For an employee to win a dis?crimination lawsuit, he has to show that he was qualified for the job he held.
Some employers assume that if they disciplined the employee for poor performance, that proves he wasn?t qualified. But a court might not see it that way if you trained and tested him before putting him to work.
Recent case: Gregory, who is black, was hired as a forklift operator for Seneca Foods. Before beginning work, he took a training class and passed the exit tests with flying colors. However, it soon became clear that he wasn?t very careful; accidents and safety violations began piling up. Finally, Gregory was fired after he derailed a group of carts he was transporting.
Gregory sued, alleging race discrimination and contending that white forklift operators were treated more favorably.
Seneca tried to have the case tossed out. It argued it had proved Gregory wasn?t qualified for his job when it cited his numerous accidents and safety violations.
The court disagreed. It noted that being qualified is different from being a good employee. Because Gregory passed the training tests, he was qualified for the job. He could therefore keep his lawsuit moving, leaving Seneca to show it had legitimate reasons for firing him.
Fortunately for the company, it did. Seneca showed that Gregory?s safety record was by far the worst among his co-workers and that was why it fired him. Gregory then couldn?t show that others were treated more leniently. He lost his case. (Jackson v. Seneca Foods, No. 09-CV-6241, WD NY, 2012)
Final note: When firing for poor performance, don?t assume you?ll automatically win because the employee isn?t qualified for his job. You must be ready to show that others with similar work problems were also fired.
Like what you've read? ...Republish it and share great business tips!
Attention: Readers, Publishers, Editors, Bloggers, Media, Webmasters and more...
We believe great content should be read and passed around. After all, knowledge IS power. And good business can become great with the right information at their fingertips. If you'd like to share any of the insightful articles on BusinessManagementDaily.com, you may republish or syndicate it without charge.
The only thing we ask is that you keep the article exactly as it was written and formatted. You also need to include an attribution statement and link to the article.
" This information is proudly provided by Business Management Daily.com: http://www.businessmanagementdaily.com/34288/employee-passed-test-hes-probably-qualified "
The first Ouya $99 video game consoles are expected to ship next week to customers who backed the team?s Kickstarter campaign. Users will be able to download and play games on their TV using the small Android-powered game system.
While most of those games will be Android titles optimized for use with a gamepad and TV (instead of a phone or tablet with a touchscreen), you may also be able to play games that were never intended for Android at all ? because the Ouya supports emulators.
Developer Paul Lamb has ported his Mupen64 emulator to the Ouya platform, which will allow users to play Nintendo64 games with an Ouya.
Other developers are also working on emulators for the classic Nintendo Entertainment System (NES) and possibly other consoles as well.
It?s no surprise that you?can use emulators on the Ouya. After all, folks have been designing and running game console emulators on Android phones and tablets for years. And users will be able to side-load any of those apps onto an Ouya.
But the Ouya team is also taking a pretty liberal approach toward emulators in their app store.
In a nutshell, as long as developers don?t offer any copyrighted games or other content, they can distribute their apps in the Ouya store. Lamb?s Mupen64 emulator, for instance, was already approved (although he needs to remove from copyrighted artwork from his screenshots and submit it again).
If you already have an Ouya (or pretty much any other Android device), you can also download the latest beta version of Mupen64 from Lamb?s website.
Theoretically it?s possible for folks to buy a PlayStation, Nintendo64, or other game disc or cartridge and use special hardware and software to rip a video game ROM for personal use with this sort of game emulation software. Most people don?t do that. Instead they download games illegally from the internet, which is why emulators tend to hang out in a relatively gray legal area.
But it?s good to know that in addition to supporting a growing number of Android games, Ouya?s $99 game console will also be able to play hundreds of classic games that were always meant to be used with a TV and gamepad.
The Ouya game console features an NVIDIA Tegra 3 quad-core processor, 1GB of RAM, and 8GB of storage and comes with a wireless game controller. While the first units should ship on March 28th, if you weren?t a Kickstarter backer you?ll have to wait until June to get your hands on one.
via AndroidPC.es and GameFans
If you're new here, you may want to subscribe to our RSS feed, follow us on Twitter, or "like" us on Facebook. Thanks for visiting!
key specs
reviews ?0
prices
Game formatDownloadable
Drive capacity8 GB
Controller typeWireless
Video outputsHDMI
Released04/01/2013
see all specs ?
There are not any user reviews for this product yet. Why not be the first to write one?
Get better reviews from people who actually have this product!
Today, Convention Center Hotel reservation services are getting better day by day. Miami Beach Convention Center Hotels has added to the list as well. These service providers take booking or reservations for hotels. Also, you can book or make reservations online easily and conveniently. In addition to individual booking, you can also make group bookings and much more. Also, you can avail various features and facilities on these hotels like few kilometers from Miami Beach Convention Center, internet facility, smoke-free hotels, club house facilities like swimming pool, gymnasium, etc, spa, on-site fitness center, and many other amazing features. Apart from this, in these hotels guestrooms and suites are decorated with unique items along with complete kitchen equipments available. The bathroom of these hotels is build with Italian marble with all the basic facilities available. Also, these hotels have accommodations for families required two bedroom suites.
These hotels are mostly famous for its ocean views and are perfect for jogging and walking. But when it comes to dining place, these hotels are famous for its eye-catching views and also offer a wide variety of multicultural cuisines. Also, there is numerous luxury hotels located at Miami. These Miami Beach Convention Center Hotels offer exclusive offers with huge discounts, making them within the budget for those individuals who want to have amazing Miami views. For more information on these Miami located hotels you can visit to different websites located on the internet and go for the right hotel as per your budget and convenience. Not only this, Las Vegas Convention Center Hotels are also in great demand these days as they have reservations for everyone whether high class or low class people. If you want to add luxury in your trip the city has a lot to offer you in terms of luxurious hotels but if you dont have much budget you can also find many hotels as per pocket convenience.
