Menendez: reimbursed donor $58.5K for 2 trips

FILE - In this Jan. 28, 2013 file photo, Sen. Robert Menendez, D-N.J. speaks on Capitol Hill in Washington. Menendez's office says he traveled on a plane owned by a Florida physician who is a friend and political donor, but denied that the senator had engaged with prostitutes in the Dominican Republic. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite, File)

FILE - In this Jan. 28, 2013 file photo, Sen. Robert Menendez, D-N.J. speaks on Capitol Hill in Washington. Menendez's office says he traveled on a plane owned by a Florida physician who is a friend and political donor, but denied that the senator had engaged with prostitutes in the Dominican Republic. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite, File)

WASHINGTON (AP) ? Sen. Robert Menendez's office said Wednesday night that he reimbursed a prominent Florida political donor $58,500 for the full cost of two of three trips Menendez took on the donor's plane to the Dominican Republic in 2010.

There was no public disclosure.

"The senator paid for the two trips out of his personal account and no reporting requirements apply," said Menendez spokeswoman Tricia Enright.

Details of Menendez's trips emerged as his office said unsubstantiated allegations that the senator engaged in sex with prostitutes in the Dominican Republic are false.

The FBI searched the West Palm Beach, Fla., office of the donor ? eye doctor Salomon Melgen ? on Tuesday night and early Wednesday, but it was unclear if the raid was related to Menendez, a New Jersey Democrat.

A third trip by Menendez aboard Melgen's plane ? a campaign fund-raising journey to the donor's residence in the Dominican Republic ? took place in May 2010. That trip was reported to the Federal Election Commission, said Enright.

Menendez categorized the other two trips as personal. The first was from Aug. 6-9, 2010, a round trip from South Florida to the Dominican Republic. The second personal trip was from Sept. 3-6, 2010, from New Jersey to the Dominican Republic and back.

Menendez could have invoked what is known as a "friendship exemption" regarding the two personal trips, which would have required the senator to report the travel to the Senate Ethics Committee as a gift. Instead, Menendez chose to reimburse the full cost of the two trips.

The Daily Caller, a conservative website, reported shortly before the November election that Menendez traveled on Melgen's private plane to the Dominican Republic to engage in sex with prostitutes.

Menendez's office said that any accusations of engaging with prostitutes "are manufactured by a politically motivated right-wing blog and are false."

At FBI headquarters in Washington, spokesman Jason Pack said the bureau "cannot comment on the existence or status of an investigation." Justice Department spokeswoman Tracy Schmaler also declined to comment.

On Tuesday, Menendez became chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, succeeding Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass.

Records filed in Palm Beach County show an Internal Revenue Service lien against Melgen of more than $11.1 million for unpaid taxes from 2006 through 2009. Prior liens for taxes from 1998 to 2002 were subsequently withdrawn, records show.

Earlier Wednesday, Menendez's office said Melgen has been a friend and political supporter of the senator for many years and that the three trips that Menendez took have been "paid for and reported appropriately." Menendez's office later changed the statement's wording to specify that the trips had been "paid for or reported appropriately" to correct the impression that all three trips had been publicly reported.

Melgen is involved in numerous businesses, all sharing the same address in West Palm Beach, according to records filed with the Department of State in Florida.

Late Tuesday and early Wednesday, FBI agents were seen inside the West Palm Beach building, walking its halls and standing beside shelves full of files.

The Daily Caller began publishing stories on its website about Menendez and Melgen on Nov. 1, when it reported that two women from the Dominican Republic said Menendez paid them for sex earlier in 2012. Prostitution is legal in the Caribbean nation.

Melgen is listed as having an ownership interest in DRM Med Assist, which Federal Aviation Administration records show is the owner of a CL-600 Challenger plane. Flight records for the aircraft were not immediately available.

Melgen, a registered Democrat, has made $193,350 in political contributions since 1998, including $14,200 to Menendez, according to Federal Election Commission records. Menendez was chairman of the Senate Democratic Campaign Committee, which raises money for Democratic Senate candidates, from 2009-2011.

Menendez, a lawyer, is a former mayor of Union City, N.J., and also served in the New Jersey state General Assembly and the New Jersey state Senate. He is divorced and has two children.

Melgen, 58, is a native of the Dominican Republic, where he earned his medical degree from the Universidad Nacional Pedro Henr?quez Ure?a in 1978. He has lived in the U.S. since at least 1980, holding an internship, residency and fellowship at hospitals in Connecticut, Missouri and Massachusetts, according to records filed with the Florida Department of Health.

Melgen has been licensed to practice in Florida since 1986 and purchased the West Palm Beach plot of land where he built his main office in 1991. Over the years, Melgen has become regarded as a top ophthalmologist, speaking at conferences and even operating on then-Gov. Lawton Chiles in 1997. The governor later appointed Melgen to a state panel on HMOs.

Calls to Melgen's offices Wednesday were forwarded to an answering service where receptionists told callers to try back Thursday. Calls to Melgen's home in North Palm Beach, which is appraised at $2.1 million, went unanswered.

On the website for his medical practice, Melgen writes: "I am always asked what sets me apart from most other doctors, and I would have to say that I do not consider myself to be a 'cookbook' physician. My patients are my number one priority, and when I am looking to treat a diagnosis I try to look at all the data at hand and extrapolate the best treatment instead of solely adhering to what the current 'standard' of treatment may be."

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/89ae8247abe8493fae24405546e9a1aa/Article_2013-01-30-Menendez/id-cdbb6f6cfdcc4a27b8c0d52f47133929

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Claire Squires never stood a chance after taking amphetamine in London Marathon

On Wednesday, at Southwark coroner?s court, we learned more about how a healthy, fit, prepared runner came to meet such an awful end during the country?s biggest mass participation sporting event.

Prof William McKenna of the University College London hospitals trust, who conducted her autopsy, said he found ?significant levels? of an amphetamine-like substance in her blood. And her boyfriend Simon van Herrewege revealed to the court how that might have come about. Ahead of the race she had bought a carton of a drink supplement called Jack3d on the internet.

?Claire was always in the gym and this stuff was being widely talked about there,? he said. He added that she had told him she was going to mix a couple of spoons-full of it into her water bottle and would take it if she was struggling in the latter stages of the race. It would help her to get over the wall, she told him. Give her the legs for the last push.

Unbeknownst to her, one of the ingredients of Jack3D is the amphetamine DMAA. And it was that, taken at the conclusion of a highly strenuous sporting event, that pushed her heart rate to an unsustainable level. The thing she thought was going to give her a little boost over the line was the very last thing she should have taken at that point.

