Watch: NBC's Michele Tafoya on Her Battle with Anorexia

India's Kingfisher cancels dozens of flights

(AP) ? India's privately owned Kingfisher Airlines was forced to cancel dozens of flights Friday amid a burgeoning crisis at the country's second-largest carrier.

Kingfisher, which is partly owned by brewery tycoon Vijay Mallya, has canceled more than 120 flights this week as pilots and crew called in sick after their October salaries were delayed.

The airline says flights were canceled because it was reconfiguring planes, the Press Trust of India reported. The Economic Times reported that leasing companies want Kingfisher to return their planes after the company fell behind on payments.

Kingfisher shares slid more than 12 percent on the Mumbai stock market Friday.

India's airline industry has been hit by rising fuel costs and a crushing price war. Kingfisher is currently struggling under debt of $1.4 billion and shut down its budget carrier in September after it ran up losses.

The airline, which began operations in 2005, bought India's first budget airline Deccan Airways in 2008, leading to the creation of its budget wing, Kingfisher Red.

Kingfisher's problems have worsened after three oil companies stopped giving it jet fuel on credit and asked the airline to make daily payments.

The airline has grounded eight of its leased turboprop ATR aircraft, and returned 14 leased A320 jets, leaving it with fewer aircraft in its fleet.

The cash-strapped airline has also piled up unpaid fees to airport operators and other agencies who are now adding to its financial pressures.

Kingfisher has said it is restructuring its operations.

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/f70471f764144b2fab526d39972d37b3/Article_2011-11-11-AS-India-Kingfisher-Airlines/id-f76a395b026641d7b0192ac520212a3e

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NASA Successfully Test Fires J-2X Engine.

Bring forward through time those same engineers with all of today's advancements and they'll stomp all over today's talent.

Bullshit. Give any group of talented engineers a sense of motivation, a nearly unlimited budget, and clear, specific goals, and they can do wonders.

The Manhattan project reached approximately 1% of all federal spending in its peak year. It had one aim: build an atom bomb. It had one main motivation: keep the bad guys (who had launched a sneak attack on us already) from taking over the world.

The Apollo program touched a massive 2.2% of all federal outlays in its peak year. It had three specifications: Man, Moon, Decade. It had one main motivation: keep the bad guys (who had put a satellite in orbit, and a man in space, first) from taking over the world. (Figuratively or literally, depending on your personal level of paranoia.)

NASA today sees about 0.6% of the federal budget: a proportion which has been shrinking steadily since the early 1990s. That funding is divided across a large number of programs and priorities. Not only do they not have clearly stated goals to guide them, they lack the funding to even maintain continuity in the programs (both scientific and engineering) which already exist.

Today's NASA has some superb engineers that I would readily stack up against those from any era in the agency's history. What NASA lacks is funding and leadership. The problem is political, not technical.

Source: http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdotScience/~3/bi2OwmaXhhg/nasa-successfully-test-fires-j-2x-engine

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Mid-ocean creatures control light to avoid becoming snacks

Thursday, November 10, 2011

If you're a snack-sized squid or octopus living in the ocean zone where the last bit of daylight gives way, having some control over your reflection could be a matter of life and death.

Most predators cruising 600 to 1,000 meters below the surface spot the silhouette of their prey against the light background above them. But others use searchlights mounted on their heads.

Being transparent and a little bit reflective is a good defense against the silhouette-spotters, but it would be deadly against the "headlight fish," says Duke postdoctoral researcher Sarah Zylinski.

Transparency is the default state of both Japetella heathi, a bulbous, short-armed, 3-inch octopus, and Onychoteuthis banksii, a 5-inch squid found at these depths. Viewed from below against the light background, these animals are as invisible as they can be. Their eyes and guts, which are impossible to make clear, are instead reflective. But when hit with a flash of bluish light like that produced by headlight fish, they turn on skin pigments, called chromatophores, to become red in the blink of an eye.