As Las Vegas is the place where several tourists visits each day. This has led to increase the competition among the hoteliers there. In order to fascinate the guests, they provide numerous attractive packages with huge discounts as well. Even five stars are providing attractive packages and discounts for its guests. It is also advisable to go for online booking of Las Vegas Convention Center Hotels. You will get many options to choose from and you can book the one which suits your pocket. Also you can have toll free numbers of many hotels located in Las Vegas to find out the current availability of discounts, deals and packages. For a complete list of hotels you take help of travel agents or travel websites to search out better deals available in Las Vegas hotels.
Also some guides are available on the internet which provides complete information on reservations available in Las Vegas hotels, discounts available in Las Vegas Hotels, cheap hotels, and hotels offers online reservations and much more. Apart from this, the Convention Center Hotels located either in Miami or in Las Vegas offers a high quality services to compliment the visitors and provide convention facilities as well.
About the Author: Clarkebradley is associated with Hotels and provides his expert consultation on Miami Beach Convention Center Hotels and Las Vegas Convention Center Hotels services. He is an authority over the subjects and aspects concerning Hotels services and his expertise may be quite valuable to you.
5200 Paint Branch Pkwy, College Park, MD | Get?Directions?? $20.00
Kids ages 10 and Under are invited to play in a Tennis Play Day Rally to benefit The Children's Inn at NIH. Join,? Kids Play For Good ambassador Henry Ko, on court Sunday, April 21st from 2:00-5:00 pm. at the Tennis Center College Park.? Three hours of non-stop fun, games and friendly round robin competition. ?All ability levels are welcome! Loaner racquets provided for beginning players. You don't need a partner to sign up! ?Click here to REGISTER?! ?
Sideline activity too: Artist Len Garon will be taking live action photos (and orders) to create personalized tennis portraits/posters. To learn more and to order your portrait ?Click Here . ?
Proceeds from the Tennis Rally benefit The Children's Inn at the National Institutes of Health. ?The Inn is a residential "place like home" for sick children and their families. ?
Join us for a special day of Tennis Kids Making a Difference on April 21st at the Tennis Center at College Park!
Barnes & Noble is kicking off a seriously nice limited time deal where buyers of a Nook tablet will be given a free Nook e-reader to complete the set. The tablet was already a good buy, but the addition of the e-reader makes this offer nearly irresistible.
The 9-inch Nook HD+ tablet has a nice full HD screen (1920x1280) and solid specs, as well as an eye-grabbing design. It's not the biggest, smallest, cheapest, or most advanced tablet on the market, but it's still a good device (we'd advise spending the extra $30 to double your storage to 32GB).
Adding a free e-reader to go along with it really sweetens the pot. The Nook Simple Touch doesn't light up like the latest generation of e-paper devices, but it's a solid, simple reading device ? and at 100 percent off, the price sure is right.
You can take advantage of the deal by buying a Nook HD+ any time during the week starting Sunday the 24th and ending on the 31st.
Devin Coldewey is a contributing writer for NBC News Digital. His personal website is coldewey.cc.
Home ? Innovation ? The Sum of the Parts is Not Always Greater When Working in Teams
March 22, 2013 ?
Today?s Friday Fun Fact?
I was recently at a seminar where the instructor asked a very straightforward question of the participants; one that everyone in the room should have been able to readily answer.? However, what followed was complete silence. ?Crickets.
Why is it that once we are assembled into a group such as this, despite having an answer, we often choose not to respond?
In my book Best Practices Are Stupid, I talk about collaboration versus competition, and how each is useful for different reasons as part of your innovation strategy.? While collaboration is essential for success, if not managed properly, it can come with significant drawbacks. One of the reasons I discuss is something called social loafing.
Social loafing is a proven phenomenon where individuals within the group assume that someone else will pick up the slack therefore exerting less effort.? In the case of the silence at my seminar, each participant knew that if they waited long enough, someone else would eventually respond. Or was the case, the instructor would give the answer,
This phenomenon has been proven out scientifically.
In an experiment conducted in the early 1900s, Max Ringelmann showed that individuals exerted more effort when working alone than when they worked collectively.? When he asked a group of men to pull on a rope, they did not pull as hard as a group, as they did when each was pulling on their own. While one plausible explanation was lack of coordination, subsequent research shows that it is more a function of motivation.
A study in the Journal of Management demonstrated that ?at the individual level, increases in task interdependence and decreases in task visibility and distributive justice were associated with greater occurrence of social loafing. At the group level, increased group size and decreased cohesiveness were related to increased levels of social loafing.?
Another study examines the sucker effect, which ?stems from the perceptions that others in the group are withholding, or intend to withhold, effort. Individuals who hold this perception then withhold effort themselves to avoid being played for a ?sucker?.
This, like other studies, gives us a glimpse into what it takes to create productive teams:
People feel that they can ?get lost? in groups.? Have each member stand out by dividing the workload in such a way that individuals can be evaluated on their own output. The less an individual feels his contributions will be noticed, the more likely he will participate in social loafing.
The larger the group size, the more tendency for social loafing.? Keep groups size to a minimum.
Find activities that impact the intrinsic motivations of the individuals.? People tend to work harder when they are participating in something that they enjoy.
Both competition (individual work) and collaboration can be useful parts of any innovation strategy.
Mar. 22, 2013 ? Development of organic single molecule magnets opens a great many of applications for magnetic materials and new memory technologies. Organic magnets are lighter, more flexible and less energy intensive in production than conventional magnets.
Scientists from the laboratory of Dr. Benedetta Casu and Professor Thomas Chass? at the Institute of Physical and Theoretical Chemistry of the University of T?bingen have established together with colleagues of the University of Florence a first step on the road to new applications for organic magnets: Their controlled deposition in a thin film.
