You Can Apply to Use Google's Street View Backpack Now

If you've always fancied mapping out an obscure part of the globe, it could be your lucky day: you can now apply to use Google's Street View backpack.

Called Trekker, the backpack is used to image the more obscure locations around the planet that cars, trikes and snowmobiles can't access. And now If you?re a "tourism board, non-profit, university, research organization or other third party" who has access to a hard-to-reach place, Google are willing to give you the chance to use it yourself.

In fact, you can apply online here to use Trekker. Which you should. [Google]

Source: http://gizmodo.com/you-can-apply-to-use-googles-street-view-backpack-now-631925651

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Japan business confidence up after almost 2 years

TOKYO (AP) ? The Bank of Japan says business sentiment among major manufacturers has turned positive for the first time in nearly two years.

The central bank's closely-watched quarterly "tankan" survey for June showed Monday that the index for major manufacturers rose to positive 4 from negative 8 in March. It was the first survey to be higher than zero since September 2011.

A positive reading means more companies are optimistic than pessimistic.

The index for major non-manufacturers rose to 12 from 6 in the last survey.

The improvement comes amid a weakening yen, which boosts overseas income for Japan's key exporters, and a series of aggressive economic policies ? moentary easing and boosting public workers projects ? by Prime Minister Shinzo Abe since he took office in December.

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/f70471f764144b2fab526d39972d37b3/Article_2013-06-30-Japan-Economy/id-c231f7e0daf34d26a0fc9cd837f0d590

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Zynga CEO steps down, Microsoft exec to take post

This undated photo provided by GlobeNewswire shows Zynga's new CEO Don Mattrick, right, with Zynga's founding CEO Mark Pincus. Zynga's CEO, Mark Pincus, is stepping down to be replaced by Don Mattrick, the head of Microsoft's Xbox business, Zynga announced Monday, July 1, 2013. (AP Photo/GlobeNewswire)

This undated photo provided by GlobeNewswire shows Zynga's new CEO Don Mattrick, right, with Zynga's founding CEO Mark Pincus. Zynga's CEO, Mark Pincus, is stepping down to be replaced by Don Mattrick, the head of Microsoft's Xbox business, Zynga announced Monday, July 1, 2013. (AP Photo/GlobeNewswire)

NEW YORK (AP) ? He's not heading out to pasture, but the CEO of "FarmVille" maker Zynga Inc. is stepping aside as the troubled online game company looks to revive itself and lift its stalled stock price.

Mark Pincus will be replaced on Monday, July 8, by Don Mattrick, who was most recently head of Microsoft's Xbox division. Zynga said Monday that Pincus, who founded Zynga Inc. and named it after his American bulldog in 2007, will stay on as chairman and chief product officer.

Mattrick, 49, had served as the president of Microsoft's entertainment business, which includes the Xbox, since 2010. He had been with Microsoft for six years, helping to launch the Kinect motion controller. He also helped grow the Xbox Live online service from 6 million members to 48 million in roughly six years.

"Zynga is a great business that has yet to realize its full potential. I'm really proud to partner with a product focused founder like Mark and work with the executive team to grow the DNA of the company and lead this transition," Mattrick wrote in an email to Zynga staff that was posted on the company's website.

In a note to Zynga employees, Pincus said he's always told the company's board "that if I could find someone who could do a better job as our CEO I'd do all I could to recruit and bring that person in. I'm confident that Don is that leader."

Mattrick faces a difficult task. Zynga's stock is down almost 70 percent since the company's 2011 initial public offering at $10 per share. Its games have waned in popularity and in June, the company announced that it was cutting 520 jobs, or about 18 percent of its workforce to save money. It shuttered OMGPop, a mobile game company it paid $183 million to acquire last year. OMGPop made a mobile game called "Draw Something." It was popular for a brief period in early 2012, and then it tanked.

Zynga's own games have also fallen out of favor, too. "FarmVille" became a household name in 2009 as millions of Facebook users spent hours clicking on virtual cows and crops ? and spent real money to get ahead in the game. Other "ville" games followed, with varying degrees of success, but Zynga has since been unseated as the maker of the No. 1 Facebook game by King.com, the company behind "Candy Crush Saga."

Besides rival Facebook diversions, Zynga also faces stiff competition from games played on mobile devices. Zynga has mobile games such as "Words With Friends" and various offshoots of the Scrabble-like game. But its mobile offerings haven't been enough to keep the company growing. In the first three months of this year, Zynga reported an 18 percent revenue decline to $263.6 million, from $321 million.

And the number of people who play Zynga games at least once a month fell 13 percent to 253 million, from 292 million a year earlier. The number of daily players dropped 21 percent to 52 million, from 65 million.

Pincus believes his successor is up to the job. In a statement, he praised Mattrick as "one of the top executives in the overall entertainment business."

"He turned Xbox into the world's largest console-gaming network, growing its installed base from 10 (million) to 80 million and transformed that business from deep losses to substantial profits. And he has grown the Xbox Live player network from 6 (million) to 50 million active members in 41 countries," Pincus said.

Before Microsoft, Mattrick was president of worldwide studios at Electronic Arts Inc. He joined EA after it bought Distinctive Software, the company he created at age 17.

Microsoft did not name a replacement for Mattrick, whose departure comes as the company prepares to launch a new gaming console, the Xbox One, later this year. In an email to staff, Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer called Mattrick's move a "great opportunity for Don." The executives who'd been reporting to Mattrick will now report to Ballmer he added, "and will continue to drive the day-to-day business as a team, particularly focused on shipping Xbox One this holiday (season)."

Zynga, along with online deals site Groupon Inc., was among the crop of promising Internet companies that went public in 2011 and 2012. The stocks of some of those companies, including Facebook, have so far disappointed investors.

Zynga's CEO switch comes five months after Groupon fired its co-founder and CEO, Andrew Mason. Unlike Mason, however, Pincus will stay involved with Zynga, reporting to its board of directors together with Mattrick in a newly formed executive committee.

San Francisco-based Zynga's stock jumped during Monday's session as rumors of Mattrick's appointment spread. The company's stock jumped 29 cents, or 10.4 percent, to close at $3.07. The stock added 16 cents in after-hours trading to hit $3.23.

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/f70471f764144b2fab526d39972d37b3/Article_2013-07-01-US-TEC-Zynga-CEO/id-a30ab4537ac54ec7ab17362147a151cd

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Culture wars: Why gay marriage and abortion have been ?decoupled?

Public opinion on abortion has held constant for 30 years. But on gay marriage, acceptance has grown dramatically in just 10 years ? most notably among young evangelical Protestants.

By Linda Feldmann,?Staff writer / June 29, 2013

Governor Rick Perry addresses a large audience in attendance at the National Right To Life Convention, Thursday in Grapevine, Texas. The Republican has called a second special legislative session beginning July 1, allowing the GOP-controlled statehouse another crack at passing restrictions opponents say could shutter nearly all the abortion clinics across the state.

Tony Gutierrez/AP

Enlarge

The contrasting images on the news this week could not have been more stark: On the steps of the Supreme Court, supporters of gay marriage celebrated two victories ? and a new sense of momentum.

