This compelling, eco-themed documentary will be of vital interest to anyone who loves acoustic guitars.
Opens
Nov. 1
Director
Maxine Trump
The Taylor, Martin and Gibson guitar companies may be longtime competitors, but they have one goal in common: to guarantee the continued supply of the high-quality wood essential to their product. MaxineTrump’s documentary Musicwood vividly illustrates the scope of the problem in its depiction of the battle to preserve the rapidly diminishing forests essential to supplying the next Bob Dylan with a high-quality acoustic guitar to strum.
The film’s central conflict is a complicated one, insofar as it involves Native American loggers, not a group that would normally be thought of as being harmful to the environment. But their stewardship of Alaska’s Tongass National Forest, a rainforest whose Sitka Spruce tree is ideal for the building of the soundboards of acoustic guitars, has created problems. The supply is quickly being extinguished as the forests have fallen victim to their practice of clear-cutting, which destroys wide swaths in one fell swoop. Much of the wood goes not to the guitar manufacturers, but rather to Asian-based companies who need it to fuel that region’s ever growing construction industry.
Documenting the quest of the company’s CEOs to battle the foresting practices with the help of the environmental group Greenpeace, the film delivers a compelling portrait of the complicated issues involved. The filmmaker’s sympathies are made evident by the presence of numerous prominent musicians -- Steve Earle, Kaki King, members of such groups as Lambchop and Yo La Tengo, among others -- who movingly testify to the glories of the acoustic guitar as well as providing music for the soundtrack.
The heroes and villains of the story are not always clear -- Gibson, for instance, runs afoul of the U.S. government after it begins importing rosewood, another vital ingredient, from Madagascar. At times the film borders on being overly sentimental, such as an interview with one veteran guitar-maker who says, “It’s all I’ve ever done…I’m unemployable.” But anyone who’s ever lovingly handled a beautifully made guitar will be made uneasy by this account of the embattled industry’s struggles.
Halloween candy is offered for sale at a Walgreens store on September 19, 2013 in Wheeling, Illinois.
Scott Olson/Getty Images
Halloween candy is offered for sale at a Walgreens store on September 19, 2013 in Wheeling, Illinois.
Scott Olson/Getty Images
Halloween candy sales have been flat over the last few years. And candy makers point to several reasons, including one I hadn't thought of: bad weather.
"The past two years have been plagued with major weather disruptions in key celebration regions," Jenn Ellek of the National Confectioners Association tells us in an email.
In 2011, there was unexpected snowfall in the Northwest, which kept candy sales at $2.36 billion for the Halloween season. Sales remained basically flat in 2012, when Hurricane Sandy coincided with the holiday, she says.
So, why is the trade industry forecasting a very conservative growth of 1 percent in candy sales this year? This time, they say it's the day of the week.
According to the NCA, fewer people throw parties and there's less time for holiday preparations when Halloween falls on a weekday compared to when it falls during the weekend.
If this reasoning holds up, the industry could be looking at two good years in the near future, with Halloween falling on a Friday in 2014 and a Saturday in 2015.
But how about all those messages we hear to cut back on sugar and empty calories? Will this end up eating away at confectioners' future growth?
It's not clear, but with all the chatter about tackling obesity, the candy industry has joined the message of moderation.
The portion sizes they recommend are a lot smaller than you might think. If you limit calories from candy to 50 to 100 calories per day, that equates just 15 to 25 small jelly beans.
Or, if you're craving chocolate, make it one fun-sized candy bar (that's the small one).
Perhaps to keep sales up, candy-makers will have to sell more packages — with less in them. As we've reported, the move to downsize candy bars is well underway.
This image provided by Google shows its new Nexus 5 phone, which was unveiled Thursday, Oct. 31, 2013. The Nexus 5 phone is the first device to run on the latest version of Google's Android operating system, nicknamed after the Kit Kat candy bar. The phone and software are designed to learn and anticipate a person’s interest and needs. (AP Photo/Google)
This image provided by Google shows its new Nexus 5 phone, which was unveiled Thursday, Oct. 31, 2013. The Nexus 5 phone is the first device to run on the latest version of Google's Android operating system, nicknamed after the Kit Kat candy bar. The phone and software are designed to learn and anticipate a person’s interest and needs. (AP Photo/Google)
This image provided by Google shows its new Nexus 5 phone, which was unveiled Thursday, Oct. 31, 2013. The Nexus 5 phone is the first device to run on the latest version of Google's Android operating system, nicknamed after the Kit Kat candy bar. The phone and software are designed to learn and anticipate a person’s interest and needs. (AP Photo/Google)
SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — Google is selling a new Android smartphone that it hopes will become more like a clairvoyant friend than a piece of hardware.
The Nexus 5 phone unveiled Thursday is the first device to run on Kit Kat, the latest version of Google's Android operating system.
As with previous Nexus phones, the latest will be sold only at full retail price, without subsidies that come with two-year contract agreements. It goes on sale Thursday in Google's online Play store starting at $349, undercutting many rival phones at contract-free prices. The phone will work on most U.S. wireless networks, but not Verizon's. A Nexus 5 model also is available for European markets.
The Nexus 5 and Kit Kat software underscore Google's ambition to ingrain its search engine and virtual assistant, Google Now, even deeper into people's lives. In the process, Google Inc. hopes to gather more insights that will enable it to sell more advertising, which generates most of its revenue.
It'll be easier for Google to learn about a person's habits and needs so it can display helpful information, such as an online post from a favorite blog or a suggestion to use Fandango's movie-ticketing service when standing in a long line at a movie theater.
When visiting a tourist attraction such as Yellowstone National Park, Google Now might automatically show information about geysers from the Web.
"We want to get to the point where you glance at your phone and it always delights you with what you need," said Sundar Pichai, a Google executive who oversees Android.
The new phone's $349 price threatens to lure more cost-conscious consumers away from Apple Inc.'s iPhone, which retails for $649 for the 5S and $549 for the 5C when sold without a traditional two-year service agreement.
