Panasonic has helped lead the market for ruggedized cameras, which have been a hit among adventurous photographers for years, and now the company has two new additions to add to its water/shock/freeze/dustproof cam line. Described as "the optical outdoor companion," the Lumix DMC-TS4 is Panasonic's new ruggedized flagship, replacing the TS3 and packing a 12.1 megapixel CCD sensor, 1080/60i HD video capture, a 4.6x 28-128mm optical zoom lens and 2.7-inch LCD. Naturally, it can withstand just about everything you'll throw its way, considering that it's waterproof to depths of 40 feet, shockproof to 6.6 feet and freezeproof to temps as low as 14 degrees Fahrenheit. The TS4 also includes GPS, compass, altimeter and barometer functionality, logging all this data to supplement your photos with a full weather and location readout. Panasonic has also added full manual control, letting you adjust both aperture and shutter speed when shooting in manual mode.
The TS4 may offer a respectable spec list, but it doesn't come cheap. The TS20 is an attractive alliterative, however, with a slim profile, 16.1 megapixel sensor, 720p HD shooting, a 4x 25-100mm optically stabilized zoom lens and a 2.7-inch LCD. It's waterproof to 16 feet, freezeproof to 14 degrees Fahrenheit and can survive drops from up to five feet. There's no manual option on this lower-end model, but it does include Panasonic's Intelligent Auto mode for more accurate shooting. The TS20 will ship in late-February in orange, blue, black and red for $180, while the flagship TS4 will be available in orange, blue, black and silver for $400 when it ships in mid-March. You'll find both press releases after the break.
ROME (Reuters) ? Former Italian President Oscar Luigi Scalfaro, who was head of state during the "Bribesville" corruption affair which overturned the old political order during the 1990s, has died, officials said on Sunday. He was 93.
Scalfaro, a former interior minister and speaker of the lower house of parliament, was appointed president in 1992 as the scandal was sweeping aside a party system which had run Italy since World War Two.
Both Scalfaro's own conservative Christian Democrat party and the centre-left Socialists were revealed to have been deeply corrupted by a web of bribery and illegal funding which destroyed Italians' confidence in government.
With preparations well under way for Italy to join the embryonic single European currency, Scalfaro had to defend the basic institutions of the Italian state at a time of corrosive mistrust of the political system.
"As President of the Republic, he faced some of the most difficult periods of our history firmly and steadfastly," the current president, Giorgio Napolitano, said in a statement.
(Reporting By James Mackenzie, editing by Tim Pearce)
Republican presidential candidate, former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, with his wife Callista, bow their heads in prayer during a campaign event at the The Villages, Sunday, Jan. 29, 2012, in Lady Lake, Fla. (AP Photo/Matt Rourke))
Republican presidential candidate, former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, with his wife Callista, bow their heads in prayer during a campaign event at the The Villages, Sunday, Jan. 29, 2012, in Lady Lake, Fla. (AP Photo/Matt Rourke))
PENSACOLA, Fla. (AP) ? Newt Gingrich's personal and political baggage is giving even the most hard-core Republicans pause in a conservative swath of the state.
"Not Gingrich" is how Annette Purvis says she plans to vote. "I've never liked Gingrich. Never. Never in the history of Gingrich."
She's turned off by what she calls his moral and ethical issues. He's been divorced twice, is an admitted adulterer and was the first House speaker to be reprimanded by his colleagues for ethical misconduct. All that has Purvis, a 49-year-old wife and mother from Laurel Hill near the Alabama border, looking elsewhere. "I'll probably do Romney," she adds, her hesitation apparent.
Marty Upfield, a 64-year-old retiree from Pensacola, seems equally uneasy with Gingrich. She, too, pointed to Gingrich's political record and personal background as a problem. She's considering voting for Mitt Romney, who she says isn't conservative enough, even though her political views are more in line with Gingrich's positions.
"But it is about trust," says Upfield. "I need to have a little more certainty that he's changed in some ways."
This deep reluctance to back Gingrich was voiced by many of the dozen and a half people interviewed last week in this city in the Florida Panhandle that borders the Gulf of Mexico to the south and west and Alabama to the north. Gingrich's past, it seemed, was heavily influencing decisions about who to back. Many said they were resigned to choosing Romney.
In one of the most conservative parts of the state, many of those interviewed said they see their political philosophy more in line with Gingrich ? who led the GOP revolution that took control of the House in 1994 ? than with Romney, the former Massachusetts governor who in the past has espoused more moderate positions on social issues. But many also said they're considering voting for Romney, or already did during the state's early voting period, because they fear that Gingrich's history ? both personally and professionally ? will hurt him in a general election match up against President Barack Obama.
"I really like him. He's one of the finest speakers. He's got fantastic memory and recall," said Tim Fuller of Gingrich.
But Fuller, 68, and wife Vicki, 67, didn't pick him.
"We voted for the more electable candidate," Fuller said, adding that they chose Romney ? "the lesser of two evils."
On the minds of many interviewed: Gingrich's ethics case while serving as House speaker, the $1.65 million his businesses made off Freddie Mac before he criticized the mortgage giant during his campaign, and his three marriages.
"I like him. I like his mannerisms. I just don't think I can vote for him. There's too much out there," said Bonnie Meenen, 64. Romney may get her vote because of that.
