WASHINGTON ? Former U.S. Ambassador Jon Huntsman is defending his refusal to compete in the leadoff Iowa Republican precinct caucuses, focusing instead on New Hampshire.
Huntsman tells CBS's "The Early Show" the formula, so far as he is concerned, is quite elementary. Says Huntsman: "They pick corn in Iowa. They pick presidents in New Hampshire."
The former Utah governor has made little effort to win in Iowa, focusing mostly on New Hampshire in the early going. He has remained in the lower tier of candidates as others, including Newt Gingrich and Rick Santorum ? and at one time, Herman Cain ? soared in the polls. He was ambassador to China for President Barack Obama, but says that shouldn't be used against him as he seeks the Republican presidential nomination.
Republican presidential candidate, Texas Gov. Rick Perry attends a campaign stop at the Westside Conservative Club breakfast,Wednesday, Dec. 28, 2011, in Urbandale, Iowa. (AP Photo/Eric Gay)
Republican presidential candidate, Texas Gov. Rick Perry attends a campaign stop at the Westside Conservative Club breakfast,Wednesday, Dec. 28, 2011, in Urbandale, Iowa. (AP Photo/Eric Gay)
WASHINGTON, Iowa (AP) ? Texas Gov. Rick Perry is questioning former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum's conservative credentials.
Perry said Thursday that he's sometimes confused when Santorum talks about fiscal conservatism. Perry says the former senator loaded up federal legislation with so-called pork-barrel spending for his home state and calls Santorum a "prolific earmarker."
In the race for the GOP presidential nomination, Perry is casting himself as an economic and social conservative best suited to take on President Barack Obama. Perry has slipped in recent polling as Santorum, who also casts himself as the only true conservative, has risen.
Looking to halt Santorum's rise, Perry said, quote: "I love Iowa pork but I hate Washington pork."
Sinead O'Connor married Barry Herridge on her 45th birthday at A Little White Wedding Chapel drive-thru in Las Vegas on Dec. 8.
By Courtney Hazlett
Sinead O'Connor on Monday announced the end of her (very brief) marriage to Barry Herridge and now explains that a wedding-night drug run led to her decision to call things quits.
O'Connor hinted at a search for drugs on her own website,?saying, "Within 3 hours of the ceremony being over the marriage was kyboshed by the behaviour of certain people in my husband's life. And also by a bit of a wild ride i took us on looking for a bit of a smoke of weed for me wedding night as I don't drink."
In an interview with Britain's Sun, she went into more detail. "We ended up in a cab in some place that was quite dangerous. I wasn't scared -- but he's a drugs counselor. What was I thinking? Then I was handed a load of crack. Barry was very frightened -- that kind of messed everything up a bit really."
The experience has left O'Connor, who has been married four times now, soured on marriage. She told the paper that she will never marry again, and added "I don't think I will even date anyone."
NEW YORK ? Better news on home sales and improved prospects for job growth sent stocks higher on Wall Street Thursday.
The Dow Jones industrial average rose 135 points, nearly making up its 140-point loss from the day before. The S&P 500 edged back into the black for 2011, with just one more day of trading left in the year.
The four-week average of unemployment claims fell to a three-and-a-half-year low, an indication that hiring could pick up. Also, the number of Americans who signed contracts to buy homes in November rose more than 7 percent to the highest level in a year and a half, according to the National Association of Realtors.
Quincy Krosby, Prudential Financial's market strategist, said the reports were encouraging signals for the economy going in to 2012.
"The correlation between jobs and housing has been crystal-clear this year," Krosby said. "Parts of the country where jobs are more plentiful are the ones where the housing market has held up."
Krosby said the correlation has become more pronounced after the real estate bust, when lenders became reluctant to even consider customers for a mortgage unless they held jobs. She said it's a noticeable trend in many cities nationwide.
For instance, Boston's 1.1 percent drop in home prices since last year was one of the lowest among metro areas tracked by S&P/Case-Shiller index. The city's unemployment rate is 6.2 percent, much lower than the national average of 8.6 percent.
The positive housing news sent the stocks of home builders sharply higher. Masco Corp. soared 8.4 percent, the most in the S&P 500. PulteGroup Inc. rose 6 percent and Lennar Corp. gained 4.6 percent.
The Dow closed at 12,287.04, a gain of 135.63 points, or 1.1 percent. For the year, the Dow is up 709 points, or 6 percent.
The S&P 500 rose 13.38 points, or 1.07 percent, to 1,263.02. That's just 5 points above where the index started the year.
The technology-heavy Nasdaq composite rose 23.76 points, or 0.92 percent, to 2,613.74. The index if down 39 points for the year.
Trading was very light as investors get ready to close the books on 2011. Markets will be closed Monday in observance of New Year's Day, which falls on Sunday.
Volume on the New York Stock Exchange was 2 billion shares, less than half of its recent average. Gaining stocks led losing ones four-to-one.
The euro fell to its lowest level against the dollar in more than a year and its lowest against the Japanese yen in a decade. The euro went as low as $1.28 versus the dollar, its weakest since September 2010.
Investors continued to be worried that Italy's 10-year borrowing rate remains uncomfortably close to 7 percent, a level that economists consider unsustainable. Greece, Ireland and Portugal all had to seek relief from their creditors after their 10-year bond yields rose above 7 percent.
