Le Shi to Unveil Super Smartphone on April 14, Create the New "Ecological Age"

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HONG KONG, April 7, 2015 /PRNewswire/ -- One of the China's most popular online video sites, Le Holdings (Beijing) Limited (Le Shi), has officially invited the press in early April to an announcement themed "From 1984 to 2015" at which the firm will unveil its Super Smartphone that will bring about unprecedented changes to user experience and the way the industry operates. The announcement will start at 14:00 on April 14 at the MasterCard Center in Beijing, China.

The theme "From 1984 to 2015" represents a new milestone in 2015. "While Apple's announcement of its Macintosh computer in 1984 was seen as the beginning of a new age, Le Shi's announcement of its Super Smartphone in 2015 will "overturn" Apple -- the one who originally overturned -- by bringing smartphones over to the new "Ecological Age," remarked Le Shi's Chairman Jia Yueting.

Le Shi's Chairman on Weibo: An invitation to break boundaries

That particular theme and its implication are also echoed in Jia's media invitation to the announcement from his Weibo account. He includes a graphic piece in which the "App" in "Apple" is crossed out, with only the "le" in "Le Shi" left untouched.

Jia's Weibo invite themed "No Ecosystem Nothing Super" reads: "our time is changing; roles have changed but our spirit never changes! From 1984 to 2015, Le Shi invites you to #BreakBoundaries, EcologicalOverturn#; see you at 2pm on 4-14."

The Chairman has proactively publicized the concepts behind the new smartphone and questioned Apple's industrial design and its closed system after his surgery to cure Thymoma in November 2014, though he has not made any public appearance since then.

The new, transformative Eco User Interface of Super Smartphone

While high-performance, gorgeous appearance, a focus on the service-first ecological mode, and unrivaled features -- such as all-metal bodies, no-frame industrial design, Qualcomm's flagship 810 chipset, HiFi stereo components, and the highest-resolution camera -- will enable Le Shi's Super Smartphone to surpass offerings by major competitors, the core edge of the Super Smartphone is the EUI (Eco User Interface) system.

"An interactive system between users and ecosystem, EUI is cross-ecology and across terminals' central nervous systems. EUI re-defines smartphone's UI system, allowing smartphones to move from the intelligence age to the ecology age," said Le Shi.

EUI will also act as the core of a complete ecosystem that transforms the existing hardware-software integrated smartphone.

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Le Shi to Unveil Super Smartphone on April 14, Create the New "Ecological Age"

Dr. Raj at Beverly Hills Orthopedic Institute Now Offering Stem Cell Therapy to Heal Chronic Tendonitis

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Beverly Hills, California (PRWEB) April 07, 2015

Dr. Raj, the top Orthopedic Surgeon in Beverly Hills and Los Angeles, is now offering stem cell therapy to heal chronic tendonitis. The treatment works exceptionally well for those suffering from tendonitis of the rotator cuff, achilles, elbow and knee. For more information and scheduling, call (310) 247-0466.

As a pioneer in regenerative medicine, Dr. Raj has been helping patients with degenerative arthritis achieve relief and avoid joint replacements for years with stem cell procedures. By adding the procedures for tendonitis, Dr. Raj is now helping patients avoid potentially risky surgeries and get back to being more active for soft tissue related pain.

"Surgery for tendonitis is often not 100% successful for patients, and the rehabilitation period may take six months," states Dr. Raj. "With the stem cell therapy, pain relief is quick and athletes get back to sports faster!"

Regenerative medicine for tennis elbow has been shown in research studies to be effective at relief and helping avoid surgery. A 2013 study out of South Florida showed that 28 out of 30 patients with chronic tennis elbow avoided surgery and got back to being very active.

For several years in a row, Dr. Raj has been named the top orthopedic doctor in Los Angeles and Beverly Hills. He is an ABC News Medical Correspondent as well as a WebMD Medical Expert.

Hundreds of patients have benefited from stem cell procedures with Dr. Raj at Beverly Hills Orthopedic Institute. They come from all over Southern California, along with throughout the country. Call (310) 247-0466 for scheduling stem cell therapy with an orthopedic surgeon Beverly Hills trusts and respects.

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Dr. Raj at Beverly Hills Orthopedic Institute Now Offering Stem Cell Therapy to Heal Chronic Tendonitis

Regen BioPharma expands Its differentiation therapy of cancer stem cells platform

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(MENAFN - ProactiveInvestors) () a biotechnology company announced the expansion of its cancer stem cell intellectual property portfolio to include targeting of the gene NR2F2 (also known as COUP-TFII) a closely related family member to the cancer stem cell gene NR2F6 with the filing of two patent applications.