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But in Texas, abortion rights were under siege in the state legislature, as Gov. Rick Perry (R) sought to join the wave of states imposing sweeping restrictions on the procedure. The effort failed, with a dramatic filibuster, but he?ll try again Monday.

What?s going on?

The ?values? issues that used to move in lock step in American opinion have been ?decoupled,? say experts on public attitudes. Public opinion on abortion has held remarkably constant in the last 30 years. But on gay marriage, acceptance has grown dramatically in just 10 years ? most notably among young evangelical Protestants.

?Gay rights and abortion were the heart of the culture war debate for years, and we talked about them synonymously,? says Daniel Cox, research director at the Public Religion Research Institute (PRRI) in Washington. ?That?s changing.?

For now, there?s little overlap between states that have legalized gay marriage or may get there in the next few years (all of them Democratic or battleground states) and states that are cracking down on abortion (most of them solidly Republican). These divergent social trends are producing a nation that is, more than ever, a cultural patchwork.

But that could change, at least on gay marriage, given the generational differences in opinion. A March poll by PRRI shows nearly a 40-point generation gap between Millennials (age 18 to 29) and seniors (65 and older) on the issue of same-sex marriage. Seventy-two percent of Millennials favor it, compared with 36 percent of seniors.

Even among white Millennial evangelical Protestants, a majority ? 52 percent -- support gay marriage. Among all white evangelicals, 24 percent favor the right to same-sex marriage. So on this issue, Mr. Cox points out, young white evangelical Protestants more closely resemble those in their age cohort than their coreligionists.

?It often comes down to personal experience,? says Cox. ?Young people are more likely to have friends or family who are gay or lesbian, and that has a profound impact on attitudes about that issue ? it trumps ideology and theology.?

Of course, Americans of all ages have grown more comfortable with homosexuality, as gays and lesbians have become more open about their identity, and about pressing for the same rights as heterosexual couples and families.

It?s no accident that conservatives with gay family members have been among the first prominent Republicans to endorse the right to same-sex marriage, such as former Vice President Dick Cheney and Sen. Rob Portman (R) of Ohio.

Societal experience with gay marriage in the 10 years since Massachusetts became the first state to legalize it has also helped build support.

?There was a traditional argument that the law had to defend marriage or terrible things would happen,? says John Green, director of the Ray C. Bliss Institute of Applied Politics at the University of Akron. ?Apparently, really terrible things haven?t happened.?

Hollywood has also helped, with sympathetic depictions of gay relationships and families that are now commonplace.

Defenders of traditional marriage say that gay relationships are unnatural ? or sinful, in the eyes of some ? and should not be granted societal sanction. Children need a mother and father, they say.

Tony Perkins, president of the Family Research Council in Washington, suggests it?s too soon to conclude that same-sex marriage won?t be harmful to society.

?As the American people are given time to experience the actual consequences of redefining marriage, the public debate and opposition to the redefinition of natural marriage will undoubtedly intensify,? Mr. Perkins says.

Time will tell. But there?s no doubt that it?s easier to argue the downside to abortion, which sets up a ?clash of absolutes,? as legal scholar Laurence Tribe puts it ? the woman?s rights versus the rights of the fetus, which grow as a pregnancy progresses.

?With abortion, there seems to be evident harm,? says Mr. Green. ?Even people who are prochoice and don?t believe life begins at conception recognize there?s a consequence to abortion.?

And so while it?s possible to foresee a day when gay marriage is largely uncontroversial, the same can?t be said for abortion. That element of the culture war appears to be here to stay.

Source: http://rss.csmonitor.com/~r/feeds/csm/~3/zm89ShIaWOc/Culture-wars-Why-gay-marriage-and-abortion-have-been-decoupled

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Lionel Richie: My own songs saved me

Celebs

Gael Fashingbauer Cooper TODAY

10 hours ago

NBC

Lionel Richie says his own songs helped him.

Many people have turned to music at sad times in their lives. Singer Lionel Richie is no different -- except the music he turned to was his own.

Richie told the U.K. Mirror that in the 1990s, he was going through a divorce and fighting depression

"Then a friend said to me: ?Lionel, I have some inspirational tapes I want you to listen to,'" Richie recalled to the newspaper. "He handed me my own songs with certain ones underlined and I started listening to my lyrics ? this time from the point of view of someone who needed that message.

?I used to look out into the audience and wonder why that guy was crying to one of my songs and now I get it -? it just hits something in your core," Richie said.

The singer also admitted that he wasn't always there for daughter Nicole when she was growing up. ?When Nicole was young I was trying to become Lionel Richie," the singer said. "I wasn?t there as much as I should have been. ... These days we are incredibly close and I am a very proud grandfather. She?s a wonderful mother.?

Richie will start his first U.S. tour in a decade this fall. "I have never had a job in my life," he told the Mirror. "This is still my hobby and I want to use the gift for good."

Source: http://www.today.com/entertainment/lionel-richie-my-own-songs-saved-me-depression-6C10488483

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AP PHOTOS: Images of the western US heat wave

A heat wave across the western U.S. was so punishing that rangers took up positions at trailheads at Lake Mead in Nevada to persuade people not to hike. Zookeepers in Phoenix hosed down the elephants and fed tigers frozen fish snacks. Dogs were at risk of burning their paws on scorched pavement, and airlines kept close watch on the heat for fear that it could cause flights to be delayed.

Here are pictures of the heat wave:

___

Follow AP photographers and photo editors on Twitter: http://apne.ws/15Oo6jo

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/ap-photos-images-western-us-heat-wave-083000457.html

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Woman Auctions Off Virginity to Pay For School

Source: http://www.thehollywoodgossip.com/2013/06/woman-auctions-off-virginity-to-pay-for-school/

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Better antibiotics: Atomic-scale structure of ribosome with molecule that controls its motion

June 28, 2013 ? This may look like a tangle of squiggly lines, but you're actually looking at a molecular machine called a ribosome. Its job is to translate DNA sequences into proteins, the workhorse compounds that sustain you and all living things.

The image is also a milestone. It's the first time the atom-by-atom structure of the ribosome has been seen as it's attached to a molecule that controls its motion. That's big news if you're a structural biologist.

But there's another way to look at this image, one that anyone who's suffered a bacterial infection can appreciate. The image is also a roadmap to better antibiotics. That's because this particular ribosome is from a bacterium. And somewhere in its twists and turns could be a weakness that a new antibiotic can target.

"We're in an arms race with the resistance mechanisms of bacteria," says Jamie Cate, a staff scientist in Berkeley Lab's Physical Biosciences Division and a professor of biochemistry, biophysics and structural biology at UC Berkeley.

"The better we understand how bacterial ribosomes work, the better we can come up with new ways to interfere with them," he adds.

Cate developed the structure with UC Berkeley's Arto Pulk. Their work is described in the June 28 issue of the journal Science.

Their image is the latest advance in the push for more effective antibiotics. The goal is new drugs that kill the bacteria that make us sick, stay one step ahead of their resistance mechanisms, and leave our beneficial bacteria alone.