Italy paid 6.98 percent on a 10-year bond auction where it raised $3.3 billion. That's lower than the 7.56 percent it had to pay at an equivalent auction last month, but not low enough to assuage investors. Italy's new premier said his government has more to do before it convinces financial markets it can manage the heavy debts that have made it the focus of the euro zone crisis.
In other corporate news:
? Chesapeake Midstream Partners rose 5 percent after the natural gas systems operator agreed to acquire Chesapeake Energy Corp.'s pipeline business.
? Hill International Inc. rose 3 percent after the construction management company was awarded a $3.3 million contract to build a new stadium in Iraq.
? Sears Holdings Corp. fell 1 percent as investors worried over the fate of the retailer, two days after it said it was closing over 100 stores nationwide.
AMSTERDAM/MARSEILLE (Reuters) ? Potentially dangerous breast implants made by a now-defunct French company were sold to about 1,000 Dutch women under a different name, a Dutch health official said on Monday, broadening a scandal that could affect some 300,000 women worldwide.
Dutch health authority spokeswoman Diane Bouhuijs said a Dutch company had bought implants made by France's Poly Implant Prothese, which went bankrupt in 2010 after French health authorities shut its doors and is now under investigation. The Dutch firm sold them in the Netherlands rebranded as "M-implants".
"We estimate that some 1,000 women in the Netherlands have those implants. We have advised them to consult their physician," Bouhuijs said.
She declined to disclose the name of the Dutch company.
The rebranding of PIP implants potentially expands the scope of the health controversy in which PIP, once the third-largest maker of breast implants in the world, stands accused of using industrial-grade instead of medical-grade silicone in some of its protheses. They were sold in a number of European and Latin America countries.
The company's founder, Jean-Claude Mas, was able to charge lower prices for the implants using the non-approved silicone.
Health authorities have cited no evidence of increased cancer risk due to the PIP implants but have said they have higher rates of rupture that could cause inflammation and irritation.
While the French government has urged the 30,000 women in France with PIP implants to have them removed, other countries, including Britain and Brazil, say women should visit their surgeons for checks.
Health spokeswoman Bouhuijs did not say how long M-implants were sold in the Netherlands before they were banned in March 2010, along with PIP-labeled implants, as in France.
In early 2010 Dutch authorities launched an investigation into breast implants which is still going on, Bouhuijs said.
France's drug and medical device regulator, AFSSAPS, was closed on Monday due to the holiday, so Reuters was unable to ascertain whether health authorities knew about the M-implants.
SICK IN SOUTHERN FRANCE
Mas' lawyer Yves Haddad told Reuters on Monday that his 72-year-old client is in poor health but ready to respond to any court summons.
No one has been charged in the case, but sources say a Marseilles court could soon announce fraud charges against four to six ex-PIP employees. An investigation into involuntary homicide is going on, following the death from cancer in 2010 of a woman who had PIP implants.
Haddad denied that Mas was in hiding, reiterating that he was still in southern France's Var region.
"He's currently in very bad health because he has just undergone a difficult surgery that prevents him from walking," Haddad said.
Mas recent surgery was confirmed by a second source, who cited a vascular problem.
"He is worried by the importance this matter is taking on. He is angry at those who pointlessly add to people's suffering," Haddad said.
Haddad denied reports that Mas was a former butcher, saying that before founding PIP in 1991 he worked for more than 15 years as a medical sales representative for Bristol Myers.
Officials at Bristol Myers in the United States and France were not immediately available over the holiday weekend to verify Mas' employment record.
PIP AT FOREFRONT
French plastic surgeon Patrick Perichaud, who implanted over 600 women with protheses made by PIP between 2001 and 2009, defended the devices, saying their rupture rates were no higher than other makers' products.
Perichaud told Reuters PIP was at the forefront of breast implant technology in the past two decades. Whereas other implant makers made saline protheses that had to be filled once inside the breast, PIP introduced a pre-filled version, he said.
In 2001, after a 10-year ban of silicone implants was lifted in France, PIP was the first to make asymmetrically shaped implants whose look was more natural than competitors', he said.
"This made for very natural-looking breasts, and allowed me to put the protheses in front of the muscle and not behind it, like we had to do often before," said Perichaud, who is based in the southern city of Toulon.
The cost of the implants was 610 euros ($800). He said the patients bought the implants directly from PIP and that he as a surgeon did not get any financial incentive to steer clients towards the company.
The current breast implant health scare was "more psychological than scientific," he said, adding that no definitive link had been made between PIP implants and cancer.
"Breast cancer affects one in 10 women, even one in eight, so if 30,000 patients received PIP implants, statistically that would make 3000 cancers," he said.
Since the start of the PIP scandal in 2010, Perichaud has re-operated on 148 women to remove the implants at issue.
($1 = 0.7669 euros)
(Additional reporting by Alexandria Sage and Sophie Louet; Yinka Adegoke in New York; writing Alexandria Sage; editing by Geert De Clercq and Dan Grebler)
(Image credit: Pennsylvania Interscholastic Hockey League)
By Matt Popchock
(mpopchock@kdka.com)
It didn?t happen exactly as we planned (the traditional press release from the league was conspicuously absent), but in any event, Brett Berner, Tanner Gilland, Conlan Sodrosky, and Justin Sabilla were honored as the PIHL Players of the Month for November while the Penguins were beating the Blackhawks.
So what have the honorees done for us lately?
