Datasets:

BEE-spoke-data

/

fineweb-literature-100k

like 1

Follow

BEEspoke Data 34

iii. IN THE ACHAEMENID PERIOD The Achaemenid empire, extending from the Indus river to the Aegean sea, comprised such economically developed countries as Egypt, Syria, Phoenicia, Babylonia, Elam, and Asia Minor, lands which had their long traditions of social institutions, as well as Sakai, Massagetai, Lycians, Libyans, Nubians and other tribes undergoing the disintegration of the primitive-communal phase. Therefore, the socioeconomic structure of the empire was characterized by extreme diversity (Dandamaev and Lukonin, pp. 95-96). For this reason the empire remained a relatively decentralized state with each ethnic province honoring local customs and traditions (idem, pp. 90-91). The predominant form of economic activity in the majority of the lands brought under the imperial rule by the Persians was agriculture (Dandamaev and Lukonin, pp. 95-96). Although possessing handicraft activities, the cities were still agricultural, and the urban population itself was chiefly engaged in agriculture. Barley was the most frequently sown cereal in the empire—grown in Babylonia, Egypt, Elam, and Persia— while spelt and wheat were less frequently sown. In Palestine wheat was staple food, along with peas, lentils, and mustard. In Babylonia, barley, millet, sesame, peas, mustard, garlic, onions, cucumbers, apples, pomegranates, and apricots were grown. In Babylonia and Elam, wine, vinegar, and honey were basic foods, along with barley; dates were also consumed there and bread made from the seed. Wine production (for which ancient Persia was renowned) was also developed in Syria, Celicia, Armenia, and Sogdiana, while Babylonia and Elam brewed beer from dates and barley. Egypt, Babylonia, Phrygia, and Persia were rich in livestock, but dairy products occupied an insignificant place in the diet of the population in the empire. Poultry and fish also constituted part of the food consumed (Dandamaev and Lukonin, pp. 130-31). Three basic economic sectors co-existed side by side: the royal sector managed by the king’s chancellery, the sector owned and operated by the religious temples, and the private sector. The Achaemenids introduced significant changes in the agrarian relations of the lands under their rule. Accurately measured lands were redistributed, and the best portions were taken by the king, the temples, business houses, the military elite, and the civil servants of the royal and temple administration (Dandamaev and Lukonin, 130). The view held by some scholars that the Achaemenid king was, theoretically, the supreme legal owner of all land has been contested. Available evidence shows that there were several kinds of major ownership in the empire: vast latifundia (particularly in Babylonia) leased out in large plots by the owners to major tenants, who would, in turn, sublet them in smaller plots; plots owned and tilled by small-holders; lands belonging to the royalty, i.e., the state, usually the best portions of lands confiscated from rulers and nobility of conquered countries who had refused voluntary subjugation themselves to the Achaemenids; and expropriated lands distributed among members of the royal family, friends and companions of the king, and the like. Large holdings were worked by hired labor, sometimes even brought in from neighboring countries (idem, pp. 132-34). Select portions of land, leased out by the Achaemenid royal house, usually included areas of conquered regions which had been made the property of the king. In addition, many large canals in Babylonia belonging to the king were rented out by his managers too (Dandamaev and Lukonin, pp. 142-43). Some irrigation canals also belonged to the temples and private individuals (idem, p. 132). The Achaemenid kings also possessed irrigation constructions along the Akes river (Harīrūd) in Khorasan (Herodotus, 3.117), forests in Syria (Nehemiah, 2:8), the right to income from fish caught in Lake Moeris in Egypt (Herodotus, 2.149), as well as pleasure gardens and palaces in various parts of the empire (Dandamaev and Lukonin, pp. 143-44). Structurally, the royal sector was unified, and its various products were delivered from one place to another as required. A number of documents record the personal decrees of Darius I issued through the chief manager of the royal sector in Pharnaces. For instance, two letters contain orders to issue respectively 100 sheep and 200 measures of wine from the royal properties to Queen Irtashduna (Cameron, pp. 214-18; Hallock, no. 1795). According to one text, nearly 700 shepherds drove the “small livestock of the king” from Persia in the direction to Susa (Hallock, no. 1441). Judging by the number of shepherds, these herds apparently numbered in the tens of thousands of head (Hinz, 1971, p. 290). According to Aramaic and Babylonian documents and to Greek sources, large estates in conquered lands were distributed as hereditary property among the members of the royal family and the Persian nobility. A description of such households is found in the Aramaic letters of Aršāma, the satrap of Egypt, and of other Persian nobles to managers of their holdings in Egypt (see Driver, nos. I-XIII). Aršāma owned large flocks of sheep and goats in the Nippur area of Babylonia and rented them out (for reference see Driver, pp. 88-90). Several Babylonian documents refer to fields of Queen Parysatis, the wife of Darius II, located in the Nippur region and rented out to the Murašū business firm (Dandamaev and Lukonin, p. 136; Dandamaev, pp. 115-16; see also Xenophon’s Anabasis 2.4.27, mentioning the “villages of Parysatis” in Babylonia). In consequence of the land tenure system introduced by Achaemenids, the royal administration settled soldiers of various ethnic origin on state lands. In theory, the land was considered to be of royal ownership, since there was no clear demarcation between state and royal property. The soldiers tilled the plots allotted to them collectively or rented them out, served their period of conscription, and paid royal taxes in silver and in kind. In addition to soldiers, some groups of royal artisans, shepherds, merchants, etc. were settled on state land (for references see Dandamaev and Lukonin, pp. 147-48). Phoenician cities, with merchants controlling international maritime trade to a considerable degree, produced a purple dye and glass dishware intended for export. The production of clothing was developed in Miletus in Asia Minor, and in Babylonian and Egyptian cities. The royal sector also owned large workshops in various parts of the empire. In royal workshops in Arachosia, Persia, Babylonia, and Egypt craftsmen produced dishware for the requirements of the king’s court (Dandamaev and Lukonin, pp. 175-76). According to Greek sources, 15,000 people were fed daily at a cost to the king of 400 talents of silver (Athenaeus, The Deipnosophists 4.115 b-146c, with references to Heracleides of Cyme, Ctesias, and Dinon). A large number of officials were in the employ of the vast royal properties; they were charged with the management of the royal sector, which comprised a single entity within the entire empire. Persepolis economic documents drafted in Elamite in 509-458 B.C.E. give an idea of this sector. It comprised more than one hundred towns and settlements located in Persia and Elam and divided into six districts (Koch, pp. 217-311). This sector was served by more than 16,000 workmen (kurtaš), including stone masons, master woodworkers, carpenters, blacksmiths, and sculptors as well as shepherds, wine makers, beer brewers, etc. Ethnically, the kurtaš mostly consisted of the representatives of the conquered people, i.e., Egyptians, Babylonians, Lydians, Ionians, Cappadocians, Carians, Bactrians, Sogdians, etc. (for references and literature, see Dandamaev and Lukonin, pp. 158-70). Documentary evidence about the economic sector owned and managed by temples is abundant only for Babylonia and, to a lesser degree, for Egypt. In Babylonia temples owned both large estates and trade and handicraft centers. The temples and other major Babylonian landowners also leased out part of their land-holdings, since they lacked sufficient numbers of agricultural workers. Hired labor, widely used on large estates, worked either the entire year or during the harvest. Hired hands sometimes were recruited even in the neighboring countries (such as Elam); in addition to wages, they were paid travel expenses and board (for references, see Dandamaev and Lukonin, p. 305). Small-holders, who usually tilled their land together with their family members, sometimes used the labor of slaves and hired hands during the period of harvest. No documentary evidence is available from the Achaemenid period on the economic life of common Persians; only sporadic references appear in Greek sources. For instance, Herodotus (1.133) writes that when the Persians were celebrating a birthday, they served roasted oxen, horses, and camels. It seems that in Persia meat constituted part of the daily food consumption, while in most other countries of the empire (including even rich Babylonia) it was a luxury. Despite its enormous size, the royal sector did not occupy a decisive place in the economy of the empire. The main source of state income was taxes, which were used for the maintenance of the army, administration, and, partially, the royal court. A considerable portion of taxes were set aside in the royal treasuries located in Pasargadae, Persepolis, Ecbatana, Susa, Babylon, and other places (Curtius, 5.2.11, 5.6.9-10; Diodorus Siculus, 17.71.1; Strabo, 15.3.9). To judge from Herodotus (3.90-94), the total annual sum of taxes calculated in silver amounted to 14,560 Eubonic talents (1 Eubonic talent = 25.86 kg.) Taxes had to be delivered in unminted silver evaluated by purity and weight and meeting a given standard. In addition to taxes, subjects delivered to the king gifts of precisely determined sizes. But in contrast to taxes, gifts were paid in kind (e.g., trunks of ebony wood, elephant tusks, horses, vessels of gold, silver, etc.). While the dominant majority of subjects paid taxes, gifts were delivered only by the peoples who lived on the borders of the empire, i.e., by Colchians, Ethiopians, Arabs, etc. (Herodotus, 3.97). According to Herodotus (idem), the Persians, as the ruling people, were exempt from taxes and forced labor. This exemption apparently applied only to monetary taxes, for, the Persepolis documents indicate that the Persians were not exempt from taxes in kind (Hinz, 1971, pp. 289-92). In the Achaemenid inscriptions, the Persians are not included in the lists of nations performing obligatory service on construction works. Although Darius I introduced a gold daric weighing 8.42 gm, which formed the basis for the Achaemenid monetary system, as well as the silver shekel with a weight of 5.6 gm., these coins were little used outside Asia Minor. In Persia itself coins were not in circulation. Workmen in the employ of the royal sector, and even the highest officials, were paid their salaries in unminted silver and products in kind. Such a practice is also attested to in documents from Babylonia and Egypt of the Achaemenid period. In general, the Persians used coins for commercial exchange with the Greeks along the borders of the state and for payment to salaried mercenaries, especially in Asia Minor (Babelon, p. XXI). In countries located beyond the Mediterranean (e.g., Babylonia), internal trade payments were made in ingots of silver. When coins came into circulation, they were also accepted by weight as unminted metal. Our information about prices in Achaemenid Persia is scanty. According to Persepolis documents, during the period between 509 and 494 B.C.E., a sheep cost about 100 lit. of barley (Hallock, nos. 278, 364, 587, 588), sesame was three times more expensive than barley (idem, no. 297), and grain and various fruits (figs, apples, etc.) were equivalent to each other (cf. below). A donkey cost 500 lit. of barley or of fruit, and a jug of 10 lit. of local wine cost 30 lit. of barley (idem, p. 5). For the period from 492 to 458 B.C.E. Persepolis documents give prices in silver. Thus, a sheep cost 3 shekels of silver, and a jug of wine with a volume of ten lit. cost 1 shekel (idem, pp. 5-8; Hinz, 1970, pp. 430-33). These prices were officially established in the royal sector and probably could differ from those on the free market. In comparison with Babylonia, for which abundant documentary evidence on prices has been preserved, grain in Persia was much more expensive, while wine in Persia was many times cheaper. Oher food products in both countries cost more or less the same (Dandamaev and Lukonin, pp. 221-22). E. Babelon, Les perses Achéménides I, Paris, 1901. P. Briant and C. Herrenschmidt, eds., Le tribut dans l’Empire perse, Actes de la Table ronde de Paris 12-13 Décembre 1986, Paris, 1989. G. G. Cameron, “Darius’ Daughter and the Persepolis Inscriptions,” JNES 1, 1942, pp. 214-18. M. Dandamayev, A Political History of the Achaemenid Empire, tr. W. J. Vogelsang, Leiden, etc., 1989. Idem, Iranians in Achaemenid Babylonia, Costa Mesa (Calif.) and New York, 1992. M. Dandamaev and V. G. Lukonin, The Culture and Social Institutions of Ancient Iran, Cambridge etc., 1989. G. R. Driver, Aramaic Documents of the Fifth Century B.C., Oxford, 1965. R. T. Hallock, Persepolis Fortification Tablets, Chicago, 1969. W. Hinz, “Die elamischen Buchungstäfelchen der Darius-Zeit,” Orientalis 39, 1970, pp. 421-40. Idem, “Achäme-nidische Hofverwaltung,” ZA 61, 1971, pp. 260-311. H. Koch, Verwaltung und Wirtschaft im persischen Kernland zur Zeit der Achämeniden, Wiesbaden, 1990. M. W. Stolper, Entrepreneurs and Empire. The Murašu Archive, the Murašu Firm, and Persian Rule in Babylonia, Leiden, 1985. (Muhammad A. Dandamayev) Originally Published: December 15, 1997 Last Updated: December 8, 2011 This article is available in print. Vol. VIII, Fasc. 1, pp. 101-104

Some initially don't even know how to turn their new laptops on or attach a file to an email message, but that doesn't matter. Emphasizing that they need to develop "insider" perspectives on new practices, we ask them to write collaboratively through blogs, create podcasts, or produce their own music videos. And we have two rules: You can't say, "I can't," and you can't ask us for help first; you have to ask someone else or search online. Self-sufficiency becomes a by-product of learning. This is exactly the way we hope they will teach their students. Unfortunately, digital literacies -- full of engagement, collaboration, and trial and error -- still aren't the norm in teacher education. Classes for both preservice and in-service students typically mirror the kind of teaching practiced for too long in K-12 schools. Traditional skills still get all the respect, and the teacher still has all the answers. It is an approach that makes sense to colleges and universities expected to cover a huge amount of standard content and feed teachers into a system fiercely wedded to its old ways of doing things. This approach has to change. If we need a paradigm shift in how we teach K-12 students (and we do), we need to rethink how we prepare teachers. At all levels, up-and-coming teachers and their instructors need to know the potential of the digital practices they can tinker with and explore. And they should tinker with them in the same way school students do -- regularly and imaginatively. They need to think of themselves as learners, seeking out learning partners, improvising, and exploring with the confidence to experiment with what they don't know. Digital literacy is key to this new way of thinking. It is a catalyst and an enabler of the kind of collaborative, participatory learning we all need to embrace. Enormous numbers of people are already seamlessly practicing a range of digital literacies in their personal and professional lives. We as teachers -- and those who train teachers -- must weave such practices into what we do as well. Recipes for Digital Literacy First, we have to update our definition of literacy. In the digital age, reading and writing have expanded to include new forms that have a wide range of intentions. The writer of a blog may choose to incorporate images, video, or the input of readers in her publication. Editing a wiki may require traditional writing skills, but it also calls for an added layer of confidence in one's own expertise, and trust in anonymous editors. Digital literacy nearly always incorporates an aspect of social networking that varies depending on the task at hand. What does digital literacy look like? Students will show you. For my doctoral thesis in the late 1990s at Australia's Queensland University of Technology, I spent an extended period studying the literacy habits of four seventh-grade students, visiting them at school and at home. One of them, Jacques, had enormous trouble with writing assignments but produced a marvelous flyer for his lawn mowing business, using key phrases such as "first time, lawn mowed free" and "reliable service." Another boy, Nicholas, came from an extremely tech-savvy family. I watched him chafe against the lockstep software programs for writing that were popular in Australian classrooms at the time. Faced with a system that forced him to write a title, lead paragraph, and essay of a certain length in a certain order, he spent the class period mucking around and annoying his classmates. Then he went home and used a regular word processing program to finish the assignment in a snap. More recently, I've seen children who struggle to read in class go home and read thick cheat books for their video games. Young people outside of school may do their writing collaboratively, through blogs and wikis and Google Docs. They increasingly spin their own tales at FanFiction.net or combine text with moving images and sound to express something about their world. A 2000 report by the U.S. government-sponsored National Reading Panel emphasized several aspects of reading instruction -- phonemic awareness, phonics, reading fluency, vocabulary, and reading comprehension in particular. If teachers stick to this one-dimensional interpretation of literacy, we fail on two fronts: We lose students who learn best with tech tools used for meaningful purposes, and we stop short of producing students who have real digital-literacy savvy in a world that demands it. If we commit to helping children and prospective teachers master digital literacy, our teaching methods must evolve. Often, educators see teaching with technology as business as usual -- as though it's simply an add-on. True, you can put your reading-comprehension tests on the computer instead of on paper, but that doesn't change the basic practice. Using Microsoft PowerPoint to retell The Three Little Pigs doesn't really change anything -- it's just an old-school practice in digital drag. The software-centric approach I see commonly in high schools, in which kids learn word processing on one day and PowerPoint on another day, will never work, not in grade school or at a teachers' college. To prepare teachers to truly succeed in the today's world, we need to immerse them in the technology their students use. We ask children to break through their fears of the unknown, dive in, and take risks. We must do the same. It may sound weird, but it's perfectly possible to teach people to do things you haven't mastered. My husband and I have never (yet) made an anime music video. (This popular form involves taking tiny clips from anime movies and syncing them to music.) Yet our students create gorgeous ones, and they tell us they have never worked so hard on a project. Plus, they get it -- they discover all the critical choices producers of these videos make: which music to select, how to match the mood of the music and video clips, how to effectively sync the rhythm with the visual transitions. Our approach is to say, "Let's give this stuff a go, and even if it's a spectacular failure, at least we'll have learned something." There are important reasons for jumping in at the deep end of the pool, however daunting it may seem. In addition to experiencing technology the way their own students have, educators in training can see the relevance of it in their own lives. Teachers can't capitalize on the educational potential of digital technology if they haven't had the opportunity to see how it can foster learning or enhance their own lives. It's a mistake to give teachers computers and demand that they find useful things to do with them. Instead, we need to create opportunities for teachers to use online technology and say, "I must have this." If we call on professors of education to transform teaching practice, we need to offer support and training for the task. In the Teacher Education Program at Montclair State University, in Montclair, New Jersey, where I coordinate the undergraduate and graduate literacy programs, we're lucky to have an administration that very much encourages digital literacy and exploratory kinds of learning. Last semester, for example, my dean provided information-technology support staff to help me evaluate the usefulness of the virtual world Second Life. I tried it in an adolescent-literacy course as a means to explore literature, using its virtual spaces to mirror the worlds you find in books. I got a level of positive response from my teacher-education students that took even me by surprise. More often than not, though, schools of education aim to cover so much material -- traditional literacy being a sizable part of it -- that digital literacy is an afterthought. There's also a prevailing (and false) wisdom that kids need to learn to read before they can use the Internet. This misperception, combined with fears for children's online safety, steers teachers and college professors away from meaningful online learning. This isn't helped by the restrictive Internet filters in place at schools, either. The truth is, it's really only through multiple online experiences that students learn to navigate the Internet's potential possibilities and pitfalls. Beyond instructional and material support from their institutions, professors need hands-on instruction -- not only the general nuts-and-bolts computer classes that are the norm but also courses that deeply explore the potential of digital tools and practices for teaching and learning. At Montclair, we're building our own professional-development practice for this approach. Colleges and universities can also help by giving up rigid courseware such as Blackboard, which provides professors with little flexibility to go beyond conventional assignments, tests, grades, and private discussions. On the Web, people from far-flung places can work together on sophisticated projects without ever meeting, or they can marshal a wide variety of expertise through public-discussion boards, often free. Without the freedom to test out these opportunities, we can hardly expect professors to weave them into teacher training. Professional organizations such as the National Council for Accreditation of Teacher Education and the International Reading Association also have an important role to play. Their standards for schools of education in many ways perpetuate the old model of teacher as expert, leaving little room for learners to use their own kinds of expertise, the kinds that can flourish when students do collaborative projects with peers at other schools or present their work to a real-world, professional audience. In looking at their standards, I hope these groups will think about the world teachers of the future will be preparing their students to successfully inhabit. I feel hopeful about the future of teacher preparation, and for the future of education as a whole. I know that positive things will happen if we look outside our traditions and beyond the walls of our institutions to see how children -- and adults -- are using digital technologies in their everyday lives to achieve new things that are often much more sophisticated than what they're asked to do in school. We must ask ourselves these questions: What are kids doing outside of school? What kinds of media are they writing, creating, and remixing? And what does that mean for what we do? Education works best when our students shape what we teach and who we are as teachers. If we follow their lead, it's inevitable that digital technologies will become a meaningful part of our teaching. This is to say not that knowledge no longer matters but, rather, that we must recognize that an emphasis on content -- so readily found online these days -- needs to give way to a focus on purposeful learning and on teaching students how to truly collaborate, participate meaningfully online, and tap into the expertise of others as they learn about their world. It feels risky, I know. But it's time for us as educators to simply jump in and give things a go to see what these tools can do. If we hang back out of fear, we -- and the teachers we prepare for the classroom -- will be distant figures in this century's rearview mirror. Michele Knobel is a professor in the Department of Early Childhood, Elementary, and Literacy Education at Montclair State University, in Montclair, New Jersey.