In an unusual twist for a software upgrade, Google built Kit Kat so it would work on cheaper smartphones equipped with less computing memory than top-of-the-line devices.
The move reflects the Mountain View, Calif., company's desire to broaden use of the most recent version of Android. More than 1 billion Android devices have been activated, but a significant number are still using a 3-year-old flavor known as Gingerbread. That version remains popular because it works on those cheaper phones.
The mishmash of Android systems has made it tougher on app developers, who haven't been able to fully embrace the new features in previous upgrades without risking older phones not being to run their software. By contrast, Apple makes its iOS upgrades free all at once to several recent models. With Kit Kat, Google has a chance to bring older and cheaper phones up to date.
Google plans to make Kit Kat available for other devices within the next few weeks, but it will be up to individual manufacturers and their wireless carrier partners to decide if and when they will make the update available.
With the release of Kit Kat, Google also has improved its voice recognition technology so it can engage in more meaningful dialogue with users.
Kit Kat also showcases a new feature in Google's search technology to fuse results from the Web and applications installed on a phone. For instance, a request for a certain restaurant will show information drawn both from the Web and the app for the reservation service OpenTable Inc. Initially, only OpenTable and nine other mobile app makers have enabled this, but more are coming. This feature will also show up on other devices, including the iPhone, but for now it works best on the Nexus 5.
The new phone features a screen that measures nearly 5 inches diagonally — about an inch longer than the iPhone — and weighs about 4.6 ounces. That's about the same as the cheaper iPhone 5C, but more than the iPhone 5S's 4 ounces.
The Nexus 5 also includes a feature, called the "dialer," that will display phone numbers pulled directly from the Web instead of just a person's contact list.
Direct link established between stimulus-response learning and substance abuse
PUBLIC RELEASE DATE:
31-Oct-2013
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Contact: Marie france Coutu marie-france.coutu@douglas.mcgill.ca 514-835-3236 Douglas Mental Health University Institute
Findings from Douglas Institute neuroscientist
Vronique Bohbot, PhD, neuroscientist at the Douglas Mental Health University Institute, found that the region of the brain involved in stimulus-response learning is directly linked to the consumption of alcohol, tobacco and drugs. More specifically, she discovered that people who resorted to stimulus-response learning smoked more, had double the consumption of alcohol and were more likely to use cannabis. Her findings have been published in the most recent issue of Hippocampus.
We rely on one of two strategies to navigate through our surroundings. One is called the spatial strategy, where we use visual cues and landmarks to develop cognitive maps that enable us to know where we are and how to get where we want to go. This process occurs in the hippocampus. The other is the stimulus-response strategy, which is a kind of auto-pilot: after travelling along the same route on a regular basis, we end up taking it out of habit. This process occurs in the striatum.
People who resort to stimulus-response learning have a more developed striatum and would consume more alcohol, tobacco or drugs. Factors such as routine, stress and reward-seeking behaviour also contribute to stimulating the striatum, at the expense of the hippocampus. "The literature indicates that children engage in stimulus-response strategies from a very young age," Vronique Bohbot explains. "Reward-seeking behavior in childhood, especially for immediate rewards like candy or playing action video games, stimulates the striatum and encourages stimulus-response strategies during navigation. This would predispose the child to drug seeking behaviour."
Previous studies have shown that an atrophied hippocampus increases the risk of developing a mental illness such as schizophrenia, depression, post-traumatic stress disorder or Alzheimer's disease.
Vronique Bohbot will present her research results on November 13 at the annual meeting of the Society for Neuroscience in San Diego, where she will talk about the importance of improving spatial navigation skills to maintain a balance and increase chances of a healthy cognition.
###
Link to Dr. Bohbot's published study: http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/hipo.22187/abstract
Vido: http://www.douglas.qc.ca/videos/243
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Direct link established between stimulus-response learning and substance abuse
PUBLIC RELEASE DATE:
31-Oct-2013
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Contact: Marie france Coutu marie-france.coutu@douglas.mcgill.ca 514-835-3236 Douglas Mental Health University Institute
Findings from Douglas Institute neuroscientist
Vronique Bohbot, PhD, neuroscientist at the Douglas Mental Health University Institute, found that the region of the brain involved in stimulus-response learning is directly linked to the consumption of alcohol, tobacco and drugs. More specifically, she discovered that people who resorted to stimulus-response learning smoked more, had double the consumption of alcohol and were more likely to use cannabis. Her findings have been published in the most recent issue of Hippocampus.
We rely on one of two strategies to navigate through our surroundings. One is called the spatial strategy, where we use visual cues and landmarks to develop cognitive maps that enable us to know where we are and how to get where we want to go. This process occurs in the hippocampus. The other is the stimulus-response strategy, which is a kind of auto-pilot: after travelling along the same route on a regular basis, we end up taking it out of habit. This process occurs in the striatum.
People who resort to stimulus-response learning have a more developed striatum and would consume more alcohol, tobacco or drugs. Factors such as routine, stress and reward-seeking behaviour also contribute to stimulating the striatum, at the expense of the hippocampus. "The literature indicates that children engage in stimulus-response strategies from a very young age," Vronique Bohbot explains. "Reward-seeking behavior in childhood, especially for immediate rewards like candy or playing action video games, stimulates the striatum and encourages stimulus-response strategies during navigation. This would predispose the child to drug seeking behaviour."
Previous studies have shown that an atrophied hippocampus increases the risk of developing a mental illness such as schizophrenia, depression, post-traumatic stress disorder or Alzheimer's disease.
Vronique Bohbot will present her research results on November 13 at the annual meeting of the Society for Neuroscience in San Diego, where she will talk about the importance of improving spatial navigation skills to maintain a balance and increase chances of a healthy cognition.
###
Link to Dr. Bohbot's published study: http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/hipo.22187/abstract
Vido: http://www.douglas.qc.ca/videos/243
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AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.
NEW YORK (AP) — October, with its history of big crashes on Wall Street, didn't scare off investors this time. To the contrary, the stock market seemed unstoppable.
