Good Reads: From Chinese dreams, to the Tsarnaevs, to a QWERTY challenger

This week's round-up of Good Reads includes a vague dream for the Chinese, the Boston bombers' connection to radical Islam, why Obama has been so slow to respond to Syria's civil war, levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere not seen since the Pliocene era, and a new keyboard configuration for mobile phones.

By Gregory M. Lamb,?Senior Editor / May 16, 2013

A user tries out the QWERTY keyboard on a smart phone.

Graeme Roy/The Canadian Press/AP

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China asks its citizens to dream

A nation confidently on its way?to becoming the biggest economy in the world ought to be chasing its own special dreams. So Chinese Communist Party General Secretary Xi Jinping has taken on promoting ?the Chinese dream? as his personal motto, and the Chinese character for ?dream? has been declared the ?character of the year? in China. But what do Chinese think about when they dream? In ?Chasing the Chinese dream,??The Economist?points out the term?s vagueness is both an advantage and a difficulty, a meme able to be fitted to many goals. Militarists see it as more than just an ?American dream? of middle-class prosperity; it?s their dream of a powerful China preeminent on the world stage. Democratic reformers see a move toward Western-style personal and political freedoms. US Secretary of State John Kerry recently tried to lasso the term in the service of better Sino-American relations, proposing that Chinese and American dreams merge into a vision of a ?Pacific Dream? that the two nations pursue together. But where it?s all headed is uncertain: When a people are allowed, even encouraged, to ?dream,? the process may set off a series of unintended consequences.

Skip to next paragraph Gregory M. Lamb

Senior editor

Gregory M. Lamb is a senior editor and writer.

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How radical were the Tsarnaev brothers?

What caused Tamerlan and Dzhokhar Tsarnaev to carry out their bombing of the Boston Marathon? We may never get a definite answer. But in ?The Bombers? World,??Christian Caryl in The New York Review of Books?digs for facts and theories and concludes that despite possible links to radical Islamists ?there are many other details of the Tsarnaev brothers? case that make it seem starkly unique, more of an outlier than something that can be easily slotted into a larger pattern.? Those particulars include the Chechen culture, which places a high value on family and ?honor? (and put immense pressure on Tamerlan, the older brother, to succeed when at the same time he was failing). Among the unanswered questions: Why was this particular Chechen family unable to assimilate into American culture when other Chechens have?

Stopping a humanitarian disaster

Source: http://rss.csmonitor.com/~r/csmonitor/globalnews/~3/TwvmnS63i8I/Good-Reads-From-Chinese-dreams-to-the-Tsarnaevs-to-a-QWERTY-challenger

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Study: No higher cancer rate at Conn. Pratt plants

HARTFORD, Conn. (AP) ? An 11-year study of the incidence of brain cancer at jet engine manufacturer Pratt & Whitney in the state ended Thursday with university researchers saying they found no statistically significant elevations in the rate of cancer among workers.

Researchers at the University of Pittsburgh and the University of Illinois at Chicago said they identified 723 workers diagnosed with tumors between 1976 and 2004 at the United Technologies Corp. subsidiary. The tumors were malignant, benign or unspecified and included 277 cases of brain cancer.

Researchers examined records such as work documents and cancer registries of 222,123 men and women who worked in one or more of eight Connecticut Pratt & Whitney plants between 1952 and 2001. They also reviewed 11 chemical or physical agents on the basis of known or suspected carcinogenic potential that could affect the central nervous system or other organs.

The $12 million study, commissioned by Pratt & Whitney, was overseen by the state Department of Public Health. William Gerrish, a spokesman for the state agency, called it a "comprehensive study that has met its goals," and the project's principal researcher said the results were positive.

"The news is good," said Gary Marsh, the University of Pittsburgh researcher who led the study.

Employees can be reassured that working at Pratt & Whitney before 2002, the start of the study period, "does not increase your risk of developing brain cancer and does not increase your risk of dying," Marsh said.

The son of a Pratt & Whitney worker who died at age 46 was not so certain, though.

"It leaves a lot of questions unanswered," said Todd Atcherson, whose father, Charles Atcherson, died in 1998 after working at Pratt & Whitney for about 25 years.

Workers and the union expressed concerns about several workers who died of brain cancer within a few years of each other and the study became too large, "losing sight" of individuals, he said.

Paul Dickes, chief health and safety representative at the Machinists union, which represents Pratt & Whitney workers, said he's reassured that the study determined it's safe to work at the two remaining Connecticut plants.

"It doesn't bring closure to people who had illnesses," he said. "I'm disappointed it doesn't resolve those issues."

Pratt & Whitney spokesman Ray Hernandez said: "We are pleased that employees have answers to their questions and there is no correlation between cancer and the workplace."

Comparisons among Pratt & Whitney plants showed a slightly higher incidence of tumors and cancer among workers at the North Haven plant, the researchers said. But further evaluation found no association with estimated workplace exposures.

The slightly elevated cancer rates at the North Haven plant may reflect external occupational factors that researchers did not measure such as other companies where employees worked or factors unique to North Haven, Marsh said.

The study is one of the largest and most comprehensive in an occupational setting, he said. It also is the first large-scale study of workers in the jet engine manufacturing industry.

The results echo what was released in the first stage of the three-stage study in 2008. The researchers said then they did not find statistically significant excesses in deaths from malignant brain tumors among North Haven workers.

Workers and their families, joined by the Machinists union, pushed for the study after widows and union officials said they were concerned with what appeared to be numerous and similar deaths at Pratt & Whitney plants.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/study-no-higher-cancer-rate-conn-pratt-plants-020956307.html

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Analysis: In any scandal, lying to Congress is tough to prove

By Joan Biskupic and Kim Dixon

WASHINGTON, D.C. (Reuters) - When embattled Internal Revenue Service official Lois Lerner was called before a congressional committee Wednesday, she declared that she had done nothing wrong - but said she did not intend to testify. Her defiance only turned up the heat from Republicans who have threatened to take her to court for misleading Congress.

Yet whatever political problems Lerner may have escalated for the Obama administration in the scandal over IRS scrutiny of Tea Party and other conservative groups, history suggests neither she nor any other IRS official is likely to face criminal charges related to congressional testimony.

Such charges are rarely filed, and convictions are even rarer. The most high-profile recent case in point is the prosecution of Major League Baseball pitching great Roger Clemens, who was acquitted by a jury in 2012 on charges he lied to Congress when he denied using performance-enhancing drugs.

