applications, we can surely say that combining big data with artificial intelligence will herald an age of new possibilities and astounding new breakthroughs and innovations in technology. Lets just hope that the virtues of this union will outweigh the vices.

Read next: Military-funded prosthetic technologies benefit veterans, but also kids

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Merging big data and AI is the next step - TNW

UNT’s next chancellor has pushed the boundaries of space exploration (audio) – Texas Tribune

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Lesa Roe hopscotched across the country working her way up the ranks at NASA. And when you spend more than three decades working on projects that push the boundaries of space exploration, its hard to pick the coolest moment of your career.

"Oh my gosh, thats really hard to nail down because theres just too many exciting things to talk about," she says.

Roe managed the research program at the International Space Station and helped launch missions that have discovered new worlds. As an engineer by training, Roe even helped build the space shuttle Endeavor. She installed its communications systems.

But she says the most thrilling moment came in the middle of the night a little more than five years ago.

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Roe was in Pasadena California, in the control room as the Curiosity rover was landing on Mars. She says the tension in the room was palpable, with dozens of blue-shirted scientists and engineers anxiously watching their screens.

"Theres what they call seven minutes of terror when you have no communications as the vehicle is going through the atmosphere of Mars," she says.

Most of them had spent their entire careers working on getting a robot the size of a MINI Cooper to the surface of the red planet. So when it landed safely, "everybody just exploded in excitement. And so thats just something that sticks with you forever."

So how do you go from being the No. 2 at NASA an organization with more than 17,000 employees and a $19 billion budget to running university system in Texas? Roe says thereisa connection.

"We really need a well-trained, well-educated workforce coming in to make those tremendous scientific discoveries, to do all of the incredible systems, the design, everything that we do at NASA. And so the University of North Texas systems role is to develop those students that can do that kind of work," she says.

Roe will inherit a growing university system.Theres new law school in Dallas, and a new medical school in the works in Fort Worth. Roe says she wants to make sure graduates are attractive to top employers.

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"Every time I talk to students I talk about doing internships and really getting that hands-on experience and seeing what its like and learning and being part of a team even while youre a student in a university," she says.

Roe wants UNT to be inclusive and accessible for people of all economic backgrounds. And personally, shes on a mission to get more women into STEM fields.

"I have a huge passion for young girls seeing yeah, I can do this, I can be a part of it. I was one of those young girls, I was the first to go to college in my family, and so I want to help be that encourager to say you can do this."

And if they need a little inspiration along the way, shes always got that whole Mars landing story to tell them.

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UNT's next chancellor has pushed the boundaries of space exploration (audio) - Texas Tribune

US to stage massive drills on Kim’s doorstep as WW3 fears grow – Daily Star

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THE US and South Korea are set to carry out joint military drills next week resisting calls from the North and China to halt their exercises.

WASHINGTON will step up its military actions in Asia as tubby tyrant Kim Jong-un defies calls to surrender Pyongyang's nukes.

Fears over the Hermit Kingdoms nuclear programme have grown in recent weeks after the Norths supremo announced he was considering firing a barrage of missiles at Guam.

But Pyongyang appears to have cooled talks of an imminent strike on the US-owned Pacific island.

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Since 2008, photographer Eric Lafforgue ventured to North Korea six times. Thanks to digital memory cards, he was able to save photos that was forbidden to take inside the segregated state

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Taking pictures in the DMZ is easy, but if you come too close to the soldiers, they stop you

GETTY

It dialled back its rhetoric after US President Donald Trump vowed to use fire and fury against North Korea if it continued to develop nuclear missiles that could hit the American mainland.

US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said Washington did, however, prefer a peaceful solution and offered an olive branch to the rogue regime.

He said: Our effort is to cause them to want to engage in talks but engage in talks with an understanding that these talks will lead to a different conclusion than talks of the past.

GETTY

Ever since the death of US student Otto Warmbier, the US has wanted to ban its citizens from travelling to the rogue nation. In spite of this, travel guide Shane Horan is still leading tours deep into the heart of the hermit state

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An army officer in frony of Mount Paektu on the Northern Chinese border. This is a sacred place for Koreans, and it is said that General Kim Jong Il was born at the base of the mountain

Our effort is to cause them to want to engage in talks

The Hermit Kingdom was quick to dismiss any suggestion it would give up its nuclear programme and said this week it would never be up for negotiation as long as the US governments hostile policy and nuclear threat continue.

