Gunfire heard in search for Boston Marathon bomb suspect

By Svea Herbst-Bayliss and Stephanie Simon

WATERTOWN, Massachusetts (Reuters) - Gunfire was heard on Friday night as dozens of police cars and armored vehicles converged on a street in a Boston suburb in the manhunt for the surviving suspect in the Boston Marathon bombings, witnesses said.

A local CBS TV station cited Boston's mayor as saying a man believed to be the suspect was surrounded in Watertown. Reuters could not independently confirm that report.

An ethnic Chechen suspected in the Boston bombings is the target of a day-long manhunt that virtually shut down the city.

Shortly after police told a news conference the suspect was still on the loose, a Reuters witness saw dozens of police and armored vehicles rush to the street and then gunfire was heard.

"There's about 50 guys there with machine guns and they all got bulletproof vests on, some of them are holding shields and they're all congregated on the far end of Franklin Street," said another witness, Anna Bedirian, a resident of Franklin Street in Watertown. "There are a couple armored cars and they're all standing around."

Officials identified the fugitive as Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, 19, whose older brother, Tamerlan Tsarnaev, 26, whom the FBI also identified on Thursday as being involved in Monday's bombings, was shot to death overnight by police in a shootout. The surviving suspect escaped on foot.

Earlier on Friday, Colonel Timothy Alben told the news conference: "We do not have an apprehension of our suspect this afternoon. We remain committed to this."

Alben said officers went door-to-door in Watertown and searched houses. Officials followed a number of leads that were not fruitful and there was "much work to be done" he said.

Authorities cordoned off a section of Watertown and told residents not to leave their homes or answer the door as officers in combat gear scoured a 20-block area. Two Black Hawk helicopters circled the area. SWAT teams moved through in formation, leaving an officer behind to ensure that searched homes remained secure, a law enforcement official said.

The normally traffic-clogged streets of Boston were empty on Friday as the city went into lockdown after a bloody night of shooting and explosions. Public transportation had been suspended and air space restricted. Famous universities, including Harvard and MIT, closed after police ordered residents to remain at home.

Massachusetts Governor Deval Patrick said the "stay-in-place" order for Boston had been lifted and mass transit reopened as police pressed their search for Tsarnaev.

Monday's bombing on the finish line of the world-famous Boston Marathon, which killed three people and injured 176, was described by President Barack Obama as "an act of terrorism." It was the worst such attack on U.S. soil since the plane hijackings of September 11, 2001.

U.S. government suspects said the men had not previously been on the radar as possible militants.

'PUT A SHAME ON OUR FAMILY'

Details emerged on Friday about the brothers, including their origins in the predominantly Muslim regions of Russia's Caucasus, which have experienced two decades of violence since the fall of the Soviet Union.

The fugitive described himself on a social network as a minority from a region that includes Chechnya, Dagestan and Ingushetia.

A man who told reporters he was an uncle of the brothers said they came to the United States in the early 2000s and settled in the Cambridge, Massachusetts, area.

Ruslan Tsarni, who lives in suburban Washington and said he had not spoken to the brothers since 2009, said the bombings "put a shame on our family. It put a shame on the entire Chechen ethnicity.

In separate interviews, the parents of the Tsarnaev brothers said they believed their sons were incapable of carrying out the bombings. Others remembered the brothers as friendly and respectful youths who never stood out or caused alarm.

"Somebody clearly framed them. I don't know who exactly framed them, but they did. They framed them. And they were so cowardly that they shot the boy dead," father Anzor Tsarnaev said in an interview with Reuters in Dagestan's provincial capital, Makhachkala, clasping his head in despair.

The FBI said the twin blasts were caused by bombs in pressure cookers and carried in backpacks that were left near the marathon finish line as thousands of spectators gathered.

The mother, Zubeidat Tsaraeva, speaking in English, told CNN, "It's impossible, impossible, for both of them to do such things, so I am really, really, really telling that this is a setup."

(Additional reporting by Mark Hosenball, Alex Dobuzinskis, Aaron Pressman, Daniel Lovering, Ben Berkowitz, Emily Flitter and Jim Bourg; Writing by Grant McCool; Editing by Peter Cooney)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/one-boston-bombing-suspect-dead-hunt-second-man-120447964.html

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The 6 Biggest Mistakes Real Estate Investors Make (And How To ...

I once had a tenant secretly move 15 children into her 800-square-foot house.

You can imagine the damage when she moved out. I don?t think I?ve ever seen so many cute drawings of ponies, rainbows and stick figures in my life? and they covered every wall. Apparently, I had not been watching this tenant closely enough and didn?t realize she had invited all her friends (and their kids) to move in.

It?s this kind of story that scares many people away from investing in real estate. However, despite the mistakes I?ve made, I wouldn?t trade my investing business for anything.

Real estate investing has a lot of great things going for it: the retirement planning, the wealth building, the tax sheltering, the sense of accomplishment from being able to own something that the tenants pay for each and every month, and a whole lot more.

However, some common mistakes that many investors make can make life difficult and expensive.

But I?m going to show you how to avoid those mistakes so your real estate investments provide the highest returns ? and least stress ? possible.