Some also were put off by Gingrich's personality.
"I think Newt's temper is too short," said David Nobles, 57, who voted for Romney. "It came down to Newt and Mitt, and Mitt just seems like more presidential material than Newt."
That Gingrich, who has emerged as the more conservative alternative to Romney, doesn't have a lock on this part of the state, regardless of his flaws, may not bode well for his prospects in other, more diverse parts of Florida ahead of Tuesday's pivotal primary. And the reluctance among some Republicans here to embrace Gingrich indicates that Romney's strategy to raise questions about Gingrich's character may be working.
Over the past week, Romney and his allies have castigated Gingrich on the campaign trail and in TV ads blanketing the state.
"While Florida families lost everything in the housing crisis, Newt Gingrich cashed in," says a Romney campaign ad airing in this state. The commercial says that Gingrich collected more than $1.6 million from "the scandal-ridden agency that helped create the crisis."
Romney's team has taken a more subtle approach in attacking Gingrich for his flawed personal life. He has been emphasizing his own 42-year marriage to the same woman, as well as his five sons and numerous grandchildren, as a way to contrast himself to Gingrich. And an outside group backing Romney has run ads mentioning Gingrich's "baggage."
A Quinnipiac University poll released Friday showed Romney leading Gingrich, 38 to 29 percent. Among voters who identify as conservative, Romney and Gingrich are in a virtual tie.
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ANN ARBOR, Mich. ? President Barack Obama called Friday for an overhaul of the higher education financial aid system, warning that colleges and universities that fail to control spiraling tuition costs could lose federal funds.
The election year proposal was also a political appeal to young people and working families, two important voting blocs for Obama. But the initiative faces long odds in Congress, which must approve nearly all aspects of the president's plan.
Speaking to students at the University of Michigan, Obama said he was "putting colleges on notice" that the era of unabated tuition hikes is over.
"You can't assume that you'll just jack up tuition every single year. If you can't stop tuition from going up, then the funding you get from taxpayers each year will go down," Obama said on the final stop of a three-day post-State of the Union trip to promote components of his economic agenda.
Obama told the largely supportive student audience that the nation's economic future depended on making sure every American can afford a world-class education.
"In the coming decade, 60 percent of new jobs will require more than a high school diploma," he said. "Higher education is not a luxury. It's an economic imperative that every family in America should be able to afford."
The president first announced the outlines of the financial aid proposal during Tuesday's State of the Union address. His plan targets what is known as "campus based" aid given to colleges to distribute in areas such as Perkins loans or in work study programs. Of the $142 billion in federal grants and loans distributed in the last school year, about $3 billion went to these programs. His plan calls for increasing that type of aid to $10 billion annually.
He also wants to create a "Race to the Top" competition in higher education similar to the one his administration used on K-12 to encourage states to better use higher education dollars in exchange for $1 billion in prize dollars. A second competition called "First in the World" would encourage innovation to boost productivity on campuses.
Obama is also pushing for the creation of new tools to allow students to determine which colleges and universities have the best value.
Some in the higher education community are nervous that the Obama administration could be setting a new precedent in the federal government's role in controlling the rising costs of college. Following the speech, Molly Corbett Broad, president of the American Council on Education, issued a statement saying there's concern that the proposal would "move decision-making in higher education from college campuses to Washington, D.C."
Sen. Lamar Alexander, R-Tenn., a former education secretary, said the autonomy of U.S. higher education is what makes it the best in the world, and he's questioned whether Obama can enforce any plan that shifts federal aid away from colleges and universities without hurting students.
"It's hard to do without hurting students, and it's not appropriate to do," Alexander said. "The federal government has no business doing this."
But Obama education secretary, Arne Duncan, said Friday that institutions of higher learning should get federal dollars based in part on their performance.
"Historically, we've funded universities whether or not they've done a good job of graduating people, whether or not they've done a good job of keeping down tuition," Duncan said on MSNBC's "Morning Joe."
Rep. George Miller, D-Calif., the ranking member of the House Education and Workforce Committee, said there is bipartisan concern in Congress about the rising costs of college, and he's hopeful the president's plan will open up a dialogue about the problem. Some Republicans in the past, including Rep. Buck McKeon, R-Calif., have offered proposals similar to the president's.
The administration has already taken a series of steps to expand the availability of grants and loans and to make loans easier to pay back. During the State of the Union, Obama spelled out other proposals to make college more affordable, such as extending a tuition tax break and asking Congress to keep loan interest rates from doubling in July.
His administration has also targeted career college programs ? primarily at for-profit institutions ? with high loan default rates among graduates over multiple years by taking away their ability to participate in such programs.
But until now, the administration has done little to turn its attention to the rising cost of tuition at traditional colleges and universities.
The average in-state tuition and fees at four-year public colleges last fall rose 8.3 percent and, with room and board, now exceed $17,000 a year, according to the College Board. Rising tuition costs have been blamed on a variety of factors, including a decline in state dollars, an over-reliance on federal student loan dollars and competition for the best facilities and professors.
In the Wild West of the ongoing mortgage mess, there?s a new sheriff in town. And he?s not handing "Get Out of Jail Free" cards in return for a $25 billion check.
The appointment of New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman to head?a special task force that will?investigate mortgage fraud marks a turning point in a year-long effort to resolve a wave of legal challenges to abusive and illegal foreclosure practices.