Berner, a freshman forward, is already an assistant captain for North Hills. That program has struggled for years, even to the point of temporarily folding its varsity team last season, so the Indians will take whatever talent they can get. He opened his first varsity campaign with two goals and four assists in his first five games, but Berner cooled off a bit in December with two goals and one helper. Still, he?s averaging a point per game, and any freshman will take that in a heartbeat.
Gilliland has been the lone bright spot on a Butler squad that is still looking for its first win after nine games. The Golden Tornado has managed only 15 goals, and he has accounted for nine. He bested his four goals in November with five in December, and he continued his strong start with six points in December, which is one more than he had the previous month.
(Photo credit: Pittsburgh Penguins)
It?s awfully fitting Sabilla, Chartiers Valley?s senior captain, won this award after winning it in November 2010. He was a driving force behind that team?s turnaround, and the scoring pace he?s on right now is just sick. Sabilla has 25 goals and 36 points in his first nine games. He scored ten of those goals in December, including his fourth short-handed tally of the season, and he?s posted four multiple-goal games in a row. With only five teams over .500 through the holiday break, you could argue Class AA is down this season, but that should not diminish what Sabilla has accomplished thus far. He seems to be as good a captain as there is in the league.
Sodrosky was not present at CONSOL Energy Center Dec. 20, but he had a reasonable excuse; he was trying to help keep upstart Penn-Trafford unbeaten. Unfortunately, his two goals and one assist weren?t enough to keep North Allegheny from snapping the Warriors? ten-game winning streak with a 7-5 victory at BladeRunners Warrendale. But after coming out of nowhere to lead Class AAA in scoring with 31 points, Sodrosky hasn?t taken his foot off the gas, contributing seven goals and 16 points in five December games. He had multiple points in all five.
###
With that win over the Warriors, North Allegheny (7-2-1) owns the second-longest active winning streak in Class AAA at five games, and it might be time to pencil the Tigers onto the ?contenders? list.
We?re going to learn a lot about them in January. They open the second half of their season by hosting Mount Lebanon with an opportunity to gain a share of first place from the Blue Devils (8-2-1) in Section 2, and they have rematches with Peters Township and undefeated Canon-McMillan. But the difference between this N.A. team and others is the firepower and the balance up front that complements the defense.
Head coach Jim Black is known for preaching responsible own-zone play. It?s what helped the Tigers win their only Penguins and Pennsylvania Cups back in 2006-07, his first season on the job. But when I talked to him after the Penn-Trafford game, he said in the off-season he examined the possibility he needed to focus his own energies on teaching offense more often.
It?s a little different approach by North Allegheny, and so far, it has paid off. The Tigers are averaging over four goals per game, and fourteen different players have scored a goal for N.A. entering the new calendar year. They own a tie with Peters, which is expected to contend this year, and lopsided wins over Upper St. Clair and Norwin?another surprise team in Class AAA.
Meanwhile, Matthew Goda has been in goal for each of N.A.?s wins, even though his GAA of 2.78 and save percentage of .867 are both modest. But thanks to his defensemen, he doesn?t face a ton of quality shots, so if they can just keep doing what they?re doing, and if Goda picks up his own game, the Tigers will like where they end up at the end of the season.
###
By the way, while I?m thinking of these things, who should be the PIHL Players of the Month for December? I?ve got a few ideas?
*Dan Merz has helped Norwin keep pace with Penn-Trafford in Class AAA Section 4 with a five-game goal streak. Two of those goals came shorthanded, and the Knights went 4-0-1 in those five games.
*Jon Levitt scored twice for West Allegheny in a huge 4-2 win over Chartiers Valley to close out its first half. He posted ten goals in four December games, and ranks second in Class AA with 16 goals, and third in points with 26. The Indians lead Section 1.
*Kevin Kenny has played well enough at both ends to put Quaker Valley back on the radar in Class A. The tall forward carries a six-game goal streak into the second half of the season, and he racked up seven goals and 14 points in four December outings. Kenny has a power play goal in five straight games, and QV has won six in a row.
*Let?s give some love to the Open Class too, shall we? Isaac Fitzpatrick played an instrumental role in John Marshall?s title run last season, and he?s picked up right where he left off for the Open Cup champs this season. Fitzpatrick leads the Monarchs with 41 points, ranking second in the classification, and he amassed 11 goals, 16 points in five December games. Five of those goals came on special teams.
?Teaching English in Taiwan Change How You Start Your Day How do you wake up in the morning? Does an alarm ring in your ear at 7am telling you to get up and get ready for work? Or do you just know that you need to be in the office by 830am and you naturally wake up at 7am? For many people this is how they start their day. However, I wake up and get out of bed when I feel ready. I am in no rush. Yes, I work and I have a job. I am an English teacher in Taiwan and that is how I start my day. For many people the idea of teaching English doesn't excite...
?Teaching English in Taiwan Experience Life in Taiwan as an English Teacher Teaching English in Taiwan can be one of the most unforgettable experiences a person can have. You might be wondering why anyone would want to teach English overseas, let alone in a small country like Taiwan. Teaching overseas has numerous advantages and while it is not for everyone it is definitely a great way to earn some money and experience a completely different way of life. With the recent economic troubles many countries are facing now, teaching is an easy way to ride out the economic...
?What Do You Need to Be Qualified to Teach English in Taiwan Would you like to try your hand at teaching in Taiwan? Not just anyone can teach English in Taiwan. It may have been true that in the past all you needed to teach English in Taiwan or just about any Asian country was a passport from an English speaking country, but this isn't the case anymore. To be eligible to teach English in Taiwan today, in addition to being a native English speaker from the USA/CAN/Australia/New Zealand/South Africa, you must also hold either a Bachelor's degree or an...