"Almost no one is prosecuted for lying to Congress," lawyer P.J. Meitl asserted in a 2007 Quinnipiac Law Review article. Meitl, who wrote the article while in private practice, is now an assistant U.S. attorney in Dallas. He found only six people who had been convicted of perjury or related charges in relation to Congress, going back to the 1940s.

Two of those cases arose from Watergate, one against President Richard Nixon's attorney general, John Mitchell, and the other against H.R. Haldeman, Nixon's chief of staff. Both men were found guilty of perjury before a Senate committee.

Unlike in a typical criminal probe, lawyers say that in a politically charged congressional setting - often involving many exchanges among officials, their staff and witnesses - it can be difficult to prove a key element in any perjury prosecution: that the person knowingly and willfully deceived.

For Lerner and some other officials, the legal cloud darkened when Attorney General Eric Holder said last week that the Justice Department would investigate possible wrongdoing relating to reports that the IRS subjected conservative groups to more scrutiny than other groups seeking tax-exempt status. Holder said the department would be looking at charges relating to the denial of civil rights to members of conservative groups, IRS rules for U.S. government employees and the Hatch Act, which bans civil servants from certain partisan political activity.

In a familiar Washington story line, legal questions have arisen not only about any possible core misconduct but also about a potential cover-up or attempt to mislead Congress about who knew what, when. Any false statements made to Congress could fit into this cover-up story line and would leave officials or former officials vulnerable to prosecution.

Wednesday's hearing was chaired by California Republican Darrell Issa, who runs the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee. Prior to the hearing, Issa accused Lerner of providing "false or misleading" information to Congress last year when she testified about the IRS's treatment of conservative groups seeking tax-exempt status.

He said she could face criminal liability under Section 1001 of Title 18 of the U.S. Code, which prohibits an individual from "knowingly and willfully" making materially false statements to Congress.

Other committee members suggested during the hearing Wednesday that additional officials, including former IRS Commissioner Douglas Shulman and outgoing acting IRS chief Steven Miller, could also face charges.

Two other statutes intended to ensure truthful responses to Congress could also come into play. Section 1621 forbids perjury, and Section 1505 prohibits the obstruction of justice. Lawyers caution, however, that all three provisions carry high standards of proof and are not often successfully enforced.

FIFTH AMENDMENT QUESTION

At Wednesday's hearing, Lerner refused to answer any questions, asserting her Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination. Her lawyer, William Taylor, told Reuters afterward that the implication that she already may have committed a crime left Lerner little choice about whether to testify.

"That committee has already made up its mind," Taylor said. "Why should she go up there and confront people who have already decided she has done something wrong?"

Yet the way in which Lerner asserted her Fifth Amendment right sparked new controversy. While she told the committee she would not testify, she nonetheless read a statement that included an assertion that, "I have not done anything wrong. I have not broken any laws. I have not violated any IRS rules or regulations, and I have not provided false information to this or any other congressional committee."

That prompted some Republicans to claim that she was essentially waiving the right not to answer questions, and Issa said he would consider recalling Lerner to testify because of this possibility.

Taylor disputes any notion that Lerner jeopardized her Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination. "She absolutely did not waive her Fifth Amendment rights," said Taylor, a prominent criminal defense lawyer who in 2011 successfully defended former International Monetary Fund chief Dominique Strauss-Kahn on sexual assault charges.

Law professors say there is no clear answer as to whether Lerner may have waived her Fifth Amendment privilege by making the statement. Doing so in court testimony likely would be seen as waiving the right against self-incrimination, they said, but the rules are looser for congressional testimony and there is no definitive court ruling on the point.

Issa said emerging information conflicts with several assertions Lerner made to the committee last year, and in a letter last week suggested that Lerner could be criminally liable.

These include, from 2012, a February briefing when committee staff asked whether criteria for evaluating tax-exempt applications had changed and Lerner said it had not; an April phone call when Issa said Lerner told committee staff that the information the IRS requested was not out of the ordinary; an April letter saying that IRS letters to certain organizations were "in the ordinary course of the application process," and in a May letter where Issa said her responses related to donor requests were misleading.

"Therefore, it appears you provided false or misleading information on four separate occasions last years in response to the Committee's oversight of IRS's treatment of conservative groups," Issa wrote in a letter to Lerner on May 14, 2013.

Republicans have also said that now-deputy IRS Commissioner Miller and former IRS Commissioner Shulman misled them in communications and testimony. Even Democrats at Wednesday's hearing disputed Shulman's veracity when he testified to Congress in March 2012 to the House Ways and Means Committee that there was "absolutely no targeting" of Tea Party groups.

But there's a long way from Congress asserting that somebody misled them to making a criminal case.

If Issa and other House members believe they have a perjury or obstruction case, they would turn their findings over to the Department of Justice for possible prosecution. A key consideration would be whether prosecutors could show that the statements were actually false, material and made with the required knowledge and willfulness to deceive.

Charges arising from responses to Congress can have a different fate from charges arising from statements made directly to investigators in the usual criminal probe, such as occurred in the celebrated cases of Martha Stewart and Lewis "Scooter" Libby. In 2004, Stewart was found guilty of making false statements to federal investigators related to her sale of stock in a biotech company. Libby, the former chief of staff to Vice President Dick Cheney, was found guilty in 2007 of lying and obstruction of justice related to his testimony to a grand jury investigating who blew the cover of CIA officer Valerie Plame.

Margaret Krawiec, a lawyer in the Washington, D.C., office of law firm Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom who previously worked in the Department of Justice, said typical criminal investigations inherently have a focus on potential criminal conduct. For members of Congress, in contrast, the original questioning "is usually driven by a legislative or political effort."

That creates a different dynamic. "At the end of the day, the question is: Was (the testimony) egregious to the level that they should refer their findings to the Department of Justice," Krawiec said.

She added that it is especially difficult to make a case against an evasive, rather than outright deceptive, witness. "It's one thing to dodge a question," she said. "It's another to intentionally mislead."

(Reporting By Joan Biskupic; additional reporting by Casey Sullivan; Editing by Eric Effron and Douglas Royalty)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/analysis-scandal-lying-congress-tough-prove-050353345.html

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Ari Folman animates Robin Wright in 'The Congress'

This publicity image provided on Tuesday May 21, 2013 by Wolf Consultants shows an animated Robin Wright in director Ari Folman's film 'The Congress.' The movie is playing in the Directors' Fortnight competition at the Cannes Film Festival. (AP Photo/Wolf Consultants)

This publicity image provided on Tuesday May 21, 2013 by Wolf Consultants shows an animated Robin Wright in director Ari Folman's film 'The Congress.' The movie is playing in the Directors' Fortnight competition at the Cannes Film Festival. (AP Photo/Wolf Consultants)

CANNES, France (AP) ? Hollywood is hell.