After a year of talks aimed at a settlement with five big banks ? Bank of America, JPMorgan Chase, Wells Fargo, Citibank and Ally Financial (formerly GMAC) ? attorneys general in all 50 states this week have been are poring over the 100-page draft of a the $25 billion deal requiring bankers to commit to modify problem loans that they have been slow to do until now. Under the proposed terms, the banks would also agree to follow strict foreclosure guidelines and procedures and contribute as much as $5 billion to foreclosure relief programs.
On Wednesday, President Barack Obama tapped Schneiderman to co-chair a joint federal-state task force to pursue criminal charges related to abusive mortgages and the bundling?of those loans into investments. Some observers suggested the appointment was intended to blunt Schneiderman?s opposition to the multistate settlement.? Schneiderman has said he's not?about to let bankers off the hook.
"My concern ... has always been to make sure that we're not releasing claims that obviously now are even more important to me because I'm investigating them," he told reporters Wednesday.
From the beginning of the settlement talks, the five big banks have been holding out for a blanket waiver of legal liability to protect them from future lawsuits or prosecution. The creation of?Schneiderman?s task force makes that blanket waiver extremely unlikely. It?may?even collapse the deal, JP Morgan Chase Chief Executive Officer?Jamie Dimon, told CNBC.
?My own read is (the creation of the new task force) has a pretty good chance of derailing it,? said Dimon.
The proposed settlement was also dealt a major blow Wednesday when California Attorney General Kamala D. Harris said its terms would limit her ability to bring civil charges against mortgage lenders that wrongfully foreclosed on homeowners.
"We've reviewed the details of the latest settlement proposal from the banks, and we believe it is inadequate for California," said Shum Preston, a spokesman for Harris
As ground zero for the mortgage meltdown, California is?critical to the approval of any settlement.?Roughly one in four of all foreclosures are happening in the state and?ten of the top 20 metro areas with the highest foreclosure rates in 2011 are there according to RealtyTrac.
From the early stages of the talks, Schneiderman and a handful of other state AGs have resisted any deal that would let banks off the hook for a variety of claims by homeowners and investors who bought bonds backed by home mortgages. In August, Iowa Attorney General Tom Miller, who is leading the state group, booted Schneiderman from the executive committee of federal and state officials because he steadfastly opposed any deals that would end investigations into mortgage fraud.
Schneiderman holds several powerful legal cards that the other 49 AGs don?t. New York?s anti-fraud Martin Act gives him broad subpoena powers other state prosecutors lack. Some New York state securities laws apply to Wall Street firms based in the state. Many of the pools of mortgages that were chopped up into bonds are held in trusts registered in New York.
Delaware, another AG holdout, has securities laws that apply to the corporate registrations of many of entities involved the mortgage mess. Massachusetts has successfully sued other smaller players in the mortgage mess. In September, Massachusetts Attorney General Martha Coakley broke with the talks to file her own lawsuit against the five banks.
From the beginning,?critics have argued that the White House has been too eager to see a settlement?and too willing to help the five big banks get the immunity they?re seeking.
?The Obama administration has been?more concerned with settling quickly than with settling in a way that moves the ball forward for homeowners,? said Diane Thomsen, an attorney with the National Consumer Law Center.
It remains to be seen whether the new mortgage fraud task force will?produce results. The Obama administration already created a Financial Fraud Enforcement Task Force in November of?2009 that?tapped 20 federal agencies, 94 U.S. Attorneys offices and state and local partners. Though the group has won a number of cases against smaller players, it has yet to win any high-profile convictions.
In June, Sen. Charles Greassley (D- Iowa) described the task force as ?a press release collection agency utilized by the Justice Department to?collect examples of investigations of prosecutions that would otherwise have been brought.?
Neil Barofsky, a former federal prosecutor who served as the special inspector general of the Troubled Asset Relief Program and worked with the 2009 task force, shared those doubts.
?I'm a little puzzled by it," he told Reuters. "Here we are three years later, launching what seems like a very similar effort, except now co-headed by a state attorney general."
"Does it mean they haven't really been working on investigating the causes of the financial crisis for the last three years?" he said. "Or is it a statement that the last three years of investigating done by the Department of Justice has been ineffectual and needs to be reworked?"
Related:
Proposed mortgage settlement offers little relief for homeowners?? Obama: New push to aid homeowners
James Dimon, chairman, president & CEO, JPMorgan Chase, discusses the world economy, muddling through in Europe, and the President's prerogative when it comes to naming a successor for Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner. Bernanke, he says, has been an...
Got plans for this evening? Cancel them now, and do everything you can to sneak into New York's Museum of Natural History. Because tonight, the museum's planetarium will play host to a 200-person space game, courtesy of Brooklyn's Babycastles arcade. It's all part of the museum's "Cosmic Cocktails and Space Arcade" evening -- an event that seems tailor made for anyone interested in cosmology, humans, and/or hallucinogens. The showcase of the soiree is the Space Cruiser game, which promises to turn the ceiling of the Rose Center for Earth and Space into a "living, breathing, space ship where participants navigate around a beautiful fictitious universe." With the Magnetic Fields' Stephin Merritt assuming the tripartite role of ship captain-navigator-narrator, the game apparently begins with the birth of the universe, before transporting visitors across new galaxies and through time-bending wormholes. The ship launches at 6:30 PM tonight, but unfortunately, tickets are already sold out. Head past the break, though, for a rather "duuuude"-inducing video.
iVoice Stephanie Dulli is still pinching herself -- she watched the State of the Union from the White House as part of a live tweet-up and even had a chance to meet Education Secretary Arne Duncan.