In 2005, Pyongyang agreed to suspend its nuclear in return for much-needed energy assistance before the deal collapsed.

Chubby Kim has repeatedly threatened to use its nuclear weapons and Intercontinental Ballistic Missiles (ICBM) to bomb targets in the US, South Korea and Japan.

The rogue communist state became more emboldened in July after it successfully launched two Hwasong-14 missiles that could strike targets in the American heartland, including Los Angeles and Chicago.

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US to stage massive drills on Kim's doorstep as WW3 fears grow - Daily Star

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Did the Bible predict North Korea starting World War 3 with the US? – Express.co.uk

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Analysis from the Philadelphia Church of God, claims the danger posed by North Korea is graver than many people realised.

They suggest Pyongyang and despot leader Kim Jong-Un could inflict major damage on the US or other Western nations.

Writing for The Trumpet, the news magazine of the church, Jeremiah Jacques indicates any strike could contribute to the wars and rumors of wars that Jesus Christ warned would occur before the third world war breaks out.

GETTY

End times and the apocalypse have long been linked to possible nuclear war.

The Bible describes that some 2,000 years ago, as Jesus sat on the Mount of Olives in Jerusalem with his disciples, he was asked what would happen at the end of the world.

He claimed there would be wars and rumors of wars, as well as fierce international tensions and famines, and pestilences, and earthquakes.

And while Mr Jacques admits this is unlikely to refer to North Korea, he suggested the hermit state could in fact play the role of a trigger to cause the devastating scenes of Revelations.

North Korea State Media

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The analysis said: All of the missiles and nuclear technology the Kim dynasty has been developing over the years will contribute to the unprecedented devastation to occur during that prophesied third world war.

And he claims that although North Korea will not cause WW3 according to the Bible, the world should take its threats and actions seriously.

Trumpet executive editor Stephen Flurry and managing editor Joel Hilliker said: If nothing else, the mere threat of a mentally unstable tyrant in North Korea using nuclear weapons should cause all of us to be asking some very hard questions.

Rising current nuclear tension should provoke us to consider seriously the biblical prophecies of nuclear destruction.

Those prophecies are drawing closer than ever to fulfillment!

It comes after Pastor Greg Laurie of Harvest Christian Fellowship in Riverside, California says analysis of the escalating tensions between North Korea and the US suggests a nuclear war between the two superpowers fits into the End Times prophecy.

He said: In the Last Days there is no mention of any nation that would resemble North Korea however the Bible does speak of Iran in the End Times scenario.

You might be surprised to know there is an alignment of sorts between North Korea and Iran.

REUTERS

In fact, former ambassador the United Nations John Bolton recently said if North Korea developed a delivery system for nuclear weapon Iran would have it the next day simply by writing a cheque.

Tensions between North Korea and the United States have escalated in recent weeks with US President Donald Trump and dictator Kim embroiled in a war of words.

Mr Trump warned the US was "locked and loaded" as Kim threatened to strike US territory Guam in the Pacific Ocean.

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Did the Bible predict North Korea starting World War 3 with the US? - Express.co.uk

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Vh1 Supersonic 2018 dates are out – Trance Hub (satire) (press release) (blog)

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After a rapturous edition in 2017, a festival which will go down in the history for Eric Prydz, Zedd and that wonderful Trance stage, Vh1 Supersonic is back with its 2018 edition.

Mark those dates 9th February to 11th February at the same Laxmi Lawns, Pune. We hope even a bigger lineup this year, more techno and of course more trance as well!

Tell us which artists would you love to see at Vh1 Supersonic 2018 and we shall share it with their talent booking team. Until then keep it uplifting!

Follow their event page for more updates = VH1 Supersonic 2018

Co-Founder of Trance Hub, Curator of The Gathering events in India and ALT+TRANCE in Czech Republic. By day, a Digital Marketing Enthusiast with love for Food and Technology. By night, a dreamer who wants to grow the Trance scene in India.

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After a super successful edition in 2017, Transmission makes its way back to...