1. Not Managing Effectively
You see, with the 15 kids, I was managing my property instead of hiring a property manager. I didn?t do it effectively, though. If you are going to manage your own properties, you will need to drive by the property, interact with your tenants and do all the other jobs that come with being a ?landlord.?

How to Avoid This:?Watch over your properties and make sure the rules are being followed. Check up with your tenants, schedule regular inspections and ensure you deal with problems quickly and efficiently.

2. Deferring Maintenance
Many landlords refuse to fix things quickly because either:

• It costs more than they want to pay.
• They just procrastinate.

This mistake has caused more grief than you want to know. Problems only get worse with time, and tenants are more likely to leave ? causing even more costs when the unit sits vacant. Problems will not fix themselves, so you may as well get a jump on it and keep your tenant happy.

How to Avoid This:?Fix maintenance problems immediately. Don?t procrastinate, or the problems will just compound. Keep a notebook/calendar on you (or a digital one in your phone) and use it to keep maintenance requests straight. However, if you don?t want to do the work yourself, see tip No. 3.

3. Doing It All Yourself
Let?s talk about that ?15 kids? situation for a moment. The mistake of not managing effectively could have easily been avoided by hiring a property manager to manage the properties. Instead, I tried to do everything myself at the beginning, which led to more problems, more costs and more stress.

This is a mistake made by many new investors. When you are beginner, it?s easy to think that it would be cheaper to do everything yourself. However, hiring someone who is trained to do a job is sometimes more efficient than trying to do it all yourself.

How to Avoid This:?Know what your areas of weakness are and hire those things out, whether it?s management, plumbing, cleaning or whatever.

4. Underestimating Repairs And Time
This is especially true for those investors specializing in properties that need significant repairs before using. In general, most repairs cost more and take longer than expected. If you don?t properly account for the time and cost, your great deal could turn into a money pit.

How to Avoid This:?Always be conservative in your estimates. For beginners, I recommend doubling your repair budget and timetable ? and if it still makes sense, proceed. Hire a qualified contractor to give you a written bid before any work begins.

5. Treating Real Estate Like A Hobby
Real estate investing is a business, not a hobby. Many investors flippantly treat their properties as something they do for fun, then they wonder why they have so much stress, pain and financial loss.

Do you know what your return on investment is for your property? If you were running a business, you?d be sure to know ? and in real estate you had better know as well.

How to Avoid This:?Create systems to manage your business, maintain proper accounting and record keeping, and run your real estate investing company like the business that it is. Find ways to increase efficiency and outsource tasks.

6. Letting Fear Hold You Back
Many real estate investors never experience all the great things real estate investing can do for them and their personal finances. They let fear of the unknown, fear of failure, fear of loss and fear of risk hold them back.

How to Avoid This:?The easiest way to get past that fear is by learning everything you can about a topic and mixing with others who are successful already. With each real estate investing term you learn and each new successful investor you sit down with for coffee, your confidence will grow.

Action to Take ?>?Real estate investing doesn?t have to be miserable (and can actually be pretty awesome) if you avoid this one thing: ignoring the advice of others who have come before. I have made each of the above mistakes in my investing career, but they could have been avoided if I had simply taken the time to connect with other investors and learned from their mistakes.

Brandon Turner is a senior editor with?BiggerPockets.com.

This article originally appeared on InvestingAnswers as
The 6 Biggest Mistakes Real Estate Investors Make (And How To Avoid Them)

P.S. ??If you enjoy the benefits of earning regular income from real estate investing, you might be interested in earning $25,000 to $55,000 in extra income every year for the rest of your life by investing in 10 stocks my colleague Carla Pasternak calls?Retirement Savings Stocks. Some pay quarterly. Others pay monthly. All offer you a safe, stable, and reliable source of high income even if the market goes down.?Learn more here.

In Obama's 2nd Term This Investment Is Going To Explode Smart investors are looking to this asset to help gain the upper hand. In my free video, find out what the smart investors already know to be true... Watch It Right Now

Source: http://www.thetradingreport.com/2013/04/17/the-6-biggest-mistakes-real-estate-investors-make-and-how-to-avoid-them/

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American cancels all US flights for several hours

Passengers gather at the American Airlines check-in for flights at Los Angeles International Airport on Tuesday, April 16, 2013. Computer problems forced American Airlines to ground flights across the country Tuesday after the airline was unable to check passengers in and book passengers. (AP Photo/Nick Ut)

Passengers gather at the American Airlines check-in for flights at Los Angeles International Airport on Tuesday, April 16, 2013. Computer problems forced American Airlines to ground flights across the country Tuesday after the airline was unable to check passengers in and book passengers. (AP Photo/Nick Ut)

Sulien Brezzo, from France, waits in line to rebook her flight to New York at the Miami International Airport, Tuesday, April 16, 2013. She had already stood in line for two hours and still had a long wait until she got to the ticket counter. American Airlines says it has fixed an outage in its main reservations system that is disrupting travel for thousands of passengers whose flights have been delayed or canceled. Roughly 900 flights are directly impacted, according to flight tracking site FlightAware, with another 800 indirectly impacted due to planes and crew being out of place. (AP Photo/J Pat Carter)