The Standard & Poor's 500 index closed at a record high seven times and ended the month up 4.5 percent. The market climbed even after October began with the 16-day government shutdown and the threat of a potentially calamitous U.S. default.
"The market didn't waver in the face of the shutdown," said Anton Bayer, CEO of Up Capital Management, an investment adviser. "That was huge."
After being rattled by a series of down-to-the-wire budget battles in recent years, investors have become inured to the ways of Washington lawmakers. Instead of selling stocks, they kept their focus on what they say really matters: the Federal Reserve.
The central bank is buying $85 billion of bonds every month and keeping its benchmark short-term interest rate near zero to promote economic growth. The Fed stimulus has helped generate a stock market rally that has been going on since March 2009.
With October's gains, the S&P 500 is now up 23.2 percent for the year and is on track for its best year since 2009. The Dow Jones industrial average is 18.6 percent higher, and the Nasdaq composite index is up 29.8 percent.
The S&P 500 has climbed 160 percent since bottoming out at 676.53 in March 2009 during the Great Recession.
Some analysts say the precipitous rise in stocks may now make the market vulnerable to a drop.
"Because stocks have gone up so much, people will get nervous about another big sell-off at some stage," said David Kelly, chief global strategist at JPMorgan funds.
Some investors will be relieved to see October behind them. The Stock Trader's Almanac refers to October as "the jinx month" because of its fraught history.
The Dow lost 40 points on Oct. 28, 1929, a day that became known as Black Monday and heralded the start of the Depression. Almost 60 years later, on Oct. 19, 1987, the Dow suffered its biggest percentage loss, plunging nearly 23 percent in the second Black Monday. The index also plummeted 13 percent on Oct. 27, 1997.
There was no such drama on Wall Street on Thursday. Stocks were mostly flat as investors took in disappointing corporate earnings.
The S&P 500 slipped 6.77 points, or 0.4 percent, to 1,756.54. The Dow dropped 73.01 points, or 0.5 percent, to 15,545. The Nasdaq composite fell 10.91 points, or 0.3 percent, to 3,919.71.
Avon slumped $4.90, or 21.9 percent, to $17.50 after the beauty products company reported a third-quarter loss, reflecting lower sales and China-related charges. The company also said the Securities and Exchange Commission is proposing a much larger penalty than it expected to settle bribery allegations.
Visa fell $7.15, or 3.5 percent, to $196.67. Its quarterly profits fell 28 percent as it set aside money for taxes. Visa also expects a slow recovery for the economy.
Overall, company earnings are beating the expectations of Wall Street analysts and lifting stock prices. Companies are benefiting from low borrowing costs and stable labor expenses, which are enabling them to boost earnings even as sales remain slack.
Earnings for companies in the S&P 500 are expected to grow 5.3 percent in the third quarter, according to data from S&P Capital IQ. That compares with 4.9 percent in the second quarter, and 2.4 percent in the same period a year ago.
The stock market is likely to keep climbing as long as the central bank keeps up its stimulus, said Up Capital's Bayer. But stocks could fall as much as 20 percent when the Fed starts to cut back on its bond-buying program, he said.
Colorado Avalanche goalie Semyon Varlamov appears in this booking photo released by the Denver Police Department. Varlamov surrendered to Denver police on an arrest warrant on charges of kidnapping and third-degree assault in what authorities are calling a domestic violence incident. Police released few details about the case Wednesday, Oct. 30, 2013, during a brief news conference. (AP Photo/Denver Police Department)
Colorado Avalanche goalie Semyon Varlamov appears in this booking photo released by the Denver Police Department. Varlamov surrendered to Denver police on an arrest warrant on charges of kidnapping and third-degree assault in what authorities are calling a domestic violence incident. Police released few details about the case Wednesday, Oct. 30, 2013, during a brief news conference. (AP Photo/Denver Police Department)
DENVER (AP) — Colorado Avalanche goalie Semyon Varlamov will be allowed out of jail and be able to travel with the team while prosecutors consider charging him in a domestic violence case.
Varlamov is accused of assaulting his girlfriend, kicking her in the chest and dragging her by the hair.
He appeared in court Thursday dressed in a yellow jail jumpsuit. A judge set his bond at $5,000, and his attorney said he would be able to post that immediately.
Denver County Judge Claudia Jordan ordered Varlamov to stay away from his girlfriend and not contact her.
Varlamov also was ordered to relinquish any firearms in his possession. He said through his lawyer he didn't have any guns.
The 25-year-old turned himself in to police Wednesday evening, after practicing with the team that day. He was arrested on suspicion of second-degree kidnapping and third-degree assault.
His arrest warrant details the alleged assault, which took place Monday. In addition to kicking the woman, police say Varlamov told her in Russian that if this were Russia, he would have beat her more.
Varlamov's attorney, Jack Rotole, declined to comment on the case going into Varlamov's court appearance.
Varlamov's agent, Paul Theofanous, said Varlamov "is completely innocent of all of these charges."
The Avalanche said in a statement they were aware of the allegations but wouldn't comment further until the conclusion of the investigation.
Acquired from Washington in a 2011 trade, Varlamov is 7-1 this season with a 1.76 goals-against average. On Sunday night, he made 24 saves in a 3-2 home victory over Winnipeg.
The Avalanche play at Dallas on Friday night and Varlamov was scheduled to start. His backup, Jean-Sebastien Giguere, has been just as good in net, recording two shutouts.
___
Associated Press writer Colleen Slevin contributed to this report.
Every day is like Halloween for Lady Gaga, and this morning (October 31) she presented yet another extravagant getup in London, England.
The “Bad Romance” hitmaker wore a custom-made dress and carried a shell umbrella as she stepped out of her hotel and greeted her fans.
Coming up next month, Gaga will be featured on a 90-minute Thanksgiving special with the Muppets on the ABC Network.