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Vh1 Supersonic 2018 dates are out - Trance Hub (satire) (press release) (blog)

Observer Hack the Minds Of Killers In This Cyberpunk Horror Story – Siliconera

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By Joel Couture . August 19, 2017 . 9:00am

Cyberpunk horror game Observertakes players to a bleak future of cybernetic implants, disease, and war, tasking them with searching the memories and thoughts of dangerous criminals in search of thought evidence of their crimes.

As Dan Lazarski, an aging neural detective with a distant son, players will follow trails of evidence using several types of implanted scanners, shifting their eyesight to see traces of physical or technological clues that will help them through a world of people twisted by their bionic implants and pacified by drugs and distorted programming.

Players will also be able to hack their way into the minds of criminals using their implants, creating living worlds out of the fears and desires of dangerous people. There, players must seek out proof of their actions, but will find the shattered minds of these men and women to be a dangerous, unsettling place, offering up unsettling imagery and frightening moments.

Obeservers frightening scenes and frightening look at a broken future are available now on Steam, PS4, and Xbox One.

Video game stories from other sites on the web. These links leave Siliconera.

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Observer Hack the Minds Of Killers In This Cyberpunk Horror Story - Siliconera

Retro cyberpunk adventure Technobabylon is out now on iOS – Eurogamer.net

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Dragon Age: Inquisition director calls it "an exceptional point and click with a killer story."

By Jeffrey Matulef Published 17/08/2017

Wadjet Eye Games' sci-fi point-and-click adventure Technobabylon has just launched on iOS.

Set in 2087, Technobabylon tells the tale of two detectives, Charlie Regis and Max Lao, who are hot on the trail of a "Mindjacker" who hacks into others' brains, steals their knowledge, then leaves them for dead. They believe the next target is an agoraphobe named Latha Sesame, who is addicted to a cyberspace realm called the Trance, and she must contend with the outside world for the first time in years.

Developer Technocrat Games has described Technobabylon as "Blade Runner meets Police Quest," which is certainly the vibe I'm getting from its original launch trailer.

Technobabylon has been out on Steam for over two years now. In that time Dragon Age: Inquisition's senior creative director Mike Laidlaw raved about the game's sharp writing. "This game is an exceptional point and click with a killer story. Recommended on any platform," he tweeted upon this mobile port's launch.

The iOS version of Technobabylon goes for 4.99 / $4.99, a pretty big savings over its 10.99 / $14.99 PC release.

If you'd like to try it out before buying, there's a free demo on Steam.

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Retro cyberpunk adventure Technobabylon is out now on iOS - Eurogamer.net

TMS Therapy in West Palm Beach – Psychologists …

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Severe depression affects eight percent of the population in the United States. More than half of those afflicted dont respond to a prescription drug treatment program. Fortunately, many of these patients are able to escape the prison of depression due to the TMS therapy offered in West Palm Beach Florida.

Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation (TMS) uses magnetic fields to stimulate neurons that lie dormant in people diagnosed with severe depression. It is highly targeted and most patients experience a significant and positive long-term improvement in mood. TMS therapy has also been found to be effective in patients diagnosed with PTSD, Schizophrenia, Parkinsons Disease, Autism, Chronic Pain, Bipolar Disorder, Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder, Nicotine Dependence, Mild Cognitive Impairment, and Pre-Alzheimers Disease.

Repetitive Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation (rTMS) was approved for use by the FDA in 2008. Unlike electroshock therapy, it can be performed while the patient is awake and non-sedated, it doesnt initiate convulsions, and there is no memory loss. The magnetic field is usually targeted to stimulate neurons within the prefrontal cortex. Brain-imaging studies using the PET scan have shown that persons with major depression experience very little activity within this region.

Magnetic and electrical fields are two sides of one coin and each can induce the other. In a typical rTMS treatment, a series of magnetic impulses is delivered repeatedly in order to jump-start electrical activity within the desired area. The magnetic impulses are delivered via a figure eight coil and penetration of the magnetic impulses within the brain is shallow, but tightly focused, with this method. This method relies more on repetition than it does upon delivering the field to a point deeper within the brain. Technicians place a hand-held figure eight coil on the head during treatment.