No professional distance runner would touch anything like Jack3D. And not just because it is on the athlete?s extensive list of proscribed substances. There is a reason some substances are banned beyond the artificial help they give. Especially amphetamines. Ever since Tommy Simpson died on the Tour de France after taking a couple of blue pills, the mix of such drugs and endurance sport has been known to be a lethal cocktail.

But Claire Squires would have had no idea what was inside Jack3D, what gave it its kick. As far as she was concerned, this was something wholly benevolent, a legal product that was going to be a bit more useful than eating a banana. She bought it innocently and openly, on the recommendation of other gym users. And it cost her life.

The thing is she would not have been alone in that race. Right across the ranks of fun runners, everyone is looking for something that might gift them an extra few seconds off their time, or make their legs ache a little less. Recommendations spill across the internet of what you should wear, what you should eat, what you should drink.

This is not doping; everyone is just looking for something to make the difference. Why, even Lance Armstrong, the man who won the world?s greatest cycle race seven times, claimed in self-justification for his drug regime that it is impossible to compete in such events without help.

Armstrong?s help may have been as illegal as Claire Squires?s was legal, but it was less dangerous than hers in this crucial respect: it was conducted under medical supervision. Thanks to a complicit doctor, he was informed precisely what it was he was taking and told when to take it. And more to the point, when not to. That was how, he said, he could level the playing field. And in terms of his health if not his reputation or wealth, he has clearly got away with it. The stimuli which propelled him round France at such speed do not appear to have had any obvious lasting side effects.

Unlike Armstrong, Claire Squires did nothing underhand. She acted out of ignorance, duped by an industry which makes reckless promises on what it can deliver. Unaware of what she was doing, she suffered the terrible misfortune of having a metabolism unable to cope at that point in the race with the sudden stimulus that kicked in from the drink.

By complete coincidence, in August 2012, five months before the verdict on her death was announced, the medical regulator MHRA recommended products containing DMAA be removed from sale as they pose ?potential risks to public safety?. Runners on this year?s marathon will not be able to buy Jack3D. Which, tragically, is way too late for Claire Squires.

Source: http://telegraph.feedsportal.com/c/32726/f/568303/s/28144f91/l/0L0Stelegraph0O0Csport0Cothersports0Cathletics0Clondon0Emarathon0C98381680CClaire0ESquires0Enever0Estood0Ea0Echance0Eafter0Etaking0Eamphetamine0Ein0ELondon0EMarathon0Bhtml/story01.htm

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White Nexus 4 pictured, looks like a Nexus 4 in white

The photo above could well be our first look at the LG Nexus 4 in white. The shot was sent in to PhoneArena by an anonymous tipster, and seems to show the current Nexus phone with a white exterior and silver-trimmed LED flash. As with any image of unknown origin, there's no way to guarantee its veracity, but we have to say it looks real enough to us.

The full 13MP original can be inspected over at the source link, and we've got an expanded view of the lens and flash after the break. If nothing else, the difficulty involved in fabricating an image of this size is a point in its favor.

We've also heard whispers ourselves of a white Nexus 4 being in the works in the weeks since the original black model launched. And remember that LG already offers a white version of the Optimus G, the phone upon which the N4 is based. The previous two Nexus phones have been available in white too, albeit in limited quantities.

Anyone in the market for a white Nexus 4? Shout out in the comments!

Source: PhoneArena

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Casey Anthony reportedly mulling legal career - U.S. News

Joe Burbank / Pool via AP

By Elizabeth Chuck, Staff Writer, NBC News

Casey Anthony's long road through the U.S. justice system has inspired her to consider a new career path: Becoming a paralegal, according to one of her lawyers.

Anthony already knows a good deal about the criminal justice system. ?At 26 she was thrust into the national spotlight when her 2-year-old daughter, Caylee, disappeared from their Orlando, Fla., home in 2008.

The toddler's body was found that December and despite Anthony's initial tale of a kidnapping babysitter, the mother was later considered the number one suspect and spent various stints behind bars on charges related to the investigation.

But in July 2011 -- after a trial full of bombshells and intense media attention -- a jury found her not guilty in her daughter's murder, yet convicted her of lying about Caylee's disappearance. A?poll at the time ranked Anthony as America's "most hated woman."?

Anthony, who has received death threats since her trial began, has been in hiding. After she was acquitted of murder but convicted of lying to police, she got credit for the three years of time she served behind bars, and was free to leave; however, she still has a number of civil lawsuits pending against her, which may prevent her from moving beyond Florida state lines.

Now, with just $1,100 worth of assets to her name, according to a recent bankruptcy filing, Anthony is considering ways to start making money.

"She would like to get a job,?I can assure you, but she can't work at McDonald's. People would be looking at her instead of at the menu," one of her attorneys, Charles Greene, told ABCNews.com on Monday, several days after Anthony filed for bankruptcy protection in Orlando, Fla.

Greene said Anthony, who hasn't worked for the past four years and is nearly $800,000 in debt, might want to become a paralegal in the future.

"She's better than many paralegals I know," he told ABCNews.com. "She could be a paralegal or something like that right away. She is very organized, a very intelligent, very computer savvy person, so I think her skills and her desire may lie somewhere in that field."

Greene wouldn't comment on her whereabouts. The most recent sighting the public got of Anthony was in the form of a video diary she had put online, reportedly without the approval of her attorneys, in January 2012.

Anthony may take some more time before she tries to pursue a career, her attorney said, but she "believes strongly in our justice system."?

"You don't go from the most hated woman in the world, according to some media outlets, to being a normal person or being able to live a normal life," Greene said. "I'm not saying she's not a normal person, but people do not perceive her as a normal person."

There are no plans for Anthony to write a "tell-all book" or "tell-all movie," he said.

"The events are very private and Miss Anthony is still yet to come to terms with them and they're still so emotional, so emotionally traumatic for her," he said. "There's just moments she breaks down and starts crying when she starts thinking about it. It's nothing she's going to talk about. She's a very private person and she won't let people see that side of her either. She'll put up a tough face."

Of the approximately $792,000 that Anthony is in debt for, $500,000 is owed to her defense attorney, Jose Baez; $100,000 of it is to search and rescue organization Texas EquuSearch, which is suing her for $100,000 for the time it spent searching for Caylee; and the rest of the money is to the IRS and Florida law enforcement.?

Anthony is also being sued by the woman she claimed had kidnapped Caylee and a former meter reader who found Caylee's body, who says Anthony's attorneys portrayed him as a potential murderer.

Other recent stories on Casey Anthony:

?