?Taiwan Teaching Jobs Common Problems ESL Teachers Face on a Daily Basis Teaching in Taiwan Teaching in Taiwan isn't without its pitfalls and problems. Many schools and recruiters have only good things to say about working in Taiwan to potential employees. This isn't to say that none of it is true, but the best thing you can do before making the move to Taiwan as an ESL teacher is to fully prepare yourself in advance. Taiwan teaching jobs are all pretty much the same and you will find that most schools and bosses follow the same basic modus-operandi. Here is a quick look at what it is...
?Be Careful Teaching English Illegally in Taiwan While teaching English in Taiwan isn't really that difficult to do thanks to the basic requirements, there still are a lot of foreign teachers in Taiwan who are teaching illegally. To be fair, they aren't all in the same boat. Some teachers in Taiwan are teaching illegally and they know they shouldn't. There are, however, another group of teachers who have no idea that where they work and what they are doing is completely in violation of the law regarding just how can teach in classrooms and...
?Teaching English in Taiwan An English Teacher s Experience If you are considering a move to Taiwan to teach English, then it is probably logical that you want to know what it is really like teaching in Taiwan. Taiwan is probably very different from what you may have heard or read about. TV shows portray Taiwan as a leading producer of high technology products and similar products. There is some truth to this but the majority of Taiwan is vastly different from what many people think it is. This can be seen in both the daily life and your work...
?English Teaching Opportunities in Taiwan The opportunities of teaching English in Taiwan are numerous. Taiwan is a small place but there is massive demand for English teachers. Spend just a few minutes looking around and you'll spot several recruitment agencies and schools posting ads online for English teachers in Taiwan. However, what they won't tell you is what teaching English in Taiwan is really like. Just like any job, teaching isn't for everyone. It does take a certain kind of person to be able to live and work in Taiwan, but...
?What Are the Average Hours Teaching English in Taiwan Taiwan is an interesting place to teach English, and there are a wide variety of schools that would be more than happy to have you work for them. However, will you be getting hours that suit your needs? Most schools that hire foreign teachers in Taiwan are cram schools and they are usually open in the afternoons. There are plenty of other job opportunities for teachers, but most of them are located in cram schools or kindergartens. Why or what is your reason for thinking about moving to Taiwan?...
?How Many Hours Do English Teachers Work in Taiwan The reasons people make the move to Taiwan to teach English vary. Some come for fun, some come just to experience something completely different and others come to make money. The reason you want to teach in Taiwan will be affected greatly by the number of hours you'll be working. What hours do English teachers in Taiwan typically work? If you are coming for fun then knowing in advance the number of hours you'll be working allows you to plan your daily activities outside of work with much...
?What Hours Will You Work Teaching English in Taiwan Without enough hours teaching English in Taiwan, you will find it hard to make a living. It is true that teachers get paid decently, but if you aren't working enough hours or you find that your daily living expenses are higher than you had planned, if you aren't working enough hours you'll probably find it difficult to save any moreny. Another question is also how many hours do you want to teach? Some people want a lot of hours while others only want a few. What number of hours do schools...
Study uncovers a molecular 'maturation clock' that modulates branching architecture in tomato plantsPublic release date: 26-Dec-2011 [ | E-mail | Share ]
Contact: Hema Bashyam bashyam@cshl.edu 516-367-8455 Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory
Manipulating the clock might provide agricultural benefits, as a slower clock increases branching, thereby increasing flower number and fruit yield
Cold Spring Harbor, N.Y. The secret to pushing tomato plants to produce more fruit might not lie in an extra dose of Miracle-Gro. Instead, new research from Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory (CSHL) suggests that an increase in fruit yield might be achieved by manipulating a molecular timer or so-called "maturation clock" that determines the number of branches that make flowers, called inflorescences.
"We have found that a delay in this clock causes more branching to occur in the inflorescences, which in turn results in more flowers and ultimately, more fruits," says CSHL Assistant Professor Zach Lippman, who led the research team. The new study, which involved a high-resolution, genome-level comparison of the stem cell populations from three tomato varieties that each have different branching architectures, will appear online in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences during the week of December 26.
When a plant is ready to flower, populations of stem cells, called shoot apical meristems, which are found in the growing tips, stop producing leaves and begin producing flowers by transforming into "inflorescence meristems." Depending on the tomato variety, inflorescences meristems can make just one branch with a few flowers arranged in the familiar, photogenic zigzag pattern (shown), or multiple branches with dozens of flowers, as seen in closely-related wild relatives of tomatoes, which are native to South America.
Although most domesticated varieties, which have been bred to produce edible, delicious fruit, produce a single inflorescence branch with just a few flowers, some varieties make dozens of branches bearing hundreds of flowers. "Although one might think that all this branching is good, too much branching is not a desirable trait, because the plant spends so much energy on making flowers on those branches that it ends up not having the resources to set those flowers into fruits," explains Lippman. "So there needs to be a balance, which the wild relatives of tomatoes seem to have achieved."
Previous studies hypothesized that extreme branching might be the result of a pause or a delay in the maturation of inflorescence meristems, causing them to sprout extra branches instead of ending their growth by making flowers. "Our previous work as well as those of others hinted at the existence of a timer or clock," Lippman notes. "We wanted to define this clock at the highest resolution, in terms of the genes that modulate the rate of meristem maturation, with the idea that finding the genes that define the clock would enable us to tweak it to get the desired level of branching."