During ship-board experiments over the Peru-Chile trench in 2010, Zylinski shined blue-filtered LED light on specimens of both creatures to watch them rapidly go from clear to opaque. When the light was removed, they immediately reverted to transparent. On a second research cruise in 2011 in the Sea of Cortez, Zylinski measured the reflectivity of the octopuses and found they reflected twice as much light in their transparent state as in the opaque state.

Zylinski experimented with 15 to 20 different species of cephalopod pulled up from the deep by the research ships, but only these two responded to the blue light. "I went through several things I thought would stimulate behaviors," she says. Shallow-water cephalopods (squid, ocotopi and cuttlefish) will change their body patterns for a shadow or shape passing overhead, but these deeper water animals don't, Zylinski says. The animals could be seen tracking the movements of probes around them, but it was only the light that made them switch on the their pigments.

Zylinski next would like to investigate the link between transparency and habitat depth for the Japetella octopus. "Smaller young animals are found higher in the water column and have fewer chromatophores, so they are more reliant on transparency, which makes sense because there won't be predators using searchlights there," Zylinski says. But the mature adults have a higher density of chromatophores making them potentially more opaque and they can be found in deeper waters (below 800 meters) where bioluminescence becomes the dominant light source.

###

Duke University: http://www.duke.edu

Thanks to Duke University for this article.

This press release was posted to serve as a topic for discussion. Please comment below. We try our best to only post press releases that are associated with peer reviewed scientific literature. Critical discussions of the research are appreciated. If you need help finding a link to the original article, please contact us on twitter or via e-mail.

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Source: http://www.labspaces.net/115103/Mid_ocean_creatures_control_light_to_avoid_becoming_snacks

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So you want to design your baby?

Link Information - Click to View

So you want to design your baby?
Bart Fauser and Paul Devroey provide an authoritative tour of the intricacies, pitfalls and ethical labyrinths of assisted conception in Baby-Making

Source: New Scientist
Posted on: Tuesday, Nov 08, 2011, 7:24am
Views: 27

Source: http://www.labspaces.net/115011/So_you_want_to_design_your_baby_

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Sex With Animals Will Give You Penis Cancer

Sex With Animals Will Give You Penis CancerI hope you didn't need the risk of death to convince you to not have sex with animals. But just in case, know this: bestiality will give you penis cancer.

Researchers studied 432 men between 18 and 80 years old in rural Brazil, 118 of whom had penile cancer. Of those with the disease, 35 percent reported that they had had sex with horses, cows, pigs, chickens, and other animals. And those are just the ones who admitted it.

The scientists, who published their work in the Oct. 24 issue of the Journal of Sexual Medicine, also asked the men if this was a habit or a one-time thing. "Zoopilia" was a regular indulgence for 59 percent of them, who had sex with animals over a period of between one and five years, while 21 percent did it for more than five years. Some did it daily, others monthly.

Stop reading now if you thought or wished desperately it couldn't get any more disturbing: Men who had sex with animals also had higher rates of sexually transmitted diseases, and the researchers think that might be because they're all having group sex. More than 30-percent practiced sex with animals in groups. This is not done alone in a remote stable?it's a party!

Why does bestiality cause cancer, you ask? St?nio de C?ssio Zequi, urologist in Sao Palo and lead author on the study explains it to LiveScience thusly:

"We think that the intense and long-term SWA practice could produce micro-traumas in the human penile tissue," Zequi said. "The genital mucus membranes of animals could have different characteristics from human genitalia, and the animals' secretions are probably different from human fluids. Perhaps animal tissues are less soft than ours, and non-human secretions would be toxic for us," he explained.

Dear lord. Oh and did you think this was just something that happened in Deliverance land? Think again. A 2003 study published in in the Archives of Sexual behavior found that of 114 self-defined zoophiles (Greek for animal lovers) in the United States, Australia, New Zealand and Europe, 36 percent lived in big cities and 83 percent had been to college. Nearly half worked in informatics or technology, and some of them earned high incomes.