Source: http://usnews.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/01/29/16753017-casey-anthony-reportedly-mulling-legal-career

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ImmunoGen slides as analyst cuts rating

NEW YORK (AP) -- ImmunoGen slipped 3 percent in Monday trading as Oppenheimer lowered its rating on the cancer drug developer, noting rapid gains in the company's share price over the last few months.

THE SPARK: Oppenheimer & Co. analyst Boris Peaker downgraded the stock to "Perform" from "Outperform." For about two weeks ImmunoGen shares have been trading above his price target of $14.

Peaker said the company's current stock price already reflects marketing approval and a successful launch for T-DM1, a cancer drug ImmunoGen helped develop. He said Wall Street will soon turn its attention to another experimental ImmunoGen drug, the experimental cancer treatment IMGN901. At this point it's difficult to tell how valuable that drug might be or how well it works, Peaker wrote.

THE BIG PICTURE: ImmunoGen and Swiss drugmaker Roche are developing T-DM1 as a treatment for breast cancer and other types of cancer. The drug combines the main ingredient in Roche's drug Herceptin a second drug and a chemical that keeps the drugs linked until they reach a cancer cell. The Food and Drug Administration is scheduled to make a decision on the use of T-DM1 in breast cancer by Feb. 26.

Roche is preparing to start other studies of T-DM1 as a breast cancer treatment and hopes to file for approval of T-DM1 as a treatment for gastric cancer in 2015.

The Waltham, Mass., company is developing IMGN901 on its own. In the second half of the year, ImmunoGen expects to report data from a mid-stage clinical trial of the drug as a treatment for small cell lung cancer. It is also studying IMGN901 as a treatment for multiple myeloma.

ImmunoGen Inc. does not have any approved drugs. It expects to report clinical trial data from its three most advanced drugs in 2013 and said it will begin human trials of a fourth drug.

SHARE ACTION: ImmunoGen shares fell 45 cents to $14.59 in afternoon trading. The stock is up 20 percent over the last month and was trading at its highest price in about four months. Shares of ImmunoGen have traded between $10.85 and $18.10 in the last year.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/immunogen-slides-analyst-cuts-rating-195229454.html

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Rimac delivers Concept_One-based one-off, refuses to pull back the curtain

What's that intriguing shape poking out from underneath the curtain? Rimac Automobili assures us all via its Facebook account that there's a Concept_One in there -- or, at least, a "one-off car based [on it]," marking the delivery of the company's much discussed and sometimes questioned 1,088 horsepower electric supercar. So, why the secrecy? According to the company's namesake executive, Mate Rimac, "the customer wished to control what will be published about the project." Hopefully the wind will blow away that curtain soon enough.

Filed under: Transportation

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Source: http://www.engadget.com/2013/01/29/rimac-concept_one/

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Padres sign Garcia to minor league deal

Associated Press Sports

updated 8:27 p.m. ET Jan. 29, 2013

SAN DIEGO (AP) - Freddy Garcia and the San Diego Padres have agreed to a minor league contract that includes an invitation to spring training.

The Padres also signed right-hander Tim Stauffer and lefty Arturo Lopez to minor league deals, inviting both pitchers to spring training. The team announced the moves Tuesday.

Garcia was 7-6 with a 5.20 ERA in 30 games, 17 starts, for the New York Yankees last year. The 36-year-old right-hander, an All-Star in 2001 and 2002, is 152-101 with a 4.15 ERA in 14 major league seasons.

Stauffer, 30, was San Diego's opening-day starter last year before missing the rest of the season with an elbow injury. He had surgery to repair tendon damage Aug. 31 and was waived by the Padres before clearing outright waivers in October.

? 2012 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

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Source: http://nbcsports.msnbc.com/id/50633792/ns/sports-baseball/

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Bulgarians support building of new nuclear plant: exit polls

SOFIA (Reuters) - A majority of Bulgarians supported the building of a new nuclear power plant in the country's first referendum since the fall of communism, exit polls showed on Sunday, increasing pressure on rightist government which has opposed the plan.

While the low turnout of between 19.5 and 20.3 percent means the result will not be binding, it shows Prime Minister Boiko Borisov's policies have alienated many voters and complicated his campaign for a July election.

(Reporting by Tsvetelia Tsolova)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/bulgarians-support-building-nuclear-plant-exit-polls-173745203--business.html

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Obama, Clinton Defend U.S. Syria Policy

President Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, in their wide-ranging joint interview on CBS' "60 Minutes," defended what some critics have called the administration's unwillingness to engage in the world, particularly on Syria, which Clinton called a "wicked problem."

Obama pointed to the U.S. role in deposing of Libyan leader Moamer Gadhafi and supporting Egypt's elections following the Arab spring, as success stories. But the president said Syria is a more complicated issue.

"We do nobody a service when we leap before we look, where we take on things without having thought out the consequences of it," the president said, calling Syria a classic example of how the United States should be clear about its objectives whenever taking any action.

"We want to make sure not only that it enhances U.S. security, but also it's doing right by the people of Syria and neighbors like Israel that are going to be profoundly affected by it," he said.

Clinton, who has spent the last year doing intense diplomacy on Syria, including attending global meetings with allies, as well as meeting her Russian counterpart to try to find a solution to the conflict, backed up the president's sentiments.

"I'm older than the president," she joked, then turned serious. "I remember some of the speeches of Eisenhower as a young girl. You know you've got to be careful, you have to be thoughtful, you can't rush in, especially now where it's more complex now than it's been in decades."

Clinton called Syria a "wicked problem" that highlights the delicate balancing act of how to make sure U.S. foreign policy upholds American values and freedom in situations where the solution has the potential to be worse than the problem.

The conflict in Syria has raged on for nearly two years, with estimates of more than 60,000 people dead. As President Bashir Al-Assad continues to wage a brutal campaign against civilians, there are increasing concerns that elements of Syria's opposition have become radicalized, including some having ties to al Qaeda.

Clinton said the president's policy on Syria has been appropriately measured.

"I'm certainly grateful for the president's steady hand and hard questions and thoughtful analysis as to what we should and shouldn't do," he said.

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Source: http://news.yahoo.com/president-obama-secretary-clinton-syria-u-needs-careful-030103404--abc-news-politics.html

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New music review: Chansons, Jill Barber (Outside Music) | Montreal ...

Jill Barber?s nod to classic chansons, both French and quebecoises, is so evocative at points that it almost amounts to a case of aural false memory. The Vancouver-based chanteuse wasn?t yet born when these songs first appeared in the `30s, `40s and `50s, nor were many of us ? and yet the sense of place and time on this disc is so strong that you could swear you were once in this imagined grainy, black and white footage.