In this cell phone image, passengers are lined up at the American Airlines ticket counters at Chicago's O'Hare International Airport Tuesday, April 16, 2013. American Airlines says it has fixed an outage in its main reservations system that is disrupting travel for thousands of passengers whose flights have been delayed or canceled. Roughly 900 flights are directly impacted, according to flight tracking site FlightAware, with another 800 indirectly impacted due to planes and crew being out of place. (AP Photo/Bob Brant)

An unidentified passenger checks the flight information board at the Miami International Airport, Tuesday, April 16, 2013. American Airlines says it has fixed an outage in its main reservations system that is disrupting travel for thousands of passengers whose flights have been delayed or canceled. But the airline expects to see flight delays and cancellations throughout the rest of the day. (AP Photo/J Pat Carter)

Police officers guard an empty check-in area at the American Airlines section of the Miami International Airport, Tuesday, April 16, 2013. American Airlines says it has fixed an outage in its main reservations system that is disrupting travel for thousands of passengers whose flights have been delayed or canceled. But the airline expects to see flight delays and cancellations throughout the rest of the day. (AP Photo/J Pat Carter)

DALLAS (AP) ? A computer system used to run many daily operations at American Airlines failed Tuesday, forcing the nation's third-largest carrier to ground all flights across the United States for several hours and stranding thousands of frustrated passengers at airports and on planes.

Flights already in the air were allowed to continue to their destinations, but planes on the ground from coast to coast could not take off. And travelers could do little to get back in the air until the computer system was restored.

American blamed its reservation system, which is used for much more than booking flights. Airlines commonly rely on such systems to track passengers and bags, update flight schedules and gate assignments and file flight plants. The computers also help determine how much fuel to put in an aircraft or which seats should be filled to balance a plane.

The failure caused cascading delays and cancelations nationwide.

As of mid-afternoon, American and its American Eagle offshoot canceled more than 700 flights, and another 765 flights were delayed, according to tracking service FlightAware.

The outage began in midmorning and stretched into the afternoon. The systems were fixed by 4:30 p.m., airline spokeswoman Stacey Frantz said.

But even as some flights took off, the airline expected delays and cancellations to persist for the rest of the day.

At airports, customers whose flights were canceled couldn't rebook on a later flight. Passengers already at the airport were stuck in long lines or killed time in gate areas.

"Tensions are high. A lot of people are getting mad. I've seen several yelling at the American agents," said Julie Burch, a business-meeting speaker who was stuck at Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport waiting for a flight to Denver. "Nobody can tell us anything."

Terry Anzur, a TV news consultant from Los Angeles who was also stranded in Dallas, said American Airlines gate employees were doing everything the old-fashioned, manual way because their computers were useless.

"No one at the counter can do anything. They can't check people in," Anzur said. "The airline is at a dead halt."

Theoretically, an airline could manually do the same work as the reservation system for any one flight. But doing it for hundreds of flights isn't practical.

"There was a time when an airline could fly without a reservation system, but those days for the most part are past," said Scott Nason, American's former technology chief and now a consultant.

If their reservation systems go down, "most airlines would be pretty much without the ability to fly more than a very limited number of flights," he added.

Such system crashes are rare in the airline industry but not unheard-of.

During nearly 29 years at American, Nason recalled maybe one failure every few years. While airlines can fix whatever caused the problem last time, "each time it's something different."

Once an opossum chewed through a cable in Tulsa, bringing down the whole system. Another time, a worker in the airline's data center used a metal tool instead of one that was rubber-coated, causing a short circuit that disabled substantial parts of the system, Nason said.

Passengers used social media to flood the airline with complaints. The airline tweeted back that it was working to fix the problem and apologized for the inconvenience.

To make amends, American offered to book people who needed to travel Tuesday on other airlines and pay for the fare difference. For those who wanted to delay their trips, American offered refunds or waivers from the usual fee for changing a reservation.

But for several hours, the airline wasn't able to process changes and refunds because of the computer failure.

American's problems on Tuesday were reminiscent of what United Airlines passengers endured for several days last year. After merging with Continental, United experienced computer glitches in the combined reservation system. On one day in August, 580 United flights were delayed, and its website was shut down for two hours. Another outage in November delayed 636 flights.

The problems prompted an apology from United Continental Holdings Inc. CEO Jeff Smisek, who acknowledged that the airline had frustrated customers and would need to work to win them back.

American's headache occurred as parent company AMR Corp. seeks government approval to merge with US Airways Group Inc. A merger would let American surpass United to become the world's biggest airline.

The combined American-US Airways plans to use the American system that broke down on Tuesday.

___

Associated Press Airlines Writers Scott Mayerowitz in New York and Joshua Freed in Minneapolis contributed to this report.

___

David Koenig can be reached at http://www.twitter.com/airlinewriter .