"Wear-and-Tear" vs "Use-It-or-Lose-It" TheoryOrgasm and Longevity: The Dose-Response CurveBy Will Block exual myths live on, despite the best attempts of researchers to allow the light of day to enter into the musty rooms of hearsay and fable. The work of Masters and Johnson conducted during the 1950s and 1960s demonstrated that the size of a man's penis does not equate to his virility, and that a woman's capacity for orgasm and for maintaining peak sexual excitement is limited only by physical exhaustion, not sexual or orgasmic exhaustion as is the case with men. Yet despite the work of debunkers such as Masters and Johnson, myths about sexual wear and tear live on. These myths are common in a wide range of cultures. They conclude that sexual enjoyment can be secured only at the cost of vigor and well-being. So it is a great pleasure to announce that this myth has been brought to its knees. Contrary to the notion of sex as an energy drain, recent research indicates that orgasm increases life span.* What's more, the greater the number of orgasms in one's life, the lower the mortality and the greater the probability of longer life. * The study examined orgasm via sexual intercourse. Do life extenders do it longer? THE SKY'S THE LIMIT The above-referenced study examined the correspondence between the frequency of sexual intercourse and death.1 For ten years, scientists followed more than 900 men (ages 45-59) in the Welsh town of Caerphilly and several nearby villages. Over the course of the study 150 men died. When follow-up studies were conducted, all deaths, including deaths due to coronary heart disease, were evaluated. In the group with the highest orgasmic frequency, mortality was 50% lower compared to the group with the lowest frequency of orgasms. Similarly, all causes of death were inversely correlated with frequency of orgasm. The more orgasm, the lower the mortality; the fewer orgasms, the higher the mortality. This association for lower mortality was most pronounced in those with coronary heart disease. At the point when the group's number of orgasms per year equaled 100 (about 2 per week) the death rate was significantly lower (68% less mortality) than that of the lowest frequency group (less than 1 per month)! Moreover there was good evidence for a "dose-response" relation across the study. Translated, this means that the improved mortality benefits from orgasm frequency continued - although perhaps at a less steep pace with advanced age - all the way up to daily "doses" (1 orgasm per day or 365 per year) as reported in some subjects, and possibly beyond, even to higher dose levels. Until now, aside from studies concerned with the sexual transmission of disease, sexual behavior and its relationship to health or mortality has not often been the subject of study. This situation may have to do with researchers in this area being predominately middle-aged who, by and large, study middle-aged and aging populations. Because of their shared assumptions with those whom they study, the researchers relate middle age and sexuality to declining sexual frequency, thus rendering the entire area uninteresting. Epidemiologists tend to study areas that interest other epidemiologists more often than those that interest the general population. Moreover, these same epidemiologists are generally employed by government, an institution not known for its innovation or desire to challenge prevailing assumptions. Orgasms have been found to increase life span. WHAT ABOUT WOMEN? In the scientific literature, we find more support for reversing the general epidemiological silence on the association between sexual behavior and mortality. In a 25-year follow-up aging study, the frequency of sexual intercourse was found to be inversely associated with mortality in men (more sex, less death), and enjoyment of intercourse was inversely related to mortality among women (more sexually-related pleasure, less death).2 From this and other studies we can reasonably conclude that for men the quantity of sexual activity is paramount while for women quality is more important. In a case-controlled study of middle-aged women expressing dissatisfaction with the quality of sex - primarily because of premature ejaculation or impotence of their partners - researchers found an increased risk of acute myocardial infarction.3 Given this general correspondence between sexual quantity/quality and morbidity and mortality, one wonders about the life of celibates such as priests and nuns? An analysis involving over 10,000 priests in the United States did find an overall but marginal increase in mortality compared to the general male population, as well as substantial increases in heart disease and greatly increased mortality attributed to cirrhosis of the liver, a disease associated with alcohol abuse.4 When nuns were studied, a general overall lowering in mortality was seen compared to the general female population, although these results were undoubtedly confuted by their significantly lower rates of smoking.5 At the point when the group's number of orgasms per year equaled 100 (about 2 per week) the death rate was significantly lower (68% less mortality) than that of the lowest frequency group (less than 1 per month)! THE RISK OF INACTIVITY There are many "old-wives' tales" as well as esoteric self-denial stories about the detrimental aspects of sex, but very little data to support conclusions that sexual frequency, independent of increasing the potential for disease transmission, can have negative or declining effects on health. In fact, scientific evidence seems to be suggesting quite the opposite. However, dear reader, because you have stayed with this article this long, presumably with the hope of another good argument for living a sexually-fulfilling life, you are entitled to the reward you've been looking for. Even if the returns aren't completely in, the knowledge gained from the Caerphilly (pronounced "carefully") study gives us the support we need to accelerate our scientific investigation of sex and its potential for enhancement. For example, scientific literature supports the use of arginine, niacin (for prolonged orgasm), choline, ginkgo biloba, yohimbine and other nutrients as useful for taking your sex life to a new level. So, get yourself a copy of Better Sex Through Chemistry or ask for some of our back articles on the subject. If you have been persuaded by the "wear-and-tear" theorists instead of the "use-it-or-lose-it advocates," it is time to think again. We are clearly in territory where too much is not enough. Need I say any more? - Davey Smith G, Frankel S, Yarnell J. Sex and death: are they related? Findings from the Caerphilly cohort study. BMJ. 1997;315:1641-1645. - Palrnore E B. Predictors of the longevity difference: a 25-year follow-up. Gerontologist. 1982;6:513-8. - Abramov L A. Sexual life and frigidity among women developing acute myocardial infarction. Psychosom Med. 1976;38:418-25. - Kaplan S D. Retrospective cohort mortality study of Roman Catholic priests. Prev Med. 1988;17:335-343. - Butler S M, Snowdon D A. Trends in mortality in older women: findings from the nun study. J Gerontol Ser B. 1996;51:S201-8.

Issue Editors: Eileen A. Joy & Andrew Rabin | November 2010 The State(s) of Early English Studies: A Shared Essay Cluster with postmedieval: a journal of medieval cultural studies Section Editor: Eileen A. Joy Elaine Treharne, Department of English, Florida State University Abstract: This essay considers the issue of adapted and new Old English poetry, as it is manifested through modern translations and poems 'after' the originals, and it also evaluates contemporary responses to new versions of the old, and contemplates how Anglo-Saxonists might exploit the popular interest in Creative Writing, particularly among graduate students. There is a wide and enthusiastic audience for Old English, who might appreciate both the original verse and its adaptations in university courses that emphasize translation and rewriting. Appended to the essay are poems by Florida State University Creative Writing graduate students, which showcase excellent translation skills influenced by a semester of learning traditional Old English literature and literacies. Mary Dockray-Miller, Lesley University Abstract: In light of current debates about literacy, critical thinking, and foundational knowledge in the undergraduate curriculum, this essay argues for an expansion and redirection of the discourse of Old English studies to include issues of literacy and aliteracy, language history and change, and interdisciplinary communication with professional training programs as well as other liberal arts disciplines. Still Theoretical After All These Years, Or, Whose Theory Do You Want, Or, Whose Theory Can We Have? Clare A. Lees and Gillian R. Overing, King's College London and Wake Forest University Abstract: We focus on some other questions that are forestalled by the repeated posing of the question of the 'in-ness' or otherwise of theory in our field, and consider also what can we do for 'theory' rather than what it can do for us. We raise further questions about the ethics of theory in past, present, and future contexts in Old English studies. Available in postmedieval: a journal of medieval cultural studies 1.3 (Nov. 2010) http://www.palgrave-journals.com/pmed/journal/v1/n3/index.html: Before and after theory: Seeing through the body in early medieval England Jacqueline A Stodnick, University of Texas-Arlington and Renée R. Trilling, University of Illinois This essay brings insights drawn from materialist theories of the body to bear on Anglo-Saxon texts with the dual aim of, first, advancing knowledge about the body in early medieval England and, second, questioning the limitations of contemporary theoretical models deeply invested in the toxicity of a post-industrial world. Providing examples drawn from Old English poetry, we argue that Anglo-Saxon uses of the body share some affinities with new materialist modes of thinking, particularly for the ways that they resist any simple severance of body from ruling consciousness. Periodization and the matter of precedent Kathleen Davis, University of Rhode Island This essay begins by considering the relation between medieval/modern periodization and the periodization of England's history as pre- or post-Norman Conquest, and suggests that despite significant differences these periodizations have a shared history—one that is nationalist, colonial, and fundamentally juridical. As a way of approaching the position of Anglo-Saxon studies in literary theory, the essay then examines the structure and function of legal precedent, and argues that periodization accomplishes for historical precedent what formalized institutional mechanisms accomplish for legal precedent: that is, a sorting out process that defines which elements of the past can serve as a rule for future guidance, and which cannot. Such a process of sorting and defining clearly still operates in the case of pre- and post-Conquest periodization. If periodization, like legal precedent, instantiates pasts capable of shaping or binding the future, then newly imagined futures and theoretical avenues require the disassemblage of this periodization. Text, sex, and politics: Present and past reflections Carol Braun Pasternack, University of California, Santa Barbara In November 2008, Proposition 8, the "California Marriage Protection Act," halted gay marriages just five months after the state's Supreme Court had ruled them protected by the state constitution. Although the proponents of Proposition 8 claim that they are protecting "traditional marriage" as understood by all cultures, faiths, and ages, this essay shows that their position intertwines religion, sexuality, and politics in a pattern that reflects the combination of values promoting chastity in late Anglo-Saxon England: both contend that a specific practice of Christianity and social adherence to their religious convictions about sexual practice are necessary to the safety of the political state. The essay also addresses the role of information technologies in the shaping of these ideas, speculating about how the shift from the hierarchical organization of the book to the more diffuse matrix of Web 2.0 may impact the governing of such ideas and social practices. What would Byrhtwold do? Lisa M.C. Weston, California State University-Fresno This essay engages with the discussion of possible futures for Anglo-Saxon Studies from the most material—and embattled—of places, the humanities within US public universities. Beset by budget cuts and by demands for "relevance" and "accountability" within increasingly corporatized institutions, medievalists especially can be dismissed as marginal. Yet proving oneself and one's field of research "central to University mission" often seems to require complicity with neo-liberal and anti-humanistic ideologies and cultures. At the very least it requires the adoption of the language of our oppression. But rather than compromising or merely bemoaning our fate, can we use our perceived position of marginality as a place from which to construct new theories and pedagogies of resistance (and also of pleasure)? This essay suggests that Anglo-Saxon Studies (and Medieval Studies more generally) may offer an appropriately "ex-central" position from which to formulate such utopian projects. Themed Articles: Anglo-Saxon Law Section Editor: Andrew Rabin Lisi Oliver, Louisiana State University Abstract: This paper argues that the unique term hion in Æthelberht §36 should be interpreted as tabulum of the skull, connecting it to the use of heafod-ban in Alfred §40. Nathan A. Breen, DePaul University Abstract: Treatments of Wealhtheow in Beowulf scholarship have traditionally viewed the queen either as an extension of Hrothgar, serving a ceremonial function in Heorot, or as a potentially subversive character, undermining the power structure of Heorot and creating strife. Primarily, these studies have been onomastic, cultural, or literary in nature, and have yielded great insight. However, as this essay demonstrates, the legal ramifications of Wealhtheow's speech have been largely ignored. Yet, it is within the context of Anglo-Saxon legal culture, as witnessed by the various law codes, writs, wills, and diplomas (and as supported by Germanic custom), that the queen's advice to Hrothgar concerning his informal adoption of Beowulf shows her political savvy and elevates her status within the poem, perhaps mirroring the roles of some Anglo-Saxon queens. Wealhtheow's speech recalls the primary prohibition of Hrothgar's kingship—that he should not alienate land from the kingdom or give his people away—as she skillfully protects the right to accession of the throne for her young sons. Jay Paul Gates, Department of English, John Jay College of Criminal Justice Abstract: The phrase ealles Englalandes cyningc appears for the first time in I–II Cnut, and represents a shift in the discourse of Anglo-Saxon kingship, changing it from king over a people to king over a territory, redefining the discourse of nationhood. Kathryn Powell, University of Cambridge Abstract: This article reviews the scholarship on MS Cambridge, Corpus Christi College 383 and particularly examines the case for the manuscript's St Paul's, London, origin. Based on a study of annotations, it suggests that the manuscript may have been produced elsewhere for the bishop of London and then modified at St Paul's. Laurence Nowell's Edition and Translation of the Laws of Alfred in London, British Library Henry Davis 59 Rebecca Brackmann, Lincoln Memorial University Laurence Nowell, a major figure in the sixteenth-century study of Old English law, laboriously gathered, transcribed, and edited Anglo-Saxon laws, eventually producing an Old English-Early Modern English edition and translation of the Laws of Alfred. Nowell's translation, examined in the context of comparable undertakings by his housemate Arthur Golding, reveals Nowell's strategies for making the Old English laws seem contemporary while still retaining their authoritative status as an object from the distant past. His manuscript's textual and visual emphasis on the royal origin of laws suggests that Nowell's presentation of Old English law as old and yet familiar also had political resonance for contemporary Elizabethan England. Daniela Fruscione, Johann Wolfgang Goethe-Universität, Frankfurt am Main The adjective "Germanic" originated among eighteenth-century philologists as a way of referring to the West Indo-European language group that produced modern-day German and English, as well as the Scandinavian, Celtic, Slavic, Italic, and Greek language families. It is a designation imposed from the outside, and thus corresponds neither to any self-determined denomination nor does it reflect any provable consciousness of a common Germanic identity among early northern European peoples. As recent studies of early medieval ethnogenesis have argued, without a uniform identity-consciousness among the speakers of the Germanic dialects, the denomination "Germanic" can be considered nothing other than a mere scientific convention However, if one speaks about the middle ages, one can only do so badly without it. This essay traces the history of the term "Germanic" and discusses ways in which it might be re-defined in a manner more useful for current scholarship. John Soderberg, University of Minnesota Jurasinski, Stefan, Ancient Privileges: Beowulf, Law, and the Making of Germanic Antiquity. Reviewed by Michel Aaij. Navigating This Issue Each page of the issue has a "print-friendly" version, which can be accessed through the "Print" function of the browser. This site experiences difficulties when viewed through Netscape Navigator on machines running on Mac OS 9. However, the pages view fine on either Internet Explorer or Safari. All files in this issue are offered to users free of charge for educational or personal purposes. Authors retain intellectual ownership of copyrighted material. Permission is not granted for commercial use. All artwork on this site is copyrighted to the credited artist, and permission must be obtained from that person before the art may be used elsewhere. All uncredited artwork is believed to be in the public domain. If this is incorrect, please email the Editor-In-Chief and proper credit will be given or the artwork will be removed at once, whichever is the preference of the artist and/or the artist's legal representatives. If an image is in the public domain, feel free to download it and upload it to your own site. Please do not link directly to the image. Staff For This Issue - Larry J. Swain, Editor-in-Chief - Deanna Forsman, Webdesign & Layout - Brad Eden, Book Review Editor - William Schipper, Archivist - Bill Hamilton - Heather M. Flowers - Kristin Vetter © 2010 The Heroic Age. All rights reserved.

ISTANBUL - Hürriyet Daily News Often accompanying the iftar meal during Ramadan are live music performances known as fasıl, a style of music from the Ottoman period The instruments used in a fasıl performance are generally the saz, a string instrument played by plucking; ney, a reed flute; tambourine with cymbals, tanbur. The iftar meal with which one breaks a day’s fast during the month of Ramadan is very frequently accompanied by what is known as fasıl music. Restaurants, whether or not they’re in hotels, often boast of providing live fasıl music. It is most often compared with the chants of the medieval Roman Catholic Church although the latter seem far less complicated. The oldest known song written in cuneiform has been dated to Ur, 4,000 years ago. Music though occurs in all societies whether written or not. When music first appeared among the Turkish tribes of Central Asia is unknown although music was definitely a part of their lives. There has been debate in the past as to whether music is allowable in Islam or not and the general consensus is that it is all right if it isn’t used for sinful purposes. As the Turks settled in Anatolia and carved out the Ottoman Empire, music of various kinds developed among the urban ruling class and in particular in the palace and its surrounds and in the mansions of the upper class. This tradition was based on two foundations – elitist or divan literature which mostly consisted of poetry and the mystic orders of Islam in the 16th century. Music was passed down from one master to another as there was no system of notation until the beginning of the 18th century. Musicians learned by heart and master musicians passed it along to their pupils. Today we are fortunate in having some 350 pieces of Turkish music, thanks to the efforts of Prince Dimitrie Cantemir of Moldavia, who lived in Istanbul between 1687 and 1710. What we term Turkish classical music today comes from the work he and others who followed him carried out. By far the best known of the classical musical forms is what is termed fasıl which means “section or part” in Turkish. The word is originally from Arabic and when applied to music, it refers to the playing and singing of pieces in a specific order. This is sometimes translated as “suite” in English. There are four different instrumental forms and three vocal forms, led by one person using a tambourine with cymbals, and during the vocal compositions there may be instrumental improvisations. A fasıl’s sequence is as follows: taksim (an instrumental improvisation); peşrev (usually of four parts, with long rhythmic patterns); kar (the first piece sung after the peşrev); first beste (a vocal composition consisting of four verses each followed by the same melodic passage); second beste (another vocal composition consisting of four verses followed by the same melodic passage); ağir semai (a rhythmic pattern of 10 beats); yürük semai (a rhythmic pattern of six beats and form of vocal music sung just before the instrumental piece at the end of the fasıl); and saz semaisi (the final instrumental form in four movements). Throughout its performance, fasıl remains in the same makam, which is the melodic creation that determines tonal relations, tessitura (the most musically acceptable and comfortable range for a given singer or musical instrument), starting tone, reciting tone and finales. It also indicates the contour and pattern of the melody. Its closest counterpart in Western music is the medieval concept of mode. The instruments used in a fasıl performance are generally the saz, a string instrument played by plucking; ney, a reed flute; tambourine with cymbals; tanbur, a plucked lute with a long neck; ud, a plucked lute with a short neck; kanun, a plucked zither; and kemence, a bowed fiddle. Some of the songs go back to the 14th century while others date to the late 19th century when songwriter Haci Arif Bey was very popular. The late Dr. Amil Çelebioğlu added considerably to what is known about the songs by analyzing a collection of fasıl from 1826 in the Ramazanname. Although the songs were strongly influenced by Ottoman poetry, there were ways in which they differed considerably. For instance, the last lines of poems usually contained the name of the poet but out of 1,500 songs, only one in the collection examined by Çelebioğlu contained a name and that was related to the janissaries, the Ottoman military corps disbanded in 1826. According to Çelebioğlu, many of the songs in the Ramazanname that he edited contain place names that are located in Istanbul such as the Ayazma Mosque and the building of the lighthouse between Ahırkapı and Çatladıkapı. As a result he places the date of the collection in the latter half of the 18th century. He also cites religious, historical and social examples to back up his chosen date. The songs traditionally were four lines long with eight syllables per line. The first, second and fourth lines rhymed but translating them into English precludes poeticizing them since that would distort the meaning. There were two types of subject matter in these earlier times. The first deals with religious items such as the night before the start of the month of Ramadan. FASIL FOR THE NIGHT BEFORE RAMADAN The moon of my Ramadan My soul is happy and pleased May your honored Ramadan Be blessed, my Sultan Listen to the happiness tonight Bid hello tonight Oh statesman mine They saw the moon tonight Tonight they saw the moon They prostrated themselves on the ground They decked themselves out with candles The mosques were adorned The other dealt with more mundane subjects like the “Song of the Cats and the Rats” or the sultan’s bribing the janissaries. This evening is number 16 As the month of Ramadan goes Today the Janissaries got Baklava from the Padisah Fasıl music in the palace began to be taught by the practice system from the time when Topkapi Palace was built. It was called “huzur fasli” or “harem fasli” when it was performed in the presence of the sultan with the participation of music experts from outside the palace. When it was performed in public places and in the audience halls of the palaces with the participation of lots of singers and saz players, it was termed “meydan faslı” or “kume (mass) faslı.” Many of the fasıl songs are indeed still popular and well known as this writer can attest when an entire ferryboat load of Turks on their way to Marmara Island from Istanbul sang the lyrics to fasıl melodies played by a saz musician who happened to be on the boat. The “performance” showed to what extent the vocal parts had gained in importance over the instrumental sections and have remained in popular memory.