WASHINGTON (AP) ? U.S. officials say the Army plans to slash its number of combat brigades from 45 to as low as 32, and broadly restructure its fighting force as part of the effort to cut the size of the service by about 80,000 soldiers.
Officials say the sweeping changes probably will increase the size of each combat brigade, generally by adding another battalion. Doing that would ensure the brigades have the capabilities they need to go to war. A brigade usually is about 3,500 soldiers, and a battalion usually is between 600-800 soldiers.
The cuts come as the Pentagon completes its 2013 fiscal year budget, which must reflect about $260 billion in savings over five years. Officials spoke on condition of anonymity because it has not yet been made public.
Fueling rumors that they are getting back together, or at least hooking up with each other again, Rihanna and Chris Brown partied at the same club last night.
The two singers, who have been the subject of so much speculation lately, left Greystone Manor, a West Hollywood club, in separate cars, around the same time.
It's unclear if they came together or headed to the same place after, but Rihanna and Chris Brown were ... there at the same time. Make of that what you will.
Again, we emphasize that several people who were at the club Tweeted that as far as they could see, Rihanna and Chris were there with separate groups.
The protective order, which required that the Grammy nominees have no contact with each other after Brown beat Rihanna in 2009, was lifted a year ago.
They've also exchanged not-so-subtle Tweets lately, so wouldn't be at all scandalous, let alone illegal if they were there together. Let the gossip continue ...
Should Rihanna and Chris Brown get back together?
UPDATE: According to Chris' rep, the singer was only interested in one girl at the club... and that was Karrueche Tran. Brown's girlfriend. So there's that.
How sudden was the turnaround that took former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney from being a step away from clinching the GOP nomination to the candidate who's putting on a brave face and pretending to look forward to a long, drawn-out primary slog?
All you have to do is go back and follow the media narrative of the past seven days. After the New Hampshire contest, Romney was considered such a shoo-in to win in the Palmetto State that most thought that all he'd have to do to win the primary was not "fall down or throw up."
But as it happened, that "something crazy" turned out to be Romney's not anticipating that anyone would hold him responsible for releasing his income taxes. Now, because of Romney's lack of transparency and a few well-delivered anti-media rants by Newt Gingrich, it's the former House speaker who's being credited for a "historical political achievement."
And so Romney looks to Florida not as the site of a GOP coronation but as the state where he'll have to begin his comeback. HuffPost's Sam Wilkes takes us through Mitt Romney's strange, sad week on the trail.
[Would you like to follow me on Twitter? Because why not?]
(Reuters) ? Nokia Siemens Networks (NSN) has raised more than 1.2 billion euros from a group of 14 European and U.S. banks as it looks to restructure the business and pay costs of a big redundancy program, a source close to the deal said on Monday.
NSN was originally seeking to raise 1.5 billion euros, but had to settle for a smaller amount due to market turmoil, the source added.
Owners Nokia and Siemens bailed out NSN with an additional 1 billion euros of equity last year after attempts to sell the business failed, but the loss-making venture has said it would not seek more money from its parents.
NSN, which has struggled to make a profit since being set up in 2007, was formed in the hope of building enough scale to lead an industry dominated by Swedish company Ericsson and, increasingly, by Chinese entrants.
The world's second largest mobile telecom gear maker has faced aggressive pricing from rivals and an economic downturn that has forced telecoms companies to cut spending. NSN said in November it was axing 17.000 jobs, almost a quarter of its workforce.
Earlier, the Financial Times (FT) newspaper said, without citing a source, that about 600 million euros would be provided as a one-year term loan that would need to replaced when it expires in the summer of 2013, with the remainder coming on a three-year term.
A source cited by the FT said NSN would look at raising money in the capital market through issuing bonds, which it hoped would be available before the expiry of the one-year debt.
The banks involved in the deal include JPMorgan, Citibank, Bank of America, Royal Bank of Scotland and Standard Chartered.
NSN needed to replace a 2-billion-euros debt facility set to expire this summer and which was used to support corporate activities.
Nokia or Siemens could not be reached for immediate comment.
(Reporting by Tarmo Virki and Stephen Mangan; editing by Miral Fahmy and Mark Potter)
LONDON (AP) ? A report by the global music industry lobbying group says the growth in digital revenues remains stuck in the single figures.
The International Federation of the Phonographic Industry blames piracy and government sluggishness for the failure of online business to take off.
While a report out Monday says that digital revenue has risen by 8 percent over the past year one analyst says that isn't nearly enough to make up for the decline in sales elsewhere.
Independent media analyst Mark Mulligan says that in Britain and the United States "we've already lost half of the music market in the past 10 years."
IFPI chief Frances Moore acknowledged that digital growth "should be much higher" but said that widespread piracy still posed a challenge to the industry.
BUENOS AIRES, Argentina (AP) ? British adventurer Felicity Aston completed her crossing of Antarctica on Monday, becoming the first woman to ski across the icy continent alone.
