Hezbollah chief: group will keep fighting in Syria

This citizen journalism image provided by Aleppo Media Center AMC which has been authenticated based on its contents and other AP reporting, shows damaged buildings during battles between the rebels and the Syrian government forces, in Aleppo, Syria, Thursday, June 13, 2013. Syria's upwardly spiraling violence has resulted in the confirmed killings of almost 93,000 people, the United Nations' human rights office said Thursday but acknowledged the real number is likely to be far higher. (AP Photo/Aleppo Media Center AMC)

This citizen journalism image provided by Aleppo Media Center AMC which has been authenticated based on its contents and other AP reporting, shows damaged buildings during battles between the rebels and the Syrian government forces, in Aleppo, Syria, Thursday, June 13, 2013. Syria's upwardly spiraling violence has resulted in the confirmed killings of almost 93,000 people, the United Nations' human rights office said Thursday but acknowledged the real number is likely to be far higher. (AP Photo/Aleppo Media Center AMC)

FILE - This Wednesday, April 17, 2013 file citizen journalism image provided by Aleppo Media Center AMC which has been authenticated based on its contents and other AP reporting, shows a mass burial of people allegedly killed by Syrian Army snipers, in Aleppo, Syria. Syria's upwardly spiraling violence has resulted in the confirmed killings of almost 93,000 people, the United Nations' human rights office said Thursday but acknowledged the real number is likely to be far higher. (AP Photo/Aleppo Media Center AMC, File)

In this citizen journalism image provided by Edlib News Network, ENN, which has been authenticated based on its contents and other AP reporting, anti-Syrian regime protesters hold a banner and flash the victory sign during a demonstration in Hass town, Idlib province, northern Syria, Friday, June 14, 2013. The Syrian government on Friday dismissed U.S. charges that it used chemical weapons as "full of lies," accusing President Barack Obama of resorting to fabrications to justify his decision to arm Syrian rebels. The commander of the main rebel umbrella group welcomed the U.S. move. (AP Photo/Edlib News Network ENN)

In this citizen journalism image provided by Edlib News Network (ENN), anti-Syrian regime protesters hold a placard with a caricature during a demonstration at Kafr Nabil town in Idlib province, northern Syria, June 14, 2013. The Syrian government on Friday dismissed U.S. charges that it used chemical weapons as "full of lies," accusing President Barack Obama of resorting to fabrications to justify his decision to arm Syrian rebels. The commander of the main rebel umbrella group welcomed the U.S. move. The Arabic on the placard reads, "Let's go to Jihad." (AP Photo/Edlib News Network ENN)

BEIRUT (AP) ? The leader of Lebanon's Hezbollah group vowed Friday to keep fighting in Syria "wherever needed" and said his Shiite Muslim group has made a "calculated" decision to defend the Syrian regime no matter what the consequences.

The comments by Sheik Hassan Nasrallah in a speech to supporters in southern Beirut signaled for the first time the Iranian-backed group will stay involved in the civil war raging next door after helping President Bashar Assad's army recapture a key town in Syria's central Homs province from rebels.

President Barack Obama has authorized lethal aid to Syrian rebels after the U.S. announced it had conclusive evidence that the Syrian regime used chemical weapons. U.S. officials are still grappling with what type and how much weaponry to send, but the announcement buoyed opposition forces, which have found themselves heavily outgunned and outmanned by the Hezbollah-backed regime.

The Syrian government on Friday dismissed U.S. charges that it used chemical weapons as "full of lies," accusing Obama of resorting to fabrications to justify his decision to arm Syrian rebels.

U.S. officials said the administration could provide the rebel fighters with a range of weapons, including small arms, ammunition, assault rifles and a variety of anti-tank weaponry such as shoulder-fired rocket-propelled grenades and other missiles. The officials insisted on anonymity in order to discuss internal administration discussions with reporters.

Hezbollah has come under harsh criticism at home and abroad for sending its gunmen to Qusair, and Nasrallah's gamble in Syria primarily stems from his group's vested interest in the Assad regime's survival. The Syrian government has been one of Hezbollah's strongest backers for decades and the militant group fears that if the regime falls it will be replaced by a U.S.-backed government that will be hostile to Hezbollah.

Nasrallah said verbal and other attacks against his militant group "only serve to increase our determination."