Wisely opting for stripped-down chamber-jazz arrangements, Barber, an avowed francophile, approaches material associated with Piaf, Gainsbourg, Salvador and others with reverence, but retains enough sexy playfulness and gentle self-awareness to make them her own.

Whether she?s surrendering to the moody Melancolie, turning the heat up a notch in Je cherche un homme or reclaiming the anti-war evergreen Quand les hommes vivront d?amour, Barber proves herself an interpreter worthy of this daunting material.

Rating: ****

Podworthy: Sous le ciel de Paris

Chansons will be available Jan. 29. Here?s a sneak peek, with Quand les hommes vivront d?amour:

Bernard Perusse

Twitter: @bernieperusse

Source: http://blogs.montrealgazette.com/2013/01/27/new-music-review-chansons-jill-barber-outside-music/

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Inmates moved after bloody Venezuela prison clash

Venezuelan police officers stand guard outside the morgue where the bodies of prisoners killed in a riot were taken in Barquisimeto,Venezuela, Saturday, Jan. 26, 2013. A clash between National Guard soldiers and armed inmates led to a deadly riot Friday that reportedly left dozens of people dead. According to a local hospital director the death toll has risen to 61 and 120 injured. (AP Photo/Misael Castro/El Informador)

Venezuelan police officers stand guard outside the morgue where the bodies of prisoners killed in a riot were taken in Barquisimeto,Venezuela, Saturday, Jan. 26, 2013. A clash between National Guard soldiers and armed inmates led to a deadly riot Friday that reportedly left dozens of people dead. According to a local hospital director the death toll has risen to 61 and 120 injured. (AP Photo/Misael Castro/El Informador)

Relatives of inmates react outside the Uribana prison in Barquisimeto, Venezuela, Friday, Jan. 25, 2013. A bloody riot erupted at the Uribana prison in the central Venezuelan city of Barquisimeto Friday when National Guard troops clashed with inmates. Venezuelan media reported that dozens were killed. It was the latest in a series of bloody riots in the country's prisons.(AP Photo/Rafael Rodriguez/El Informador)

An injured prison inmate is escorted by a policeman into the hospital in Barquisimeto, Venezuela, Friday, Jan. 25, 2013. A bloody riot erupted at the Uribana prison in the central Venezuelan city of Barquisimeto Friday when National Guard troops clashed with inmates, and Venezuelan media reported that dozens were killed. It was the latest in a series of bloody riots in the countrie's prisons.(AP Photo/Rafael Rodriguez/El Informador)

An injured prison inmate is carried into the hospital in Barquisimeto, Venezuela, Friday, Jan. 25, 2013. A bloody riot erupted at the Uribana prison in the central Venezuelan city of Barquisimeto Friday when National Guard troops clashed with inmates. Venezuelan media reported that dozens were killed. It was the latest in a series of bloody riots in the country's prisons.(AP Photo/Rafael Rodriguez/El Informador)

CARACAS, Venezuela (AP) ? Venezuelan authorities finished evacuating more than 2,000 inmates on Sunday from a prison where the government said 58 people were killed in one of the deadliest prison clashes in the nation's history.

More than two days after the bloodshed, Penitentiary Service Minister Iris Varela released an official death toll and said 46 wounded victims remained hospitalized.

She said the evacuation of Uribana prison in the city of Barquisimeto was completed on Sunday morning. Inmates were loaded aboard buses and driven to other prisons.

She and other officials appeared on television inside the empty prison compound, among wandering dogs and sheep that the inmates had kept. They pointed out makeshift shacks constructed with wood scraps and sheets of zinc where some inmates had taken shelter in the overcrowded prison.

Varela said that the violence erupted on Friday when groups of armed inmates began firing shots at National Guard troops who were attempting to carry out an inspection.

"There was resistance to what was imminent ... a peaceful inspection," Varela said, adding that groups of prisoners had opened fire "on a large scale."

Those killed included inmates as well as two Protestant pastors and one soldier, she said. One victim's body was burned, Varela said.

The death toll provided by the government differed from that given a day earlier by Dr. Ruy Medina, director of Central Hospital in the city, who had said 61 were reported killed and about 120 were wounded. Medina said that nearly all of the injuries were from gunshots.

Relatives of the victims mourned in funerals, while survivors' families waited anxiously to hear where inmates were taken.

"I still don't know where my son is," said Nayibe Mendez, the mother of a 22-year-old inmate who was unhurt. She spoke by telephone from outside the prison, where she and others gathered waiting for lists showing where their relatives were transported.

The riot was the latest in a series of deadly clashes in Venezuela's overcrowded and often anarchical prisons, where inmates typically obtain weapons and drugs with the help of corrupt guards. Critics called it proof that the government is failing to get a grip on a worsening national crisis in its penitentiaries.

The gunbattles seized attention amid uncertainty about President Hugo Chavez's future, while he remained in Cuba recovering and undergoing treatment more than six weeks after his latest cancer surgery.

Government officials pledged a thorough investigation, while critics said there should have been ways for the authorities to prevent such bloodshed.

The riot was the deadliest in nearly two decades. In January 1994, more than 100 inmates died in the country's bloodiest prison violence on record when a riot and fire set by inmates tore through a prison in the western city of Maracaibo. In 1992, about 60 inmates were killed in a riot in a Caracas prison.

Varela said the government decided to send troops to search the prison after reports of clashes between groups of inmates during the past two days. She said the government is battling against "mafias" that slip weapons into prisons, and that the authorities next plan to thoroughly search Uribana prison for hidden weapons.

She said that during one initial swing through the prison, officials came upon a grenade.

"No one doubts that inspections are necessary procedures to guarantee prison conditions in line with international standards, but they can't be carried out with the warlike attitude as (authorities) have done it," said Humberto Prado, an activist who leads the Venezuelan Prisons Observatory, a watchdog group. "It's clear that the inspection wasn't coordinated or put into practice as it should have been. It was evidently a disproportionate use of force."

In 2011, when Chavez had been in office for 12 years, he created a cabinet-level ministry to focus on prisons and appointed Varela to lead it. The president made that decision following a deadly, weekslong armed uprising at the prisons El Rodeo I and El Rodeo II outside Caracas.

Chavez at the time acknowledged that his government's previous initiatives to improve the prisons hadn't worked, and he pledged changes including building new prisons, improving conditions and speeding trials. Since then, Chavez has approved funds to repair and renovate prisons.

But opponents and activists say the government hasn't made real progress at penitentiaries where hundreds continue to die each year.

Violence has flared repeatedly at other prisons in the past year. In August, 25 people were killed and 43 wounded when two groups of inmates fought a gunbattle inside Yare I prison south of Caracas.