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/495d344a0d10421e9baa8ee77029cfbd/Article_2013-04-16-American%20Airlines-Reservations/id-d6fb858df66848bf905faf83ddb2f311

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How to selectively back up app data to iCloud in order to save storage space

If you use iCloud in order to back up your iPhone or iPad, you're probably already aware that you only get 5GB per iCloud account for free. Depending on how many devices you have linked to your account, this may not be a lot at all. Unless you pay for additional storage, you may find your devices unable to back up after your storage is filled.

Choosing which app data you want to back up can save tremendous amounts of space in some cases. Follow along and we'll show you how to turn off backups for storage hungry apps.

1. Launch the Settings app from the Home screen of your iPhone or iPad.
2. Now tap on iCloud.
3. Scroll down and tap on Storage & Backup.
4. Now tap on Manage Storage under the Storage section.
5. Here you'll see all the devices that are currently backing up to your iCloud account. Tap on the device that says This iPhone or This iPad underneath its name. You can't alter other devices remotely, you'll have to do each from the actual device.
6. Under the Backup Options section, you'll see a list of apps and how much data they are storing in iCloud. You can toggle some of these to Off in order to save storage space.

Keep in mind if you turn off app data, it doesn't mean that app will not return to your device during a restore, it just means the app data will not return. Typically the camera roll and document-centric apps are the most storage hungry. If you decide to turn these off, just make sure you're okay with losing the data within them in the event of a restore. We'd suggest saving any documents or photos to your computer frequently to free up storage space.

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/TheIphoneBlog/~3/lWptbiaib60/story01.htm

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RT on DVD & Blu-Ray: Django Unchained Brings Western Justice Home, Tarantino Style

News ? Columns ? RT On DVD ? RT on DVD & Blu-Ray: Django Unchained Brings Western Justice Home, Tarantino Style

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Also, an indie dramedy, a French animated film, and a couple of rereleases.

With the exception of our illustrious headliner, you can mark this down as the third week in a row we've had with just a few notable releases on home video. Maybe Quentin Tarantino's latest is big enough to render all others negligible, but for what it's worth, we also have a relationship dramedy starring Lizzy Caplan and Alison Brie, as well as an animated film from France and a small nature documentary and our customary Criterion Collection releases. See below for the full list.

Also available this week:

• Two more from the Criterion Collection: The 1984 cult sci-fi comedy Repo Man (98%) is newly available on both Blu-ray and DVD, and an Eclipse Series collection of four of influential Japanese director Masaki Kobayashi's films is available on DVD.
• The animated French import A Monster in Paris (84%), about a mutated flea with an operatic singing voice (among other things).
• Dragon (84%), starring Donnie Yen and Takeshi Kaneshiro in a period martial arts drama about a quiet craftsman whose shadowy past comes under investigation of the local detective.

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'DWTS' pro Val: I'm grateful to dance next to Maks

Steffen Thalemann

"Dancing With the Stars" pro Val Chmerkovskiy.

"Dancing With the Stars" pro Valentin Chmerkovskiy will be blogging about his experiences and thoughts on his fourth quest for the mirror ball trophy in The Clicker throughout the season. The 14-time US champion in dance is paired with 16-year-old Disney star Zendaya, who plays Rocky Blue on "Shake It Up!"

By Valentin Chmerkovskiy

This week, Zendaya and I are very privileged to have my brother Maks and Anna Trebunskaya joining us in our Argentine tango. It?s really exciting. The number is great, the dance is really strong, really passionate.

On a personal level, it?s huge ... I?m very grateful for the opportunity to perform side-by-side with my brother, just simply for all our fans and my family, particularly. I had a conversation with my grandma Thursday and she was just ecstatic that she?s gonna get to see Maks and I dance together.?

But the most important thing is Zendaya and her dance, making sure that we don?t sidetrack into something that?s not as important. The goal is to make sure Zendaya looks great, and that?s why I feel really lucky to have Maks and Anna join us because they really helped out with this number.

The truth is I never danced the Argentine tango before in my life. It?s a dance that I?m familiar with, I?m a big fan of, but when it comes to ... maybe teaching it, I?ve never done that. At the same time, I?ve never done contemporary before either, and that was quite successful for me.

Argentine tango, yes, traditionally it?s something that?s very passionate toward the relationship between a man and a woman. But that?s traditionally. We have a song that has a different energy about it, so that allows us to still be passionate, still have the strength and the attitude of an Argentine tango, still have proper technique. But we?re passionate about a completely different topic. There?s going to be a theme to the dance, and I don?t want to reveal before you watch it and that will all make sense as to why there is aggression, why there is passion, why there is a struggle. It?s going to be great, but it doesn?t always have to be about love. Even love has very different angles. We celebrate the love for dance!

This dance has been a lot ? a lot ? more challenging than any other dance we?ve done this season. The most challenging part of it is the speed, the precision, the intricate footwork. The technique of the dance is like no other. The posture is like no other. The frame, the lead ... so that?s been challenging. The choreography, most importantly, is very, very challenging. I don?t know if it?s going? to be noticed by the judges, but most certainly I know that the fans are really going to appreciate.