Homeschool Literature says: Be sure to join us tomorrow for tons of giveaways, exciting events, and interactions with the authors. Also there will be a live Twitter chat with the publisher on “Helping the Reluctant Writer” During the virtual book release party you can find interviews with Caja Coyote in text and video, trivia clues, games, and a review of Fractured Fate. Click here for all material on the Homeschool Literature website related to the virtual book release party. Please note the text and video interviews with Caja Coyote are different interviews. It’s very interesting to see other people’s take on Fractured Fate. The review of our book is very positive, even stating, ““Fractured Fate” is one of those books that is going to become a classic for those of us who love the “supernatural” of it all.” We hope you enjoy the virtual book release party!

- About this Journal · - Abstracting and Indexing · - Advance Access · - Aims and Scope · - Annual Issues · - Article Processing Charges · - Articles in Press · - Author Guidelines · - Bibliographic Information · - Citations to this Journal · - Contact Information · - Editorial Board · - Editorial Workflow · - Free eTOC Alerts · - Publication Ethics · - Reviewers Acknowledgment · - Submit a Manuscript · - Subscription Information · - Table of Contents Journal of Nanomaterials Volume 2013 (2013), Article ID 795652, 10 pages Synthesis and Visible Photocatalytic Activities of Poly(aminobenzoic acid)/TiO2 Nanocomposites Department of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering, Baoji University of Arts and Science, 1 Gaoxin Road, Baoji, Shaanxi 721013, China Received 4 July 2013; Revised 23 November 2013; Accepted 10 December 2013 Academic Editor: Vladimir Agabekov Copyright © 2013 Puhong Wen and Xiaomei Wang. This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. Three kinds of polymers, poly(p-aminobenzoic acid) (PPA), poly(m-aminobenzoic acid) (PMA), and poly(o-aminobenzoic acid) (POA), were prepared by oxidizing p-, m-, and o-aminobenzoic acid with (NH4)2S2O8 in acidic solution, respectively. Poly(aminobenzoic acid)/TiO2 nanocomposites PPA/TiO2, PMA/TiO2, and POA/TiO2 were prepared by adsorption of PPA, PMA, and POA polymers on surface of TiO2 nanocrystals ST01 and P25, respectively. The polymers and the poly(aminobenzoic acid)/TiO2 nanocomposites were studied by FT-IR and UV-visible spectra, TG-DTA analysis, SEM observation, and measurements of isotherms and adsorption model of the polymers on TiO2 nanocrystals. Furthermore, the visible photoelectrochemical and photocatalytic activities of these nanocomposites were investigated by the photocatalytic decomposition of water and methylene blue under visible irradiation. These nanocomposites have exhibited higher and different the abovementioned activities. This difference can be attributed to the influence of site of amino group in aminobenzoic acid. Among the various semiconductor photocatalysts, titanium dioxide is one of the most popular and promising materials, because it is stable in various solvents under photoirradiation, it is also available commercially, and it can induce various types of redox reactions . The enhancement of photocatalytic activity is needed for applications of photocatalytic reactions. It is thus important to increase efficiencies absorbing and utilizing light energy. But TiO2 photocatalyst can absorb only the UV light with a wavelength region of below 400 nm that is only about 4% energy in the solar spectrum. Recently, there have been several attempts to enhance visible photocatalytic activity of TiO2, such as modification of TiO2 band gap by inducing oxygen-vacancy , replacing oxygen site with nitrogen , substituting Ti site with Cr, Fe, or Yb [4, 5], and modification of TiO2 by adsorbing organic dye molecules as sensitizer on the surface [6, 7]. To develop suitable sensitizer, some studies have been carried out on the synthesis of organic dyes [8–12]. Polyaniline (PANI), as a well-known conducting polymer, has attracted a considerable interest in recent years because of its good stability, electrical, electrochemical, and optical properties [13–15]. The polyaniline and its derivatives can be expected to be utilized as a new type of photocatalytic sensitizer, because they are p-type semiconducting material. Very recently, we reported synthesis of poly(o-aminobenzoic acid) (POA), adsorption of the polymer on TiO2 nanocrystals, and the behavior as photocatalytic sensitizer in the photocatalytic reaction . In this study, three chemical reagents p-aminobenzoic acid (PAB), m-aminobenzoic acid (MAB), and o-aminobenzoic acid (OAB) were selected as the starting monomer of the polymerization for comparing the activities of these polymers as photocatalytic sensitizer, because they have a carboxyl group located on the para-, meta-, or ortho-position of amino-group in the benzene ring, it will be polymerized into a poly (aminobenzoic acid) with straight-chain structure. In these polymers, the –NH2 groups can be utilized in the polymerization reaction, and carboxyl groups can be used to combine to Ti(IV) on TiO2 surface by a multi-bridging chelating coordination . The synthesized poly(aminobenzoic acids) and the poly(aminobenzoic acid)/TiO2 nanocomposites obtained by adsorption of the polymer on TiO2 nanocrystals were studied by FT-IR and UV-visible spectra, TG-DTA analysis, SEM observation, and measurements of isotherms and adsorption model of the polymers on TiO2 nanocrystals. Furthermore, the visible photoelectrochemical and photocatalytic activities of these nanocomposites were investigated by the photocatalytic decomposition of water and methylene blue under visible irradiation. These nanocomposites have exhibited higher and different the above-mentioned activities. This difference can be attributed to the influence of site of amino group in aminobenzoic acid. 2. Experimental Details ST01 (commercial TiO2 powder, anatase phase, crystal size about 7 nm, BET surface area 349 m2·g−1) was obtained from Ishihara. P25 (commercial TiO2 powder, mixed phases of anatase and rutile, crystal size about 30 nm, BET surface area 63 m2·g−1) was obtained from Degussa. N719 (cis-di(thiocyanate) bis(2,2′-bipyridyl-4,4′-dicarboxylate)-ruthenium(II) bis-tetrabutyl-ammonium) was purchased from Sigma-Aldrich. Other chemicals and reagents were of analytical grade, and all the reagents were used as received without further purification. 2.2. Synthesis of Poly(aminobenzoic acid) Poly(aminobenzoic acid) was synthesized by oxidizing aminobenzoic acid with an oxidizing agent of peroxodisulfate ammonium (NH4)2S2O8 in an acidic solution. A mixed solution containing 0.1 mol/L p-aminobenzoic acid, 0.15 mol/L (NH4)2S2O8, and 0.2 mol/L HNO3 was reacted at 40°C for 24 h with stirring. After the reaction, the precipitated solid was separated from the solution by centrifugation, then washed with distilled water, and finally dried at 40°C. The polymer poly(p-aminobenzoic acid) (PPA) is obtained. The synthesis methods of polymers poly(m-aminobenzoic acid) (PMA) and POA were similar to that of PPA. In the synthesis, the molar ratio of aminobenzoic acid/peroxodisulfate ammonium/nitric acid is selected as 1/3/1 for PMA and 1/1/3 for POA, respectively, for obtaining products with larger absorbance on visible light and pledging higher reacting speed. 2.3. Adsorption of Polymer on TiO2 Nanocrystals Ishihara ST01 and Degussa P25 were used as TiO2 nanocrystal samples in adsorption experiments. The adsorption experiment of the polymer on TiO2 nanocrystals was carried by a batch method. TiO2 nanocrystal powder sample (5 mg) was added into an ethanol solution (5 mL) of the polymer in a concentration range of 0.06 to 0.5 g·L−1, and then stirred at room temperature for 72 h. After the adsorption, the liquid phase was separated from the solid phase by centrifugation, and then the concentration of the polymer in the solution was analyzed using SHIMADZU UV-2450 spectrophotometer. The solid phase was washed with ethanol for 3 times and dried at 40°C. The TiO2 nanocrystal sample was calcined at 450°C for 30 min before using in the adsorption experiment . A TiO2 nanocrystalline film on conducting glass (FTO coated glass) was prepared by coating the conducting glass surface with ST01 or P25 TiO2 nanocrystal paste and then calcined at 450°C for 60 min. A polymer/TiO2 nanocomposite film was obtained by soaking the TiO2 film in 0.3 g·L−1 polymer ethanol solution for 24 h. 2.4. Physical Analysis FT-IR spectra of the samples were measured on a PERKIN ELMER SPECTRUM ONE spectrophotometer at a resolution of better than 2 cm−1 using the KBr technique. UV-visible spectra were recorded on a SHIMADZU UV-2450 spectrophotometer. Scanning electron microscopy (SEM) observation was performed on JEOL JSM-5500S. Nitrogen gas adsorption was carried out on a QUANTACHROME AUTOSORB-1-MP apparatus. The specific surface area was calculated from the adsorption data using the Brunauer-Emmett-Teller (BET) method. Simultaneous thermogravimetry and differential thermal analysis (TG-DTA) data were obtained on a SHIMADZU DTG-60H thermal analyzer at a heating rate of 10°C/min in air. In the photoelectrochemical and electrochemical measurements, a Hokuto-Denko BAS100B electrochemical analyzer was used. 2.5. Measurement of Photocatalytic Activity The visible photocatalytic activity of polymer/TiO2 nanocomposite was characterized by methylene blue (MB) degradation method and photoelectrochemical method. In the MB degradation method, the nanocomposite powder sample (30 mg) was added in the MB aqueous solution (150 mL, 5 ppm), and then irradiated with a 300 W, 110 V TAI incandescent lamp made by Toshiba Corp. in Japan located at 1 m from the MB solution. The spectral range of the lamp is mainly in visible range and containing about 5% UV-light. The concentration of MB in the solution was measured using SHIMADZU UV-2450 spectrophotometer. A blank experiment was carried simultaneously using 5 ppm MB solution without TiO2 to deduct MB degradation by direct photoreaction. The amount of MB adsorbed on sample surface was evaluated by desorbing MB from the sample with a 0.1 mol/L HCl solution after photocatalytic degradation experiment. The decrease amount of MB by the adsorption was removed from the degradation amount by the photocatalytic reaction. A sample of polymer-free TiO2 was used also as the reference in the visible photocatalytic active study. In the photoelectrochemical measurement, the polymer/TiO2 nanocomposite film was used as working electrode, and irradiated in a quartz cell containing sodium sulfate supporting electrolyte solution using a Xe lamp (Asahi Spectra USA LAX-Cute, VIS 400–700 nm) with a light intensity of 3000 W/m2. The masked-off irradiated area was 1.13 cm2. A Pt plate and an electrode were used as counter and reference electrodes respectively. An external bias was applied, and photocurrent was measured using the electrochemical analyzer. 3. Results and Discussion 3.1. Synthesis and Characterization of Poly(aminobenzoic acid) The polymers were synthesized by mixed the solutions of aminobenzoic acid and peroxodisulfate ammonium. The aminobenzoic acid has an aromatic structure similar to aniline that can be polymerized to polyaniline by an oxidation reaction [18, 19]. The long conjugated system of polyaniline leads to absorption of visible light in a wide wavelength region and electric conduction. It is expected that aminobenzoic acids can be polymerized also to a poly(aminobenzoic acid). The mechanism of the polymerizing reaction is similar to that of aniline . In the reaction, (NH4)2S2O8 is used as an oxidizing agent and the strongly acidic environment requiring for the reaction is provided by nitric acid. When (NH4)2S2O8 solution is added into the aminobenzoic acid solution, free radicals as initiating agent produced by breaking peroxodisulfate can attract the activated hydrogen of amino group of aminobenzoic acid, resulted new free radical of aminobenzoic acid molecular. The new free radical can attract aminobenzoic acid molecular, and then acted with the initiating agent free radical for completing a substitution reaction on the aromatic ring by free radicals. This substitution product can be attracted and lengthened further by free radical of aminobenzoic acid molecular. The product with enough great molecular weight can be precipitated from reacting solution. Therefore, polymerizations of lengthened chain can be ended, and formed PPA, PMA and POA respectively. The carboxyl groups on the poly(aminobenzoic acid) can be utilized for the adsorption of this polymer on TiO2 surface similar to the case of ruthenium bipyridryl derivative dyes . The optical absorption properties of synthesized polymers are dependent also on their synthesis conditions, such as the concentration of (NH4)2S2O8 oxidizing agent and HNO3. The influences produced by amount of oxidizing agent and the acid are different in the synthesis of PPA, PMA, and POA because of the difference of site of amino group in aminobenzoic acid. The increase of amount of oxidizing agent is not advantage to enhance the visible light absorption of polymers PPA and POA, but is advantage for polymer PMA. The increase of HNO3 concentration is advantage to enhance the visible light absorption of polymer POA, but lead to decrease greatly the visible light absorption of polymers PPA and PMA and color of the sample change to light. A precipitate was formed by aminobenzoic acid reacted with (NH4)2S2O8 in acidic solution. Colors of precipitates are black for POA, brown for PPA, and brown-black for PMA, respectively. Their SEM images were shown in Figure 1. It is observed that their morphology show hollow ball-like for POA (Figure 1(a)), grain-like for PPA (Figure 1(b)) and branch-like for PMA (Figure 1(c)), respectively. The solubility of the polymer samples in water solvent is low, while it is high in ethanol solvent. The UV-visible absorption spectra of synthesized polymers and their monomers in ethanol solvent are shown in Figure 2. The absorption spectrum of N719 dye in ethanol solvent is also shown in Figure 2 for the comparison. It is observed that all monomer have not absorption in visible light range, while the polymer PPA, PMA, and POA reveal a broad absorption band between 400 and 700 nm. The correlating data are summarized in Table 1. Their absorption peaks red shift to 300 and 391 nm for PPA, 331 and 346 nm for PMA, and 350 and 550 nm for POA compared with their monomers. The absorbance coefficients of the polymers in visible light region are much larger than that of N719 dye used in dye-sensitized solar cell. The average value of absorbance coefficient in 400–600 nm increases in the order of . The results indicate that the conjugation extent and activity absorbing on visible light of the molecular chain increase in the order of because their monomers have a same molecular weight. The polyaniline also shows two absorption peaks around 360 and 600 nm in water solvent, which can be attributed to the transition of the benzenoid rings and the exciton transition of the quinoid rings, respectively . This fact indicated that the carboxylic acid groups substituted on the benzene rings cause a blue shift due to their electron-withdrawing nature . Figure 3 showed the TG and DTA curves of the polymers. As shown in Figure 3, the decomposition of main part approaching 95% occurred at 200 to 650°C and formed broad exothermic peak corresponding to the burnout of the polymer. The broad peaks indicate they are a mixture with different polymeric degree. The results illustrate they are thermal stable polymers. The FT-IR spectra of synthesized polymers and their monomers samples are shown in Figure 4. The correlating data are summarized in Table 1. It is found that the main differences between the IR spectra of the monomer and the polymer are vibration bands of the amino groups. The sharp ν(N–H) bands located at around 3500~3300 cm−1 of PAB and OAB changed to broad bands, and ν(C–N) band at around 1350~1325 cm−1 changed to a broad band and red shift, after the polymerization reaction. The two strong bands at 1692 and 1292 cm−1 for PPA and 1688 and 1247 cm−1 for POA are assigned to the ν(C=O) and ν(C–OH) group of carboxylic acid (–COOH). The two weak bands at 1579 and 1385 cm−1 for PPA and 1606 cm−1 and 1385 cm−1 for POA are assigned to the asymmetric (–COO−as) and the symmetric (–COO−s) stretches of the carboxylate group, respectively. It is observed the absence of character bands of asymmetric and symmetric stretch vibration (N–H) of aromatic primary amine and the presence of vibration bands of carboxylate group in the FT-IR of MAB . It suggests hydrogen bands between primary amine group and carboxylic acid group exist in MAB. The spectrum of PMA showed the presence of carboxylic acid and carboxylate groups. The strong band at 1697 cm−1 is assigned to the ν(C=O) group of carboxylic acid. The shoulder band at 1610 cm−1 (–COO−as) and medium band at 1385 cm−1 (–COO−s) can be assigned to the asymmetric and the symmetric stretch of the carboxylate group, respectively. The broad band at 3416 and strong band at 1301 cm−1 are assigned to the ν(N–H) and ν(C–N) groups of aromatic secondary amine, respectively. The broad band at 3223 cm−1 and strong band at 1579 cm−1 are assigned to stretching vibration and bend vibration of N–H of groups, respectively. These results reveal that amino groups are used for the polymerization reaction similar to the case of polyaniline, and carboxylic acid group was not used for the polymerization reaction since the bands of this group were remained after the polymerization reaction. The bands at 823 and 871 cm−1 in FTIR spectra of POA are assigned to bend vibration of C−H of aromatic ring occurring 1,2,4-disubstituted. In the chemical structure of POA, whose scheme has been shown in literature 16, the ortho-position (occupied by a nitrogen atom) to one carboxylate group at a given monomeric unit would be located in meta-position relative to the carboxylate group of the neighboring unit. One nitrogen atom is located the para-position to other nitrogen atom on an aromatic ring. In fact, ortho-, meta-, and para- aminobenzoic acids should give polymers with quite the same chemical structure. But there are some differences in their chemical structure. The bands at 837, 867, and 683 cm−1 in FTIR spectra of PMA are assigned to bend vibration of C−H of aromatic ring occurring 1,3,5-disubstituted. The result is close to the theoretical analysis since there are the steric effect and the substituent effect. Therefore, in the chemical structure of PMA, one nitrogen atom is located the meta-position to other nitrogen atom on an aromatic ring. The bands at 845 and 871 cm−1 in FTIR spectra of PPA are assigned to bend vibration of C−H of aromatic ring occurring 1,2,4-disubstituted. The result agreed with the theoretical analysis by the steric effect and the substituent effect in this synthesis. Therefore, in the structure of polymer PPA, one nitrogen atom is located the ortho-position to other nitrogen atom on an aromatic ring. 3.2. Formation of Polymer/TiO2 Nanocomposites Two kinds of typical commercial TiO2 nanocrystal samples ST01 with a crystal size of about 7 nm and P25 with a crystal size of about 30 nm were used for the preparation of polymer/TiO2 nanocomposites. The samples ST01 and P25 have a value of BET specific surface area (SBET) as 349, and 63 m2·g−1 respectively, corresponding to their crystal sizes. Nanocomposite of polymer and TiO2 nanocrystals can be obtained by adsorbing polymer on the TiO2 nanocrystal surface. The preparing nanocomposite samples have been measured by specific surface area. These polymer/ST01 and polymer/P25 nanocomposites have a SBET value as 348 and 61 m2·g−1 for PPA, 341 and 62 m2·g−1 for PMA, and 344 and 62 m2·g−1 for POA, respectively. The results indicate the particle size of these nanocomposites is in a nanoscale. Figure 5 showed the adsorption isotherms of synthesized polymers on TiO2 nanocrystal samples ST01 and P25 at room temperature. The experimental data fit the Langmuir isotherm for all these samples. Thus the adsorptions of PPA, PMA, and POA on the TiO2 nanocrystals can be explained using the Langmuir monolayer adsorption model . The Langmuir equation can be represented in the linear formula (1): where is PPA, or PMA or POA uptake (mg·mg−1), is the equilibrium concentration of the polymer in the solution (mg·mL−1), is the saturation (maximum) adsorption capacity (mg·mg−1), and is the adsorption constant (mL·mg−1). From the fitting of experimental data by plotting against , the saturation capacity and the adsorption constant for PPA, PMA, and POA adsorptions were evaluated, respectively, and listed in Table 2. The adsorption parameters of dye N719 on TiO2 nanocrystals sample are also shown in Table 2 for the comparison. It is observed that the majority adsorption constant value for polymers is larger than that for N719, except PMA adsorption on P25. This result suggests the adsorptions of polymers on TiO2 nanocrystals are stronger than that of N719. The saturation capacity value (mg/mg (TiO2)) for polymers is approach or larger than that for N719. The molecular weight of chemical composition corresponding per –COOH group for the polymers is much smaller than that of N719. If the value is in M(–COOH)/mg (TiO2) unit, where M(–COOH) is amount (mole) of –COOH group adsorbed on TiO2, the value (mmole/g (TiO2)) of polymers are much larger than that of N719. It has reported that the carboxylic acid or carboxylate groups of organic molecules can coordinate to the TiO2 surface by various bonding modes, such as (a) unidentate mode, (b) chelating mode (4-membered bidentate), and (c) bidentate bridging mode [24–26]. Since the asymmetric and symmetric IR absorptive bands of carboxylate groups are different each other in these binding modes, these modes can be identified by the IR spectrum data. It has been reported that if the wavenumber difference between the asymmetric and symmetric bands in the adsorbed state is lower than that in the free-state, then the anchoring mode is bidentate chelating or bidentate bridging, while if the wavenumber difference is greater or equal to that in the free-state, then anchoring mode is unidentate . Figure 6 showed the FT-IR spectra of the nanocomposite samples obtained by adsorbing PPA, PMA, and POA on the TiO2 nanocrystal surface. The intensities of ν(C=O) and ν(C–OH) bands of carboxylic acid groups (–COOH) decreased largely after being adsorbed on TiO2 for PPA, PMA, and POA, and the decreased intensity is follow as . The result reveals –COOH groups were deprotonated to –COO− groups after the adsorptions, and the order of deprotonated degree in accord with that of the decreased intensity. As shown in Figures 4 and 6, the wavenumber differences between the carboxylate group asymmetric and symmetric bands of POA, PPA and PMA in the free state are 221, 194 and 225 cm−1, and that in adsorbed state are 232, 201 and 227 cm−1, respectively, for the polymer/ST01 nanocomposite sample. The wavenumber differences are larger than that in the free-state, and the results are identical for the polymer/P25 nanocomposite sample. The results suggest that the polymers anchor as unidentate coordination to the TiO2. It has been reported that the carboxylate groups in N719 anchor to the TiO2 surface with bidentate chelating or bridging binding mode [16, 20]. Although the bidentate chelating and bridging binding modes are more stable than the unidentate mode, meaning that the adsorption of N719 must be more stable than that of the polymers. But the adsorption isotherm results revealed that adsorption constant of the polymers is larger than that of N719 (Table 2). This fact can be explained by formation of a multibridging chelating mode in the polymer/TiO2 nanocomposite . Each polymer molecule has many carboxylate groups, and each carboxylate group can coordinate to TiO2 surface with the unidentate mode, which forms the multi-bridging chelating mode, and enhances the stability of the adsorption. 3.3. Activities of Polymer/TiO2 Nanocomposites in Visible Photocatalytic Reaction The nanocomposites prepared by adsorbing polymer on surface of P25 or ST01 nanoparticles were employed in visible photocatalytic degradation of methylene blue (MB) to measure their visible photocatalytic activities. Figure 7 showed the changes of the degradation ratio of MB with photocatalytic reaction time for POA/P25, PMA/P25 and PPA/P25 nanocomposite samples and P25 under the incandescent lamp irradiating conditions. The results showed the degradation ratio of MB at 330 min as 44.1%, 32.2%, 29.3%, and 21.1% for PMA/P25, POA/P25, PPA/P25, and no sensitized P25, respectively. The PMA/P25 nanocomposite showed the highest degradation rate in all testing samples. And that for all polymer/P25 nanocomposite samples is higher than the polymer-free P25 sample under visible light irradiating conditions. Furthermore, the photocatalytic degradation process was studied on the dynamics. The related data are summarized in Table 3. It can be found that these reactions are first order reaction and the reaction rate is proportional to the concentration of MB. The rate constant increased according to the sequence of , indicating the reaction activation energy of the order of decreasing, therefore, the catalytic activity of the catalysts is enhanced in this order. These results indicate the visible light sensitizing effect of PPA, PMA, and POA on TiO2 nanocrystal surface for the photocatalytic reaction. Figure 8 showed UV-visible spectra of MB solution degraded for the polymer/ST01 and N719/ST01 nanocomposites samples under indoors-light irradiating conditions for 3d. It is found that the visible photocatalytic activity of POA/ST01 sample is higher than that of others. The result showed the degradation ratio of MB at 3d as 77.5%, 66.3%, 47.2%, 22.3%, and 16.1% for POA/ST01, PMA/ST01, PPA/ST01, N719/ST01, and no sensitized ST01, respectively. This result suggests that samples from POA and PMA have strong adsorbing character and higher visible photocatalytic activity than that of others. And the syntactic polymer/ST01 samples used as a photocatalyst have more advantages than N719/ST01 sample in visible photocatalytic activity, synthesis condition and producing cost. The visible photocatalytic activity of the polymer/TiO2 nanocomposite is further demonstrated by the results of photoelectrochemical study. Figure 9(a) is a typical current-voltage curve obtained by irradiating intermittently the PPA/ST01 nanocomposite film electrode with a 100 W Xe lamp with 400–700 nm wavelengths. When the potential was scanned from −0.3 to 1.2 V (versus SCE), the photocurrent decreased slightly with increasing the applied potential, and so for the dark current, which is due to electrochemical oxidation reaction of PPA on the electrode . The hydrogen gas evolution was observed at the Pt counter electrode accompanying the photocurrent, suggesting the reduction of H+ to H2. Figure 9(b) is a typical current-voltage curve obtained at the same conditions for PMA/ST01 nanocomposite. It is observed that the almost constant photocurrent is much lower than that of PPA/ST01 nanocomposite, and the dark current closed to zero. The polymer-free ST01 film was also employed for the comparison, but without photocurrent was observed in the current-voltage curve under the same conditions (Figure 9(c)). The results indicate PPA/ST01 and PMA/ST01 nanocomposites are the material with visible photoelectrochemical activity, and the activity of PPA/ST01 nanocomposites is more than three times PMA/ST01 in the photocatalytic reaction. Figure 10 showed current-time curves of PPA/ST01 film at zero applied pressure (Figure 10(a)) and POA/ST01 film when applied pressure is 200 mV (Figure 10(b)) in aqueous solution containing 0.1 mol/L of sodium sulfate in the dark and under irradiation with light (400–700 nm). It is observed that the photocurrent for PPA/ST01 film is still much higher than that at applied pressure as 200 mV for POA/ST01 film although the applied pressure closes zero. The above results suggest that visible photoelectrochemical activity of PPA/ST01 nanocomposites is the highest among the three. Three kinds of poly(aminobenzoic acid) were synthesized by oxidizing p-, m-, or o-aminobenzoic acid with an oxidizing agent of peroxodisulfate ammonium in an acidic solution. The influences produced by the amount of oxidizing agent and the acid are different in the synthesis of PPA, PMA, and POA because of the difference of site of amino group in aminobenzoic acid. The polymer/TiO2 nanocomposite can be obtained by adsorbing the polymer on TiO2 surface and shows high stability, due to that the carboxylate groups anchor to the TiO2 surface with the multi-bridging chelating mode. PMA/P25 and PPA/ST01 nanocomposites exhibit much higher visible photocatalytic activity than others in the photocatalytic reaction, and PPA/ST01 nanocomposite reveals higher visible photoelectrochemical activity than others. Therefore, they have a potential application as visible light photocatalyst. This work was supported by the Grants-in-Aid for the Natural Science Foundation of China (no. 21173003), the Scientific Research Project (no. 2011JM2009) from Science and Technology Department of Shaanxi Province, and Key Research Project (no. ZK1051) from Baoji University of Arts and Sciences. - H. Kominami, S.-Y. Murakami, J.-I. Kato, Y. Kera, and B. Ohtani, “Correlation between some physical properties of titanium dioxide particles and their photocatalytic activity for some probe reactions in aqueous systems,” The Journal of Physical Chemistry B, vol. 106, no. 40, pp. 10501–10507, 2002. - I. Nakamura, N. Negishi, S. Kutsuna, T. Ihara, S. Sugihara, and K. Takeuchi, “Role of oxygen vacancy in the plasma-treated TiO2 photocatalyst with visible light activity for NO removal,” Journal of Molecular Catalysis A, vol. 161, no. 1-2, pp. 205–212, 2000. - H. Irie, Y. Watanabe, and K. Hashimoto, “Nitrogen-concentration dependence on photocatalytic activity of TiO2-xNx powders,” The Journal of Physical Chemistry B, vol. 107, no. 23, pp. 5483–5486, 2003. - E. Borgarello, J. Kiwi, M. Grätzel, E. Pelizzetti, and M. Visca, “Visible light induced water cleavage in colloidal solutions of chromium-doped titanium dioxide particles,” Journal of the American Chemical Society, vol. 104, no. 11, pp. 2996–3002, 1982. - T. Yoshida, T. Tanaka, T. Yamamoto, S. Yoshida, H. Ishitani, and S. Kobayashi, “XAFS study of ytterbium complexes as new-type Lewis acid catalysts,” Journal of Synchrotron Radiation, vol. 6, no. 3, pp. 455–457, 1999. - M. Grätzel, “The artificial leaf, molecular photovoltaics achieve efficient generation of electricity from sunlight,” Comments on Inorganic Chemistry, vol. 12, no. 2-3, pp. 93–111, 1991. - P. Péchy, F. P. Rotzinger, M. K. Nazeeruddin et al., “Preparation of phosphonated polypyridyl ligands to anchor transition-metal complexes on oxide surfaces: application for the conversion of light to electricity with nanocrystalline TiO2 films,” Journal of the Chemical Society, no. 1, pp. 65–66, 1995. - A. Kay and M. Grätzel, “Photosensitization of titania solar cells with chlorophyll derivatives and related natural porphyrins,” The Journal of Physical Chemistry, vol. 97, no. 23, pp. 6272–6277, 1993. - K. Sayama, K. Hara, N. Mori et al., “Photosensitization of a porous TiO2 electrode with merocyanine dyes containing a carboxyl group and a long alkyl chain,” Chemical Communications, no. 13, pp. 1173–1174, 2000. - Z.-S. Wang, F.-Y. Li, and C.-H. Huang, “Photocurrent enhancement of hemicyanine dyes containing group through treating TiO2 films with hydrochloric acid,” The Journal of Physical Chemistry B, vol. 105, no. 38, pp. 9210–9217, 2001. - K. Hara, M. Kurashige, Y. Dan-oh et al., “Design of new coumarin dyes having thiophene moieties for highly efficient organic-dye-sensitized solar cells,” New Journal of Chemistry, vol. 27, no. 5, pp. 783–785, 2003. - M. Dürr, A. Bamedi, A. Yasuda, and G. Nelles, “Tandem dye-sensitized solar cell for improved power conversion efficiencies,” Applied Physics Letters, vol. 84, no. 17, pp. 3397–3399, 2004. - Y. N. Xia, J. M. Wiesinger, A. G. MacDiarmid, and A. J. Epstein, “Camphorsulfonic acid fully doped polyaniline emeraldine salt: conformations in different solvents studied by an ultraviolet/visible/ near-infrared spectroscopic method,” Chemistry of Materials, vol. 7, no. 3, pp. 443–445, 1995. - J. Huang, S. Virji, B. H. Weiller, and R. B. Kaner, “Polyaniline nanofibers: facile synthesis and chemical sensors,” Journal of the American Chemical Society, vol. 125, no. 2, pp. 314–315, 2003. - E. Westerweele, P. Smith, and A. J. Heeger, “‘Inverted’ polymer light-emitting diodes on cylindrical metal substrates,” Advanced Materials, vol. 7, no. 9, pp. 788–790, 1995. - P. Wen, S. Yang, Y. Ishikawa, H. Itoh, and Q. Feng, “Visible light sensitization effect of polyaminobenzoate adsorbed on TiO2 nanocrystal surface,” Applied Surface Science, vol. 257, no. 6, pp. 2126–2133, 2011. - M. Adachi, Y. Murata, J. Takao, J. Jiu, M. Sakamoto, and F. Wang, “Highly efficient dye-sensitized solar cells with a titania thin-film electrode composed of a network structure of single-crystal-like TiO2 nanowires made by the “oriented attachment” mechanism,” Journal of the American Chemical Society, vol. 126, no. 45, pp. 14943–14949, 2004. - X.-L. Wei, Y. Z. Wang, S. M. Long, C. Bobeczko, and A. J. Epstein, “Synthesis and physical properties of highly sulfonated polyaniline,” Journal of the American Chemical Society, vol. 118, no. 11, pp. 2545–2555, 1996. - W. Li and H.-L. Wang, “Oligomer-assisted synthesis of chiral polyaniline nanofibers,” Journal of the American Chemical Society, vol. 126, no. 8, pp. 2278–2279, 2004. - M. K. Nazeeruddin, R. Humphry-Baker, P. Liska, and M. Grätzel, “Investigation of sensitizer adsorption and the influence of protons on current and voltage of a dye-sensitized nanocrystalline TiO2 solar cell,” The Journal of Physical Chemistry B, vol. 107, no. 34, pp. 8981–8987, 2003. - W. Liu, J. Kumar, S. Tripathy, K. J. Senecal, and L. Samuelson, “Enzymatically synthesized conducting polyaniline,” Journal of the American Chemical Society, vol. 121, no. 1, pp. 71–78, 1999. - M. Samsonowicz, T. Hrynaszkiewicz, R. Świsłocka, E. Regulska, and W. Lewandowski, “Experimental and theoretical IR, Raman, NMR spectra of 2-, 3- and 4-aminobenzoic acids,” Journal of Molecular Structure, vol. 744–747, pp. 345–352, 2005. - M. Xue, R. Chitrakar, K. Sakane et al., “Selective adsorption of thiophene and 1-benzothiophene on metal-ion-exchanged zeolites in organic medium,” Journal of Colloid and Interface Science, vol. 285, no. 2, pp. 487–492, 2005. - A. Islam, H. Sugihara, and H. Arakawa, “Molecular design of ruthenium(II) polypyridyl photosensitizers for efficient nanocrystalline TiO2 solar cells,” Journal of Photochemistry and Photobiology A, vol. 158, no. 2-3, pp. 131–138, 2003. - T. Ma, K. Inoue, H. Noma, K. Yao, and E. Abe, “Effect of functional group on photochemical properties and photosensitization of TiO2 electrode sensitized by porphyrin derivatives,” Journal of Photochemistry and Photobiology A, vol. 152, no. 1–3, pp. 207–212, 2002. - A. Vittadini, A. Selloni, F. P. Rotzinger, and M. Grätzel, “Formic acid adsorption on dry and hydrated TiO2 anatase (101) surfaces by DFT calculations,” The Journal of Physical Chemistry B, vol. 104, no. 6, pp. 1300–1306, 2000. - G. B. Deacon and R. Phillips, “Relationships between the carbon-oxygen stretching frequencies of carboxylato complexes and the type of carboxylate coordination,” Coordination Chemistry Reviews, vol. 33, no. 3, pp. 227–250, 1980.

