Astronomers discover pulsar with widest orbit ever

Written By: Chuck Bednar
Christopher Pilny

Chuck Bednar for redOrbit.com – @BednarChuck

A newly discovered pulsar has the widest orbit ever discovered around a neutron star and is part of a rare double neutron star system, and could help astronomers gain new insight as to how such systems form and evolve, the National Radio Astronomy Observatory (NRAO) has announced.

Perhaps more impressively, the discovery (reported in a paper scheduled for publication in an upcoming edition of The Astrophysical Journal) was made by a pair of high school students who were analyzing data from the Robert C. Byrd Green Bank Telescope (GBT) in West Virginia.

widest orbit pulsar

Data from the 100-meter Robert C. Byrd Green Bank Telescope revealed the telltale signal of a previously unknown pulsar, which was determined to have the widest orbit ever observed around a companion neutron star. (Credit: NRAO/AUI/NSF)

Pulsars, the researchers explained, are rapidly spinning neutron stars, the superdense remains of massive stars that have exploded as supernovas. As it spins, a pulsar emits radio waves from the poles of its magnetic field. Those waves travel across space, and they can be captured by a radio telescope as they sweep across the Earth.

Joe Swiggum, a graduate student in physics and astronomy at West Virginia University and lead author of the study, said that pulsars “are some of the most extreme objects in the universe,” and that the students’ findings show “one of these objects in a really unique set of circumstances.”

Only one out of every 10 identified pulsars are part of a binary system, and most of those can be found in orbit around ancient white dwarf companion stars, the researchers explained. Just a few of them orbit other neutron stars or main sequence stars, and astronomers believe that this is due to the process through which pulsars and other types of neutron stars form.

A tale of two students

Near the end of its normal life, a massive star’s explosion can be “one-sided,” imparting a “kick” to the remaining stellar core and causing the resulting neutron star to be thrown through space, the study authors said. Combined with the loss of mass resulting from a supernova explosion, the phenomenon makes it unlikely that such stars would remain gravitationally locked together.

The pulsar featured in the new study was officially designated as PSR J1930-1852 and was first discovered by Cecilia McGough, who was a student at Strasburg High School in Virginia at the time, and De’Shang Ray, then a student at Baltimore’s Paul Laurence Dunbar High School.

The students were taking part in a National Science Foundation-funded summer Pulsar Search Collaboratory (PSC) workshop in which they analyzed pulsar survey data collected by the GBT. Those who identify strong pulsar candidates are then invited to Green Bank, where they work alongside astronomers to confirm their discoveries.

Based on the differences in spin frequency between the original detection of the pulsar and the follow-up observations, the researchers found that PSR J1930-1852 was part of a binary system. They eventually struggled to find the companion, then eventually discovered that it was another neutron star, and that the duo had widest separation ever observed in a double neutron star system, and that J1930-1852 orbits its companion just once every 45 days.

It’s orbital path, which is about 52 million kilometers, is “more than twice as large as that of any previously known double neutron star system,” Swiggum said. “[Its] parameters give us valuable clues about how a system like this could have formed. Discoveries of outlier systems like J1930-1852 give us a clearer picture of the full range of possibilities in binary evolution.”

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Nazca Lines likely marked pilgrimage routes

Written By: Chuck Bednar
Christopher Pilny

Chuck Bednar for redOrbit.com – @BednarChuck

Peru’s Nazca Lines are not the work of a single group of people, but two separate groups that lived in different regions of the desert plateau and used the etched geoglyphs for pilgrimages to an ancient temple for religious rites, researchers claim in a new study.

According to LiveScience, the authors of the study explained the purpose of the Nazca Lines may also have changed over the course of time. While the very first ones were created so that pilgrims would be able to view the geoglyphs along their processional route, later travelers might have broken ceramic pots on the ground where the lines intersected as part of a ritual.

The findings are based on the recent discovery of 100 new geoglyphs and broken ceramic pieces at the intersection points of some of the lines, and analysis of the location, style and construction method of these recently-discovered features, by experts at Japan’s Yamagata University. Their findings were presented last month at a meeting of the Society for American Archeology.

Nazca Lines pilgrimage

The Spider, Nazca Lines, Peru. (Credit: Thinkstock)

Unearthing the reason the Nazca Lines were made

The Nazca Lines, a UNESCO World Heritage Site located between the Andes Mountains and the coast in Southern Peru, were reportedly created by ancient peoples between 200 BC and 600 AD by removing reddish-colored surface rocks to reveal the white colors of the desert beneath. They come in various shapes, including animals, supernatural entities, and geometric designs.

Their purpose has long been debated. Some archaeologists believe they formed a labyrith, while others argued they match-up with the constellations in the sky, or underground water routes; and still others believe they were part of an ancient route used by pilgrims. Based on their analysis, Masato Sakai of Yamagata University and colleagues believe that the pilgrimage route is the most likely possibility.

Sakai’s team discovered four main different styles of geoglyphs that tended to be clustered together along different routes leading to a massive pre-Incan temple complex called Cahuachi, the website said. Based on archaeological evidence found at the site, the researchers believe this had at one time been a destination for pilgrims who brought offerings with them.

Nazca Lines pilgrimage

The Hands, Nazca Lines, Peru. (Credit: Thinkstock)

Different strokes for different folks

Furthermore, the geoglyphs did not only show different content, but actually differed from one another, Sakai explained. For example, images of animals such as condors and camelids were found along a route starting from the Ingenio River, while a separate style of images, such as supernatural beings and trophy heads, were found along a different route.

The researchers believe this second route was made by a distinct people who lived in another region and also traveled to Cahuachi. A third set of geoglyphs was found between where the two different cultures would have lived, and is believed to have been made by both groups.

The purpose of the formations may also have changed over time, the study authors noted. Sakai said the geoglyphs placed during the Formative period, which lasted until 200 AD, were placed to be seen from the ritual pathways. Conversely, those created during the early Nazca period (which ended in 450 AD) were central to ritual activities, including the intentional destruction of the ceramic vessels discovered along the routes.

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Gas giant’s orbit unexpectedly close to tiny star

Written By: Chuck Bednar
Christopher Pilny

Chuck Bednar for redOrbit.com – @BednarChuck

Astronomers from the Australian National University analyzing a small red dwarf star located some 500 light years from Earth have made a startling discovery: the presence of a massive gas giant orbiting far closer to its tiny parent star than should be possible.

This unusual exoplanet, which according to Gizmodo was first indentified thanks to an observed, temporary decline in the already dim amount of light given off by the star, has approximately the same mass as Saturn (roughly 100 times that of Earth). Conversely, its star, HATS-6, is only half the size of our Sun in terms of both mass and diameter, the researchers said.

HATS-6 is one of the smallest stars astronomers have ever seen with a gas giant, and no current model can explain how this gas giant came to be so close to its host star, the website said. The authors reported their findings in a recent edition of The Astronomical Journal.

Exoplanet likely moved inward after forming

Since it is orbiting so closely, the planet known as HATS-6b has experienced so much heat that its gas has started billowing out, causing it to inflate to approximately the size of Jupiter. Also, it has an orbital period of 3.3 days, meaning that it is closer to its star than the far smaller Mercury is to the Sun. In fact, it’s orbit is just one-tenth that of Mercury’s.

“The planet has a similar mass to Saturn, but its radius is similar to Jupiter, so it’s quite a puffed up planet. Because its host star is so cool, it’s not heating the planet up so much; it’s very different from the planets we have observed so far,” explained George Zhou from the Research School of Astrophysics and Astronomy at The Australian National University (ANU)

“It must have formed further out and migrated in, but our theories can’t explain how this happened,” added Zhou, who was joined by TJ Tan of the Perth Exoplanet Survey Telescope, Dr. Daniel Bayliss from ANU and an international team of colleagues. “The atmosphere of this planet will be an interesting target for future study.”

Typically, gas giants form in the outer regions of the solar system, where gas and ice are more abundant. However, they don’t always stay there; they sometimes wind up moving inward due to the gravity of other objects. Zhou believes that HATS-6b first formed further out before migrating, but said that “our theories can’t explain how this happened.”

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New camera captures one trillion frames-per-second

Written By: Chuck Bednar
Christopher Pilny

Chuck Bednar for redOrbit.com – @BednarChuck

Researchers from the University of Tokyo and colleagues from institutions throughout Japan and the US have created a new high-speed camera capable of recording events more than 1,000-times faster than their conventional counterparts.

The device is known as STAMP (Sequentially Timed All-optical Mapping Photography), and according to Phys.org, it is capable of capturing more than one-trillion-frames-per-second, overcoming the mechanical and electrical limitations of traditional cameras by exclusively using fast optical components to increase its processing speed.

STAMP “holds great promise for studying a diverse range of previously unexplored complex ultrafast phenomena,” Keiichi Nakagawa, a research fellow at the University of Tokyo, who was involved in the camera’s development, explained to the website on Wednesday.

“Many physical and biological phenomena are difficult to reproduce. This inspired me to work on an ultrafast camera that could take multiple frames in a single shot,” he added, referring to the pump-probe method, which is an optical imaging technique that can create movies with a frame rate higher than STAMP’s, but can only do so one frame at a time.

STAMP could eventually image ultrafast phenomena

While pursuing his master’s degree, Nakagawa found himself in the need of a camera like STAMP to see how acoustic shock waves changed living cells. Scientists believed that mechanical stress caused by such waves could increase bone and blood vessel growth, but they had no tools capable of capturing a shock wave passing through a cell.

“Since there was no suitable technique,” Nakagawa told Phys.org, “I decided to develop a new high-speed imaging technique in my doctoral program.” Originally described in an August 2014 edition of the journal Nature Photonics, his device uses light dispersion and splits ultrashort light pulses into different colored flashes that rapidly pummel the object being imaged.

The researchers can then analyze each of those individual color flashes and combine them to create a moving image of what the object looked like over the time it took the dispersed light pulse to travel through the device, the website explained. During the 2014 prototype, STAMP was only able to take six frames in a single shot, but its performance has improved dramatically.

Nakagawa explained that he and his colleagues are looking for further improve their device so that it will be able to acquire 25 sequential images, and that they believe that with the technology that is currently available, the number of frames could eventually be increased to 100.

It has already been used to image electronic motion and lattice vibrations in a lithium niobate crystal, as well as how a hot, rapidly expanding plasma plume was formed using a laser focused on a glass plate, Phys.org said. The developers believe that STAMP could ultimately be used to observe several different types of ultrafast phenomena for the first time.

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Diabetic teens test ‘artificial pancreas’

Written By: Chuck Bednar
Emily Bills

Chuck Bednar for redOrbit.com – @BednarChuck

As part of a unique real-world experiment being conducted this weekend at the Yale University Pediatric Specialty Clinic, a group of teenagers are taking a “vacation” from diabetes in order to test-drive an “artificial pancreas” in real-world conditions.

Five participants between the ages of 14 and 17 are scheduled to take part in the study, according to the researchers. They will be using an automated system that continually monitors blood sugar levels and administers the correct dosage of insulin as needed over a four-day period.

While Yale scientists have been studying such devices for the last decade, this will mark the first time that they will be tested in pediatric patients outside of the hospital, they noted. The device is a two-part system that combines an insulin pump with a continuous glucose sensor, adjusting the delivery of insulin automatically in response to what the body needs at any given time.

Currently, the standard treatment for children and teenagers with Type 1 diabetes is to either give them multiple injections of insulin each day or to use a manually operated insulin pump. In the last 10 years, though, experts at the Yale School of Medicine and industry partners have teamed up to combine insulin pumps and continuous glucose sensors in an “artificial pancreas.”

Hoping for a “major advance” in diabetes care

Separately, both components of the “artificial pancreas” have been approved by the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA). However, the Yale team indicates that a closed-loop system using a sensor to control the function of the insulin pump would be “a major advance” in treating Type 1 diabetes, which affects as many as three million Americans, according to the JDRF.

“The ability of the system to self adjust automatically in the background while patients go about their daily lives would really be transformative in the lives of people with diabetes,” explained Dr. Stuart Weinzimer, lead investigator of the study, associate professor of pediatrics at the Yale School of Medicine, and associate clinical professor of nursing at the Yale School of Nursing.

As part of the current study, five teenagers will sleep at a hotel in New Haven, Connecticut and participate in a variety of activities, including hiking and laser tag. They will also eat their meals together, all while under the supervision of Yale medical officials. The teenagers will have their blood sugar levels monitored regularly, both directly and remotely using mobile devices.

Previous outpatients studies have indicated that the device can achieve good glucose control in adults, but doing so can be more difficult in teens. Dr. Weinzimer said that his team ultimately plans to study a total of 15 teenagers, which he says is a large enough group to gauge the safety and effectiveness of the device. If successful, they plan to conduct larger-scale studies involving multiple sites before submitting the device to the FDA for approval.

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Astronomers capture detailed images of Io’s lava lake

Written By: Chuck Bednar
Emily Bills

Chuck Bednar for redOrbit.com – @BednarChuck

Using the Large Binocular Telescope Observatory (LBTO) in Arizona, researchers have for the first time captured detailed images of heat rising from the horseshoe-shaped lava lake on Io, the innermost moon of Jupiter, National Geographic reported on Thursday.

Thanks to the telescope, which features a pair of 8.4-meter mirrors, astronomers used imaging interferometry to capture the first detailed observations of the 125-mile (200 km) wide lava lake known as Loki. The images reveal that the feature is active, with multiple bright spots representing heat rising from its surface.

Loki, the largest of Io’s 300-plus volcanic features, is a volcanic depression known as a patera in which denser lava crust solidifying on top of a lava lake episodically sinks in the lake, LBTO experts said in a statement. This causes a rise in thermal emissions visible from Earth.

Gaining new insight into the Jovian moon

Loki is located approximately 600 million kilometers from Earth, and up until recently it was too small to be investigated in detail using ground-based optical or infrared telescopes. Thanks to the twin mirrors of the Large Binocular Telescope (LBT), however, it was captured in two images that were combined digitally into one 75-foot optical unit.

“We combine the light from two very large mirrors coherently so that they become a single, extremely, large mirror,” explained Al Conrad, lead investigator of a study published Thursday in The Astronomical Journal. “In this way, for the first time we can measure the brightness coming from different regions within the lake.”

Phil Hinz, head of the Large Binocular Telescope Interferometer (LBTI) project at the University of Arizona Steward Observatory, added that the discovery was the result of nearly 15 years worth of work. It was built “both to form sharp images, and to detect dust and planets around nearby stars at extremely high dynamic range,” he said, adding that it was “gratifying” to see it work so well.

Thanks to the instruments, the researchers can now identify different bright spots on the Loki patera – areas that they believe may represent individual lava flows or eruptions as the crust of the lake breaks apart and re-forms, according to National Geographic. In turn, those discoveries could solve some fundamental mysteries about Io’s orbit and internal structure.

Loki is the bright volcano on the left and Pele the other one on the lower right. (Credit: LBTO)

“Io’s highly elliptical orbit close to Jupiter is constantly tidally stressing the moon, like the squeezing of a ripe orange, where… [magma] can escape through cracks in the peel,” said team member Chick Woodward of the University of Minnesota.

“Studying the very dynamic volcanic activity on Io, which is constantly reshaping the moon ‘s surface, provides clues to the interior structure and plumbing of this moon, helping to pave the way for future NASA missions.”

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Hypnagogia: The twilight zone of sleep

Written By: John Hopton
Emily Bills

John Hopton for redOrbit.com – @Johnfinitum

Hypnagogia is the twilight zone between being awake and being asleep. Often we cross this border quickly and without fuss, but other times the transition can provide an interesting end to the day.

For a lot of people, the main experience of hypnagogia is believing that they are consciously going through the day’s final thoughts, until they realize that instead of thinking about preparing for that meeting tomorrow they are thinking about a dolphin riding a horse or how they really must get on with painting all the food in the fridge (for example). Our thoughts go crazy and can become as surreal as a dream, but they are still thoughts. This is what happens to them when we take off the harness and they run away with themselves.

Sometimes, we are conscious enough to realize that our mind has gone bonkers and rein it in or allow it to move on to sleep. We can even embrace what’s happening, as long as we can keep wakeful reality away and stay in the zone. Edgar Allan Poe, who was greatly interested in hypnagogia, wrote of the “fancies” he experienced “only when I am on the brink of sleep, with the consciousness that I am so.”

Visitations of ghosts, monsters, aliens

These are the milder facets of hypnagogia, and can be enjoyable. Also at the milder end, although not as much fun, is seeing shapes before our closed eyes. This includes the Tetris effect, in which we see approximations of real things we have looked at repetitively during the day, like a video game (Tetris would be a good example, hence the name). According to Scientific American, this has to do with the brain deciding whether it should commit what we have been looking at and doing all day to memory.

At the opposite, intense end of the scale are out-of-body experiences and full-on hallucinations. One of the most disconcerting manifestations of hypnagogia is sleep paralysis. Sufferers have a temporary inability to move, speak, or react, and this is often accompanied by terrifying visions they can’t deal with or escape from because of the paralysis. In Sleep Paralysis: A Guide to Hypnagogic Visions and Visitors of the Night author Ryan Hurd describes sleep paralysis as a “supernatural assault” and discusses “night visitations of ghosts, vampires, and even aliens.”

Maybe I won’t go to sleep tonight after all…

Other physical manifestations of hypnagogia include feeling as if an electronic current is running through the body and a sensation of falling.

Some people “hear” realistic sounds such as animal noises nearby, which can be disconcerting or pleasing, depending on whether they are aware of and comfortable with their hypnagogic state (and depending on what kind of animal, presumably).