Patent application #14588374 is for treatment of myelodysplastic syndrome (MDS) by inhibition of NR2F2 and patent application # 14588373 is for methods and compositions for treatment of cancer by inhibition of NR2F2 the San Diego California-based company said in a statement today.

Patent application #14588374 covers methods compositions and treatment protocols for the treatment of MDS. This patent application also covers induction of differentiation or stimulation of apoptosis as a result of NR2F2 inhibition to reduce the state of MDS and/or in other embodiments to inhibit or revert progression to leukemic states Regen said.

Patent application #14588373 covers utilizing of gene silencing technologies pertaining to suppression of the nuclear receptor NR2F2 for use as cancer stem cell inhibitors as well as cancer stem cell pathway inhibitors and methods of using such compounds to treat cancer.

These new patent applications add to the company's existing portfolio of intellectual property covering therapeutics that can be used as differentiation therapy a new form of cancer treatment that works by instructing cancer stem cells to mature in to normal cells that have a limited lifespan.

This intellectual property will compliment other intellectual property in the gene silencing of cancer stem cells therapeutics platform including in-house and acquired IP from the University of Toronto for the cancer stem cell gene NR2F6 (also known as EAR-2) and the company's CTCFL technology also known as BORIS).

We are working on establishing an area of expertise in gene silencing of cancer stem cell target genes that builds upon a licensing agreement with Benitec Biopharma for use in conjunction with their shRNA gene silencing platform chief executive officer David Koos said in the statement.

This allows us to take advantage of synergisms by establishing strengths and programs that we can use to comprehensively target the important genes in the cancer stem cell space. This will lead to economies of scale in therapy development.

The cancer stem cell is the most important and sought after cellular target of cancer therapy. Not every cancer cell within a tumour is able to divide. Cancer stem cells are the cells within the tumour that can divide an infinite number of times and are the cells within the tumour that allow a tumour to maintain its cancerous ability therefore it is important to target those cells specifically.

"Patent protection is also essential for thoroughly protecting the Company's space in this field chief scientific officer Thomas Ichim said in the statement.

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Regen BioPharma expands Its differentiation therapy of cancer stem cells platform

Mozart's Magic Flute: A spiritual journey for all ages

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(MENAFN - Muscat Daily) This week the Royal Opera House Muscat (ROHM) will host the first interactive opera of its kind in the region for children and family! We have chosen Mozart's sublime Singspiel lit. sung play written in 1791 Mozart's final year due to its suitability for all ages.

The work is a spiritual journey towards Enlightenment truth purification and quest for knowledge but for children it is also a fairytale about magic triumph of good over evil tolerance over hatred and clemency over vengeance.

The opera is an allegory set in no real locality or historical period but Ancient Egypt is evoked through the character of the wise Sarastro mysticism and his three temples. Mozart's The Magic Flute is a story of gripping power fantasy fairytale and magic. Surely magic is no stranger to opera; the first operas ever written in Italy by Jacopo Peri and Claudio Monteverdi for example were all based on the magical power of Orpheus' musical instrument the lyre. In The Magic Flute Tamino's flute is able to tame the wild animals by the sound of his playing.

A symbolic opera

As a fairytale the opera centers on binary polar opposites; good vs evil light vs darkness real vs fantasy spiritual vs temporal. The characters are a bizarre mixture of various backgrounds; Papageno is a 'bird catcher' who lives by eating and drinking. He catches birds for the starry Queen of the Night and thus counters the noble origin of Tamino a Javanese prince. Likewise the wise Sarastro is priest of the Sun and stands in opposition to the evil Queen of the Night. But if the Queen is the source of evil her daughter Pamina is her antithesis; the strongest force for good and a complement to Tamino. Falling short of Enlightenment the earthy Papageno and his mate Papagena are happy with their sensual pleasures of food and drink and unlike Tamino and Pamina they do not aspire to higher values of wisdom truth and spirituality.

As usual Mozart gives prime importance to his female characters. They are often the power that directs the action and even in the spiritual vain our spiritual path involves the rediscovery and guidance of feminine wisdom. To this end Tamino and Papageno are incomplete without Pamina and Papagena. Only with them side by side are they able to be led back to their true spiritual destination. Together they represent God's manifestation of a complete image. In the duet between Papageno and Pamina (Bei Mnnern welche Liebe) we hear 'Husband and wife and wife and husband reach towards the divine.' The duet epitomises the opera's moral story of Love which is the result of growth trial and overcoming. It's a sign of mutual relationship and the merging of two lives into one.