Purely organic magnets are chemical compounds based on carbon, they are not composed of classic magnetic elements like iron. To be precise, these organic compounds are paramagnetic, exhibiting their magnetic character only as long as they are near a magnetic field. The investigated organic magnets contain an unpaired electron enabling the magnetic character of the molecule. In chemistry, these compounds are called free radicals. In previous studies, the investigation of the chemistry of organic magnets has been the main object. However, in their new study the scientists concentrated on the production of a very thin film of molecular magnets in the dimension of nanometers -- only millionths of millimeters. The scientists let grow the molecule NitPyn, a derivative of the nitronyl-nitroxide radical that had already proved to be a stable organic magnet, in an ordered structure on a single gold crystal.
For the first time the scientists used an established production process of thin layers of organic compounds for the deposition of a thin film of organic magnets. The paramagnetic character of NitPyn proved to be stable even during evaporation and deposition processes. The scientists investigated also the interface between the gold crystals and the layer of NitPyn. It is foreseen that the thickness of the NitPyn layer and structural order of the molecules can be varied with temperature or structure of the substrate.
In producing these thin films of purely organic magnets, the scientists have provided a substantial progress for the development of component parts for new memory technologies. In future, a single molecule could transport one bit of information, storing a great many data in a very small space. This project at the interface of physics, chemistry, material science and technology pushes the potential of these substances towards organic electronics.
Share this story on Facebook, Twitter, and Google:
Other social bookmarking and sharing tools:
Story Source:
The above story is reprinted from materials provided by Universitaet T?bingen.
Note: Materials may be edited for content and length. For further information, please contact the source cited above.
Journal Reference:
Sabine-Antonia Savu, Indro Biswas, Lorenzo Sorace, Matteo Mannini, Donella Rovai, Andrea Caneschi, Thomas Chass?, Maria Benedetta Casu. Nanoscale Assembly of Paramagnetic Organic Radicals on Au(111) Single Crystals. Chemistry - A European Journal, 2013; 19 (10): 3445 DOI: 10.1002/chem.201203247
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.
Five former Bell City Council members, shown in court on Wednesday, were found guilty of stealing public money by paying themselves extraordinary salaries in one of Los Angeles County's poorest cities. On Thursday, a mistrial was declared on the remaining counts.
By Olsen Ebright and Melissa Pamer, NBCLosAngeles.com
A mistrial was declared Thursday afternoon on the remaining charges against five former Bell elected officials.
Superior Court Judge Kathleen Kennedy had asked jurors to decide whether further deliberations would help break a deadlock on the remaining charges.
The judge noted, however, that based on a flurry of testy communications from the panel, "It seems to me that all hell has broken loose in the jury deliberation room."
Read more on NBCLosAngeles.com
The defendants had been convicted of counts related to the city?s Solid Waste and Recycling Authority, but acquitted on counts related to the Public Housing Authority.
The jury had deadlocked on 42 charges related to pay for service on two additional boards.
On Wednesday, the jury had reached the following conclusions:
Ex-mayor Oscar Hernandez: guilty on five counts; not guilty on five counts. No verdict on 10 counts.
Former Councilwoman Teresa Jacobo: guilty on five counts; not guilty on five counts. No verdict on 10 counts.
Former Councilman George Mirabal: guilty on five counts; not guilty on five counts. No verdict on 10 counts.
Former Councilman Victor Bello: guilty on four counts; not guilty on four counts. No verdict on eight counts.
Former Councilman George Cole: guilty of two counts; not guilty on two counts. No verdict on four counts.
Former Councilman Luis Artiga was acquitted on all charges.
Related:?Multiple guilty verdicts in Bell, Calif., corruption trial
BRISTOL, Conn. (AP) ? President Barack Obama is going with Brittney Griner and Baylor to win back-to-back titles in the NCAA women's basketball tournament.
Obama's pick was announced Friday on ESPN. In his 2013 bracket, he has Baylor defeating Notre Dame in the April 9 final in New Orleans, a repeat of last year's NCAA title matchup.
The president also selected Connecticut and California to advance to the Final Four. Baylor features 6-foot-8 dunking sensation Griner. Her team is on a 30-game winning streak after an early loss to Stanford.
Obama filled out his bracket Tuesday before departing on his Middle East trip. He picked Indiana to beat Louisville for the men's title.
Baylor, Connecticut and Notre Dame are the women's No. 1 seeds and California is a No. 2.
From the Desk of Danielle,If you were able to attend one of the 3 webinars Jomar held last Tuesday, you'd know that photography and rellenong bangus were the business examples he used. In Jomar's informative webinar, he revealed why businesses fail sa group buying sites (like Groupon or Metrodeal); how you can earn more sa business and affiliate marketing.See? Jomar's ALL on helping you succeed. Whatever it takes: Whether FREE Webinars or J.Co donuts or a whiteboard to visualize your success or exclusive mentoring lunch (his treat syempre). Yup, you read that right. The last 3 items, you can win any of those if you get in the VA League of Experts (VLE). Kasi hanggang tomorrow (Mar 22,Fri) 12 midnight na lang ang VLE. Here's the site http://valeagueofexperts.com Wag nang maraming excuses ha?We love to see you succeed! You make the work we do worth it :)
CHICAGO (AP) ? The nation's most influential pediatrician's group has endorsed gay marriage, saying a stable relationship between parents regardless of sexual orientation contributes to a child's health and well-being.
The American Academy of Pediatrics' new policy, published online Thursday, cites research showing that the parents' sexual orientation has no effect on a child's development. Kids fare just as well in gay or straight families when they are nurturing and financially and emotionally stable, the academy says.