"We will be where we should be, we will continue to bear the responsibility we took upon ourselves," Nasrallah said. "There is no need to elaborate... we leave the details to the requirements of the battlefield."

Assad's forces, aided by fighters from Lebanon's militant group Hezbollah, captured Qusair on June 5, dealing a heavy blow to rebels who had been entrenched in the strategic town for over a year.

Since then, the regime has shifted its attention to recapture other areas in the central Homs province and Aleppo to the north.

A visibly angry Nasrallah did not say outright whether his fighters would go as far as fighting in Aleppo, but his words strongly suggested the group was prepared to fight till the end.

"After Qusair for us will be the same as before Qusair," he said. "The project has not changed and our convictions have not changed."

Nasrallah reiterated that the fight in Syria was one against the "American, Israeli and Takfiri project" that was meant to destroy Syria, which along with Iran has been the group's main backer. Takfiri Islamists refers to an ideology that urges Sunni Muslims to kill anyone they consider an infidel.

Much of the group's arsenal, including tens of thousands of rockets, is believed to have come from Iran via Syria or from Syria itself.

In addition to the increased military aid, the U.S. also announced Thursday it had conclusive evidence that Assad's regime has used chemical weapons, including the nerve agent sarin, on a small scale against opposition forces. The White House said multiple chemical attacks last year killed up to 150 people.

Obama has said the use of chemical weapons cross a "red line," triggering greater U.S involvement in the crisis.

"The White House has issued a statement full of lies about the use of chemical weapons in Syria, based on fabricated information," a statement issued Friday by the Syrian Foreign Ministry said. "The United States is using cheap tactics to justify President Barack Obama's decision to arm the Syrian opposition," it said.

The statement also accused the U.S. of "double standards," saying America claims to combat terrorism while providing support for "terrorist" groups in Syria, such as Jabhat al-Nusra, with arms and money. The group, also known as the Nusra Front, is an al-Qaida affiliate that has emerged as one of the most effective rebel factions in Syria.

The commander of the main Western-backed rebel group fighting in Syria said he hoped that U.S. weapons will be in the hands of rebels in the near future.

"This will surely reflect positively on the rebels' morale, which is high despite attempts by the regime, Hezbollah and Iran to show that their morale after the fall of Qusair deteriorated," Gen. Salim Idris told Al-Arabiya TV.

Loay AlMikdad, a spokesman for the Free Syrian Army, said Idris will begin meeting with international players on Saturday to work out the details of the weapons and their delivery.

"We encourage them to take a decision in this relation, by establishing a no-fly zone either all over Syria or areas they choose based on their technical or military considerations on the ground," he said, adding that would ensure safe areas for civilians. "We hope they start arming immediately. Any delay costs blood of Syrians. It is not water, it is blood of the Syrians, women and children and its future."

AlMikdad said the rebels have asked for shoulder propelled rockets, thermal anti-tank missiles, anti-aircrafts missiles, surface to surface missiles and armored vehicles.

The regime's advances have added urgency to U.S. discussions on whether to provide the rebels with weapons. The United Nations said this week that nearly 93,000 people have been confirmed dead in Syria's civil war, but the actual number is believed to be much higher.

Russia, a staunch ally of Assad, disputed the U.S. charge that Syria used chemical weapons against the rebels.

President Vladimir Putin's foreign affairs adviser, Yuri Ushakov, told reporters that the information provided by U.S. officials to Russia "didn't look convincing."

But he said there was no talk yet about whether Russia could retaliate to the U.S. move to supply weapons to the Syrian rebels by delivering the S-300 air defense missile systems to the regime.

"We aren't competing over Syria, we are trying to settle the issue in a constructive way," he said.

Ushakov warned that providing such assistance could derail efforts to convene a Syria peace conference. The main opposition coalition has already said it would not attend, all but scuttling the initiative.

Alexey Pushkov, chairman of Russia's parliamentary foreign affairs committee, wrote on his Twitter account Friday that "the data on Assad's use of chemical weapons were faked in the same place as the lie about (Saddam) Hussein's weapons of mass destruction," referring to the deposed Iraqi dictator.

"Obama is going down the route of G. Bush," he added, in reference to former President George W. Bush's assertion ? never proven, but used to justify the invasion of Iraq ? that Saddam Hussein possessed weapons of mass destruction.