The music of Mozart is designed to appeal to all ages but its complex layers of symbolism and numerology can equally be enjoyed by amateurs and connoisseurs. Symbolism and numerology play important role in The Magic Flute; the opera has three ladies three spirits three trials; and three temples (nature reason and wisdom). Likewise its music is centered on keys with three flats (C minor and E-flat major) and the overture commences with three majestic opening chords.

Educational project

This production by the Teatro Sociale di Como in Italy is especially designed for family and children. The opera is in abbreviated form that caters to children's attention span and it is made relevant in the form of a child's dream obsessed with his video game. The protagonist is a boy who also must confront his own monsters and demons. In this production our students and children will sing and accompany Tamino in his journey towards light.

The opera is interactive in many ways; as a part of our education and outreach mission at the Royal Opera House Muscat we have collaborated with several schools public and private and worked over the last five months with hundreds of students and their teachers to familiarise them with the plot and the music of the opera. During their performances they will interact with the characters sing and actively participate in carrying the action. We are thrilled to host more than 2400 students in three of our morning performances that do not appear in our published program along with college students and various non-profit organisations. Their participation in the show goes beyond the passive attendance to the more engaging part of performing.

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Mozart's Magic Flute: A spiritual journey for all ages

The Book of Yeezus replaces every mention of God in The Bible with Kanye

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The Book of Yeezus replaces every mention of God with Kanye or Yeezus.

Image: Charles Sykes/Invision/AP/Associated Press

By Tim ChesterUK2015-04-07 10:22:06 UTC

In the beginning Kanye created the heaven and the earth And Kanye said, Let there be light: and there was light.

So begins The Book of Yeezus, a comic and gleefully sacrilegious tome on sale on Etsy that promises spiritual enlightenment for a celebrity-saturated age.

The text, described by its creators as "an interventionist art, coffee table novelty," takes the Book of Genesis and replaces every mention of God with "Kanye" or Yeezus", attempting to answer some big questions along the way.

"What if the Bible, the most singularly significant publication in the ancient canon of Western tradition, were updated to reflect our modern society? What would it look like?"

The Book of Yeezus, which is bound in a black, gold leaf-imprinted hard cover, also contains a foreword that ruminates on the "religion and spectacle of media icons in the 21st century" and attempts to dissect the significance of all things Kanye.

"In a sense, Kanyes awesome and orchestrated spectacle is truly a religious experience," they say. Word.

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The Book of Yeezus replaces every mention of God in The Bible with Kanye

There Are No Politics on the International Space Station, with Astronaut Ron Garan – Video

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There Are No Politics on the International Space Station, with Astronaut Ron Garan
Former NASA astronaut Ron Garan explains how the cooperative lessons learned through space exploration are applicable in other realms of life. Garan is author of the new book The Orbital Perspectiv ...

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There Are No Politics on the International Space Station, with Astronaut Ron Garan - Video

Hermitcraft FTB: SPACE STATION BUILD! Ep. 11 (Hermitcraft FTB Infinity) – Video

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Hermitcraft FTB: SPACE STATION BUILD! Ep. 11 (Hermitcraft FTB Infinity)
Video Info Today we start working on our new build. The space station! Hope you enjoy! Donation Info Paypal: https://streamtip.com/t/ijevin Patreon: https://www.patreon....

By: iJevin

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Hermitcraft FTB: SPACE STATION BUILD! Ep. 11 (Hermitcraft FTB Infinity) - Video

Fan’s LEGO Replica of International Space Station Soars to …

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A fan's yearlong mission to gain support for his LEGO version of the International Space Station is now complete.

Christoph Ruge's model of the orbiting outpost recorded its 10,000th vote on Friday (April 3) after being posted to the Danish toy company's social website, LEGO Ideas, more than a year ago. Ruge's plastic brick replica of the space station racked up its final 2,035 supporters in a matter of just 10 hours after it made it onto the front page of another popular website.

"Please support the project so we can all have a little ISS in our homes and/or office cubicles," Monitor343, a Reddit member, wrote in his appeal to readers of the site's Space community. [LEGOs and Space Travel: A Photo Gallery]

LEGO will officially review fan-proposed ideas for production if they receive 10,000 votes on the LEGO Ideas site.