The manifestation of the brain’s transition between wakefulness and sleep does different things to different people, but two things are certain – it happens to a lot of us (though not many of us know the name of it), and it can be strange to say the least.

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Fibromyalgia

Sombra Warm Therapy Natural Pain Relieving Gel

Written By: Fibromyalgia Treating

Sombra Warm Therapy

Heat is something that well-known to help with a wide variety of aches and pains. There is also some proof that it is useful in the treatment of fibromyalgia and other related pain disorders. That being said, there have been plenty of gels and other treatments that use heat in order to fend off the symptoms of the disorder.

In this review, we’re going to take a closer, critical look at one of those treatments, Sombra Warm Therapy Natural Pain Relieving Gel. We will give you an idea of the product, its ingredients, whether or not there are side effects associated with it, and what customers are saying about the product.

What is Sombra Warm Therapy Natural Pain Relieving Gel and What’s Inside?

Sombra Warm Therapy Natural Pain Relieving Gel is a gel that works to make sure that you get the heat that you need in order to find the relief that you want. The gel, essentially, heats up so that you have everything that you need in order to soothe those aching joints and muscles. Of course, then comes the most important question – what’s inside to make sure that you’re going to find relief? What ingredients are going to make it so that you are able to feel energetic and ready to go? Here are a few of the main ingredients that you will find when you’re using Sombra Warm Therapy Natural Pain Relieving Gel.

  • Aloe Vera Extract has been used for centuries for wound and burn care. As you likely know, it is incredibly useful when it comes to soothing the pain and aches that you get, both internally and externally. Anti-inflammation properties are also a possibility; further research needs to be done in order to determine whether or not it is the case.
  • Capsaicin is the active chemical that is naturally found in chili peppers, and that works to make them hot. In medicine, it is used to create heat (which is the main thing that this product is doing in the first place), and it is also meant to help increase blood flow, which is helpful for healing the pain in your joints and the stiffness you may feel.
  • Carbomer is used to help thicken up the gel so that it stays in a solid state and is able to absorb into your skin, thus making it easier for you to use the gel and making it so that you get the most effects from it.
  • Decyl Polyglucose is a cleaning agent that is extracted from various plants and has been tested for use during a variety of different trials on both animals and humans. It used as anti-bacterial and antiseptic qualities.
  • Deionized water is a type of water that has all the ions removed from it; it acts as a base for the rest of the gel and helps to soothe the skin as well.
  • Grapefruit Seed Extract is used to reduce fungus, to clean the areas of the skin it is used on, and to help preserve the mixture.
  • Green Tea Extract is a commonly used extract (you find it in a lot of different natural compounds and remedies) that is known for its anti-inflammatory properties as well as anti-microbial and antioxidant uses.
  • Orange Peel Extract is a cleanser and helps to prevent inflammation of the skin.
  • Queen of the Prairie Extract is often used for its antiseptic qualities.
  • Rose Water is a type of extract found in Sombra Warm Therapy Natural Pain Relieving Gel, and it is often used for its antibacterial, antiseptic, healing, and soothing properties. It can also help to relieve itching and irritation of the skin.
  • Sodium Hydroxymethylglycinate is a preservative that is there to ensure that your Sombra Warm Therapy Natural Pain Relieving Gel will last for a long while. It’s very safe and is known for
  • Vegetable Glycerin is in the mixture as a natural and safe lubricant that does not cause irritation to your skin. The lubricant qualities help you to rub it in without a lot of friction and irritation as well.
  • Witch Hazel is a useful extract that is used as both a strong anti-oxidant and astringent. It is also known for its power to reduce inflammation in the joints or around injured areas of the body.
  • Yucca Extract is an extract from the Yucca plant, and it is often used for its anti-inflammatory and anti-bacterial properties, thus making it so that you feel stronger and better able to handle your pain.

All of these different chemicals and natural compounds work together to make it so you get the most comfort that you can get from your fibromyalgia symptoms. As you can see above, these ingredients help with pretty much anything you can imagine, from stiffness, to pain, to irritation on the skin, to itching, and whatever else you could imagine having to deal with as a result of dealing with your fibromyalgia on a regular basis.

Are There Any Side Effects Associated with Sombra Warm Therapy Natural Pain Relieving Gel?

Sombra-Warm-Therapy-order-nowAs with any sort of medication, there are a small handful of side effects that you may encounter when you are using Sombra Warm Therapy Natural Pain Relieving Gel. Some of them are, obviously, more common than others, but you want to make sure that you keep an eye on your skin and muscles in order to make note of any changes that may occur while you’re using Sombra Warm Therapy Natural Pain Relieving Gel.

Some people complain about occasionally dealing with irritation to the skin. What can skin irritation include? Small blisters may occur if you are not careful with where you are using the product. You may notice contact dermatitis in certain parts of the skin, and you may see swelling in the area. If you notice any of these side effects while you are using Sombra Warm Therapy Natural Pain Relieving Gel, you will want to stop using it until you can talk to a doctor or another professional about the risks and such that are associated with the product’s use, or until you can get something that can help the skin irritation get under control.

In some cases where people have especially sensitive skin, or the product is being used in areas where the skin may be more sensitive in general (elbows, knees, etc), there may be chemical burns. The burns are incredibly rare, but since there have been a small handful of cases where it has occurred, it is something that you are least want to be aware of if you are going to try Sombra Warm Therapy Natural Pain Relieving Gel for your fibromyalgia symptoms.

All in all, the side effects for Sombra Warm Therapy Natural Pain Relieving Gel are actually quite mild when compared to all of the other creams that you may come across when you’re looking for a fibromyalgia gel or cream. If you are especially concerned about the possibility of skin irritation, then you will want to make sure that you discuss the possibility of using Sombra Warm Therapy Natural Pain Relieving Gel with your doctor ahead of time in order to ensure that you will be able to identify these side effects without issue.

What are Customers Saying about Sombra Warm Therapy Natural Pain Relieving Gel?

Of course, now that you’ve taken a look at what Sombra Warm Therapy Natural Pain Relieving Gel claims to do for its customers, now you want to know what other people are actually saying about this pain relieving gel. Here are some of the thoughts that many users have brought forward when they talk about the benefits and the wonders that the Sombra Warm Therapy Natural Pain Relieving Gel has brought to them in the time that they have used it.

First, a number of customers have talked about how great Sombra Warm Therapy Natural Pain Relieving Gel has been for relieving pain. There are a number of physical therapists that are using it as part of their therapy routines and, on top of that, hospitals are starting to add it into their regimens when it comes to caring for patients with aches and pains.

One of the most common words that you see in user reviews is “unbeatable.” As you likely know, people try a number of different remedies in order to try and deal with their fibromyalgia pain. Because of that, they know their way around the pain gels and creams that are out on the market. So, for people with fibro pain to say that something actually works and, on top of that, that the product in question is, in fact, “unbeatable” is saying a lot. Many times, people with fibro just have to deal with whatever they are given and grin and bear it. Many fibro patients talk about just how much of a difference it makes when they use Sombra Warm Therapy Natural Pain Relieving Gel on their trouble spots. They feel the difference within a short period of time, no questions asked. Obviously, it’s not that way for everyone (a few customers talk about how long it took before they felt relief), but you may notice that it doesn’t necessarily work as quickly as you may expect it to.

That’s another thing that user reviews often talk about as well. There are so many fibro gels and creams out there that do a little bit of work and last for a short while, but it’s hard to find something that is actually going to help them feel comfortable for an extended period of time. Sombra Warm Therapy Natural Pain Relieving Gel is known for working very quickly; as soon as you start to rub it into the trouble spots, you will start to see a significant difference in what you’re feeling in those areas.

Sleep is a common problem that fibromyalgia patients are dealing with as well. Because of that, many fibro patients are on sleeping pills and other supplements that can help them to get through the night, even if they are suffering with pain. Many fibro patients who are using Sombra Warm Therapy Natural Pain Relieving Gel for their pain talk about how much of a difference it makes when they are getting ready to go to bed. They want to sleep and they want to make sure that they can find pain relief. So, Sombra Warm Therapy Natural Pain Relieving Gel does all of that for many customers, which is rare.

Some people complain about the heating element of Sombra Warm Therapy Natural Pain Relieving Gel and say that it warms up way too quickly. Other customers say that it actually warms up a lot more slowly than other products that claim to do similar things, so it all depends on your perspective and whether or not you have used these sorts of products in the past. As we mentioned above, those with sensitive skin may see that there is a lot of irritation related to using the product, so you may want to keep that in mind before you try using it out for yourself.

If you think that this sounds like the right treatment for you and your needs, you will definitely want to check it out. The Sombra Warm Therapy Natural Pain Relieving Gel is a nice alternative to all of the other medicated gels that are out there, and there’s definitely some research that indicates that it is helpful to those who try it out. It’s certainly worth giving it a try yourself. That being said, make sure that you talk to your doctor ahead of time before you start using Sombra Warm Therapy Natural Pain Relieving Gel. That way, you can keep track of how it may (or may not) be helping your symptoms, and you can keep an eye on it so that you don’t end up having very negative side effects as a result.

Further reading:

SOMBRA http://www.sombrausa.com/

SOMBRA WARM THERAPY http://www.drugs.com/otc/112987/sombra-warm-therapy.html

Thomas Ahern Joins Calo as Vice President of Marketing and Business Development

Written By: admin

Ahern, an adoptee himself, comes to Calo with over two decades of experience in the mental health field, including outpatient, residential, wilderness and acute care.

Lake Ozark, MO (PRWEB) May 02, 2015

Thomas A. Ahern MA, joined Calo in a newly created position as Vice President of Marketing and Business Development. Ahern will have oversight of strategic relations and national outreach for all Calo programs (New Vision Wilderness, Calo Teens, and Calo Preteens).

Ahern is joining Calo’s executive team and reporting to Calo CEO, Alex Stavros. “I am thrilled that Thomas will be joining our team,” said Stavros. “We like to focus our hires on those that fit, not only professionally but also personally. Thomas not only lives our Core Values but also represents, to his core, what Calo is all about.”

Ahern comes to Calo with over two decades of experience in the mental health field, including outpatient, residential, wilderness and acute. “Thomas is respected and trusted amongst referents and has shown himself to be a passionate and creative thought leader. Thomas also has a proven track record of advocating for adoptees and their families,” said Stavros.

“I am profoundly honored to join Calo, and very much look forward to working with the Calo and New Vision Wilderness teams to further enrich our families and referring professional’s experience,” said Ahern. “With the use of true “relationship based” treatment models, the Calo programs have redefined the treatment of developmental trauma that is complicated by adoption. As an adoptee, I have always admired Calo’s innovative and impactful programs, and hope to contribute to the continued success.”

Ahern joined Calo from his private, behavioral health consulting firm where he assisted behavioral health companies with strategic growth. Ahern is a former School Psychologist with over 25 years of experience dedicated to advocating, growing and enhancing programs for youth. He has served in both clinical and leadership roles throughout his career and has been a featured lecturer on topics ranging from adoption to the modern American family. Mr. Ahern volunteers for the Connecticut Adoption Council and serves on the board of classes4classes, a nonprofit formed after the tragedy at Sandy Hook elementary school (http://classes4classes.org/).

Mr. Ahern will begin his new role as of April, 27 2014. He may be contacted at: tahern(at)ca-lo(dot)com.

About Calo

Calo is a behavioral health provider specialized in healing the effects of complex, developmental trauma amongst preteens, teens and young adults. Calo is comprised of Calo Teens (http://www.caloteens.com), Calo Preteens (http://www.calopreteens.com) – both residential programs serving adoptees with a history of trauma, and their families– and New Vision Wilderness (http://www.newvisionwilderness.com – “NVW”). NVW is an outdoor behavioral health program with two locations in the North Woods of Wisconsin and the Mountain Desert of Oregon. NVW offers one of the most clinically intensive wilderness models in the country and is the only wilderness program completely specialized in Trauma Informed Care.

The leading edge, trauma-informed clinical modalities across programs include, but are not limited to: Brainspotting, Heartmath Techniques, Mindfulness, Heart Rate Variability Biofeedback, EMDR, Neurofeedback, Brain Mapping / qEEG, Trauma Senstive Yoga, Transferable Attachment Canine Therapy, Adventure Therapy, Art, Music, Play and Sand Therapy and various Sensory / Occupational Therapies.

For the original version on PRWeb visit: http://www.prweb.com/releases/2015/05/prweb12694502.htm

Synthetic blood vessels help grow the real thing

Written By: Chuck Bednar
Emily Bills

Chuck Bednar for redOrbit.com – @BednarChuck

Blocked blood vessels are among the most common causes of death among people living in industrialized part of the world, and they are typically treated by either using stents to force the blood vessel open or by transplanting one from another part of the body.

Researchers from the Vienna University of Technology and Vienna Medical University have come up with a new treatment, however. They have developed artificial blood vessels out of a special elastomer material that encourages the body to replace them with real, natural blood vessels. Over time, they break down and are replaced by regenerated vessels.

According to Engadget, the technique has already been successfully tested in trials involving a rat subject. Less than six months after it was implanted into the rodent, the researchers’ artificial vascular prostheses had broken down and were replaced by an actual blood vessel.

In a statement, Helga Bergmeister of the Vienna Medical University said that she and her fellow researchers “did not find any aneurysms, thrombosis, or inflammation,” and that cells that had “colonized the vascular prostheses” and “turned the artificial constructs into natural body tissue.” This worked faster than expected, meaning the implants can be made to degrade faster.

Creating vascular prostheses from biodegradable polymers

The universities behind this study joined forces to investigate options for new materials that could be used to create the prosthetic vessels, and according to Engadget, they ultimately opted for a type of polymers known as thermoplastic polyurethanes. The researchers spun this material in an electrical field to create miniature tubes suitable for implantation.

“The wall of these artificial blood vessels is very similar to that of natural ones,” Heinz Schima of the Medical University of Vienna explained. Since the material is slightly porous, it allows a trace amount of blood to pass through, thus enriching the wall with growth factors, encouraging the migration of endogenous cells.

Afterwards, it’s only a matter of time before the body is able to build a biological replacement for the artificial vascular prostheses. While there is still a lot of work to be done in the field, and more clinical trials need to be conducted before the synthetic blood vessels can be implanted in a human, the team is hopeful that their technique will eventually be usable in a clinical setting.

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NASA sounding rocket explores supernova innards

Written By: Chuck Bednar
Emily Bills

Chuck Bednar for redOrbit.com – @BednarChuck

On Saturday morning, a NASA-funded sounding rocket was launched towards a supernova remnant, with the goal of examining the X-rays emitted by the object to determine the composition of this 20,000-year-old explosion’s debris.

As the US space agency announced on Thursday, the Off-plane Grating Rocket for Extended Source Spectroscopy (OGRESS) mission was set to lift off from the White Sands Missile Range in New Mexico at 4:30am EDT. OGRESS was travelling on board a Terrier Black Brant rocket for a 15-minute flight. This allowed it to observe the Cygnus Loop for five minutes.

“Supernovae remnants are rich with astrophysical features,” said Randall McEntaffer, principal investigator for OGRESS at the University of Iowa in Iowa City. “We want to show that we can resolve the details of those features – of an extremely large, diffuse object – in high resolution.”

Designing optical components for deep-universe research

OGRESS uses a series of optical components known as gratings created by McEntaffer and his colleagues. Each one was etched with a specific pattern, NASA explained. Soft X-rays passed across them during the probe’s observation period, splitting them into individual wavelengths of light to create patterns known as spectra.

Since scientists know which particles emit which wavelengths of light, the OGRESS team will be able to take these spectral patterns and figure out what types of matter are present in objects like the Cygnus Loop. Once they know that the gratings work as intended, they will be able to use them to investigate supernova in deep space, McEntaffer said.

The ultimate goal is to use this type of technology to hunt for missing matter in distant parts of the universe. While astrophysicists can measure the amount of material is out there, they haven’t yet been able to fully categorize the composition of all that material. The OGRESS team hopes to ultimately use their gratings on a larger telescope to identify and measure that material.

For now, however, McEntaffer and his colleagues plan to take the knowledge gained from the Cygnus Loop observations and make improvements to their gratings. The project is currently scheduled to embark on its next mission: the star Capella sometime in 2018.

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Play MS-DOS games on your Twitter news feed

Written By: Chuck Bednar
Emily Bills

Chuck Bednar for redOrbit.com – @BednarChuck

Remember when the good folks at the Internet Archive added more than 2,000 playable MS-DOS games to their growing collection of software and other media earlier this year? This week, some intrepid individuals have discovered that those titles are now playable on Twitter.

As reported by Endgaget, Wired, and elsewhere, all 2,400 playable MS-DOS titles (yes, including The Oregon Trail) can be played directly though the popular social media website, without even having to leave your own news feed. Simply paste the URL to the game of your choosing into a tweet, view it on the Web, and you can start playing.

This feat is accomplished through the magic of Twitter’s Cards platforms, according to reports. All you have to do is tweet the URL and the game you want to play and the system automatically handles the complicated stuff. The tweets can even be embedded into a webpage, making it so that the game can be played while you (pretend to) read science news.

Not as good as the real thing

The MS-DOS games in question were added to the Internet Archive back in January, joining a collection of software titles that already included co-op arcade games and Atari 2600 software. Among the games added were Castle Wolfenstein, Prince of Persia, Leisure Suit Larry, the Bard’s Tale, the Carmen Sandiego series, and many others.

At the time, the curators of the Archive revealed that interested gamers could play their preferred games directly through their Web browsers, but warned that some of the games could have a few bugs in them. In addition, they warned that gamers would not be able to save their progress, and that some of the titles may eventually be pulled, changed, or replaced by others.