She did it in 59 days, pulling two sledges for 1,084 miles (1,744 kilometers) from her starting point on the Leverett Glacier on Nov. 25.
Now she's tweeting that she has made it to Hercules Inlet on the Ronne Ice Shelf, completing her journey. She's still alone in a tent, waiting in bad weather for a small plane to pick her up and take her to a base camp.
"!!!Congratulations to the 1st female to traverse Antarctica SOLO.V proud," her Twitter message said.
Aston was still alone Monday. A support team was waiting for weather to clear in order to greet her.
"Just in case I was in danger of feeling sentimental, a violent wind has appeared from nowhere and is beating the tent like the bad old days," she tweeted.
Aston also set another record: the first human to ski solo across Antarctica using only her own muscle power. A male-female team already combined to ski across Antarctica without kites or machines to pull them across, but Aston is the first to do this alone.
The veteran adventurer, 34, worked as a meteorologist in Antarctica and has led team expeditions in the Antarctic, the Arctic and Greenland.
Her journey took her from the Ross Ice Shelf, up the Leverett Glacier and across the Transantarctic Mountains to the continent's vast central plateau, where she had to fight headwinds most of the way to the South Pole. Then she turned toward Hercules Inlet and a base camp where the company Antarctic Logistics and Expeditions provides logistical support to each summer's Antarctic expeditions.
Aston tweeted that she's been promised red wine and a hot shower after she gets picked up. "No plane tonight but I have my last Beef and Ale Stew to enjoy for my final evening alone ? yum!" she wrote.
Athletics general manager Billy Beane said during the Winter Meetings last month that he would prefer to go younger at designated hitter this season, but despite having a number of internal options, things might not work out that way.
Enrique Rojas of ESPN Deportes Los Angeles?was told by a source (link in Spanish) that Oakland is ?very interested? in Manny Ramirez, who is currently preparing for his comeback attempt in Miami.
We learned a couple of weeks ago that the Orioles and Blue Jays sent scouts to watch Ramirez take batting practice. Rojas was told that while Baltimore ?liked? what they saw, the A?s are the team showing the most interest, despite the fact that they haven?t actually seen him in person yet. The 39-year-old is expected to hold a workout for interested teams before the end of the month, so if Rojas? source is correct, they?ll presumably take a look at him within the next few days.
If or when Ramirez signs with an MLB team, he?ll have to serve a reduced 50-game suspension for his second positive PED test before being eligible to play during the regular season. However, he would be allowed to suit up during spring training.
LOS ANGELES ? "The Help" has been served eight Image Award nominations.
The adaptation of Kathryn Stockett's best-selling novel about black maids speaking out about their white employers during the civil-rights movement led the 43rd annual NAACP Image Awards nominations Thursday with eight nods in film categories, including outstanding motion picture against "Jumping the Broom," "Pariah," "The First Grader" and "Tower Heist."
The medical drama "Grey's Anatomy" and football sitcom "The Game" ruled the TV categories with six nominations each.
Beyonce and Jill Scott both received four nominations in the music categories. They'll both vie against Jennifer Hudson, Ledisi and Mary J. Blige for the outstanding female artist trophy.
The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People's Image Awards honor diversity in the arts and will be presented Feb. 17 on NBC.
If you're prone to unintentionally killing plants, these Petal solar lights from Mohzy might be a good way to ease back into gardening. You'll still need to ensure they get plenty of sunlight, but won't die if you screw that up. More »
Giuliana Rancic knows a thing or two about staying strong even when things get tough.
She took her own battle with breast cancer public earlier this year, and now that she's on the mend, she's lending her support to fellow survivor Lauren Scruggs.
So what words of encouragement does the E! News host have for the fashion blogger and part-time model as she recovers from a horrific plane propeller accident?
MORE: Giuliana Talks Recovery: I Feel Great
"[I] wanted to reach out to her and say you're an inspiration, this is all going to make sense and I'm praying for you," Rancic told us Thursday at a Glade Expressions dinner party in New York City.
"I saw that picture of her [stepping out for the first time], and it just inspired me," she explained. "I thought, 'Wow she looks so great. Good for her.' She's out and about. She's got her baseball cap on and she looks like herself. She's adorable. She looks like the girl that I've been seeing in these reports."
GALLERY: Get Giuliana's Look!
When Rancic first heard about the 23-year-old Texan and the injuries she sustained on Dec. 3, she was in recovery herself. "I remember kind of feeling sorry for her at a time when I was feeling sorry for myself," she said. "Then as I've been getting stronger every day and feeling better about my situation, it puts me in a different space...I never thought I would be able to move into a good space so quickly."
Rancic has been in touch with Scruggs via Twitter and hopes to one day meet her in person. In the meantime, she wants the fashionista to know the adversity she's facing "will add meaning to your life. That's what it did to mine."
MORE: Breast Cancer Survivor Christina Applegate to Giuliana: "I'm Here for You"
"I remember when [my battle with cancer] was all first happening and I was right in the midst of it all, I thought, 'No. This isn't adding meaning to my life,'" she recalled. "This is adding a lot of unhappiness and anger and sadness to my life...But something in me wanted to reach out to her and just say, 'It will all mean something soon.' That's how I feel now."