Known as Deep Transcranial Stimulation, dTMS first received FDA approval for the treatment of major depression in 2013. An H-coil that is similar to a helmet is secured to the head in order to maintain placement of the electromagnets. Before the treatment session begins, a series of low-level impulses are sent to test for the specific strength of the field for each individual. Like traditional rTMS, most treatment plans include a session Monday through Friday and the entire sequence lasts four to six weeks.

The H-coil penetrates further into the brain and the anatomical effects are more localized than they are in traditional rTMS. The device was designed to allow the field to reach its optimal strength at the desired depth. In clinical trials, almost one-third of the treated patients went into remission and an additional 36% of participants experienced significant improvement.

(Photo by Bruce R. Bennett/The Palm Beach Post)

Major depression has many causes. It may be genetic, induced by a traumatic life event or a result of a head injury. No matter what the cause, untreated depression is profoundly difficult. Many patients report an immediate positive effect on their mood after their initial TMS session. Brett Armstrong came to Advanced Mental Health Care in West Palm Beach Florida after a 2003 motorcycle accident left him unable to shake off a deep and debilitating depression. He states that, It was like a miracle. TMS therapy gave me my life back.

Advanced Mental Health Care has 3 locations near West Palm Beach Florida. They are located in Palm Beach, Royal Palm Beach, and Juno Beach. AHMC has participated in clinical trials with traditional rTMS and dTMS treatments for depression. They are currently looking for persons diagnosed with Bipolar Disorder to study the effect that dTMS treatment has on depression within this target population. Participants must be diagnosed as Bipolar, the use of prescription medication must have failed, and they must currently be taking mood stabilizers. The clinical trial will take place over an eight-week period.

For additional information regarding this trial or to see if you qualify, please email Dr. Holly LaSalle-Ricci at drlasallericci@gmail.com or call 561-333-8884.

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TMW Adds Real-Time Freight Tracking to TMS Solutions – Heavy Duty Trucking

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August 16, 2017

Fleets using TMW Systems Innovative IES, Access, or AccessPlus transportation management solutions can now extend real-time order and shipping information to their customers with the IES Freight Tracker portal, an integrated customer service and dispatch.

Replacing TMWs Pressurize platforms, the new visibility portal enables carriers to improve customer satisfaction through accurate, transparent and timely order updates.

More than ever before, transportation and logistics providers are facing pressure to provide customers with transparency into every step of the delivery process, said Ray West, senior vice president and general manager of TMS solutions for TMW. With the launch of the IES Freight Tracker portal, we are enabling Innovative IES users to meet these heightened expectations by giving them a way to provide customers with accurate, up-to-date load status whenever and wherever they want to access them.

The IES Freight Tracker portal is designed to be a scalable and cost-effective customer support tool that integrates into a users existing Innovative IES platform. The web-based solution allows carriers to view shipments from multiple customer codes and utilize drag-and-drop functionality to reposition shipment details.

Users can offer their customers configurable, secure access to real-time delivery details. Transportation providers can easily customize settings for each customer, allowing them to view orders based on type and to sort and filter shipment details. In addition, customers can use the portal to access shipment documents and related images, export shipment data to Excel, and create up to seven hyperlinks to important documents indexed by order number.

Implementation of the IES Freight Tracker portal requires the use of Innovative IES, Access, or Access Plus solutions in version R9.7 or later along with the Innovative Web Edition module. Other requirements include an internet-connected device with a web browser and business-quality internet bandwidth.

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TMW Adds Real-Time Freight Tracking to TMS Solutions - Heavy Duty Trucking

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TMS To Host Solar Eclipse Watch Party on World’s Largest TV – Speedway Digest (press release) (blog)

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Texas Motor Speedway will celebrate the first total solar eclipse across the continental United States in 38 years with a watch party on the world's largest TV as well as a celestial-themed, pre-event luncheon for its entire staff.

Texas Motor Speedway President Eddie Gossage is throwing a solar eclipse bash in the speedway infield beginning at 12:30 p.m. CT Monday for his entire staff of more than 80 employees that will feature a variety of celestial-named delights. The staff will enjoy "Out Of This World" Dickey's BBQ sandwiches, Krispy Kreme limited-edition Solar Eclipse doughnuts, Moon Pies and Sun Chips among the treats for lunch at the Fuzzy's Taco Shop in the infield.