One way to do this is to get to know the bacterial ribosome inside and out. Many of today's antibiotics target ribosomes. A better understanding of how ribosomes function will shed light on how these antibiotics work. This could also lead to even "smarter" molecules that quickly target and disable a pathogen's ribosomes without affecting friendly bacteria.

Cate and Pulk used protein crystallography beamlines at Berkeley Lab's Advanced Light Source to create diffraction patterns that show how the ribosome's molecules fit together. They then used computational modeling to combine these patterns into incredibly high-resolution images that describe the locations of the individual atoms.

The result is the colorful structure at the top of this article. Those blue and purple halves are ribosomes. They're from E. coli bacteria, but they work in similar ways throughout nature. Ribosomes move along messenger RNA and interpret its genetic code into directions on how to stitch amino acids into proteins.

But sometimes ribosomes want to move backward, which isn't good when you're in the protein-making business. That's where that yellow-red-green squiggle wedged between the two ribosome halves comes in. It's elongation factor G. It acts like a ratchet and prevents the ribosome from slipping backward. It also pushes the ribosome forward when it's sluggish.

Scientists knew that elongation factor G performs these jobs, but they didn't know how. Now, with an atomic-scale structure in hand, they can study the chemical and molecular forces involved in this ratcheting process. Cate and Pulk found that the ratchet controls the ribosome's motion by stiffening and relaxing over and over. This is the kind of insight that could lead to new ways to monkey-wrench the ribosome.

"To create better antibiotics, we need to learn how bacterial ribosomes work at the smallest scales, and this is a big step in that direction," says Cate.

The National Institutes of Health and the National Cancer Institute supported the research. The U.S. Department of Energy provides support for the Advanced Light Source, where this research was conducted.

Source: http://feeds.sciencedaily.com/~r/sciencedaily/top_news/~3/zlOztV3J4SM/130628103149.htm

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New low-cost, transparent electrodes

June 27, 2013 ? Indium tin oxide (ITO) has become a standard material in light-emitting diodes, flat panel plasma displays, electronic ink and other applications because of its high performance, moisture resistance, and capacity for being finely etched. But indium is also rare and expensive, and it requires a costly deposition process to make opto-electronic devices and makes for a brittle electrode. Replacing indium as the default material in transparent electrodes is a high priority for the electronics industry.

Now, in a paper appearing in APL Materials, a new open-access journal produced by AIP Publishing, researchers report creating a sturdy, transparent, and indium-free electrode from silver (Ag) and titanium dioxide (TiO₂) that could replace indium-based electrodes in some applications.

"Silver and titanium are much more abundant than indium in the earth's crust, and so we anticipate that electronic devices based on silver and titanium dioxide would be a more sustainable materials system and be manufactured at a low cost," said T.L. Alford, a professor of Materials Science and Engineering at Arizona State University who led the research.

The TiO₂/Ag/TiO₂ composite electrode multilayer film the researchers studied has been well characterized in the literature, but the team optimized both the thickness of the silver layer and the manufacturing process so that the multilayer film has a low sheet resistance and high optical transmittance, both properties necessary for high-performance.

The researchers created films with a sheet resistance as low as one sixth of that achieved by previous studies, while maintaining approximately 90 percent optical transmittance. With the choice of an underlying substrate made of polyethylene napthalate (PEN) -- a sturdy polymer used in a variety of applications from bottling carbonated beverages to manufacturing flexible electronics -- the researchers added additional durability.

Because of a less expensive manufacturing process and the wide availability of titanium dioxide, silver and PEN, the new TiO₂/Ag/TiO₂ thin film could one day help make devices such as electronic displays and solar cells more affordable by replacing more expensive indium-based electrodes.

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The above story is reprinted from materials provided by American Institute of Physics (AIP), via Newswise.

Note: Materials may be edited for content and length. For further information, please contact the source cited above.

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Journal Reference:

1. Aritra Dhar, T. L. Alford. High quality transparent TiO₂?Ag?TiO₂ composite electrode films deposited on flexible substrate at room temperature by sputtering. APL Materials, 2013; 1 (1): 012102 DOI: 10.1063/1.4808438

Note: If no author is given, the source is cited instead.

Source: http://feeds.sciencedaily.com/~r/sciencedaily/top_news/~3/H1X-9lhBbuM/130627130953.htm

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More Frontiers: Internal grants for humanities, arts and social sciences

News for Faculty and Staff

June 28, 2013

By Dateline staff

Vice Chancellor Harris Lewin recently announced the second round of internal grant funding to stimulate new research and innovative ideas.

First came the Research Initiatives in Science and Engineering Program, or RISE. Now comes the Interdisciplinary Frontiers in Humanities and Arts Program, or IFHA, under which seven projects in the humanities, arts and social sciences will share $3.6 million over three years.

An external advisory committee of distinguished scholars recommended the seven projects (from among 30 submissions) as having the greatest potential for excellence in research and creative production, and impact on society.?

These successful proposals will address such questions as:

• Is vocational education effective at providing true economic opportunities?
• What are the long-term effects on children in economic distress?
• How has increased international mobility, specifically temporary migration, affected economic development, social evolution and cultural exchange?
• How does the use of the Internet and other transformations in scholarly publishing affect the meaning of ?publication? and ?scholarship??
• Can video game technologies be produced and developed to help expand access to the arts, science, health interventions and culture?
• What are the community narratives, practices, rituals and activity settings that activate community strength and well-being?
• How might design be used to clarify information, enhance civic participation, and empower individuals to make informed choices?

?Interdisciplinary research teams are critical to crafting new approaches to the complex problems facing today?s individuals and societies,? said Lewin, who leads the Office of Research. ?I?d like to congratulate the successful applicants, and we look forward to working with them to maximize the impacts of their research.?

RISE and IFHA comprise the Interdisciplinary Frontiers Program, an effort to establish new, globally competitive, interdisciplinary research programs, coordinated by the Office of Research. Lewin announced the RISE awards in November.

Funding comes from indirect costs of grants awarded to UC Davis under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, or ?stimulus? funds. Chancellor Linda P.B. Katehi set aside the funds for reinvestment in campus research, consistent with UC Davis? goal of reaching $1 billion in sponsored research activity.

In choosing only seven projects for IFHA funding, Lewin ?acknowledged the efforts of the research clusters that did not receive funding.

All of the submissions together sought almost $28 million ? and that just was not possible. Lewin said the Office of Research will work with all of the funded and unfunded clusters to identify new funding sources for their ideas.

The successful proposals:

? Vocational education and the economy ? Ann Stevens, professor and chair of economics, and director of the Center for Poverty Studies, and Michal Kurlaender, associate professor in the School of Education, lead a team that will look at vocational programs in community colleges and how such training has affected the work force.

?There has been a clear policy push in recent years to promote vocational education as a solution to the stagnant earnings of U.S. workers, with billions of federal dollars committed in the last few years,? Stevens said. ?Unfortunately, high-quality research on the effectiveness of these programs has been very limited.

?Our UC Davis faculty team will bring together expertise in higher education, poverty and labor markets, and begin to answer the critical questions of whether, when and for whom these programs provide true economic opportunities.?