Of the “Lady Gaga and the Muppets’ Holiday Spectacular” she told press, "I was so excited when ABC called me about doing a holiday special this year. I knew it just wouldn't be a complete night of laughter and memories without the Muppets! Can't wait to see the gang again and I hope Miss Piggy's still not mad about Kermit. We're just friends!"
Audio for this story from Tell Me More will be available at approximately 3:00 p.m. ET.
Members of the Oneida Nation met with representatives from the NFL on Wednesday to discuss the growing call to change the Washington Redskins name. Host Michel Martin finds out how the meeting went from the Nation's representative, Ray Halbritter.
Google's stable Chrome release already has a reset tool in case malware hijacks the browser, but we're sure many would rather avoid that rogue code in the first place. Thankfully, a new build of Chrome Canary automatically blocks hostile apps. Try to download malware that Google recognizes and you'll get a polite warning instead of a rude surprise. The safeguard isn't likely to reach more reliable versions of Chrome for some time, but those willing to experiment in the name of security can grab the Canary browser at the source link.
When Owen Wilson was in his 20s and in Los Angeles to film scenes for his breakout 1996 movie Bottle Rocket, he went to The Ivy at the Shore and saw a painting by Ed Ruscha, famed for his landscape and text-based works that cast a deadpan eye on Southern California's man-made environment.
"Me and my brothers and Wes [Anderson] would go to The Ivy at the Shore when my parents came to visit," recalls Wilson, "and they had a great big painting that said, 'Brave Men Run in My Family.' We all loved that, my dad in particular. That always stuck in my mind."
Within a few years, the actor, who next appears in Anderson's The Grand Budapest Hotel, fell into the art world's gravitational pull, becoming friends with New York gallerist and artist Tony Shafrazi, hitting the Art Basel Miami Beach art fair regularly and collecting works by Cady Noland, Donald Judd and Andy Warhol. Wilson met Ruscha through Shafrazi, and the actor not only has acquired three of his works, but the two have become friends. (Ruscha and his wife, Danna, got Wilson into Breaking Bad.)
One of his Ruscha pieces, a painting of a mountain, is called The Celluloid Light Projection, a Ruscha-ism for a movie. Once, says Wilson, "Ed knew I was going off to make a movie and he said, 'Good luck on your celluloid light projection.' I always thought that was a funny thing to call a movie."
Music video powerhouse VEVO is launching a major redesign this week, after rebuilding its back end from the ground up. The online music video site has undergone a complete overhaul, which you can see here, designed to make it easier for users to browse and discover new content, while also streamlining the ability to search for the videos that they want to watch.
The new VEVO, which goes live Friday, is an extension of the company’s continued iteration on its web, mobile, and connected TV platforms. With this launch, the VEVO team has done a lot of work to actually simplify the user interface and strip out some of the clutter that had been in previous versions. At the same time, it’s setting the stage for VEVO to do some more interesting things around content discovery and personalization.
The new website is designed to be cleaner, faster, and dynamic, so viewers can tune in via desktop, smartphone, or tablet, and it automatically fits the screen. Now viewers who go to VEVO TV will have a simplified nav bar with just a few options: VEVO TV, Search, and Browse.
On the homepage, in addition to the carousel of videos, there’s also now a feed of regularly updated content that goes beyond its usual daily feed. By featuring new videos regularly, the hope is to draw the user in and get viewers watching videos more quickly.
“We wanted to simplify things to get people watching videos right away. As we started thinking about engagement, there’s now a sense of urgency… There’s always something new coming up,” SVP of Product & Technology Michael Cerda told me.
In addition to updating the homepage, VEVO has also expanded its VEVO TV live music feed. Launched in May, VEVO TV is designed to evoke the same feeling of that old “music television” — you know, from back when it actually played music. But it’s mean to be streamed rather than just delivered via cable.
Now instead of a single VEVO TV channel, VEVO will have three channels of videos. VEVO’s “Pop” channel will take over as the main feed, providing a live broadcast of all the most popular music videos today. It’s also introducing two new channels — Country and R&B/Rap — to provide viewers with access to continuous, linear programming of music from both of those genres.
While the most obvious changes might be on the VEVO homepage, the more important work went on under the hood. When it first launched, VEVO had been built on a Microsoft .NET stack. But according to Cerda, the team has quietly moved its backend to a Node.js framework.
It’s also refined and rebuilt its API, which will help VEVO extend its content to new partners, and also make it easier for the company to build experiences for new platforms.
Given all the changes behind the scenes, Cerda called it the most significant update that the company has ever done. The company started building the new experience in the late winter, rebuilding the backend from the ground up. The first step was building the web and mobile web sites, but the new backend will speed up its ability to reach new devices and update apps on existing platforms.
For instance, the company just rolled out a new experience on Samsung Smart TVs and is currently working on apps that work with Google’s $35 Chromecast streaming dongle. Once that’s done, viewers will have the AirPlay-like ability to send videos from its mobile apps for iOS and Android straight to their TV.
Her husband Carey Hart took their daughter Willow for a little motorbike ride over the weekend, and Pink found herself on the receiving end of some nasty tweets as a result.
After her followers began questioning her parenting skills for allowing the 2-year-old to ride with her dad, the “So What” songstress decided to fire back with a series of her own comments.
Pink wrote, "If any of u have more experience on a bike than my husband, then I will listen to your opinions on how he should take my daughter for a ride. I can't promise I will care, but I will listen none the less."
A fan named Ashley Sweeney tweeted, "@Pink wait until she's 16 and let her decide for herself. Bikes are no joke!” to which Pink replied, “Yeah ok. I've never met you but that's great."
Prior to the firestorm, Carey posted, "Been waiting for this day for a very long time. Willz went for her 1st ride on my motorcycle around the pits today. She was pumped the whole time. When we stopped, she gave me a big hug and said it was fun, thank you Papa. That's my girl.”