PICS: Do-Gooder Gallery
? 2012 E! Entertainment Television, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
The rail and road network in Spain does not follow economic criteria, but centralPublic release date: 18-Jan-2012 [ | E-mail | Share ]
Contact: SINC info@plataformasinc.es 34-914-251-820 FECYT - Spanish Foundation for Science and Technology
A researcher at the University of Barcelona has examined the construction of surface transportation infrastructure in Spain from 1720 to 2010. The economist and author of the study, Germ Bel explains how both the construction of train lines and state highways in Spain since the 18th century has been based radially around Madrid as the political capital and not on the commercial activity of routes.
"In Spain, infrastructure policy tends to follow a national construction model comprising connections that converge in one point the political capital. This mainly happens as of the 23rd April, 1720 with the implementation of a new ruling that drives centralization by prioritizing radial roads for administrative reasons, not according to traffic flow," explains Germ Bel, lead author of the study published in the Business History journal.
The article highlights that in other countries such as Germany, Italy and the UK, and even France, infrastructure policy is linked to the economic and productive activity. In other words, the type of infrastructure such as the temporal sequence in which the building takes into account criteria of economic activity and productivity of the economy.
As the researcher clarifies, "the fact that Spanish infrastructure construction tends to be more economic and productive use, does not mean that investment is made solely in and around Madrid but that route financing comes from differing sources."
In this respect, Germ Bel states that when funding was needed from the user, by tolls or private levies, investment has been made in routes with commercial activity. "In this way the first toll motorways were built across the Mediterranean Corridor and the Valle del Ebro," says the researcher. However, on an instrumental level, when their use does not correspond to commercial activity, they have generally been built using funds from the state budget.
"Public money has been systematically used to make infrastructures radially converge in Madrid. As a general rule they are funded mainly from the state budget, including their upkeep, and they are generally older. If for whatever reason, like a recession, infrastructure construction undergoes a rational rethink, it is much more transversal (not radial) and leans towards the corridors where productive activity is higher," explains the researcher.
AVE: the high-speed train with the longest and least commercial route
The geographical centralization of transport services also occurs in the case of the train. In particular, the high-speed AVE train has a radial extension policy expressly declared on the 25 April, 2000 by the then president of the Spanish government, Jos Mara Aznar. He stated that the focal point of its infrastructure policy was to create "a high-speed rail network that in ten years time would connect all of Spain's provincial capitals with the centre of the country in four hours." (Aznar, 2000). Germ Bel asserts that "An example of this is that, along the Barcelona-Valencia, for example, that in the 80's was the most densely-line traffic continues without high speed, and still single track sections on the Iberian gauge ride."
Historically however, the first commercial trains linked Barcelona with Matar (1848), Sama with Langreo (1852/56), Valencia with Xtiva (1854) and Madrid with Aranjuez (1851). The latter was the only line built using public money.
The expert stresses that demand for rail services is small compared to other pioneering countries despite it have the most railway tracks in kilometres in Europe. As the researcher points out, "AVE passengers in Spain represent just 6% of passengers in Japan, less than 20% in France and 30% in Germany."
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References:
Germ Bel, "Infrastructure and nation building: The regulation and financing of network transportation infrastructures in Spain (1720 -2010)", Business History 53 (5): 688 705, 2011.
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The rail and road network in Spain does not follow economic criteria, but centralPublic release date: 18-Jan-2012 [ | E-mail | Share ]
Contact: SINC info@plataformasinc.es 34-914-251-820 FECYT - Spanish Foundation for Science and Technology
A researcher at the University of Barcelona has examined the construction of surface transportation infrastructure in Spain from 1720 to 2010. The economist and author of the study, Germ Bel explains how both the construction of train lines and state highways in Spain since the 18th century has been based radially around Madrid as the political capital and not on the commercial activity of routes.
"In Spain, infrastructure policy tends to follow a national construction model comprising connections that converge in one point the political capital. This mainly happens as of the 23rd April, 1720 with the implementation of a new ruling that drives centralization by prioritizing radial roads for administrative reasons, not according to traffic flow," explains Germ Bel, lead author of the study published in the Business History journal.
The article highlights that in other countries such as Germany, Italy and the UK, and even France, infrastructure policy is linked to the economic and productive activity. In other words, the type of infrastructure such as the temporal sequence in which the building takes into account criteria of economic activity and productivity of the economy.
As the researcher clarifies, "the fact that Spanish infrastructure construction tends to be more economic and productive use, does not mean that investment is made solely in and around Madrid but that route financing comes from differing sources."
In this respect, Germ Bel states that when funding was needed from the user, by tolls or private levies, investment has been made in routes with commercial activity. "In this way the first toll motorways were built across the Mediterranean Corridor and the Valle del Ebro," says the researcher. However, on an instrumental level, when their use does not correspond to commercial activity, they have generally been built using funds from the state budget.
"Public money has been systematically used to make infrastructures radially converge in Madrid. As a general rule they are funded mainly from the state budget, including their upkeep, and they are generally older. If for whatever reason, like a recession, infrastructure construction undergoes a rational rethink, it is much more transversal (not radial) and leans towards the corridors where productive activity is higher," explains the researcher.