While the Archive’s efforts were hailed by media outlets as a consumer-friendly way to enjoy these classic games, there were also concerns over the legality of the project, and whether or not gaming companies would allow it to remain. While some of the MS-DOS titles are considered to be abandonware, and are thus in an emulation-related grey area, others were still actively being marketed by companies, but thus far the collection appears to be largely intact.

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New trick could help overcome procrastination

Written By: Chuck Bednar
Emily Bills

Chuck Bednar for redOrbit.com – @BednarChuck

Researchers from the University of Southern California say that they’ve come up with a sure-fire way for people to overcome procrastination and get to work on accomplishing their goals.

The trick, they explain in the journal Psychological Science, is to change the way that you think about the future. Future goals have to feel as though they’re important now.

“The simplified message that we learned in these studies is if the future doesn’t feel imminent, then, even if it’s important, people won’t start working on their goals,” said Oyserman, who was assisted on the research by co-author Neil Lewis Jr. of the University of Michigan.

In a series of experiments, the duo presented study participants with different scenarios and found that those individuals looked at the future as something that was far more imminent when they evaluated goals and deadlines in terms of days rather than months or years.

Events appear closer when viewed in days

Oysterman and Lewis recruited 162 men and women and asked them to imagine that they were preparing for future events, such as a wedding or a presentation at work, and were randomly told to think of the event in days, months, or years. The authors found that participants viewing the event in terms of days said that it would occur an average of 29.6 days sooner.

A second set of studies investigated if this sense of time altered a person’s plans to begin saving money for the long-term. The authors recruited more than 1,100 participants, asking them when they planned to begin saving for college or retirement. In one case, they were either told college would start in 18 years or 6,570 days, while in the second, they were told retirement would start either 30-40 years or 10,950-14,600 days in the future.

Oysterman and Lewis found that participants planned to start saving four times sooner when they viewed the upcoming event in terms of days instead of years, and follow-up studies revealed that while participants believed that long-term saving was important, those assigned to count down to college or retirement in days instead of years felt more connected to their future selves.

The researchers believe that this technique could be used by people to motive themselves to accomplish goals. “So when I think in a more granular way – when I use days rather than years – it makes me feel like the future is closer,” they explained. “If you see it as ‘today’ rather than on your calendar for sometime in the future, you’re not going to put it off.”

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How did the largest black holes get so big?

Written By: Chuck Bednar
Emily Bills

Chuck Bednar for redOrbit.com – @BednarChuck

Quasars, the ravenous supermassive black holes that consume tremendous amounts of gas and dust into their gravitational pull, may be better at devouring matter than previously believed, according to research published in The Astrophysical Journal.

Using data obtained from the NASA Chandra X-ray Observatory, lead investigator Bin Luo, a postdoctoral researcher at Penn State University, and his colleagues examined 51 quasars located between five billion and 11.5 billion light years from Earth.

By discovering that that some quasars are consuming more matter than previous expected, the study authors believe that they could learn more about how these black holes were able to grow so rapidly during the earliest days of the universe. Luo said that the largest black holes appear to be consuming matter at rates five to ten time faster than most quasars.

Findings could explain early-universe black holes

The quasars were selected because they had unusually weak emission from atoms such as carbon at ultraviolet wavelengths, the agency explained in a statement. About two-thirds of those quasars were as fainter in X-rays than regular quasars, with some up to 40 times fainter.

Those weak UV atomic emissions and X-ray fluxes from these objects may help explain how a supermassive black hole consumes matter, NASA officials added. In computer models, experts found that as matter swirls towards a black hole in a thin disk when inflow rates are low, and if those inflow rates increase, pressure from radiation can dramatically inflate that disk.

Black holes can’t stop eating donuts

As a result of that inflation, a donut-shaped ring or “torus” can form around the inner part of the disk, the researchers found. If a quasar becomes embedded in this type of structure, the torus can absorb much of the radiation produced closer to the black hole, preventing it from colliding with gas located further out, resulting in weaker UV atomic and X-ray emissions.

The phenomenon would also affect the delicate balance between the inward pull of gravity and the outward pressure of radiation, the researchers said. An increased amount of radiation would be emitted perpendicular to the disk instead of along it, allowing material to be consumed at a higher rate.

“The important implication is that these ‘thick-disk’ quasars may harbor black holes growing at an extraordinarily rapid rate,” NASA noted. When combined with previous research, the new paper suggests that “quasars might have been more common” about one billion years after the Big Bang, and that this rapid growth “might also explain the existence of huge black holes at even earlier times,” they added.

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Dino-killing asteroid triggered largest lava flow on Earth

Written By: Chuck Bednar
Emily Bills

Chuck Bednar for redOrbit.com – @BednarChuck

The massive asteroid that crashed into the ocean near the coast of Mexico millions of years ago (and is believed to have wiped out the dinosaurs) was likely the catalyst for a series of worldwide volcanic eruptions contributed to the extinction event, new research claims.

As a team of geophysicists from the University of California, Berkeley explained in The Geological Society of America Bulletin, that the asteroid impact likely triggered the largest eruptions of lava in India – the Deccan Traps.

The Deccan Traps occurred so close to the impact that they led some to doubt that the asteroid was the sole cause of the end-Cretaceous mass extinction event, the study authors explained in a statement Thursday. Now, Mark Richards, a UC Berkeley professor, has found new evidence explaining what may have really happened.

“If you try to explain why the largest impact we know of in the last billion years happened within 100,000 years of these massive lava flows at Deccan… the chances of that occurring at random are minuscule. It’s not a very credible coincidence,” Richards said. Instead, he and his colleagues believe that the lava flows started before the asteroid but were re-ignited by its impact.

So, did the lava contribute to extinction?

The researchers calculated that the asteroid responsible for the Chicxulub crater may have been capable of generating a magnitude 9 or larger earthquake throughout the Earth, which would be sufficient to ignite the Deccan flood basalts and potentially cause lava eruptions to occur all over the planet. They also found chemical differences in the Deccan lava, pre- and post-impact.

Those chemical differences indicate that lava rose to the surface more quickly after the asteroid crash-landed, and more randomly-oriented faults from which the lava flowed post-impact were also found. Additional exploration found that there was a span of inactivity in Deccan volcanism prior to the Chicxulub impact, which suggests that the asteroid re-awakened the eruptions.

The Deccan lava flows erupted for several hundred thousand years after the impact, and probably sent tremendous amounts of carbon dioxide and other noxious, climate-modifying gases into the atmosphere. However, it remains uncertain whether or not these events played a role in the extinction of the dinosaurs and most other life on Earth at the time.

“This connection between the impact and the Deccan lava flows is a great story and might even be true, but it doesn’t yet take us closer to understanding what actually killed the dinosaurs,” said Richards. He and his colleagues wrote that “high-precision radioisotopic dating” of the Deccan flood basalt formations could be able to determine whether or not the eruptions played a key role in the global extinction events.

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Health

MD Anderson Cancer Center Joins Castle Connolly’s Partnership for Excellence Program

Written By: admin

Castle Connolly Medical Ltd., America’s trusted source for the identification of Top Doctors, is pleased to announce that the internationally renowned cancer treatment and research center, the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, has recently joined the Partnership for Excellence program.

Houston, Texas (PRWEB) May 01, 2015

Castle Connolly Medical Ltd., America’s trusted source for the identification of Top Doctors, is pleased to announce that the internationally renowned cancer treatment and research center, the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, has recently joined the Partnership for Excellence program. As a participant in this important consumer-focused program, the online profiles of MD Anderson’s more than 220 affiliated Castle Connolly Top Doctors Top Doctors® will now be fully accessible, free of charge, to all the visitors to the Castle Connolly website – http://www.CastleConnolly.com. This will enable people seeking the very best in medical care related to the diagnosis, treatment and management of both adult and pediatric cancers to have the option of identifying the most appropriate and outstanding physicians on the Castle Connolly website. MD Anderson Cancer Center joins another recent participant, U C Irvine Health, as well as long time participating institutions such as: The Cleveland Clinic, Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, Johns Hopkins Medical Center, Penn Medicine, New York Presbyterian Hospital, Mount Sinai Health, NYU Langone Medical Center, Hospital for Special Surgery, Temple Health/Fox Chase Cancer Center, Barnabas Health; Maimonides Medical Center, Hackensack UMC, Wills Eye Hospital, Bascom Palmer Eye Institute, Northside Hospital System, North Shore University Health System; Jefferson University Hospitals; Cancer Treatment Centers of America and many other leading academic medical centers, specialty hospitals and regional health systems. The Partnership for Excellence hospitals all value the identification of Castle Connolly Top Doctors and the participation in the Partnership for Excellence program as a means to further extend their ability to bring their outstanding services and centers of excellence to consumers who seek the best in American medicine for themselves and their loved ones.

About MD Anderson Cancer Center

The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, located in Houston on the campus of the Texas Medical Center, is one of the world’s largest and most respected centers devoted exclusively to cancer patient care, research, education and prevention. Its mission is to eliminate cancer in Texas, the nation and the world through exceptional programs that integrate patient care, research and prevention. U.S. News & World Report’s annual “Best Hospitals” survey has ranked MD Anderson the nation’s leading cancer care hospital for 10 of the past 13 years, and it has been named one of the nation’s top two cancer centers every year since the survey began in 1990. In 2014, more than 127,000 people sought care at the institution, with more than 8,000 participants enrolled in clinical trials, making its cancer clinical trials program the largest in the nation.

In addition to MD Anderson’s main campus in the Texas Medical Center and two research campuses in Bastrop County, Texas, the institution has developed a number of local, national and international locations. Houston-area care centers include: Bay Area, Katy, West Houston (diagnostic imaging), Bellaire (diagnostic imaging), Sugar Land, The Woodlands, Memorial City (surgical clinic). MD Anderson is now the exclusive provider of breast radiology services for five of Memorial Hermann’s 10 breast care centers in the Houston area — Memorial City, The Woodlands, Sugar Land, and Northeast and Southwest Houston. MD Anderson physicians provide cancer care to patients at Lyndon B. Johnson Hospital. The MD Anderson Cancer Network® across the United states has as its partner members: Banner MD Anderson Cancer Center (Gilbert, Arizona), MD Anderson Cancer Center at Cooper (Camden, New Jersey), and Baptist MD Anderson Cancer Center (Jacksonville, Florida); as an associate member, Hospital Israelita Albert Einstein in São Paulo, Brazil; and 12 hospitals and health systems in 10 states as certified members. Finally, MD Anderson affiliates include: MD Anderson Cancer Center Madrid (Spain); MD Anderson Radiation Treatment Center at American Hospital (Istanbul); and MD Anderson Radiation Treatment Center at Presbyterian Kaseman Hospital (Albuquerque, New Mexico)

About Castle Connolly Medical Ltd.

The mission of Castle Connolly Medical Ltd. is to help consumers find the best healthcare. To this end, it has identified and displays online the detailed profiles of more than 44,000 outstanding physicians in virtually all medical specialties and throughout the United States. These top doctors have been nominated by their peers in an extensive survey process of many tens of thousands of American doctors each year. The Castle Connolly physician-led research team thoroughly reviews the educational and professional credentials of those nominated – their medical education, training, hospital appointments, disciplinary histories – before selecting those deemed to be reflective of the very best in their specialty in the nation, America’s Top Doctors, and those deemed to be reflective of the very best in their specialty within their region. Doctors do not and cannot pay to be included in any Castle Connolly Guide or online directory.

In addition to appearing online at its website, Castle Connolly has numerous online and print partnerships with national and regional newspapers and magazines to enable the broadest distribution of its valuable information. National magazine partners have included Ladies Home Journal, Good Housekeeping, Redbook, Women’s Health, Men’s Health, Worth and Town & Country. Newspaper partners for online Top Doctor’s features include The Washington Times, The Baltimore Sun, The Dallas morning News, The Arizona Republic and The Hollywood Reporter. And among its more than 45 regional magazine partners for annual top Doctors features are: New York, Boston, San Francisco, Philadelphia, Atlanta, Honolulu, Austin monthly, Philadelphia, Inside Jersey, Oklahoma, Sarasota, Indianapolis monthly, Orange Coast, Palm Springs Life, Memphis, Nashville Lifestyles, Greenwich, Westchester and many others. Castle Connolly also licenses its top doctors databases to other leading corporations and offers several corporate programs of personalized assistance services to help consumers identify and access the very best physicians.

The company was founded in 1991 by two respected leaders in healthcare, John K. Castle and John J. Connolly, Ed.D. Dr. Connolly was the President of New York Medical College for more than ten years. Mr. Castle served for six years as a commissioner and executive officer of the Joint Commission (formerly JCAHO); he also served as Chairman of the Board of New York Medical College for eleven years and served on its Board for twenty-two years. The professional staff at Castle Connolly is led by Jean Morgan, M.D., Vice President, Chief Medical & Research Officer and William Liss-Levinson, Ph.D., VP, Chief Strategy & Operations Officer.

For further information contact: William Liss-Levinson, Ph.D, VP, Chief Strategy & Operations Officer, Castle Connolly Medical Ltd, 212.367.8400, ext. 114; bliss-levinson(at)castleconnolly(dot)com

For the original version on PRWeb visit: http://www.prweb.com/releases/2015/05/prweb12690754.htm

How to pronounce Pluto’s moon Charon

Written By: John Hopton
Christopher Pilny

@Johnfinitum

Let’s just get down to it:

Even though it bares the same name as the Greek god Charon, which is pronounced like Karen, but with more emphasis on the -on (Kare-RON), Pluto’s moon is pronounced Share-ON, like a frustrated Ozzie Osbourne with diction training.

So why is this so confusing?

Well, according to NASA, the backstory of how it was named has to do with the guy who discovered, James Christy:

“Christy proposed the name Charon after the mythological ferryman who carried souls across the river Acheron, one of the five mythical rivers that surrounded Pluto’s underworld. Apart from the mythological connection for this name, Christy chose it because the first four letters also matched the name of his wife, Charlene.”

Which is pronounced “Shar-leen”. Hence Charon’s pronunciation, which is accepted by NASA and most astronomers. (We can’t speak for them all.)

In conclusion?

Wives 1 Greek Gods 0

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Featured Image: Pluto and Charon in false color show compositional diversity. (Credit: NASA/APL/SwRI)

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NuSTAR captures ‘screams’ from zombie stars

Written By: Chuck Bednar
Christopher Pilny

Chuck Bednar for redOrbit.com – @BednarChuck

A mysterious high-energy X-ray signal detected by the NASA Nuclear Spectroscopic Telescope Array (NuSTAR) could be the sounds of “zombie” stars feeding on the “brains” of nearby stellar companions, according to research published recently in the journal Nature.

“We can see a completely new component of the center of our galaxy with NuSTAR’s images,” lead author Kerstin Perez from Columbia University said in a statement earlier this week. “We can’t definitively explain the X-ray signal yet – it’s a mystery. More work needs to be done.”

Our galaxy, the Milky Way, is bustling with stars of all ages, smaller black holes, and a wide variety of stellar corpses, all of which surround a supermassive black hole called Sagittarius A*, the US space agency explained. In the new images, NuSTAR shows a 40 light-year across area around Sagittarius A* which had an unexpected haze of high-energy X-rays.

“Almost anything that can emit X-rays is in the galactic center,” Perez explained. “The area is crowded with low-energy X-ray sources, but their emission is very faint when you examine it at the energies that NuSTAR observes, so the new signal stands out.”

So what is causing this unusual X-ray glow?

Perez and her colleagues have come up with four potential explanations for this phenomenon, three of which center on different classes of stellar corpses. When a star dies, NASA explained, they don’t always simply fade away. Collapsed dead binary stars can feed on matter from the other member of their stellar pair, which could cause X-ray eruptions.

One of the theories involves a type of stellar zombie known as a pulsar, which is the collapsed remains of starts that explode as supernovae. Pulsars can spin with extreme velocity, emitting intense beams of radiation that can sweep throughout the sky. Those beams can intercept Earth on occasion, similar to a lighthouse beacon, the US space agency said.

“We may be witnessing the beacons of a hitherto hidden population of pulsars in the galactic center,” explained co-author Fiona Harrison of the California Institute of Technology (Caltech), principal investigator of the NuSTAR image. “This would mean there is something special about the environment in the very center of our galaxy.”

White dwarfs, the collapsed remains of stars not massive enough to explode in supernovae, may also be a potential source of these X-rays. A third theory suggests that small black holes that are feeding slowly off their companion stars are radiating X-rays as they swallow up matter.

The fourth hypothesis suggests that the source may not be a stellar corpse at all. Rather, cosmic rays coming from the supermassive black hole at the center of the galaxy could be emitting the X-rays as it devours material and interact with their surroundings. However, the researchers said that none of the theories are a perfect match for previous research findings.

“This new result just reminds us that the galactic center is a bizarre place,” said co-author Chuck Hailey of Columbia University. “In the same way people behave differently walking on the street instead of jammed on a crowded rush-hour subway, stellar objects exhibit weird behavior when crammed in close quarters near the supermassive black hole.”

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First-ever 3D images of Pillars of Creation captured

Written By: Chuck Bednar
Christopher Pilny

Chuck Bednar for redOrbit.com – @BednarChuck

For the first time, astronomers have produced a fully three-dimensional view of the Pillars of Creation, using the MUSE instrument on the Very Large Telescope (VLT) to capture the iconic billowing dust pillars in new detail and discover never-before-seen features.