Using a systems biology approach and next-generation sequencing technology to "capture" the transcriptome the activity of all the genes in a genome of stem cells at five different stages of maturation, the team identified nearly 4000 genes that represent the clock. With help from CSHL associate professor and computational biologist Michael Schatz, the team, which included post-doctoral researchers Soon-ju Park and Ke Jiang, compared the clocks of a mutant variety that undergoes extreme branching and a wild relative from Peru that undergoes modest branching.
This analysis revealed that subtle differences in the activity of the clock's genes could alter branching architecture. "Our data showed that wild relatives of tomato have evolved to have a slight delay in maturation, which leads to just a few more branches and a doubling of the number of flowers and fruits compared to what is typically found on cultivated tomatoes grown for ketchup or in the home garden," explains Lippman, who is enthusiastic about the implications of this work and the next steps that his team will take. "We now have a master list of candidate genes that we can go after to manipulate the clock in order to make domesticated tomatoes produce a branching architecture that's similar to the wild variety," he says.
###
This research was supported by the National Science Foundation Plant Genome Research Program and the International Human Frontier Science Program Organization.
"The rate of meristem maturation determines inflorescence architecture in tomato" appears in the online early edition of The Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences during the week of December 26. The full citation is: Soon Ju park, Ke Jiang, Michael C. Schatz and Zachary B. Lippman. The paper can be downloaded at: http://www.pnas.org.
About Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory
Founded in 1890, Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory (CSHL) has shaped contemporary biomedical research and education with programs in cancer, neuroscience, plant biology and quantitative biology. CSHL is ranked number one in the world by Thomson Reuters for impact of its research in molecular biology and genetics. The Laboratory has been home to eight Nobel Prize winners. Today, CSHL's multidisciplinary scientific community is more than 350 scientists strong and its Meetings & Courses program hosts more than 11,000 scientists from around the world each year. Tens of thousands more benefit from the research, reviews, and ideas published in journals and books distributed internationally by CSHL Press. The Laboratory's education arm also includes a graduate school and programs for undergraduates as well as middle and high school students and teachers. CSHL is a private, not-for-profit institution on the north shore of Long Island. For more information, visit http://www.cshl.edu.
[ | E-mail | Share ]
?
AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.
Study uncovers a molecular 'maturation clock' that modulates branching architecture in tomato plantsPublic release date: 26-Dec-2011 [ | E-mail | Share ]
Contact: Hema Bashyam bashyam@cshl.edu 516-367-8455 Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory
Manipulating the clock might provide agricultural benefits, as a slower clock increases branching, thereby increasing flower number and fruit yield
Cold Spring Harbor, N.Y. The secret to pushing tomato plants to produce more fruit might not lie in an extra dose of Miracle-Gro. Instead, new research from Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory (CSHL) suggests that an increase in fruit yield might be achieved by manipulating a molecular timer or so-called "maturation clock" that determines the number of branches that make flowers, called inflorescences.
"We have found that a delay in this clock causes more branching to occur in the inflorescences, which in turn results in more flowers and ultimately, more fruits," says CSHL Assistant Professor Zach Lippman, who led the research team. The new study, which involved a high-resolution, genome-level comparison of the stem cell populations from three tomato varieties that each have different branching architectures, will appear online in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences during the week of December 26.
When a plant is ready to flower, populations of stem cells, called shoot apical meristems, which are found in the growing tips, stop producing leaves and begin producing flowers by transforming into "inflorescence meristems." Depending on the tomato variety, inflorescences meristems can make just one branch with a few flowers arranged in the familiar, photogenic zigzag pattern (shown), or multiple branches with dozens of flowers, as seen in closely-related wild relatives of tomatoes, which are native to South America.
Although most domesticated varieties, which have been bred to produce edible, delicious fruit, produce a single inflorescence branch with just a few flowers, some varieties make dozens of branches bearing hundreds of flowers. "Although one might think that all this branching is good, too much branching is not a desirable trait, because the plant spends so much energy on making flowers on those branches that it ends up not having the resources to set those flowers into fruits," explains Lippman. "So there needs to be a balance, which the wild relatives of tomatoes seem to have achieved."
Previous studies hypothesized that extreme branching might be the result of a pause or a delay in the maturation of inflorescence meristems, causing them to sprout extra branches instead of ending their growth by making flowers. "Our previous work as well as those of others hinted at the existence of a timer or clock," Lippman notes. "We wanted to define this clock at the highest resolution, in terms of the genes that modulate the rate of meristem maturation, with the idea that finding the genes that define the clock would enable us to tweak it to get the desired level of branching."
Using a systems biology approach and next-generation sequencing technology to "capture" the transcriptome the activity of all the genes in a genome of stem cells at five different stages of maturation, the team identified nearly 4000 genes that represent the clock. With help from CSHL associate professor and computational biologist Michael Schatz, the team, which included post-doctoral researchers Soon-ju Park and Ke Jiang, compared the clocks of a mutant variety that undergoes extreme branching and a wild relative from Peru that undergoes modest branching.