The dance turned out amazing so far. We took huge risks this week with tricks and choreography. And obviously, there?s a moment in the dance where we?re dancing side-by-side, which is a huge risk because no matter how talented Zendaya is or I am as a teacher, Anna is a professional ballroom dancer. That?s what she does, better than most people. That comparison?s going to be interesting. You don?t have to be the best dancer to be a great performer, and that?s what I really want to showcase in Zendaya this week. I think this tango?s going to do that better than any other dance we?ve done this season.

I think the side-by-side challenge is great.? It shows how committed production is to our fans and the viewers. A number danced by one person will never ? no matter how incredible it is ? will never have the same power and or impact as a group of four people. It?s just the collection of energy that really speaks to the audience and has the opportunity to create a lot more dynamic because there?s more people. It?s going to look cool.

Related content:

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Source: http://theclicker.today.com/_news/2013/04/15/17738032-dancing-with-the-stars-pro-val-chmerkovskiy-im-very-grateful-to-dance-next-to-maks?lite

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Photons run out of loopholes: Quantum world really is in conflict with our everyday experience

Apr. 15, 2013 ? A team led by the Austrian physicist Anton Zeilinger has now carried out an experiment with photons in which they have closed an important loophole. The researchers have thus provided the most complete experimental proof that the quantum world is in conflict with our everyday experience.

The results of this study appear this week in the journal Nature (Advance Online Publication/AOP).

When we observe an object, we make a number of intuitive assumptions, among them that the unique properties of the object have been determined prior to the observation and that these properties are independent of the state of other, distant objects. In everyday life, these assumptions are fully justified, but things are different at the quantum level. In the past 30 years, a number of experiments have shown that the behaviour of quantum particles -- such as atoms, electrons or photons -- can be in conflict with our basic intuition. However, these experiments have never delivered definite answers. Each previous experiment has left open the possibility, at least in principle, that the observed particles 'exploited' a weakness of the experimental setup.

Quantum physics is an exquisitely precise tool for understanding the world around us at a very fundamental level. At the same time, it is a basis for modern technology: semiconductors (and therefore computers), lasers, MRI scanners, and numerous other devices are based on quantum-physical effects. However, even after more than a century of intensive research, fundamental aspects of quantum theory are not yet fully understood. On a regular basis, laboratories worldwide report results that seem at odds with our everyday intuition but that can be explained within the framework of quantum theory.

On the trail of the quantum entanglement mystery

The physicists in Vienna report not a new effect, but a deep investigation into one of the most fundamental phenomena of quantum physics, known as 'entanglement.' The effect of quantum entanglement is amazing: when measuring a quantum object that has an entangled partner, the state of the one particle depends on measurements performed on the partner. Quantum theory describes entanglement as independent of any physical separation between the particles. That is, entanglement should also be observed when the two particles are sufficiently far apart from each other that, even in principle, no information can be exchanged between them (the speed of communication is fundamentally limited by the speed of light). Testing such predictions regarding the correlations between entangled quantum particles is, however, a major experimental challenge.

Towards a definitive answer

The young academics in Anton Zeilinger's group including Marissa Giustina, Alexandra Mech, Rupert Ursin, Sven Ramelow and Bernhard Wittmann, in an international collaboration with the National Institute of Standards and Technology/NIST (USA), the Physikalisch-Technische Bundesanstalt (Germany), and the Max-Planck-Institute of Quantum Optics (Germany), have now achieved an important step towards delivering definitive experimental evidence that quantum particles can indeed do things that classical physics does not allow them to do. For their experiment, the team built one of the best sources for entangled photon pairs worldwide and employed highly efficient photon detectors designed by experts at NIST. These technological advances together with a suitable measurement protocol enabled the researchers to detect entangled photons with unprecedented efficiency. In a nutshell: "Our photons can no longer duck out of being measured," says Zeilinger.

This kind of tight monitoring is important as it closes an important loophole. In previous experiments on photons, there has always been the possibility that although the measured photons do violate the laws of classical physics, such non-classical behaviour would not have been observed if all photons involved in the experiment could have been measured. In the new experiment, this loophole is now closed. "Perhaps the greatest weakness of photons as a platform for quantum experiments is their vulnerability to loss -- but we have just demonstrated that this weakness need not be prohibitive," explains Marissa Giustina, lead author of the paper.

Now one last step

Although the new experiment makes photons the first quantum particles for which, in several separate experiments, every possible loophole has been closed, the grand finale is yet to come, namely, a single experiment in which the photons are deprived of all possibilities of displaying their counterintuitive behaviour through means of classical physics. Such an experiment would also be of fundamental significance for an important practical application: 'quantum cryptography,' which relies on quantum mechanical principles and is considered to be absolutely secure against eavesdropping. Eavesdropping is still theoretically possible, however, as long as there are loopholes. Only when all of these are closed is a completely secure exchange of messages possible.

An experiment without any loopholes, says Zeilinger, "is a big challenge, which attracts groups worldwide." These experiments are not limited to photons, but also involve atoms, electrons, and other systems that display quantum mechanical behaviour. The experiment of the Austrian physicists highlights the photons' potential. Thanks to these latest advances, the photon is running out of places to hide, and quantum physicists are closer than ever to conclusive experimental proof that quantum physics defies our intuition and everyday experience to the degree suggested by research of the past decades.