The Pillars of Creation, a feature located in the Eagle Nebula (Messier 16) are located approximately 7,000 light years away and are “a classic example of the column-like shapes that develop in the giant clouds of gas and dust that are the birthplaces of new stars,” the ESO said in a statement. And here’s the image:

Credit: Imgur

Just kidding; these are ferrets.

The columns arise when extremely large, newly formed blue-white O and B stars give off UV radiation and stellar winds that cause less dense materials to be blown away. Dust and gas pockets that are denser can resist this erosion for longer periods of time, and the thicker dust pockets can shield material from that radiation and stellar wind.

As result, dark “tails” or “elephant trunks” are created, pointing away from the bright O and B stars. To us, they look like a dusty pillar. Now, the authors of a new study published Thursday in the Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society reported that they had used the MUSE instrument to illustrate the ongoing evaporation of the Pillars in unprecedented detail.

New features discovered; pillars’ lifespan determined

Lead authors and astronomers wrote that they were able to reveal the orientation of the pillars and how they are distributed in space. They also found new details, such as a previously undetected jet from a young star.

The left tip of the pillar is facing the Earth, the authors found using MUSE, and is atop a pillar that unlike the others is actually located behind a nearby star cluster, NGC 6611. The tip of this pillar is being exposed to massive amounts of radiation from the cluster’s stars, and as a result, it appears to be brighter to the human eye than the bottom left, middle and right pillars.

The tips of those other three pillars are all pointed away from our point-of-view, they noted. While there have been several studies that have identified that these pillars are home to still-forming protostars, the new paper also revealed new evidence of two gestating stars in the left and middle pillars, as well as a jet from a young star that had not been previously found.

The authors were also able to determine the pillars’ rate of evaporation. Their observations show that the structures shed approximately 70 times of the Sun’s mass every one-million years or so. Based on the present mass of the columns (about 200 times that of the Sun), the authors concluded that the Pillars of Creation have an expected lifespan of just three million more years, a mere cosmic blink of the eye.

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How 3D-printed throat implants saved three babies

Written By: Chuck Bednar
Christopher Pilny

Chuck Bednar for redOrbit.com – @BednarChuck
Three US newborns were facing certain death due to a condition called tracheobronchomalacia until researchers from the Universities of Michigan, Utah, and Pittsburgh were able to save their lives with three-dimensional printed throat implants.
According to Science, the condition causes an infant’s windpipe to periodically collapse, making it so that the child can’t breathe. The condition would have almost certainly killed the trio of children, Kaiba, Garrett, and Ian, had doctors and additive manufacturing not stepped in.
Tracheobronchomalacia (TBM) typically leads to respiratory failure, an inability to absorb food, and even cardiac arrest, the website explained. However, doctors took CT scans to determine the size and shape of each boy’s trachea, and then used those images to create computer models of tube-shaped hollow plastic splints. These models were then created using 3D printing technology.
In their paper, the authors explained that TBM “can lead to life-threatening cardiopulmonary arrests,” and that to address the ailment, they used an additive manufacturing technique known as laser sintering in which a laser melted particles of powdered plastic to create a new structure.
Life-saving, biodegradable external airway splints
“We demonstrate the successful application of 3D printing technology to produce a personalized medical device for treatment of TBM, designed to accommodate airway growth while preventing external compression over a predetermined time period before bioresorption,” they wrote. “We implanted patient-specific 3D-printed external airway splints in three infants with severe TBM.”
“At the time of publication, these infants no longer exhibited life-threatening airway disease, and had demonstrated resolution of both pulmonary and extrapulmonary complications.” The researchers added that long-term data collected over the years had shown “continued growth of the primary airways” in all three of the infants.
Science noted that the implants were designed to not only be flexible, but to also allow the airways to move and stretch slowly to match the growth of the windpipes. The implants were made from a polymer called polycaprolactone, which biodegrades over the course of three to four years when exposed to bodily fluids, the website reported.
The implants were wrapped around the damaged tracheas of the children, and then sewed in place to keep the airways open. The results were so effective that each youngster was able to come off of ventilation devices, leave intensive care, and make their way home. The boys are known between 17 months and three years old, and by the time their splints fully dissolve, doctors expect their windpipes to be developed enough to continue growing and functionally normally.
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Researchers have found a way to modify blood types

Written By: Chuck Bednar
Christopher Pilny

Chuck Bednar for redOrbit.com – @BednarChuck

There’s a serious supply-and-demand problem when it comes to blood transfusions: Patients are in constant need of the bodily fluid, which delivers oxygen and nutrients to the cells, but because they need a specific type, hospitals and blood banks often experience shortages.

Fortunately, chemists from the University of British Columbia and colleagues from the Center for Blood Research have created an enzyme that could potentially solve this problem by cutting off the antigens (sugars) found in Type A and Type B blood to make it more like Type O, which is universal and can be given to patients regardless of their blood types.

UBC postdoctoral fellow David Kwan, lead author of a new Journal of the American Chemical Society study detailing the research, explained in a statement that their “mutant enzyme” is “very efficient” at cutting off antigens in A and B blood, and “much more proficient” at removing the A-antigen subtypes that the parent enzymes tend to struggle with.

Using directed evolution to remove blood antigens

Kwan, associate professor Jayachandran Kizhakkedathu, chemistry professor Steve Withers and their fellow researchers created the enzyme using a new technology known as directed evolution. In this method, mutations are inserted into the gene which codes for the enzymes, then selecting the mutants which are the most effective at cutting the antigens.

“The defining difference between A, B and O blood types is the presence of slightly different sugar structures on the outside of the red blood cells of each type. Type A and B blood cells each have a single additional sugar attached to their surface (N-acetylgalactosamine and galactose respectively) beyond that present on O type red blood cells,” co-author Stephen G. Withers, a professor in the UBC Department of Chemistry, explained to redOrbit via email.

“The idea of converting blood types by enzymatic removal of blood group antigens using specific sugar hydrolysing enzymes (glycosidases) has been around since the early 1980s, but a major limitation has always been the efficiency of the enzymes that can do this: impractically large amounts of enzyme were needed,” he added. “Our lab specializes in the mechanistic analysis and the engineering of glycosidases and has had considerable success at increasing rates of several of these enzymes through directed evolution.”

Withers added that this directed evolution is a process that essentially “evolves” enzymes in the laboratory, doing the same thing that can be accomplished through natural selection, but doing it far more quickly than would ordinarily happen. He and his colleagues decided to apply this approach to increasing the activities of enzymes capable of removing A and B antigens.

Promising research, but not quite ready for clinical use

Over the span of five generations, the enzyme become 170 times more effective, the authors said. Using the enzyme, they were able to remove most of the antigens in A and B blood, but they emphasize that before the technique can be used in clinical settings, the enzyme would have to capable of removing all of the antigens. This is due to the sensitivity of the immune system, and the fact that even trace amounts of residual antigens could trigger a response.

“As O-type blood is the universal donor type, there is high demand for O-type blood resulting in a shortage of supply. It’s possible to alleviate this demand and the resulting shortage if we have a means of converting A, B, and AB-type blood into a universal donor type,” Withers said, noting that “before our enzyme can be used clinically… further improvements by directed evolution will be necessary to effect complete removal of antigens.”

“In this way we hope to be able to generate one or more enzymes that can be used to efficiently convert A or B blood to a generally acceptable type just like O. In practical terms this will take some time to come to fruition,” he said. “What we have done so far is to show that it is feasible to make these enzymes more efficient. We now need to broaden their abilities a little more so that they can handle all A-types. If we can do this, then the process will have to go through the lengthy and very important safety approval process.”

Ultimately, Withers said that he envisions using the technique to pre-treat A or B type blood on an as-needed basis whenever hospitals or blood banks are faced with a shortage of compatible blood. However, he noted that it has taken a long time to this point, as he and his colleagues have been working on this specific process for roughly five years, and their work was built upon a foundation of more than three decades of basic research in the field.

“I think the main take-home message is that it should be feasible to substantially improve the activities of enzymes to be used in antigen removal through methods of directed evolution, thereby decreasing the cost of the process,” he said. “We are not quite there yet, but the route forward is clear and that involves the evolution of the enzyme further to better cleave the other major sub-types of A blood.”

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Every episode of ‘Seinfeld’ will soon be on Hulu

Written By: Chuck Bednar
Christopher Pilny

Chuck Bednar for redOrbit.com – @BednarChuck

If you want to binge-watch a show about nothing, you’re going to have to turn to Hulu, as the online service has acquired the video streaming rights to all 180 episodes of Seinfeld for slightly less than $1 million per episode, various media outlets reported earlier this week.

According to Gizmodo and Variety, the Los Angeles-based Netflix rival shelled out about $875 thousand dollars per episode (a total value of nearly $160 million) to fend off their competition. The licensing deal between Hulu and Sony TV is believed to be for at least five years. The show is expected to hit the service in June, so binge-watchers have about a month to prepare.

The per-episode deal will be split evenly between Sony TV, which is distributing the show; the original production company, Castle Rock; and co-creators Jerry Seinfeld and Larry David. The deal comes on the heels of Netflix’s late-2014 purchase of the rights to Friends, another sitcom that was televised by NBC in the 1990s, for more than $500 thousand per episode.

They’re out of the contest

While Amazon and Yahoo were both said to be in the mix for the rights to stream the adventures of Jerry, George, Elaine and Kramer online, the Wall Street Journal (citing a person familiar with the matter) reported back in March that Netflix decided to pass on the bidding.

“Reruns of Seinfeld have been on local TV stations and the cable channel TBS for years, but the buyers believe it has potential to continue that run for another several years on the Web,” the WSJ said. “There, it could hold appeal for a generation of cord-cutters who can’t catch Seinfeld episodes on cable, and will allow users to search for their favorite episodes on-demand.”

“An agreement with an online video service would not mean the end of Seinfeld repeats on other outlets,” they added. “Friends remains in heavy rotation on TBS even though Netflix has the rights and does not have commercials. Despite the addition of Friends to Netflix, ratings for the reruns on TBS have held steady.”

Seinfeld had previously only been available online through Sony’s ad-supported Crackle video platform, Variety said, and the Hulu deal will mark the first time that the series can be watched in its entirety through a Web-based streaming service. The acquisition comes after Hulu acquired the rights to more than 300 episodes of the CBS crime drama CSI back in February.

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No, NASA did not accidentally invent the warp drive

Written By: Chuck Bednar
Christopher Pilny

Chuck Bednar for redOrbit.com – @BednarChuck

Space enthusiasts and sci-fi geeks everywhere (including those of us at redOrbit) pretty much broke the Internet on Thursday after online reports surfaced indicating that NASA scientists may have accidentally discovered warp-speed travel.

Those rumors stemmed from information posted on the NASASpaceflight.com forums regarding the EM Drive, a proposed method of interstellar vehicle propulsion that uses an electrical power source, has no moving parts, requires no material fuel and breaks the laws of physics.

In its report, Tech Times cites one forum post, which reads, “…this signature (the interference pattern) on the EmDrive looks just like what a warp bubble looks like. And the math behind the warp bubble apparently matches the interference pattern found in the EmDrive.”

Based on those comments, the website said, it was “entirely possible” that NASA has created a “stable warp bubble” that could make “faster-than-light travel” a possibility. Other online media outlets, including CNET, io9 and IFL Science (among many others), also posted versions of the report ranging from “the EM Drive works” to “ZOMG! Here comes warp speed!”

So could the rumors actually be true?

As cool as it would be to travel faster than the speed of light ala Star Trek, sadly, it does not look like we’ll be doing it anytime soon. If you visit the NASASpaceflight.com forums  and check out the discussion, you’ll see that it is rather complex and technical in nature – highly open to misinterpretation by those of us without a Ph.D. in our pocket.

The EM Drive, also known as the electromagnetic drive, could theoretically propel objects to near-relativistic speeds, according to io9, and NASA Eagleworks has apparently been working with the device to see if they can make it work in a space-like vacuum. If that the site reports is accurate, they may have done that, but there are still other obstacles to overcome.

For instance, the EM Drive appears to violate conventional physics and the law of conservation of momentum. It allegedly converts energy to thrust without requiring a propellant, doing so by firing microwaves into a closed container. Without the expulsion of propellant, however, there is nothing to offset the change in the spacecraft’s momentum when it accelerates.

If the technology could somehow be proven to work, it could provide faster, cheaper and more efficient travel throughout the solar system and beyond – and yes, in theory, it could potentially lead to the development of a warp drive. But for now, as NASA itself explained, while there are “some credible concepts in scientific literature, however it’s too soon to know if they are viable,” meaning that “traveling at the speed of light is simply imaginary at present.”

One expert’s take on the possibilities of warp speed

RedOrbit asked Robert J. Scherrer, a cosmologist, professor and chair of the Department of Physics and Astronomy at Vanderbilt University in Nashville, about all of these wild rumors and about the possibility of warp-speed travel as a whole – and, well, try not to be too bummed out by his response.

“Here’s the bottom line.  We don’t really think faster-than-light travel is possible,” he said via email. “The lightspeed limit is written into the DNA of special relativity, and it is therefore part of the foundation of almost all of modern physics. And more importantly (since physics is at its core based on experimental evidence), we’ve never actually observed it.

“That’s why when an experimental group a few years ago claimed that maybe neutrinos could travel faster than the speed of light, their claims were met with extraordinary scrutiny, and ultimately shown to be incorrect,” Scherrer added. “Now the  ‘warp drive’ proposed by Alcubierre, is a slightly different animal. It relies on the possibility of warping space-time, so that you get to go as fast as you want while not violating relativity.”

The problem with that, the professor explained, is that it mandates a violation of the “weak energy condition,” which stipulates that for every timelike vector field, the matter density that is observed by the corresponding onlookers must always be non-negative. While it isn’t possible to prove that the weak energy condition has to be satisfied, he said, strange, never-before-seen things (such as negative energy densities) start to happen if it isn’t.

“If there is a claim of faster-than-light travel using a table-top experiment, I would be instantly skeptical,” Scherrer concluded. “And sadly, I don’t think we’ll see faster-than-light travel in our lifetimes, or ever, for that matter. Sorry to be a wet blanket. I am always happy to be proven wrong.”

I think we all know how Han feels at this point.

You can read more of Dr. Scherrer’s comments on warp speed on his new blog “Cosmic Yarns”, which explores the intersection of science and science fiction.

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Sombrero Galaxy to be visible tonight!

Written By: Chuck Bednar
Christopher Pilny

Chuck Bednar for redOrbit.com – @BednarChuck

Astronomy enthusiasts have a golden opportunity to see what National Geographic refers to as a “stunning galaxy” on Friday night, as Messier 104 – better known as the Sombrero Galaxy – will be visible in the southern part of the sky, according to the website.

Messier 104 is “is a dramatic-looking telescope object with a distinctive dark dust lane that cuts right across its bright core, giving it a strong resemblance to its namesake,” they added. It is one of the brightest and most famous galaxies that can be seen using household telescopes.

Stargazers can track down the galaxy by mentally drawing a line from the moon to Gienah, a bright star that is located 165 light-years away in the constellation Corvus, Nat Geo said. Then, using either a good set of binoculars or a small backyard telescope, scan to the midpoint of this line in search of “a faint, fuzzy oval patch.” That object will be Messier 104.

Taking a closer look at Messier 104

The Sombrero Galaxy, which according to NASA is +8 in magnitude, is located about 28 million light-years from Earth at the southern edge of the constellation Virgo. It has a mass equivalent to 800 billion suns, making it one of the most massive objects in the cluster. It is 50,000 light-years across and is located some 28 million light-years from Earth.

“The galaxy’s hallmark is a brilliant white, bulbous core encircled by the thick dust lanes comprising the spiral structure of the galaxy. As seen from Earth, the galaxy is tilted nearly edge-on. We view it from just six degrees north of its equatorial plane,” the US space agency said. “[It] is just beyond the limit of naked-eye visibility and is easily seen through small telescopes.”

Messier 104 is nicknamed the Sombrero Galaxy because of its resemblance to the well-known Mexican hat, famed for its broad rim and high top. It has a “rich system of globular clusters” that number nearly 2,000, or 10 times as many as those in orbit around the Milky Way, and their ages range from between 10 billion and 13 billion years old.

Embedded in its bright core is a smaller disk that is tilted in relation to the larger one, and X-ray emissions appear to indicate that there is material falling to its core, which contains a one-billion solar-mass black hole. Once believed to be a disk of luminous gas around a young star, the object was later found to be a galaxy traveling at speeds of up to 700 miles per second, said NASA.

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Health

The Oncology Institute of Hope and Innovation Expands in San Bernardino County with New Location in Upland

Written By: admin

The Oncology Institute of Hope and Innovation Expands in San Bernardino County with New Location in Upland

Downey, CA (PRWEB) April 30, 2015

In order to provide better coverage in the San Bernardino area, The Oncology Institute of Hope and Innovation will start seeing patients in their new Upland location on May 4, 2015. With ongoing focus on quality patient care, the new space will feature state-of-the-art equipment plus all of the top notch care already offered in all of their locations. Thomas F. Reynolds, M.D., F.A.C.P., and staff expresses their excitement over expanding the practice to its third county from Los Angeles and Orange County to now San Bernardino.

Located on:

1310 San Bernardino Road, Suite 205

Upland, CA 91786

For appointments, please call (909) 906-1519.