The project's soaring support came within 26 days of its expiration. Interest in the space station model grew slowly until last month, when it finally reached the halfway mark of 5,000 votes. Along the way, NASA and the European Space Agency (ESA) partners aboard the actual space station gave Ruge's idea a boost by sharing it with their social media followers.

"A space station design is up for LEGO community fans to vote on," NASA wrote on Twitter in November.

Ruge also had the chance to talk about and show off his model at ESA's European Astronaut Center, located near Cologne, Germany.

"Beginning the [March 21 SpaceUp] event with a talk by veteran astronaut Reinhold Ewald and a live tweet from space by ESA astronaut Samantha Christoforetti set the bar high," the space agency described on its website. "It continued to be raised even higher ... [by] both giant and miniature International Space Station models built out of custom LEGO bricks."

Ruge's large model, as posted on LEGO Ideas, recreates the International Space Station in its current configuration, including all of its U.S., Russian, Japanese and European modules. Built from slightly more than 1,000 LEGO bricks, it features rotating solar arrays, an articulated robotic arm and visiting vehicles that can dock to the outpost.

Ruge's model, if approved for production, will be LEGO's first replica of the complete International Space Station to be offered for sale. In 2003, the company, in partnership with the Discovery Channel, sold a 162-brick set of the orbital laboratory based on its then-still under construction configuration.

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Lakewood High chosen by NASA to test plant project on space station

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Clara Wilson, 16, left, Ryan Sparks, 16, Trevor Lucero, 17, and Joe Tiberi, 16, right, work with elements of their self-developed Hydrofuge 9.0 after class at Lakewood High School on April 1, 2015, in Lakewood. (Anya Semenoff, Your Hub)

LAKEWOOD Inside a lab at Lakewood High School, an after-school project has morphed into a system that could one day feed and provide stress relief to astronauts in space.

On April 13, six years of design work and testing including four flights aboard the "vomit comet" parabolic plane in Houston will be put to the test when a zero-gravity hydroponic plant chamber built by instructor Matt Brown's class will be blasted into space and tested aboard the International Space Station for 120 days.

Clara Wilson, 16, gestures to the Hydrofuge 9.0 after class at Lakewood High School on April 1, 2015, in Lakewood. (Anya Semenoff, Your Hub)

The project is part of "high school students united with NASA to create hardware" program or HUNCH a partnership where the space agency theoretically gets cost-effective and useful equipment while students get a chance to try their skills on real-world exercises.

Lakewood High is one of a select few schools in the country with a fully-developed project capable of landing a coveted spot on the International Space Station.

"It's really unusual for a high school class to get 120 days aboard the ISS," Brown said. "Most of the experiments that have gone up before us have been small, short-term things. This a really complex, complicated device that was 100 percent developed, designed and tested right here in the classroom."

Six years ago, the group was told by a NASA liaison that the agency was always looking for plant experiments. The students came up with an experiment looking at the psychology of how plants could affect humans beings in space.

"Here we walk outside and there's green everywhere, and up there, they're living in a computer for six months to a year and that messes with you a bit," Brown said.

The only problem with that experiment?

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Lakewood High chosen by NASA to test plant project on space station

Plants use sixth sense for growth aboard the Space Station

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IMAGE:Image a is a culture dish of arabidopsis seedlings for the plant gravity sensing investigation. Image b illustrates photon emission from the plants when plants are rotated and calcium ion... view more

Credit: JAXA/Hitoshi Tatsumi

Although it is arguable as to whether plants have all five human senses -- sight, scent, hearing, taste and touch -- they do have a unique sense of gravity, which is being tested in space. Researchers with the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency will conduct a second run of the Plant Gravity Sensing study after new supplies are delivered by the sixth SpaceX commercial resupply mission to the International Space Station. The research team seeks to determine how plants sense their growth direction without gravity. The study results may have implications for higher crop yield in farming and for cultivating plants for long-duration space missions.

The investigation examines the cellular process of formation in thale cress, or Arabidopsis thaliana, a small flowering plant related to cabbage. The genetic makeup of thale cress is simple and well-understood by the plant biology community. This knowledge allows scientists to easily recognize changes that occur as a result of microgravity adaptation.

Understanding the cellular processes in plant development may translate to better knowledge of cellular processes in the human body. Since thale cress is considered a model organism for biological research, there are genetic similarities that may reveal insights into our health. Specifically, this could impact medical science since research teams may gain a better understanding of mechanisms of diseases affected by gravity, such as osteoporosis and muscle loss.