Venezuela has 33 prisons built to hold about 12,000 inmates. Officials have said the prisons' population is currently about 47,000.

Uribana prison was built to hold about 850 inmates. Varela said that when the violence erupted the prison held about 2,400.

Opposition leader Henrique Capriles called government officials' response "incredible" and inadequate. Without mentioning Vice President Nicolas Maduro by name, Capriles criticized government officials who ordered an investigation and then traveled off to a summit in Chile.

He noted that in Brazil, President Dilma Rousseff reacted differently after a nightclub fire that killed more than 230 people, when she cut short her summit trip and returning to visit the injured.

"Here, they go away to a summit. They dispose of it as if it were one more matter, one more little problem," Capriles said at a televised event. "If we have a state that's not capable of providing security within a penitentiary, what's left for common citizens?"

"The problem that we're seeing can't be solved closing a prison," Capriles said. "The way to solve it is resolving the problem of overcrowding."

___

Associated Press writer Vivian Sequera in Bogota, Colombia, contributed to this report.

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/cae69a7523db45408eeb2b3a98c0c9c5/Article_2013-01-27-LT-Venezuela-Prison-Violence/id-2a6840982b4643c1868bcc7c7c8b59ca

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Lawmakers see immigration overhaul this year

WASHINGTON (AP) ? Republican and Democratic lawmakers were cautiously optimistic Sunday that a long-sought overhaul of the nation's immigration system that includes a pathway to citizenship for the 11 million illegal immigrants currently in the country will clear Congress this year, the result of changes in the political landscape shown in November's election.

"We are trying to work our way through some very difficult issues," said Illinois' Sen. Richard Durbin, the No. 2 Democrat in the Senate. "But, we are committed to a comprehensive approach to finally, in this country, have an immigration law we can live with. We have virtually been going maybe 25 years without a clear statement about immigration policy. That's unacceptable in this nation of immigrants."

Sen. Robert Menendez, who along with Durbin and Sen. John McCain, is part of the six-member, bipartisan Senate group working on a framework for immigration legislation to be announced this week, said current politics dictate that a pathway for citizenship must be included.

"Let's be very clear: having a pathway to earned legalization is an essential element. And I think that we are largely moving in that direction as an agreement," said Menendez, D-N.J., said.

But the package "will have the enhancement of the border security," he said, nodding to Republicans' priority to tighten borders to prevent future illegal immigration.

He also said the package would have to crack down on employers hiring undocumented workers.

Arizona Republican McCain has returned to the issue after having led a failed push to fix the nation's broken immigration system ahead of his 2008 bid for the White House.

McCain said: "What's changed is, honestly, is that there is a new, I think, appreciation on both sides of the aisle ? including, maybe more importantly on the Republican side of the aisle, that we have to enact a comprehensive immigration reform bill."

Despite making little progress on immigration in his first term, President Barack Obama won more than 70 percent of the Latino vote, in part because of the conservative positions on immigration that Republican nominee Mitt Romney staked out during the GOP primary. Asians, who immigrated to the U.S. in higher numbers than Hispanics in 2010, also overwhelmingly backed Obama. Latino voters accounted for 10 percent of the electorate in November.

Obama is to press his case for immigration changes during a trip to Las Vegas Tuesday: a pathway to citizenship for illegal immigrants that includes paying fines and back taxes; increased border security; mandatory penalties for businesses that employ unauthorized immigrants; and improvements to the legal immigration system, including giving green cards to high-skilled workers and lifting caps on legal immigration for the immediate family members of U.S. citizens.

In an opinion piece published online Sunday in the Las Vegas Review-Journal, Sen. Marco Rubio, also a member of the bipartisan Senate group, laid out his proposal to address the issue. The Florida Republican, son of Cuban immigrants, wrote that "significant progress" on enforcing immigration laws must be certified before unauthorized immigrants now in the country are allowed to apply for residency and "get in the back of the line."

Rep. Paul Ryan, the 2012 Republican candidate for vice president, said he backs Rubio's proposal.

"Immigration is a good thing. We're here because of immigration. We need to make sure it works," Wisconsin's Ryan said.

If Republicans fail to act, they will pay the price in elections for generations, McCain warned.

"Well, I'll give you a little straight talk: Look at the last election... We are losing dramatically the Hispanic vote, which we think should be ours for a variety of reasons," McCain said.

McCain and Menendez spoke with ABC's "This Week," Durbin appeared on "Fox News Sunday" and Ryan was on NBC's "Meet the Press."

___

Associated Press writer Philip Elliott contributed to this report.

___

Follow Michele Salcedo on Twitter at http://twitter.com/michelesalcedo.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/lawmakers-see-immigration-overhaul-183149291--politics.html

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Poor sleep in old age prevents the brain from storing memories

Jan. 27, 2013 ? The connection between poor sleep, memory loss and brain deterioration as we grow older has been elusive. But for the first time, scientists at the University of California, Berkeley, have found a link between these hallmark maladies of old age. Their discovery opens the door to boosting the quality of sleep in elderly people to improve memory.

Postdoctoral fellow, Bryce Mander, demonstrates how the sleep study was conducted.

UC Berkeley neuroscientists have found that the slow brain waves generated during the deep, restorative sleep we typically experience in youth play a key role in transporting memories from the hippocampus -- which provides short-term storage for memories -- to the prefrontal cortex's longer term "hard drive."

However, in older adults, memories may be getting stuck in the hippocampus due to the poor quality of deep 'slow wave' sleep, and are then overwritten by new memories, the findings suggest.

"What we have discovered is a dysfunctional pathway that helps explain the relationship between brain deterioration, sleep disruption and memory loss as we get older -- and with that, a potentially new treatment avenue," said UC Berkeley sleep researcher Matthew Walker, an associate professor of psychology and neuroscience at UC Berkeley and senior author of the study to be published Jan. 27, in the journal Nature Neuroscience.

The findings shed new light on some of the forgetfulness common to the elderly that includes difficulty remembering people's names.

"When we are young, we have deep sleep that helps the brain store and retain new facts and information," Walker said. "But as we get older, the quality of our sleep deteriorates and prevents those memories from being saved by the brain at night."

Healthy adults typically spend one-quarter of the night in deep, non-rapid-eye-movement (REM) sleep. Slow waves are generated by the brain's middle frontal lobe. Deterioration of this frontal region of the brain in elderly people is linked to their failure to generate deep sleep, the study found.

The discovery that slow waves in the frontal brain help strengthen memories paves the way for therapeutic treatments for memory loss in the elderly, such as transcranial direct current stimulation or pharmaceutical remedies. For example, in an earlier study, neuroscientists in Germany successfully used electrical stimulation of the brain in young adults to enhance deep sleep and doubled their overnight memory.