This analysis revealed that subtle differences in the activity of the clock's genes could alter branching architecture. "Our data showed that wild relatives of tomato have evolved to have a slight delay in maturation, which leads to just a few more branches and a doubling of the number of flowers and fruits compared to what is typically found on cultivated tomatoes grown for ketchup or in the home garden," explains Lippman, who is enthusiastic about the implications of this work and the next steps that his team will take. "We now have a master list of candidate genes that we can go after to manipulate the clock in order to make domesticated tomatoes produce a branching architecture that's similar to the wild variety," he says.
###
This research was supported by the National Science Foundation Plant Genome Research Program and the International Human Frontier Science Program Organization.
"The rate of meristem maturation determines inflorescence architecture in tomato" appears in the online early edition of The Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences during the week of December 26. The full citation is: Soon Ju park, Ke Jiang, Michael C. Schatz and Zachary B. Lippman. The paper can be downloaded at: http://www.pnas.org.
About Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory
Founded in 1890, Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory (CSHL) has shaped contemporary biomedical research and education with programs in cancer, neuroscience, plant biology and quantitative biology. CSHL is ranked number one in the world by Thomson Reuters for impact of its research in molecular biology and genetics. The Laboratory has been home to eight Nobel Prize winners. Today, CSHL's multidisciplinary scientific community is more than 350 scientists strong and its Meetings & Courses program hosts more than 11,000 scientists from around the world each year. Tens of thousands more benefit from the research, reviews, and ideas published in journals and books distributed internationally by CSHL Press. The Laboratory's education arm also includes a graduate school and programs for undergraduates as well as middle and high school students and teachers. CSHL is a private, not-for-profit institution on the north shore of Long Island. For more information, visit http://www.cshl.edu.
[ | E-mail | Share ]
?
AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.
Oh yes, there IS a permanent record that collects a public school student's career, and a new federal grant will expand North Carolina's digital record-keeping of student academic histories beginning in infancy for some children.
About $9 million of the $70 million Race to the Top grant the U.S. Education Department recently awarded North Carolina will be used to expand to younger children the ability to track their progress, something an existing 2-year-old database already does with more than 1.5 million public school students between kindergarten and 12th grade. Teachers also are recorded with unique ID numbers so their performance can be tracked. Four-year-olds enrolled in a state pre-kindergarten program were tracked previously.
Last week, state education officials applied for a $4 million grant that would increase the ability to track student performance into their university or community college career, and even follow what happens when they enter the work force.
The goal in tracking student learning from their early years to graduation and beyond is to produce hard data about what works in public education, what doesn't and why.
It's part of a national trend that shaping efficient and effective schools depends on "good data instead of anecdotes and feelings and political decisions," said Adam Levinson, the state education department official in charge of its Race to the Top grant programs.
"This has implications for investment decisions, like where would the state put money to get the best bang for the buck for children?" Levinson said. "Or if we looked at community colleges on up, what are the best investments for young adults or adults who come back to school?"
Soon, children whose families receive subsidized child care, who get government help to cope with a disability, or join a state-financed pre-kindergarten program will be issued an identification number that makes it possible for their digital records to stay updated through their academic career.
"It will help us to be able to follow a student from the time they enter services," state schools superintendent June Atkinson said. "And then we have a system that we continue to follow the student. So we really can see the benefits or the impact of early childhood education, or early learning."
All states have established databases that identify each student and track their performance on tests, graduation and dropouts, according to the Data Quality Campaign, a national advocacy group that supports student-tracking efforts and is funded in part by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.
North Carolina is one of 11 that can follow children from before they reach school age into their college and employment careers, the group said. Such tracking should help educators and policymakers to see trends that point to classroom success and shortcomings, Data Quality Campaign executive director Aimee Guidera said.
"That feedback is incredibly important not just for accountability purposes but really important for continuous improvement," Guidera said. "It provides real-life accountability and information back to (school) systems so they can use the information to better prepare their graduates for the requirements of post-graduate education and the workplace, not for data to sit on a spreadsheet somewhere."
For example, North Carolina already is one of a half-dozen states that shares teacher performance data, based on student achievement, with the institutions from which they graduated, the group says.
Other uses might include establishing whether children enrolled in state-supported pre-kindergarten programs read as well or better than their peers once they reach third grade. How many who start in pre-K graduate from college? What's the best sequence of high school courses to boost the chances of success? Which children are graduating from college and actually getting a job?
Besides tracking trends in the great mass of the state's public school population, online capabilities allow parents to track their children throughout the year. A system called NC WISE allows parents with an online password to track the homework missing, credits earned, standardized test results, and days absent. The service, which the Data Quality campaign says is now provided by only a handful of other states, is popular with parents and PTAs.
An enhanced application called Parent Assistant now available in a handful of the state's 115 school districts allows parents to access their child's performance data down to individual assignments.
"If your child struggles in science, you usually know what the assignments are," said Laura Elliott, 44, of the Iredell County town of Harmony, mother of two sons in middle school and high school. "You're not waiting for the report card to come out to be surprised,"
Federal law prohibits the release of an individual student records without parental consent but exceptions are made for researchers doing studies or evaluating programs who sign confidentiality agreements. Levinson said the identification numbers issued to each child for their academic career also moves away from Social Security numbers, a key to online and financial security.
While Levinson agrees that parents who learn for the first time about the state's capability to track students for decades might worry about data security, North Carolina PTA executive director Debra Horton says privacy concerns haven't much worried parents.
"We haven't heard any huge outcry from our members about using these systems. If anything it's been very supportive," Horton said.