In the Plant Gravity Sensing study, scientists examine whether the mechanisms of the plant that determine its growth direction -- the gravity sensor -- form in the absence of gravity. Specifically, the research team analyzes how concentrations of calcium behave in the cells of plants originally grown in microgravity when later exposed to a 1g environment, or gravity similar to that on Earth. Plant calcium concentrations have been shown to change in response to temperature and touch and adapt to the direction of gravity on Earth.

"Plants cultivated in space are not experienced with gravity or the direction of gravity and may not be able to form gravity sensors that respond to the specific direction of gravity changes," said Hitoshi Tatsumi, Ph.D., principal investigator of the Plant Gravity Sensing investigation and associate professor at Nagoya University in Nagoya (present address: Kanazawa Institute of Technology), Japan.

Researchers use a centrifuge in the Cell Biology Experiment Facility in Kibo, the Japanese Experiment Module, to monitor the plants' response to changes between microgravity and a simulated 1g condition. The research team does this to determine if the plants sense changes in gravitational acceleration and adapt the levels of calcium in their cells.

Scientists hypothesize that the process in which amyloplast -- particles within the plant cell that store and synthesize starch for energy -- distributes and assembles occurs in the direction of gravitational pull. Once the amyloplast settles, it activates mechanisms within the plant's cells, including an increase in calcium concentrations. These mechanisms form the molecular structure in the cell that stimulates gravity sensing for growth. The unknown here is whether or not the gravity sensing components actually assemble in microgravity to determine direction of plant growth.

If the study hypothesis is proven true, it may be possible to modify plant gravity sensing mechanisms on Earth or to cultivate healthy plants for consumption on future deep space missions or conceivably on other planets. The plant's gravity sensor may be regulated for growth in either a low or high magnitude of gravitational acceleration.

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Plants use sixth sense for growth aboard the Space Station

The 'Cat Mantra': How Astronomers Handle an Ungraspable Universe (Podcast)

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The Great Nebula in Orion is a intriguing place. Visible to the unaided eye, it appears as a small fuzzy patch in the constellation of Orion. But this image, an illusory-color composite of four colors of infrared light taken with the Earth orbiting WISE observatory, shows the Orion Nebula to be a bustling neighborhood or recently formed stars, hot gas and dark dust. The power behind much of the Orion Nebula (M42) is the stars of the Trapezium star cluster, seen near the center of the above wide field image. The eerie green glow surrounding the bright stars pictured here is their own starlight reflected by intricate dust filaments that cover much of the region. The current Orion Nebula cloud complex, which includes the Horsehead Nebula, will slowly disperse over the next 100,000 years. Credit: NASA,JPL-Caltech,UCLA

Michelle Thaller is the Assistant Director of Science at Goddard Space Flight Center at NASA. She contributed this article toSpace.com's Expert Voices: Op-Ed & Insights.

A lot of people ask me if being an astronomer changes the wayIlook at life. To some degree, I guess there's no way it couldn't. There's a lot you have to let go of things that seem so obvious and straightforward in people's everyday lives take on a scale and complexity that the human brain can't process. So you give up trying. I have no idea what it really feels like to travel through a distance like a light-year, a little more than a trillion miles. I can't easily visualize what 1,000 of something is, let alone a billion.

My mind doesn't grasp the scale of the universe any better than anyone else's, yet this is the environment that I go to work in, talk to my friends at cocktail parties about and muse about with my husband before we turn off the lights. Andrew (said husband) works on the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST), which, when launched, will have the power to peer into the universe more than 13 billion light-years away. Effectively, it will look back to the time when the first stars began to shine. So he knows about this stuff. We often hold hands and buffer ourselves against all this scale. We even have an expression for it: "You still have to feed the cat."

Whenever we're listening to a particle-physicist friend of ours describe multiple rolled-up dimensions or reading the latest paper that asserts that space and time don't really exist and maybe we're all just asingle quantum-entangled particle, we look at each other with some wistfulness and repeat our cat mantra.

All those discoveries can be overwhelming, and sometimes it behooves us to remember that, in fact, there are some fixed points of certainly in it all. My cats would agree with that, or at least there would be hell to pay if we forgot to feed them, lost in the rapture of the cosmos.