The secret math of plants: UCLA biologists uncover rules that govern leaf design
PUBLIC RELEASE DATE:
30-Oct-2013
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Contact: Stuart Wolpert swolpert@support.ucla.edu 310-206-0511 University of California - Los Angeles
Life scientists from UCLA's College of Letters and Science have discovered fundamental rules of leaf design that underlie plants' ability to produce leaves that vary enormously in size. In their mathematical design, leaves are the "perfect machines," said Lawren Sack, a professor of ecology and evolutionary biology and senior author of the research.
The UCLA team discovered the mathematical relationships using "allometric analysis," which looks at how the proportions of parts of an organism change with differences in total size. This approach has been used by scientists since Galileo but had never before been applied to the interior of leaves.
Reporting in the October issue of the American Journal of Botany, the biologists focused on how leaf anatomy varies across leaves of different sizes. They examined plant species from around the world, all grown on the UCLA campus.
While it is easy to observe major differences in leaf surface area among species, they said, differences in leaf thickness are less obvious but equally important.
"Once you start rubbing leaves between your fingers, you can feel that some leaves are floppy and thin, while others are rigid and thick," said Grace John, a UCLA doctoral student in ecology and evolutionary biology and lead author of the research. "We started with the simplest questions but ones that had never been answered clearly such as whether leaves that are thicker or larger in area are constructed of different sizes or types of cells."
The researchers embedded pieces of leaf in plastic and cut cross-sections thinner than a single cell to observe each leaf's microscopic layout. This allowed them to test the underlying relationship between cell and tissue dimensions and leaf size across species.
Leaves are made up of three basic tissues, each containing cells with particular functions: the outer layer, or epidermis; the mesophyll, which contains cells that conduct photosynthesis; and the vascular tissue, whose cells are involved in water and sugar transport. The team found that the thicker the leaf, the larger the size of the cells in all of its tissues except in the vascular tissue.
These relationships also applied to the components of the individual cells. Plant cells, unlike animal cells, are surrounded by carbohydrate-based cell walls, and the scientists discovered that the larger cells of thicker leaves are surrounded by thicker cell walls, in a strict proportionality.
The team was surprised by the "extraordinary" strength of the relationships linking cell size, cell-wall thickness and leaf thickness across diverse and distantly related plant species. These relationships can be described by new, simple mathematical equations, effectively allowing scientists to predict the dimension of cells and cell walls based on the thickness of a leaf. In most cases, the relationships the team found were what is known as "isometric."
"This means that if a leaf has a larger cell in one tissue, it has a larger cell in another tissue, in direct proportion, as if you blew up the leaf and all its cells using Photoshop," said Christine Scoffoni, a doctoral student at UCLA and member of the research team.
By contrast, a leaf's area is unrelated to the sizes of the cells inside. This allows plants to produce leaves with a huge range of surface areas without the need for larger cells, which would be inefficient in function, the researchers said.
The team hypothesized that these strong mathematical relationships arise from leaf development the process by which leaves form on the branch, growing from a few cells that divide into many, with cells then expanding until the leaf is fully mature. Because light can penetrate only so many layers of cells, leaves cannot vary much in the number of cells arranged vertically. The expansion of individual cells and their cell walls occurs simultaneously and is reflected in the thickness of the whole leaf. On the other hand, the number of cells arranged horizontally in the leaf continues to increase as leaves expand, regardless of the size of the individual cells.
The new ability to predict the internal anatomy of leaves from their thickness can give clues to the function of the leaf, because leaf thickness affects both the overall photosynthetic rate and the lifespan, said Sack.
"A minor difference in thickness tells us more about the layout inside the leaf than a much more dramatic difference in leaf area," John said.
The design of the leaf provides insights into how larger structures can be constructed without losing function or stability.
"Fundamental discoveries like these highlight the elegant solutions evolved by natural systems," Sack said. "Plant anatomy often has been perceived as boring. Quantitative discoveries like these prove how exciting this science can be. We need to start re-establishing skill sets in this type of fundamental science to extract practical lessons from the mysteries of nature.
"There are so many properties of leaves we cannot yet imitate synthetically," he added. "Leaves are providing us with the blueprints for bigger, better things. We just have to look close enough to read them."
The new allometric equations are an important step toward understanding the design of leaves on a cellular basis, John said. And because leaves are so diverse, she said, there is much to learn. In future research, the group will study species that are very closely related in an effort to uncover any evolutionary relationships between leaf design and function.
"What makes the cross-sections especially exciting is the huge variation from one species to the next," John said. "Some have relatively enormous cells in certain tissues, and cell shapes vary from cylindrical to star-shaped. Each species is beautiful in its distinctiveness. All of this variation needs decoding."
###
The research was federally funded by the National Science Foundation.
UCLA is California's largest university, with an enrollment of more than 40,000 undergraduate and graduate students. The UCLA College of Letters and Science and the university's 11 professional schools feature renowned faculty and offer 337 degree programs and majors. UCLA is a national and international leader in the breadth and quality of its academic, research, health care, cultural, continuing education and athletic programs. Seven alumni and six faculty have been awarded the Nobel Prize.
For more news, visit the UCLA Newsroom and follow us on Twitter.
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The secret math of plants: UCLA biologists uncover rules that govern leaf design
PUBLIC RELEASE DATE:
30-Oct-2013
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Contact: Stuart Wolpert swolpert@support.ucla.edu 310-206-0511 University of California - Los Angeles
Life scientists from UCLA's College of Letters and Science have discovered fundamental rules of leaf design that underlie plants' ability to produce leaves that vary enormously in size. In their mathematical design, leaves are the "perfect machines," said Lawren Sack, a professor of ecology and evolutionary biology and senior author of the research.
The UCLA team discovered the mathematical relationships using "allometric analysis," which looks at how the proportions of parts of an organism change with differences in total size. This approach has been used by scientists since Galileo but had never before been applied to the interior of leaves.
Reporting in the October issue of the American Journal of Botany, the biologists focused on how leaf anatomy varies across leaves of different sizes. They examined plant species from around the world, all grown on the UCLA campus.