The academy believes that a two-parent marriage is best equipped to provide that kind of environment. Their policy says that if a child has two gay parents who choose to marry, "it is in the best interests of their children that legal and social institutions allow and support them to do so."
The policy cites reports indicating that almost 2 million U.S. children are being raised by gay parents, many of them in states that don't allow gays to marry.
The academy announced its position Thursday. Officials with the group said they wanted to make the academy's views known before two gay marriage cases are considered by the U.S. Supreme Court next week.
"We wanted that policy statement available for the justices to review," said Dr. Thomas McInerney, the academy's president and a pediatrician in Rochester, N.Y.
The pediatricians' stance is not surprising. They previously joined other national groups including the American Medical Association in supporting one of the Supreme Court cases, which contends the Defense of Marriage Act is unconstitutional. The academy also previously supported adoption by gay parents.
The academy's statement notes that several other national health groups have supported gay marriage. Those are the American Academy of Family Physicians, the American Psychiatric Association, the American Psychological Association and the American College of Nursing.
Dr. Ben Siegel, a Boston pediatrician and chairman of an academy committee that developed the new policy, said its focus is on "nurturing children. We want what's best for children."
___
Online:
Academy: http://www.aap.org
___
AP Medical Writer Lindsey Tanner can be reached at http://www.twitter.com/LindseyTanner
Mar. 20, 2013 ? In the wake of last week's meetings at the UN on the definition of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), a group of international scientists have published a call in the journal Nature today, arguing for a set of six SDGs that link poverty eradication to protection of Earth's life support. The researchers argue that in the face of increasing pressure on the planet's ability to support life, adherence to out-dated definitions of sustainable development threaten to reverse progress made in developing countries over past decades.
Ending poverty and safeguarding Earth's life support system must be the twin priorities for the Sustainable Development Goals, say the researchers. The team identified six goals that, if met, would contribute to global sustainability while helping to alleviate poverty.
"Climate change and other global environmental threats will increasingly become serious barriers to further human development," says lead author Professor David Griggs from Monash University in Australia. Humans are transforming Earth's life support system -- the atmosphere, oceans, waterways, forests, ice sheets and biodiversity that allow us to thrive and prosper -- in ways "likely to undermine development gains," he added.
Co-author Professor Johan Rockstr?m, director of the Stockholm Resilience Centre said, "Mounting research shows we are now at the point that the stable functioning of Earth systems is a prerequisite for a thriving global society and future development."
The team asserts that the classic model of sustainable development, of three integrated pillars -- economic, social and environmental -- that has served nations and the UN for over a decade, is flawed because it does not reflect reality. "As the global population increases towards nine billion people sustainable development should be seen as an economy serving society within Earth's life support system, not as three pillars," says co-author Dr. Priya Shyamsundar from the South Asian Network for Development and Environmental Economics, Nepal.
The researchers say that the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), set to expire in 2015, have helped focus international efforts on eight poverty-related goals. However, despite successes in some areas -- the number of people living on less than one dollar a day has been more than halved -- many MDGs have not been met, and some remain in conflict with one another. Economic gains, for example, have come at the expense of environmental protection. Politicians are struggling to link global environmental concerns with addressing poverty.
The new set of goals -- thriving lives and livelihoods, food security, water security, clean energy, healthy and productive ecosystems, and governance for sustainable societies -- aim to resolve this conflict. The targets beneath each goal include updates and expanded targets under the MDGs, including ending poverty and hunger, combating HIV/aids, and improving maternal and child health. But they also define a set of planetary "must haves": climate stability, the reduction biodiversity loss, protection of ecosystem services, a healthy water cycle and oceans, sustainable nitrogen and phosphorus use, clean air and sustainable material use.
Co-author Dr. Mark Stafford Smith, science director of CSIRO's climate adaptation research programme in Australia said: "The key point is that the SDGs must genuinely add up to sustainability. The SDGs have the potential to lock in the spectacular gains on human development that we have achieved in the past two decades and help the globe transition to a sustainable lifestyle. But the link between these two aims must be more coherent."
The new research is linked to Future Earth, a new international research programme designed to "develop the knowledge required for societies worldwide to face challenges posed by global environmental change and to identify opportunities for a transition to global sustainability." Several authors are closely involved in developing this new research programme.
"Ultimately, the choice of goals is a political decision. But science can inform what combination of goals can achieve a sustainable future. And science can identify measurable targets and indicators," said Dr Stafford Smith.
Share this story on Facebook, Twitter, and Google:
Other social bookmarking and sharing tools:
Story Source:
The above story is reprinted from materials provided by International Council for Science, via EurekAlert!, a service of AAAS.
Note: Materials may be edited for content and length. For further information, please contact the source cited above.
Journal Reference:
David Griggs, Mark Stafford-Smith, Owen Gaffney, Johan Rockstr?m, Marcus C. ?hman, Priya Shyamsundar, Will Steffen, Gisbert Glaser, Norichika Kanie, Ian Noble. Policy: Sustainable development goals for people and planet. Nature, 2013; 495 (7441): 305 DOI: 10.1038/495305a
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.
BAGHDAD (AP) ? An al-Qaida in Iraq front group claimed responsibility Wednesday for bloody attacks that killed 65 people across the country a day earlier, underscoring the terror group's potency a decade after the U.S.-led invasion that ousted dictator Saddam Hussein.
In a statement posted on a militant website, the Islamic State of Iraq said it unleashed the car bombs and other explosions to avenge the executions and "massacres" of convicted Sunni inmates held in Iraqi prisons.
It made no mention of the start of the war, but the claim of responsibility came 10 years after the U.S.-led war began on March 20 with an airstrike on Dora Farms in southern Baghdad in a failed attempt to kill Saddam.
The dictator's eventual toppling quickly led to a breakdown of law and order, enabling the rise of al-Qaida and other Sunni insurgents as well as releasing sectarian, ethnic and class hatreds that had been suppressed by his iron-fisted rule.