A lawmaker in Damascus echoed those comments.

"This reminds us of what America did in the prelude to the invasion of Iraq by releasing fabrications and lies to the international community that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction," said Issam Khalil, a member of Assad's Baath party.

In Friday's violence, Syrian troops and rebels fought some of the heaviest battles in months in Aleppo, Syria's largest city, activists said.

The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said the clashes were concentrated in the city's eastern rebel-held neighborhood of Sakhour, calling the fighting "the most violent in months." It said regime troops attacked the neighborhood from two directions but failed to advance, suffering casualties.

___

Associated Press writers Albert Aji in Damascus and Vladimir Isachenkov contributed to this report from Moscow.

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/cae69a7523db45408eeb2b3a98c0c9c5/Article_2013-06-14-Syria/id-37181dd0f401476ebc492f1bfe47a519

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Expert: Dying woman should have got Irish abortion

DUBLIN (AP) ? A miscarrying woman who died in an Irish hospital should have had her blood poisoning detected much sooner and been offered an abortion to improve her odds of survival, an experts' report concluded Thursday in a case that is forcing Ireland to modernize its abortion laws.

The 108-page report into the October death of Savita Halappanavar documented what the lead investigator described as "a cascade of mistakes" overshadowed by officials' refusal to remove the fetus until its heart stopped beating.

That took four days. By then, the report found, the woman's ill-diagnosed sepsis from a ruptured uterus already had reached lethal levels.

"If it was my case, I would have terminated the pregnancy," Dr. Sabaratnam Arulkumaran, a London professor of obstetrics and gynecology who led the seven-month probe, said. The five investigators found that a chain of doctors and nurses all failed to take proactive steps to identify and halt the spread of infection throughout her body.

The report found that when Halappanavar, a 31-year-old Indian dentist living in the western city of Galway, was hospitalized for back pain 17 weeks into her pregnancy, doctors identified she was miscarrying and the fetus could not survive.

But they consistently missed evidence for days pointing to an existing case of sepsis, or blood poisoning, as the cause. Blood test results were left uninspected and successive shifts failed to read earlier medical notes as vital signs worsened.

The report found that doctors placed too much emphasis on measuring the fetus' heartbeat and too little on investigating why Halappanavar's white blood-cell count was jumping, her blood pressure was falling and her heart rate and temperature were rising. All were signs of growing internal infection linked to a rupture in her uterus that a night-shift doctor identified in notes, but a day-shift doctor failed to read.

Arulkumaran said Ireland's doctors and constitutional lawyers must draft regulations that specify when an abortion can be performed on a pregnant woman suffering sepsis, because such cases can surge to lethal levels within hours.

He said some Irish doctors' wait-and-see approach, fearful of violating Ireland's constitutional ban on abortion, presented an unjustifiable courting of danger to the patient.

"When sepsis sets in, it is difficult to say who is going to live and who is going to die. We are just guessing here," he said, describing the death rate from severe sepsis as 40 percent and septic shock as 60 percent. He said if Halappanavar had received an abortion and aggressive doses of antibiotics early into her hospitalization, "the risk would be much less."

She delivered a dead fetus four days into her hospitalization, and fell into a coma and died of massive organ failure four days later.

The findings came hours after Ireland's government published a bill to create new rules on when doctors can perform abortions to save the life of a woman.

Six previous governments had refused to draft such a bill in support of a 1992 Supreme Court judgment that declared such abortions should be legal, given that the constitution ? despite its supposed blanket ban on abortion ? also guarantees to protect the woman's right to life.

Most controversially, the Supreme Court said abortion should be legal in cases when doctors deem one necessary to stop a woman from killing herself.

Anti-abortion activists argue that permitting a suicide threat as legal grounds would be open to abuse and encourage wider abortion access.

"The suicide ground will lead to abortion on request, and that will be very destructive of unborn children's lives and it's deeply unjust," said Sen. Ronan Mullen, a Catholic conservative.

Previous governments insisted they didn't need to pass any law in support of the court judgment, and instead twice tried to roll back its suicide provision in national referendums that voters rejected in 1992 and 2002. A 2011 European Court of Human Rights ruled that Ireland's inaction was jeopardizing women's health by forcing seriously ill women to travel overseas for abortions.