UC Berkeley researchers will be conducting a similar sleep-enhancing study in older adults to see if it will improve their overnight memory. "Can you jumpstart slow wave sleep and help people remember their lives and memories better? It's an exciting possibility," said Bryce Mander, a postdoctoral fellow in psychology at UC Berkeley and lead author of this latest study.

For the UC Berkeley study, Mander and fellow researchers tested the memory of 18 healthy young adults (mostly in their 20s) and 15 healthy older adults (mostly in their 70s) after a full night's sleep. Before going to bed, participants learned and were tested on 120 word sets that taxed their memories.

As they slept, an electroencephalographic (EEG) machine measured their brain wave activity. The next morning, they were tested again on the word pairs, but this time while undergoing functional and structural Magnetic Resonance Imaging (fMRI) scans.

In older adults, the results showed a clear link between the degree of brain deterioration in the middle frontal lobe and the severity of impaired "slow wave activity" during sleep. On average, the quality of their deep sleep was 75 percent lower than that of the younger participants, and their memory of the word pairs the next day was 55 percent worse.

Meanwhile, in younger adults, brain scans showed that deep sleep had efficiently helped to shift their memories from the short-term storage of the hippocampus to the long-term storage of the prefrontal cortex.

Co-authors of the study are William Jagust, Vikram Rao, Jared Saletin and John Lindquist of UC Berkeley; Brandon Lu of the California Pacific Medical Center and Sonia Ancoli-Israel of UC San Diego.

The research was funded by the National Institute of Aging of the National Institutes of Health.

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Story Source:

The above story is reprinted from materials provided by University of California - Berkeley. The original article was written by Yasmin Anwar.

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

---

Journal Reference:

1. Bryce A Mander, Vikram Rao, Brandon Lu, Jared M Saletin, John R Lindquist, Sonia Ancoli-Israel, William Jagust, Matthew P Walker. Prefrontal atrophy, disrupted NREM slow waves and impaired hippocampal-dependent memory in aging. Nature Neuroscience, 2013; DOI: 10.1038/nn.3324

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

Disclaimer: This article is not intended to provide medical advice, diagnosis or treatment. Views expressed here do not necessarily reflect those of ScienceDaily or its staff.

Source: http://feeds.sciencedaily.com/~r/sciencedaily/top_news/top_health/~3/mPkLDBVS1dI/130127134212.htm

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Pentagon: Civilian furloughs could last months

WASHINGTON (AP) ? A top Pentagon official says that if Congress does not come up with a way to avoid mandatory budget cuts by March 1, hundreds of thousands of Pentagon civilian employees will face furloughs and reduced paychecks by April.

Deputy Defense Secretary Ashton Carter told a small group of reporters Friday that the furloughed employees would lose one day of work per week for the remainder of the budget year, which ends in September.

The Pentagon has about 800,000 civilian employees; they have not yet been officially notified of furloughs. Carter said the furloughs would be expected to save $5 billion.

Carter said the Pentagon already is eliminating all 46,000 of its temporary civilian workers in anticipation of budget cuts.

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/89ae8247abe8493fae24405546e9a1aa/Article_2013-01-25-US-Pentagon-Budget/id-56b21c44e81f415881451d88fbbc2443

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Ian McKellen, Patrick Stewart heading to Broadway

NEW YORK (AP) ? Serious theater fans have a reason to suddenly freak out: Ian McKellen and Patrick Stewart will team up on Broadway this fall in two of the most iconic plays of the 20th century.

Producers announced Thursday that Stewart and McKellen will star in Harold Pinter's "No Man's Land" and Samuel Beckett's "Waiting for Godot" which will play in repertoire under the direction of Sean Mathias.

The Broadway theater, performance dates, the two supporting actors and the schedule of performances will be announced later.

Stewart and McKellen starred in a production of "Waiting for Godot" in London's West End in 2009. Prior to Broadway, they'll tackle "No Man's Land" in an as-yet-unspecified out-of-town tryout this summer.

Mathias told The Associated Press all three men struggled to make "Waiting for Godot" as honest and realistic as possible ? an approach they'll likely replicate with Pinter's play.

"What we tried to do, with so much effort, was make it real. Make them human beings, compassionate, funny, flawed and vulnerable and cocky ? all the things human beings are," Mathias said. "We never wanted to make it esoteric. I'm sure this is how we will approach the Pinter as well."

Stewart, 72, and McKellen, 73, first worked together in 1977 in Tom Stoppard's "Every Good Boy Deserves Favour." They've also starred in the "X-Men" movie franchise as Professor Xavier and Magneto.

Stewart will play Vladimir in "Waiting for Godot" and Hirst in "No Man's Land;" McKellen will play Estragon in "Waiting for Godot" and Spooner in "No Man's Land."

"My main feeling is it's lovely to be back with friends and it will be lovely to be back in New York," said McKellen, who is doing a sit-com in England and next goes to Middle Earth to film scenes for "The Hobbit" franchise. "But I've got an awful lot to do in the meantime."

McKellen made his Broadway debut in Aleksei Arbuzov's "The Promise" in 1967 and won a Tony Award for his performance in "Amadeus" in 1981. His films include "Apt Pupil," ''Gods and Monsters" and "The Lord of the Rings."

Stewart, perhaps best known as Capt. Jean-Luc Picard of "Star Trek: The Next Generation," first appeared on Broadway in Peter Brook's production of Shakespeare's "A Midsummer Night's Dream" in 1971 and has recently been in David Mamet's "A Life in the Theatre" and "Macbeth."

Putting the Beckett and Pinter plays together in repertoire makes theatrical sense since both require four male actors and they both mine a surreal, witty vein.

"Both plays play tricks with our memory, with time, with what time is," said Mathias. "Both plays are dealing with a landscape of poetry, a landscape of psychology, a landscape that is both real and isn't real. So there are incredible reverberations and resonances."

Stewart and McKellen will sink their teeth into Beckett and Pinter after spending the summer filming "X-Men: Days of Future Past." Mathias, a Tony nominee in 1995 for "Indiscretions," will be directing "Breakfast at Tiffany's" on Broadway this spring.

Now a thorny question: Who gets top billing on Broadway ? McKellen or Stewart? After all, both actors have gotten knighthoods for their services to drama and the performing arts.

"For me there's no question," Stewart said. "Ian was a star actor while I was still working in regional theater. To be absolutely frank, I was in awe of him and his work long before I knew him."