This work was completed in a collaboration including the following institutions: Institute for Quantum Optics and Quantum Information -- Vienna / IQOQI Vienna (Austrian Academy of Sciences), Quantum Optics, Quantum Nanophysics and Quantum Information, Department of Physics (University of Vienna), Max-Planck-Institute of Quantum Optics, National Institute of Standards and Technology / NIST, Physikalisch-Technische Bundesanstalt, Berlin.

This work was supported by: ERC (Advanced Grant), Austrian Science Fund (FWF), grant Q-ESSENCE, Marie Curie Research Training Network EMALI, and John Templeton Foundation. This work was also supported by NIST Quantum Information Science Initiative (QISI).

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Story Source:

The above story is reprinted from materials provided by University of Vienna.

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

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Journal Reference:

1. Marissa Giustina, Alexandra Mech, Sven Ramelow, Bernhard Wittmann, Johannes Kofler, J?rn Beyer, Adriana Lita, Brice Calkins, Thomas Gerrits, Sae Woo Nam, Rupert Ursin, Anton Zeilinger. Bell violation using entangled photons without the fair-sampling assumption. Nature, 2013; DOI: 10.1038/nature12012

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

Disclaimer: Views expressed in this article do not necessarily reflect those of ScienceDaily or its staff.

Source: http://feeds.sciencedaily.com/~r/sciencedaily/top_news/~3/LgsxwvJYvxg/130415124910.htm

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Court: Can human genes be patented?

WASHINGTON (AP) ? The Supreme Court seemed worried Monday about the idea of companies patenting genes that can be found inside the human body, as it heard arguments in a case that could profoundly reshape U.S. medical research and the fight against diseases like breast and ovarian cancer.

The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office has been awarding patents on human genes for almost 30 years, but opponents of Myriad Genetics Inc.'s patents on two genes linked to increased risk of breast and ovarian cancer say patent protection should not be given to something that can be found inside the human body.

"Finding a new use for a product of nature, if you don't change the product of nature, is not patentable. If I find a new way of taking gold and making earrings out of it, that doesn't entitle me to a patent on gold. If I find a new way of using lead, it doesn't entitle me to a patent on lead," lawyer Christopher Hansen said.

Allowing companies like Myriad to patent human genes or parts of human genes will slow down or cripple lifesaving medical research like in the battle against breast cancer, he said.

But companies have billions of dollars of investment and years of research on the line, with Myriad arguing that without the ability to recoup their investment through the profits that patents bring, breakthrough scientific discoveries needed to combat all kind of medical maladies wouldn't happen.

That concerned several justices. "Why shouldn't we worry that Myriad or companies like it will just say, 'Well, you know, we're not going to do this work anymore?'" Justice Elena Kagan said.

Hansen said that a company could get recognition for its work and that money for research would always be available, a statement that Justice Anthony Kennedy said wasn't sufficient. "I don't think we can decide the case on, 'Don't worry about investment. It'll come,'" Kennedy said.

The Supreme Court has already said that abstract ideas, natural phenomena and laws of nature cannot be given a patent, which gives an inventor the right to prevent others from making, using or selling a novel device, process or application.

Myriad has used its patents to develop its BRACAnalysis test looks for mutations on the breast cancer predisposition gene, or BRCA. Those mutations are associated with much greater risks of breast and ovarian cancer.

Women with a faulty gene have a three to seven times greater risk of developing breast cancer and a higher risk of ovarian cancer. Men can also carry a BRCA mutation, raising their risk of prostate, pancreatic and other types of cancer. The mutations are most common in people of eastern European Jewish descent.

Myriad sells the only BRCA gene test.

The American Civil Liberties Union and other groups challenged Myriad's patents, arguing that genes couldn't be patented, and in March 2010 a New York district court agreed. But the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit has now twice ruled that genes can be patented. In Myriad's case, it's because the isolated DNA has a "markedly different chemical structure" from DNA within the body.

But the ACLU is arguing that isolating the DNA molecules doesn't stop them from being DNA molecules, which they say aren't patentable.

Justices attempted to break the argument down to an everyday level by discussing things like chocolate chip cookies, baseball bats and Amazonian jungle plants in attempts to understand the complicated issues. For example, Justice Sonia Sotomayor said if a new way was found to extract the ingredients of a cookie, a company still wouldn't be able to patent flour, eggs or salt.

"I can't imagine getting a patent simply on the basic items of salt, flour and eggs, simply because I've created a new use or a new product from those ingredients," she said.

Myriad lawyer Gregory A. Castanias argued that justices could think about their invention like a baseball bat. "A baseball bat doesn't exist until it's isolated from a tree. But that's still the product of human invention to decide where to begin the bat and where to end the bat," he said.

But that didn't work for Chief Justice John Roberts.

"The baseball bat is quite different. You don't look at a tree and say, well, I've cut the branch here and cut it here and all of a sudden I've got a baseball bat. You have to invent it, if you will," Roberts said. "You don't have to invent the particular segment of the strand. You just have to cut it off."

The court will rule before the end of the summer.