The legal limbo also has left Irish maternity hospitals and obstetricians to guess when they could perform an abortion to save a woman's life without facing the risk of a murder charge. Scores of such terminations have occurred annually in total secrecy for the past two decades, with the number of deaths connected to delayed treatment unknown. Halappanavar's case became public only because her widower spoke out, denouncing the imposition of Catholic teaching on a Hindu.

When presenting the Protection of Life During Pregnancy Bill, Prime Minister Enda Kenny declared in parliament that he "happens to be a Catholic" but could not govern as a Catholic prime minister. He wants the bill passed by July and is threatening to expel lawmakers from his party who oppose him.

Kenny's statement, during which he described receiving letters written in blood from anti-abortion activists, is being seen as a watershed moment in church-state relations in predominantly Catholic Ireland, where past generations of leaders showed public deference to church authority and handed substantial control of schools, hospitals and social services to Catholic orders.

The bill would permit abortions for women threatening suicide only if three doctors, including two psychiatrists, ruled that the woman's threat was severe. Abortions for non-emergency cases involving a threat to life would require support from two doctors.

Many lawmakers and doctors say Irish women will sidestep these Irish hurdles and keep traveling to neighboring England for abortions, where the practice was legalized in 1967. More than 4,000 Irish women receive abortions there annually.

"Unfortunately I don't think the provisions on suicide will encourage any woman to go through that system in Ireland," lawmaker Thomas Pringle said.

An opinion poll published Thursday in The Irish Times indicated overwhelming public support for the bill, with strong majorities wishing the bill extended abortion rights further.

The poll found 89 percent want abortions to be granted in cases where a woman's life is endangered from medical complications caused by pregnancy.

About 83 percent also wanted abortion legalized in cases where the fetus couldn't survive at birth, 81 percent for cases of pregnancy caused by rape or incest, and 78 percent where a woman's health ? not simply her life ? was undermined by pregnancy. The bill excludes those three scenarios.

The poll of 1,000 people this week across the Republic of Ireland, a country of 4.6 million, had an error margin of 3 percentage points.

___

Online:

Report on Halappanavar death: http://bit.ly/1bAITHT

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/expert-dying-woman-got-irish-abortion-184528492.html

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Stefani Jackenthal: Ultra-Running: The Epic Giants Causeway, North Ireland

My feet felt as light as helium balloons and my adrenaline thumped like boiling oil as we sprinted off the starting line. It had been nearly four years since my last ultrarunning race and despite the callous wind knocking me around like a paper doll, I felt dangerously blissful -- as if I sipped one too many espressos.

I chased the lead group of runners up the steep asphalt hill leading out of Larrybane Head Quarry for the 50K Lost Worlds Trail Series Causeway Crossing http://www.lostworldsracing.com along the Antrim Coast in North Ireland. The early afternoon May sun on that chilly Saturday played hide and seek behind a band of puffy clouds. We turned onto a windswept field and a gust of wind knocked me back like a boxer hit with a solid right jab. Tall emerald wild grass danced high above the mighty white-capped sea swathed by black volcanic rocks peppering the shoreline below.

I was the lead woman and took a quick glimpse over my shoulder as I unhooked the latch on the first of countless sheep retaining wooden fences. Not another woman in site. I slipped through the opening, picked up my pace and settled into a relaxed, brisk trot. It was a long way to the turn-around at the stone ruins of Dunluce Castle, the headquarters of the MacDonnell Clan in 1513 and target of several takeovers.

My fitness was a crapshoot, considering my "long" training run was three hours in Central Park, NYC, where I live just a few blocks away. I was counting on experience and adrenaline to get me to the finish line of this 31-mile out and back race.

A brief stint back on the asphalt led us down a twisty switchback road that ultimately dumped us onto the rocky kelp beach of Ballintoy Harbour. The pure sea air was delightful as I gently picked my way over colossal piles of slimy kelp - squish, squish, squish - that looked liked seaweed salad on steroids. Cautiously, I crossed slippery taupe and ashen boulders, which were unnerving to navigate for this urban chic.

I was relieved to reach the flat sandy beach and run along the foamy water ebbing out and flowing in. The ocean spray on my face felt refreshing. The booming crashing waves were hushed by viscous headwind that made it feel like I was running through molasses. In the distance, grassy jagged mountains sprouted out of the turbulent ocean.