That's an idea to set tongues wagging at the Cannes Film Festival, and it's the distinct impression left by Israeli director Ari Folman's head-spinning part-animated feature "The Congress."

Fittingly, Cannes provided the inspiration for the director's dystopian vision of the entertainment business, which stars actress Robin Wright as, well, actress Robin Wright ? a 40something performer whose career is on the slide.

Folman conceived the kernel of the film when he came to the festival in 2008 with "Waltz With Bashir," his Academy Award-nominated animated film about his experiences as a young Israeli soldier in Lebanon in the 1980s.

The director said he was walking through the bustling movie marketplace at Cannes when he saw an elderly woman.

"And my sales agent asked me, do you recognize this lady? And I said no," Folman said. "And he told me her name and I was shocked, because she was this goddess American actress from the 70s. She was in her 70s, and no one recognized her. And this is Mecca for cinema, this place!

"And I thought, she's got in front of her, everywhere, the image of her young, stolen forever in the movies. And here she is and she has to live with her image forever young, but she's getting old."

Folman diplomatically declined to name the actress. But he said the episode gave him a way to realize a long-held dream of adapting "The Futurological Congress," a satirical sci-fi novel by Polish writer Stanislaw Lem in which pharmaceutical overlords keep the population hooked on hallucinogenic drugs.

In the movie, Wright agrees to become a "scanned actor," a digital avatar owned by her studio. The digital Wright can be endlessly, agelessly used in new movies ? the studio makes her "Agent Robin" in a sci-fi action series ? while the flesh-and-blood person grows old in obscurity.

The film's live-action first half is an entertainingly bleak depiction of Hollywood, with an on-the-ropes Wright berated by her agent (a delicious Harvey Keitel) and bullied by her studio boss (a malevolent Danny Huston).

Wright has been called brave for taking on issues of aging and image so directly. But Folman said he didn't see it that way when he offered the role to the actress after sitting across from her at an awards ceremony and thinking she looked sad.

"I think it's a great role," he said. "She is Robin Wright, she is Agent Robin in the movie, she's an animated character, she's an old Robin at the very end, she sings two songs ? it's a great role.

"Although Harvey Keitel told me one day on the set, 'Man, she is so brave. You could have offered me the world, I would never do what she does in this movie.'"

Wright has said she doesn't think she is playing herself, even though she and her screen character share a name and many biographical details, including roles in "The Princess Bride" and "Forrest Gump."

Once Wright has been digitally scanned, the movie switches to animation as the character visits a conference at a luxury hotel ? where her films screen endlessly and she goes unrecognized ? and learns of a sinister plot to make the power of celebrity even more addictive.

The movie's audacious shifts of tone, and its swirling, psychedelically tinged animation, have elicited diverse reactions at Cannes, where "The Congress" opened the Director's Fortnight competition.

Many saw it as original but uneven. It's inarguably a strikingly original work by a director who is both amused and despairing about the modern entertainment business.

Folman, a genial, bearded 50-year-old sporting a gold medallion and an earring, says he fears the sort of movies that inspired him ? the director-driven American cinema of the 1970s ? is dying, soon to be found only in cinema museums.

And don't get him started on 3-D, CGI and the other digital tricks that, Folman thinks, are ruining movies.

"The role of the director is completely different (today)," he said. "Until recently the urgency on the set to make a movie was huge. Today, it's only part of the job, because you can fix everything afterwards. The set is blue screens, and then you build it and you can fix it. And sometimes it's for the good, but I can give you examples where it's terrible.

"My favorite sci-fi movie ever is 'Blade Runner.' This film was done with hand-made crafts."

For the movie, director Ridley Scott "built the sets ? it's wood and paper and plastic and aluminum. I see this movie every few months on a big screen at home and it will live forever.

"Same guy did 'Prometheus' last year. Who saw it?"

Folman is keeping the flame burning for an older form of cinema ? but it's a slow and laborious process. "The Congress" took five years to make, and slightly under an hour of animation required two years of work by animators in nine countries.

"I try not to look at myself as this nostalgic (person)," Folman added, pausing a second before adding: "But."

"I don't say we will have scanned actors. I think the human side will win. I am a true believer in that.

"But if I look at my kids and the way they use everything ? iPads and electronics and everything ? I have to be honest with myself and say, if my kids, in 15 years' time, see a movie with scanned characters, they won't give a damn."

___

Jill Lawless can be reached at http://Twitter.com/JillLawless

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/4e67281c3f754d0696fbfdee0f3f1469/Article_2013-05-21-France-Cannes-Ari%20Folman/id-fed818ead58149448911f5fbc1f1b305

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S.Africa's Netcare H1 profit up 25 pct, local unit robust

JOHANNESBURG (Reuters) - Netcare Ltd, Africa's third-biggest private hospital group, posted a 25 percent rise in half-year profit on Monday, helped by a strong performance in South Africa and favourable currency swings.

Netcare, which also runs hospitals in Britain, said diluted headline earnings per share totalled 65.8 cents in the six months to end-March compared with 52.7 cents a year earlier.

While demand for private healthcare has increased in South Africa thanks to a fast-growing middle class, stalling economic growth in Britain has led to a drop in the number of people with private medical insurance.

Netcare said revenue grew 8.5 percent to 13.3 billion rand with currency swings adding another 631 million rand.

Shares in the company are up about 16 percent so far this year, outpacing a 6 percent rise in the JSE All-share index.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/africas-netcare-h1-profit-25-pct-local-unit-065235512.html

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China Is Hacking the US Again

Just three months after hacks by China?s People?s Liberation Army came to an abrupt halt, the country is once again attacking US targets reports the New York Times.

Hacks on organizations like the Wall Street Journal and the New York Times ceased three months back when it came to light that the perpetrators had stolen data?from blueprints to clinical trial results?from American companies and government agencies. Now, though, according to security experts and American officials, attacks have started once more from Unit 61398, China's hacking HQ.

A report by Mandiant, a private security company, has revealed that "attacks had resumed", though the company was unwilling to name the affected parties because of privacy agreements. It did, however, admit that "the victims were many of the same ones the unit had attacked before". That doesn't really narrow it down much, and could suggest targets ranging from Coca-Cola Company to Lockheed Martin. What is clear, though, is that the Chinese certainly aren't holding back, as the Times points out:

[O]ver the past two months, they have gradually begun attacking the same victims from new servers and have reinserted many of the tools that enable them to seek out data without detection. They are now operating at 60 percent to 70 percent of the level they were working at before.