While it is easy to observe major differences in leaf surface area among species, they said, differences in leaf thickness are less obvious but equally important.
"Once you start rubbing leaves between your fingers, you can feel that some leaves are floppy and thin, while others are rigid and thick," said Grace John, a UCLA doctoral student in ecology and evolutionary biology and lead author of the research. "We started with the simplest questions but ones that had never been answered clearly such as whether leaves that are thicker or larger in area are constructed of different sizes or types of cells."
The researchers embedded pieces of leaf in plastic and cut cross-sections thinner than a single cell to observe each leaf's microscopic layout. This allowed them to test the underlying relationship between cell and tissue dimensions and leaf size across species.
Leaves are made up of three basic tissues, each containing cells with particular functions: the outer layer, or epidermis; the mesophyll, which contains cells that conduct photosynthesis; and the vascular tissue, whose cells are involved in water and sugar transport. The team found that the thicker the leaf, the larger the size of the cells in all of its tissues except in the vascular tissue.
These relationships also applied to the components of the individual cells. Plant cells, unlike animal cells, are surrounded by carbohydrate-based cell walls, and the scientists discovered that the larger cells of thicker leaves are surrounded by thicker cell walls, in a strict proportionality.
The team was surprised by the "extraordinary" strength of the relationships linking cell size, cell-wall thickness and leaf thickness across diverse and distantly related plant species. These relationships can be described by new, simple mathematical equations, effectively allowing scientists to predict the dimension of cells and cell walls based on the thickness of a leaf. In most cases, the relationships the team found were what is known as "isometric."
"This means that if a leaf has a larger cell in one tissue, it has a larger cell in another tissue, in direct proportion, as if you blew up the leaf and all its cells using Photoshop," said Christine Scoffoni, a doctoral student at UCLA and member of the research team.
By contrast, a leaf's area is unrelated to the sizes of the cells inside. This allows plants to produce leaves with a huge range of surface areas without the need for larger cells, which would be inefficient in function, the researchers said.
The team hypothesized that these strong mathematical relationships arise from leaf development the process by which leaves form on the branch, growing from a few cells that divide into many, with cells then expanding until the leaf is fully mature. Because light can penetrate only so many layers of cells, leaves cannot vary much in the number of cells arranged vertically. The expansion of individual cells and their cell walls occurs simultaneously and is reflected in the thickness of the whole leaf. On the other hand, the number of cells arranged horizontally in the leaf continues to increase as leaves expand, regardless of the size of the individual cells.
The new ability to predict the internal anatomy of leaves from their thickness can give clues to the function of the leaf, because leaf thickness affects both the overall photosynthetic rate and the lifespan, said Sack.
"A minor difference in thickness tells us more about the layout inside the leaf than a much more dramatic difference in leaf area," John said.
The design of the leaf provides insights into how larger structures can be constructed without losing function or stability.
"Fundamental discoveries like these highlight the elegant solutions evolved by natural systems," Sack said. "Plant anatomy often has been perceived as boring. Quantitative discoveries like these prove how exciting this science can be. We need to start re-establishing skill sets in this type of fundamental science to extract practical lessons from the mysteries of nature.
"There are so many properties of leaves we cannot yet imitate synthetically," he added. "Leaves are providing us with the blueprints for bigger, better things. We just have to look close enough to read them."
The new allometric equations are an important step toward understanding the design of leaves on a cellular basis, John said. And because leaves are so diverse, she said, there is much to learn. In future research, the group will study species that are very closely related in an effort to uncover any evolutionary relationships between leaf design and function.
"What makes the cross-sections especially exciting is the huge variation from one species to the next," John said. "Some have relatively enormous cells in certain tissues, and cell shapes vary from cylindrical to star-shaped. Each species is beautiful in its distinctiveness. All of this variation needs decoding."
###
The research was federally funded by the National Science Foundation.
UCLA is California's largest university, with an enrollment of more than 40,000 undergraduate and graduate students. The UCLA College of Letters and Science and the university's 11 professional schools feature renowned faculty and offer 337 degree programs and majors. UCLA is a national and international leader in the breadth and quality of its academic, research, health care, cultural, continuing education and athletic programs. Seven alumni and six faculty have been awarded the Nobel Prize.
For more news, visit the UCLA Newsroom and follow us on Twitter.
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PROVO, Utah (AP) — Another mistress of a former Utah doctor accused of killing his wife testified Wednesday that he had once described how he could induce a heart attack in someone that would appear natural.
Anna Walthall took the witness stand and said she began a six-month affair with defendant Martin MacNeill in 2005 when he was a consulting doctor at a laser hair removal clinic that she operated.
MacNeill described the heart attack method during "pillow talk," she said.
Walthall quoted MacNeill as saying, "'There's something you can give someone that's natural that's a heart attack that's not detectable after they have a heart attack.'"
No cause of death has been determined for Michele MacNeill.
Defense lawyers have argued that she had a heart attack and fell into a bathtub in April 2007 in the family home in Pleasant Grove, about 35 miles south of Salt Lake City.
Defense lawyers challenged Walthall by getting her to acknowledge she had been diagnosed with what was formerly called multiple personality disorder, but she insisted she was giving a true account of Martin MacNeill's statement.
Earlier in the day, two daughters of the MacNeills testified that their father had hired another mistress, Gypsy Willis, as a nanny soon after his wife died, but Willis did not cook or take care of the children and went to their father's bedroom at night.
Sabrina MacNeill, 19, testified that Willis didn't do anything a nanny would be expected to do.
"She made spaghetti once, and that was the only time she cooked," said Sabrina MacNeill. "She didn't do anything."
Another daughter, Alexis Somers, testified that Willis would come and go throughout the day, seemingly more focused on the doctor than the children.
Prosecutors say Martin MacNeill, 57, hounded his wife, Michele MacNeill, to get cosmetic surgery then knocked her out with painkillers and left her to die in a bathtub. His motive, they said, was to get rid of his wife so he could be with Willis.