About The Oncology Institute:

The Oncology Institute of Hope and Innovation is committed to providing superior, compassionate and state-of-the-art medical care. Offering programs to help patients and families cope with the challenges that are brought on by cancer and strive to optimize their quality of life, comprehensive and realistic treatment goals are tailored to every person's unique needs and decided upon in partnership with the patients and their families. Dedicated to excel in cancer prevention, diagnosis and education through our exceptional team of physicians, nurse practitioners, nurses, medical assistants and office staff, The Oncology Institute of Hope and Innovation has 12 Southern California locations in the cities of Anaheim, Covina, Downey, Glendale, Long Beach, Lynwood, Los Angeles, Montebello, Santa Ana, Torrance, Upland, and Whittier. For more information please visit http://www.theoncologyinstitute.com.

For the original version on PRWeb visit: http://www.prweb.com/releases/2015/04/prweb12688133.htm

Health

India Network Visitor Health Insurance Launches Instant Quote and Easy Select Tools to Select Best Visitor Health Insurance Plan for Parents and Grandparents Visiting US

Written By: admin

India Network makes it easy to select most affordable visitor health insurance for visiting parents and grand parents following instant quote tool.

Orlando, FL (PRWEB) April 30, 2015

India Network Foundation, USA based non-profit organization has been sponsoring visitor health insurance programs to help Indian visitors heading to the United States for more than two decades. Today, India Network launches new tools to empower members to select most suitable health insurance plan for their visitors – Easy Select and Instant quote. Several options are available including coverage for all ages groups and coverage for pre-existing problems. India Network plans are designed with the view of providing most cost effective and reliable coverage for all visitors. A typical health insurance program offered in the google space today underwritten by surplus lines overseas insurance companies with several crucial gaps and exclusions in coverage such as coverage for Urinary Tract Infections, heart attacks, stroke, etc.

On the other hand, India Network Health Insurance Plans offer broader coverage with fewer exclusions. India Network Standard, Premier, and network plans are underwritten by ACE American Insurance and claims are adjudicated in the United States following strict US HIPPA privacy regulations. EasySelect and InstantQuote links on the web site provide an overview of all plans, premiums, and benefits summary make it easy to choose the right plan for their visitors depending on their health conditions and age.

Dr.KV Rao, Founder President of India Network Foundation said that one can purchase India Network health insurance policy with confidence. Over the last two decades, India Network health insurance plans help thousands of families with much needed coverage for major medical problems such as cholesterol, blood pressure, diabetes related complications. India Network continue to provide high quality reliable coverage that is often not found anywhere else. Every visitor to the United States is welcome to take advantage of the India Network health insurance program by completing the membership form and the appropriate online insurance form. Insurance applications are processed in real time and coverage is issues instantly as long as the insurance plan is purchased before arrival of visitor in the United States.

About India Network Foundation

India Network Foundation, established as a US non-profit organization, has been helping the Asian Indian community in North America with programs and grants to academics from India for more than two decades. India Network Foundation sponsors visitor health insurance to tourists, students, temporary workers (H1 visa holders) and their families. All insurance products sponsored by the foundation are administered by India Network Services and underwritten by ACE American Insurance Company (ACE). All operations are carried out in the United States only.

For more information visit http://www.indianetwork.org

About India Network Health Insurance

India Network Health Insurance is a US based company that administers visitor health insurance to transition residents, tourists, students, temporary workers and their families. All insurance products are underwritten by The ACE American Insurance Company (ACE). Visitor medical plans are offered for all age groups with both fixed coverage, comprehensive coverage and with pre-existing condition coverage.

For more information visit http://www.kvrao.org

For the original version on PRWeb visit: http://www.prweb.com/releases/2015/05/prweb12691774.htm

Clinovo Exhibits at the 2015 PharmaSUG Annual Conference on May 17-20th in Orlando, FL

Written By: admin

Clinovo Staffing Solutions participates in the 2015 PharmaSUG Annual Conference, the leading SAS conference in the Life Sciences Industry taking place in Orlando, FL on May 17th-20th

Sunnyvale, California (PRWEB) April 30, 2015

Clinovo Staffing Solutions will represent Clinovo at the 2015 PharmaSUG Annual Conference held in Orlando, FL on May 17-20th, 2015. Trisha Heredia, Senior Director of Staffing Solutions along with Leslie Kolman, Manager of Staffing Solutions, will present Clinovo’s staffing services and share the latest Clinovo news at Booth #17.

“We are excited to be participating in the PharmaSUG Annual Conference again this year”, Says Trisha Heredia, Senior Director of Staffing Solutions at Clinovo. “PharmaSUG is the premier event of the year for SAS users in the pharmaceutical, healthcare, and related industries and we look forward to represent Clinovo, and share our latest news at this conference.”

With over 20 years of experience in building relationships, Clinovo is the preferred member for large leading Fortune 100 pharmaceutical and medical device companies. Clinovo is currently recruiting for numerous open positions in the San Francisco Bay Area, including both contract and full time opportunities with skillsets such as SAS Statistical and SAS Clinical Programming, Clinical Data Management, Biostatistics, Drug Safety, Medical Writing and Clinical Operations. Clinovo’s clients include leading sponsor companies such as Gilead Sciences, Genentech, Amgen, BioMarin Pharmaceutical, Medivation and Onyx Pharmaceuticals.

Clinovo’s staffing team will also present the TechTrainings to the conference attendees, a series of hands-on courses for individuals looking to improve their technical skills and reach the next step in their professional career. Clinovo offers a “CDISC Standards: Theory and Application”, a training program taught by Sy Truong, President at Meta-Xceed and author of award-winning papers. Registrations are open at clinovo.com/techtrainings.

Visit Clinovo Staffing Solutions at Booth #17 to learn about Clinovo’s career opportunities for SAS experts, and a chance to play and win raffle.

About Clinovo Staffing Solutions:

With over 20 years of experience in building relationships, Clinovo Staffing Solutions is the preferred member for large leading pharmaceutical and medical device companies. Clinovo Staffing Solutions provides both contract and full time opportunities will skillsets such as SAS Statistical and SAS Clinical Programming, Clinical Data Management, Biostatistics, Drug Safety, Medical Writing and Clinical Operations. Clinovo’s clients include leading sponsor companies such as Gilead Sciences, Genentech, Amgen, BioMarin Pharmaceutical, Medivation and Onyx Pharmaceuticals.

About Clinovo:

Clinovo is a leading provider of Cloud-based eClinical software. Clinovo's flagship solution ClinCapture is the only validated electronic data capture software, available for free. ClinCapture empowers CROs, Pharmaceuticals and Medical Device companies to build their studies themselves, lower their clinical trials costs and streamline their data capture processes. Clinovo is headquartered in the Silicon Valley

About PharmaSUG:

PharmaSUG’s mission is to provide a forum for the exchange of information and the promotion of new ideas concerning the use of software and tools in the clinical research, pharmaceutical, and healthcare industries. PharmaSUG is governed year round by an all-volunteer Executive Committee of past and future conference chairs, and a volunteer Conference Committee organizes each conference.

Contact Information:

Sophie McCallum | Director of Operations

sophie.mccallum(AT)clinovo.com | +1 (408) 773 6258

For the original version on PRWeb visit: http://www.prweb.com/releases/clinovoexhibitsat/Pharmasug2015/prweb12691385.htm

Health

Celebrity FUE Now Takes Hold in Beverly Hills

Written By: admin

Celebrity FUE, a new method for the FUE hair transplantation, is now available at the offices of Parsa Mohebi Hair Restoration.

Los Angeles, CA (PRWEB) April 30, 2015

Dr. Parsa Mohebi, an innovator in the field of hair restoration, has introduced a new method of follicular unit extraction (FUE) hair transplantation called the Celebrity FUE. The Celebrity FUE Hair Transplant is a more discrete hair transplant. This procedure for transplanting hair, which involves almost zero downtime, requires no need for shaving the donor area, and no scar. Celebrity FUE Hair Transplant offers patients all the advantages of a hair transplant surgery with truly no perceptibility, even after the first day of the procedure.

Dr. Parsa Mohebi explains, "Because of the advantages of the Celebrity FUE, we have access to a procedure that eliminates the need to shave the donor area and minimizes downtime. In an area as well known for its Hollywood exposure, Beverly Hills is a celebrity hotspot where the downtime needs to be minimal, so that our patients can go back to being entertained or entertaining the world….with a full head of hair."

This type of transplant was intended to minimize the obvious look of a hair transplant. In spite of the fact that this technique was developed specifically for the life of a VIP, it can be performed on individuals who also wish to keep their hair transplant as secret as a celebrity would, with a specific end goal to keep up their everyday way of life and schedule.

The perception and detectability of the transplant is just one of the considerations necessary when performing this procedure to cover balding areas. The slow strategy produces more prominent and satisfying results with less downtime, allowing a more developed appearance as the duration and frequency of the sessions goes on. Amid every session, the patient will get around 500 grafts, which can take up to 3-4 hours, guaranteeing the procedure is undetectable during and after the development period over time.

Celebrity FUE Hair Transplants are getting to be prominent among superstars and with the public overall. These viable small FUE sessions offer a helpful answer to the individuals who wish to have an unnoticeable hair transplant. This extraordinary technique is growing among doctors in the field of hair restoration, helping serve the needs of numerous patients since its inception.

About Dr. Parsa Mohebi:

As former chairman of the FUE Research Committee and creator of several methods and techniques in modern hair restoration, Dr. Mohebi, along with his incredible staff, provides the most advanced techniques in the industry. Dr. Mohebi prides himself in advancing new research and developing the latest technology to improve the quality of hair restoration. The overall goal at his office is to restore patient’s self-esteem through the use of quality hair restoration techniques.

For the original version on PRWeb visit: http://www.prweb.com/releases/2015/05/prweb12691367.htm

Health

PureFormulas Presents Special Olympics 5K Run/Walk on Sunday, May 3, 2015

Written By: admin

Proceeds will benefit the Miami-Dade athletes of Special Olympics Florida.

Miami, FL (PRWEB) April 30, 2015

PureFormulas is pleased to be the presenting sponsor at the annual “Special Olympics Sponsor an Athlete 5k Run/Walk” on Sunday, May 3, 2015.

The event, hosted by Gulliver Preparatory School in Pinecrest, will feature a certified 5K-run/walk course, family activities and live entertainment. Funds raised will go toward the mission of the Miami-Dade chapter of Special Olympics Florida, an organization that provides year-round sports training and athletic competition in a variety of Olympic-type sports for children and adults with intellectual disabilities.

"We are honored and excited to support the 16th annual ‘Sponsor an Athlete 5k run/walk’," said José L. Prendes, CEO of PureFormulas. “We look forward to walking and running alongside Special Olympic athletes, and helping make this year’s event bigger and better than ever.”

After the run/walk, participants will get a chance to wind down at the event’s “Olympic Village,” featuring live musical entertainment, complimentary food and beverages, and a slew of not-to-be-missed activities. PureFormulas' hospitality tent will feature games and giveaways, including gift cards for pureformulas.com, SmartShake™ bottles, jump ropes and more. PureFormulas will also raffle several FitBit Charge Heart Rate and activity wristbands. Winners will be announced after the walk and before the awards ceremony.

Registration for this event begins at 7 am at Gulliver Preparatory School (6575 North Kendall Drive). Race begins at 8 am. Once the race begins, festivities in the “Olympic Village” also will get underway. For more information, visit http://specialolympicsflorida.org/miami-dade/fundraising/2015-sponsor-an-athlete-5k/

About PureFormulas

Headquartered in Miami, FL, PureFormulas.com is a leader in the online health supplement space, distributing GMP-certified quality products, including dietary supplements, organic food, beauty products, sports nutrition supplements, and pet products, with an average of 400,000 active customers and 80+ service professionals. PureFormulas.com features a secure and friendly online shopping experience providing free shipping on more than 40,000 products. PureFormulas’ professionals work with a board of healthcare advisors, naturopaths and chiropractors to keep up-to-date with customers’ needs and healthcare trends. PureFormulas’ mission is to maintain daily motivation and passion for healthy living, with a focus on high-level customer service and quality products. For more information on PureFormulas, please go to: http://www.pureformulas.com.

About Special Olympics

Special Olympics transforms lives through the joy of sport, every day, everywhere. It is the world’s largest sports organization for people with intellectual disabilities with 4.4 million athletes in 170 countries. Here in Florida, they are serving over 26,000 athletes with the help of 19,000 dedicated coaches and volunteers. Through the power of sports, people with intellectual disabilities discover new strengths and abilities, skills and success. Special Olympics athletes find joy, confidence and fulfillment – on the playing field and in life. They also inspire people in their communities and elsewhere to open their hearts to a wider world of human talents and potential.

For the original version on PRWeb visit: http://www.prweb.com/releases/2015/05/prweb12692555.htm

Does diet shape the skull?

Written By: Chuck Bednar
Christopher Pilny

Chuck Bednar for redOrbit.com – @BednarChuck

Determining if a prehistoric creature was a carnivore or a plant-eater isn’t as easy as comparing its skull shape and tooth patterns to modern animals with similar features, researchers from the American Museum of Natural History explain in a new PLOS One study.

Rather, using models and tests on living species, John J. Flynn, the Museum’s Frick Curator of Fossil Mammals, and his colleagues found that there is a complex link between animal diets and skull biomechanics, and that a creature’s ancestry plays a larger-than-expected role.

“Traditionally, when we looked at a fossilized skull with pointy piercing teeth and sharp slicing blades, we assumed that it was primarily a meat eater, but that simplistic line of thinking doesn’t always hold true,” he said in a statement. “We’ve found that diet can be linked to a number of factors – skull size, biomechanical attributes, and often, most importantly, the species’ position in the tree of life.”

skulls diet

This image shows the skulls of the different species the researchers studied along with biomechanical profiles, which were made by mapping each animal's bite force against skull stiffness. They found that ancestry has a strong influence on the models, with closely related animals like leopards and mongooses grouping together, but also that predications about diet can be made based on the shape of the individual biomechanical profiles. (Credit: Copyright AMNH/Z.-J. Tseng)

Flynn and his colleague Z. Jack Tseng, a National Science Foundation and Frick Postdoctoral Fellow in the Museum’s Division of Paleontology, looked at the link between the shape and function of five different modern carnivore species, including meat-eating “hypercarnivores” like wolves and leopards and more omnivorous “generalists” such as skunks and raccoons.

Creating models and applying them to extinct carnivores

First, they mapped the force of an animal’s bite against the stiffness of its skull, and much to their surprise they found that creatures that had similar diets and biomechanical demands (such as the wolf and leopard) did not match up exactly. Rather, the leopard and mongoose were found to have a closer bond because the two creatures are more in an evolutionary sense, even though they now have vastly different dietary preferences and feeding strategies.

Once they took into account the impact that ancestry and skull size had on their models, though, Flynn and Tseng said that they were still able to use biomechanics to distinguish generalists from hypercarnivores. They did so by focusing on the row of teeth where the skull is strongest.

Skulls of dedicated meat eaters are stiffest when hunting with the front teeth and slicing/crushing with the back ones, while the skulls of generalists show incrementally increasing stiffness when biting sequentially from the front to the back of the tooth row, the researchers explained.

Flynn and Tseng then applied this revised model to a pair of extinct creatures: a predatory mammal known as Thinocyon velox and an early carnivore called Oodectes herpestoides. They discovered that the former had a unique hypercarnivorous feeding style which featured skull strength at both the front teeth for prey capture and the back teeth for slicing and crushing, and the latter was a generalist that likely fed on small prey due to its relatively weak skull.

“Beyond feeding adaptations of extinct species, we also want to decipher how adaptations evolved using reconstructed ancestors of living and fossil forms,” explained Tseng. “We are applying similar types of skull shape and biomechanical analyses to reconstructed hypothetical ancestor skulls of Carnivora and their relatives to map out and better understand the long history of feeding adaptation of living top predators.”

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Technology

T. rex from ‘Jurassic Park’ will return in upcoming sequel

Written By: Chuck Bednar
Christopher Pilny

Remember that large, vicious, angry Tyrannosaurus rex that wreaked havoc during the original Jurassic Park, leading to countless sleepless nights among the youth of America? According to media reports, she’s back and looking for revenge in the upcoming Jurassic World.

As both Slashfilm and Mashable reported Wednesday, filmmakers have revealed that the same T. rex that terrorized the tour group and devoured Martin Ferrero’s character Donald Gennaro in the first film will play a role in the sequel, though she’ll be a lot older this time around.

Considering that the dinosaur was full-grown when Jurassic Park came out in 1993, and in light of the fact that a T. rex is only half grown by age 15 and has an estimated lifespan of less than 30 years, the dinosaur is question is pretty much a fossil by this point (figuratively, not literally). But as director Colin Trevorrow explained, she hasn’t mellowed with age.

“This movie is her Unforgiven”

“The T. rex that’s in the film is the T. rex from the original Jurassic Park. She is 22 years older. But she’s not limping around,” he told Slashfilm. “We took the original design and obviously, technology has changed. So, it’s going to move a little bit differently, but it’ll move differently because it’s older. And we’re giving her some scars and we’re tightening her skin. So, she has that feeling of, like, an older Burt Lancaster. And this movie is her Unforgiven.”

Trevorrow added that new dinosaurs would also be introduced in Jurassic World, the fourth movie in the Jurassic Park series. Among those new species will be the Ankylosaurus, which the director refers to as “a bad ass dinosaur,” as well as a “new kind of flying dinosaur that no one’s ever seen before” and an underwater reptile that is “pretty cool.”

“We got to build everyone from the ground up because technology has changed so much that everything is a rebuild,” the director told Slashfilm. “I got to bring in dinosaurs that I’ve always thought deserved a big scene… [but] I didn’t want to just throw the kitchen sink at it. Each of these movies has done a good job at just very carefully, in a measured way, increasing the new dinosaurs that you see. But, there’s a lot of dinosaurs in the movie for sure.”