? Children and poverty ? Marianne Page, professor of economics, leads this project, titled ?Understanding the Long-Term Effects?on Children in Economic Distress.? Focusing on the recent economic downturn, researchers from the departments of Psychology, Economics and Human Ecology will focus on understanding the full range of economic crises? impacts on children.?Most research today focuses on?the impacts of economic downturns on adults.

?The dismal prognosis for disadvantaged children has worsened over time,? Page said in the project proposal. ?By some measures, inequality is nearly twice as high as it was 30 years ago.?

? Migration and the economy ? In ?Managing Temporary Migrations: California, U.S. and the World,? a team led by economics professor Giovanni Peri will analyze how increased international mobility, specifically temporary migration, has affected economic development, social evolution and cultural exchange.

?Understanding the complex and multifaceted phenomenon of international mobility and managing migrations to maximize their socioeconomic benefits for the sending and receiving countries and for the migrants themselves is one of the key challenges of the next decade facing California, the U.S. and the world,? Peri said in his proposal.

? Innovation in scholarly communication ? The use of the Internet and other transformations in scholarly publishing ? from peer review, to open access to data publishing and more ? vary across academic disciplines, said Mario Biagioli, professor, Science and Technology Studies (College of Letters and Science, and the School of Law). He will work with colleagues from a variety of disciplines ? from library science to the College of Biological Sciences, and more from law, English, computer science, creative writing and the Graduate School of Management ? to ?think globally but act locally? in assessing the different meanings of ?scholarship.?

For the project titled ?Innovating the Communication of Scholarship,? researchers will look at changes and challenges in the traditional system of scholarly publication and the changing meaning of ?publication,? whether that be on the Internet or in a hardcover book, Biagioli said.??

?We do not believe that any of the different positions in each case are wrong or arbitrary, but rather that they need to be made sense of, and rendered translatable across institutional and disciplinary divides if we are to come up with a new, comprehensive system of scholarly publishing,? he said in his proposal.

? Gamification ? This team will carry out a cultural analysis of video game technologies. The team also intends to produce and develop game technologies that can help expand access to the arts, science, health interventions and culture.

The team comprises representatives from 11 disciplines, from geology and food science to cinema studies and anthropology. And English, where Colin Milburn, the team leader, is an associate professor of English, and holder of the Gary Snyder Endowed Chair in Science and Humanities.

?By some measures, the video game has become the most significant medium of contemporary culture,? Milburn said. ?Games and game technologies are now used in an immense variety of contexts beyond entertainment and artistic expression, including education, politics, business, military training, medicine and even scientific research.?

? Health and resilience in immigrant communities ? Nolan Zane, professor of Asian American studies and psychology, leads this group of faculty from nursing, medicine, psychology, cultural studies and the arts in an exploration of underappreciated and undervalued sources of strength and resiliency in immigrant communities. Partnering with immigrant groups in the Sacramento region, the researchers will begin by asking two questions: ?How do the expressive arts activate personal strength and well-being?? and ?What are the community narratives, practices, rituals and activity settings that activate community strength and well-being??

?We recognize that immigrants can and do succeed in achieving personal health and well-being,? Zane said. ?Elucidating these ?hidden? sources of resiliency are essential for effective public health approaches that are truly culturally valid and meaningful."

? Design in the public interest ? What does democratic design look like? That?s the question to be addressed by a team of researchers led by Susan Verba, associate professor of design, and ?and Sarah Perrault, assistant professor, University Writing Program. The team, also including faculty from the departments of Anthropology, Communication and Computer Science, the School of Education, and the Women and Gender Studies Program, will seek to create accessible, user-centered design ?outcomes? that can be disseminated as open-source models and used to create graphics and communications that resonate with broad audiences.

?We are confronted daily by information, artifacts and environments that are confusing, inaccessible, even potentially dangerous,? Verba said. ?From public documents and graphics to entire programs and systems ? from election ballots to the voting process, from hospital signage to communication flow within and among hospital teams ? much of this confusion is the result of narrow design decisions. Given this, we want to explore how we might use design to clarify information, enhance civic participation, and empower individuals to make informed choices.?

Online

The Interdisciplinary Frontiers in the Humanities and Arts Program website includes a list of the seven funded projects and all the faculty participants.

Research Investments in the Sciences and Engineering Program

Interdisciplinary Frontiers Program

Follow Dateline UC Davis on Twitter.

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Source: http://www.dateline.ucdavis.edu/dl_detail.lasso?id=14529

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Wired Space Photo of the Day: Mercury?s Terminator

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Wired Space Photo of the Day: Mercury?s Terminator
The terminator returns! This color image portrays the striking separation of night and day on Mercury, evident in the change from dark to light. On Mercury, a solar day (the time it takes for the Sun to return to the ...????

Source: Wired
Posted on: Thursday, Jun 27, 2013, 8:51am
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Source: http://www.labspaces.net/128829/Wired_Space_Photo_of_the_Day__Mercury___s_Terminator

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Christians tweet more happily, less analytically than atheists

June 26, 2013 ? A computer analysis of nearly 2 million text messages (tweets) on the online social network Twitter found that Christians use more positive words, fewer negative words and engage in less analytical thinking than atheists. Christians also were more likely than atheists to tweet about their social relationships, the researchers found.

The findings are reported in the journal Social Psychological & Personality Science.

"Whether religious people experience more or less happiness is an important question in itself," the authors of the new analysis wrote. "But to truly understand how religion and happiness are related we must also understand why the two may be related."

To identify Christian and atheist Twitter users, the researchers studied the tweets of more than 16,000 followers of a few prominent Christian and atheist personalities on Twitter. They analyzed the tweets for their emotional content (the use of more positive or negative words), the frequency of words (such as "friend" and "brother") that are related to social processes, and the frequency of their use of words (such as "because" and "think") that are associated with an analytical thinking style.

Overall, tweets by Christians had more positive and less negative content than tweets by atheists, the researchers report. A less analytical thinking style among Christians and more frequent use of social words were correlated with the use of words indicating positive emotions, the researchers also said.

"If religious people are indeed happier than nonreligious people, differences in social support and thinking style may help to explain why," said University of Illinois graduate student Ryan Ritter, who conducted the research with U. of I. psychology professor Jesse Preston and graduate student Ivan Hernandez.

The findings are also in line with other studies linking greater levels of social connectedness to higher well-being, Ritter said.

"Religious communities are very social. Just being a member of a religious group connects people to others, and it may be this social connection that can make people happier," Preston said. "On the other hand, atheists had a more analytical thinking style in their tweets than Christians, which at extremes can make people less happy."

Previous research has found a positive association between religion and well-being among Buddhists, Hindus, Christians and Muslims. But most such studies rely on individuals to report how satisfied they are with their lives or their experience of positive and negative emotions at a given time.

"What's great about Twitter is that people are reporting their experiences -- good or bad -- as they occur," Preston said. "As researchers, we do not need to ask them how they feel because they are already telling us."

Christians appear to be happier than atheists on Twitter, but the authors caution that the results are correlational and "this does not mean atheists are unhappy overall or doomed to be miserable," Preston said. "If religion improves happiness indirectly through other factors, those benefits could also be found outside religious groups."