My wishes were granted when a tall, broad guy clad in a blue-shirt lumbered past me. In a snap, I jumped on his heels for protection from the raging wind, mimicking his stride. An admitted heel sucking pig, I stayed tightly tucked behind him - drafting like a bike racer - until we hit the end of the beach and began climbing to higher ground. Beneath us, cobalt foamy water split shaggy jade sea cliffs.

Approaching the first aide station, a quarter way into the race, Jolene Mellon, a local Ironman triathlete - turned ultrarunner - caught me. A tinge of disappointment lit through me like a lightening bolt. But, after an hour trotting mostly solo, it was nice to have company. I sipped water from my Gregory backpack while we swapped stories about NYC and North Ireland. Jolene lives about 90 minutes away and while she doesn't train in the area, she ran part of the course during the 2009 Causeway Coast half trail marathon, from Ballintoy Harbour to Portballintrae. "It was my very first off-road race and I thought that anyone crazy enough to do a full marathon or heaven forbid an ultra on this course should be institutionalized." she said with a smirk.

As if plucked from a scene of the Hobbit, the sprawling fertile farmland melded with craggy wooly mammoth cliffs that sharply dropped into the ocean. We trotted up slatted staircases, over hilly grassy knolls and past herds of fluffy sheep with black faces. Oddly, the sheep were spray painted with neon blue numbers - apparently, a sort of accounting system.

Monster crosswinds roared as Jolene and I stomped to the upper cliffs. My adrenaline buzz was gone and my legs had turned to anvils. I backed off pace and sucked a chocolate PowerGel, hoping to re-ignite the fire with a shot of sugar and caffeine. Jolene did the same. We upped pace. But my wheels were wobbly and I was unable to keep with her powerful stride. She cut through the violent wind like a chef's knife through paper. While, I felt more like a dull butter knife spreading lard.

I watched Jolene's red and white jersey disappear around the corner of the first set of stairs leading down to the epic Giant's Causeway, inscribed as Ireland's first U.N.E.S.C.O World Heritage Site in 1986. Its some 40,000 interlocking black basalt columns - many hexagonal - sprouting out of the sea, were formed by volcanic eruptions nearly 60 million years ago.

I've raced and run around the globe - Borneo, Ecuador, South Africa, Costa Rica, India, Croatia, Uganda, Tibet - and this was amongst the most beautiful and magical. It was a typical Tim Holmstrom production - visually stunning and equally physically brutal. Once a renowned adventure photographer, Holmstrom turned his eye to creating astounding adventure runs in some of the planet's most magnificent locales. "I believe in the magic and allure of certain places and their profound ability to transport - you if you let them." said Holmstrom, founder of Lost Worlds Racing. "My hope is to offer challenging races in extraordinary locations and create indelible experiences for our runners and their guests."

In 2005, I participated in Holstrom's first international race-directing endeavor, The Coastal Challenge, a six-day, 250K running stage-race in Costa Rica. Each day was a new arduous mountain run along pristine beaches, through mountainous rain and cloud forests. Race staff moved gear to the finish line, where racers camped overnight swapping the day's adventures of Howler Monkey's screeching overhead in canopied jungles, quad-burning downhills and hoofing steep, muddy trails. Next February is the 10th edition, which I'm hoping to run.

"You went off the line pretty quick this morning." said a yellow shirt-clad local runner from Belfast, who appeared beside me. "I never thought I'd catch you." I cringed, thinking, "don't remind me." I tapped his local knowledge for my overnight stay in Belfast after the race. "Go to The Spaniard for a Dark & Stormy!" he insisted. "It's a cozy, funky place with great jazz and drinks." Who was I to argue?

We trotted along a jumble of gravel paths, dodging and weaving through scores of camera-clutching tourists who were admiring the Causeway's feral surroundings. The frenetic energy was jarring after running in remoteness for much of the route.

We crossed paths with local legend Hannah Shields who was competing in the 100K-race, which started earlier that morning. Shields, who is an orthodontist by trade, is the first Irish woman to complete a 350-mile ski race to the Magnetic North Pole, while pulling 100-pound sled and the first North Irish woman to summit Mt. Everest.