Jurassic World stars Chris Pratt and Bryce Dallas Howard and is due out June 12.

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Pancreatic cancer rates higher in countries with less sunlight

Written By: Brett Smith
Christopher Pilny

Brett Smith for redOrbit.com – @ParkstBrett

Those of us living in northern latitudes know that not getting enough sunlight during winter can have a negative effect on our mood, and now it turns out those grey skies could also mean a higher risk of pancreatic cancer.

According to a new study published in the Journal of Steroid Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, countries with the lowest levels of sunlight year-round, due to either cloud cover or latitude, have the highest incidences of pancreatic cancer. The study team suggested that the effect could be due to lower levels of vitamin D.

“If you’re living at a high latitude or in a place with a lot of heavy cloud cover, you can’t make vitamin D most of the year, which results in a higher-than-normal risk of getting pancreatic cancer,” said study author Cedric F. Garland, adjunct professor in the Department of Family Medicine and Public Health at the University of California, San Diego.

“People who live in sunny countries near the equator have only one-sixth of the age-adjusted incidence rate of pancreatic cancer as those who live far from it,” Garland added. “The importance of sunlight deficiency strongly suggests – but does not prove – that vitamin D deficiency may contribute to risk of pancreatic cancer.”

Strengthening the connection

Previous work by the same researchers had revealed that adequate levels of a metabolite of vitamin D, known as 25-hydroxyvitamin D, was connected with considerably reduced risk of breast and colorectal cancer. In the new study, scientists studied information from nearly 110 countries, taking into consideration relevant international difference and confounding factors, such as alcohol usage, obesity and smoking.

“While these other factors also contribute to risk, the strong inverse association with cloud-cover adjusted sunlight persisted even after they were accounted for,” Garland said.

Past research has made the connection between high latitude and a greater risk of pancreatic cancer before; however, Garland said the new study strengthens that connection by looking at levels of solar ultraviolet B radiation adjusted for cloud cover.

The study team noted that their paper is the first to point directly to vitamin D deficiency with respect to pancreatic cancer risk. In addition to sunlight, vitamin D can also be obtained by eating fatty fish, cheese, and egg yolks.

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Early tests of NASA’s shape-changing wings successful

Written By: Chuck Bednar
Christopher Pilny

Chuck Bednar for redOrbit.com – @BednarChuck

Shape-shifting wings developed by researchers at NASA, the Air Force Research Laboratory (AFRL), and Michigan-based FlexSys Inc. have successfully completed a series of initial fight tests, officials at the US space agency announced earlier this week.

The technology–which NASA claims has the potential to significantly reduce fuel costs, airframe weight, and noise during takeoffs and landings–went on 22 test flights over a six-month span, test teams at the agency’s Armstrong Flight Research Center in Edwards, California said.

Known as Adaptive Compliant Trailing Edge (ACTE) flight control surfaces, the wings can be adjusted as needed. For the purposes of the test flights, however, the curvature was set anywhere from -2 to 30 degrees. Ultimately, the flexible wings could allow planes to be lighter and quieter while potentially saving millions of dollars in fuel costs.

Results will be used to guide future aircraft development

AFRL and FlexSys first started collaborating through the Small Business Innovative Research (SBIR) program in 1998, NASA said, and the two firms developed and used wind tunnels to test several different designs through 2006. In 2009, NASA’s Environmentally Responsible Aviation (ERA) project got involved as it and the AFRL agreed to outfit a Gulfstream III jet with ACTE flaps designed and built by their private sector, Michigan-based partner.

The technology can be retrofitted to existing airplane wings or integrated into new airframes, the agency explained. The flight tests were designed to prove the concept was airworthy, they added, and both primary and secondary objectives were completed successfully and within budget. The test results will be used to help guide the development of future large transport aircraft.

In a statement, ERA project manager Fay Collier said that “the completion of this flight test campaign at Armstrong is a big step for NASA’s Environmentally Responsible Aviation Project. This is the first of eight large-scale integrated technology demonstrations ERA is finishing up this year that are designed to reduce the impact of aviation on the environment.”

“We are thrilled to have accomplished all of our flight test goals without encountering any significant technical issues,” added AFRL Program Manager Pete Flick from Wright-Patterson Air Force Base in Ohio. “These flights cap 17 years of technology maturation, beginning with AFRL’s initial Phase 1 SBIR contract with FlexSys, and the technology now is ready to dramatically improve aircraft efficiency for the Air Force and the commercial aviation industry.”

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Monkey language has at least six ‘words’

Written By: Chuck Bednar
Christopher Pilny

Chuck Bednar for redOrbit.com – @BednarChuck

While male Campbell’s monkeys may not have a large enough vocabulary to come up with one of those word-a-day calendars, new research published in the latest edition of the Proceedings of the Royal Society B reveals that the primates are able to communicate using six main sounds.

The key to those sounds, Camille Coye of the University of St. Andrews and an international team of colleagues explained, are the use of the suffix “-oo,” which partially offsets the lack of control that they have over their acoustic flexibility. The same researchers previously reported that male Campbell’s monkeys use at least six primary calls: boom-boom, krak, krak-oo, hok, hok-oo and wak-oo.

Each of those calls have a unique meaning, according to Discovery News, and can be understood by both male and female members of their own species, as well as by members of a related group of primates known as Diana monkeys. Furthermore, their research confirms previously suspected translations of what each of those calls mean.

For instance, when a male Campbell’s monkey makes the “krak” sound, it means that there is a leopard nearby, but by adding the suffix “-oo” to make “krak-oo,” the meaning changes to indicate the presence of a non-leopard disturbance such as another animal passing by. They can combine the sounds, so that the noises “boom-boom-krak-oo” form a sentence meaning “Look out for that falling tree branch!”

Experimentally testing non-humans use of suffixation

“This study is the first to experimentally test the existence and saliency to receivers of ‘suffixation’ – a mechanism analogous to the one observed in humans – in the natural communication of wild animals,” Coye told redOrbit via email. “There are only a few studies describing suffixation-like systems in the vocal repertoire of their species, and ours is the only one to demonstrate experimentally the cognitive relevance of this combinatorial system in wild animals.”

However, she added that her team believes this phenomenon may be “widespread” and that experts only lack “comparative investigations at the moment. In line with this idea, there are more and more studies finding call combinations at the vocal sequence level (e.g. in hyraxes and bonobos). We hope that our study will inspire other researches of this kind.”

Coye and her colleagues used a playback experiment, broadcasting both actual and artificially modified male Campbell’s monkey calls to see how recipients would react to those suffixation patterns. The calls were played to a group of 42 male and female Diana monkeys, and the way that the latter group responded indicated that they understood the meaning of the calls for both natural and artificially recombined calls, hence confirming the combinatorial hypothesis.

Other root calls used by the primates include “hok” for crowned eagle and “wak,” which has a less clear-cut meaning. They know the context in which the monkeys use these calls, but they are always used in complex sequences with other calls, Coye explained. Like “krak,” each of these terms can be altered by adding “-oo,” changing “hok” from an alert about birds of prey to “boom boom hok-oo hok-oo,” which Discovery News said appears to involve claiming territory.

Similar to, but not quite, a human-like language

The researchers emphasize that the use of the term “language” should be reserved for people, though several similarities between humanity’s method of communicating and the calls of the Campbell’s monkeys. In addition the use of suffixes to change call meanings, they have been shown to engage in conversations and possess “vocal convergence” similar to accents.

“Language is a uniquely human capacity, involving complex cognitive functions, memory and developed vocal abilities, and we still do not know how it appeared in our species,” Coye told redOrbit. “Its outstanding complexity led the specialists to the conclusion that it could not have evolved from scratch and that some precursors of the cognitive abilities and communicative mechanisms observed in humans may have evolved earlier in the primate lineage.”

As such, she added, these abilities and mechanisms “may be found in other primate species. Hence, our goal is to understand which abilities existed before language, abilities which may have been the ground of language evolution. To this end, we try to describe the parallels and differences observed between human language and non-human primates’ communication.”

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Sour Apple: Samsung regains top spot in smartphone sales

Written By: Chuck Bednar
Christopher Pilny

Chuck Bednar for redOrbit.com – @BednarChuck
After briefly being locked in a virtual dead heat with Apple in terms of global smartphone sales in the fourth quarter of last year, Samsung has once again pulled ahead of its US-based rival and reclaimed the top spot in the mobile device market, according to media reports.
Figures published by The Verge on Wednesday reveal that, while the two companies had each shipped about around 74 million devices worldwide in Q4 2014, Samsung’s sales were up to 80-plus million during the first three months of 2015, while Apple’s had fallen to 61 million.
However, the news wasn’t all good for the Korean tech giant. While sales are up, profits fell for the fourth consecutive quarter, according to Mashable. Samsung made $4.3 billion in Q1 2015, a 39-percent decline compared to the same period last year, the website added.
So what’s up? Why isn’t Samsung making money?
The reason, according to analysts, is due to the bulk of the company’s sales coming from the less profitable low-end and mid-range devices, such as the Galaxy A, E and J line, while Apple’s sales are from more expensive smartphones. Samsung may sell more phones, but Apple makes more money from each device it sells, they explain.
Neil Mawston, executive director of Strategy Analytics, told Mashable that the Korean company has been caught in what he calls a “pincer movement,” meaning that it faces competition from Apple on the high-end of the smartphone spectrum and from start-ups such as Chinese company Huawei on the lower, budget-friendly end of the spectrum.
He added that it had taken Samsung “several quarters” to react to the competition on both ends and develop products to address the issue, such as the high-end Galaxy S6 and Galaxy S6 edge that were designed to challenge Apple’s iPhone 6 and 6+. While it’s a step in the right direction, Mawston said that Samsung likely has “another year or two of work” to do to fully recover.
It has also launched new, cheaper devices such as the Z1 (which costs just $92) to compete with the likes of Huawei and Xiaomi, the website added. The firm has also been investing in making its own microchips, screens and other components in order to reduce reliance on third-parties and make more money from each phone.
“All of that work and all of that investment that the company has had on the high end will be trickling down to the other designs and hopefully yield better cost control,” said ABI Research analyst Jeff Orr. However, he noted that it would still be difficult to appear to consumers at all ends of the spectrum, since it “has to compete with every… phone company out there.”
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Cell phone use during surgery may be the new anesthetic

Written By: Christopher Pilny
Christopher Pilny

Shayne Jacopian for redOrbit.com – @ShayneJacopian

There is a time and a place for everything, and sometimes, there is a time and place where you shouldn’t be texting. Whether you’re out to dinner, driving, listening to your significant other talk about their day—okay, people do that stuff anyway, so maybe this isn’t so strange, after all.

A Cornell University study led by Communications and Information Science Professor Jeff Hancock and doctoral student Jamie Guillory has found that cell phone use during surgery can reduce patients’ need for narcotic pain relief.

Wait, what?!

Knowing that social support before and during procedures done without general anesthesia can reduce perceptions of pain, the researchers allowed subjects to use their cell phones during their minor surgeries to either play the ever-popular Angry Birds, text a friend or family member, or text a complete stranger.

What they found was that those who received standard therapy—those who weren’t allowed to use cell phones during their procedures—were twice as likely to receive additional pain relief drugs than patients who played Angry Birds during their operations. Standard patients were four times as likely to need additional relief than patients who texted friends or relatives, and six times as likely to need more drugs than those who got familiar with strangers during their procedures.

The researchers say this study provides the first evidence that texting during surgery is more affective than, well, not texting during surgery, and is even more effective than other distraction methods like playing videogames while going under the knife for minor surgeries, like the removal of benign skin growths.

cell phone anesthetic

Just don’t expect to make a new friend via text message during your next open heart surgery. They’re probably not going to let you stay awake for that one.

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Goodbye MESSENGER; it’s been a good 10 years

Written By: Chuck Bednar
Christopher Pilny

Chuck Bednar for redOrbit.com – @BednarChuck

After several years of service studying Mercury, the closest planet to the sun, the NASA MESSENGER spacecraft has run out of fuel and will fall to Mercury’s surface this afternoon, sometime around 3:30pm EDT, officials from the US space agency have confirmed.

The probe is scheduled to crash at speeds of more than 8,750 miles per hour (3.91 kilometers per second) and will leave an impact crater that engineers estimate could be up to 52 feet (16 meters) wide, forever becoming part of the world that it spent so much time analyzing for afar.

(Cue this.)

Bringing light and intricacies

The MESSENGER (MErcury Surface, Space ENvironment, GEochemistry, and Ranging) probe has travelled around Mercury more than 4,100 times since entering the orbit around the planet on March 18, 2011, becoming the first spacecraft ever to do so and only the second to get a close-up look at the smallest world in the solar system (Mariner 10 was the other).

“MESSENGER brought to light the intricacies of an intriguing world,” NASA said.

“The mission discovered a surface rich in diverse chemistry,” the agency recalled. “It sensed a bizarrely offset magnetic field. It photographed strange ‘hollows’ where material seems to have boiled away into space under the scorching sun. It mapped vast volcanic deposits, found that the entire planet has shrunk by as much as 7 kilometers in radius, and… uncovered deposits of water ice in the depths of polar craters where the sun never shines.”

A word from MESSENGER:

Drastically changing understanding

MESSENGER launched on August 3, 2004, traveling 4.9 billion miles (7.9 billion kilometers) and completing flybys of Earth, Venus, and Mercury before finally beginning what was supposed to be a one-year science orbit around its target in March 2011. However, as it started collecting data, scientists found themselves left with more questions than answers, leading NASA to grant a pair of mission extensions for a total of three additional years of research.

Over the course of its lifespan, the spacecraft has drastically changed scientists’ understanding of Mercury, according to deputy principal investigator Larry Nittler from the Carnegie Institution of Washington. Geochemical measurements conducted by MESSENGER revealed that the planet’s surface had little iron but was rich in moderately volatile elements like sodium and sulfur, ruling out existing theories used to explain why the planet had a higher density than other worlds.

Elemental maps also revealed that the planet was highly heterogeneous, chemically speaking, and that Mercury’s surface was shaped by volcanic activity. MESSENGER also discovered a series of unique geological structures that were shaped by the loss of volatile materials, as well as confirmed the presence of considerable water ice that was sheltered from the sun’s heat in a series of permanently shadowed impact craters near the planet’s polar regions.

“We have found that the complex interplay of the interplanetary magnetic field with that of Mercury results in a remarkably dynamic electromagnetic environment surrounding the planet, including unexplained bursts of electrons and highly variable distributions of different elements in the thin exosphere,” Nittler said last year while marking the probe’s 10th anniversary.

Officials from the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory unveiled a list of their “Top 10” MESSENGER science results – discoveries which include field-aligned currents running from its magnetosphere to low altitudes along magnetic field lines, bursts of energetic electrons in the planet’s magnetosphere, seasonal variations in its exosphere and the fact that the planet is getting smaller, having contracted by as much as seven kilometers in radius.

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So…Pluto may have a polar ice cap

Written By: Chuck Bednar
Christopher Pilny

Chuck Bednar for redOrbit.com – @BednarChuck

New images captured by NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft have revealed a bright feature near the visible pole of the dwarf planet Pluto – a feature that could be a polar cap made of frozen molecular nitrogen ice, officials from the US space agency announced on Wednesday.

The feature, one of several dark and bright spots captured using New Horizons’ telescopic Long-Range Reconnaissance Imager (LORRI) camera earlier this month, appears to be brighter than its surroundings, leading scientists to believe it may be caused by a “cap” of highly reflective snow.

The images were captured from a distance of less than 70 million miles (113 million kilometers) during the early and middle parts of the month, and the polar cap hypothesis will be confirmed or disproven when the spacecraft completes a close flyby of Pluto in July, NASA said.

An early look at Pluto and its largest moon

In addition to the possible polar cap, these LORRI images revealed changing brightness patterns from place to place as the dwarf planet rotates, the agency said. The resolution of the raw images were improved using a mathematical technique known as “deconvolution,” which restored nearly the image to full resolution.

Pluto LORRI

“As we approach the Pluto system we are starting to see intriguing features such as a bright region near Pluto’s visible pole, starting the great scientific adventure to understand this enigmatic celestial object,” John Grunsfeld, associate administrator for NASA’s Science Mission Directorate in Washington, said in a statement. “As we get closer, the excitement is building in our quest to unravel the mysteries of Pluto using data from New Horizons.”

In addition to capturing pictures and video of Pluto, the spacecraft’s cameras were able to snap images of its largest moon, Charon, rotating during its 6.4-day long orbit, the agency said. The exposure times needed to create this image set were just one-tenth of a second, making them too short for the camera to detect and capture images of the dwarf planet’s smaller moons.

Alan Stern, New Horizons principal investigator at Southwest Research Institute in Boulder, Colorado, said that it was “stunning” to get a good look at Pluto and its surface features after a journey of more than nine years. He added that these “incredible” images are “already showing us that Pluto has a complex surface.”

“We can only imagine what surprises will be revealed when New Horizons passes approximately 7,800 miles (12,500 kilometers) above Pluto’s surface this summer,” added Hal Weaver, project scientist at the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory (APL) in Maryland.

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MPH Acquisition Holdings LLC to Hold Investors’ Conference Call

Written By: admin

Investors' Conference Call to be held May 4, 2015

(PRWEB) April 29, 2015

MPH Acquisition Holdings LLC today announced that on Monday, May 4, 2015 at 4:30 pm Eastern Time, an investors’ conference call will be held for the holders of its Senior Notes due 2022.