AVE: the high-speed train with the longest and least commercial route
The geographical centralization of transport services also occurs in the case of the train. In particular, the high-speed AVE train has a radial extension policy expressly declared on the 25 April, 2000 by the then president of the Spanish government, Jos Mara Aznar. He stated that the focal point of its infrastructure policy was to create "a high-speed rail network that in ten years time would connect all of Spain's provincial capitals with the centre of the country in four hours." (Aznar, 2000). Germ Bel asserts that "An example of this is that, along the Barcelona-Valencia, for example, that in the 80's was the most densely-line traffic continues without high speed, and still single track sections on the Iberian gauge ride."
Historically however, the first commercial trains linked Barcelona with Matar (1848), Sama with Langreo (1852/56), Valencia with Xtiva (1854) and Madrid with Aranjuez (1851). The latter was the only line built using public money.
The expert stresses that demand for rail services is small compared to other pioneering countries despite it have the most railway tracks in kilometres in Europe. As the researcher points out, "AVE passengers in Spain represent just 6% of passengers in Japan, less than 20% in France and 30% in Germany."
###
References:
Germ Bel, "Infrastructure and nation building: The regulation and financing of network transportation infrastructures in Spain (1720 -2010)", Business History 53 (5): 688 705, 2011.
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ZAVENTEM, Belgium ? It takes Mikael Ohlsson five minutes ? and the help of one other person ? to assemble IKEA's Ektorp sofa.
After 33 years at the Swedish home-ware chain, the 54-year-old chief executive is an expert at configuring IKEA's famous flat-pack furniture.
But Ohlsson is not bragging about the fact that he can beat the assembly time the company itself advertises by some 10 minutes. What makes him proud is that the Ektorp can be flat-packed at all.
Seated on a "Blekinge white" example of the Ektorp in a cozily furnished exhibition room at an IKEA store in Zaventem, Belgium, Ohlsson recounts how, until recently, the popular couch also came packed in one of the company's biggest cardboard boxes ? a pain for customers to squeeze into their cars or carry up narrow staircases.
But then in 2010, IKEA's product designers came up with a way of breaking the Ektorp into different pieces. The results was a package half its former size, which the company claims took some 7,477 trucks off the roads and cut its yearly CO2 emissions by 4,700 tons. Savings in production and transport costs knocked euro100 ($128) off the price IKEA charges its customers, Ohlsson pointed out.
It's innovations like these, the CEO says, that make IKEA so successful even in the uncertain economic times that some of its biggest markets are facing.
On Friday, IKEA reported a 10.3 percent jump in net profit to euro2.97 billion ($3.81 billion) for the year ended Aug. 31, even though it cut prices by 2.6 percent. Revenue rose 6.9 percent to euro25.17 billion in the same period and Ohlsson says the sales pace has been accelerating since then ? even as stock markets around the world have taken a dive amid the worsening financial crisis in Europe.
"We are becoming a more natural choice when people are looking after their spending or are concerned about the future," says Ohlsson, his black trousers, black sweater and half-rimmed glasses all possessing the understatement of a Billy bookcase.
"A lot of people see that home is a very important place, maybe the most important place in their lives."
While sales have fallen in some Southern European countries like Greece, Ohlsson says IKEA has gained market share in all of them.
Over the past decade, the company expanded into big emerging markets like Russia and China, although 79 percent of its sales are still generated in Europe. In the next two or three years, IKEA wants to open stores in Serbia and Croatia and it has recently bought land in South Korea.
But the biggest opportunity may lie in India, a fast-growing country of around 1.2 billion people, that Ohlsson says IKEA has been eyeing "patiently but also impatiently" for years.
"The impatience is that of course there are a lot of people that are moving into the city, have better incomes and want to furnish their homes and that's why there is space for us," says Ohlsson. "And patient because we wanted FDI (foreign direct investment) legislation to change."
That change happened last week, when the Indian Commerce Ministry announced it would allow foreign companies that sell products under a single-brand name, such as IKEA, to own 100 percent of their stores there.
Ohlsson and his chief financial officer, Soeren Hansen, say the company is still studying the fine print, to make sure, for instance, that requirements to source a certain percentage of products locally won't interrupt its cherished value chain, where it controls design, production, storage and retail.
In contrast to other companies, which are under pressure to quickly produce new value for shareholders, IKEA can move more slowly. The retailer is not traded on the stock market, but is owned by a foundation controlled by the family of its octogenarian founder Ingvar Kamprad.
That structure not only protects IKEA from being split up or taken over, but, says Ohlsson, allows him to make investments in new markets or store upgrades that may not pay off for several years.
Throughout the conversation, the CEO stresses IKEA's eco-friendly policies and humble origins in a poor area of Sweden. In the Zaventem store on the outskirts of Brussels, solar panels on the roof provide up to 20 percent of the energy. The company owns several wind parks and one of its Berlin stores uses local wastewater to control internal temperatures.
IKEA has come a long way from its start in the Smaland region in Southern Sweden. Today it employs 131,000 people in 41 countries and its 287 stores drew in 655 million customers last year.
Ohlsson says he believes the urge to upgrade and become more comfortable does not seem to recede during an economic downturn. Asked whether IKEA's business was "recession-proof," Ohlsson laughs somewhat embarrassed.
"I wouldn't say it like that and it would not be humble to say it," he said.