Source: http://feeds.sciencedaily.com/~r/sciencedaily/living_well/~3/nXsfhg3-oLk/130626143106.htm

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Gas-giant exoplanets cling close to their parent stars

June 27, 2013 ? Gemini Observatory's Planet-Finding Campaign finds that, around many types of stars, distant gas-giant planets are rare and prefer to cling close to their parent stars. The impact on theories of planetary formation could be significant.

Finding extrasolar planets has become so commonplace that it seems astronomers merely have to look up and another world is discovered. However, results from Gemini Observatory's recently completed Planet-Finding Campaign -- the deepest, most extensive direct imaging survey to date -- show the vast outlying orbital space around many types of stars is largely devoid of gas-giant planets, which apparently tend to dwell close to their parent stars.

"It seems that gas-giant exoplanets are like clinging offspring," says Michael Liu of the University of Hawaii's Institute for Astronomy and leader of the Gemini Planet-Finding Campaign. "Most tend to shun orbital zones far from their parents. In our search, we could have found gas giants beyond orbital distances corresponding to Uranus and Neptune in our own Solar System, but we didn't find any." The Campaign was conducted at the Gemini South telescope in Chile, with funding support for the team from the National Science Foundation and NASA. The Campaign's results, Liu says, will help scientists better understand how gas-giant planets form, as the orbital distances of planets are a key signature that astronomers use to test exoplanet formation theories.

Eric Nielsen of the University of Hawaii, who leads a new paper about the Campaign's search for planets around stars more massive than the Sun, adds that the findings have implications beyond the specific stars imaged by the team. "The two largest planets in our Solar System, Jupiter and Saturn, are huddled close to our Sun, within 10 times the distance between the Earth and Sun," he points out. "We found that this lack of gas-giant planets in more distant orbits is typical for nearby stars over a wide range of masses."

Two additional papers from the Campaign will be published soon and reveal similar tendencies around other classes of stars. However, not all gas-giant exoplanets snuggle so close to home. In 2008, astronomers using the Gemini North telescope and W.M. Keck Observatory on Hawaii's Mauna Kea took the first-ever direct images of a family of planets around the star HR 8799, finding gas-giant planets at large orbital separations (about 25-70 times the Earth-Sun distance). This discovery came after examining only a few stars, suggesting such large-separation gas giants could be common. The latest Gemini results, from a much more extensive imaging search, show that gas-giant planets at such distances are in fact uncommon.

Liu sums up the situation this way: "We've known for nearly 20 years that gas-giant planets exist around other stars, at least orbiting close-in. Thanks to leaps in direct imaging methods, we can now learn how far away planets can typically reside. The answer is that they usually avoid significant areas of real estate around their host stars. The early findings, like HR 8799, probably skewed our perceptions."

The team's second new paper explores systems where dust disks around young stars show holes, which astronomers have long suspected are cleared by the gravitational force of orbiting planets. "It makes sense that where you see debris cleared away that a planet would be responsible, but we did not know what types of planets might be causing this. It appears that instead of massive planets, smaller planets that we can't detect directly could be responsible," said Zahed Wahhaj of the European Southern Observatory and lead author on the survey's paper on dusty disk stars. Finally, the third new paper from the team looks at the very youngest stars close to Earth. "A younger system should have brighter, easier to detect planets," according to the lead author Beth Biller of the Max Planck Institute for Astronomy.

"Around other stars, NASA's Kepler telescope has shown that planets larger than the Earth and within the orbit of Mercury are plentiful," explains Biller. "The NICI Campaign demonstrates that gas-giant planets beyond the distance of the orbit of Neptune are rare." The soon-to-be-delivered Gemini Planet Imager will begin to bridge this gap likely revealing, for the first time, how common giant planets are in orbits similar to the gas-giant planets of our own Solar System.

The observations for the Campaign were obtained with the Gemini instrument known as NICI, the Near-Infrared Coronagraphic Imager, which was the first instrument for an 8-10 meter-class telescope designed specifically for finding faint companions around bright stars. NICI was built by Doug Toomey (Mauna Kea Infrared), Christ Ftaclas, and Mark Chun (University of Hawai'i), with funding from NASA.

The first two papers from the Campaign have been accepted for publication in The Astrophysical Journal (Nielsen et al. and Wahhaj et al.), and the third paper (Biller et al.) will be published later this summer.

The NICI Campaign team is composed of PI Michael Liu, co-PI Mark Chun (University of Hawaii), co-PI Laird Close (University of Arizona), Doug Toomey (Mauna Kea Infrared), Christ Ftaclas (University of Hawaii), Zahed Wahhaj (European Southern Observatory), Beth Biller (Max Planck Institute for Astronomy), Eric Nielsen (University of Hawaii), Evgenya Shkolnik (DTM, Carnegie Institution of Washington), Adam Burrows (Princeton University), Neill Reid (Space Telescope Science Institute), Niranjan Thatte, Matthias Tecza, Fraser Clarke (University of Oxford), Jane Gregorio Hetem, Elisabete De Gouveia Dal Pino (University of Sao Paolo), Silvia Alencar (University of Minas Gerais), Pawel Artymowicz (University of Toronto), Doug Lin (University of California Santa Cruz), Shigeru Ida (Tokyo Institute of Technology), Alan Boss (DTM, Carnegie Institution of Washington), and Mark Kuchner (NASA Goddard), Tom Hayward and Markus Hartung (Gemini Observatory), Jared Males, and Andy Skemer (University of Arizona).

Source: http://feeds.sciencedaily.com/~r/sciencedaily/top_news/top_science/~3/KTKfCN1rQK4/130627161436.htm

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Gay marriage ruling boosts benefits, but confusion expected

By Kim Dixon

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A U.S. Supreme Court ruling on Wednesday forcing the federal government to recognize same-sex marriage in states where it is legal will open up new benefits to thousands of gay couples, but confusion may reign in states that do not allow gay marriage.

At issue in the case were the estate taxes a New York lesbian widow owed upon her wife Thea Spyer's death in 2009. Because they were gay, surviving spouse Edith Windsor missed out on a lucrative tax break - the exemption from the federal estate tax on wealth passed from one spouse to another.

It was denied because of the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA), a law passed by Congress and signed by President Bill Clinton in 1996 that defined marriage as between a man and a woman.

Wednesday's ruling clears the way for Windsor to claim a $363,000 tax refund, plus interest, and for gay couples possibly to enjoy more than 1,100 federal benefits, rights and burdens linked to marriage status.

Details must be worked out by regulators, including the timing for benefits to kick in, and how couples fare in the 37 states that do not allow gay marriage. Before Wednesday's ruling, 12 of the 50 U.S. states permitted gay marriage. California would be the 13th.

Traditionally, marital tax status has been based on where the couple currently resides, but that is not always the case.

"We don't have any idea of what the rights are of someone who gets married in New York and lives in Florida," said Todd Solomon, a benefits attorney at McDermott Will & Emery.

An estimated 114,000 same-sex couples are legally married in the United States and as many as one-third of them live in states that do not recognize marriage, according to the Williams Institute, an arm of the University of California at Los Angeles School of Law.