The investors’ conference call information will be available to Noteholders on the company's secure online data site. Holders of the Notes who do not already have access to this secure online data site may request it by sending an email to Tracy.Fritz(at)multiplan(dot)com.

For the original version on PRWeb visit: http://www.prweb.com/releases/2015/04/prweb12683782.htm

Rhinophyma: Tips for Dealing with a Large, Red Nose

Written By: admin

Dermatology Specialist Dr. Joshua Fox Answers Questions and Explains Link to Rosacea

Albertson, NY (PRWEB) April 29, 2015

The bulbous, red nose most often associated with the comedian W.C. Fields has often been thought to be caused by heavy drinking. While alcohol consumption may increase blood flow to the face and cause temporary redness, it is not responsible for rhinophyma, a skin condition characterized by a large, red, bumpy nose that is just as likely to occur in non-drinkers as in drinkers.

“Rhinophyma is a complication of an advanced stage of severe rosacea,” says Dr. Joshua Fox, Founder and medical director of Advanced Dermatology, P.C. “It can rarely interfere with breathing and the changes to appearance can cause severe emotional distress and even social isolation. Fortunately, we have effective treatments for rhinophyma that reduce or eliminate its disfiguring effects.”

What causes rhinophyma?

While rhinophyma is rare, rosacea is a common, chronic, inflammatory skin condition in which blood vessels under the skin expand allowing more blood to flow to the surface and giving the face a red, sun-burned or wind-burned appearance. As the condition progresses, small, pimple-like bumps appear that resemble acne but there are no blackheads or whiteheads that are typical of that teen-age affliction. In the most severe, advanced cases of rosacea, the outer layers of skin on the nose thicken and develop enlarged pores as the lower nose gradually grows into the swollen, bulbous shape typical of rhinophyma.

“We don't know why some cases of rosacea advance to rhinophyma and others don't,” says Dr. Fox. “Some think rhinophyma is most commonly seen in middle-aged and older men although rosacea occurs more often in women. People with light hair, skin and eyes and a family history of the disorder are also at higher risk for rosacea.”

In addition, if the rosacea is treated at an earlier stage it may prevent its progression.

What can be done to prevent rhinophyma?

There is no definitive way of preventing the progression of rosacea to rhinohpyma but avoiding triggers that aggravate rosacea by increasing blood flow to the face can delay the worsening of symptoms. Common irritants include excessive exposure to the sun; hot, cold and windy weather extremes; stress; hot and spicy foods; alcohol; and medications that dilate the blood vessels. One new cream is Soolantra 1% Ivermectin cream which may help rosacea.

Tips for treating rhinophyma.

Rhinophyma will not clear up on its own. When it is diagnosed in the early stages, some medications can be effective in alleviating the symptoms. These include oral antibiotics to reduce inflammation, topical creams or ointments to reduce swelling, and acne treatments that prevent the sebaceous glands from producing oil.

In most cases, surgery to remove excess tissue and reshape the nose is the best solution for long-term elimination of rhinophyma's disfiguring effects. Surgical techniques include reconstructive (or cosmetic) surgery using a scalpel and performed under an anesthetic; laser surgery, which generally causes less bleeding than conventional surgery; electro-surgery, using electric current; cryosurgery, which freezes the tissue to be removed; and dermabrasion, which uses a rotating brush to smooth the tissue and is often used in combination with other procedures. There are many techniques to reshape the nose and remove excessive tissue. But according to Dr. Fox, the best technique is laser surgery as it allows reshaping of the nose with minimal to no bleeding and the lowest risk of scarring.

“Untreated rhinophyma gets progressively worse and can cause permanent disfigurement as well as breathing problems,” says Dr. Fox. “Since treatment is most effective in the early stages, people with rosacea and rhinophyma should be vigilant in avoiding aggravating factors and seeking treatment before symptoms progress to a more serious stage and may be more difficult to manage or eliminate. With the treatments available today, there is no need to live with the physical and emotional effects of rhinophyma. This year we treated several men and one woman with this disfiguring condition. Most did not realize that there was a laser treatment for their condition to allow them to look normal again.”

Joshua L. Fox, M.D., F.A.A.D., Medical Director at Advanced Dermatology PC. He is board certified and specializes in skin cancer, cosmetic surgery and laser procedures.

Advanced Dermatology P.C. and the Center for Laser and Cosmetic Surgery (New York & New Jersey) is one of the leading dermatology centers in the nation with 13 locations in New York and New Jersey, offering highly experienced physicians in the fields of cosmetic and laser dermatology as well as plastic surgery and state-of-the-art medical technologies. http://www.advanceddermatologypc.com.

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Ace Hardware Celebrity Shootout to Benefit Children’s Miracle Network Hospitals, Premiers May 12 on the Golf Channel

Written By: admin

Professional baseball, basketball, football and hockey athletes compete in 18th annual Ace Hardware golf tournament to raise $1.6 million for Children’s Miracle Network Hospitals.

KOHALA COAST, Hawaii (PRWEB) April 29, 2015

Professional athletes from baseball, football, basketball and hockey will level the playing field on the golf course for the 18th Annual Ace Hardware Celebrity Golf Shootout. The event supports Children’s Miracle Network Hospitals®, a charity that raises funds and awareness for 170 children’s hospitals across North America.

Set to air on the Golf Channel at 5 a.m. and 5 p.m. ET on May 12, and again at 2 a.m. ET on June 9 and 11 a.m. ET on June 10, the 18th Annual Ace Hardware Celebrity Golf Shootout features some of the biggest names in professional sports in an event known for stunning golf shots at a premier course in Hawaii. Paired in teams according to sport, the athletes will compete in a series of golf challenges, raising $1.6 million for Children’s Miracle Network Hospitals. Each athlete also will play for their local Children’s Miracle Network Hospital, with the fan favorite receiving $50,000 to donate to his hospital.

“What these athletes can do with a golf club is amazing,” said NFL Hall of Famer Steve Young, who hosts the event with Melanie Collins, the face of Yahoo! Sports and co-host of the Golf Channel’s Big Break. “But to witness their competitive spirit to ultimately benefit sick and injured kids in their communities, is truly remarkable. It was an honor to raise funds for Children’s Miracle Network Hospitals with each of them.”

Competing in the 2015 Ace Celebrity Golf Shootout are:

  • MLB Network analyst Kevin Millar, playing for Dell Children’s Medical Center of Central Texas
  • Two-time MLB All-Star Derek Lowe, playing for Miami Children’s Hospital
  • NBA All-Star Julius Irving, playing for Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta
  • Slam dunk legend Spud Webb, playing for Children’s Medical Center of Dallas
  • NFL Chicago Bears placekicker Robbie Gould, playing for Ann & Robert H. Lurie Children's Hospital of Chicago
  • Former NFL player and Monday Night Football commentator Trent Dilfer, playing for Valley Children’s Hospital, Fresno, Calif.
  • 1980 U.S. Olympic Hockey Team Captain Mike Eruzione, playing for Boston Children’s Hospital
  • Four-time Stanley Cup winner Clark Gillies, playing for Steven and Alexandra Cohen Children’s Medical Center of New York

The event was held at the scenic Mauna Lani Bay Hotel and Bungalows in Kohala Coast, Hawaii. The weeklong event began with a reception that included a performance by Grammy award nominee Brian McKnight. Since its inception, the Ace Hardware Celebrity Shootout has raised $13 million for kids treated at Children’s Miracle Network Hospitals.

***Photos available upon request.

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About Children's Miracle Network Hospitals

Children’s Miracle Network Hospitals® raises funds and awareness for 170 member hospitals that provide 32 million treatments each year to kids across the U.S. and Canada. Donations stay local to fund critical treatments and healthcare services, pediatric medical equipment and charitable care. Since 1983, Children’s Miracle Network Hospitals has raised more than $5 billion, most of it $1 at a time through the charity's Miracle Balloon icon. Its various fundraising partners and programs support the nonprofit's mission to save and improve the lives of as many children as possible. Find out why children's hospitals need community support, identify your member hospital and learn how you can “Put Your Money Where the Miracles Are", at CMNHospitals.org and facebook.com/CMNHospitals.

About the Ace Hardware Foundation

As the official charitable division of Ace Hardware Corporation, the Ace Hardware Foundation helps

enhance the vision of being the “Helpful Place” in local communities across the country and around the globe through charitable giving. The Ace Foundation provides support and philanthropic opportunities to its consumers, retail store owners, vendors and team members to give back to local communities through fundraising efforts for Children’s Miracle Network Hospitals and American Red Cross Disaster Relief.

About Ace Hardware

For more than 90 years, Ace Hardware has been known as the place with the helpful hardware folks in thousands of neighborhoods across America, providing customers with a more personal kind of helpful. In 2014, Ace ranked “Highest in Customer Satisfaction with Home Improvement Retails Stores, Eight Years in a Row”, according to J.D. Power. With more than 4,800 hardware stores locally owned and operated across the globe, Ace is the largest retailer-owned hardware cooperative in the world. Headquartered in Oak Brook, Ill., Ace and its subsidiaries currently operate 17 distribution centers in the U.S. and also have distributions capabilities in Shanghai, China; Panama City, Panama; and Dubai, United Arab Emirates. Its retailers’ stores are located in all 50 states, the District of Columbia and approximately 60 countries. For more information on Ace, visit http://www.acehardware.com.

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Health

Skin Care Institute Introduces InMode Laser System to Tulsa, OK

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Skin Care Institute is proud to offer the InMode laser system for fractional skin resurfacing, laser hair removal, skin tightening and IPL Photo Facials.

TULSA, Oklahoma (PRWEB) April 30, 2015

Skin Care Institute offers a variety of skin rejuvenation treatments for clients. However, what sets Skin Care Institute apart is a constant improvement of technology and dedication to providing the most advanced and effective skin rejuvenation and body contouring treatments available. Now, the InMode system is available to clients to ensure optimal results for all skin care concerns.

InMode lasers have taken fractional skin resurfacing, laser hair removal, noninvasive skin tightening and IPL photo facials to new dimensions and Skin Care Institute is excited to be the first to offer this laser technology in Oklahoma. This revolutionary laser system has been featured on The Doctors, Rachel Ray, E!, EXTRA, and more!

The InMode laser system is a faster, more effective system for skin resurfacing. The Fractora™ laser for example, is used for skin resurfacing and utilizes the most advanced radio-frequency technology available to ensure optimal results. Youthful looking skin can also be achieved with Forma™, which tightens skin and stimulates the formation of collagen to leave clients with long-lasting results. Lumecca™ uses selective photothermolysis to effectively treat a variety of skin types and conditions, resulting in the reduction of visible signs of aging such as age spots, sun spots, uneven skin tone and more. With the various skin rejuvenation treatments available with InMode, patients are able to restore a smooth, natural look with little to no downtime.

Skin Care Institute is proud to offer the most advanced technology to help their clients enjoy the benefits of ageless skin with non-invasive skin rejuvenation treatments in Tulsa, Oklahoma.

About Skin Care Institute Medical & Wellness Spa

Skin Care Institute’s mission is to provide both men and women with the best in skin care and wellness. Dermatologist Jeff Alexander, MD, is always seeking the newest, safest and most effective technology for skin rejuvenation and anti-aging. A balanced blend of science and aesthetics is the foundation for the services provided by Skin Care Institute Medical & Wellness Spa, established in 1999. Two years ago, Skin Care Institute added a "wellness" component to their medical spa.

Skin Care Institute’s licensed professionals provide the finest in treatments and products in the relaxing and soothing atmosphere of a modern spa setting. With this combination, Skin Care Institute has become Oklahoma’s premier medical spa, offering treatments like Vectus laser hair removal, Botox®, Juvéderm®, Restylane®, laser hair reduction, Ultherapy®, Clear + Brilliant™, IPL Photo Facials, chemical peels and more.

Skin Care Institute Medical & Wellness Spa is located in the Kelly Medical Building at 6565 South Yale Avenue, Suite 110 in Tulsa Oklahoma.

About Dr. Jeff Alexander, Medical Director of Skin Care Institute

Jeff Alexander, MD, is the owner and medical director of Skin Care Institute Medical & Wellness Spa in Tulsa, OK. He is certified by the American Board of Dermatology and he has over 30 years of experience in skin care.

He is a graduate of the University of Nebraska Medical School and of the University of Oklahoma Dermatology Program. Dr. Alexander has served as President of the Oklahoma Dermatological Society and of the Tulsa Dermatological Society. He is currently the Chairman of the Department of Dermatology at St. Francis Hospital in Tulsa. He has also served on the speaker’s bureau for GlaxoSmithKline, SkinCeuticals, Novartis Pharmaceuticals and SkinMedica and he has served as assistant clinical professor and dermatology instructor for medical students and residents at the University of Oklahoma.

In 1999, Dr. Alexander opened the first medical spa in Oklahoma, Skin Care Institute. By combining cutting-edge laser technology with aesthetic and medical procedures, he paved the way for others in the industry. As medical director of Skin Care Institute in Tulsa, Dr. Alexander introduced laser hair removal and intense pulsed light FotoFacial™ rejuvenation to Oklahoma. In addition, he was also the first to bring Ultherapy® to Tulsa.

He was awarded the prestigious honor of being one of the top two dermatologists in North America for best skin tightening procedures and overall results by Reliant Technologies, manufacturer of the Fraxel repair™ laser. In 2011, Dr. Alexander's practice became the first in Oklahoma to offer CoolSculpting® by ZELTIQ™. This FDA-approved, fat-freezing system is a noninvasive procedure with little or no downtime.

For the original version on PRWeb visit: http://www.prweb.com/releases/2015/05/prweb12689632.htm

U.S. Issues Patent for Administration of Pentec Health’s PROPLETE® Product

Written By: admin

Latest Award Extends Patent Protection to Domestic IDPN Market

Philadelphia, PA (PRWEB) April 30, 2015

Pentec Health, Inc. today announced that its proprietary PROPLETE® product line has been awarded a United States patent. The renal nutrition formulation now enjoys patent protection in the US, as well as Europe (United Kingdom), Asia (Japan, Hong Kong), Australia (Australia, New Zealand), Africa (South Africa) and North America (Canada). It is the only Intradialytic Parenteral Nutrition formulation in the US with a patent.

"With the award of a US patent, Proplete patents now literally circle the globe,” remarked Joseph Cosgrove, Chairman, President and CEO of Pentec Health. “The US patent has been long anticipated by our employees and associates across the country,” noted Cosgrove. “The issuance of the only American patent for administration of an IDPN nutritional supplement recognizes the uniquely distinctive profile of this widely utilized therapy. It provides yet another source of pride for the entire Pentec Health family.”

The PROPLETE® product line, Pentec Health's proprietary Intradialytic Parenteral Nutrition (IDPN) supplement, was developed through continued efforts to meet the renal nutrition needs of the dialysis community. The PROPLETE® product line is effective in treating patients with malnutrition who are receiving hemodialysis for end-stage chronic kidney disease.

The inventor, Eileen Moore, CNSC, RD LD, Clinical Liaison Director-Renal Products at Pentec Health explains, “The formulation design addresses the issue of protein malnutrition and, unlike traditional products, is characterized by reduced dextrose, no lipids and low volume.” She adds, “It is noteworthy that the use of PROPLETE® IDPN therapy demonstrated an increase in albumin levels of both non-diabetic and diabetic hemodialysis patients. According to key opinion leaders, improved albumin levels coupled with an improving protein energy wasting profile have demonstrated a potential for not only a higher quality of life but also for survival advantages for patients.” As of December 31, 2012, there were nearly a half million prevalent hemodialysis patients in the US, nearly half of which had a diagnosis of diabetes. References available upon request.

Not surprisingly and buoyed by this latest success, Pentec Health is currently pursuing additional patents for its PROPLETE® product line in the US and around the world. Pentec's PROPLETE® and pharmacy compounding services are available in all 50 US states.

About Pentec Health, Inc.

For over 30 years, Pentec Health has been an industry leader in providing physician prescribed, custom prepared, patient-specific sterile medications that are intended for patient administration in the home as well as various alternate administration sites. Pentec Health is focused on providing renal nutritional products and services to dialysis centers for their malnourished dialysis patients, and as a Joint Commission accredited home care provider, the company offers in-home infusion services for highly complex conditions that are underserved by traditional home care providers. For more information on Pentec Health, Inc., visit http://www.pentechealth.com.

For the original version on PRWeb visit: http://www.prweb.com/releases/2015/05/prweb12689201.htm

Lakes, signs of life discovered under Antarctica’s dry valleys

Written By: Eric Hopton
Christopher Pilny

Eric Hopton for redOrbit.com – Your Universe Online

Antarctica may not be the frozen wasteland many people imagine. Helicopters carrying a novel airborn electromagnetic mapping sensor system, known as SkyTEM, have discovered hidden interconnected lakes beneath its dry valleys. This is the first time SkyTEM, developed at the University of Aarhus in Denmark, has been deployed in Antarctica.

The scientists behind the project believe the valleys could sustain life and help us understand more about ancient climate change.

Jill Mikucki, a, microbiology assistant professor at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, was part of the team that detected extensive salty groundwater networks.

The research was funded by the National Science Foundation and provides compelling evidence that the underground lakes and brine-saturated sediments may support subsurface microbial ecosystems. The findings helped the team understand glacial dynamics and also revealed how Antarctica has responded to climate change over time.

“It may change the way people think about the coastal margins of Antarctica. We know there is significant saturated sediment below the surface that is likely seeping into the ocean and affecting the productivity of things that feed ocean food webs. It lends to the understanding of the flow of nutrients and how that might affect ecosystem health” said Mikucki.