This was the second race in the three-part Lost Words Trail Series, offering 100K, 50K or 25K options. The Tuscany Crossing, in Tuscany, Italy took place the prior week and the Ladonia Crossing, starting in Kullabeg - a nature reserve situated on a peninsula, in southwest Sweden - was set for the following. Kristi Battalini, a Chicago police detective, who ran the 50K with us in Ireland, planned to race the 50K in Sweden, after exploring Europe for the week with her Mom.

The Lost Worlds Trail Series Championships are set for summer 2014 in Greece, starting near Meteora, renowned for its 60 million year old grouping of 24 monasteries - a U.N.E.S.C.O World Heritage site - built on 1312 feet sandstone peaks, overlooking Peneas Valley.

My Belfast friend took off and again, I was alone - but not for long. About two miles from the turn-around, a local woman Col Conway caught me. She was gung-ho to hammer. We traded places into the turn-around at Dunluce Castle, an archaic crumbled stone structure that castle was destroyed in an epic storm in 1639. I was relieved to have the first 15.5 miles done and happier about the tailwind home. Admittedly, I thought about the opulent 20-year old Bushmills Whiskey that I sipped at Clenaghans Pub http://www.clenaghans.com in Moira on my first night in Ireland - as we were just a couple a miles from the Bushmills Distillery.

The tailwind felt divine and infused me with renewed bounding energy. I passed Col on a sloping downhill section, only to be passed back by her upon hitting a rocky section with a pushy side-wind. At the three-and-half hour mark the wheels came off my bus. My legs were as heavy a whiskey casks and I caught my toe on rock. Splat! Superman crashed onto the spongy green meadow. It knocked the wind out of me, like a boxer to the matt. Other than a scraped knee and sore ribs - I was OK.

Buena vistas rewarded me as I pushed down on the top of my aching quads helping to propel my weary legs up the long, steep rock staircase winding up and out of the Giant's Causeway. Despite fatigue, I couldn't stop saying "This is f**king amazing!"

At the top, I ran into Michael and Jordan Napoli, a father and 22-year old daughter from Orlando, Florida. The Napoli's, who do marathons and adventure races for family fun, made the 25K the start of their Ireland family vacation. "We saw the race video on Facebook and decided we HAD to do it!" said Michael, a software applications developer, whose wife Mary-Jo, a subcontract administrator for a defense contractor, had started the 25K with them, but turned back due to a foot injury. "After doing this we are going to do the Tuscany race in 2014."

I was relieved to finally reach the beach, knowing I was nearing the finish. As I diligently dibbed and dabbed across the slippery rocks, another local women passed me. "Ugh!" I let out an audible Charlie Brown howl. My heart sunk. So close to the finish and I was going to lose podium. I needed conserve my energy - and not get hurt. So, I let her go, but kept her in lassoing range.

Once clear of the technical terrain, I found my mojo. My posture straightened and leg speed hastened as I hoofed past her using my last reserves of energy. I huffed and puffed up the twisty, steep long asphalt road out of the Harbour and I glanced back to confirm my lead. She was walking up the hill. Phew! I joyously galloped across the gusty field and shuffled down the dirt path. Music and cheers filled the air. My heart raced. With pumping elbows and knees - and a big ole smile - I crossed the finish line, placing 3rd amongst the women in just over five hours.

Side Note:
In Belfast, the day after the race: Following a lovely refueling dinner in The Great Room in the Merchant Hotel http://www.themerchanthotel.com, my race pal Ty Stevens and I tracked down The Spaniard http://www.thespaniardbar.com and ordered Dark & Stormy's - 1 oz dark rum, 2 oz ginger beer, squeezed fresh lime, 2 shakes of bitters, served over ice. We toasted a fantastic race - and the guy in yellow shirt. Cheers!

?

Follow Stefani Jackenthal on Twitter: www.twitter.com/@stefjackenthal

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Source: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/stefani-jackenthal/ultrarunning-the-epic-gia_b_3422611.html

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Cool muscles: Storing elastic energy for flight - Science News

(Phys.org) ?Flying has always fascinated humans, probably because we are so relentlessly Earthbound. One of the things that interests researchers who study flight is the question of how animals that do it can generate the energy required. Flying is an intensely power-hungry activity that is less than 10% efficient. Some studies have suggested that physical properties of the molecules involved in insect flight might contribute small amounts of energy to the flight "power grid" through potential energy savings in the form of elastic strain energy.