The case is 12-398, Association for Molecular Pathology v. Myriad Genetics, Inc.

.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/court-human-genes-patented-073805381--finance.html

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April 14, 2013

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Three-alarm Bronx fire leaves 37 injured, 5 critical

By Katherine Creag, NBCNewYork.com

A three-alarm fire in New York City's the Bronx Saturday morning left 37 people injured, including one child and four adults who were in critical condition, fire department officials said.

The fire broke out in an apartment on the fifth floor of a building on East 149th Street in Melrose at around 7:45 a.m. Authorities said smoke from the fire quickly spread throughout the 27-story high-rise.

"When we opened the door to put the fire out, it just fills the building up -- the hallways, the stairs -- up with smoke," said FDNY Deputy Assistant Chief Jack Mooney.

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Residents said the heavy smoke darkened their hallways and made breathing extremely difficult. At least 12 people had to be carried down by firefighters, authorities said.

"Smoke was so thick on 22 and the fire started on five," said building resident, Dolores Carter, an asthma sufferer who had to be helped down by firefighters and needed to use a ventilator afterward. "It was a trying time."

Officials said most of the injuries were minor, but four adults and a child were being treated for smoke inhalation in hyperbaric chambers at Jacobi Medical Center.

Red Cross workers were on the scene assisting evacuated residents.

There is no word yet on what caused the fire.

Source: http://feeds.nbcnews.com/c/35002/f/653381/s/2aaf435d/l/0Lusnews0Bnbcnews0N0C0Inews0C20A130C0A40C130C17737750A0Ethree0Ealarm0Ebronx0Efire0Eleaves0E370Einjured0E50Ecritical0Dlite/story01.htm

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Like Mother, Like Son! Shakira?s Son Visits ?The Voice?

Milan debuts his judging skills with his mom on The Voice! Check out other cute and candid moments from the stars

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Brilliant: A Resignation Letter From A Public High School Teacher ...

'I am not leaving my profession... it has left me. It no longer exists'

The education crisis in America is real, and anyone who?s willing to publicly address it should be applauded. After teaching for 27 years at Westhill High School in New York, Gerald S. Conti resigned with a letter to his school?s Superintendent and the Board of Education. The brilliantly written letter has since gone viral, as it examines and problematizes the American educational system (and it is a system) from a personal and professional perspective. Towards the end of the letter he comes to an important conclusion: After writing all of this I realize that I am not leaving my profession, in truth, it has left me. It no longer exists. Click inside to read the full text of his letter.

Gerald S. Conti shared this letter a few weeks ago on his Facebook page. It is absolutely worth reading in full:

Mr. Casey Barduhn, Superintendent Westhill Central School District 400 Walberta Park Road Syracuse, New York 13219

Dear Mr. Barduhn and Board of Education Members:

It is with the deepest regret that I must retire at the close of this school year, ending my more than twenty-seven years of service at Westhill on June 30, under the provisions of the 2012-15 contract. I assume that I will be eligible for any local or state incentives that may be offered prior to my date of actual retirement and I trust that I may return to the high school at some point as a substitute teacher.

As with Lincoln and Springfield, I have grown from a young to an old man here; my brother died while we were both employed here; my daughter was educated here, and I have been touched by and hope that I have touched hundreds of lives in my time here. I know that I have been fortunate to work with a small core of some of the finest students and educators on the planet.

I came to teaching forty years ago this month and have been lucky enough to work at a small liberal arts college, a major university and this superior secondary school. To me, history has been so very much more than a mere job, it has truly been my life, always driving my travel, guiding all of my reading and even dictating my television and movie viewing. Rarely have I engaged in any of these activities without an eye to my classroom and what I might employ in a lesson, a lecture or a presentation. With regard to my profession, I have truly attempted to live John Dewey?s famous quotation (now likely clich? with me, I?ve used it so very often) that ?Education is not preparation for life, education is life itself.? This type of total immersion is what I have always referred to as teaching ?heavy,? working hard, spending time, researching, attending to details and never feeling satisfied that I knew enough on any topic. I now find that this approach to my profession is not only devalued, but denigrated and perhaps, in some quarters despised. STEM rules the day and ?data driven? education seeks only conformity, standardization, testing and a zombie-like adherence to the shallow and generic Common Core, along with a lockstep of oversimplified so-called Essential Learnings. Creativity, academic freedom, teacher autonomy, experimentation and innovation are being stifled in a misguided effort to fix what is not broken in our system of public education and particularly not at Westhill.

A long train of failures has brought us to this unfortunate pass. In their pursuit of Federal tax dollars, our legislators have failed us by selling children out to private industries such as Pearson Education. The New York State United Teachers union has let down its membership by failing to mount a much more effective and vigorous campaign against this same costly and dangerous debacle. Finally, it is with sad reluctance that I say our own administration has been both uncommunicative and unresponsive to the concerns and needs of our staff and students by establishing testing and evaluation systems that are Byzantine at best and at worst, draconian. This situation has been exacerbated by other actions of the administration, in either refusing to call open forum meetings to discuss these pressing issues, or by so constraining the time limits of such meetings that little more than a conveying of information could take place. This lack of leadership at every level has only served to produce confusion, a loss of confidence and a dramatic and rapid decaying of morale. The repercussions of these ill-conceived policies will be telling and shall resound to the detriment of education for years to come. The analogy that this process is like building the airplane while we are flying would strike terror in the heart of anyone should it be applied to an actual airplane flight, a medical procedure, or even a home repair.