HowAboutWe.com was boot-strapped into life in April 2010 at the apex of the iPhone’s market ascendency. Like rookies (we were rookies) we built a basic web app. No API. No native apps. No real mobile strategy. And yet, in creating HowAboutWe—a dating service in which users post the actual places they want to go on dates—we had built a mobility dream of location-based, on-the-go, high-converting repeat usage. Obviously the “offline dating site” should be the “offline dating app.” We realized this pretty quickly and so began the process of retroactively becoming a mobile-first product. IOS was the obvious first platform. Like hundreds of thousands of other companies we built a native iPhone app. We launched it with great success; it was the number-one new featured app when it came out, has acquired hundreds of thousands of downloads, is top in in-app purchases, and has usage correlated with our very highest subscription conversion rates. We thought we could take our beautiful iPhone app, make a few tweaks for Android, and call ourselves ready for development. After all, we had seen this pattern from dozens of other highly successful apps. But after diving into design research, we realized this project would be a lot more complicated. The seven questions below stake out a path of inquiry that will help you translating your own design language from iOS to Android. We had high hopes for Android, and it hasn't disappointed. In December 2012, we launched HowAboutWe for Android and, in its first few weeks, the app has been installed over 20,000 times with about a 65 percent conversion rate from install to complete sign-up. We’re seeing over 10 percent conversion rates from sign-up to subscription (we launched with a seven-day free trial subscription that auto-converts into paid membership). In fact, in some ways our Android users are showing up the folks on iOS. Key engagement rates (such as photos uploads) are 20 percent higher on Android than they are on the web. Early data indicates high repeat usage rates with an average of three sessions per day per active user. And all of this is based on the limited feature set with which we launched. We've come to believe strongly that Android will be a great source of ongoing user acquisition, retention, and monetization. We seriously considered doubling up our mobile web and Android approach by building an HTML5 app and throwing it into a wrapper for Android, but our early prototypes indicated that we would never be able to achieve with a PhoneGap-type solution the kind of design elegance that was our standard. Native it was. Around that time, two big things happened. First, Google released its Android Design Guidelines, changing the entire trajectory of our Android strategy for the better. It’s only in the last six to 12 months that Android design and development patterns have come to mature, making 2013 an auspicious time to dive into Android development. Second, we hired a top tier in-house Android engineering team, and charged them with building an app based on Android development best practices, not a mere duplication of our iOS architecture. (The team is pictured below: Matt Lim, Chuck Greb and Baldur Gudbjornsson respectively.) They immediately set about asking and answering the following seven questions. Android, iOS, and mobile web each have their own design patterns and conventions. In designing for these platforms, the goal is to achieve both cross-platform brand consistency and alignment with the conventions specific to the platform. The truth is that almost no actual users outside your QA team will use both your iOS and Android apps, so consistency of interaction isn't the goal. It can be annoying (at best) and downright confusing (at worst) to users to be presented with interactions that are not consistent with the general patterns followed by other apps on their phone. And yet, while you seek to avoid anti-patterns, you also want to pursue breakthrough UI innovation. This is the mogul course of cross-platform design. Let’s take the HowAboutWe messaging interface as an example. (Below, our original iOS-like Gingerbread inbox, our Jelly Bean inbox, and our iOS inbox.) IPhone and Android each convey essentially the same information, but the visual treatment and interactions are quite different. The primary information shown here is a list of messages, tabs for each label, read/unread status, and an indicator showing if a reply has been sent. Tapping on any of the messages opens a new screen with the full conversation thread, and some other peripheral functionality is there, too. Android’s Action Bar follows a few key, differentiated patterns. In all three applications, tapping the top-left most icon opens the main menu of the application. But the visual treatment of these icons is quite different. Android uses the app logo (or "home" icon) and the title is left-aligned on Android, showing the “up” navigation to the left of the home icon, which indicates additional content is available. Android also uses scrolling tabs rather than iOS style buttons to display the labels for inbox, sent, and archive, and hides additional functionality behind action icons. Rather than showing an indicator icon on unread messages like iOS, Android relies on changing the background color of the cell. Also, notice on Android the absence of the iOS convention of a right-pointing caret on each line to show it is clickable. In short, what look like two similar views really aren't the same from the standpoint of interaction. Our original designs copied the iOS patterns almost exactly, but the new Android Design Guidelines called for a significantly updated, and more native UI. It was only once we internalized the native Android design patterns that we were able to get away from our original, iOS-derivative designs. When should you use the system default widgets? When should you create custom widgets? On Android, the look and feel (and sometimes even behavior) of system default components will vary significantly depending on platform version, device manufacturer, and theme. Recently, Android has been trying to reduce style inconsistencies, but this is still a significant challenge for developers. The only way to truly ensure style and layout consistency across various platform versions, manufacturers, screen sizes and densities is by using custom UI components. This can mean anything from simply swapping a different image asset to be used as the background to coding a brand new view class with the desired look and functionality. There is an increased cost in terms of design, development, and QA time for any custom solution, but it can lead to a more consistent, brand-aligned result. (Below, side-by-side respective comparisons of similar buttons in Jelly Bean and Gingerbread; Jelly Bean and Gingerbread; Gingerbread and Jelly Bean.) Buttons are one of the easiest components to customize, so start your customizations there. Typically, functionality for a button is not going to change. But the look and feel is drastically different between pre-Honeycomb and post-Honeycomb devices. Developers can simply drop in alternative assets for each screen density and state to make the buttons look the same across all platform versions. We chose to customize many of the buttons that appear in HowAboutWe, and the workload was minimal because we are able to reuse the same handful of button styles throughout the app. This allows us to keep a more consistent, branded look and feel across all platform versions and devices. Spinners (also known as dropdown menus) look very different on pre-Honeycomb devices. This can affect not only the look and feel of the individual component but the overall layout of a screen. (Above, spinners as they appear in Gingerbread, Jelly Bean, Gingerbread, and Jelly Bean respectively.) For the screen that allows a user to edit his or her basic information, we wanted to use spinners since the user is limited to a select set of responses for most fields. However, we knew the layout would look too cluttered on Gingerbread and Froyo devices with the old big gray box style that opens a separate dialog over the screen. We customized this to create consistency. Since the theme of the application is based on Holo, we decided to use the new spinner style even on older devices. We achieved this result by creating a custom style for the spinners using the new assets from AOSP. In some cases, customization felt too costly to be worth it, despite the consistency gains we would reap. For instance, we decided not to customize Text Fields (ex. "CAREER/JOB"), so older devices and newer devices still have a different look and feel for these components. (Above, similar screens in Gingerbread and Jelly Bean show their different text fields side-by-side.) In designing the UI pattern for the HowAboutWe app, we wanted to provide an elegant full-screen experience, keeping navigation quarantined in a secondary area. However, we also wanted to provide the capacity for rapid switching between tasks. Our initial designs used the fullscreen dashboard view pattern seen in the earlier version of the Facebook Android app and the 2011 Google I/O app. We eventually moved to a sliding drawer, and here's why. Initially, the advantages of the grid UI seemed obvious. The options are presented to the user in a simple, easy-to-digest grid. And, from an implementation standpoint, it’s fairly simple and straightforward. However, from a user's perspective, there are significant downsides. The navigational experience disruptively occupies the entire screen. It makes navigation a primary act rather than a facilitative one. In this way, it’s a bit of a monolithic design choice. (Our old grid layout next to Facebook and Google's former designs, below.) Within the last year, the sliding drawer model has become increasingly popular, perhaps first made popular by the Twitter iPad app. Visually compelling, easeful, and fun to use, it has since been adopted by Facebook, YouTube, Google+, Path and many, many others. We decided to go with this less interruptive, more elegant pattern. For implementation, we decided to use jfeinstein10’s public SlidingMenu library project which is available on Github here. It gave us a base FragmentActivity that hosts an easily configurable sliding drawer contained in a Fragment. This is significant because it is stateful, has access to useful lifecycle methods, and allows clean interaction between itself and its hosting activity. When opened, the active fragment slides its left edge to the right, just short of being completely offscreen. The vertically scrolling list is just an AdapterView, so it is possible to implement conditionally displayed items with different layouts, states, and even badges. (Below, our drawers as seen in mobile Safari, iPhone, iPad, and two Jelly Bean views, one which shows our Free Trial Membership banner.) Based on our Android work, we went back and reworked our iPhone and mobile web navigation, implementing the sliding drawer across all of our mobile products. This is one case where cross-platform interaction consistency makes sense, but it's the exception, not the rule. The HowAboutWe Dating app relies on numerous Status Bar Notifications for asynchronous messaging to the user. Some of these are generated by the application itself, and others are server push notifications powered by Google Cloud Messaging (GCM). With the introduction of rich notifications, status bar notifications became much more visually appealing and powerful. Now more information can now be conveyed to the user via notifications along with additional options for taking action. (Below, notifications as they appear in our Android apps. At left, a new message in Jelly Bean; a successful upload; pending upload; Gingerbread notifications; and a failed upload.) HowAboutWe uses notifications in Android for processes it might not in iOS. When a user uploads a new profile photo, for example, this requires transferring a non-trivial amount of data over the network. Instead of blocking the Android app's UI with a loading dialog to communicate the status of the upload, a series of notifications is used to convey this information. When the upload is started, the application generates a status bar notification to let the user know the upload is in progress. The network data transfer itself is processed on a background thread, so while the upload is pending, the user can continue to interact with the application. Then, once the upload is complete, the application fires a second notification to let the user know the upload is complete. If for some reason the upload failed (say, a network error) a failure notification is shown instead. If the upload pending notification is still showing in the status bar, this notification is updated. The point is that the user never sees both pending and success notifications at the same time. When the user receives a new message, a push notification is sent from using Google Cloud Messenger to notify the user. Rather than showing the classic “[USER] sent you a new message” text in the notification, using BigTextStyle for expandable rich notifications (on Jelly Bean devices), the user can actually read the full text of the message right in the notification. Also the profile photo of the user who sent the message is shown as the icon. Using the rich notification format (on ICS and Jelly Bean devices), we can even display a clipped version of the actual photo that was uploaded. Using the NotificationCompat.Builder class in the Support Library, these notifications gracefully degrade on older devices. Engineers thrive on good tools that save them time and help them write better code. Over the years, engineers have built vast integrated development environments, or IDEs, that allow other developers to dive right into high level implementation without needing to lay the groundwork. Instead, a few clicks and keystrokes allow you to compile, deploy, and commit your work back to version control. Before these lovely IDEs, programmers had to manually compile source files into object files, link them together, and ensure that all of their library paths were correct; writing a good, flexible Make script is a non-trivial undertaking. Further, IDEs can now inspect our code, optimize it, and refactor it—usually better, faster, and with fewer mistakes than our human hands. In this section, we will attempt to compare the two most popular Java IDEs for Android development: Eclipse and IntelliJ. We will also include a supplementary comparison with Xcode, the official IDE for iOS development. We'll focus on the following areas: - Keymapping: how customizable is everything? - Window management/manipulation: how easy is it to toggle between different tool views, and can you do it using the keyboard? - Introspection: how well does the IDE examine your code and alert you to optimizations, improvements, and unused items? - Refactoring: what kind of refactoring operations are available and how powerful are they? - Source control manipulation: what kind of operations can you do from within the IDE, and what is the UI experience around it? - Interleaved command line use: if you switch branches on the commandline, does the IDE choke or does it keep up? The first IDE to be officially supported by Google for the AOSP was Eclipse. Eclipse by itself does not come with Android support out of the box; it is added via Google’s Android Developer Tools plug-in. Previously, this was a separate installation, but Eclipse and the ADT plug-in are now available on the Android Developer website as a bundle. The layout of Eclipse, IntelliJ, and Xcode is very similar; collapsible, resizeable tool panes on the left, bottom, and right edges of the application window with the editor window in the center. In Eclipse, these tool panes can be anchored to nearly all edges of the screen, can be minimized and can be popped out of the UI into separate windows. They can be summoned with a keystroke if they are not currently shown, but they cannot be hidden this way—you’ll need to reach for the mouse. Introspection is quite powerful; it will warn you of unused variables and missing imports at the source level via a red (error) or yellow (warning) squiggly underline. Hovering the mouse over the offending token will show the Quick-Fix menu. The Quick-Fix menu offers helpful solutions to simple errors, and sometimes it suggests improvements or offers to do things like generate getters and setters for private variables. It is also accessible with a handy keystroke (⌘1). This is incredibly convenient—you can go straight from writing code to fixing it, without reaching for the mouse and reorienting your eyes to find the mouse pointer. (Below, the Eclipse Quickfix menu at left and refactoring menu at right.) This, and countless other small opportunities for seamless operations can truly add up to extended periods of uninterrupted concentration. Refactoring features of Eclipse are varied and are well-implemented. Changing method signatures, promoting local variables to member variables, extracting blocks of code into methods—all of these are easy to do. These functions can be accessed using the secondary mouse button menu. These refactoring features are incredibly powerful and can save lots of time, but more importantly, can truly prevent mistakes when changes ripple across multiple files. As far as version control integration, Eclipse comes with nothing out of the box—like the Android support, it requires a plug-in that is easy to find. There are several plug-ins available for git, Subversion, and probably anything else you’d want to use. Beginning with version 9, the JetBrains’ IntelliJ IDE added out-of-the-box support for Android. As of version 10, it became available in the free Community Edition version of IntelliJ, which opened it up for much more widespread use. The layout of this IDE is very similar to Eclipse w/tool panes on the bottom, left, and right edges of the IDE and the editor in the center. Also like Eclipse, these panels can be summoned with a keystroke, but unlike Eclipse, they can be hidden with the same keystroke, allowing fast toggling of tool panes exactly when you need them. This is incredibly useful in the contexts of quickly needing to browse the project hierarchy, checking to see which files have been modified since the last commit, or hiding and showing the console window, for example. It effortlessly surfaces information in a clear, concise manner and doesn’t make the user pay for it when switching back to coding. (Below, the IntelliJ commit view at left, and the IntelliJ changes pane at right.) Like Eclipse, IntelliJ’s introspection features are thorough. It alerts the user to unused variables and unused code, but instead of using a single callout that signifies all generic warnings, it alerts the user to unused variables by subtle syntax coloring hints. Unused variables and functions are dimmed a darker shade, and they are never colored this way for any other reason—other more complex warnings are underlined and typically require manual identification. Such informative visual cues are effective and non-interruptive. Yellow underlined items in IntelliJ are not always warnings—occasionally they are simple optimizations and quick wins. Sometimes it will point out that a member variable can become a local variable, or that a boolean expression is more complicated than it needs to be. This is great, as it constantly enforces good style and better code. Nearly all of these features can be quickly activated via IntelliJ’s Show Intention Actions feature, very similar to Eclipse’s Quick-Fix menu as described above—also bound to a handy keystroke. IntelliJ’s refactor menu looks almost identical to Eclipse’s, though IntelliJ’s seems to be more of a superset. More features doesn’t always necessarily mean better, but it does offer a few things that Eclipse doesn’t. Out of the box, IntelliJ offers VCS support for Git, Mercurial, Subversion, and CVS. You can even import projects directly from a repository URL, often without very much additional fiddling. This is by no means impossible in Eclipse, but it is incredibly convenient that it requires no extra plug-ins or components. First-party support for these features offers another level of comfort that just doesn’t come with third-party plug-ins. Mentioned earlier, the Changes pane in IntelliJ shows all changes made on all repository files since the last commit. In practice, this can be a priceless asset. After an hour of work, if you realize you are on the wrong branch and need to switch to another one that will require an ugly rebase—no problem! Shelve all, some, or parts of some of your changes to a changelist, do what you need to do on the command line, come back to IntelliJ and reapply as desired. Changing branches on the command line between trips back and forth to the IDE never produces any error-like dialogs asking if files need to be refreshed—they are refreshed automatically. The currently checked out branch is also always visible in the status bar. All in all, raw code editing features across the three IDEs are similar. Each powerfully supports the user to quickly write clean code that is easy to change and reorganize. The experiences across the IDEs vary, though. Eclipse and IntelliJ have almost the same layout and featureset, yet these features are considerably easier to discover and are better implemented in IntelliJ. The overall look and feel of IntelliJ is more streamlined, more informative, and more responsive. Eclipse’s use patterns and appearance feel dated in comparison. When minimizing certain tool panes in Eclipse, sometimes it’s not obvious where they went or how to retrieve them. When popping windows out of the main window in Eclipse, they behave normally when dragged alone—but then dragging the main window causes the popped out windows to move along with it. It’s less than cute. In contrast, IntelliJ’s tool panes are all clearly labeled, cleverly placed, and easily toggleable. IntelliJ offers tremendous assistance and intervention without becoming intrusive. Make no mistake: Eclipse is far from unusable; however, it definitely hasn’t aged well, considering IntelliJ has been around for just as long. For Android, IntelliJ is a much smoother, more streamlined experience with a shallower learning curve. It feels like a modern piece of software, as software for making software should. Without delving into too many differences between iOS and Android implementation, we wanted to briefly discuss how the two most widely used Android IDEs compare, from an experience perspective, to Xcode. Once again, the same kind of overall layout is present here: central editor windows with collapsible tool panes on the outer edges. Like IntelliJ, these panels are toggleable with convenient keystrokes, but, as an added bonus, they sweep in and out of view with eye-pleasing, eased animations. Not required, but definitely neat. Introspection in Xcode is definitely thorough, but it needs to be triggered, either from a clean, a compilation cycle, or with a pass of the static analyzer. In other words, not all errors and warnings are detected at source-level, many of them are only ever reported at compile time, which is more of a result of the platform architecture rather than the IDE. That said, the static analyzer is incredibly informative and graphical—it will draw arrows procedurally through code in order to illustrate where errors originate, and it explains how and why with associated textual cues. Refactoring features in Xcode are comparatively limited. Automatically changing method signatures is not possible, only method renaming can be done. Blocks of code can be extracted into new functions or methods, but not into external protocols or categories. Getter/setter generation is possible through the Encapsulate option, but is not immediately useful since this can generally be achieved more concisely using properties. (Below top, the Xcode static analyzer; below left, the Xcode commit view; below right the Xcode refactor menu.) Version Control Integration via Git or Subversion is thoroughly supported out of the box. As is possible in IntelliJ, it is possible to import projects directly from a repository URL, and repository creation is possible as well. For the same reasons as discussed before, this is immensely powerful. There are facilities for comparing changes and performing selective, detailed commits to specific branches. According to the current distribution graph, as of December 5, 2012, the majority of Android devices are still running Gingerbread (50.8%). A non-trivial number of devices are still running Froyo (10.3%). And roughly only one third of devices are running Honeycomb or newer versions (35.8%) of the operating system. At first glance as an Android developer it might be tempting to decide to only use features available in all platform versions you will support. This is not a very good approach. To quote Mark Murphy, in his book The Busy Coder’s Guide to Android Development (v4.2): Aiming to support older releases is noble. Ignoring what has happened since those releases is stupid, if you are trying to distribute your app to the public via the Play Store or similar mass-distribution means. You want your app to be distinctive, not decomposing. When building HowAboutWe Dating for Android, we knew that we wanted to take advantage of recent advancements in the platform including fragments, action bar, rich notifications, and the Holo theme. Fortunately there are open source tools and strategies we found to help us deliver a modern and rich experience to users with the latest versions of the the platform, yet still provide a gracefully degraded experience to the rest of users and devices. The Support Library allows many platform features introduced in Honeycomb and later to be used on earlier versions of Android. However the Support Library is just a minimal set of APIs and only gets you so far. (Below, the action bar in Jelly Bean; the action bar in Gingerbread; and the action bar as it appears in the Jelly Bean inbox.) Jake Wharton’s ActionBarSherlock project enables a fully functional backwards compatible version of the Action Bar and the Holo theme with very little work on the part of the developer. We leveraged both of these libraries in HowAboutWe Dating to provide a rich experience on all supported versions of Android. ActionBarSherlock even offers more flexibility than the system components in some instances, like allowing 3 action icons to be shown on smaller screens rather than the overflow menu. Early on we decided to take a fragment first approach to developing the app. The advantages of using fragments on a phone are readily apparent when using something like a ViewPager. For example, in the Messages section of the application, there are 3 fragments in a single activity using a ViewPager (Inbox, Sent, and Archive). Users can swipe or tap on the tab indicators to switch between the various fragments. Even when only one fragment is active at a time, we still decided to implement the majority of functionality using fragments, to take advantage of the fragment lifecycle, APIs, and to ease the transition to tablets in the future. Most of our activities ended up as simple wrappers for the fragments they contained. On most screens, the activity handles high level functionality such as the Action Bar, broadcasts, and result intents, whereas the fragment handles the layout, user inputs, and basically everything else. Sometimes even the tools available don’t give you everything you want. For example, in the sign up flow, we wanted to implement smart and stylish number pickers for birthdate and age preferences. While the DatePicker widget has existed since API level 1 (Base), the standalone NumberPicker widget has only existed since API level 11 (Honeycomb). (Below, the number pickers in Jelly Bean and Gingerbread, respectively.) To build an age range picker in the same style as the date picker on Gingerbread and Froyo required implementing a custom backport of this component. (You can see both versions above.) Fortunately the NumberPicker widget is available as an internal component on earlier versions of the platform. After porting this widget from the Android source code into our project, all that was left was creating a wrapper class to use the correct implementation based on the current version of Android running on the device. See a code sample hosted on Github here. Automated testing on Android is still not as simple as one might hope. Several solutions come bundled with the SDK including the Android Testing Framework, Monkey Runner, and JUnit. However the version of JUnit that comes with the Android SDK is JUnit 3. JUnit 4 can be integrated separately for unit testing but is not compatible with Instrumentation. Finally, there is Robolectric, an open source tool developed by Pivotal Labs that allows you to unit test Android code in the JVM. There are also a number of testing services that have cropped up like TestDroid, AppThwak, and Apkudo. And of course there is good old-fashioned manual device testing. Each of these solutions has its own costs (time and/or money). When building HowAboutWe Dating, we knew that we want to take a test-driven approach. The benefits of Test-Driven Development (TDD) are well documented by industry leaders like Kent Beck, Uncle Bob, and Michael Feathers, who we'll quote below. I don't care how good you think your design is. If I can't walk in and write a test for an arbitrary method of yours in five minutes its not as good as you think it is, and whether you know it or not, you're paying a price for it. The Android Testing Framework is well designed for integration tests that run on an emulator or device. Automated tests are written in a separate test project that runs in the same process as your application. Using instrumentation, activities, and services can be tested running in a real environment. However because this method requires you to compile, dex, and deploy TWO applications onto an emulator or device this is prohibitively slow for test-driven development. And as we all know, when tests are slow, the tendency is not to run them. Pure JUnit, while fast, has the limitation of not being able to test any code that loads a class from the Android SDK. All business logic must be extracted into POJOs that are then invoked by the activity or service. While noble in principle, this quickly leads to cumbersome architecture. And you are still unable to test any logic that is linked to the lifecycle of Android components such as an Activity or Fragment. Robolectric, however, provides the best of both worlds. Using a proxy for the Android SDK, unit tests can be run in the JVM without deploying to an emulator or device, and still invoke Android specific code. However, Robolectric is only as good as its coverage of the Android framework. But since it is open source, developers are encouraged to contribute to the project if you run into a part of the framework that does not yet have a proxy implemented. With extensive unit test coverage, we are able to implement new features and refactor the code base with confidence, since ideally any regressions will be caught by the existing tests. This also gives us a high degree of confidence in the business logic that controls the application. Beyond unit testing to cover our logic, to weed out issues related to differences between devices and OS versions we relied heavily on manual testing. With a big device library, we are able to test the final product on a representative array of devices to root out issues related screen sizes, densities, manufacturers, and OS versions. While this can seem daunting, thanks to our unit tests very few issues related to core logic are found at this stage which greatly reduces manual testing time. While local builds work well for development phase, to ensure a high degree of consistency at the QA and release phases of the project we rely on a robust Continuous Integration (CI) environment. (For more on setting up your own continuous integration environment, check out this guide.) QA and release versions of the app are built using Apache Maven and the Android Maven Plugin running on Jenkins. Dependencies and artifacts are stored on an internal repository server using Sonatype Nexus. When a new commit is pushed to GitHub, our build server pulls the latest code from master. Using Maven, it compiles all the classes using the dependencies stored in our internal Nexus repository. All Robolectric unit tests are then run against the compiled classes. If all unit tests pass, Jenkins then packages two versions of each build. First, a debug version is created that is configured for internal testing against our staging or production environment. Second, a release version is produced that is configured for upload to Google Play. Finally, both debug and release builds are archived in Sonatype Nexus for future reference. This process ensures a high degree of consistency and reliability in builds that go to QA and/or are uploaded to Google Play and reduces the chance of issues introduced due to anomalies in the development environment or forgetting to run the tests. The mobile game is rapidly moving out of inning one via exponential smartphone and tablet penetration curves (particularly outside the US); rapid innovation in mobile app design; smarter and more seamless monetization systems; infrastructural improvements to support performance; the burgeoning of a genuine advertising opportunity; growing development communities; and increasing mass addiction to our phones. Alongside these changes, the design and engineering communities have built increasingly sophisticated frameworks and tools to support rapid app development. And yet, the literature about these frameworks and tools—particularly on Android—tends to be scattered and incomplete. We hope the development of the HowAboutWe Dating app as a case study will serve as a remedy for intrepid developers moving from iOS to Android. HowAboutWe is the modern love company. Created by Brian Schechter and Aaron Schildkrout, HowAboutWe has launched a series of products designed to help people fall in love and stay in love. The new HowAboutWe Dating app for Android is featured in this article. Aaron Schildkrout is co-founder and co-CEO of HowAboutWe, where he runs product. Matt Lim is a mobile software developer for HowAboutWe. He lives in New York City and loves music, dancing, eating and video games. Chuck Greb is a mobile software craftsman, test-driven evangelist, and clean code connoisseur, changing the way the world goes on dates at HowAboutWe.