Contact: Mika Ono mikaono@scripps.edu 858-784-2052 Scripps Research Institute
Discovery could aid search for Huntington's, Spinocerebellar ataxia, and Kennedy disease treatments
Scientists from the Florida campus of The Scripps Research Institute have identified a compound that can help repair a specific type of defect in RNA, a type of genetic material. The methods in the new study could accelerate the development of therapeutics to treat a variety of incurable diseases such as Huntington's disease, Spinocerebellar ataxia, and Kennedy disease.
The new study, published January 17, 2012 in an advance, online edition of the journal ACS Chemical Biology, describes a method to find compounds that target defective RNAs, specifically RNA that carries a structural motif known as an "expanded triplet repeat." The triplet repeat, a series of three nucleotides repeated many more times than normal in the genetic code of affected individuals, has been associated with a variety of neurological and neuromuscular disorders.
"For a long time it was thought that only the protein translated from this type of RNA was toxic," said Matthew Disney, an associate professor at Scripps Florida who led the new study. "But it has been shown recently that both the protein and the RNA are toxic. Our discovery of a small molecule that binds to RNA and shuts off its toxicity not only further demonstrates that the RNA is toxic but also opens up new avenues for therapeutic development because we have clearly demonstrated that small molecules can reverse this type of defect."
In the new research, the scientists used a query molecule called 4', 6-diamidino-2-phenylindole (DAPI) as a chemical and structural template to find similar but more active compounds to inhibit a toxic CAG triplet repeat. One of these compounds was then found effective in inhibiting the RNS toxicity of the repeat in patient-derived cells, which demonstrated an improvement in early-stage abnormalities.
"The toxic RNA defect actually sucks up other proteins that play critical roles in RNA processing, and that is what contributes to these various diseases," Disney said. "Our new compound targets the toxic RNA and inhibits protein binding, shutting off the toxicity. Since the development of drugs that target RNA is extremely challenging, these studies can open up new avenues to exploit RNA drug targets that cause a host of other RNA-mediated diseases."
Disney and his colleagues are already hard at work to extend the lab's findings.
###
The lead author of the study, "Chemical Correction of Pre-mRNA Splicing Defects Associated with Sequestration of Muscleblind-Like 1 Protein by Expanded r(CAG)-containing Transcripts," is Amit Kumar of Scripps Research. Other authors include Raman Parkesh and Jessica Childs-Disney of Scripps Research, and Lukasz J. Sznajder and Krzysztof Sobczak of Adam Mickiewicz University, Poland. For more information, see http://pubs.acs.org/doi/abs/10.1021/cb200413a
The study was supported by the National Institutes of Health and the Polish Ministry of Science and Higher Education, Camille & Henry Dreyfus Foundation, and the
Research Corporation for Science Advancement.
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Contact: Mika Ono mikaono@scripps.edu 858-784-2052 Scripps Research Institute
Discovery could aid search for Huntington's, Spinocerebellar ataxia, and Kennedy disease treatments
Scientists from the Florida campus of The Scripps Research Institute have identified a compound that can help repair a specific type of defect in RNA, a type of genetic material. The methods in the new study could accelerate the development of therapeutics to treat a variety of incurable diseases such as Huntington's disease, Spinocerebellar ataxia, and Kennedy disease.
The new study, published January 17, 2012 in an advance, online edition of the journal ACS Chemical Biology, describes a method to find compounds that target defective RNAs, specifically RNA that carries a structural motif known as an "expanded triplet repeat." The triplet repeat, a series of three nucleotides repeated many more times than normal in the genetic code of affected individuals, has been associated with a variety of neurological and neuromuscular disorders.
"For a long time it was thought that only the protein translated from this type of RNA was toxic," said Matthew Disney, an associate professor at Scripps Florida who led the new study. "But it has been shown recently that both the protein and the RNA are toxic. Our discovery of a small molecule that binds to RNA and shuts off its toxicity not only further demonstrates that the RNA is toxic but also opens up new avenues for therapeutic development because we have clearly demonstrated that small molecules can reverse this type of defect."
In the new research, the scientists used a query molecule called 4', 6-diamidino-2-phenylindole (DAPI) as a chemical and structural template to find similar but more active compounds to inhibit a toxic CAG triplet repeat. One of these compounds was then found effective in inhibiting the RNS toxicity of the repeat in patient-derived cells, which demonstrated an improvement in early-stage abnormalities.
"The toxic RNA defect actually sucks up other proteins that play critical roles in RNA processing, and that is what contributes to these various diseases," Disney said. "Our new compound targets the toxic RNA and inhibits protein binding, shutting off the toxicity. Since the development of drugs that target RNA is extremely challenging, these studies can open up new avenues to exploit RNA drug targets that cause a host of other RNA-mediated diseases."
Disney and his colleagues are already hard at work to extend the lab's findings.
###
The lead author of the study, "Chemical Correction of Pre-mRNA Splicing Defects Associated with Sequestration of Muscleblind-Like 1 Protein by Expanded r(CAG)-containing Transcripts," is Amit Kumar of Scripps Research. Other authors include Raman Parkesh and Jessica Childs-Disney of Scripps Research, and Lukasz J. Sznajder and Krzysztof Sobczak of Adam Mickiewicz University, Poland. For more information, see http://pubs.acs.org/doi/abs/10.1021/cb200413a
The study was supported by the National Institutes of Health and the Polish Ministry of Science and Higher Education, Camille & Henry Dreyfus Foundation, and the
Research Corporation for Science Advancement.
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Public release date: 18-Jan-2012
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