Most of the nearly 20 attacks on Tuesday targeted Shiite areas in Baghdad. In addition to those killed, more than 200 were wounded, officials said, demonstrating in stark terms how dangerously divided Iraq remains more than a year after American troops withdrew.
The al-Qaida statement warned the Shiite-led government to stop executing Sunni prisoners or "expect more bad events ... and seas of blood."
"What has reached you on Tuesday was the first drop of rain, and a first phase ... that will be followed by more revenge," it said.
Violence has ebbed sharply since the peak of Sunni-Shiite fighting that pushed the country to the brink of civil war in 2006 and 2007. But insurgents are still able to stage high-profile attacks, and sectarian and ethnic rivalries remain threats to the country's long-term stability.
Iraqis showed little interest in marking the anniversary of the war that sparked years of bloodshed as Sunni and Shiite militants battled U.S. forces and each other, leaving nearly 4,500 U.S. soldiers and more than 100,000 Iraqis dead. For many Iraqis, March 20 carries less significance than April 9, the date that Baghdad fell to the Americans, forcing Saddam to flee.
"Nobody cares about this anniversary. We don't even want to remember it because it was the beginning of a tragedy that bred even more tragedies. It's a painful anniversary because it rid us of Saddam but it brought us something even worse," said Hussein Kadhim, a Shiite employee at the Oil Ministry. "The only things reminding us of the invasion are the pictures of the victims who die on a daily basis."
The symbolism of Tuesday's attacks was strong, coming 10 years to the day, Washington time, that President George W. Bush announced the start of hostilities against Iraq. It was already early March 20, 2003, in Iraq when the airstrikes began.
The violence continued Wednesday, when a car bomb exploded during rush hour in eastern Baghdad, killing two civilians and wounding four.
In the western province of Anbar, police said gunmen shot and killed Ahmed Jihad, a candidate in provincial council elections, as he was walking near his house in Fallujah city.
Medical officials in a nearby hospital confirmed the casualty figures. All spoke on condition of anonymity as they were not authorized to release information to reporters.
____
Associated Press writers Sameer N. Yacoub and Adam Schreck contributed to this report.
Ohio school shooter TJ Lane arrived at his sentencing hearing today wearing a blue button down shirt. After he sat down, he unbuttoned the shirt to reveal a white t-shirt with the word "killer" emblazoned across the front in black marker.
When Lane was given the opportunity to make a statement to the court, he made a short statement and then stuck his middle finger up in the courtroom filled with the loved ones of the three students he gunned down.
Lane, 18, smirked and smiled as family members of his victims called him "repulsive" and hoped for him to be locked up in a cage "like an animal" for the rest of his life.
"Frankly, I wasn't prepared for this," the prosecutor said moments after Lane's gesture. He said the action was proof that Lane is a "disgusting human being."
"This is confirming what we have known all along, that this was a cold, calculated, premeditated killing," the prosecutor said.
The judge sentenced Lane to life imprisonment without parole. Lane chuckled at the sentence.
Lane killed three students during a Feb. 27, 2012 rampage at Chardon High School. Daniel Parmertor, 16, Demetrius Hewlin, 16, and Russell King Jr., 17, were all killed. When he was captured a short time later he was wearing a grey shirt with the word "killer" written on the front.
Lane's defense attorney told the court that he "strongly urged" Lane not say what he was about to the court, but Lane proceeded anyway.
Lane smiled as a mother who lost her son said she is cynical now and devastated. She wished an "extremely slow, torturous death" for him.
"You don't deserve to take another breath while my 16-year-old son Danny lies in the cold, hard ground," Daniel Parmertor's mother said.
Lane plead guilty on Feb. 26 and faces life in prison.
VATICAN CITY (AP) ? After a week marked by acts of simplicity and openness, Pope Francis finally let his words do the talking as he officially began his stewardship of the Catholic Church on Tuesday.
"Please," he implored the tens of thousands, both poor and powerful, gathered outside St. Peter's Basilica. "Let us be protectors of creation, protectors of God's plan inscribed in nature, protectors of one another and of the environment."
It was a message Pope Francis has hinted at, but now he made it clear, as he urged the economic, political and religious leaders arrayed before him not to allow "omens of destruction and death to accompany the advance of this world."
On a day of warm, blue skies, the 76-year-old pope thrilled the crowd as he arrived in the sun-drenched piazza in an open-air jeep, shouting "Ciao!" to well-wishers and kissing babies handed up to him.
At one point, as he neared a group of people in wheelchairs, he signaled for the jeep to stop, hopped off and approached a disabled man held up to the barricade by his family, blessing him and then kissing him on his forehead.
It was a gesture from a man whose short papacy so far has been defined by such spontaneous forays into the crowd, which seem to surprise and concern his security guards.
"I like him because he loves the poor," said 7-year-old Pietro Loretti, who came from his home in Barletta in southern Italy to attend the Mass. Another child, 9-year-old Benedetta Vergetti from Cervetri near Rome, also skipped school to attend. "I like him because he's sweet like my dad," she said.
The Argentine native is the first pope from Latin America and the first named for the 13th-century friar St. Francis of Assisi, whose life's work was to care for nature, the poor and the most disadvantaged.
In Buenos Aires, thousands of people packed the central Plaza de Mayo square to watch the ceremony on giant TV screens, erupting in joy when Francis called them from Rome, his words broadcast over loudspeakers.
"I want to ask a favor," Francis told them in Spanish. "I want to ask you to walk together, and take care of one another. ... And don't forget that this bishop who is far away loves you very much. Pray for me."
Back in Rome, Francis was interrupted by applause as he declared his role as the leader of the world's 1.2 billion Catholics was to open his arms to "the whole of humanity, especially the poorest, the weakest, the least important, those whom Matthew lists in the final judgment on love: the hungry, the thirsty, the stranger, the naked, the sick and those in prison."