Insight into this question has been provided by research completed at the Biophysics Collaborative Access Team (Bio-CAT) beamline 18-ID at the U.S. Department of Energy's Advanced Photon Source (APS) at Argonne National Laboratory.

The study, by researchers from the University of Washington, the Illinois Institute of Technology, and Harvard University combines time-resolved small-angle x-ray diffraction with measurements of mechanical energy-exchange in the wing muscle of the moth Manduca sexta to create high-speed video of muscle motion at the molecular level. Their results, published in Science magazine, show that temperature differences between the dorsal (top) and ventral (bottom) sides of the wing create an opportunity for elastic strain energy to be stored in the cooler regions of the muscle and then released during the transitions between contraction and relaxation to assist with the inertial power costs associated with accelerating and decelerating the wings.

The breakthrough in this work was the development of an apparatus that allowed the team to make high-speed x-ray diffraction measurements at the same time as they measured wing-muscle motion mechanics.

To do this, the researchers first fixed the body and flight muscle of the moth onto a "work-loop" apparatus that allowed them to stimulate muscle contractions in a controlled manner that simulated flight while measuring the forces of those contractions.

Next, the work-loop apparatus was aligned into the x-ray beam and a custom shutter was installed to allow for high-speed measurements. The team recorded 5 diffraction images per wing-beat cycle, 1 every 8 milliseconds, for 100 cycles at 25? C and at 35? C.

The force generated during muscle contraction is known to result from the ratcheting of cross-bridge proteins along other muscle filament proteins. As the cross-bridge proteins bind, move, and release the filament, they generate force. As with all molecular interactions, the cross-bridges move faster at higher temperatures. These researchers had already shown that the temperature of the muscle on the dorsal and ventral sides of the moth wing can differ by as much as 6.9? C during flight.

By taking their x-ray diffraction images at 25? C and 35? C?temperatures that cover the range observed for M. sexta wing muscle?they were able to see what was going on at each temperature at the molecular level.

The x-ray diffraction data showed differences in the spacing of the molecules involved in muscle contraction depending on the temperature. This indicated that the cross-bridges cycled faster at the warmer temperature and slower at the cooler temperature.

These results support a model in which the cross-bridges that drive the muscles on the warmer, underside of the wing cycle quickly during flight, while cross-bridges on the cool, top side of the wing remain bound to filaments longer, building up strain until it is released as elastic energy as the muscle advances into its next phase of shortening or lengthening.

According to Professor Tom Daniel, lead author of the study, "The combination of advanced technologies at the APS and the x-ray expertise of Tom Irving, Director of Bio-CAT and our collaborator on this project, made possible a new view of how temperature, strain, and molecular motors conspire to produce a range of functions in a single muscle: from an actuator to a spring."

This work provides important information about how flying species meet the energy needs of their powerful adaptation and may have implications for locomotion in general.

Explore further: Hybrid carbon nanotube yarn muscle

More information: George, N. et al. The Cross-Bridge Spring: Can Cool Muscles Store Elastic Energy? Science 340(6137), 1217 (7 June 2013). DOI:10.1126/science.1229573

Source: http://phys.org/news/2013-06-cool-muscles-elastic-energy-flight.html

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Video: One-on-one with Eddie Lacy

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Slight decline in early trading on Wall Street

NEW YORK (AP) ? Disappointing earnings results weighed on the stock market in early trading on Thursday, following two steep drops this week.

Shortly after 11:30 a.m., the Dow Jones industrial average was off 46 points at 14,572, a decline of 0.3 percent. The Dow lost 138 points the day before and is down 2 percent for the week.

Morgan Stanley, Pepsi and others joined in the parade of companies turning in quarterly results Thursday. Morgan Stanley sank 5 percent to $20.47 after reporting a drop in earnings and revenue. It made less money from trading bonds and commodities, a common theme for many investment banks.

Ebay's stock sank 5 percent to $53.38 after the online auction company cut its forecast for profits in the current quarter.

Verizon, Pepsi and Union Pacific surged after reporting quarterly results. Verizon Communications' profits beat analysts' predictions as wireless revenue kept rising at a rate that's the envy of the industry. Profits and sales for Pepsi also surpassed estimates. Verizon's stock gained 3 percent to $51.09, while Pepsi climbed 5 percent to $82.78.