In my podcast on the Transistor series, "The Ultimate Wayback Machine," I speak to two exceptionally brilliant women, Nancy Grace Roman, former chief of astrophysics, solar physics and relativity at NASAs Office of Space Science and Jane Rigby Deputy Project Scientist for Operations of the James Webb Space Telescope, about what time really means when you have to let go of the idea that there is a real past, present and future.

For example, consider what you see when you look up at a single constellation. Orion has always been my favorite, and I do a little dance every year when I see it for the first time in the autumn sky seriously. I've also published papers on some of the stars in Orion's belt, which are actually ginormous monsters: closely bonded binary stars that race around each other, orbiting in just a few days. The stars you see in that constellation are not all at the same distance from Earth, so the light has taken different amounts of time to reach your eye. You're not seeing a single point in time, but a span of several hundred years that somehow all arrives at your eye together, all at once. That gives me some pause, every time I look up at what now seems like an old friend in the sky.

But letting go of human perspective doesn't stop there. Not only does the universe leave the human sense of scale and time woefully in the dust, but people's literal senses what they can see, hear, smell and touch are also an incomplete picture of what is happening. Take sight: Human eyes are sensitive to only a tiny range of light energies. All around you, information about an invisible world is pouring into your eyes, but nothing in your retina reacts with it; no signal neurons are fired to send information to your brain that something is right in front of you. []

Again, take Orion: The space between the stars in this constellation are filled with gas and dust from a vast stellar nursery that is churning out hundreds of new stars at this moment. Near the top of the familiar figure of Orion is the star Meissa (or Lambda Orionis), which is ringed by an expanding shell of gas 130 light-years across, the remnant of a spectacular stellar tantrum. If your eyes could detect infrared light, light that is just a bit too low in energy to react with human retinas, you would see Orion filled with huge, glowing rings and clouds stretching between the stars.

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The 'Cat Mantra': How Astronomers Handle an Ungraspable Universe (Podcast)

NASA MSFC Solicitation: Star Tracker for a Small Satellite Application

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Synopsis/Solicitation Combo - Apr 06, 2015 Terms and Conditions and Specifications - Posted on Apr 06, 2015 General Information Solicitation Number: NNM15546363Q Posted Date: Apr 06, 2015 FedBizOpps Posted Date: Apr 06, 2015 Recovery and Reinvestment Act Action: No Original Response Date: Apr 13, 2015 Current Response Date: Apr 13, 2015 Classification Code: 18 -- Space vehicles NAICS Code: 541712 Set-Aside Code: Total Small Business Contracting Office Address NASA/George C. Marshall Space Flight Center, Procurement Office, Marshall Space Flight Center, AL 35812 Description **********PLEASE CONTACT DENECE NORRIS(ARCS), ONLY, IN WRITING AT denece.a.norris@nasa.gov FOR QUOTE OR TECHNICAL CONCERNS. CONTACT INFORMATION IS ALSO IN THE BODY OF THIS SOLICITATION.************** This notice is a combined synopsis/solicitation for commercial items prepared in accordance with the format in FAR Subpart 12.6, as supplemented with additional information included in this notice. This announcement constitutes the only solicitation; offers are being requested and a written solicitation shall not be issued. This notice is being issued as a Request for Quotations (RFQ) for (1) Ea., Star Tracker for a Small Satelite Application which includes the Emulator. This procurement is a total small business set-aside. The NAICS Code and the small business size standard for this procurement is 541712/500. The offeror shall state in their offer their size status for this procurement. All responsible sources may submit an offer which shall be considered by the agency. However, any award from this RFQ shall require the potential vendor to be certified within the System For Award Management System (SAM)and completion of Reps and Certs in the SAM system prior to award at http://www.sam.gov. Delivery shall be FOB Destination to MSFC, Central Receiving, Bldg 4631, MSFC, AL. Delivery date TBD. Offers for the items described above are due by April 13, 2015 by 4:00 P.M. CST to Denece Norris(ARCS) at denece.a.norris@nasa.gov and must include, solicitation number, FOB destination to this Center, proposed delivery schedule, discount/payment terms, warranty duration, taxpayer identification number (TIN), identification of any special commercial terms, and be signed by an authorized company representative. Offerors shall provide the information required by FAR 52.212-1 (OCT 2014), Instructions to Offerors-Commercial Items, which is incorporated by reference. If the end product offered is other than a domestic end product as defined in the clause entitled "Buy American Act -- Supplies," the offeror shall so state and shall list the country of origin. FAR 52.212-4(DEC 2014), Contract Terms and Conditions-Commercial Items is applicable. FAR 52.212-5 (MAR 2015), Contract Terms and Conditions Required To Implement Statutes or Executive Orders-Commercial Items is applicable and are attached to this solicitation. The FAR may be obtained via the Internet at URL: http://www.acquisition.gov/far/index.html The NFS may be obtained via the Internet at URL: http://www.hq.nasa.gov/office/procurement/regs/nfstoc.htm All contractual and technical questions must be in writing (e-mail or fax) to Denece Norris(ARCS) at denece.a.norris@nasa.gov no later than April 9, 2015 by 12:00 P.M. CST. Telephone questions shall not be accepted. Any technical questions will be answered on a "one on one" basis. Selection and award shall be made to the lowest priced, technically acceptable offeror. Technical acceptability shall be determined by review of information submitted by the offeror which must provide a description in sufficient detail to show that the product offered meets the Government's requirement. NASA Clause 1852.215-84(NOV 2011), Ombudsman, is applicable. It is the offeror's responsibility to monitor the following Internet site for the release of solicitation amendments (if any): http://prod.nais.nasa.gov/cgi-bin/eps/bizops.cgi?gr=D&pin=62 . Potential offerors will be responsible for downloading their own copy of this combination synopsis/solicitation and amendments (if any). Any referenced notes may be viewed at the following URLs linked below. The official point of contact is Melinda James; however, all questions/offers shall be submitted to Denece A. Norris(ARCS) at denece.a.norris@nasa.gov. Point of Contact Name: Melinda James Title: Contracting Officer Phone: 256-544-0317 Fax: 256-961-9604 Email: melinda.l.james@nasa.gov