The news comes as a blow for the Obama administration, which recently took the bold step of naming and shaming China, for the frist time officially fingering the company for hacking the US. Clearly, China has no intention of stopping the attacks, but it remains unclear what the best course of action is for the US government. Until that's decided, it's clearly something that big businesses are going to have to face up to. [New York Times]

Image by Shutterstock / Andersphoto

Source: http://gizmodo.com/china-is-hacking-the-us-again-508837615

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Hope rises: Woman found alive 17 days after deadly Bangladesh factory collapse

The death toll from the collapse reached 1,036 today, but the recovery of 'Reshma' is giving rescuers hope that more people may still be found alive.

By Saad Hammadi,?Correspondent / May 10, 2013

Rescuers carry a survivor pulled out from the rubble of a building that collapsed in Saver, near Dhaka, Bangladesh, Friday. When the woman, whom soldiers identified as Reshma, was freed within an hour of her discovery in the flooded basement of the building, the crowd erupted in both cheers and tears.

AP

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Seventeen days after the building collapsed killing more than 1,000 workers in Bangladesh, armed forces and firefighters have rescued one woman alive from the basement of the eight-story building at?4:28 p.m.?local time, raising cautious hope that more people could still be found alive.

Skip to next paragraph Saad Hammadi

Bangladesh Correspondent

Saad Hammadi is an investigative journalist based in Dhaka, covering Bangladesh for The Christian Science Monitor and The Guardian.?He is also the assistant editor of Xtra, the weekend magazine of New Age, one of the leading English dailies in Bangladesh.?Saad graduated from the University of Liberal Arts Bangladesh with a BSS in media studies and journalism and a minor in English.

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When the woman, whom soldiers identified as Reshma, was freed within an hour of her discovery in the flooded basement of the building, the crowd erupted in both cheers and tears. Despite her ordeal, she appeared to be in good shape and was rushed to a military hospital on the outskirts of the Bangladeshi capital.

Reshma?s rescue comes 12 days after Bangladesh mourned a failed attempt to rescue another woman, Shahina Akhter. After the death of Ms. Akhter, rescuers lost hope of finding anyone alive in the rubble and rolled out heavier equipment to clear the rubble and recover dead bodies. But with Reshma's rescue, the mood at the scene has been uplifted.?

The death toll from the collapse of a building, which housed five factories, reached 1,036 today, and that number is expected to rise as more bodies are being found. The incident is being described as the world's deadliest garment industry disaster and one of the worst industrial accidents. As many as 6,000 people may have worked in the building, according to some estimates. The collapse puts a spotlight on the often extremely poor labor conditions of the country?s $20 billion garment industry, which provides cheap clothing for major retailers around the world.

As some bulldozers were crushing building beams to clear the way to look for bodies today they reached the basement, and noticed something.

?We were removing slabs. Between 2:45 p.m. and 3:00 p.m. we learned of the trace of a person,? says Lt. Col. SM Imran-Uz-Zaman, an Army spokesman at the site. ?We immediately halted work in all other areas and [focused] people on rescuing Reshma.?

Maj. Gen. Chowdhury Hasan Sarwardy, coordinator of the search and rescue operations at the disaster site, told The Christian Science Monitor how she was discovered: ?She shouted when we were going inside. We saw her. I talked to her,? he says.

?We have halted use of all heavy equipment such as hydraulic drilling. Our rescuers are working with information we are getting from her,? said Sarwardy ? just before she was rescued.?

Rescuers at the site said Reshma was confined between two beams and they had to be extremely cautious in order to rescue her alive.?

After a fire broke out just before the rescue of Shahina, Imran said the rescuers put water around the perimeter of their rescue operation to ensure that wouldn?t happen again.?

Once the woman was pulled out alive, says Sawardy, ?we provided her with oxygen and saline.? Reshma was rescued unhurt but with complications after 17 days without food and trauma.

Though Reshma told rescuers there were no more survivors in her area, workers began to sift through nearby rubble for more survivors.

Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina congratulated the rescuers for saving Reshma.?"This is an unbelievable feat," she was quoted as saying by her assistant, Mahbubul Haque Shakil.

Source: http://rss.csmonitor.com/~r/csmonitor/globalnews/~3/-JxLXGRS9lc/Hope-rises-Woman-found-alive-17-days-after-deadly-Bangladesh-factory-collapse

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The Basics Of Affiliate Promotion In A Nutshell | Inner Badass Team

Affiliate marketing has roots in centuries of promotional techniques. It stands out from the ?quick and easy? attitude of online speedsters. Affiliate programs have been generating revenue for webmasters for a good number of years. When the lengthy history of affiliate promotion and the swift rate at which it continues to develop are taken into account, it becomes apparent that a wealth of information exists on the subject. No matter what stage of internet marketing you are in, this article provides helpful information to help with your success.

It?s a good idea to research how a business keeps track of orders not created through their web site when you?re looking through online marketing programs. You might lose commission if orders you directed to the company are made by mail or on the phone.

Carefully research any products that you are considering linking to before you actually do so. Doing the homework to determine how to organize affiliate links within your website may take a bit of time, but the effort is handsomely rewarded as the profits start to roll in.

There are many different options for partners in affiliate marketing and each has their own positives and negatives. Many of them are frustrating or confusing to navigate. A good affiliate marketer doesn?t allow a poor website to interfere with his business. You establish trust through this method and garner purchases.

Think about your target market when choosing affiliates. This also helps your audience clearly learn more about how you plan to provide them what they need, along with boosting your traffic.

Affiliate marketing is one of the most popular and effective ways to get results from your online business. There are other online advertising methods like contextual networks and banner advertising but affiliate programs will consistently generate more visitors to your site. When choosing an affiliate program, bear in mind the payment you receive for referrals, the popularity of the directory and its ease of navigation.

If you want to make a lot of money in your web marketing venture, go for companies that convert customers easily. Even a one percent conversion rate is good.

Banner ads can be used creatively to encourage more users to visit your webpage. Include an interesting trivia question in the ad and entice users to visit your website to find the answer. Curiosity will get the most out of a lot of individuals. You can encourage participation by giving discounts for winning answers.

Once you have determined which products you want to promote for your affiliate partner, you should ensure that your marketing strategy is directed toward the appropriate audience. Cheaper products are easy to make money based on higher volumes. For instance, selecting a rather expensive product will require you to focus on convincing customers more than working with volumes.

Lifetime commissions, in affiliate marketing, are now quite rare. Still, the rewards are very great. Vendors pay website owners for products sold from their referrals, of course. This is a typical commission arrangement. Be aware that commissions are paid out when customers make purchases during a specifically agreed upon time line. Lifetime commissions are a huge income stream, so they are still worth looking for.