- Vascular reconstruction and complications in living donor liver transplantation in infants weighing less than 6 kilograms: the Kyoto experienceYasumasa Shirouzu Departments of Transplant Surgery, Kyoto University Hospital, Kyoto, Japan Liver Transpl 12:1224-32. 2006..04). In conclusion, our surgical technique for smaller-size recipients resulted in an acceptable rate of vascular complications. Overcoming early posttransplantation complications will further improve outcomes in infantile LDLT... - Development of pulmonary hypertension in 5 patients after pediatric living-donor liver transplantation: de novo or secondary?Yasumasa Shirouzu Department of Transplant Surgery, Kyoto University Hospital, Kyoto, Japan Liver Transpl 12:870-5. 2006..Periodic echocardiography is essential for early detection and treatment of PH especially in the recipients with portal hypertension not only preoperatively but also postoperatively... - Current role of liver transplantation for the treatment of urea cycle disorders: a review of the worldwide English literature and 13 cases at Kyoto UniversityDaisuke Morioka Organ Transplant Unit, Kyoto University Hospital, Kyoto, Japan Liver Transpl 11:1332-42. 2005..In conclusion, LT should be considered to be the definitive treatment for UCDs at this stage, although some issues remain unresolved... - Electrofusion of mesenchymal stem cells and islet cells for diabetes therapy: a rat modelGoichi Yanai Department of Organ Reconstruction, Institute for Frontier Medical Sciences, Kyoto University, Kyoto, Japan PLoS ONE 8:e64499. 2013..These results show that electrofusion between MSCs and islet cells yield special cells with β-cell function and robustness of MSCs and seems feasible for novel therapeutic strategy for diabetes mellitus... - Inhibition of acute rejection after skin or cardiac transplantation by administration of donor antigens in the ratYasumasa Shirouzu Department of Surgery, Kurume University Faculty of Medicine, 67 Asahimachi, Kurume, Fukuoka, Japan Surg Today 34:341-8. 2004..We examined differences in host immunologic changes induced by the intravenous or intraportal administration of donor antigens at engrafting and evaluated their contribution to graft survival using a rat transplantation model... - The fungal DNA examination is useful as a sensitive parameter for the initiation and the quit of antifungal therapy in immunocompromised pediatric patients after surgeryShigeki Hikida Departments of Pediatric Surgery, Kurume University School of Medicine, Kurume 830 0011, Japan Kurume Med J 51:125-31. 2004..We conclude that the fungal DNA examination could be a sensitive parameter not only to start but to quit antifungal medication in pediatric patients with mycosis...