___

Follow Mark Kennedy on Twitter at http://twitter.com/KennedyTwits

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/ian-mckellen-patrick-stewart-heading-broadway-200035731.html

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Tampa Retail News | Tampa Commercial Real Estate | Florida ...

Sweetbay Supermarket to Close 33 Stores in Florida

Sweet Bay Supermarket

The local grocery store wars chalked up another casualty as Sweetbay Supermarket announced it will shutter 33 stores, including 22 in the Tampa Bay area.

The decision disappointed loyal customers but came as little surprise to industry analysts who have watched Publix and Walmart solidify their stranglehold in this market.

Sweetbay?s Belgian parent company, Delhaize Group, said the move to close a third of its Florida stores was needed to improve its U.S. results and strengthen its bottom line after a difficult year. About 2,000 employees will lose their jobs, including about 1,200 locally?Continue Reading?

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New Stores Brighten Tampa Retail Real Estate

The Tampa Bay retail real estate market is faring better than most other regions across the state, according to a new study by CBRE Global Research and Consulting?s team in Tampa. The Tampa Bay retail vacancy rate was 7.8% in 2012, compared with a statewide rate of 8.7%. Only Miami had a lower vacancy rate than Tampa Bay.

The average retail rent was $14.90 per square foot for the region in 2012, with asking lease rates highest in Hillsborough County, at $15.61, and lower in Pinellas, at $13.69 per square foot, on a triple-net-lease (NNN) basis, which means that tenants share property tax, insurance, utility, and other costs. The asking lease rate in Pasco County was $14.81?Continue Reading

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Retailers Ring in Profits Catering to Gasparilla Crowds

Not many retailers can profit from a niche market associated with pillaging, drinking rum and wearing an eye patch. Unless they?re in Tampa.

Pirate fever runs high year-round with the Buccaneers but spikes this time of year for Gasparilla, Tampa?s biggest party and the namesake for races, art shows and other events.

Several merchants, from T-shirt printers to clothing boutiques and costume stores, have made a business selling Gasparilla goods. And interest continues to grow as retailers look for ways to get more gold in a lackluster economy?Continue Reading

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Checkers & Other Restaurant Chains Embrace Smaller Venues

Checkers Drive-In Restaurants Inc.?is one of several restaurant chains that have adopted strategies of getting smaller in order to grow.

The prototype, built next to a traditional store that was demolished, generated sales of $1.2 million in its first year, compared with $770,000 generated by the previous store in the year before it came down, according to the report.

Checkers Restaurants

This prototype cost about $500,000 to build, compared to $700,000 for the double-lane model?Continue Reading

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Interested in leasing or purchasing commercial real estate? Call us @ 813.514.1070
or email by clicking HERE!

Source: http://floridatriplenet.com/blog/cre-news/tampa-commercial-real-estate-news-and-commentary/tampa-retail-news/

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Senate approves limits on the filibuster rule to speed debate (Los Angeles Times)

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Men, women already fighting side by side

Shannon McLaughlin, left, and a colleague (Massachusetts National Guard)Defense Secretary Leon Panetta announced Thursday that the Pentagon is dropping its remaining rules excluding women from ground combat. The decision ends a nearly 20-year ban that kept women from about 230,000 positions.

Women are already on the front lines?more than 150 have lost their lives in Iraq and Afghanistan?but are in roles categorized as "combat support." This has led some servicewomen, including a group that filed suit against the military, to argue that they take on similar combat risks as their male peers but are not granted the same recognition for their service.

The change will most likely allow women to become battlefield medics and take on other dangerous combat jobs, but it's still unclear if the military's elite special operations jobs will be open to them, the Wall Street Journal reported.

Shannon McLaughlin, a U.S. Army major in the Massachusetts National Guard and a judge advocate general, shares her thoughts on the announcement. She has been in the military for 15 years, including a sting deployed in Iraq. (McLaughlin is currently a plaintiff in a suit challenging the federal government's Defense of Marriage Act, which denies military benefits to her spouse because McLaughlin is married to a woman.)

Q: What do you think of the recent decision by the Pentagon to open up all combat roles to women?

A: It's a great move. I've been in for 15 years, and that includes the last 10 years that we've been in war, and I think that it will be an opportunity for us to truly reflect what's happening in the field. The reality is that women might be in noncombat or combat-support roles, but they frequently end up in combat, and we've certainly had many women injured and killed in combat. I think it's really in many ways a reflection of reality.

Q: Were you ever engaged in combat while you were deployed?

Yes. I've been fired upon. I've fired. I was never injured in the line of duty by enemy engagement or anything like that. But sure, like most people that ended up deployed, we found ourselves in very tough combat-like situations from time to time. We were at a forward operating base and enemy fire was coming in, and we had to take cover and return fire. It was a very short duration, but it was nonetheless very real and very harrowing. (McLaughlin was deployed for Operation Enduring Freedom.)

I'm a JAG. I'm an attorney. When I deployed I was in sonar intelligence.

Q: What do you think of the arguments that having women in combat roles will negatively affect unit cohesion and that women aren't suited for ground combat?

We already have this situation where men and women are fighting next to each other. They're taking shrapnel from IEDs; they're taking fire together. Some women won't be good at combat; some men won't be good at combat. Even within our military there's those who are better suited to carrying rifles [than others]. It should be based on ability, aptitude and willingness.

Q: How do you think the move will be received within the military?

I'm full-time military and I went to work yesterday and today, and it wasn't a hot topic. It was just like, 'Oh, OK, yup, that was coming.' It was like the repeal of 'don't ask, don't tell.' I think the military does an extremely good job at adapting to what our leaders and commander in chief tell us to do. We'll do that here, too. There may be some realignments that have to go on, some attitudes may have to shift. We'll do fine like we always do.

Q: Have you ever felt like being a woman has held you back in the military?

I certainly have felt at times that women were looked at as though we couldn't perform the task up to par, and it was assumed that we couldn't. If there can be any benefit to having a wartime situation, it's that women have truly been tested in these [combat-support] roles and have done incredibly well. They've served just as admirably as their male counterparts. We've gone through all the same tests.

Q: If the nation ever needs to reinstate a draft, do you think it should include women?

Yes, it should be open to women. Why not? We haven't had a draft since Vietnam, and things have changed in our country. We have an all-volunteer now, and I think almost everybody would prefer it stay that way. But if we had a draft, I would think that everybody should be included ... and we would have the same criteria for people to be excused from it as in Vietnam.

Q: How has the military changed since you enlisted 15 years ago?

It's become more diverse. I think it's become more inclusive. We have more women in the military than we did 15 years ago. We finally have the ability for gay and lesbians to [openly] serve. My first five years of service it was a very different landscape. Women were on the periphery; now we are right there. There's a handful of female generals and female colonels. Being in the military is not easy whether you're straight or a gay man or woman.