Higher shipping rates pushed Union Pacific's profit up 11 percent, and the railroad said it expects shipping to pick up later this year. Union Pacific rose 4 percent to $142.11.

After the closing bell, the tech sector weighs in with earnings from IBM, Google and Microsoft.

The market didn't get any help from economic news early Thursday.

The Labor Department reported that the number of Americans seeking unemployment benefits increased 4,000 last week to 352,000. The slight gain suggests that the sluggish hiring seen in March may not last. Applications are a proxy for layoffs.

Also, the Philadelphia branch of the Federal Reserve reported a slowdown in manufacturing in the mid-Atlantic region. The survey was weaker than economists had been expecting.

In other trading, the Standard & Poor's 500 index fell five points, or 0.3 percent, to 1,547. The Nasdaq composite fell 21 points, or 0.6 percent, to 3,183.

In the market for U.S. government bonds, Treasury prices rose and their yields fell as traders moved money into low-risk assets.

The yield on the 10-year Treasury note slipped back to 1.69 percent, near its lowest level of the year. That's down from 1.70 percent late Wednesday.

Commodities prices held steady following sharp falls earlier this week. Crude oil was little changed at $86 a barrel and copper was down 2 cents at $3.16 a pound. Gold edged up $9 to $1,392 an ounce.

On Monday gold had its biggest plunge in 30 years as U.S. inflation receded and worries escalated that European central banks might start selling gold. Crude has lost $10 a barrel over the past two weeks as the outlook for the global economy weakens and oil supplies remain high.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/slight-decline-early-trading-wall-street-135003823--finance.html

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Peel-and-stick solar cells

Wednesday, April 17, 2013

It may be possible soon to charge cell phones, change the tint on windows, or power small toys with peel-and-stick versions of solar cells, thanks to a partnership between Stanford University and the U.S. Department of Energy's National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL).

A scientific paper, "Peel and Stick: Fabricating Thin Film Solar Cells on Universal Substrates," appears in the online version of Scientific Reports, a subsidiary of the British scientific journal Nature.

Peel-and-stick, or water-assisted transfer printing (WTP), technologies were developed by the Stanford group and have been used before for nanowire based electronics, but the Stanford-NREL partnership has conducted the first successful demonstration using actual thin film solar cells, NREL principal scientist Qi Wang said.

The university and NREL showed that thin-film solar cells less than one-micron thick can be removed from a silicon substrate used for fabrication by dipping them in water at room temperature. Then, after exposure to heat of about 90?C for a few seconds, they can attach to almost any surface.

Wang met Stanford's Xiaolin Zheng at a conference last year where Wang gave a talk about solar cells and Zheng talked about her peel-and-stick technology. Zheng realized that NREL had the type of solar cells needed for her peel-and-stick project.

NREL's cells could be made easily on Stanford's peel off substrate. NREL's amorphous silicon cells were fabricated on nickel-coated Si/SiO2 wafers. A thermal release tape attached to the top of the solar cell serves as a temporary transfer holder. An optional transparent protection layer is spin-casted in between the thermal tape and the solar cell to prevent contamination when the device is dipped in water. The result is a thin strip much like a bumper sticker: the user can peel off the handler and apply the solar cell directly to a surface.

"It's been a quite successful collaboration," Wang said. "We were able to peel it off nicely and test the cell both before and after. We found almost no degradation in performance due to the peel-off."

Zheng said the partnership with NREL is the key for this successful work. "NREL has years of experience with thin film solar cells that allowed us to build upon their success," Zheng said. "Qi Wang and (NREL engineer) William Nemeth are very valuable and efficient collaborators."

Zheng said cells can be mounted to almost any surface because almost no fabrication is required on the final carrier substrates.

The cells' ability to adhere to a universal substrate is unusual; most thin-film cells must be affixed to a special substrate. The peel-and-stick approach allows the use of flexible polymer substrates and high processing temperatures. The resulting flexible, lightweight, and transparent devices then can be integrated onto curved surfaces such as military helmets and portable electronics, transistors and sensors.

In the future, the collaborators will test peel-and-stick cells that are processed at even higher temperatures and offer more power.

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DOE/National Renewable Energy Laboratory: http://www.nrel.gov

Thanks to DOE/National Renewable Energy Laboratory for this article.

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Source: http://www.labspaces.net/127783/Peel_and_stick_solar_cells

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