President Barack Obama blended his roles as a father and commander-in-chief this Christmas, exchanging presents and singing carols with his family, then greeting U.S. service members stationed at a Marine base in Hawaii.
posted Dec 25th - 12:46pm
The White House is condemning what it is calling a "senseless" Christmas terrorist attack in Nigeria.
posted Dec 25th - 10:46am
Vice President Joe Biden is reaching out to Iraq's leaders to discuss recent violence there and the country's tenuous political climate.
By HOLLY RAMER ??|?posted Dec 25th - 7:53am
Mitt Romney's wife gushes about his silly side and devotion to their five sons and 16 grandchildren. Rick Santorum's college-age daughter opines online about missing the campus coffee shop and chats with friends about their Friday night plans. Jon Huntsman's daughters generate much-needed buzz for him with a joint Twitter account and online videos, including at least one that went viral.
By HOLLY RAMER ??|?posted Dec 25th - 3:05am
Relatives of the Republican presidential candidates are doing far more handshaking and smiling from the sidelines as voting nears.
By JULIE PACE ??|?posted Dec 24th - 8:21pm
Michelle Obama was looking for help from more than just House Republicans so her husband could make it to Hawaii in time for Christmas.
By ERICA WERNER ??|?posted Dec 24th - 1:16pm
Fighting to win over unhappy American voters, President Barack Obama and his Republican challengers are seizing on one of the most potent issues this election season: the struggling middle class and the widening gap between rich and poor.
By RYAN J. FOLEY ??|?posted Dec 24th - 1:13pm
The passionate support of an eclectic group of libertarians and young people has Ron Paul in contention to win the Iowa caucus. So has the work of two well-funded nonprofits that for the past three years have kept his aides employed, his volunteers organized and his ideas afloat.
posted Dec 24th - 4:12am
President Barack Obama is wishing a Merry Christmas and happy holidays to all Americans in his weekly radio and Internet address, with a special message of thanks to the troops.
By ERICA WERNER ??|?posted Dec 24th - 1:49am
President Barack Obama and his Republican rivals are focusing on economic inequality as an issue in the 2012 campaign as they argue about which of them can best help the middle class.
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Other than the one we're currently living on, that is. As discoveries of alien planets accelerates, the discovery of an "alien Earth" could be just over the horizon.?
While 2011 was a huge year for alien-planet discoveries, 2012 could bring something even more exciting: the first true "alien Earth."
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This year saw the tally of confirmed exoplanets top 700, with NASA's Kepler space telescope flagging thousands of additional candidates that still need to be verified. And just this month, Kepler scientists announced two landmark finds ? the?first two Earth-size alien planets, as well as a larger world in its star's habitable zone, that just-right range of distances where liquid water (and possibly life as we know it) could exist.
These and other recent discoveries suggest that the prized quarry of many exoplanet hunters ??an "alien Earth"?? could be just over the horizon. In fact, such a planet may well pop up in the next round of Kepler candidates, which should be released next year, researchers said.
"I'm guessing that this next planet catalog is going to see, finally, some numbers of points that are really, truly Earth-sized and in the habitable zone," said Natalie Batalha, deputy leader of the Kepler science team at NASA's Ames Research Center in Moffett Field, Calif. "That's something that I really look forward to, is getting those candidates." [Vote Now! Most Intriguing Alien Planets of 2011]
The year has seen a huge increase in the?number of known exoplanets. At the start of 2011, astronomers had confirmed 528 alien worlds, according to the Extrasolar Planets Encyclopedia, a database compiled by astrobiologist Jean Schneider of the Paris-Meudon Observatory.
Less than one year later ? and just 16 years after the first alien planet was found orbiting a sun-like star ? the count now stands at 713. And thousands more are waiting in the wings.
On Dec. 5, Kepler scientists announced the discovery of?1,094 new exoplanet candidates, bringing the mission's total tally in its first 16 months of operation to 2,326. So far, just 33 of these potential planets have been confirmed by follow-up observations, but researchers have estimated that at least 80 percent of them will turn out to be the real deal.
These huge numbers are exciting by themselves, but the search for alien planets isn't really about increasing the tally. Rather, it's a quest to better understand the nature and?diversity of alien worlds, researchers say.
"You can only understand the diversity of systems if you have enough numbers that speak to the statistics," Batalha told SPACE.com. "You really want a large sample, and that's where Kepler's going to make a huge contribution."
The diversity of alien worlds and systems appears to be high. Astronomers have found one planet as light and airy as Styrofoam, for example, and another as dense as iron. And in September, the Kepler team announced the discovery of an?alien planet that circles two suns, like Luke Skywalker's home planet of Tatooine in the "Star Wars" films.
[SPOILER WARNING: This story contains key plot details from Wednesday's season finale of American Horror Story. Read at your own risk.]
American Horror Story really lived up to its name, huh?
In the FX series' first season finale, the Harmons were finally reunited in the afterlife when Ben's vengeful former lover Hayden hanged him by the chandelier, staging it to look like a suicide. (You'll recall that Vivien and Violet, Ben's wife and daughter, already died, respectively, in childbirth and by overdosing on pills.)
What were the top TV shows of 2011?
So what does this mean for Season 2? Will Connie Britton and Dylan McDermott, who starred as Vivien and Ben, return to haunt the new owners of Murder House? Nope! "Those characters and those stories are done," creator Ryan Murphy told reporters Thursday morning. "Every season of the show will be a different haunting. Every season will have a beginning, a middle and an end. What you saw in the finale was the end of the Harmon house. The second season of the show will be a brand new home or building to haunt."