The Frankfurter Buchmesse ( Frankfurt Book Fair ) starts tomorrow. The Moleskine booth feature three notebooks from MyDetour Istanbul; by Beste Miray Doğan (one of the two winners), Kadir Yardimci (Special mention/Architecture) and Aslı Aydın - Gaye Başaran (Special mention Graphic). From the official Book Fair site: "Guest of Honour Turkey – from the Bosphorus to the Main River" The Guest of Honour Frankfurt Book Fair 2008 is featuring a multifaceted programme that will give you profound insight into the multifaceted culture and literature of the country on the Bosphorus. The Organisation Committee Guest of Honour Turkey will not only be showcasing 350 authors from Turkey. It will also be presenting art, music, theatre and films from Turkey in Frankfurt. Turkey will be this year’s Guest of Honour at the Frankfurt Book Fair. In keeping with the motto Turkey in all its colours, Turkey will be showing itself to the German and international public on the trade fair grounds and in the City of Frankfurt from October 15‐19. The motto alludes to Turkey’s culture that was formed by a wide range of factors. But it also underscores the reasons for Turkey being in Frankfurt. The Frankfurt Book Fair wants to raise international awareness for Turkey’s mostly undiscovered historical heritage and the great potential modern Turkey has. Ahmet Ari is the general co‐ordinator of the guest of Honour presentation. He is of the opinion that “Considering the developments in the new millennium, every society has to open up to other countries to make sure that their potential and facets become a part of the universal cultural heritage”. In keeping with the motto, the colourful logo for Turkey – designed by the high‐profile designer Bülent Erkmen – is an open, many‐coloured and many‐layered tapestry. The word Turkey is embedded in a labyrinth that at first glance appears to be closed. But, if the observer takes a closer look, the outward and inward openness becomes apparent. This is the image of the culture of their country that the persons in charge of the Guest of Honour would also like to share. It is a symbol for the centuries‐old rich cultural heritage of the modern Republic of Turkey. You can make out influences in literature, music, architecture and art that the various ethnic groups in Turkey and from the Balkan countries, the Arab world and Persia have contributed to the culture of the country, weaving it into a very special many‐coloured tapestry. Turkey is the Guest of Honour at the Frankfurt Book Fair to illustrate this variety and the historical intertwining of cultures. Even though it often seems to be closed and unreachable, the hope is this will draw the international public’s attention to the fascinating, cosmopolitan and especially colourful inner view of this country at the intersection between Europe and Asia so that it can be re‐discovered. The main accent of Guest of Honour presentation will be on showcasing the literature and publishing system of the Republic of Turkey. 100 publishers from Turkey will be on hand in Frankfurt am Main on more than 4,000 square meters of the trade fair grounds. Visit the official Frankfurter Buchmesse site (English)

Compiler and date details 15 June 2009 - Updated by ABRS following Brock & Hasenpusch (2007, 2009). 30 June 1997 - John Balderson, D.C.F. Rentz & A.M.E. Roach, CSIRO Entomology, Canberra, Australian Capital Territory, Australia The Phasmida, commonly known as stick and leaf insects, are large (35–240 mm in length), terrestrial, often thamnophilus or tree-dwelling insects attaining the greatest abundance in tropical climes. In terms of length, they are among the world's largest insects. Most species show remarkable resemblance to plant parts, such as twigs, leaves and stems. Several species have been used widely in behavioural and physiological studies while others have been of considerable use in cytological investigations. Kevan (1982) estimated that 2500 species of Phasmatodea were described worldwide; Brock and Hasenpusch (2009) give a figure of 'about 3000' species worldwide. Key (1991) estimated that the Australian fauna would probably reach about 150 species when all species are described. Brock & Hasenpusch (2007, 2009) list 104 described species for Australia. Genetic variation in anatomical characters occurs in many, if not most, species. This has led to many errors in taxonomy. Lobes, 'horns', spines and differences in rugosity can be highly variable or absent among individuals of the same population. Green and non-green morphs also often occur in the same population. This, coupled with geographic variation, size and wing variation, and the fact that males are much smaller and quite different in appearance from females, has confounded the taxonomic literature. Stick insects have had a taxonomic history somewhat similar to that of cockroaches and mantids. They were considered as a family of Orthoptera in the early days but are now generally recognised as a separate order. However, the names used for the order often vary with the author. Cheleutoptera, Phasmida, Phasmodea, Phasmatodea, Phasmatoptera and Phasmoptera have all been used to designate the order. The classification used in the Australian Faunal Directory follows the online checklist of Brock (2013) with a minor modification, following the molecular systematic analyses of Bradler et al. (2014). Bedford (1978) provided a comprehensive, world review of the biology and ecology of stick insects. Kevan (1982) provided a similar review at the taxonomic level. His 'escalated' view of the higher taxonomic levels is not followed here. Regular notes on the behaviour and ecology of stick insects, including Australian species, can be found in the Newsletter of the Phasmid Study Group (ISNN 0268–3806) and their journal, Phasmid Studies (ISSN 0966–0011). Brock and Hasenpusch (2009) give a very useful comprehensive review of stick and leaf insect biology and history of collecting of Australian stick and leaf insects. They also detail methods for collection, rearing and preserving stick insects and give a summary of information on each of the described species. Phase differences (often called kentromorphism in Australia) have been reported by Key (1957) in three Australian stick insects. These are Podacanthus wilkinsoni Macleay, Didymuria violescens (Leach) and Ctenomorphodes tessulatus (Gray), all of which can reach high population numbers. Low density nymphs are uniformly coloured—usually green, while those prone to high density populations are aposematically coloured and patterned. Morphometric phase differences are analogous to those of locusts. There is no correlation between density and activity, and stick insects show no obvious gregariousness. One species, the Lord Howe Island stick insect, Drycocelus australis (Montrouzier), was believed to be extinct (Gurney 1947; Smithers 1969). It was endemic to Lord Howe Island where it lived on the trunks and in cavities of banyans. It is thought to have been exterminated after rats were introduced to the island in the early part of the century. It was found on the offshore Ball's Pyramid in 2001, and is being reared for release back on the Island. Most stick insect species seem to be nocturnal and, with a few exceptions, rare in nature. Most species are found in foliage upon which they feed but a few are wholly terrestrial. They are entirely plant feeders and are unusual in their ability to develop on a wide variety of unrelated plant species. They exhibit cryptic postures and perform rhythmical swaying when disturbed. A few species can produce sound when disturbed by rubbing the hind wings against tubercles on the legs. There is no indication that they can hear any of the sounds they produce. When disturbed, some species drop to the ground in a state of catelepsy that may last for hours. Other defensive responses in Australian species have been described by Bedford & Chinnick (1966). Australian Megacrania species squirt a milky substance smelling of peppermint, probably actinidine for M. alpheus Westwood (Chow & Lin 1986), at intruders when disturbed. Morphologically, stick insects are very distinctive. They are generally prognathous with the head ovoid to rectangular, often with horns or protuberances. The antennae are short to long, ranging from 8 to more than 110 segments. Eyes are small and inconspicuous; ocelli are present only in some winged species. The prothorax is longer than the other thoracic segments (in contrast to the stick katydids, Tettigoniidae: Phasmodinae, in which the metathorax is the expanded thoracic segment). All three pairs of legs are gressorial and are long and slender. Tarsi of all Australian species are 2–5-segmented. Many species have the capability of being able to regenerate lost appendages if they are lost at an early stage of development. In those limbs, the tarsi are 4-segmented. Terminal claws bear an arolium. Both sexes of most Australian Phasmatodea are apterous, however, males of some species are fully winged, the females wingless or semi alate. The forewings are toughened tegmina, which are often small, rounded and dome-like and cover the base of the hind wings at rest and slightly overlap. The forewings typically have a knob-like structure dorsally in the proximal portion that accommodates a prominent sclerite on the base of the hind wing when folded. The hind wings are large, broad, with a large membranous anal area, folded fan-like at rest. Venation is very uniform; costa absent in forewing, weak and positioned on the anterior margin of hind wing; subcosta unbranched; radius unbranched in forewing, branching in hind wing forming R1 and radial sector; media bifurcate in forewing, in hind wing only basally and occasionally trifurcate. Abdomen cylindrical or dorso-ventrally compressed, with or without spines or outgrowths; abdomen 11-segmented with the first tergite called the median segment, connected to metanotum (Australian species); tenth tergite well developed, emarginate posteriorly in males with ventro-caudal angles produced, clasping, often with small tufts of spines, lateral walls of this tergite curving ventrally or meeting the mid-ventral line anteriorly; eleventh tergite constituting the supra-anal plate, often concealed under T-10 in males, more elongate, often articulated in females. Sternite 10 well developed, fused posteriorly to the paraprocts. Cerci unsegmented, long or short, often concealed beneath the tenth tergite, often modified as claspers in males. In males the ninth sternite constitutes the subgenital plate which lacks styles but is modified distally into a cup-like lobe, often termed the poculum. The tenth sternite in males of some groups is provided with a backwardly projecting prong-like process, the vomer, which is used in copulation. The genitalia are concealed by the subgenital plate and constitute a group of symmetrical, membranous or lightly sclerotised lobes. Females are different in the structure of the posterior abdominal segments. The eighth sternite consists of a scoop-like or keeled structure called the operculum, the posterior margin of which may project beyond the abdomen and frequently bears an egg. The ovipositor is very short and consists of three pairs of valves, and is wholly concealed by the operculum. The chromosome complements of Australian Phasmatodea range in number from 26 to 69, the larger numbers occurring in parthenogenetic species. Males usually are XO but XY species are known. Intricate studies illustrating chromosome races have been done by Craddock (1972) and varying chromosome numbers in parthenogenetic females have been demonsrated in the genus Sipyloidea by John et al. (1987). Eggs of stick insects are of special interest because of their resemblance to seeds. The chorion is hard and may be wrinkled or smooth and patterned. The anterior pole bears an operculum and it in turn may bear a median prominence, the capitulum. On the dorsal surface there is usually a well-defined micropylar plate that resembles the scar-like hilum of seeds. The microstructure of stick insect eggs provides many reliable taxonomic characters. The eggs of Sipyloidea nelida Rentz are unique in that they are enclosed in two supernumerary membranes. Shortly after deposition, the membranes rupture and a system of tubules in the operculum everts forming a cluster of stellate hairs resembling the head of a dandelion. These have been shown to be connected to the inside of the egg and may transport moisture. Stick insect nymphs may or may not resemble adults. They are often mimetic, resembling ants. Males undergo fewer moults than females and the exuviae are usually eaten. The number of antennal segments increases progressively. Originally this section of the Australian Faunal Directory was derived from the Zoological Catalogue of Australia database, from which the published Catalogue (Balderston et al. (1998) was prepared at CSIRO Entomology, Canberra and the Division's resources and facilities were made available to the authors. The authors were greatly aided by the kindness of several individuals. The Phasmid Study Group is an international organisation of amateurs and professionals dedicated to the understanding of the systematics, biology and ecology of stick-insects. Several members of that organisation provided invaluable help: Mr Paul Brock contributed photographs and notes on the type specimens of a number of Australian species he had studied in the BMNH and various museums in Europe. He also helped to locate important literature which was unknown to the authors prior to the study. Mr Phil Bragg, also a member of the above-mentioned organisation, provided the authors with a copy of his Phasmatid Database. This document will eventually list all of the stick-insect taxa and their dates of publication, references, type localities and location of types. The authors acknowledged the comprehensive catalogue and reference list of Australian species prepared by Vickery (1983) and thanked Mr Jon Prance of the CSIRO Black Mountain Library for assistance and time spent with the literature search. The illustrations used in the family introductions in the published Catalogue are from Key (1991). They were reproduced with permission from CSIRO Entomology and the Melbourne University Press. Funding was made available for the original checklisting project by the Australian Biological Resources Study. The original information on the Australian Faunal Directory site for the Phasmida was derived from the Zoological Catalogue of Australia database compiled on the Platypus software program. It has now been upgraded and updated following Brock and Hasenpusch (2007, 2009). Distribution data in the Directory is by political and geographic region descriptors (IBRA) and serves as a guide to the distribution of a taxon. For details of a taxon's distribution, the reader should consult the cited references (if any) at genus and species levels. Australia is defined as including Lord Howe Is., Norfolk Is., Cocos (Keeling) Ils, Christmas Is., Ashmore and Cartier Ils, Macquarie Is., Australian Antarctic Territory, Heard and McDonald Ils, and the waters associated with these land areas of Australian political responsibility. Political areas include the adjacent waters. Terrestrial geographical terms are based on the drainage systems of continental Australia, while marine terms are self explanatory except as follows: the boundary between the coastal and oceanic zones is the 200 m contour; the Arafura Sea extends from Cape York to 124°E; and the boundary between the Tasman and Coral Seas is considered to be the latitude of Fraser Island, also regarded as the southern terminus of the Great Barrier Reef. Distribution records, if any, outside of these areas are listed as extralimital. The distribution descriptors for each species are collated to genus level. Users are advised that extralimital distribution for some taxa may not be complete. Balderson, J., Rentz, D.C.F. & Roach, A.M.E. 1998. Phasmatodea. pp. 347-376 in Houston, W.W.K. & Wells, A. (eds). Zoological Catalogue of Australia. Archaeognatha, Zygentoma, Blattodea, Isoptera, Mantodea, Dermaptera, Phasmatodea, Embioptera, Zoraptera. Melbourne : CSIRO Publishing, Australia Vol. 23 xiii 464 pp. Bedford, G.O. 1978. Biology and ecology of the Phasmatodea. Annual Review of Entomology 23: 125-149 Bedford, G.O. & Chinnick, L.J. 1966. Conspicuous displays in two species of Australian stick insects. Animal Behaviour 14: 518-521 Bradler, S., Robertson, J.A. & Whiting, M.F. 2014. A molecular phylogeny of Phasmatodea with emphasis on Necrosciinae, the most species-rich subfamily of stick insects. Systematic Entomology 39: 205-222 Bradley, J.C. & Galil, B.S. 1977. The taxonomic arrangement of the Phasmatodea with keys to the subfamilies and tribes. Proceedings of the Entomological Society of Washington 79: 176-208 Brock, P. 2014. Phasmida Species File Online. http://phasmida.speciesfile.org/HomePage/Phasmida/HomePage (accessed April 2014) Brock, P.D. & Hasenpusch, J. 2007. Studies on the Australian stick insects (Phasmida), including a checklist of species and bibliography. Zootaxa 1570: 1-81 Brock, P.D. & Hasenpusch, J.W. 2009. The Complete Field Guide to Stick and Leaf Insects of Australia. Collingwoord, Victoria : CSIRO Publishing 204 pp. Chow, Y.S. & Lin, Y.M. 1986. Actinidine, a defensive secretion of the stick insect, Megacrania alpheus Westwood (Orthoptera: Phasmatidae). Journal of Entomological Science 21: 97-101 Craddock, E. 1972. Chromosomal diversity in the Australian Phasmatodea. Australian Journal of Zoology 20: 445-462 Günther, K. 1953. Über die taxonomische Gliederung und die geographische Verbreitung der Insektenordnung de Phasmatodea. Beiträge zur Entomologie (Berlin) 3(5): 541-563 Gurney, A.B. 1947. Notes on some remarkable Australasian walkingsticks, including a synopsis of the genus Extatosoma (Orthoptera: Phasmatidae). Annals of the Entomological Society of America 40(3): 373-396 John, B., Rentz, D.C.F. & Contreras, N. 1987. Extensive chromosome variation in the stick insect genus Sipyloidea Brunner von Wattenwyl (Phylliidae: Necrosciinae) within Australia, and descriptions of three new species. Invertebrate Taxonomy 1: 603-630 Kevan, D.E.McE. 1982. Phasmatoptera. pp. 379-383 in Parker, S.P. (ed.). Synopsis and Classification of Living Organisms. New York : McGraw Hill Vol. 2. Kevan, D.K.McE. (ed.) 1977. The higher classification of the orthopteroid insects. Lyman Entomol. Mus. Res. Lab. Memoir No. 4. 26 pp. Key, K.H.L. 1957. Kentromorphic phases in three species of Phasmatodea. Australian Journal of Zoology 5: 247-284 Key, K.H.L. 1991. Phasmatodea (Stick-insects). pp. 394-404 in CSIRO (ed.). The Insects of Australia. A textbook for students and research workers. Melbourne : Melbourne University Press Vol. 1 xiii 542 pp. Smithers, C.N. 1969. On some remains of the Lord Howe Island phasmid (Dryococelus australis Montrouzier)) (Phasmida) from Ball's pyramid. Entomologist's Monthly Magazine 105: 252 Vickery, V.R. 1983. Catalogue of Australian stick insects (Phasmida, Phasmatodea, Phasmatoptera, or Cheleutoptera). CSIRO Aust. Div. Entomol. Tech. Pap. No. 20. 15 pp. History of changes |Published||As part of group||Action Date||Action Type||Compiler(s)|