"That will be a topic the Obama administration will have to consider," said Gary Gates, a demographer with the institute.

Hailing the decision, President Barack Obama directed Attorney General Eric Holder to review all federal laws to carry it out. The tax-collecting Internal Revenue Service may be the agency watched most closely, lawyers said.

Lack of clarity over individual and estate taxation - and also taxation of health and pension benefits - will need to be addressed, said Brian Moulton, an attorney with the Human Rights Campaign gay rights group.

"We certainly think the IRS in particular is an agency where people will be looking for guidance," Moulton said.

Among other taxes and benefits at issue:

* INCOME TAXES - Because of the ruling, married gay couples will likely be able to file their income tax returns jointly in states that allow gay marriage. Like heterosexual couples, gay taxpayers filing as married couples may face higher taxes as their collective income crosses into a higher tax bracket sooner than if they were filing separately, the so-called marriage penalty.

* HEALTH INSURANCE - Because of the decision, same-sex married gay couples may now be free of federal taxes they pay on healthcare benefits received through a spouse's employer. Unmarried domestic partners now owe an extra $1,000 annually in taxes on these benefits, according to the Williams Institute.

* SOCIAL SECURITY BENEFITS - Same-sex married couples may be able to claim survivor Social Security benefits previously denied. But Social Security recipients might face steeper taxes on benefits because they will hit the level where the benefits begin to be taxed sooner for married couples.

(Editing by Howard Goller and Will Dunham)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/gay-marriage-ruling-boosts-benefits-confusion-expected-212403600.html

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Cosmic Currency: PayPal and SETI Developing Space Cash System

Scientists searching for extraterrestrials are teaming up with one of the world's best-known online-transaction companies to create the first system for space-based payments for astronauts and tourists venturing beyond Earth, project officials announced today (June 27).

Called?PayPal Galactic,?the new initiative seeks to help lay the financial groundwork for the rapidly evolving field of commercial spaceflight and other private space commerce.

The novel project will investigate the best options for cosmic currency in a cash-free interplanetary society. It also seeks to study the potential changes in store for banks and financial regulations as humanity increasingly expands its activities in space. [9 Ways to Stay Safe Using PayPal]

The new initiative is a collaboration between Internet-payment service PayPal and the SETI Institute (Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence) research organization, and has backing from Apollo 11 astronaut Buzz Aldrin.

"Trips to Mars, the moon ? even orbit ? will require we provide astronauts and astro-tourists with as many comforts from home as possible, including how to pay each other," Aldrin said in a statement. "Whether it's paying a bill, even helping a family member on Earth, we'll need access to money. I think humans will reach Mars, and I would like to see it happen in my lifetime. When that happens, I won't be surprised if people use PayPal Galactic for the little things and the big ones."

The project has gained substantial interest, with the advent of numerous private spaceflight firms that plan to send space tourists on trips to the edge of space, orbit and beyond, officials said. Suborbital flight company Virgin Galactic aims to begin launching passengers into space by the end of the year, while Space Exploration Technologies Corp. (SpaceX) intends to loft people into Earth orbit in coming years on its Falcon 9 rocket and Dragon spacecraft.

"As space-tourism programs are opening space travel to the rest of us, this drives questions about the commercialization of space," PayPal President David Marcus said in a statement. "We are launching PayPal Galactic, in conjunction with leaders in the scientific community, to increase public awareness of the important questions that need to be addressed."

The program aims to create an optimal system for processing financial transactions beyond Earth, where the borders of countries and laws don't yet apply.

"One thing is clear: We won't be using cash in space," Marcus said. "PayPal has already pushed payments into the Internet, onto phones and across terrestrial borders. We look forward to pushing payments from our world to the next, and beyond."

The Mountain View, Calif.-based SETI Institute is actively looking for signs of intelligent civilizations across the universe. So far, no reliable signal has been found, but the scientists there are using the dedicated Allen Telescope Array in northern California to look for radio signals that might originate from aliens.

"PayPal and the SETI Institute are well-matched to work on PayPal Galactic because together we can create a recipe for innovation," Jill Tarter, the Bernard M. Oliver Chair for the SETI Institute, said in a statement. "PayPal envisions exploring possibilities in space the way that we do, breaking boundaries to make real progress. When the SETI Institute succeeds in its exploration of the universe, and as we find our place among the stars, PayPal will be there to facilitate commerce, so people can get what they need, and want, to live outside of our planet."

The initiative will be presented during a live press conference today at 9 a.m. PDT (12:00 p.m. EDT) at the SETI Institute. The event will be broadcast live here: www.paypal-galactic.com.

Follow Clara Moskowitz on?Twitter?and?Google+. Follow us?@Spacedotcom,?Facebook?and?Google+. Original article on SPACE.com.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/cosmic-currency-paypal-seti-developing-space-cash-system-040732323.html

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What's Wrong With the iOS 7 Icons?

?It looks childish.? That was the first reaction I heard to iOS 7. I?m not going to lie, when I saw it for the first time myself, I freaked out a little too. Like any good simplicity-loving designer, I was eagerly waiting for Jonathan Ive to reveal a fresh, clean take on iOS.

But the icons that were unveiled feel rushed. Lots of them look like the very first sketch was thrown right into the keynote.

My developer friends had similar reactions, but they couldn?t put their finger on why they felt that way. That?s because there are tons of tiny details that go into designing app icons that the average person doesn?t ever think about. You may not recognize the details, but you will feel their effects.

Even designing just one simple, clean, good-looking icon is not an easy task. Multiply that by 25 and there was a ton of work to do in the eight months since Forstall was booted, which led to certain things being overlooked?

[This post originally appeared on the blog of its author, Ian Storm Taylor.]

Poor choice of color

To be honest, Apple?s software has had this problem for a long time. For hardware design it?s not a problem because their signature gray aluminum will take on different hues and shadows depending on its environment. But in software, a dull gray will always be a dull gray.

Calculator is a great example where poor color choice can ruin an icon. Actually if we?re being completely honest, its colors look like they were pulled straight out of Windows Metro. (And that?s not a good thing!)

On Dribbble, Jackie Anh came up with a much more aesthetically appealing icon. Just by slightly tweaking the orange, adding a subtle gradient, and getting rid of the dull grays, the icon feels noticeably better. And it?s even more harmonious with the overall tone of iOS 7.

On the opposite end of the spectrum you have apps like Phone, FaceTime andMessages that use extremely saturated and low-contrast colors. Colors that my high school art teacher would have referred to as ?straight from the tube," meaning taken directly from the tube of paint without thought.

Just like you don?t want to use pure black, you also never want to use ?straight from the tube? colors. They come off as tacky and cheap.

Drawing from the fashion world, there was a period of time where you?d find hipsters around town wearing neon clothing, but they?ve long since passed neon on to the bros. Never take fashion advice from the bros.

Weak use of metaphor

The Contacts icon is also screaming for some creative help. For one, the colors are very uninspired. There?s that dull gray again.

But the bigger problem with this icon is that it?s still sporting the address book metaphor! This new iteration of iOS was supposed to save us from the unnecessary skeuomorphism that Jobs and Forstall loved. And from what I?ve seen, the Contacts app has largely done that? Everywhere except the home screen!