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NASA MSFC Solicitation: Star Tracker for a Small Satellite Application

NASA Community Announcement: SOFIA Third Generation Science Instrument

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Synopsis - Apr 06, 2015 General Information Solicitation Number: NNH15ZDA007J Posted Date: Apr 06, 2015 FedBizOpps Posted Date: Apr 06, 2015 Recovery and Reinvestment Act Action: No Original Response Date: N/A Current Response Date: N/A Classification Code: A -- Research and Development NAICS Code: 541712 Contracting Office Address NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center, NASA Headquarters Acquisition Branch, Code 210.H, Greenbelt, MD 20771 Description Summary of Announcement: NASA's Astrophysics Division plans to solicit proposals for the development of a Third Generation Science Instrument (3G SI) for the Stratospheric Observatory for Infrared Astronomy (SOFIA) via an Amendment to ROSES-2015 in June 2015. Background and Details: The SOFIA observatory consists of a German built 2.7 meter telescope mounted in a Boeing 747 SP aircraft supplied and modified by NASA. Flying at altitudes up to 45,000 feet, SOFIA observes from above more than 99 percent of Earth's atmospheric water vapor, thereby opening windows to the universe not available from the ground. The SOFIA Program conducts Principal Investigator (PI)-led investigations to advance NASA's strategic goals in astrophysics, which are to discover the origin, structure, evolution, and destiny of the Universe and search for Earth-like planets. Additional information concerning these areas of investigation is provided through appropriate links found on the NASA Science Mission Directorate (SMD) homepage at http://science.nasa.gov/ . Currently, seven first- and second-generation science instruments are commissioned, or in commissioning, or in development by institutions in both the U.S. and Germany, including both imaging cameras and spectrographs. This Community Announcement is for the intended release of a program element in the ROSES-2015 NRA for the development and delivery of a 3G SI for the SOFIA observatory. The total funding available for the SOFIA 3G SI is expected to be $17M. The current SOFIA Program planning budget is sufficient to select and develop one new instrument over the period of Fiscal Year (FY) 2016 to FY 2019. NASA has the goal to commission any new instrument selected in the 2018 time frame. Proposals in response to the final SOFIA 3G SI solicitation will be due 90 days after its formal release. Participation will be open to all categories of U.S. and non-U.S. organizations, including educational institutions, industry, not-for-profit organizations, Federally Funded Research and Development Centers, NASA Centers and other Government agencies. Institutions under the jurisdiction of the German Space Agency (Deutsches Zentrum fur Luft-und Raumfahrt - DLR) are not eligible to propose under the SOFIA 3G SI solicitation. The participation of all eligible non-U.S. institutions and investigators is conducted as a no-cost transfer agreement. The SOFIA 3G SI program element posted in ROSES-2015 may contain provisions that differ substantially from this Community Announcement, in which case the provisions in the program element and ROSES-2015 will take precedence. This Community Announcement is issued to provide the scientific community with advance notice that NASA plans to release a solicitation in the near future for the purposes of procuring the above SOFIA 3G SI. It is expected that the solicitation will be released as Program Element D.11 of the ROSES-2015 NRA by an amendment in early June 2015. It is anticipated that Step-1 proposals will be due in mid July and full Step-2 proposals will be due at the end of August. The due date for proposals will be not less than 90 days after the release of the solicitation. Additional Info: This solicitation for third generation science instruments for SOFIA will appear on the NSPIRES web page for program element D.11 of ROSES-2015. Once it is posted it will be found by going to http://solicitation.nasaprs.com/ROSES2015table3 and following the link for Program Element D.11. Questions regarding this community announcement may be directed to: Point of Contact Name: Dr Eric Tollestrup Title: Program Scientist NASA SOFIA Program Phone: 202-358-1256 Fax: 202-358-3062 Email: eric.v.tollestrup@nasa.gov