The speedway also has produced "No Limits" Solar Eclipse t-shirts and celestial snack packs that will be raffled off to the staff through solar eclipse trivia games at lunch. The packs consist of a Moon Pie, Eclipse Gum, Star Crunch, Cosmic Brownie, Milky Way, Starburst, Sun Chips and Satellite Wafers.

Each staff member also will receive Eclipse Shades for the option to watch the eclipse directly in addition to viewing it on Big Hoss TV with no special glasses needed. North Texas will see a partial solar eclipse - the moon will cover 76 percent of the sun's surface in Dallas/Fort Worth - with maximum viewing coming at 1:09 p.m.

While Texas Motor Speedway couldn't provide those highly sought-after Eclipse Shades from Denton's Orbit Press for the general public, the speedway will film the eclipse with a special camera filter from the grandstand rooftop and air it live of Big Hoss TV and Facebook Live.

Locally, Texas Motor Speedway will open its infield to the public to watch the eclipse on the colossal "Big Hoss TV" that stands 12 stories tall on the speedway's backstretch. "Big Hoss" is nearly 23,000 square feet of high-definition screen display that boasts 281 trillion colors and five million pixels. The Guinness Book of World Records recognized "Big Hoss" as the world's largest HDTV in 2014.

For those visiting, the South Infield Tunnel will be open to the public beginning at Noon CT. Parking will be available in the infield camping area in front of "Big Hoss" (Turns 2 & 3 side of the infield). Visitors can watch from the comfort of their vehicle or are encouraged to bring lawn chairs to watch from outside. The South Paddock concession restrooms also will be open.

For Texas Motor Speedway and solar eclipse fans across the state, country and the world, the speedway also will utilize Facebook Live on the speedway's page to broadcast the eclipse in North Texas beginning at 11:35 a.m.

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TMS To Host Solar Eclipse Watch Party on World's Largest TV - Speedway Digest (press release) (blog)

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Urban Dictionary: politically correct

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A term originally meant to describe behavior that minimises offence, particularly in relation to minorities. Now the term is an overused strawmen misused against many of those against unfair prejudice. Call a racist irrational and get branded a PC pussy. The term has effectively been used to stifle debate and thought about issues. It has reframed those who want fair and equal treatment of people, to people who have a PC agenda. The term does not censor offensive discussion against minorities, but rather censors discussion for positive social change. People get branded as PC pussies instead of raising debate and free thought. Health minister Hakuo Yanagisawa calls women baby making machines. Bob: No way, he can't say that! Tom: Why not? Stop spreading your politically correct garbage here. Bob: It ain't nothing to do with political correctness. He has a responsibility to the state and people to make a good example and good policies. This statement shows he has little respect for women as people and it effects how he handles his role as a minister. It also sends the wrong message to the people.

Shintaro Ishihara claims foreigners would riot in the event of an earthquake requiring not the police but the self defense force. Bob: No way! Tom: Well someone had to come out and say the truth. All you political correct guys are pussies! Foreigners come here with their stinking culture and create crime. Bob: It has nothing to do with political correctness. It is both wrong, as foreigner in Japan have lower crime rates, and harmful, as it incites irrational xenophobic fear.

In France a local soup kitchen for the homeless only has pork dishes, while having many Muslim patrons. Bob: Man that sucks they should try some non-pork dishes too so that Muslims can also eat (Muslims can't eat pork on religous grounds). Tom: Damn pussy! Stop trying to be a politically correct idiot. Bob: What! It has nothing to do with politcal correctness. I simply want the soup kitchen to help as many people as possible. If non-pork dishes help in that sense they should do that. Particularly if it is supported by government tax breaks.

"Political correctness is one of the brilliant tools that the American Right developed in the mid-1980s as part of its demolition of American liberalism....What the sharpest thinkers on the American Right saw quickly was that by declaring war on the cultural manifestations of liberalism - by levelling the charge of political correctness against its exponents - they could discredit the whole political project." - Will Hutton

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Gachapon: Tracing the evolution of Japan’s colorful toy capsules – The Japan Times

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Where else but Japan could you buy a miniature version of Edvard Munchs The Scream figure crouching over a squat toilet, horror-struck? Its one of thousands of ingeniously designed trinkets you can buy for a pittance from toy machines across the nation. Theyre subversive, beautifully crafted and often hilarious. They are gachapon.