Use a handwritten, scanned advertisement on your site. That personal touch will go a long way to connecting with potential buyers, because it will help them see the real person behind the products. If you dislike writing things by hand, or have illegible handwriting, hire a freelancer to help you create the ad.

Include all the media you can in your affiliate marketing efforts. Try adding screenshots or even videos of the product in action. People will want to buy your product because it is so appealing. Also, play to people?s love of technical details. Give plenty of specifics in your reviews so people can be confident about your product.

Your newsletter should be written in a style that will encourage people to join your email list. Not too long ago, people really enjoyed getting emails. Nowadays, with everyone jumping through hurdles to avoid spam, an informative and friendly newsletter can go a long way.

Boost your sales by ensuring your site has plenty of links, but also be sure that those links are relevant to the content being provided. If a person clicks on a link that says ?Apple iPad,? they will not be pleased if it leads to your page selling Verizon handsets. Any attempt to use cleverness or vagueness to lure visitors could backfire, and seem dishonest to your viewers.

Promote only products that you are confident about. What you recommend also as an effect on how customers view your business. By promoting only the best and most useful items, you?ll instill a sense of trust in your customers. You can keep customers if you promote good products and prices.

You need to make sure that you remain relevant if you wish to find success with internet marketing. It is important to stay current on new tools offered by your affiliate programs. Check out the constantly evolving tools that will draw customers into your web marketing goals.

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Knicks JR Smith plays through illness vs. Pacers

INDIANAPOLIS (AP) ? Knicks guard J.R. Smith played against the Pacers in Game 3 on Saturday night after being iffy to go because of an illness.

Smith, the NBA's top sixth man, entered the game late in the first quarter and missed his first two shots -- both came up short.

Coach Mike Woodson said during his pregame availability that Smith would warm up before a decision would be made. Smith missed the Knicks morning shootaround after spiking a 102-degree fever, but Woodson said the temperature came down throughout the day.

If Smith is effective, he could have a big impact in a series that is tied at 1.

Smith averaged 18.1 points and 5.3 rebounds during the regular season and won the NBA's Sixth Man Award. But his playoff numbers are down to 14.4 points and 4.7 rebounds, and he's just 7 of 30 from the field in the first two games against Indiana.

Amare Stoudemire also was active for the game and entered in the second quarter. He has not played in more than two months after having surgery on his right knee.

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/347875155d53465d95cec892aeb06419/Article_2013-05-11-BKN-Knicks-Smith-Illness/id-de3ffe25e755495487adea7494ef6eb1

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For Cleveland women, ordeal of recovery begins now

Workers board up the house Saturday, May 11, 2013 where three women were held in Cleveland on Saturday, May 11, 2013. Suspect Ariel Castro, who allegedly held three women captive for nearly a decade, is charged with rape and kidnapping. (AP Photo/Tony Dejak)

Workers board up the house Saturday, May 11, 2013 where three women were held in Cleveland on Saturday, May 11, 2013. Suspect Ariel Castro, who allegedly held three women captive for nearly a decade, is charged with rape and kidnapping. (AP Photo/Tony Dejak)

FILE - In this Thursday, May 9, 2013 file photo, a "Welcome Home" sign is posted at a restaurant near a crime scene where three women were held captive for a decade in Cleveland. For Gina DeJesus, Amanda Berry and Michelle Knight, who were freed from captivity inside a Cleveland house Monday, May 6, 2013, the ordeal is not over. Next comes recovery _ from sexual abuse and their sudden, jarring reentry into a world much different than the one they were snatched from a decade ago. (AP Photo/David Duprey, File)

FILE - In this Wednesday, May 8, 2013 file photo, people hug after Gina DeJesus returned home, in Cleveland. For DeJesus, Amanda Berry and Michelle Knight, who were freed from captivity inside a Cleveland house on Monday, May 6, the ordeal is not over. Next comes recovery _ from sexual abuse and their sudden, jarring reentry into a world much different than the one they were snatched from a decade ago. (AP Photo/Tony Dejak, File)

FILE - In this Wednesday, May 8, 2013 file photo, a missing poster still rests on a tree outside the home of Amanda Berry, in Cleveland. For Berry, Gina DeJesus and Michelle Knight, who were freed from captivity inside a Cleveland house earlier this week, the ordeal is not over. Next comes recovery _ from sexual abuse and their sudden, jarring reentry into a world much different than the one they were snatched from a decade ago. (AP Photo/Tony Dejak, File)

FILE - In this Tuesday, May 7, 2013 file photo, Jaycee Dugard, right, who was abducted as a child and held for 18 years, and her mother, Terry Probyn, appear with their Hope Award at the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children annual Hope Awards in Washington. For Gina DeJesus, Amanda Berry and Michelle Knight, who were freed from captivity inside a Cleveland house earlier this week, the ordeal is not over. Next comes recovery _ from sexual abuse and their sudden, jarring reentry into a world much different than the one they were snatched from a decade ago. Dugard survived 18 years in captivity. Like Berry, Dugard was impregnated by her captor, and is now raising the two children. She still feels anger about her ordeal. (AP Photo/Cliff Owen, File)

Year after year, the clock ticked by and the calendar marched forward, carrying the three women further from the real world and pulling them deeper into an isolated nightmare.

Now, for the women freed from captivity inside a Cleveland house, the ordeal is not over. Next comes recovery - from sexual abuse and their sudden, jarring re-entry into a world much different from the one they were snatched from a decade ago.

Therapists say that with extensive treatment and support, healing is likely for the women, who were 14, 16 and 21 when they were abducted. But it is often a long and difficult process.

"It's sort of like coming out of a coma," says Dr. Barbara Greenberg, a psychologist who specializes in treating abused teenagers. "It's a very isolating and bewildering experience."

In the world the women left behind, a gallon of gas cost about $1.80. Barack Obama was a state senator. Phones were barely taking pictures. Things did not "go viral." There was no YouTube, no Facebook, no iPhone.

Emerging into the future is difficult enough. The two younger Cleveland women are doing it without the benefit of crucial formative years.

"By taking away their adolescence, they weren't able to develop emotional and psychological and social skills," says Duane Bowers, who counsels traumatized families through the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children.

"They're 10 years behind in these skills. Those need to be caught up before they can work on reintegrating into society," he says.

That society can be terrifying. As freed captive Georgina DeJesus arrived home from the hospital, watched by a media horde, she hid herself beneath a hooded sweatshirt. The freed Amanda Berry slipped into her home without being seen.

"They weren't hiding from the press, from the cameras," Bowers says. "They were hiding from the freedom, from the expansiveness."