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NASA Community Announcement: SOFIA Third Generation Science Instrument

NASA and IBM Rally Global Developers around Space Exploration on the IBM Cloud

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IBM(NYSE: IBM)today announced that it will offer itsBluemixplatform for the NASASpace App ChallengeVirtual Event to help developers rapidly build applications thatcontribute to space exploration and solve global challenges.IBM will also collaborate with NASA Space Apps Challenge events globally to offer mentorship, guidance and tutorials for Challenge participants; and will help foster innovation by granting free access to over a hundred unique cloud-based services such as Watson analytics and Internet of Things (IoT) tools through Bluemix.

The NASA Space Apps Challenge is an international three-day code-a-thon where developers,scientists, students, entrepreneurs and educatorsgather to build applications, software, hardware, data visualization and platform solutions to bolster space exploration missions and improve life on Earth. This year, more than 10,000 developers are expected to participate across 136 cities and online through the virtual challenge. Through their collaboration with NASA Space Apps events around the world, IBM will help participants leverage publicly available data to design solutions to 35 different challenges across four categories, including: outer space, Earth, humans and robotics. Some examples of specific challenges include:

Visualizing Asteroids in the Sky:Participants are challenged to leverage data aggregators and analytics to create a system that can help NASA tracks asteroids.

Sensor Yourself:Participants are challenged to put together a stream of senor data to guide movement for robots

Crop Alert Learning from the Growers:Participants are challenged to develop a mobile/web app/SMS capability to help growers create more creative methods of growing crops

More than 200 NASA data sources including data sets, services and tools, supplied through real-life NASA missions and technology will be available for participants to leverage for their applications. Using Bluemix, participants can call on more than 100 different services to rapidly build and iterate on solutions with team members around the world. For example, participants building solutions for theroboticscategory could use IBMsIoT serviceto build an app for the sensor yourself challenge; coupling it with analytics services through Bluemix to analyze and make sense of sensor data for a potential robot simulator.

The NASA International Space Apps Challenge is at the forefront of innovation, providing real-world examples of how technology can be used to by the best and brightest developers in the world to solve some of the most daunting challenges facing our civilization, said Sandy Carter, General Manager, Cloud Ecosystem and Developers, IBM. Using the IBM Cloud, IBM is making it easier for developers to solve NASA challenges by helping them leverage and make sense of data in ways that wouldnt have been possible even just a few years ago.

For developers building applications on the IBM Cloud, IBM will provide online tutorials to showcase best practices, and will offer dedicated virtual support with access to IBM experts to help guide the development process. IBM experts will alsowork side-by-side with onsite contestants to help them master cloud-based developmentat various locations around the world, including New York, Austin, Boston and more.

Two projects from each of the 136 cities will have an opportunity to advance to global judging, where a panel of NASA judges will select one winner in each of the five finalist categories, including: Best Mission Concept, Best Use of Hardware, Best Use of Data, Most Inspiring, and Galactic Impact. IBM will award up to 30 awards at local Space Apps events for the most innovative use of Bluemix,with winners receiving up to a year of free access to Bluemix and up to 80 hours of technical support and assistance over six months by senior IBM developers.

Developers interested in participating in the challenge, which runs from April 10 12, can register athttps://2015.spaceappschallenge.org/.

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NASA and IBM Rally Global Developers around Space Exploration on the IBM Cloud