Has anyone even seen an address book in the past ten years?

I tried to think up some interesting ideas for Contacts, but I couldn?t come up with any. And I realized, I don?t even use the Contacts app. I threw it into my ?Junk? folder years ago.

When I need to call someone I go to Phone. When I want to see a friend I go to Facebook. If I really wanted to maintain a list of friends I call a lot on my home screen, I?d use an app like Brewster. Apple could remove the Contacts app and I?d never notice. (I?ll come back to this later?)

On the topic of skeuomorphism, is a pad of perforated paper really the best we can do for Notes? We?ve traded the old, nicely rendered icon for the new one which looks like a sketch from OmniGraffle with no new take on the metaphor.

I don?t necessarily think the pad can?t be done well. Squarespace Note is my favorite example of a clean notes icon: slightly skeuomorphic, but still incredibly simple at the same time.

Videos still maintains its unhelpful skeuomorphism too. I?ve never associated those black and white stripes with videos. I realized way a couple minutes later, because those stripes for for movies, not videos.

If they wanted to be contemporary, they?d include the ?play? icon, like Graph Concepts did on Dribbble. It?s an icon everyone is familiar with from YouTube, Vimeo, Vevo, or any other video that?s been watched on the internet in the past ten years.

That?s the icon that will scream ?videos!? the fastest.

Inconsistent language

The new Camera icon is probably my least favorite of all the new icons. It is just plain inconsistent with the rest of the design language across iOS 7. In an aesthetic that is all about reducing to until only the absolutely necessary remains, why does the icon need extra hairlines, a yellow flash and a extra little button?

All of it is excessive. And even worse, the camera icon on the lock screen isn?t even the same one. Why?

I actually loved the original Camera icon. It was beautifully geometric and abstract. It wasn?t skeuomorphic at all, it was a literal representation of the hardware on the other side of the phone. (Especially when you remember that the first generation iPhone had an aluminum case.) It was like you were invoking the camera right on the other side of the phone by magic.

All of that magic has been replaced by an ugly camera icon. This new icon is like showing a floppy disk for ?Save?. Instead of seeing a representation of the actual hardware that would be doing your bidding, now we?re left with a old-timey camera.

Reminders is another huge let down. To be honest, the app has always been a let down. Unless you use Siri it?s impossibly hard to create a new reminder, which is 90 percent of the app?s use case.

It feels like Reminders was a sacrifice that Apple knew it wasn?t going to be able to redesign this time around. It is, as far as I can tell, the only interface in iOS 7 that still features an uninspired pseudo-paper texture. Reminders are quick, one-off items? they definitely shouldn?t be letter-pressed into my phone.

The icon feels uninspired as well; it?s a casualty of the grid system. In this case it looks like there wasn?t really a clear direction for it?s design, so a few random elements were aligned on the grid and that was that. It doesn?t live up to the quality we expect from Apple.

Speaking of inconsistent, I honestly have no idea what?s going on with the Game Center icon. Apple ditched the glossy aesthetic everywhere but in those glass spheres. If the spheres perfectly expressed the ?game? metaphor I might be able to forgive them, but they aren?t really special in any way.

Apps that shouldn?t exist

Like Contacts, some of the other default apps should be cut. There, I said it. It sounds like a entirely separate problem, but I actually think it shows up in the icon design because they get neglected more than others.

Stocks is one of those apps. As imagined, it doesn?t suit the needs of anyone who actually need to check their stocks, but it?s never been cut after all these years. To be fair the Stocks icon has never really looked good. It just used to hide behind all that gradient and gloss, so no one noticed.

But now that Apple?s gone ?flat? it?s so much harder to hide. The lines on the new dark icon feel very brittle, just like the lines on Reminders and Notes, and instead of the green or red that make an appearance in the app itself, the accent color is a weird light blue.

iTunes is another app that, in a perfect experience, wouldn?t exist. You know how you can tell? If you remove the circle from its icon, what do you get? The Music icon with a different color. Why? Because everything iTunes does for music should actually be in Music! And everything video-related should be in Videos?

And keeping repeating until the iTunes app has no content left.

A few successes

Of course there are also a few icons that I think are well done. Icons that nailed the balance between adhering to the new aesthetic and expressing the soul of the app they represent. I don?t hate everything!

One of the best icons in the group is Music. You might be thinking, ?What the heck Ian that?s another neon color!?, and you?d be right.

But Music nailed its color. It wasn?t straight out of the tube, it was carefully chosen. That pink orange successfully evokes MTV or VH1 or VEVO or Taylor Swift. It really feels like ?music."

Calendar is another great one. The old icon was probably the ugliest of all the iOS 6 icons. And it was due in large part to poor color choice: using pure white to make highlights and pure black to make shadow.

The new Calendar icon on the other hand is simple, but does its job perfectly: showing us the current date.

Speaking of which, the Clock icon now keeps the current time as well, which is a nice addition! The icon itself features only minor tweaks from iOS 6, but each change was a careful improvement: the unnecessary black loop was removed, the extra gloss was removed, and the hands were slimmed, and the numerals are now Helvetica to match the rest of the interface. Perfect.

There are also a few icons that you also don?t see on the home screen that are very nicely designed. I could only find these three in Apple.com?s promotional content. They?re all beautifully simple, made up entirely of geometric shapes and clean lines. If Apple applies this kind of quality to the rest of their icons in the time between now and when iOS 7 ships we?ll be in for a real treat.

And a few missed opportunities

I really like the idea of icons that adapt to their environment to be helpful to the user. Clock and Calendar are obvious examples, but the idea could be taken a lot further.

Stocks is another icon that could actually be put to work for the user. Why not show me the fluctuation of my entire portfolio in the trend line of the icon? Better yet, if my portfolio is up, turn the icon green. Down? Red. That way I can quickly gauge my performance without needing to open the app all the time.

Color with a purpose!

No portfolio setup? Show me the S&P 500!

Newsstand is another missed opportunity. Even though it was universally hated for not being folder-able on iOS 6, it was still unique in that it changed based on content curated by the user. That?s interesting!

The new icon has some nice, old-school looking magazine cover designs, but it doesn?t convey the future of news like it should.

On a similar note, other icons could become personalized, like Music, Videos or Photos showing the last album cover, video, or photo you engaged with. Surely each of those have good-looking-enough artwork to pull it off. Make my home screen feel a bit more personal. (Angry internet people calm down, I?m aware that Windows Phone does similar things, but that doesn?t mean Apple shouldn?t too.)

Or another random idea: what if Camera was still a lens like it used to be, and in the lens was the reflection of the last photo you snapped! Useful? Absolutely not! But playful at least.

I wish there were more misfits, rebels and troublemakers ideas in the icon design for iOS.

I?m not too worried about the future though

I freaked out in the beginning because I thought the crummy icons were representative of Apple screwing up the entire new design direction for iOS. But now that I?ve seen the rest of iOS, I?m not that worried.

Yeah the icons are below standard, but the rest of iOS 7 looks damn well done?lots of really strong interaction design. If I really had to pick between icon design and interaction design, I?d obviously choose the interactions.