Read lots more about the science behind "zoos" on this Scientific American blog. Though I'll understand if you choose not to.

[LiveScience; Image: Associated Press]


You can keep up with our Science Editor, Kristen Philipkoski, on Twitter, Facebook, and occasionally Google+

Source: http://gizmodo.com/5857174/sex-with-animals-will-give-you-penis-cancer

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One killed in Liberia pre-election clash (Reuters)

MONROVIA (Reuters) ? Clashes and sporadic gunfire rocked part of Monrovia Monday, killing at least one person after Liberian riot police fired tear gas to disperse several hundred supporters of presidential challenger Winston Tubman.

Members of Tubman's CDC party said at least three other people were killed, though this could not be confirmed. Two United Nations helicopters flew overhead as police and Tubman's rock-throwing supporters clashed in side streets.

Liberian police firing tear gas and live rounds later stormed the CDC headquarters before they were repelled by U.N. peacekeepers, who have set up a cordon around the building.

Tension has risen in the Liberian capital ahead of a November 8 election run-off between Tubman and President Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf after Tubman called on his supporters to boycott the vote over alleged irregularities, despite international pressure on him to stand.

Violence erupted after police tried to break up a crowd of several hundred CDC supporters. Shooting then broke out and a police officer said both the police and Tubman's supporters had fired, but it was not possible to confirm the information.

A Reuters reporter saw a dead body with an apparent bullet wound to the head at Tubman's CDC party headquarters. Several people were injured, including two police officers.

"I saw four dead bodies, two men and two women," said Lavla Washington, a 36-year-old unemployed CDC supporter.

"I have never in my life seen the police treat civilians like the enemy. The Nobel peace laureate is killing us," Washington said, referring to Johnson-Sirleaf, who was recently co-awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.

A U.N. vehicle had its windows smashed, slightly injuring two peacekeepers, according to a U.N. official. An official at Liberia's ministry of information said the government was holding a security meeting and could not immediately comment.

Johnson-Sirleaf took nearly 44 percent of the first round vote on October 11 and has since won the backing of the third-place finisher, former warlord Prince Johnson, all but sealing her victory in the second round run-off.

Former U.N. diplomat Winston Tubman - who took roughly 33 percent in the first round - announced last week he would withdraw from Tuesday's race and called on Liberians to boycott the poll due to evidence of fraud.

But international election observers called the October 11 vote mostly free and fair, and the United States, regional bloc ECOWAS and the African Union have all criticized Tubman's decision to boycott the second round.

The vote is due to gauge the West African state's progress since a devastating civil war ended in 2003 and pave the way for new investment, but fears are rising it could instead open the door to open-ended political turmoil.

Retreating CDC supporters set up barricades of burning tires and tree stumps as they were pushed back by riot police.

Tubman told Reuters Sunday he was seeking changes to Liberia's vote-counting procedures and a delay to the run-off of between two and four weeks, adding that his party would reject the results if the election goes ahead Tuesday as planned.

"I think that at the end of the day we will have to evaluate what is likely to be better for the country: delaying the elections or going forward with them in a way that doesn't carry the support of such a big party in the country," Tubman said.

"The impact on the region would be huge if we were to descend into chaos again." He said he had urged his supporters not to be violent on polling day.

U.N. "DEEPLY CONCERNED"

The United Nations Security Council said Sunday it was "deeply concerned" by the boycott announcement, and added that it had received reports that members of Liberia's national electoral body had received threats. It gave no details.

Johnson-Sirleaf, who campaigned to cheering crowds in the capital Sunday, called the boycott unconstitutional.

Liberia is one of the world's least developed countries with over half of its people surviving on less than U.S. 50 cents a day. Fourteen years of on-and-off fighting that ended in 2003 killed nearly a quarter of a million people and left its infrastructure in ruins.