In the house owned by Ariel Castro, who is charged with kidnapping and raping the women, claustrophobic control ruled. Police say that Castro kept them chained in a basement and locked in upstairs rooms, that he fathered a child with one of them and that he starved and beat one captive into multiple miscarriages.

In all those years, they only set foot outside of the house twice ? and then only as far as the garage.

"Something as simple as walking into a Target is going to be a major problem for them," Bowers says.

Jessica Donohue-Dioh, who works with survivors of human trafficking as a social work instructor at Xavier University in Cincinnati, says the freedom to make decisions can be one of the hardest parts of recovery.

"'How should I respond? What do they really want from me?'" Donohue-Dioh says, describing a typical reaction. "They may feel they may not have a choice in giving the right answer."

That has been a challenge for Jaycee Dugard, who is now an advocate for trauma victims after surviving 18 years in captivity ? "learning how to speak up, how to say what I want instead of finding out what everybody else wants," Dugard told ABC News.

Like Berry, Dugard was impregnated by her captor and is now raising the two children. She still feels anger about her ordeal.

"But then on the other hand, I have two beautiful daughters that I can never be sorry about," Dugard says.

Another step toward normalcy for the three women will be accepting something that seems obvious to the rest of the world: They have no reason to feel guilty.

"First of all, I'd make sure these young women know that nothing that happened to them is their fault," Elizabeth Smart, who was kidnapped at age 14 and held in sexual captivity for nine months, told People magazine.

Donohue-Dioh says that even for people victimized by monstrous criminals, guilt is a common reaction. The Cleveland women told police they were snatched after accepting rides from Castro.

"They need to recognize that what happened as a result of that choice is not the rightful or due punishment. That's really difficult sometimes," Donohue-Dioh says.

Family support will be crucial, the therapists say. But what does family mean when one member has spent a decade trapped with strangers?

"The family has to be ready to include a stranger into its sphere," Bowers says. "Because if they try to reintegrate the 14-year-old girl who went missing, that's not going to work. That 14-year-old girl doesn't exist anymore. They have to accept this stranger as someone they don't know."

Natascha Kampusch, who was kidnapped in Austria at age 10 and spent eight years in captivity, has said that her 2006 reunion with her family was both euphoric and awkward.

"I had lived for too long in a nightmare, the psychological prison was still there and stood between me and my family," Kampusch wrote in "3096 Days," her account of the ordeal.

Kampusch, now 25, said in a German television interview that she was struggling to form normal relationships, partly because many people seem to shy away from her.

"What a lot of these people say is, 'What's more important than what happened is how people react,'" says Greenberg, the psychologist.

The world has reacted to the Cleveland women with an outpouring of sympathy and support. This reaction will live on, amplified by the technologies that rose while the women were locked away.

Yet these women are more than the sum of their Wikipedia pages. Dugard, Smart and other survivors often speak of not being defined by their tragedies - another challenge for the Cleveland survivors.

"A classmate will hear their name, or a co-worker, and will put them in this box: This is who you are and what happened to you," Donohue-Dioh says. "Our job as society is to move beyond what they are and what they've experienced."

"This isn't who they are," Dugard told People. "It is only what happened to them."

Still, for the three Cleveland women, their journey forward will always include that horrifying lost decade.

"We can't escape our past," Donohue-Dioh says, "so how are we able to manage how much it influences our present and our future?"

___

AP Researcher Judith Ausuebel and AP Writer Frank Jordans in Berlin contributed to this report.

___

Jesse Washington on Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/jessewashington

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/386c25518f464186bf7a2ac026580ce7/Article_2013-05-11-US-Missing-Women-Found-What-Now?/id-e4c593881fca4270b96f7c5300629174

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Nano-breakthrough: Solving the case of the herringbone crystal

May 12, 2013 ? Leading nanoscientists created beautiful, tiled patterns with flat nanocrystals, but they were left with a mystery: Why did some sets of crystals arrange themselves in an alternating, herringbone style? To find out, they turned to experts in computer simulation at the University of Michigan and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

The result gives nanotechnology researchers a new tool for controlling how objects one-millionth the size of a grain of sand arrange themselves into useful materials -- and a means to discover the rest of the tool chest. A paper on the research is published online May 12 in Nature Chemistry.

"The excitement in this is not in the herringbone pattern, it's about the coupling of experiment and modeling, and how that approach lets us take on a very hard problem," said Christopher Murray, the Richard Perry University Professor and professor of chemistry at the University of Pennsylvania.

Murray's group is well-known for making nanocrystals and arranging them into larger crystal superstructures.

Ultimately, researchers want to modify patches on nanoparticles in different ways to coax them into more complex patterns. The goal is a method that will allow people to imagine what they would like to do and then design a material with the right properties for the job.

"By engineering interactions at the nanoscale, we can begin to assemble target structures of great complexity and functionality on the macroscale," said U-M's Sharon Glotzer, the Stuart W. Churchill Collegiate Professor of Chemical Engineering.

Glotzer introduced the concept of nanoparticle "patchiness" in 2004. Her group uses computer simulations to understand and design the patches.

Recently, Murray's team made patterns with flat nanocrystals made of heavy metals, known to chemists as lanthanides, and fluorine atoms. Lanthanides have valuable properties for solar energy and medical imaging, such as the ability to convert between high- and low-energy light.

They started by breaking down chemicals containing atoms of a lanthanide metal and fluorine in a solution, and the lanthanide and fluorine naturally began to form crystals. Also in the mix were chains of carbon and hydrogen that stuck to the sides of the crystals, stopping their growth at sizes of around 100 nanometers, or 100 millionths of a millimeter, at the largest dimensions. By using lanthanides with different atomic radii, they could control the top and bottom faces of the hexagonal crystals to be anywhere from much longer than the other four sides to non-existent, resulting in a diamond shape.

To form tiled patterns, the team spread a thin layer of nanocrystals and solvent on top of a thick fluid. As the solvent evaporated, the crystals had less space available, and they began to pack together.

The diamond shapes and the very long hexagons lined up as expected, the diamonds forming an Argyle-style grid and the hexagons matching up their longest edges like a foreshortened honeycomb. The hexagons whose sides were all nearly the same length should have formed a similar squashed honeycomb pattern, but instead, they lined up in more complicated, alternating herringbone style.

"Whenever we see something that isn't taking the simplest pattern possible, we have to ask why," Murray said.

They posed the question to Glotzer's team.

"They've been world leaders in understanding how these shapes could work on nanometer scales, and there aren't many groups that can make the crystals we make," Murray said. "It seemed natural to bring these strengths together."