Gachapon refers both to vending machines and the capsule toys they spit out. When you crack open one of these plastic eggs, youll never know what youll get even though its part of a defined set of toys. Thats only a fraction of the fun of gachapon, a roughly 30 billion industry with 150 new toys hatched every month. While capsule toys originated overseas, gachapon are uniquely Japanese.

If you grew up in North America, chances are you raided your piggy bank to feed gumball and capsule toy machines made by Oak Manufacturing, Beaver Machine and other manufacturers. For a fistful of quarters, you could go home with a jawbreaker in your cheek and a pocketful of miniature playing cards, die-cast animals, toy soldiers, rubber monsters and other novelties. Then you grew up and forgot all about the trinkets you once coveted.

In Japan, however, childhood seems to enjoy an extended lease. And gachapon are loved by kids of all ages: At the capsule toy corner on the sixth floor of Yodobashi Cameras Akihabara outlet, you can see boys and girls and men and women, even suit-and-tie salarymen, jamming 100 coins into stacks of machines, perusing the display cards and hunting for a rare prize. Akihabara is a mecca for otaku geeks, a moveable feast of subculture products, and gachapon can easily be overlooked in the riot of anime and electronics. But step outside of Yodobashi Camera and youll find gachapon shops along Chuo-dori, in the back streets and at the station. At Gachapon Kaikan, a legendary specialist shop that has been around for about 16 years, there are some 500 gachapon machines and 60 percent of its clientele are non-Japanese.

Capsule toy vending machines in Yodobashi Camera in Tokyos Akihabara district. | TIM HORNYAK

Gachapon used to be mainly figures, but recently theyre small items you can place around your computer, or attach with a strap to your smartphone or key ring, says manager Yo Kono, who tends to the machines and fields customer requests, often in Chinese. They were also more geared to guys who were into anime, but younger females, and ordinary men and women, are getting into it.

Like modern-day netsuke accessories, gachapon are remarkable for their multiplicity, craftsmanship and sheer wackiness. Theyre miniature works of art in plastic. There are gachapon sushi, cars, motorcycles, bicycles, dinosaurs, trains, insects, Tokyo Towers, manekineko cats, daruma dolls, Mount Fujis and samurai. There are oodles of popular anime and manga characters on Lilliputian scale from franchises such as Pokemon, Anpanman, Sailor Moon, Dragonball, Doraemon, One Piece, GeGeGe no Kitaro, and, of course, Gundam.

And then there are the progressively wacky gachapon. These could fill an encyclopedia, but heres a selection: capsules containing tiny office chairs, backpacks, camping lanterns, water faucets, wrist pillows, traffic lights, raw eggs, stretchable tamagoyaki, pizza toast, ramen, pygmy hippopotamuses, aquatic animals wearing bowties, cats showing off their butts, headscarves, bunny ears and penguin bonnets for cats, police caps for dogs, whales with oversized chins, the Statue of Liberty hoisting a glass of beer, cute girls with snail shells on their backs, Easter Island Moai wearing lipstick, underwear and sweaters for plastic bottles, futons for smartphones and drumroll, please Godzilla formally apologizing at a press conference podium for wanton acts of destruction. Now who wouldnt spend 300 for one of those?

While modern, coin-operated vending machines selling postcards and gum date to 1880s London and New York, the zany, freewheeling culture that is gachapon began with an entrepreneur named Ryuzo Shigeta, known today as Gacha-gacha Ojisan. In the 1960s, Shigeta and his brother had been exporting cheap goods to the United States and a partner there sent them an American vending machine known as a bulk vendor. For 10 a pop, it would spit out candy and cheap toys, but they came out willy-nilly, all mixed together. Shigeta found that unsanitary and frustrating, and had a brainwave: Why not encase each product in a plastic shell? On Feb. 17, 1965, gachapon were born when Shigeta set up the capsule vending machine at his shop, Penny Shokai, located in Kuramae 3-chome in Tokyos Taito Ward.