Sombra Pain Relief Warm Therapy Topical Analgesic Gel for Ultrasound - 4 oz Jar You Save: $1.00 (8 %) Item Number: Sombra4 Manufacturer Part No: 4 oz (NOTE: All ultrasound massage therapy units must be used with conductive gel in order to be effective! Purchase your portable ultrasound machine HERE!) Sombra Warm Therapy Pain Relieving Gel is a unique herbal formula of effective natural ingredients developed and clinically tested! Thank you for getting the products to me so fast! I am so pleased with how the Sombra works, even by just rubbing it into the skin after a warm shower. I have left hip osteoarthritis with degenerative joint disease. (Don't want to get cortisone shots or hip replacement, which is what osteopath recommends.) I have told my chiropractor about it and she tried some of mine and would love to purchase some as she has many patients she sees and uses ultrasound with. I told her I would check with you because it is amazing and brings relief quickly, and I would prefer she use that on me and all her patients. It lasts for hours and hours without NSAIDs or other pain meds. P.S.: Keep up the great work, folks. We truly appreciate it! Pain-free the natural way. What a great site. Thank you, thank you, thank you! -D.W. - Wauwatosa, WI - 7-8-2012 16 oz VALUE PACK only $8.50 per Jar (regular price is $10.99)! A leading topical analgesic with a refreshing, natural orange-citrus scent - it's perfect for chronic conditions as well as basic aches and pains! Doubling as a phonophoresis ultrasound gel, Sombra Gel is a greaseless therapeutic cream that incorporates natural pain reliving ingredients for one amazing pain relief muscles cream Sombra Gel a unique therapeutic herbal pain reliever that enhances healing and speeds recovery of painful muscles. Rub a little Sombra Gel on your neck to enhance relaxation while in pose at the end of a long yoga or Pilates session. Used professionally by chiropractors, physical therapists, massage therapists, and in athletic and rehabilitation programs. This hot warm therapy gel is ideal for joint pain and weakness and muscular pain. |7 Herbal Ingredients Menthol ~ cooling effect, mild anesthetic Camphor ~ natural coolant, anesthetic Capsaicin ~ stimulates blood circulation, decreases pain signals to brain Aloe Vera Extract ~ anti-inflammatory, natural healing properties Green Tea Extract ~ anti-irritant, antioxidant Orange Peel Extract ~ anti-inflammatory Queen of the Prairie Extract ~ antiseptic, healing extract How Does Sombra Gel Work? When applied as directed, Sombra Gel ointment, stimulates the body's endorphin response to pain and reduces constant joint and muscle stiffness thereby lessening pain and discomfort, enhancing healing. The deep penetrating effect of this pain relieving gel offers long lasting cool-to-warm soothing muscular and joint relief. What's in Sombra Gel? Most medicated phonophoresis gels and topical pain reliever remedies only contain one or two pain relieving ingredients, but Sombra Gel relief cream contains 7 unique substances that are clinically proven to decrease pain and inflammation, loosen tight muscles, ease aches and pains, and increase blood flow. A great lower back pain treatment and topical muscle pain reliever. Sombra Gel pain cream is made with 7 Herbal Extracts: Menthol (5%), Camphor (3%), Menthol, Camphor, Capsaicin, Aloe Vera Extract, Green Tea Extract, Orange Peel Extract, and Queen of the Prairie Extract. Numerous scientific research papers and herbal literature endorse the analgesic action of Sombra Gel's all natural anti-inflammatory ingredients. In addition, unlike other topical analgesic gels, Sombra gel does not have a harsh medicinal smell. This phonophoresis ultrasonic gel couplant for pain relief has a pleasing lavender scent that once applied, ultimately becomes odorless as the creme dries. Wonderful for neck and shoulder pains and muscle strain treatment. Sombra Gel Applications: - Medicated Ultrasound Gel For Use During Ultrasound Treatment - Massage Therapy Treatment - Soft Tissue Trigger Point Therapy Remedy - Rehabilitation Exercise - Targeted Pain Relief of Aches and Pains - Both Pre and Post Workout Stretching Purchase your portable ultrasound machine HERE! Visit our F.A.Q.’s page for more information on how ultrasound therapy works! Using Sombra Gel Topical Cream to Take Advantage of Phonophoresis: Why do I need to use Ultrasound Gel? The speed ultra sound waves travel are affected by the different types of body tissues. The ultra sonic waves travel fastest through bone tissue, and moves slowest through air. Because air is such a poor conductor, when the ultrasound machine is applied to the skin, the ultrasound waves cannot enter the body. Prior to ultrasound treatment, coupling gel is applied to the skin to allow for smooth movement of the transducer over the skin and to eliminate air between the skin and the transducer. Ultrasound gel is hyper-ionic so it conducts the ultrasonic sound waves into the body. Without the proper conductivity gel, ultrasound therapy is ineffective. Phonophoresis, also known as sonophoresis, is the use of ultrasound to enhance the delivery of topically applied drugs. Effectively, medicines contained within or under the ultrasound gel are pushed by the sound waves of the ultrasound and driven deep below the skin. Phonophoretically administered medications can penetrate the body at a much deeper level than those massaged by hand over the surface of the skin. The Sombra Gel ointment's naturally based pain relieving and anti-inflammatory ingredients are driven deep into the tissue with ultrasound application - delivering pain relief EXACTLY where you need it. The duration of the treatment, and the need to adhere to a specific dosage, is also a large consideration. Obviously, the longer ultrasound is used over a topical phonophoretic drug, the more medication is delivered and the deeper it goes. Drugs that require very exact doses, like insulin for example, cannot be controlled accurately enough to be delivered via Phonophoresis. Many natural analgesics (muscle pain rubs), such as Sombra Gel Treatment, and anti-inflammatory drugs, are excellent candidates for phonophoretic application though and provide great relief for muscle pain. One of the greatest benefits to delivering medications via phonophoresis is that the medication can be delivered locally to a desired area. Oral pain killers, muscle pain medications and anti-inflammatory drugs are introduced to the entire body in equal amounts. Even if you only need pain relief in your tennis elbow, or an anti-inflammatory in your swollen bursa, when using oral medications, you end up drugging your entire body - including your brain, your heart, and your lungs - even if they might not need the drug. With phonophoresis lotions, such as Sombra Gel, the part of the body that receives the medication is the precise part of your body that needs it. Where is Phonophoresis Typically Used? Phonophoresis is most commonly used by Physical Therapists and Chiropractors for the treatment of localized physical injuries. As a very cutting edge technology, phonophoresis is currently being studied for the use of a vast array of medications. Articles on Phonophoresis APTA Research Report(PDF) BioMechanics Magazine Article - Relieves minor aches and pains for superior muscle pain therapy. - Absorbs quickly with a refreshing orange scent. - Unique warming and cooling ingredients. - Alcohol free, non-greasy, non-staining - Used in Ultrasound - Animal free. - Made in the USA. - Greaseless, Non-Irritating and Non-Staining (water soluble) lotion - Versatile: can be used both as a phonophoresis ultrasound gel and topical analgesic cream rub - All natural pain relief ingredients - 7 herbal pain relief, anti-inflammatory components - Enhances healing and improves local blood flow - Gentle, soothing, long lasting cool to warm sensation for deep tissue pain relief - Sombra Gel pain therapy gel reduces pain and discomfort by stimulating the body's endorphin response to pain or injury, to ease aches - Contains no salt or formaldehyde - Used and recommended by leading medical health professionals (doctors, physical therapists and chiropractors) - Jar size: 4 oz. (.12 L) - (Please note: Due to hygienic reasons, we are unable to accept returns of used Sombra Gel for refunds). Sombra Gel Pain Relief Gel can effectively help relieve pain from: Post-injury conditions (dislocations, distortions of joints, inflammation of muscles, spasms tendons, etc) Pain in rheumatic diseases Low-back pain of neurological origin, Back Ache (e.g. root pain, discopathies, sciatica) Bursitis and similar inflammatory ailments Carpal Tunnel Syndrome Foot/Toe Sprains/Achilles Sprains, Strains and Muscle Spasms Ankle/Knee/Calf/Neck Sprains and Strains Hip Sprains, Thigh Sprains/Strains Post - Exercise Recovery (when the workout goes a bit too far) Plantar Fascitis (Heel Spurs) Supraspinatus / Infraspinatus injuries Tarsal Tunnel Syndrome Tendonitis (acute or chronic) Tennis Elbow, Golfers Elbow, Upper and Lower Back Strains Wrist/ Hand/Elbow/Shoulder Sprains, Strains and Stiffness Hand Muscle Pain Available Sombra Gel Sizes: View product testimonials & reviews below from customers you have bought the “Sombra Gel Topical Analgesic Pain Relief Ultrasound Phonophoresis Gel - 4 oz. Jar”: Sombra Gel Rocks! 4/7/2013 7:21 PM I love the Sombra pain relief gel and use it by itself. Please continue to offer it as it really rocks! btw so does customer support, they have been great!

This Scholarly Library of Facts about Domestic & Worldwide Zionist Criminality The Jew Watch Project Is The Internet's Largest Scholarly Collection of Articles on Zionist Top: Jewish Mind Control: Feminism The Promise Keepers, a new evangelical Christian men's movement, follows an agenda that many Jews feel is antithetical to Jewish values and corrosive to constitutional safeguards of religious liberty. Yet the Jewish community has been relatively unresponsive to the exponential growth and mainstream embrace of this volatile young organization. During the Promise Keepers' "Stand In The Gap" rally in Washington, DC, on October 4, 1997, Jewish organizations‹including politically active groups like the Reform Movement's Religious Action Center‹were noticeably absent from the assorted liberal groups who showed up to protest. Other Jewish watchdog organizations, including the Anti-Defamation League and the American Jewish Committee, have kept their usually humming faxes at bay. And while the Jewish press did cover the rally in Washington, they have largely ignored the Promise Keepers and their founder, Bill McCartney. After demonstrating a fearless approach to activism in recent decades, has the American Jewish community reverted back to 1950s era timidity? Or is an organization that many believe is mounting a ferocious attack on the wall separating church and state really just an innocuous religious movement? According to Steven Steiner, the public relations representative for the American Jewish Congress, his organization hasn't felt the need to voice an opinion about the Promise Keepers. "If they issued antisemitic statements we would get involved," said Steiner. "There is no reason for us to be involved right now ." The AJCongress' wait-for-the-smoking-gun approach has been mirrored by most other Jewish organizations, who don't seem entirely comfortable with the popularity and power of Promise Keepers, but are not prepared to take a major stand opposing the group. When Jewish organizations have expressed displeasure with Promise Keepers, often their umbrage is directed at the inclusion of so-called "messianic Jews" in Promise Keepers activities. The rally in Washington was kicked off by a "messianic Jew" wearing a kippah, who blew a shofar and declared that the tikiyah represented a victory for those who believe Jesus is the Messiah. "Their only portrayal of Jews in Washington was offensive," remarked American Jewish Committee National Director of Inter-religious Affairs Rabbi James Rudin, who has been following the Promise Keepers for the AJCommittee. Rudin was very disturbed by the representation of Jews at the rally. "While there were representatives of other communities, the only Jewish representative was a converted one." Yet despite the outrage, the AJCommitee's response has basically mirrored that of its shared acronym: it has remained silent. The Anti-Defamation League is the only major Jewish organization that has directly confronted the Promise Keepers. Jeffrey Ross, the Director of Campus Affairs for the ADL, joins other Jewish groups in criticizing the organization's public embrace of "messianic Jews" and what he called an "ambiguous stand towards women." Twice the ADL has taken action against the Promise Keepers for their infringement on church/state separation, albeit for isolated incidents. According to Ross, the Promise Keepers had planned to hold an event at a United States naval base. "The ADL found out about this and protested using state grounds for Promise Keepers purposes," said Ross. "Partially because of our protest the rally was called off." The second incident, Ross explained, occurred before McCartney had founded the Promise Keepers when he was coaching the University of Colorado football team. McCartney had introduced prayer and other Christian elements into team activities. In the mid-1980s he attempted to recruit a Jewish player. The student had problems with what Ross described as "the Christianizing of the team." The local Jewish community contacted the ADL, who felt that McCartney's Christianizing at a public university was a breach of separation of church and state. The dispute was resolved when the player decided to attend a different university. The Religious Action Center in Washington has been critical of the Promise Keepers, but has limited its activism against the group. The Center joined 60 other religious organizations to form an anti-Promise Keepers coalition called Equal Partners in Faith, which put out a statement criticizing Promise Keepers for excluding women and female clergy, and for a message that asserts that "women belong behind men, not in equal partnerships, and that this is God's will for men and women." But for the most part it has been content to let liberal Christian groups get involved. "The Christian community has done a good job responding to the Promise Keepers," according to Mark Palavin, the Associate Director of the Religious Action Center. "We try to educate the community about the Promise Keepers," said Palavin. Interestingly, the Religious Action Center, which often gets involved in political advocacy over issues of interest to the liberal Jewish community, has not made an issue of the links of Promise Keepers to the religious right. While Promise Keepers claims to be nonpolitical, the movement is a major force in right wing political circles. Its rallies have political undertones, and the behind-the-scene supporters of the organization are all influential men identified with the religious right. In fact, Promise Keepers represent the "third wave" of the religious right, following the fall of Jerry Falwell's Moral Majority and the still active Christian Coalition of Pat Robertson. According to several sources, including a comprehensive article in The Nation, the most influential and important figures behind McCartney and the Promise Keepers are James Dobson, Bill Bright, and Pat Robertson, who gave the organization the exposure it needed through the Christian Broadcasting Network. Dobson is a social psychologist, radio commentator and head of the largest religious right organization in the country, Focus on the Family, which is the current publisher for Promise Keepers. The political views of Dobson are reflected in the militantly anti-abortion and anti-gay Family Research Council, a Washington lobby group to the right of the Christian Coalition that was founded by Dobson's son. Bill Bright is involved with Campus Crusade for Christ and has been a part of the radical right since the 1950's. The overall mission of the Campus Crusade is to "win every human being on earth for Christ in preparation for the Second Coming." In addition, Bright has attempted past ventures such as banning director Martin Scorsese's film The Last Temptation of Christ. Bright's most recent book, which is sold at all Promise Keepers events, denounces the "homosexual explosion," abortion, the lack of state-sponsored prayer in schools and the teaching of evolution rather than creationism. The presence of numerous political organizations at all Promise Keepers conferences provides further evidence of the organization's political agenda. Outside each gathering are vendors selling Promise Keepers books, shirts, caps, and tapes. But most of the space is taken up by various political organizations. One such group is World Magazine which offers "to help Christians apply to their understanding of and response to everyday events." In this magazine, advertisements are mixed with political statements, including one ad with the headline, "Traditional Christian Faith and Values vs. Welfarism and Big Government." Books published by Focus on the Family are usually available. One such book is Check Colson's Breakpoint which identifies feminism as an "extremist ideology" and argues that God had created a female chemical and hormonal balance that women who have abortions disrupt, thereby risking breast cancer. Another organization, Exodus International, is a "Christian referral and resource network . . .[whose] primary purpose is to proclaim that freedom from homosexuality is possible through repentance and faith in Jesus Christ as Savior and Lord." Promise Keepers president Randy Phillips has denied the assertions of critics that PK is a right wing organization. "We are not a political organization, we are not politically motivated and we do not have political goals." But the amount of space allocated to political causes and messages at Promise Keepers conferences along with the prominent roles of right wing activists within the organization belie his assertion. It is clear that McCartney and his followers are linked to the Christian Right and its war against contemporary culture. As National Organization for Women (NOW) president Patricia Ireland pointed out at the "Stand In The Gap" rally, "There is a reason that Promise Keepers is having their rally in Washington with the Capitol as the backdrop. . . When members of Congress look out onto the Mall, they see the same thing I see‹hundreds of thousands of constituents and voters." Just as Patricia Ireland has been the most forceful voice speaking out against Promise Keepers, the strongest response from Jews has come from the Jewish feminist community. Susan Weidman Schneider, editor of the Jewish feminist magazine Lilith, is taking Promise Keepers seriously. "Promise Keepers represents a danger to Jews in their frequent assertion that this is a Christian nation." Schneider also believes that the Jewish community should be aware the Promise Keepers' "dangerous stand towards women." Traditionally attacks on feminism become attacks of "Jewish feminists", or on the "un-Christian" nature of feminism. Lilith is planning to run a substantial article on the Promise Keepers in an upcoming issue. Michael S. Kimmel, a scholar of men's studies at State University of New York at Stony Brook, agrees with Schneider's assessment. In a recent article in Tikkun magazine, Kimmel criticized the Promise Keepers attitude toward women. Kimmel writes that, "the resurrection of responsible manhood is really the Second Coming of Patriarchy." According to the Promise Keepers, men have abdicated their responsibility as the head of the household. At home, husbands are "not giving their wives the support they need," and are absent from the lives of their children and friends. The Promise Keepers 'remind' men of the 'power' they are born with, and make it clear that the husband should be the head of the household. Yet even Tikkun, which ran Kimmel's article condemning the PK's conservative, patriarchal agenda, tempered their criticism in the November/December 1997 issue. The differences between Promise Keepers leadership and its constituents can be significant, and just as many of the men who attended the Million Man March felt that they could separate the messenger from the message, many Promise Keepers do not fit the right wing mold of the group's leadership. According to Tikkun, liberals were right to point out the Promise Keepers connection to right wing leaders and their sexists assumptions about the proper structure of the family; yet they "missed the point. Most men who have been attracted to the Promise Keepers and other right-wing-connected Evangelical movements have not come into that context because of the politics, but because of their own hunger for meaning and community." So what, exactly, is the Promise Keepers' stance on the role of men and women in society? The form of masculinity called for by the Promise Keepers relies on men "taking back" control over their homes, and apologizing to their wives for making them lead the home all these years. Relying on the aggression men have been socialized to exhibit, Promise Keepers also promises an upcoming holy war that will bring Christian heterosexual men back to their deserved patriarchal position in society. The Promise Keepers put forward a critique of feminized masculinity. "The demise of our community and culture is the fault of sissified men who have been clearly influenced by women," writes Tony Evans, a black Dallas evangelist, who is among the most popular speakers at Promise Keepers rallies. He warns that men must "reclaim" their manhood, declaring, "I want to be a man again." Building on the image of a "strong masculine man," Promise Keepers makes constant reference to the upcoming "holy war." Promise Keepers literature and speeches are filled with metaphors of cultural war. McCartney's call for battle is a crowd pleaser, once announcing that "we're calling men of God to battle - we will retreat no more. We're going to contest anything that sets itself up against the name of Jesus Christ." In the Promise Keepers book, Go the Distance, McCartney predicted that his evangelical efforts will be met with "violent opposition." He told a gathering of pastors in Atlanta (the largest gathering of clergymen in history), "many of you feel that you have been in a war for a long time, yet the fiercest fighting is just ahead. God has brought us here to prepare us. Let's proceed. It's wartime!" In addition, he has referred to the clergy as "commissioned officers" of his movement, and has even sought to penetrate the armed forces through the Pentagon's chaplain system. If the opposition McCartney predicted has been slow to organize, it may be due to a new coalition based on "traditional values." "What happened here is that the boy's club has expanded to include people of color," writes Chip Berlet, who researches right-wing populism in the United States. "When push comes to shove, what's more important, race or gender?" Indeed, on the issue of gender, black and white male clergy have found room to unite. Promise Keepers' promotion of a softer patriarchy caters perfectly to men's anxieties by "reminding" men of the "power" they are born with. During a rally at Shea Stadium in New York City, Rev. Ed Cole reminded his audience that "God's revelations came through man," not woman, and so the two genders can never be equal. Speaker Wellington Boone noted that "how you handle your wife," would reveal how you "handle the world." He added that "woman came from man, not man from woman." Boone also equates the relationship in the house between man and woman as a form of competition‹"spiritual warfare,"‹a test of masculine strength. "I'm never gonna let no woman outserve me," he once shouted to an applauding crowd. The role of women called for by the Promise Keepers not only keeps wives at home, but has often stripped women of their economic independence. In an email to the National Organization for Women, the group at the forefront of anti-Promise Keeper activism, one Promise Keeper wife wrote to request a free copy of NOW's video on PK: "He keeps the checkbook and all the credit cards so I am unable to right [sic] you a check." Women are expected to limit their involvement at home to caring for their family. "Promise Keepers are about the return of patriarchy in its Sunday best: spiffed up, polite, and earnest but always, and ultimately, in charge," says Unitarian minister Rev. David Blachard of Syracuse. While the philosophy of the Promise Keepers may lead some men to have better relations with their wives and daughters, it does so at the expense of women's freedom. Perhaps women's rights just isn't considered enough of a "Jewish issue" to inspire most Jewish groups to act. Or have the similarities between Promise Keepers and orthodox Jews, both politically and socially, dampened the enthusiasm of Jewish organizations to confront the Christian group? Susan Weidman Schneider shared an encounter she had with a group of Jews during the Washington rally. "While walking in the Georgetown area, I noticed a group of individuals carrying signs printed with the words 'Shalom. Jews keep promises too.' Interested, I asked whether this was an organized protest against the Promise Keepers. They explained that it wasn't a protest, but a way for them to express their belief in many of the Promise Keepers messages." One can only wonder why the most visible Jewish presence at the rally was a group of Promise Keepers wanna-bees. Mik Moore is the editor of New Voices. Udi Ofer is graduated from SUNY Buffalo in 1997 and is a frequent contributer to New Voices. This article is herein archived under "fair use" provisions of the copyright act and solely for scholarly, educational, and research use. It was found on the internet on June 20, 2004 at http://www.shmoozenet.com/jsps/stories/promisekeep.shtml. If copyrighted, all rights to reproduce this article for profitable enterprise are reserved by the copyright holder unless the holder so notes. Please respect the copyright holder's rights. You may quote in part for college or other papers under "fair use" only if you give credit to the owner and/or writer. If still published on the web, may want to visit the copyright holder's website to honor his work with your presence there. In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, any copyrighted work in the Jew Watch Library is archived here under fair use without profit or payment to those who have expressed a prior interest in reviewing the included information for personal use, non-profit research and educational purposes only. If you have additions or suggestions Email Jew Watch