"Today, amid so much darkness we need to see the light of hope and to be men and women who bring hope to others," he said. "To protect creation, to protect every man and every woman, to look upon them with tenderness and love, is to open up a horizon of hope. It is to let a shaft of light break through the heavy clouds."
After the celebrations die down, Francis has his work cut out as he confronts a church in crisis.
Retired Pope Benedict XVI spent his eight-year papacy trying to reverse the decline of Christianity in Europe, without much success. While growing in Africa and Asia, the Catholic Church has been stained in Europe, Australia and the Americas by sex abuse scandals.
Closer to home, Francis is facing serious management shortcomings in a Vatican bureaucracy in dire need of reform.
Francis hasn't indicated how he might tackle those greater problems, focusing instead on messages and gestures that signal a total shift in priority and personality from his German theologian predecessor.
On Wednesday, Francis may reveal some of his ecumenical intentions, as he holds an audience with Christian delegations who attended his installation. On Friday, he will put his foreign policy chops on display in an address to the ambassadors accredited to the Holy See.
He plans to call on Benedict at Castel Gandolfo, the papal retreat south of Rome, on Saturday, and the next day to celebrate Palm Sunday Mass in St. Peter's Square.
Next week, Francis presides over all the rites of Holy Week, capped by Easter Sunday Mass on March 31, when Christians mark the resurrection of Christ, an evocative start to a pontificate.
Tuesday was the feast of St. Joseph, and Francis made special mention in his homily of the carpenter saint's "lowly, concrete and faithful service."
He later telephoned Benedict, the former Joseph Ratzinger, to wish him a happy name day, and the Vatican said in a statement that the pope emeritus has been following the celebrations with "intense interest" and "assures his successor his continued closeness in prayer."
At the start of the Mass, Francis received the gold-plated fisherman's ring, which recalls how St. Peter fished for food and later for souls, and a wool stole symbolizing his role as shepherd of his flock. The ring was something of a hand-me-down, first offered to Pope Paul VI, who presided over the latter half of the Second Vatican Council, the meetings that brought the church into the modern world.
Francis also received vows of obedience from a half-dozen cardinals ? a potent symbol given that Benedict is still alive and was reportedly watching the proceedings on TV.
A cardinal intoned the rite of inauguration, saying: "The Good Shepherd charged Peter to feed his lambs and his sheep; today you succeed him as the bishop of this church."
Flags from around the world, including Argentina's blue and white flag, fluttered above the crowd, which the Vatican said numbered 150,000-200,000 people. Civil protection crews closed the main streets leading to the square to traffic and set up barricades for nearly a mile along the route to try to control the masses and allow official delegations through.
Some 132 official delegations attended, including more than a half-dozen heads of state from Latin America, a sign of the significance of the election for the region. Francis's determination that his pontificate would be focused on the poor has resonance in a poverty-stricken region that counts 40 percent of the world's Catholics.
In the VIP section was U.S. Vice President Joe Biden, German Chancellor Angela Merkel, Argentine President Cristina Fernandez, Taiwanese President Ying-Jeou Ma, Zimbabwe President Robert Mugabe, Prince Albert of Monaco and Bahrain Prince Sheik Abdullah bin Haman bin Isa Alkhalifa, among others. All told, six sovereign rulers, 31 heads of state, three princes and 11 heads of government attended, the Vatican said.
Francis directed his homily to them, saying: "We must not be afraid of goodness or even tenderness."
After the Mass, Francis stood in a receiving line for nearly two hours to greet each of the government delegations in St. Peter's Basilica, chatting warmly and animatedly with each one, kissing the few youngsters who came along with their parents and occasionally blessing a rosary given to him.
Unlike his predecessors, he did so in just his white cassock, not the red cape.
Among the religious VIPs attending was the spiritual leader of the world's Orthodox Christians, Bartholomew I, who became the first patriarch from the Istanbul-based church to attend a papal investiture since the two branches of Christianity split nearly 1,000 years ago. Also attending for the first time was the chief rabbi of Rome. Their presence underscores the broad hopes for ecumenical and interfaith dialogue in this new papacy, given Francis' own work for improved relations.
In a gesture to Christians in the East, the pope prayed with Eastern rite Catholic patriarchs and archbishops before the tomb of St. Peter at the start of the Mass, and the Gospel was chanted in Greek rather than the traditional Latin.
But it is Francis' history of living with the poor and working for them while archbishop of Buenos Aires that seems to resonate with ordinary Catholics who say they are hopeful that Francis can inspire a new generation of faithful who have fallen away from the church.
"As an Argentine, he was our cardinal. It's a great joy for us," said Edoardo Fernandez Mendia, an Argentine who was in the crowd. "I would have never imagined that it was going to be him."
Recalling another great moment in Argentine history, when soccer great Diego Maradona scored an improbable goal in the 1986 World Cup, he said: "And for the second time, the Hand of God came to Argentina."
___
Reporter Daniela Petroff contributed.
___
Follow Nicole Winfield at www.twitter.com/nwinfield
Contact: Joshua Brown joshua.e.brown@uvm.edu 802-656-3039 University of Vermont
60-year-old health mystery solved by Vermont and French research team
In the early 1950's, a 66-year-old woman, sick with colon cancer, received a blood transfusion. Then, unexpectedly, she suffered a severe rejection of the transfused blood. Reporting on her case, the French medical journal Revue D'Hmatologie identified her as, simply, "Patient Vel."
After a previous transfusion, it turns out, Mrs. Vel had developed a potent antibody against some unknown molecule found on the red blood cells of most people in the worldbut not found on her own red blood cells.