Johnson-Sirleaf became Africa's first freely elected female head of state in 2005, and has been internationally praised for reducing the country's debt and maintaining peace. But she faces criticism within for the slow pace of development.

Analysts had anticipated that a smooth election would trigger a surge in foreign investment in resources like iron ore and oil, which have already attracted major firms like ArcelorMittal, BHP Billiton and Anadarko Petroleum.

"A ... boycott would indeed undermine the credibility of the election in that the elections would not reflect the views of all voters," said Lydie Boka, head of risk consultancy StrategiCo. "It would also open the door to endless claims and accusations that the regime is not democratic."

Many, like Rachael Dennis, a mother of four who works at a market stall, merely yearn for peace.

"Those who say they will not vote, it is their right to say so. For those who will go to vote too, it is their right. All that I am saying is there should be no hala-hala," she said, using the local term for violence.

(Additional reporting by Finbarr O'Reilly; Writing by David Lewis; Editing by Matthew Jones)

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/africa/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20111107/wl_nm/us_liberia_election

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App adds self-checkout and pickup options to Apple Store

App Store

By Rosa Golijan

Version 2.0 of the official Apple Store app is now available and ? as expected, thanks to some detailed reports???it brings some rather great new features: Personal Pickup and EasyPay.?These new functionalities mean that you can order items online for pickup in retail Apple Store locations or even complete some in-store transactions without ever dealing with a blue-shirted retail employee.

To use the Personal Pickup option, you'll simply order whatever you want online and then head to your local Apple Store. Most products will be ready for pickup within an hour of ordering.

On the other hand, if you're already in an Apple Store and looking to pick up some accessories?but don't feel like waiting for someone to ring up your purchase, then you can whip out your iPhone and use EasyPay. All you'll need to do is scan the products' barcodes using your iPhone's camera and follow some on-screen prompts to complete your transaction. No word on whether a bag will magically materialize in front of you or if you'll have to ask someone for one though.

It's worth noting that the Personal Pickup and EasyPay options are only available in U.S.-based Apple Store locations.

The Apple Store app can be downloaded from the Apple App Store ??say that three times fast!?? and it's completely free, of course.

Related stories:

Want more tech news, silly puns or amusing links? You'll get plenty of all three if you keep up with Rosa Golijan, the writer of this post, by following her on?Twitter, subscribing to her?Facebook?posts, or circling her?on?Google+.

Source: http://technolog.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2011/11/08/8699211-app-adds-self-checkout-and-pickup-options-to-apple-store

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Billionaire NY mayor grapples with Wall St protest (AP)

NEW YORK ? It would seem that Mayor Michael Bloomberg would be a natural foe for protesters now in their seventh week on Wall Street's footstep.

He is not only the 1 percent, he was named the 30th richest person on the planet, according to Forbes magazine. He is a man who has used his fortune to achieve vast political influence. A former trader and CEO who ardently defends the big banks against those who would blame the institutions for the nation's economic woes.

But the billionaire mayor has thus far avoided taking decisive action against the encampment protesting economic inequality and corporate greed.

Bloomberg may not be able to keep that distance for long, however. Local officials displeased with noise and sanitation complaints at the site have been notching up the pressure on City Hall. And park owners may yet choose to clear out the group on trespassing charges, causing a potential showdown with police.

The mayor has said the situation is the city's responsibility ? but has yet to explain how his administration might step in.

"It is the city's problem and we'll make a decision," he said recently. "But, you know, it's just not so easy. You can't just walk in and say, `Hey, you're out of here.'"

As the protests have grown to include encampments around the country, some mayors are taking that exact approach, while others are publicly pondering similar action. Results have been mixed.

In Oakland, Calif., police in riot gear fired tear gas and bean bags to disperse protesters who had been camping in front of City Hall ? a move followed by confrontations that have led local business leaders and residents to question Mayor Jean Quan's leadership. In Atlanta and in Sacramento, Calif., police arrested dozens of people to clear out park encampments. The mayor of Providence, R.I., has threatened to ask a court to evict protesters, and Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa has said an encampment outside City Hall "cannot continue indefinitely."