Why should it be acceptable in our careers and in the education of our children? My profession is being demeaned by a pervasive atmosphere of distrust, dictating that teachers cannot be permitted to develop and administer their own quizzes and tests (now titled as generic ?assessments?) or grade their own students? examinations. The development of plans, choice of lessons and the materials to be employed are increasingly expected to be common to all teachers in a given subject. This approach not only strangles creativity, it smothers the development of critical thinking in our students and assumes a one-size-fits-all mentality more appropriate to the assembly line than to the classroom. Teacher planning time has also now been so greatly eroded by a constant need to ?prove up? our worth to the tyranny of APPR (through the submission of plans, materials and ?artifacts? from our teaching) that there is little time for us to carefully critique student work, engage in informal intellectual discussions with our students and colleagues, or conduct research and seek personal improvement through independent study. We have become increasingly evaluation and not knowledge driven.

Process has become our most important product, to twist a phrase from corporate America, which seems doubly appropriate to this case.

After writing all of this I realize that I am not leaving my profession, in truth, it has left me. It no longer exists. I feel as though I have played some game halfway through its fourth quarter, a timeout has been called, my teammates? hands have all been tied, the goal posts moved, all previously scored points and honors expunged and all of the rules altered.

For the last decade or so, I have had two signs hanging above the blackboard at the front of my classroom, they read, ?Words Matter? and ?Ideas Matter?. While I still believe these simple statements to be true, I don?t feel that those currently driving public education have any inkling of what they mean.

Sincerely and with regret,

Gerald J. Conti Social Studies Department Leader Cc: Doreen Bronchetti, Lee Roscoe

I?m so glad this letter and these ideas are going viral. The truth is, many of us feel similarly, and should probably be writing our own letters to various boards of education across the country.

Conti quotes John Dewey, and the truth is, education is not life. Not in this country, at least. Education is merely a means to an end. Which is why it was so appropriate for him to make that reference to the assembly line. And sadly, it?s been my experience that the institutions that do operate with the understand that education is life (as opposed to something you have to do or should do so you can live the life you really want to live) are ridiculously expensive, private institutions. I?m so proud of the education I got at Sarah Lawrence College. Like. So. Ridiculously. Proud. Too bad SLC is always topping Forbes?s Most Expensive Colleges list. Too bad I?m scared ish-less that a traditional public school won?t teach my son Jonovan what I really want him to learn, and he will instead experience many of the things Conti mentions (and many things I experienced in high school), because most schools teach children from the very beginning that education is somehow separate from everything else in life, that being educated is something you endure (rather than something that you navigate for yourself, with the guidance and support of teachers and parents). I love, love, love the Montessori school Jonovan goes to, and I love their specific philosophy of education? and at the same time, I don?t really love? um? how far behind I am on payments to said school! But considering the state of the educational system in this country, I?d rather start paying for him to experience education in a positive, organic way now (in preschool? because? yeah), than watch him experience the alternative. And I?m not kidding. I really am behind on those payments? lol! No, but seriously. It?s an issue.

I think it should also be noted that Conti is clearly a different kind of teacher. As in, a very good teacher. You can pick up on this just reading the comments and responses to his resignation on his Facebook page. here?s one from a former student, Mishal Kanabar:

Westhill [High School], to me, has a few outstanding memories (not in order):

1. Winning championships in football
2. Engineering classes
3. You, and the manner in which you taught your class. You prepared me for college more than anything else Westhill did. You let me teach about Hinduism in your classroom, and now I can attest some of my success to my 11th grade teacher. I would not be a lead engineer at my company if, in some part, you weren?t there because I was prepared and taught to think critically and freely.

Thank you Mr. Conti, and when I come back to Cuse I am buying you a drink.

Let?s be real. How many high school teachers are encouraging their students to ?think critically and freely?? It?s sad, but it?s just not going down like that. The educational system fails the teachers in many ways, but many teachers also fail their students (I think). I was lucky to have a lot of great teachers during my time in high school, but even they had a ?job? to do and much of that ?job? pertained to getting their students to pass standardized tests. Oh, and then I did have lots of crappy teachers as well. And sadly, even crappy teachers have so much to deal with, it?s hard to blame them fully for whatever they might be lacking.

So yes, this whole thing is a complicated problem, but I thought Conti did a brilliant job of tackling everything in his letter.

I?m curious to hear everyone?s thoughts on this. Did he hit the nail on the head, or what?

P.S. Conti makes great references to Abe Lincoln and Pearson Education. If some of them missed you (like they missed me) Rap Genius broke down much of the letter for us HERE.

[Source] [Source]

Source: http://www.pinkisthenewblog.com/2013-04-13/brilliant-a-resignation-letter-from-a-public-high-school-teacher-goes-viral

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