But what was this molecule? Nobody could find it. A blood mystery began, and, from her case, a new blood type, "Vel-negative," was described in 1952.
Soon it was discovered that Mrs. Vel was not alone. Though rare, it is estimated now that over 200,000 people in Europe and a similar number in North America are Vel-negative, about 1 in 2,500.
For these people, successive blood transfusions could easily turn to kidney failure and death. So, for sixty years, doctors and researchers have huntedunsuccessfullyfor the underlying cause of this blood type.
But now a team of scientists from the University of Vermont and France has found the missing moleculea tiny protein called SMIM1and the mystery is solved.
Reporting in the journal EMBO Molecular Medicine, UVM's Bryan Ballif, Lionel Arnaud of the French National Institute of Blood Transfusion, and their colleagues explain how they uncovered the biochemical and genetic basis of Vel-negative blood.
"Our findings promise to provide immediate assistance to health-care professionals should they encounter this rare but vexing blood type," says Ballif.
The pre-publication results were presented online, March 18, 2013, and the finalized report will be published, as an open-access article, in the next edition of the journal.
(Last year, Ballif and Arnaud identified the proteins responsible for two other rare blood types, Junior and Langeris, moving the global count of understood blood types or systems from 30 to 32. Now, with Vel, the number rises to 33.)
Before this new research, the only way to determine if someone was Vel-negative or positive was with tests using antibodies made by the few people previously identified as Vel-negative following their rejection of transfused blood. Not surprisingly, these antibodies are vanishingly rare and, therefore, many hospitals and blood banks don't have the capacity to test for this blood type.
"Vel blood is one of the most difficult blood types to supply in many countries," the scientists write, "This is partly due to the rarity of the Vel? blood type, but also to the lack of systematic screening for the Vel?type in blood donors."
In response, the UVM and Paris researchers developed two fast DNA-based tests for identifying Vel-negative blood and people. These tests can be easily integrated into existing blood testing proceduresand can be completed in a few hours or less.
"It's usually a crisis when you need a transfusion" says Ballif. "For those rare Vel-negative individuals in need of a blood transfusion, this is a potentially life-saving time frame."
To make their discovery, Arnaud and coworkers in Paris used some of the rare Vel-negative antibody to biochemically purify the mystery protein from the surface of human red blood cells. Then they shipped them to Ballif in Vermont.
The little protein didn't reveal its identity easily. "I had to fish through thousands of proteins," Ballif says. And several experiments failed to find the culprit because of its unusual biochemistryand pipsqueak size. But he eventually nabbed it using a high-resolution mass spectrometer funded by the Vermont Genetics Network. And what he found was new to science. "It was only a predicted protein based on the human genome," says Ballif, but hadn't yet been observed. It has since been named: Small Integral Membrane Protein 1, or SMIM1.
Next, Arnaud's team in France tested seventy people known to be Vel-negative. In every case, they found a deletiona tiny missing chunk of DNAin the gene that instructs cells on how to manufacture SMIM1. This was the final proof the scientists needed to show that the Vel-negative blood type is caused by a lack of the SMIM1 protein on a patient's red blood cells.
Today, personalized medicine where doctors treat us based on our unique biological makeupis a hot trend. "The science of blood transfusion has been attempting personalized medicine since its inception," Ballif notes, "given that its goal is to personalize a transfusion by making the best match possible between donor and recipient."
"Identifying and making available rare blood types such as Vel-negative blood brings us closer to a goal of personalized medicine," he says. "Even if you are that rare one person out of 2,500 that is Vel-negative, we now know how to rapidly type your blood and find blood for youshould you need a transfusion."
###
[ | 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.
Contact: Joshua Brown joshua.e.brown@uvm.edu 802-656-3039 University of Vermont
60-year-old health mystery solved by Vermont and French research team
In the early 1950's, a 66-year-old woman, sick with colon cancer, received a blood transfusion. Then, unexpectedly, she suffered a severe rejection of the transfused blood. Reporting on her case, the French medical journal Revue D'Hmatologie identified her as, simply, "Patient Vel."
After a previous transfusion, it turns out, Mrs. Vel had developed a potent antibody against some unknown molecule found on the red blood cells of most people in the worldbut not found on her own red blood cells.
But what was this molecule? Nobody could find it. A blood mystery began, and, from her case, a new blood type, "Vel-negative," was described in 1952.
Soon it was discovered that Mrs. Vel was not alone. Though rare, it is estimated now that over 200,000 people in Europe and a similar number in North America are Vel-negative, about 1 in 2,500.
For these people, successive blood transfusions could easily turn to kidney failure and death. So, for sixty years, doctors and researchers have huntedunsuccessfullyfor the underlying cause of this blood type.
But now a team of scientists from the University of Vermont and France has found the missing moleculea tiny protein called SMIM1and the mystery is solved.
Reporting in the journal EMBO Molecular Medicine, UVM's Bryan Ballif, Lionel Arnaud of the French National Institute of Blood Transfusion, and their colleagues explain how they uncovered the biochemical and genetic basis of Vel-negative blood.
"Our findings promise to provide immediate assistance to health-care professionals should they encounter this rare but vexing blood type," says Ballif.
The pre-publication results were presented online, March 18, 2013, and the finalized report will be published, as an open-access article, in the next edition of the journal.
(Last year, Ballif and Arnaud identified the proteins responsible for two other rare blood types, Junior and Langeris, moving the global count of understood blood types or systems from 30 to 32. Now, with Vel, the number rises to 33.)
Before this new research, the only way to determine if someone was Vel-negative or positive was with tests using antibodies made by the few people previously identified as Vel-negative following their rejection of transfused blood. Not surprisingly, these antibodies are vanishingly rare and, therefore, many hospitals and blood banks don't have the capacity to test for this blood type.