Somers testified that her father bullied her mother to get the face-lift and insisted the plastic surgeon prescribe an unusual combination of painkillers and other drugs for her recovery.
Two days after the surgery, Somers said, she confronted her father after finding her mother knocked out by the powerful drugs.
Somers, also a doctor, recalled her father saying, "'I must have given her too much medicine.'"
Michele MacNeill had tried to delay the surgery until she could reduce her high blood pressure and weight and to wait until her daughter could help take care of her, Somers said.
Somers, who has adopted her mother's maiden name, described an argument between her parents about the timing of the surgery.
"He got angry at my mom and said, 'If you don't have the surgery now, you're not getting it,'" Somers testified.
The White House has issued a clarification. When the president said if you like your insurance plan you can keep it, what he meant was you can keep it if he likes it.
Hundreds of thousands of Americans who are getting policy cancellation notices this month can't be as surprised as they pretend to be. President Obama made it clear at his 2010 health care summit what he thought of their taste in insurance.
His alleged assault of a man in D.C. last week has already brought legal consequences, but now Chris Brown is taking responsibility for his own actions and has checked himself into rehab for his anger issues.
According to reports, the "Don't Judge Me" singer will stay in a Malibu rehab center for up to three months.
In addition to hurting himself and the alleged victim, two nightclubs will feel the pain as the 24-year-old hip-hop star will now be unable to perform hosting duties.
On Thursday night (October 31), Chris was scheduled to lead a party at the Conga Room in L.A. and on Friday would have teamed up with girlfriend Karrueche Tran at Haze nightclub in Las Vegas.
Anna Walthall, a former mistress of Martin MacNeill, testifies during his trial at the Fourth District Court in Provo Wednesday, Oct. 30, 2013. MacNeill is charged with murder for allegedly killing his wife Michele MacNeill in 2007. (AP Photo/Daily Herald, Mark Johnston, Pool)
Anna Walthall, a former mistress of Martin MacNeill, testifies during his trial at the Fourth District Court in Provo Wednesday, Oct. 30, 2013. MacNeill is charged with murder for allegedly killing his wife Michele MacNeill in 2007. (AP Photo/Daily Herald, Mark Johnston, Pool)
Alexis Somers testifies at the trial of her father Martin MacNeill at the Fourth District Court in Provo Wednesday, Oct. 30, 2013. Martin MacNeill is charged with murder for allegedly killing his wife Michele MacNeill in 2007. (AP Photo/Daily Herald, Mark Johnston, Pool)
Pleasant Grove physician Martin MacNeill, center, charged with murder for allegedly killing his wife, Michele MacNeill in 2007 so he could continue and extramarital affair, speaks with defense attorney's Susanne Gustin and Caleb Proulx in Judge Derek Pullan's 4th District Court in Provo on Friday, Oct. 25, 2013. (AP Photo/The Salt Lake Tribune, Francisco Kjolseth)
Chad Grunander, Utah County prosecutor, right, speaks to Sam Pead, fellow Utah County prosecutor, during the trial of Martin MacNeill at the Fourth District Court in Provo Wednesday, Oct. 30, 2013. MacNeill is charged with murder for allegedly killing his wife Michele MacNeill in 2007. (AP Photo/Daily Herald, Mark Johnston, Pool)
Alexis Somers wipes tears from her eyes while testifying at the trial of her father Martin MacNeill at the Fourth District Court in Provo Wednesday, Oct. 30, 2013. Martin MacNeill is charged with murder for allegedly killing his wife Michele MacNeill in 2007. (AP Photo/Daily Herald, Mark Johnston, Pool)
PROVO, Utah (AP) — Another mistress of a former Utah doctor accused of killing his wife testified Wednesday that he had once described how he could induce a heart attack in someone that would appear natural.
Anna Walthall took the witness stand and said she began a six-month affair with defendant Martin MacNeill in 2005 when he was a consulting doctor at a laser hair removal clinic that she operated.
MacNeill described the heart attack method during "pillow talk," she said.
Walthall quoted MacNeill as saying, "'There's something you can give someone that's natural that's a heart attack that's not detectable after they have a heart attack.'"
No cause of death has been determined for Michele MacNeill.
Defense lawyers have argued that she had a heart attack and fell into a bathtub in April 2007 in the family home in Pleasant Grove, about 35 miles south of Salt Lake City.
Defense lawyers challenged Walthall by getting her to acknowledge she had been diagnosed with what was formerly called multiple personality disorder, but she insisted she was giving a true account of Martin MacNeill's statement.
Earlier in the day, two daughters of the MacNeills testified that their father had hired another mistress, Gypsy Willis, as a nanny soon after his wife died, but Willis did not cook or take care of the children and went to their father's bedroom at night.
Sabrina MacNeill, 19, testified that Willis didn't do anything a nanny would be expected to do.
"She made spaghetti once, and that was the only time she cooked," said Sabrina MacNeill. "She didn't do anything."
Another daughter, Alexis Somers, testified that Willis would come and go throughout the day, seemingly more focused on the doctor than the children.
Prosecutors say Martin MacNeill, 57, hounded his wife, Michele MacNeill, to get cosmetic surgery then knocked her out with painkillers and left her to die in a bathtub. His motive, they said, was to get rid of his wife so he could be with Willis.
Somers testified that her father bullied her mother to get the face-lift and insisted the plastic surgeon prescribe an unusual combination of painkillers and other drugs for her recovery.
Two days after the surgery, Somers said, she confronted her father after finding her mother knocked out by the powerful drugs.
Somers, also a doctor, recalled her father saying, "'I must have given her too much medicine.'"
Michele MacNeill had tried to delay the surgery until she could reduce her high blood pressure and weight and to wait until her daughter could help take care of her, Somers said.
Somers, who has adopted her mother's maiden name, described an argument between her parents about the timing of the surgery.
"He got angry at my mom and said, 'If you don't have the surgery now, you're not getting it,'" Somers testified.