But in New York, a decision to forcibly evict the protesters could prove unpopular for a mayor already coping with a third-term decline in public approval. Two-thirds of New York City voters polled recently by Quinnipiac University say they agree with the protesters' views, and 82 percent believe the group should be allowed to continue the protest, which is costing the city millions of dollars in ramped up security.

"Bloomberg is in a bad spot," said 61-year-old protester Aron Kay, standing with the help of a cane amid the tents at Zuccotti Park. "He knows he's damned if you do, damned if you don't. ... They will look very bad if they come in here like gangbusters."

Still, patience with the movement is wearing thin with some. The New York Post emblazoned the word "ENOUGH!" on its front page Thursday and accused the mayor of refusing to take action on what the newspaper said was a public nuisance. Politicians representing Wall Street-area residents have asked the city to crack down on protesters' loud drumming and public urination, even while saying they value the protesters' message.

So far, Bloomberg's dealings with the protesters have been a balancing act.

He has expounded at length about the group's free-speech rights ? repeatedly saying that he has been their biggest defender. But he has also openly mocked Occupy Wall Street and his statements have harshened in recent days.

"Increasingly you're seeing that communities, businesses and residents in Lower Manhattan feel that they are the ones that are being occupied ... and it's really hurting small businesses and families," he said Wednesday. "No one should think that we won't take actions that we think are appropriate when we think they are appropriate."

A day later, he said he was concerned about crime at the camp and unwillingness among some protesters to report crimes to the police, but declined to say whether that could be reason to evict the group. He later said the city wouldn't tolerate "some of the things that have gone on," and vowed to do something, but said it was also important to understand laws and implications.

Bloomberg, who gets daily updates on the protest in a meeting with senior aides and agency heads, has said the police department won't move to evict the protesters unless there's a threat to public health or safety ? or unless Brookfield Office Properties, which owns the park, asks the city for help removing trespassers.

The administration remains in constant contact with Brookfield. But the mayor has said repeatedly his administration has tried to identify representatives among the protesters with whom it could negotiate ? but the leaderless nature of the protesters' organization has made it impossible.

The city called progressive politicians, political organizations and labor groups ? some of which have worked with the group at Zuccotti Park ? in an attempt to identify protesters who would talk to city officials, said Bloomberg spokesman Marc La Vorgna. But no names have surfaced, he said.

Some protesters say the mayor or one of his representatives could simply walk a few blocks from City Hall and get on the "stack," the list of speakers for the nightly general assembly, the open meeting at which the protesters make decisions through a consensus voting process. The city could ask the group to empower a representative with limited authority to speak with them.

United Federation of Teachers President Michael Mulgrew recommended that the mayor's administration send someone to the General Assembly, although other leaders who contacted the city were less encouraging.

Mulgrew's recommendation gained no traction.

It's not reasonable to expect the city to attempt to deal with the group without the option of hashing things out with a few representatives at a negotiating table, La Vorgna said.

On Bloomberg's only visit to the site, to tell the protesters about the park owner's later-abandoned plan to clean the plaza, the reception he received was mixed. In video of the unannounced visit later posted online, some protesters chanted "billionaire Bloomberg go to hell" and "you are the 1 percent," while others offered him food and even a security detail.

The mayor has made clear he fears that anger driven by economic dissatisfaction can breed chaos. He has declared violence that befell California will not happen in New York. There, protesters said it was a small group that wreaked havoc despite the peaceful desires of the movement as a whole.

That's part of the reason the mayor won't step in to evict, said one of the protesters, Justin Stone-Diaz.

"He may try, but he also knows that if something goes wrong we can't control what happens," he said.

___

Samantha Gross can be reached at http://www.twitter.com/samanthagross

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/us/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20111105/ap_on_re_us/us_occupy_nyc_mayor

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