Glotzer and her group built a computer model that could recreate the self-assembly of the same range of shapes that Murray had produced. The simulations showed that if the equilateral hexagons interacted with one another only through their shapes, most of the crystals formed the foreshortened honeycomb pattern -- not the herringbone.

"That's when we said, 'Okay, there must be something else going on. It's not just a packing problem,'" Glotzer said.

Her team, which included U-M graduate student Andres Millan and research scientist Michael Engel, then began playing with interactions between the edges of the particles. They found that that if the edges that formed the points were stickier than the other two sides, the hexagons would naturally arrange in the herringbone pattern.

The teams suspected that the source of the stickiness was those carbon and hydrogen chains -- perhaps they attached to the point edges more easily. Since experimentation doesn't yet offer a way to measure the number of hydrocarbon chains on the sides of such tiny particles, Murray asked Ju Li, now the Battelle Energy Alliance Professor of Nuclear Science and Engineering at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, to calculate how the chains would attach to the edges at a quantum mechanical level.

Li's group confirmed that because of the way that the different facets cut across the lattice of the metal and fluorine atoms, more hydrocarbon chains could stick to the four edges that led to points than the remaining two sides. As a result, the particles become patchy.

"Our study shows a way forward making very subtle changes in building block architecture and getting a very profound change in the larger self-assembled pattern," Glotzer said. "The goal is to have knobs that you can change just a little and get a big change in structure, and this is one of the first papers that shows a way forward for how to do that."

The paper is titled "Competition of shape and interaction patchiness for self-assembling nanoplates."

Murray is also a professor of materials science and engineering. Glotzer is also a professor of materials science and engineering, macromolecular science and engineering, physics and applied physics. Li is also a professor of material science and engineering.

Source: http://feeds.sciencedaily.com/~r/sciencedaily/~3/kOnNe91VKq0/130512141206.htm

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Will Obama suffer the ?second-term curse?? (Washington Post)

Share With Friends: | | Politics - Top Stories News, News Feeds and News via Feedzilla.

Source: http://news.feedzilla.com/en_us/stories/politics/top-stories/305151732?client_source=feed&format=rss

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Khan, Sharif appear ahead in Pakistan election count

By Katharine Houreld and Mehreen Zahra-Malik

ISLAMABAD (Reuters) - The parties of former prime minister Nawaz Sharif and cricketer-turned-politician Imran Khan appeared to be well ahead of their rivals in Pakistan's election, according to a partial count of votes cast on Saturday.

The election, in which 86 million people were eligible to vote, will bring the first transition between civilian governments in a country ruled by the military for more than half of its turbulent history.

Despite pre-election violence, and attacks on Saturday which killed at least 17 people, millions turned out to vote.

The partial count showed that while Sharif was in the lead, his party could lose 15 of its seats in the critical province of Punjab to Khan, whose emergence on the political stage has up-ended a system dominated by two parties.

Television channels showed Khan's party was ahead in more than 50 of the 272 seats in the election.

Khan, Pakistan's best-known sportsman who led a playboy lifestyle in his younger days, is seen by many as a refreshing change from the dynastic politicians who long relied on a patronage system to win votes.

His Tehrik-i-Insaf (PTI) appeals mostly to young, urban voters because of his calls for an end to corruption, a new political landscape and a halt to U.S. drone strikes on Pakistani soil. About one-third of the country's population is under the age of 30.

Sharif's party, the Pakistan Muslim League - Nawaz (PML-N), looked set to win the most seats in parliament but Khan could deprive it of a majority and dash Sharif's hopes of a return to power 14 years after he was ousted in a military coup, jailed and later exiled.

The strong performance of Sharif and Khan will likely deal a blow to the outgoing Pakistan People's Party (PPP), placing it third.

DISENCHANTMENT

Power in Pakistan has for decades alternated between the PML-N and the PPP, whose most prominent figure is President Asif Ali Zardari, widower of assassinated former premier Benazir Bhutto.

Opinion polls have suggested that disenchantment with the mainstream parties could mean that no one group emerges with a parliamentary majority, making the next government unstable and too weak to push through much-needed reform.

Voters were electing 272 members of the National Assembly. To win a simple majority, a party would have to take 137 seats.

However, a further 70 seats, most reserved for women and members of non-Muslim minorities, are allocated to parties on the basis of their performance in the contested constituencies. To have a majority of the total of 342, a party would need 172.

Pakistan's Taliban, who are close to al Qaeda, have killed more than 120 people in election-related violence since April. The group, which is fighting to topple the U.S.-backed government, regards the election as un-Islamic.

More bloodshed marred election day. A bomb attack on the office of the Awami National Party (ANP) in Karachi killed 11 people and wounded about 40. In Baluchistan, four died in a gun battle and elsewhere gunmen on a motorcycle opened fire near a polling station, killing two people, police said.

Despite the searing heat, many went to the polls excited about the prospect of change in a country that is plagued with Taliban militancy, a near-failed economy, endemic corruption, chronic power cuts and crumbling infrastructure.

"The team that we elect today will determine whether the rot will be stemmed or whether we will slide further into the abyss," prominent lawyer Babar Sattar wrote in The News daily.

Despite Pakistan's history of coups, the army stayed out of politics during the five years of the last government and threw its support behind Saturday's election. It still sets the nuclear-armed country's foreign and security policy and will steer the thorny relationship with Washington as NATO troops withdraw from neighboring Afghanistan in 2014.

However, some fear the military could step back in if there is a repeat of the incompetence and corruption that frustrated many Pakistanis during the last government.

Power cuts can last more than 10 hours a day in some places, crippling key industries like textiles, and a new International Monetary Fund bailout may be needed soon to rescue the economy.

(Writing by John Chalmers and Michael Georgy; Additional reporting by Gul Yousafzai in QUETTA, Mubasher Bukhari in LAHORE and Jibran Ahmed in PESHAWAR; Editing by Janet Lawrence)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/pakistanis-vote-landmark-election-031123656.html

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Middle schooler?s iPhone 5, iPod stolen from playground

An 11-year-old?s iPhone 5 and iPod were stolen from the Saxe Middle School playground on Saturday, May 4, at around 5 p.m., according to police.

The boy?s father called police at around 6:38 p.m. to report that his son was playing on the playground and he set his phone and iPod down at about 5 p.m., and then 10 minutes later when he went to get them, they were missing.

The iPhone 5 is valued at $400 and the iPod is valued at $100.