Murphy says the show was always intended to be an anthology, with a new set of cast members and characters each season. But there will be some residual elements from Season 1. "Some of [the actors] will be coming back... so there will be familiar faces and also new faces on the show, but they will be playing completely different characters, creatures and monsters, etc."
"Connie and Dylan will not be playing the leads of the show," Murphy reiterated. "But I'd love for them to come back and do something, albeit a different part or a smaller part or a cameo." He cites New York's Mercury Theatre, a troupe founded by Orson Welles and John Houseman in the 1930s, as an inspiration. "You have a cast of actors that you love and believe in and you just rotate them every season.... I have been getting a lot of calls from film actors who've always wanted to dabble in television."
While Murphy declined to specify which original actors they are negotiating with to return for next season, he says, "I'd have them [all] back in a heartbeat." An announcement of new cast members and the second season story line is slated to come in February. Season 2 is tentatively scheduled to premiere in late September or October 2012.
Who were the breakout stars of the year?
Until then, Murphy says he's happy with the finale, in which the reunited ghost Harmons decorated the Christmas tree together. "I thought it was a great goodbye to those characters," he said. "I felt a lot of peace with how they ended up and I hope other people felt that as well. We're simply not interested in doing another season with all those people trapped in the house. The criticism had we done that would've been that it would be the same old thing. You really can't win sometimes... I can say with 100 percent optimism, I really think they will love the second season, perhaps even more so based on what we've cooked up."
So what is in store for the second season? Murphy says there are plenty of tales to choose from, "Be it serial-killing stories, true crime stories or prison stories. Every year of the show is almost like a miniseries in itself.... The only thing I don't think I would do would be a season about vampires. The season we're planning now is very different from the California house approach." Murphy teases that there is a clue within the last three episodes that indicates exactly what next season will be about. Any guesses?
What did you think of the American Horror Story finale? Will you miss the Harmon family? Hit the comments with your thoughts.
GHAZNI CITY, Afghanistan (Reuters) ? A roadside bomb killed five Polish soldiers in Afghanistan on Wednesday, the country's prime minister said, Poland's largest loss of life in a single incident since it joined the NATO-led coalition of foreign troops almost a decade ago.
"This is very sad information for the Polish soldiers, for the whole of Poland, and especially for the families who are being informed of the fact right now," Prime Minister Donald Tusk told a news conference in Katowice, southern Poland.
"The bomb had to be of a very significant power as the vehicles the Polish soldiers use are generally well-protected against this type of attack," he said.
Poland has about 2,475 troops in Afghanistan, most of them stationed in Ghazni province, southwest of the capital, Kabul. A total of 36 Polish soldiers have now been killed in Afghanistan, according to Poland's defense ministry.
Ghazni province has a heavy and growing Taliban presence but the blast hit in a village considered relatively secure, and just two kilometers from the provincial capital, Ghazni city.
Rawza village contains several historical sites and police security is seen as tight. Polish soldiers have been involved in reconstruction work on historical sites.
No civilians were wounded but the loud explosion was heard throughout the city and shattered the windows of nearby houses.
Colonel Miroslaw Ochyra from the Polish army's operational headquarters in Poland said it was unclear how the bomb had been activated because it did not explode when the first of the soldiers' armored vehicles drove over it.
It contained an estimated 100 kg (220 lb) of explosives.
The Taliban claimed responsibility for the blast, but Ochyra said Poland would investigate that claim.
"We must remember that the Taliban often claim some attacks to showcase their strength," he told Polish media.
(Additional reporting by Agnieszka Flak and Mirwais Harooni in KABUL, Gabriela Baczynska in WARSAW and Wojciech Zurawski in KATOWICE; Editing by Sanjeev Miglani and Paul Tait)
Gabrielle Union Hits the Beach in Miami in a Bikini
Posted on 22 December 2011 by splash
Gabrielle Union hit the beach in Miami today. The actress was spotted in a bright orange bikini as she played in the surf with boyfriend Dwayne Wade?s children.
It's official. AT&T will drop its $39 Billion bid to purchase T-Mobile. According to the official statement, the actions of the FCC and the DOJ are to blame. [AT&T] More »
Britney Spears and her fianc? Jason Trawick made their debut as an engaged couple at Planet Hollywood in Las Vegas on Friday evening.
The pair, who originally planned to be in the city to celebrate Trawick?s 40th birthday, made it a double celebration after getting engaged the night before. Us Weekly broke the news.
PHOTOS: Inside their romance.
Spears wore a pale pink dress as she proudly showed off the three carat Neil Lane sparkler given to her by her former agent beau.
"This is something they've both wanted for a long time," a source explains to Us. "It's a way to cement their family. They're both extremely happy and can't wait to become man and wife."
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Blippar?s image recognition based Augmented Reality platform is getting more and more popular around the world, so JWT have teamed up with them to issue staff with Augmented Reality business cards, and here is the demo video to give you a quick taste!
The Blippar image recognition engine reads the graphics on the card and activates the Augmented Reality experience. On this occasion, the experience is pretty simple, with the card playing the agency showreel and providing a link to Google maps. I would have loved it to save contact details into my phone and perhaps flicked through the agency process and key services. What?s great about Blippar is that once you have it, you can activate any Blippar experience. (thanks Kon!)
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Public release date: 26-Dec-2011
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