For the next 10 years, gachapon featured cheap novelties made with scrap plastic. Manufacturers such as Konno Sangyo Co. also pioneered the industry but it was revolutionized in 1977 with the entry of a toy giant: Bandai Co. Founded in 1950, Bandai was a trailblazer in gachapon. Aside from trademarking them as Gashapon, its executives gambled that their capsule toys would sell even if priced at 100 a pop, much more than competitors who were offering 20 trinkets.

That gamble paid off in spectacular fashion. On the back of Gundam, Kamen Rider, Ultraman and other popular brands, Gashapon lifted capsule toys to new heights and Bandai sold an astonishing 3.4 billion units in the 40 years to March 2017. The company says it has some 360,000 vending machines across Japan and claims a roughly 70 percent market share; it has some 20,000 elsewhere in Asia.

Hand-carved in Japan as prototypes, then manufactured and hand-painted in China, the Philippines and elsewhere in Asia, Gashapon lead a brief retail existence. Bandai launches 30 to 40 new Gashapon every month, priced at 100 to 500 apiece, with some tied to seasonal events. Popular Gashapon can sell out in a week or two; while some see repeat production runs, the vast majority are done after only one batch.

There have been three gachapon booms. The first was in 1983 with the launch of Kinniku Man Keshigomu; Bandai sold more than 180 million units of the polyvinyl chloride muscleman erasers in over 400 varieties. This emboldened Bandai to launch capsule toys priced at 200 in 1991. The second boom began in the mid-1990s with the appearance of full color, detailed Gashapon figures such as the SD Gundam series. This attracted an increasingly adult clientele, especially collectors and fans of anime and manga. The third boom began with Yokai Watch, the hit multimedia franchise that debuted in 2013 as a Nintendo 3DS game. Meanwhile, gachapon have grown more sophisticated, with intricate items that require assembly. They can include up to 24 joints and even have glowing LED eyes, as seen in the Ultraman Ultimate Luminous series.

We can see gashapon all over Japan and Ive come to think its part of Japanese culture, says Kenichiro Otsuka, assistant manager in Bandais Vending Machine Business Department, where about 30 staffers dream up new capsule toys. In recent years weve seen women getting into them for Sailor Moon and Disney, as well as foreign tourists buying gashapon as souvenirs.

The evolution of gachapon hasnt been confined to toys. Gashapon machines were at first large and clunky and delivered the capsule to a basket at the bottom. Today theyre slim, double-decker affairs, allowing them to be lined up by the dozen in compact rows. This can be done anywhere, since most dont require electricity, though some of the newer models do because they can accept payment by smart card; some capsule toy machines even work with large video or lottery game screens. While originally confined to dagashiya neighborhood candy shops and the roofs of department stores, gachapon are now found everywhere, from street corners, convenience stores, supermarkets and electronics retailers to train stations, airports, tourist spots and locations such as Gashapon Street in Tokyo Station.

Capsules themselves have changed little over the years from the original design of connecting halves, one of polypropylene and the other of polystyrene. In recent years, however, Bandai introduced polypropylene-only versions that can be recycled more easily. It also launched cylindrical capsules to accommodate larger products, as well as capsules that form the toy itself, such as the head of Doraemon or a Zaku robot from the Gundam franchise.

Kitan Clubs Koppu no Fuchiko capsule toys | TIM HORNYAK

Some capsule toys are a phenomenon unto themselves. A standout gachapon in recent years and one of the drivers of the third boom has been Koppu no Fuchiko. With a name that plays on the Japanese word for edge (fuchi), shes an OL (office lady) whose outstretched arms allow her to hang from the lip of a glass or whatever else you fancy.

Launched in 2012 and designed by manga artist Katsuki Tanaka, Fuchiko has been a smash hit among all capsule toys, with sales of 20 million units and more than 1,500 variations of her in various poses, wearing everything from Hawaiian dresses to Shinto robes. Shes extremely popular online do an Instagram photo search with the hashtag # (koppunofuchiko) and youll find more than 145,000 hits and even has her own set of Line stickers. Manufacturer Kitan Club, which has turned out some of the more bizarre gachapon in recent years, marked Fuchikos fifth anniversary with special sales and exhibitions.