Source: http://www.ncadvertiser.com/21727/middle-schoolers-iphone-5-ipod-stolen-from-playground/

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Woman pulled alive from rubble of Bangladesh factory

By Rafiqur Rahman

SAVAR, Bangladesh (Reuters) - A young Bangladeshi woman who spent 17 days buried alive under a collapsed garments factory was rescued on Friday when astonished workmen heard a voice calling "save me, save me" from the rubble.

Pale, drawn but seemingly unhurt, Reshma Begum was cut from the ruins and hoisted onto a stretcher to wild cheers in scenes that captivated a nation which had long given up hope of finding any more survivors.

When the eight-storey building collapsed on April 24, Begum was trapped in a lightless, cell-like nook - alone, but alive. She managed to survive by taking sips from bottles of water buried with her.

"To save water I used to drink only a small quantity," Begum, 19, told Somoy television from her hospital bed.

The 45-minute rescue was broadcast live on television. Cameras captured hope lighting up the faces of rescue workers peering into the hole, before Begum was carried out.

For a moment she was shown with her head lolling to the side, as if unconscious. Emergency workers placed an oxygen mask on her face and loaded her into an ambulance that sped away with its doors open.

Hours earlier, crews had pulled the 1,000th dead body from the wreckage.

By the end of the day, a spokesman at the army control room coordinating the operation said the number of people confirmed to have been killed had reached 1,050. It was the world's worst industrial accident since Bhopal in India in 1984.

"A MIRACLE"

Major Moazzem Hossain said Begum had been discovered by chance after army engineers searching for more bodies began cutting through concrete beams, inadvertently allowing a ray of sunlight to pour into the space where she had been stuck.

Begum began waving an aluminum curtain rail through the gap to attract attention and cried out "Save me! Save me!".

"We told her the whole country is with you, we will never leave this place until we rescue you," Hossain told Reuters. "How can she have survived for 17 days? It must have been a miracle."

Mohammad Rubel Rana, a workman who had been cutting iron rods at the site said he had alerted rescue crews after hearing her cries.

"I heard a faint voice saying 'Save me, Save me'," Rana told Reuters television. "She was given water, biscuits and oxygen."

A doctor at the Combined Military Hospital in Savar where Begum was treated told reporters she was stable but needed rest.

Good news has been in short supply in Bangladesh, which is simultaneously reeling from the aftermath of the disaster and its worst bout of violent since independence in 1971 ahead of elections due early next year.

A series of deadly incidents at factories has focused global attention on safety standards in Bangladesh's booming garment industry. Eight people were killed in a fire at a factory this week, which an industry association said on Friday may have been started deliberately.

About 2,500 people were rescued from Rana Plaza, in the industrial suburb of Savar, 20 miles northwest of Dhaka, including many injured, but there is no official estimate of the numbers still missing.

The disaster, believed to have been triggered when generators were started up during a blackout, has put the spotlight on Western retailers who use the impoverished South Asian nation as a source of cheap goods.

Nine people have been arrested in connection with the disaster, including the building's owner and bosses of the factories it housed.

(Reporting by Ruma Paul and Matthew Green; Writing by Matthew Green; Editing by Andrew Heavens)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/bangladesh-building-collapse-death-toll-tops-1-000-055923561.html

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How individuality develops: Experience leads to growth of new brain cells

May 9, 2013 ? The adult brain continues to grow with the challenges that it faces; its changes are linked to the development of personality and behavior. But what is the link between individual experience and brain structure? Why do identical twins not resemble each other perfectly even when they grew up together? To shed light on these questions, the scientists observed forty genetically identical mice that were kept in an enclosure offering a large variety of activity and exploration options.

"The animals were not only genetically identical, they were also living in the same environment," explains principal investigator Gerd Kempermann, Professor for Genomics of Regeneration, CRTD, and Site Speaker of the DZNE in Dresden. "However, this environment was so rich that each mouse gathered its own individual experiences in it. Over time, the animals therefore increasingly differed in their realm of experience and behavior."

The DFG-Center for Regenerative Therapies Dresden -- Cluster of Excellence at the TU Dresden (CRTD), the Dresden site of the German Center for Neurodegenerative Diseases (DZNE), and the Max Planck Institute for Human Development in Berlin played a pivotal role in the study.

New neurons for individualized brains

Each of the mice was equipped with a special micro-chip emitting electromagnetic signals. This allowed the scientists to construct the mice's movement profiles and to quantify their exploratory behavior. The result: Despite a common environment and identical genes the mice showed highly individualized behavioral patterns. They reacted to their environment differently. In the course of the three-month experiment these differences increased in size.

"Though the animals shared the same life space, they increasingly differed in their activity levels. These differences were associated with differences in the generation of new neurons in the hippocampus, a region of the brain that supports learning and memory," says Kempermann. "Animals that explored the environment to a greater degree also grew more new neurons than animals that were more passive."

Adult neurogenesis, that is, the generation of new neurons in the hippocampus, allows the brain to react to new information flexibly. With this study, the authors show for the first time that personal experiences and ensuing behavior contribute to the ?individualization of the brain." The individualization they observed cannot be reduced to differences in environment or genetic makeup.

?Adult neurogenesis also occurs in the hippocampus of humans," says Kempermann. "Hence we assume that we have tracked down a neurobiological foundation for individuality that also applies to humans."

Impulses for discussion across disciplines

?The finding that behavior and experience contribute to differences between individuals has implications for debates in psychology, education science, biology, and medicine," states Prof. Ulman Lindenberger, Director of the Center for Lifespan Psychology at the Max Planck Institute for Human Development (MPIB) in Berlin. "Our findings show that development itself contributes to differences in adult behavior. This is what many have assumed, but now there is direct neurobiological evidence in support of this claim. Our results suggest that experience influences the aging of the human mind."

In the study, a control group of animals housed in a relatively unattractive enclosure was also examined; on average, neurogenesis in these animals was lower than in the experimental mice. ?When viewed from educational and psychological perspectives, the results of our experiment suggest that an enriched environment fosters the development of individuality," comments Lindenberger.

Interdisciplinary teamwork

The study is also an example of multidisciplinary cooperation -- it was made possible because neuroscientists, ethologists, computer scientists, and developmental psychologists collaborated closely in designing the experimental set-up and applying new data analysis methods. Biologist Julia Freund from the CRTD Dresden and computer scientist Dr. Andreas Brandmaier from the MPIB in Berlin share first authorship on the article. In addition to the DZNE, CRTD, and the MPIB, the German Research Center for Artificial Intelligence in Saarbr?cken and the Institute for Geoinformatics and the Department of Behavioural Biology at the University of M?nster were also involved in this project.

Source: http://feeds.sciencedaily.com/~r/sciencedaily/~3/1qlU0Ar5Pr8/130509142050.htm

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