Q: If combat roles had been open to you when you enlisted, would you have considered taking one on?

Earlier in my career, if Special Forces was open to me I certainly would have considered it. It's too late for me in my career now. But when I was just starting out and very eager, that's when people do things like that. I've been in many situations, and you look around the room and some of the men, even on the JAG side ... some of them will have those Special Forces tags on their shoulders. That is a great honor and a great achievement for a military person to have. That type of designation or accomplishment can mean promotions earlier, other opportunities because you've proven yourself. That was never open to me or any other women. I would love to see the next generation of military women have that option.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/lookout/women-combat-q-female-soldier-163115910.html

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The 3D fireworks of a star

Public release date: 24-Jan-2013
[ | E-mail | Share ]

Contact: SINC
info@agenciasinc.es
34-914-251-820
FECYT - Spanish Foundation for Science and Technology

In 1901 the star GK Persei gave off a powerful explosion that has not stopped growing and astonishing ever since. Now a team of Spanish and Estonian astronomers has reconstructed the journey of the emitted gas in 3D which, contrary to predictions, has hardly slowed down its speed of up to 1,000 km/s after all this time.

Thanks to the images captured from the Isaac Newton Telescope and the Nordic Optical Telescope in La Palma (Canary Islands, Spain), a European team of astronomers has constructed a three dimensional map of the remnant of a nova, or in other words, what was left of the star after its explosion. The results have just been published in the Astrophysical Journal.

The protagonist of this story is the star GK Persei situated at 'just' 1,300 light years away from Earth. It is also known as Nova Persei 1901 because a strong thermonuclear eruption occurred on its surface on the 21st February 1901. On that day astronomers observed how its brightness suddenly increased to such an extent that it became one of the brightest stars in the skies.

The surprising thing is that the explosion created remaining material made up of gaseous knots, which become visible in 1916. "From then the visual spectacle has been similar to that of a firework display seen in slow motion," claims Miguel Santander, researcher at Spanish National Observatory and coauthor of the study.

After patient work to gather images, the team was able to measure the movements of more than 200 knots as well as the radial velocity using the Doppler effect, which allows to determine if they are getting closer or moving further away from us. In this way the 3D map of the nova was created and its dynamic was analysed.

"Such data are rarely available in astrophysics because as a general rule apparent expansion or, in other words, in the layout of the sky, the majority of objects cannot be seen," outlines another of the authors, Romano Corradi, from the Astrophysics Institute of the Canary Islands.

An unexpected result

In any case, the main result of this work "is that the gas seems to be moving further away in a ballistic or free manner and is hardly slowing down, contrary to what was thought in previous studies," comments the lead author of the investigation, Tiina Liimets of the Tartu Observatory in Estonia.

Until now it was thought that the gas from the explosion would slow down "significantly" due to the large quantity of matter in its path that the star has expelled previously. However, its speed has remained between a range of 600 and 1000 kilometres per second.

Long before the explosion in 1901, more than one hundred thousand years ago, GK Persei had already undergone a massive transformation from a red giant to a white dwarf. This process expelled its external layers forming a planetary nebula, which is a giant gas cloud within which the nova is now growing in 3D.

###

References:

T. Liimets, R.L.M. Corradi, M. SantanderGarca, E. Villaver, P. Rodrguez-Gil, K. Verro, I. Kolka. "A three-dimensional view of the remnant of Nova Persei 1901 (GK Per)". Astrophysical Journal 761(1): id. 34, December 2012.

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[ | E-mail | Share ]

?

AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.

Public release date: 24-Jan-2013
[ | E-mail | Share ]

Contact: SINC
info@agenciasinc.es
34-914-251-820
FECYT - Spanish Foundation for Science and Technology

In 1901 the star GK Persei gave off a powerful explosion that has not stopped growing and astonishing ever since. Now a team of Spanish and Estonian astronomers has reconstructed the journey of the emitted gas in 3D which, contrary to predictions, has hardly slowed down its speed of up to 1,000 km/s after all this time.

Thanks to the images captured from the Isaac Newton Telescope and the Nordic Optical Telescope in La Palma (Canary Islands, Spain), a European team of astronomers has constructed a three dimensional map of the remnant of a nova, or in other words, what was left of the star after its explosion. The results have just been published in the Astrophysical Journal.

The protagonist of this story is the star GK Persei situated at 'just' 1,300 light years away from Earth. It is also known as Nova Persei 1901 because a strong thermonuclear eruption occurred on its surface on the 21st February 1901. On that day astronomers observed how its brightness suddenly increased to such an extent that it became one of the brightest stars in the skies.

The surprising thing is that the explosion created remaining material made up of gaseous knots, which become visible in 1916. "From then the visual spectacle has been similar to that of a firework display seen in slow motion," claims Miguel Santander, researcher at Spanish National Observatory and coauthor of the study.

After patient work to gather images, the team was able to measure the movements of more than 200 knots as well as the radial velocity using the Doppler effect, which allows to determine if they are getting closer or moving further away from us. In this way the 3D map of the nova was created and its dynamic was analysed.

"Such data are rarely available in astrophysics because as a general rule apparent expansion or, in other words, in the layout of the sky, the majority of objects cannot be seen," outlines another of the authors, Romano Corradi, from the Astrophysics Institute of the Canary Islands.

An unexpected result

In any case, the main result of this work "is that the gas seems to be moving further away in a ballistic or free manner and is hardly slowing down, contrary to what was thought in previous studies," comments the lead author of the investigation, Tiina Liimets of the Tartu Observatory in Estonia.

Until now it was thought that the gas from the explosion would slow down "significantly" due to the large quantity of matter in its path that the star has expelled previously. However, its speed has remained between a range of 600 and 1000 kilometres per second.

Long before the explosion in 1901, more than one hundred thousand years ago, GK Persei had already undergone a massive transformation from a red giant to a white dwarf. This process expelled its external layers forming a planetary nebula, which is a giant gas cloud within which the nova is now growing in 3D.

###

References:

T. Liimets, R.L.M. Corradi, M. SantanderGarca, E. Villaver, P. Rodrguez-Gil, K. Verro, I. Kolka. "A three-dimensional view of the remnant of Nova Persei 1901 (GK Per)". Astrophysical Journal 761(1): id. 34, December 2012.

---

[ | E-mail | Share ]

?

AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.

Source: http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2013-01/f-sf-t3f012413.php

College Football Scoreboard nfl scores nfl scores Devon Walker Tom Cruise ryan reynolds Star Trek: The Original Series