Public insurance fills the health coverage gap, new UCLA analysis shows
PUBLIC RELEASE DATE:
30-Oct-2013
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Contact: Gwen Driscoll gdriscoll@ucla.edu 310-794-0930 University of California - Los Angeles
In the years leading up to implementation of the Affordable Care Act, the percentage of Californians who received their health insurance through public programs continued to rise, likely in direct response to the loss of job-based coverage in the state, according to a new analysis by the UCLA Center for Health Policy Research.
The data for the analysis, collected in 2012 by the California Health Interview Survey, represents the most recent comprehensive statewide source of information on health insurance trends. The fact sheet was funded by The California Endowment and The California Wellness Foundation.
According to the analysis, the percentage of non-elderly state residents receiving health insurance through an employer dipped just below 50 percent in 2011 and remained there in 2012 a 6 percentage-point decrease since 2001.
Public programs, such as Medi-Cal and Healthy Families, insured nearly 20 percent of Californians in 2012, a 3 percentage-point increase since 2009 and a 5 percentage-point increase since 2001.
"In effect, public programs have stepped in as employers have stepped out," said Shana Alex Lavarreda, the center's director of health insurance studies and the lead author on the fact sheet. "The data refutes any lingering arguments that employer-based insurance is the solution to our health care coverage crisis."
Jobs that are returning to the state after the Great Recession seem to lack affordable health insurance benefits, depriving workers of a major source of coverage. From 2009 to 2012, the proportion of Californians with employment-based insurance dropped from 52.1 percent to 49.5 percent. With the recent economic recovery, unemployment rates in California have declined, from 20 percent in 2009 to 9.8 percent in 2012. Still, the rate of job-based health insurance has remained below 50 percent of the non-elderly population rather than exhibiting a similar recovery.
"The steady decline in employer-based health coverage affirms the need for Obamacare," said Dr. Robert K. Ross, president and CEO of The California Endowment. "For the first time in history, health coverage is within the reach of many more Californians who aren't covered by job-based health insurance."
"These data make it clear that many Californian families are still struggling financially and will need to access low- or no-cost health coverage," said Colburn S. Wilbur, interim president and CEO of The California Wellness Foundation. "The state's Covered California online marketplace makes it easy to apply for coverage whether through a public plan like Medi-Cal or one of the private insurance programs offered."
###
Read the fact sheet: "Before Health Reform Expansion, Public Programs Already Covered One in Five Nonelderly Californians in 2012."
The California Endowment, a private, statewide health foundation, was established in 1996 to expand access to affordable, quality health care for underserved individuals and communities and to promote fundamental improvements in the health status of all Californians.
The California Wellness Foundation's mission is to improve the health of the people of California by making grants for health promotion, wellness education and disease prevention.
The California Health Interview Survey (CHIS) is the nation's largest state health survey and one of the largest health surveys in the United States.
The UCLA Center for Health Policy Research is one of the nation's leading health policy research centers and the premier source of health-related information on Californians.
For more news, visit the UCLA Newsroom and follow us on Twitter.
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AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.
Public insurance fills the health coverage gap, new UCLA analysis shows
PUBLIC RELEASE DATE:
30-Oct-2013
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]
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Contact: Gwen Driscoll gdriscoll@ucla.edu 310-794-0930 University of California - Los Angeles
In the years leading up to implementation of the Affordable Care Act, the percentage of Californians who received their health insurance through public programs continued to rise, likely in direct response to the loss of job-based coverage in the state, according to a new analysis by the UCLA Center for Health Policy Research.
The data for the analysis, collected in 2012 by the California Health Interview Survey, represents the most recent comprehensive statewide source of information on health insurance trends. The fact sheet was funded by The California Endowment and The California Wellness Foundation.
According to the analysis, the percentage of non-elderly state residents receiving health insurance through an employer dipped just below 50 percent in 2011 and remained there in 2012 a 6 percentage-point decrease since 2001.
Public programs, such as Medi-Cal and Healthy Families, insured nearly 20 percent of Californians in 2012, a 3 percentage-point increase since 2009 and a 5 percentage-point increase since 2001.
"In effect, public programs have stepped in as employers have stepped out," said Shana Alex Lavarreda, the center's director of health insurance studies and the lead author on the fact sheet. "The data refutes any lingering arguments that employer-based insurance is the solution to our health care coverage crisis."
Jobs that are returning to the state after the Great Recession seem to lack affordable health insurance benefits, depriving workers of a major source of coverage. From 2009 to 2012, the proportion of Californians with employment-based insurance dropped from 52.1 percent to 49.5 percent. With the recent economic recovery, unemployment rates in California have declined, from 20 percent in 2009 to 9.8 percent in 2012. Still, the rate of job-based health insurance has remained below 50 percent of the non-elderly population rather than exhibiting a similar recovery.
"The steady decline in employer-based health coverage affirms the need for Obamacare," said Dr. Robert K. Ross, president and CEO of The California Endowment. "For the first time in history, health coverage is within the reach of many more Californians who aren't covered by job-based health insurance."
"These data make it clear that many Californian families are still struggling financially and will need to access low- or no-cost health coverage," said Colburn S. Wilbur, interim president and CEO of The California Wellness Foundation. "The state's Covered California online marketplace makes it easy to apply for coverage whether through a public plan like Medi-Cal or one of the private insurance programs offered."
###
Read the fact sheet: "Before Health Reform Expansion, Public Programs Already Covered One in Five Nonelderly Californians in 2012."
The California Endowment, a private, statewide health foundation, was established in 1996 to expand access to affordable, quality health care for underserved individuals and communities and to promote fundamental improvements in the health status of all Californians.
The California Wellness Foundation's mission is to improve the health of the people of California by making grants for health promotion, wellness education and disease prevention.
The California Health Interview Survey (CHIS) is the nation's largest state health survey and one of the largest health surveys in the United States.
The UCLA Center for Health Policy Research is one of the nation's leading health policy research centers and the premier source of health-related information on Californians.
For more news, visit the UCLA Newsroom and follow us on Twitter.
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Share
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AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.
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