"Vel blood is one of the most difficult blood types to supply in many countries," the scientists write, "This is partly due to the rarity of the Vel? blood type, but also to the lack of systematic screening for the Vel?type in blood donors."
In response, the UVM and Paris researchers developed two fast DNA-based tests for identifying Vel-negative blood and people. These tests can be easily integrated into existing blood testing proceduresand can be completed in a few hours or less.
"It's usually a crisis when you need a transfusion" says Ballif. "For those rare Vel-negative individuals in need of a blood transfusion, this is a potentially life-saving time frame."
To make their discovery, Arnaud and coworkers in Paris used some of the rare Vel-negative antibody to biochemically purify the mystery protein from the surface of human red blood cells. Then they shipped them to Ballif in Vermont.
The little protein didn't reveal its identity easily. "I had to fish through thousands of proteins," Ballif says. And several experiments failed to find the culprit because of its unusual biochemistryand pipsqueak size. But he eventually nabbed it using a high-resolution mass spectrometer funded by the Vermont Genetics Network. And what he found was new to science. "It was only a predicted protein based on the human genome," says Ballif, but hadn't yet been observed. It has since been named: Small Integral Membrane Protein 1, or SMIM1.
Next, Arnaud's team in France tested seventy people known to be Vel-negative. In every case, they found a deletiona tiny missing chunk of DNAin the gene that instructs cells on how to manufacture SMIM1. This was the final proof the scientists needed to show that the Vel-negative blood type is caused by a lack of the SMIM1 protein on a patient's red blood cells.
Today, personalized medicine where doctors treat us based on our unique biological makeupis a hot trend. "The science of blood transfusion has been attempting personalized medicine since its inception," Ballif notes, "given that its goal is to personalize a transfusion by making the best match possible between donor and recipient."
"Identifying and making available rare blood types such as Vel-negative blood brings us closer to a goal of personalized medicine," he says. "Even if you are that rare one person out of 2,500 that is Vel-negative, we now know how to rapidly type your blood and find blood for youshould you need a transfusion."
###
[ | 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.
Mar. 19, 2013 ? An international team of scientists led by Dr Kate Sanders from the University of Adelaide, and including Dr Mike Lee from the South Australian Museum, has uncovered how some sea snakes have developed 'shrunken heads' -- or smaller physical features than their related species.
Their research is published today in the journal Molecular Ecology.
A large head -- "all the better to eat you with" -- would seem to be indispensable to sea snakes, which typically have to swallow large spiny fish. However, there are some circumstances where it wouldn't be very useful: sea snakes that feed by probing their front ends into narrow, sand eel burrows have evolved comically small heads.
The team has shown normal-shaped sea snakes can evolve such "shrunken heads" very rapidly. This process can lead to speciation (one species splitting into two).
The small-headed populations are also much smaller in absolute size than their ancestors, and these shape and size differences mean they tend to avoid interbreeding with their large-headed ancestors.
Dr Lee says, "A team led by my colleague Dr Kate Sanders (University of Adelaide) has been investigating genetic differences across all sea snakes, and we noticed that the blue-banded sea snake (Hydrophis cyanocinctus) and the slender-necked sea snake (Hydrophis melanocephalus) were almost indistinguishable genetically, despite being drastically different in size and shape.
"The slender-necked sea snake is half the size, and has a much smaller head, than the blue-banded sea snake.
"This suggested they separated very recently from a common ancestral species and had rapidly evolved their different appearances.
"One way this could have happened is if the ancestral species was large-headed, and a population rapidly evolved small heads to probe eel burrows -- and subsequently stopped interbreeding with the large-headed forms."
Dr Sanders says the research could have wider implications in other scientific studies: "Our results highlight the viviparous sea snakes as a promising system for studies of speciation and adaptive radiation in marine environments."
Share this story on Facebook, Twitter, and Google:
Other social bookmarking and sharing tools:
Story Source:
The above story is reprinted from materials provided by University of Adelaide.
Note: Materials may be edited for content and length. For further information, please contact the source cited above.
Journal Reference:
Kate L. Sanders, Arne R. Rasmussen, Mumpuni, Johan Elmberg, Anslem de Silva, Michael L. Guinea, Michael S. Y. Lee. Recent rapid speciation and ecomorph divergence in Indo-Australian sea snakes. Molecular Ecology, 2013; DOI: 10.1111/mec.12291
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.
Fox has been quietly busy over the last few days, unveiling plans for a 24-hour sports network that may be the biggest challenger to ESPN's throne, and adding new features to its mobile apps. Fox Sports 1 is scheduled to launch Saturday August 17th, loaded with content including NASCAR, soccer (Champions League, Europe League and World Cup in 2018 and 2022), weekly UFC fights, college football, college basketball and in 2014, pro baseball. The bad news? According to the LA Times, for Fox Sports 1 to live Speed TV will die this fall, while Fuel TV is expected to be replaced by Fox Sports 2 while Fox Soccer is turned into an entertainment channel. One tweak it will bring is the "double box" commercial format that keeps the game on while ads play, which is expected to be used frequently on the new channel. It will have a suite of studio shows to compete with the sports leader as well, and even a Fox Sports Go "mobile experience" on iOS, Android and the web with live video streaming and news/stats for authenticated subscribers.
Speaking of "authenticated" cable and satellite subscribers, the broadcaster also updated the free Fox Now second screen apps on iOS and Android, adding access to stream full episodes of its TV shows wherever you are -- as long as you have a membership with a participating provider. That list currently consists of Mediacom and Verizon FiOS, but it may grow in the future. The Fox Now apps still have other features, with synced content, Twitter streams and behind the scenes info, so New Girl and Bones fans may still have a reason to check them out.
![[ Back to EurekAlert! ]](http://www.eurekalert.org/images/back2e.gif){kind=small}
Public release date: 20-Mar-2013
Share ] 