We had noticed that many OLs would post rather boring photos of their lunches to SNS sites such as Facebook, so we thought about how they could be made more interesting, says Kitan Club spokesman Seita Shiki. Since its launch, Koppu no Fuchiko has been featured at meetings, tea parties, drinking parties, and so on. The cup edge became a completely new genre that took off with the whole SNS craze.

Indeed, Kitan Club has launched about 40 other cup edge gachapon under its Putitto series. Kitan Club and other makers have produced hanging cats, dogs, frogs, hedgehogs and penguins, anime characters from Pikachu to Golgo 13, Star Wars Imperial stormtroopers and even singer Shigeru Matsuzaki.

Its perhaps not surprising that gachapon have spawned a fan subculture that includes avid collectors.

Waki Kaiyama is an author, TV and radio personality from Sendai whose business card features a cartoonish drawing of him holding a capsule and a gachapon machine. Kaiyama began collecting in 1977, the year Gashapon hit the streets, and is still going strong 40 years later. He now has an unbelievable 100,000 capsule toys and is known as the top gachapon collector in Japan.

Kaiyama became addicted to the capsule toy drug through his grandmother, who ran a dagashiya candy shop with gachapon. When his parents were splitting up, she took him in. He didnt have friends in her neighborhood, so gachapon became his friends. While other kids would buy them and eventually toss them out, he held on to them. A collector was born.

Collector Waki Kaiyama has around 100,000 capsule toys. | TIM HORNYAK

Over iced coffee in Tokyo, Kaiyama proudly displays some of his treasures: an early alien figure gachapon, originally priced at 100, and now worth 100,000; simple gachapon of yesteryear featuring musclemen and sumo wrestlers; vintage vouchers that, if found in a capsule, entitled the bearer to pick any number of novelties; gag knives and poop; and intricate modern gachapon such as a rickshaw from Tokyo manufacturer Epoch. He even has an old capsule toy vending machine to show off. You can really get a sense of time travel back to your childhood when you look at gacha-gacha, says Kaiyama, who goes by the name MC Wacky when appearing on television. Gacha-gacha are like a barometer for life reflecting your happiness, sadness and all your ups and downs. You can see how such silly products are being made and perhaps find encouragement for your own ideas.

Those views are echoed by another capsuleist, Hiroaki Omatsu, a journalist and gachapon fan who has just written his own book on the subject, Gachapon Idea Note. In it, he profiles not only dozens of crazy gachapon but the insights of about 10 designers. For instance, Hiroaki Haba of capsule toy maker Takara Tomy Arts created a series of richly detailed salarymen figurines called Kakkoi Ossan that are engaged in uncharacteristic action poses such as firing guns or baring washboard abs, all while keeping their neckties, glasses and comb-overs intact.

Some examples of capsule toys from Waki Kaiyamas collection. | TIM HORNYAK

The book quotes Haba as saying he watches a lot of movies and was sketching a typical middle-aged salaryman face in a meeting when he started thinking about how it could look cool. The result was a hit gachapon for 2016.

Gachapon that appeal to adults are a form of pop culture plus traditional Japanese monozukuri craftsmanship, says Omatsu, who has accumulated more than 1,000 gachapon. Theres definitely a nostalgic element to it. When we were kids, we didnt have any money to buy these things but as adults, we can.

However, gachapon can also be a communication tool, for instance as desktop ornaments at work. In an age of video games and virtual entertainment, gachapon are wonderful analog toys that havent changed for decades.

For just three coins, they give you a thrill, a surprise and a lot of fun. I hope this form of Japanese culture will spread overseas.

Capsule toys in Japan are known by various names, but the most common term is gachapon, referring to the toys and the vending machines themselves. Its an onomatopoeia based on the sound of the vending machine crank and the thud the capsules make when spat out. Depending on demographics and trademarks, however, people may use a different term.

Japanese in their 40s and 50s tend to call them gacha-gacha, says gachapon fan Hiroaki Omatsu, while Japanese in their 20s and 30s call them gachapon.

Meanwhile, Bandai Co. calls its capsule toys Gashapon, while Takara Tomy Arts Co. uses the trademark Gacha.

To make things slightly more confusing, not all gachapon sold under these makers machines are their trademarked products. For instance, Bandai machines also sell other companies toys, which are not Gashapon.

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Gachapon: Tracing the evolution of Japan's colorful toy capsules - The Japan Times