FactorShares, the sponsor that introduced spread trading in an ETF wrapper back in early 2011, launched a new line of ETFs under a new PureFunds brand. According to the firm’s literature, PureFunds was designed to provide the market with easy access to niche sectors through Pure-Play ETFs. PureFunds aims to launch tactical ETFs that the market desires but do not currently exist. The three new ETFs began trading November 29, have expense ratios of 0.69%, share a common prospectus (pdf), and will be assigned to the Materials Sector category of the ETF Field Guide. PureFunds ISE Diamond/Gemstone ETF (GEMS) seeks to track global companies actively engaged in the gemstone industry including exploration, production, or sales. The underlying index has 23 holdings including Signet Jewelers Ltd 9.0%, Chow Tai Fook Jewellery Group Ltd 8.7%, BHP Billiton Ltd 8.3%, Harry Winston Diamond Corp 8.1%, and Luk Fook Holdings International Ltd 7.1%. Country allocations are Hong Kong 28%, UK 20%, Canada 19%, US 18%, Australia 12%, and Japan 3%. Additional information is located in the GEMS overview and GEMS fact sheet (pdf). Analysis/Opinion: This is not a physically backed diamond ETF. The prospect of a diamond ETF has been the focus of much media speculation the past year. I’m on record with my opinion that implementing such a fund could be tricky due to the qualitative nature of valuing gems and lack of futures contracts or other trading vehicles. GEMS is a unique offering, but it should probably have “producers” or “industry” in its name to avoid being mistaken for a physically backed fund. PureFunds ISE Mining Service (NYSEARCA:MSXX) seeks to track the performance of the largest and most liquid companies involved in facilitating the operations of the mining services industry as a whole, from companies that manufacture, lease, sell, and provide equipment to companies providing consulting and other related services. The underlying index has 30 holdings including Atlas Copco AB A 9.6%, China Coal Energy Co Ltd H Shares 9.1%, Joy Global Inc 8.1%, Monadelphous Group Ltd 7.5%, and Mineral Resources 7.4%. Countries with current weightings of 10% or greater include Australia 48%, US 17%, Canada 11%, Hong Kong 10%, and Sweden 10%. Additional information is located in the PureFunds ISE Mining Service (NYSEARCA:MSXX) overview and MSXX fact sheet (pdf).

Posted on January 18, 2010. I’ve been dreading this point at which I have to post my first blog for the Gender Masala. It’s a tough job trying to fill the shoes of Mercedes Sayagues who started the blog and, together with a band of other contributors, kept it an inspired, lively and engaging space for readers to return to again and again and also make their contributions. But the fact is that sooner or later I would have to jump right in and this is it. I’m excited about this blog and I hope that we will be able to keep it engaging. By we, I mean myself, Kudzai Makombe in Harare, Tess Bacalla in Manila, Estrella Gutierrez in Caracas and Diana Cariboni in Montevideo. Mercedes is not completely off the hook. She will still be contributing from her new home in Maputo. There will also be posts from other contributors. Its not a great way to start the new year, but my head has been puzzling over the growing militarization around the world and its catastrophic impact on women in particular. What got me going is a book I’m reading by journalist Christina Lamb called ‘The Sewing Circles of Herat’. The book, which traces the war in Afghanistan and its particular effect on women, came highly recommended by my husband, a prolific and speed reader, who picked it up as the only remaining piece of literature in English abandoned by previous tenants at a lodge where we stayed in Namibia late last year. The remainder of the reading material was in German. Its taking me a long time finish the book not only because I’m a slow reader but as I go through it I become deeply disturbed by the complete and utter impunity with which men with guns can and do commit atrocities and their particular desire to strip women of all human rights. I have to put it aside and move on to another of the books my bedside table. Over the holidays I caught up with one of the BBC World Service’s best documentaries of 2009, ‘Chechnya’s Missing Women’ which traces the kidnapping of women and girls by bands of armed young men in Chechnya’s capital Grozny. The women are forced into cars at gunpoint and some are forced to marry their captors while others simply disappear to possibly turn up dead in a vacant field. Their families are helpless to stop it. What is troubling me most is that like many others, I read the news and perceive what is happening to women in Afghanistan and Chechnya as remote occurrences in distant lands that have little to do with me. But when I look closer I see it happening at my doorstep. Naively perhaps, I would never have thought that the systemic rapes, beatings and killings of women and girls that took place in Kenya post the December 2007 elections and in Zimbabwe ahead of the Presidential run-off elections in 2008 were possible. Then there were the women who were brutally raped and some killed in Guinea in September last year. And who doesn’t know about the thousands of women who are raped and killed regularly by both government and rebel troops in the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo. In all cases government has been somehow complicit and impunity has been the order of the day. The affected women and their families have had little recourse and are generally expected to shut up about it for “the greater good”. The argument being that progress and peace processes will be derailed if these issues are dredged up. And so women are silenced and violence against women in normalized. As a follow-up to United Nations Resolution 1325 (2000), which obliges groups in armed conflict to protect women and girls from violence, the UN Security Council unanimously adopted Resolution 1888 on 30 September 2009. UNSCR 1888 establishes a UN Special Representative to deal specifically with sexual violence in armed conflict and enables the Security Council’s sanctions committee to take into account rape and sexual violence as criteria when considering sanctions against nations and individuals. Personally, I’m not feeling particularly optimistic that this latest resolution will make much more of a difference for women faced with guns and impunity. After all, there is also UNSCR 1820, which affirms the Security Council’s intention to consider targeted sanctions against perpetrators of sexual violence in armed conflict. As with many of the other UN Resolutions – and there are so many – the laudable words are taking time to translate into action. In the meantime it seems as though groups struggling for power and resources are actually learning from each other that its okay to battle on the bodies of women and that this can be a quick and sure way to ascendancy.

Title text: Einstein was WRONG when he said that provisional patent #39561 represented a novel gravel-sorting technique and should be approved by the Patent Office. Nobel laureate and Time Person of the Century Albert Einstein is often considered one of the smartest and most influential men in world history. His theories have revolutionized our understanding of the Universe and inspired generations of scientists. In this comic, Cueball indicates to a friend that he is working on an experiment that may disprove Einstein. The implication is that Cueball is conducting a formal scientific experiment which may disprove one of Einstein's scientific theories. The second frame, however, implies that the Einsteinian "theory" Cueball's experiment may disprove is an offhand (and subjective) remark by Einstein about the availability of good sandwiches. There are several possible interpretations/explanations for this comic, which is slightly vague: - The first possibility is that Randall is playing with the notion that everything Einstein said constitutes words to live by: A casual observation on the quality of sandwiches is treated as a major hypothesis, and Cueball is in fact conducting a formal scientific experiment which may "disprove" the statement. - This would not be the first time that xkcd has addressed people taking scientists too seriously. In 947: Investing, Randall comments on how people put too much credence in a joke Einstein made in passing, and in comic 799 we see Stephen Hawking in a similar predicament, every word he says taken as a major declaration. - A key part of the humour is that a significant number of people believe Einstein's physical theories (particularly Special and General Relativity) to be wrong: its universal promotion in scientific literature is ascribed to a conspiracy. This attitude has been lampooned before in xkcd comic 808 and comic 675. - The second possibility is that Cueball is simply trying to impress his friend by using "technically accurate" language to imply that he is involved in important scientific work, when all he is really doing is buying sandwiches and hoping to find a good one. Perhaps he's a scientist out to lunch with an old friend who's never respected his work, and knows that anything Einstein-related sounds impressive and foreboding, meaning his friend is unlikely to ask for details. - Another explanation might be simply that while scientists today are so focused on determining whether he was right, all he really cared about was finding a good sandwich shop. The title text demonstrates the ability to "disprove" Einstein while not challenging his scientific work but rather one of his decisions in his capacity as a patent clerk at the Swiss Patent Office at the time he published his first major papers (previously alluded to in 1067: Pressures). According to the Einstein FAQ on the Swiss Federal Institute of Intellectual Property's website, patent #39561 is one of several patents that "we can assume ... were personally examined by Einstein". A PDF of the patent, which was indeed a gravel sorter (trommel), can be found here in German. Another part of the joke involves tenses: when Cueball says "I'm currently conducting an experiment," his friend assumes that Cueball is involved in an ongoing research project; but he actually means that he is conducting an experiment at that very moment, by eating a sandwich. - [Cueball and friend eating at a table.] - Cueball: I'm currently conducting an experiment which may prove Einstein wrong! - Friend: Ooh, exciting! - [Einstein and Cueball walking.] - Einstein: It's impossible to find a good sandwich in this town.

British actor and comedian Stephen Fry has rarely been so excited to be lazy. But as part of the cast of the sequel Sherlock Holmes 2, Fry gets to pour all of his energy into playing Victorian literature’s most famously brilliant but solidly sedentary deductive mind. “I play Mycroft, Sherlock Holmes' brother – the smarter brother, I hasten to add,” said Fry. “He's so lazy that he never gets the reputation that Sherlock does.” Mycroft Holmes has long been one of the more intriguing characters in Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s canon, with his mysterious and significant role in the British government, his large girth and aversion to physical activity, and utter lack of practicality, despite being his brother Sherlock’s equal – and possible superior – in mental acuity. “Historically it's a very interesting character, and as a lover of Sherlock Holmes since I was a boy I've always enjoyed that character myself,” said Fry. “I hope that people enjoy it. It's certainly been fun making the picture. I'm on it until January and it's really been fun.” Fry’s also a fan of director Guy Richie’s inventive reinterpretation of Holmes-ian lore. “It's what known in the Sherlock business as noncanonical. It's not based on the books – It's based on the idea of the characters and the relationships, and I love the way that Guy uses the camera. I love the fluency and speed and the wit and the drive of it." "It's not exactly Steampunk, but there's a very 21st century angle on Victorian England," he said. "Which of us doesn't love Basil Rathbone and Jeremy Brett - in particular those two - but he's the kind of character that will be done in 200 years time. They'll be making hologram movies of Sherlock Holmes. He'll never die. He's an imperishable figure. So each age will remake him in their own image, if you like, and I like what Guy did. He's very filmic.” With his personal appreciation of Holmes as a British icon, Fry admits it did take some doing to wrap his own brain around the notion of an American – in the form of Robert Downey, Jr. - playing the detective. “To some extent, but he's such a charismatic and likeable screen presence, Robert, that you very soon forget it. More than most, he owns every second of screen time. He's just wonderfully likable. He's the real thing.”

The recent revelation from the Finance Ministry’s probe into Crown corporations that found ever-more and ever-higher paid managers at ICBC has enraged British Columbians and especially consumers of auto insurance in this province. It is of course entirely possible that ICBC, a government-owned monopoly, has too many managers and that they’re paid too much. However the fact is, without competition to determine how many managers are necessary—no one has any idea what the "right" staffing levels are. In addition, without an independent (non-political) body to set compensation in the public sector equal to that in the private sector for comparable jobs, compensation for managers is instead determined by politics or the Crown monopoly itself. Unlike private companies in competitive markets, government protected monopolies are not required to constantly innovate, compete for consumers, ensure efficient and effective staffing levels and pay, offer competitive prices and/or high quality services including more options. In Canada, six provinces (Alberta, Ontario, New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, Prince Edward Island, and Newfoundland & Labrador) rely entirely on private insurers to provide auto insurance. Saskatchewan and Manitoba are much like BC in that government-owned insurers have a monopoly over basic auto insurance but compete with private companies in the market for optional insurance coverage. Quebec’s government monopoly for basic coverage does not compete with private insurers for optional insurance. A 2011 Fraser Institute study comparing automobile insurance premiums found that from 2007 to 2009, auto insurance has been the most costly and least affordable in British Columbia, Ontario, Manitoba, and Saskatchewan—three of which are provinces with government-run auto insurance monopolies. Ontario is in that high-priced crowd because of tight regulations (in rate-setting as well as mandatory minimum liability) and high levels of insurance fraud (Toronto has been characterized as a centre for organized crime rings that carry out a number of fraud scams that result in higher premiums). This evidence contradicts the myth promoted by supporters of public auto insurance who often trot out old reports published by groups like the Consumers’ Association of Canada to claim BC is a great deal on auto insurance. The problem with reports from the CAC is that their methodology is not rigorous and has often been criticized. For example, it used internet surveys of possible insurance premiums, not actual policies purchased, to come up with prices in its comparisons. Back in 2003, when the federal office of the association released its numbers, the then-Ontario director for the same group, Theresa Courneyea, called the national numbers faulty and said studies from the national office violated arithmetic and "slant the picture." In 2006, even a B.C. Supreme Court judge noticed the CAC's statistical methods were in error. Justice Loryl Russell wrote that "what methodology can be gleaned from the [Consumers' Association] affidavit is demonstrably flawed." Given the recent ICBC executive pay revelations and the fact that BC has among the highest premiums in the country, drivers should be asking why the provincial government continues to restrict competition and consumer choice. The benefits of privatizing crown corporations are well established in the academic literature. For example, renowned privatization experts, Professors William Megginson and Jeffry Netter, provided the most comprehensive review of worldwide privatizations in a 2001 study published in the prestigious Journal of Economic Literature. They found both short- and long-term benefits to economies undertaking privatizations. In the short term, taxpayers gained through one-time revenues from the sale of government assets. In the longer term, privatization improved firm performance and increased economic growth. If British Columbians want cheaper automobile insurance and an end to politicized staffing and pay at ICBC, privatize it.