One thing I realized is that an icon?s job is to convey the soul of the app itself, and lots of the apps are still undergoing major redesigns. Redesigns that will probably not be perfected until iOS 8 at least. So we shouldn?t expect their icons to be perfect yet either.

What?ll be really interesting is to see how companies adapt their icons and interfaces to iOS?s new feel. Honestly, Rdio?s and Brewster?s apps already feel like iOS 7; they?re minimal, clean and airy.

As far as icons do, every other company has a lot more skin in the game than Apple does too. Their success is directly proportional with the amount of times their icons are pressed, so they spend a lot more time making them perfect. Imagine what Blue could do if they were allowed to make their icon reactive.

[This post originally appeared on the blog of its author, Ian Storm Taylor.]

Source: http://gizmodo.com/whats-wrong-with-the-ios-7-icons-513831117

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Plan aims for women in most combat jobs

WASHINGTON (AP) ? Military leaders are ready to begin tearing down the remaining walls that have prevented women from holding thousands of combat and special operations jobs near the front lines.

Under details of the plans obtained by The Associated Press, women could start training as Army Rangers by mid-2015 and as Navy SEALs a year later.

The military services have mapped out a schedule that also will include reviewing and possibly changing the physical and mental standards that men and women will have to meet in order to quality for certain infantry, armor, commando and other front-line positions across the Army, Navy, Air Force and Marines. Under the plans to be introduced Tuesday, there would be one common standard for men and women for each job.

Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel reviewed the plans and has ordered the services to move ahead.

The move follows revelations of a startling number of sexual assaults in the armed forces. Earlier this year, Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Gen. Martin Dempsey said the sexual assaults might be linked to the longstanding ban on women serving in combat because the disparity between the roles of men and women creates separate classes of personnel ? male "warriors" versus the rest of the force.

While the sexual assault problem is more complicated than that, he said, the disparity has created a psychology that lends itself to disrespect for women.

Under the schedules military leaders delivered to Hagel, the Army will develop standards by July 2015 to allow women to train and potentially serve as Rangers, and qualified women could begin training as Navy SEALs by March 2016 if senior leaders agree. Military leaders have suggested bringing senior women from the officer and enlisted ranks into special forces units first to ensure that younger, lower-ranking women have a support system to help them get through the transition.

The Navy intends to open up its Riverine force and begin training women next month, with the goal of assigning women to the units by October. While not part of the special operations forces, the coastal Riverine squadrons do close combat and security operations in small boats. The Navy plans to have studies finished by July 2014 on allowing women to serve as SEALs, and has set October 2015 as the date when women could begin Navy boot camp with the expressed intention of becoming SEALs eventually.

U.S. Special Operations Command is coordinating the matter of what commando jobs could be opened to women, what exceptions might be requested and when the transition would take place.

The proposals leave the door open for continued exclusion of women from some jobs if research and testing find that women could not be successful in sufficient numbers. But the services would have to defend such decisions to top Pentagon leaders.

Army officials plan to complete gender-neutral standards for the Ranger course by July 2015. Army Rangers are one of the service's special operations units, but many soldiers who go through Ranger training and wear the coveted tab on their shoulders never actually serve in the 75th Ranger Regiment. To be considered a true Ranger, soldiers must serve in the regiment.

In January, then-Defense Secretary Leon Panetta and Dempsey signed an order that wiped away generations of limits on where and how women could fight for their country. At the time, they asked the services to develop plans to set the change in motion.

The decision reflects a reality driven home by the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, where battle lines were blurred and women were propelled into jobs as medics, military police and intelligence officers who were sometimes attached, but not formally assigned, to battalions. So even though a woman could not serve officially as a battalion infantryman going out on patrol, she could fly a helicopter supporting the unit or be part of a team supplying medical aid if troops were injured.

Of the more than 6,700 U.S. service members who have been killed in Iraq and Afghanistan, about 150 have been women.

The order Panetta and Dempsey signed prohibits physical standards from being lowered simply to allow women to qualify for jobs closer to the battlefront. But the services are methodically reviewing and revising the standards for many jobs, including strength and stamina, in order to set minimum requirements for troops to meet regardless of their sex.

The military services are also working to determine the cost of opening certain jobs to women, particularly aboard a variety of Navy ships, including certain submarines, frigates, mine warfare and other smaller warships. Dozens of ships do not have adequate berthing or facilities for women to meet privacy needs, and would require design and construction changes.

Under a 1994 Pentagon policy, women were prohibited from being assigned to ground combat units below the brigade level. A brigade is roughly 3,500 troops split into several battalions of about 800 soldiers each. Historically, brigades were based farther from the front lines, and they often included top command and support staff.

Last year the military opened up about 14,500 combat positions to women, most of them in the Army, by allowing them to serve in many jobs at the battalion level. The January order lifted the last barrier to women serving in combat, but allows the services to argue to keep some jobs closed.

The bulk of the nearly 240,000 jobs currently closed to women are in the Army, including those in infantry, armor, combat engineer and artillery units that are often close to the battlefront. Similar jobs in the Marine Corps are also closed.

Army officials have laid out a rolling schedule of dates in 2015 to develop gender-neutral standards for specific jobs, beginning with July for engineers, followed by field artillery in March and the infantry and armor jobs no later than September.

Women make up about 14 percent of the 1.4 million active U.S. military personnel. More than 280,000 women have been sent to Iraq, Afghanistan or neighboring nations in support of the wars.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/military-plans-put-women-most-combat-jobs-180430171.html

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Smiling Prince Philip leaves UK hospital after operation

LONDON (Reuters) - A smiling Prince Philip, the 92-year-old husband of Britain's Queen Elizabeth, left hospital after 11 days on Monday, slightly earlier than expected, following an operation on his abdomen.

Looking sprightly and in good spirits, the prince walked unaided out of the London Clinic, shaking hands with the staff and waving to onlookers outside, before getting into his car to be driven to Windsor Castle, west of London.

Philip, also known as the Duke of Edinburgh, had been taken to hospital on June 6 for the planned operation, the fourth time he had been hospitalized in the last 18 months.

"The Duke has expressed his thanks and appreciation to the medical staff at the London clinic and to members of the public for their good wishes," a Buckingham Palace spokeswoman said.

The prince, who was visited by his 87-year-old wife of more than 65 years and other senior members of the royal family during his stay, had been expected to remain at the clinic for two weeks after undergoing what the palace described as an "an exploratory operation following abdominal investigations".

The palace said the results of the operation would be analyzed, while Philip would take a period of convalescence of approximately two months. He is expected to resume engagements in the autumn.

The longest-serving consort of any British monarch and the oldest living great-great-grandchild of Queen Victoria, Philip has had a number of health issues in recent years.

He was hospitalized for a bladder infection during the queen's Diamond Jubilee celebrations last year, and spent Christmas 2011 in hospital where he underwent an operation to clear a blocked heart artery after suffering chest pains.

(Reporting by Michael Holden; editing by Stephen Addison)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/smiling-prince-philip-leaves-uk-hospital-operation-093952010.html

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