The newly discovered brines form extensive aquifers below glaciers and lakes and within permanently frozen soils. They could contain similar microbial communities in the deep, cold dark groundwater. The brines may also give an insight into the way microbes survive such extreme conditions. They may even provide the basis for future exploration of a subsurface habitat on Mars.

Blood Falls microbes

The international interdisciplinary team used the airborne sensor to gather extensive imagery of the subsurface of the coldest, driest desert on earth, Antarctica’s McMurdo Dry Valleys. Using a helicopter meant measurements from large areas of rugged terrain could be surveyed.

The helicopter also flew the sensor over the Taylor Glacier which has a unique feature known as Blood Falls, where iron-rich brine from the subsurface is released at the front of the glacier. Blood Falls has an active microbial community where organisms use iron and sulfur compounds for energy and growth. This process facilitates rock weathering.

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Polygamy is bad for the heart, study says

Written By: Chuck Bednar
Christopher Pilny

Chuck Bednar for redOrbit.com – @BednarChuck

Men who are have more than one wife are far more likely to have cardiovascular disease, claims new research linking polygamy with a four-fold increase in the risk of blocked heart vessels.

Dr. Amin Daoulah, a cardiologist at the King Faisal Specialist Hospital and Research Centre in Saudi Arabia found that the risk and severity of heart disease increased with the number of wives, and was lowest in men who were in a monogamous marriage.

“There is evidence that married people have better overall health and longevity, but until now no study has assessed the effect of polygamy on cardiovascular health,” Dr. Daoulah explained in a statement Wednesday, adding that he and his co-authors had discovered “an association between an increasing number of wives and the severity and number of coronary blockages.”

Balancing multiple families may be bad for the heart

The cardiologist explained polygamy is practiced primarily in North and West Africa, the Middle East, and Central and Southeast Asia, and that polygamous men can have up to four wives at the same time. Those women can be in the same region, but are not usually in the same home.

According to Live Science, the Koran states that men in polygamous marriages must treat each household fairly and equitably, and Dr. Daoulah believes that the link between polygamy and the increased risk of heart disease could be due to the financial and emotional burdens of doing so.

“The need to provide and maintain separate households multiplies the financial burden and emotional expense,” he explained, noting that the “stress” of balancing “several spouses and possible several families of children is considerable” and could have an adverse impact on a person’s cardiovascular health and overall wellbeing.

“However, unmeasured confounding variables such as physical activity, level of intimacy, dietary habits, and genetic effects from interbreeding with close relatives needs to be analyzed in greater depth as they may influence the outcome,” the cardiologist continued.

Polygamous men more likely to have narrowed arteries

Dr. Daoulah, whose team presented their findings Wednesday at the Asian Pacific Society of Cardiology Congress 2015, emphasized that there is currently “only an association” between coronary heart disease and polygamy, and that “further studies are required to verify the link.”

The researchers followed 687 men who had been referred to one of five different hospitals in Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates to be tested for heart disease. Among the men, 68 percent had one wife, 19 percent had two, 10 percent had three, and three percent had four.

The men were an average of 59 years old, nearly half of them had a prior history of heart disease, and the majority had high blood pressure and diabetes. Those patients who were polygamous tended to be older and to live in more rural areas, the authors found. Men who practice polygamy were 4.6 times more likely to have at least one narrowed coronary artery and 2.6 times more likely to have more than one compared to monogamous ones.

“We know that long-term stress in family life increases the risk of coronary heart disease (CHD) and it would be interesting to see what effect polygamy had on wives’ CHD risk,” said Michel Komajda, a past president of the ESC who was not involved in the research. “People with psychosocial risk factors are less likely to take cardiac medications, which could be relevant in the group with prior [coronary artery bypass grafting].”

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Harbor lights can adversely affect marine life

Written By: Chuck Bednar
Christopher Pilny

Chuck Bednar for redOrbit.com – @BednarChuck

The artificial lights used in harbors during the nighttime is changing the behavior of animals that attach themselves to the hulls of sailing vessels, causing some creatures to be lured and others to be scared off by the illumination, according to a new study.

In research published Wednesday in the journal Biology Letters, University of Exeter ecologist Dr. Thomas Davies explained that the artificial lighting is attracting types of marine life that could damage ships and boats, and that light pollution from coastal development and other sources could be altering the composition of marine epifaunal communities.

“The presence of lighting at night can change the composition of these marine communities,” Dr. Davies told BBC News. “There is also what we call an ‘ecosystem disservice’. The presence of artificial lighting might actually increase ‘fouling’ species that can damage boats.”

Measuring the impact of light pollution

According to the British news agency, researchers have estimated that nearly 25 percent of the world’s coastal regions (not including Antarctica) are subject to some form of artificial lighting at night. Harbors, marinas, fisheries, and oil rigs all contribute to this phenomenon.

In order to measure the impact of this synthetic glow, Dr. Davies and his colleagues looked at a group of small creatures that live in sediment or attach to hard surfaces. These creatures, known as sessile creatures, include mussels, barnacles, sponges, and sea squirts, BBC News explained.

During the larval stage of their life cycles, sessile creatures use light to find good places that they can become attached to, and they will remain in those locations throughout their adult lives. This process is often guided by the intensity and spectral quality of that light.

To investigate the impact of light pollution around harbors, they created artificial rafts, exposed them to different lighting conditions, and observed what happened. They found that the light in some way affected 39 percent of the analyzed creatures, and they were either inhibited or encouraged by the sight of the light.

Dr. Davies said that the team now plans to expand the research to find out how lighting impacts a wider range of marine organisms, as well as to determine the degree of disruption it is causing. If it turns out to be a significant problem, he explained, it may mean that different types of artificial lighting will need to be used – perhaps ones that use different wavelengths.

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NASA’s new non-stick wings to save money and bugs

Written By: Chuck Bednar
Emily Bills

Chuck Bednar for redOrbit.com – @BednarChuck

Non-stick wing coatings designed by NASA to minimize the residue left behind from bugs and to reduce an aircraft’s fuel consumption were put to the test on Monday, as a Boeing jet outfitted with the material flew from Seattle to Shreveport, Louisiana.

Monday afternoon’s flight was just the first of 15 planned test missions scheduled to take place through May 15, the US space agency announced earlier this week. During those test flights, the Boeing ecoDemonstrator 757 flight test jet will be used to assess how well five different coatings prevent insect remains from sticking to the leading edge of its right wing.

The goal of this, according to Aviation Today, is to determine which coating proves most effective at decreasing the amount of insect remains on the wing, as well as to provide engineers with enough data to determine how reducing bug strikes in specific locations can cause turbulent wedges that can increase drag and reduce the aircraft’s fuel efficiency.

Beginning the search for the best insect repellant

The non-stick coatings were developed by engineers at the NASA Langley Research Center in Hampton, Virginia, and underwent initial testing in a small wind tunnel and on the wing of a jet at that facility, the agency said. The five best candidates were selected for further testing using the ecoDemonstrator 757, while officials searched for a bug-rich area for test flights.

A team of NASA, Boeing, US Department of Transportation and University of California-Davis officials narrowed an initial list of 90 airports down to six, ultimately selecting Shreveport due to its runway length, temperature, humidity, thunderstorm frequency, and ability to hand a 757.

Throughout the tests, researchers from Langley and pilots and engineers from Boeing will work together to test the coatings on two leading edge slats on the ecoDemonstrator’s right wing. They first planned to establish a baseline insect accumulation rate using uncoated surfaces, then fly an untreated control surface along with samples of the five coatings undergoing testing.

Previous research has shown that keeping the flow smooth over a wing can reduce fuel usage by up to six percent, and since even something as a small as an insect can interrupt that flow, NASA is hoping to discover which coating most effectively decreases bug residue amounts. In addition, they want to collect data on which specific locations most impact airflow.

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Meet T. rex’s vegetarian cousin: Chilesaurus

Written By: Chuck Bednar
Christopher Pilny

Chuck Bednar for redOrbit.com – @BednarChuck

Therapods, a group of dinosaurs that include the likes of Tyrannosaurs and Velociraptors, are typically viewed as ferocious predators, but a team of researchers has reportedly discovered the vegetarian cousin of these vicious meat-eaters at a site in southern Chile.

Fernando Novas of the Argentinian Museum of Natural Sciences and his colleagues reported the discovery in Monday’s edition of the journal Nature, explaining that the bizarre, enigmatic lizard lived during the Late Jurassic period and telling National Geographic that it looked like a strange mash-up of therapods, saurpods, ornithischians, and basal crocodyliforms.

The creature was named Chilesaurus diegosuarezi in honor of the son of the geologist who first discovered the bones, and Novas told Nat Geo that his team initially believed it was just a typical Jurassic-era dinosaur. They soon discovered that the specimen was anything but typical.

An odd mash-up of different dinosaur parts

It’s pelvic bones resembled those of a stegosaurs or triceratops, while its vertebrae had therapod-like perforations and its teeth, neck and limbs were similar to a brontosaurus. The unusual set of features led them to compare it to the three other groups to see which it was most like, and they found it was a therapod that evolved from a meat-eater to a plant-eater.

While shifts from carnivore to herbivore are relatively rare during the course of evolution, they are not unprecedented – for instance, pandas evolved from the same meat-eating ancestor as the polar bear and the grizzly bear.

“We realized that these specimens belonged to a new species and entirely new group of dinosaurs when we finished to remove the surrounding rock from the first articulated skeleton,” Martin D. Ezcurra, a doctoral researcher at the University of Birmingham School of Geography, Earth and Environmental Sciences and co-author of the study, told redOrbit via email.

“At that point, it was around early 2012, we realized that this dinosaur was not similar to anything known before,” he added. “We felt very excited about this discovery, but at the same time puzzled because it will represent a very hard work to figure out the position of this animal in the ‘dinosaur genealogical tree’ and its implications for the evolution of the entire group.”

First herbivorous theropod from the Southern Hemisphere

This is not the first plant-eating therapod to be discovered, Nat Geo said, but it is the first to come from this early in the evolutionary record and were far less common that Chilesaurus. Novas told Nat Geo that the discovery was “just the tip of the iceberg” and that he expected to find more specimens, both of Chilesaurus and of the predators that hunted it.

Ezcurra told redOrbit that their newly-discovered creature “belongs to a completely unknown lineage of dinosaurs that acquired herbivore habits from carnivorous ancestors and was probably endemic from South America. Also, Chilesaurus is the first herbivorous theropod (a lineage that includes predominantly carnivorous forms) from the Southern Hemisphere.”

“The most interesting about Chilesaurus is the story that it tells about how evolution works,” he added. “We can see in Chilesaurus how evolutionary pressures acted in its ancestor species and produced a very similar anatomical regions to those independently reached by other different groups of unrelated dinosaurs. Chilesaurus shows how evolution works in deep time.”

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Eta Aquarids meteor shower visible next two weeks

Written By: Chuck Bednar
Christopher Pilny

Chuck Bednar for redOrbit.com – @BednarChuck

Hot on the heels of last week’s peak viewing conditions for the Lyrid meteor shower comes the Eta Aquarids, which will become visible this week before peaking on Tuesday, May 6.

The Eta Aquarids are viewable in both the Northern and Southern hemispheres during pre-dawn hours, according to NASA, though the view is typically better in the South. National Geographic noted that stargazers should be able to see between five and 10 shooting stars per hour before the sun rises if they view from a dark location during its peak next week.

When viewing the Eta Aquarids, NASA recommends finding an area located far away from any artificial lights, and to bring a blanket, lawn chair or sleeping bag. Enthusiasts should lie on their backs with their feet facing east and look up, making certain to keep their eyes on as much of the sky as possible. After 30 minutes or so, their eyes will adapt and meteors will become visible.

What you should know about the Eta Aquarids

The Eta Aquarids is one of two meteor showers that occur each year when Earth travels through dust released by Halley’s Comet (the other, the Orionids, occur in late October). They appear to emanate from the constellation Aquarius, and since this part of the sky tends to rise just one hour or so before the start of morning twilight, according to Meteor Showers Online.

The meteors of the Eta Aquarids are known for their speed, as these quick-moving objects travel at speeds of more than 148,000 mph (66 km/s) through the planet’s atmosphere. Particularly fast-moving meteors can leave behind incandescent debris fragments known as “trains,” the US space agency said, and in northern latitudes the meteors may appear to skim the Earth’s surface.

Meteor Showers Online notes that there are also typically other, weaker meteor showers that can be seen at the same time as the Eta Aquarids. In addition to meteors from this shower moving at fast speeds, stargazers can ensure that they are viewing the Eta Aquarids by tracing it backwards to see if they wind up at the constellation Aquarius, the website noted.

The Eta Aquarids were officially discovered in 1870 by Lieutenant-Colonel G. L. Tupman as he was sailing in the Mediterranean Sea. Tupman spotted 15 meteors on April 30 and 13 meteors on the night of May 2 and May 3, and 45 meteors plotted during the April 29 to May 5, 1870, were later found in the records of the Italian Meteoric Association. The meteor shower was officially confirmed by Tupman on April 29, 1871, when he spotted and plotted eight meteors.

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Fibromyalgia

Fibromyalgia and Headaches and Pains

Written By: Fibromyalgia Treating

Fibromyalgia and Headaches

Everyone has had a headache at least one time in their life. These can range from a mild ache in the head to a pounding migraine that causes us to vomit and prevents us from doing much of anything with our day. As fibromyalgia sufferers, we have to deal with these headaches even more, because it’s just yet another common symptom of the disorder. Why are they so closely related? And what can we do in order to relieve this frustrating pain? Let’s take a closer look.

Why Does Fibromyalgia Cause Headaches?

There are a variety of reasons that fibromyalgia can end up causing headaches for the sufferers of this disease. The most common reason, as you may expect, is because our bodies are so tense with pain all of the time. When our bodies are tense, our entire body suffers from it, and as a result, we get pain in areas that may not even actually be affected by the fibromyalgia otherwise.

Our spine ends up carrying a lot of our tension, which is why we end up struggling with pain in our shoulders, neck, and yes, even our heads. Headaches will come along without any warning at times, just because our bodies are always so tensed up.

Another reason that we may have headaches is because of all of the side effects that we can have as a result of the fibromyalgia. For example, if we are dealing with dizziness or we have issues with “brain fog,” we may also have headaches alongside of those symptoms. Why? Because mental fatigue can sometimes end up resulting in headaches and other pains in the head, neck, and shoulders. It can be frustrating, because we’re already dealing with enough pain, why do we need headaches as well.

Trigger points can also end up causing us a lot of pain in our heads. Have you ever hit your hand off of something, or landed on your rear end, and the pain shot right up into your neck and caused you a headache? That’s the same sort of thing that ends up happening if you hit a trigger point.

Everyone has different trigger points when they are dealing with fibromyalgia; the most common ones are around the shoulders, on certain parts of the legs, the temples, and the elbows. There are others, of course, but the shooting pain that we end up feeling as a result can cause severe headaches and, in some cases, migraines.

If you have any history of injuries, you want to make sure that those are kept in check as well, especially if you have ever had whiplash during your lifetime. Injuries of the neck, shoulders, and head (even if it’s been a long time since the injury occurred) can make it so that you get headaches more easily and/or more often. Pair that up with fibromyalgia and you’ve got the formula that makes it a lot more likely that you will be fending off headaches on a regular basis.

Lastly, let’s take a quick look at another common headache cause that many fibromyalgia patients have to deal with on a regular basis – TMJ (“Lockjaw”). TMJ is when the jaw locks up (hence the other name we know it by) and makes it so that our face is clenched.

Because of how tense the entire body is with fibromyalgia, it makes it so that TMJ is a lot more common in people suffering from the disease. Since TMJ is in the jaw, it’s close to the head, and the constant tension that occurs as a result of the issue will also cause tension in the temples, thus resulting in tension headaches.

These aren’t the only reasons that one with fibromyalgia could get headaches – sufferers could also end up dealing with headaches just like everyone else does. Allergies, colds, the flu, and any other number of ailments can result in a headache.

The issue is when the headaches become migraines, or when they are happening so often that the sufferer doesn’t seem to be getting any relief from the headaches at all. When that’s going on, you want to make sure that you figure out what is going on, and do so quickly. It’s likely the sign of a bigger issue, so you want to get it dealt with appropriately.

What Can We do to Reduce Headaches for Fibromyalgia Sufferers?

Thankfully, there is a lot of self care that we can do in order to reduce the headaches that we are dealing with on a regular basis. Many people with fibromyalgia will suggest that you do the same things you would do to reduce the pain in your muscles. You can try using aromatherapy, you can get massages or physical therapy, or you could take a warm bath or shower. All of these help to reduce tension, which helps to reduce the severity and/or frequency of headaches.

Your specialist can also be a huge help when it comes to taking care of your headaches. Many times, they will prescribe different medications in order to help you cope with it a bit better.

Muscle relaxers are commonly used by those who are suffering from fibromyalgia, because by releasing the tension in the muscles, you will find that you are much more relaxed and, as we mentioned above, your headaches will not be as common and they will not hurt as badly.

Headaches (and other aches) can be a real pain, so it’s important to know how to prevent and even deal with them. If you have fibromyalgia, it’s even more important that you understand where these are coming from and what you can do in order to reduce the frequency and the severity of headaches.

If you have frequent headaches, there may also be something else going on, so as always, make sure that you are keeping in open conversation with your specialist – only they can help you to deal with these sorts of pains in an effective manner.

Further reading:

Headaches http://www.nfra.net/fibromyalgia-headaches.htm

Fibromyalgia And Chronic Headache http://www.headache-help.org/fibromyalgia-and-chronic-headache