Source: http://news.feedzilla.com/en_us/stories/politics/top-stories/180478215?client_source=feed&format=rss
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Saturday, December 31, 2011
Jobs on the mind as U.S. approaches 2012 presidential election
QUOTE OF THE WEEK
"We are not in desperate economic times. But we believe that we are, and that is as paralyzing today as it was when Franklin Roosevelt famously intoned on his inauguration that fear itself is the biggest obstacle. In 2012, the American economy will do better than muddle and less than soar. Let's hope for the new year that Americans can adjust to that reality without succumbing to despair." - Zachary Karabell, author and economist.
Source: The Daily Beast
?
BY THE NUMBERS
20.1 percent - Average U.S. unemployment in 1935, the year prior to Franklin Delano Roosevelt seeking election to a second term.
16.1 percent - Average U.S. unemployment in 1936, the year FDR captured over 60 percent of the popular vote and 523 electoral votes in the general election.
8.6 percent - U.S. unemployment rate as Barack Obama approaches his 2012 bid for re-election.
Sources: Schmoop.com, U.S. Election Atlas, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics
FINAL WORD
"...I think any Republican who assumes that because we have high unemployment they are going to win the election hands down is mistaken. It's true there has been a rule since 1936, no president has been re-elected with unemployment above I think it's 7.8 percent. I don't think that rule applies anymore. We sort of have gotten used to perhaps not nine percent, but it isn't as shocking as it would have been had we been at four percent last year. It's becoming a chronic condition." - Washington Post? columnist Charles Krauthammer
Source: The Weekly Standard
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Election 101: How an Iowa GOP caucus works
Contrary to popular belief, the Iowa caucuses are not a part of the state populated by Georgians, Armenians, and Azerbaijanis. Sorry, bad pun. (See Caucasus, a region of Eurasia.) But there is some confusion about what the Iowa caucuses are, exactly. So in a few easy steps, let us explain what will happen in the Hawkeye State the evening of Jan. 3 ? the first presidential nominating contest of the season.
1. What is a caucus?
Generally speaking, a caucus is a club or meeting of like-minded people. In the context of presidential politics, a caucus is a gathering of Republicans or Democrats for the purpose of stating a preference for their party?s presidential nomination. In Iowa, a caucus is held in each precinct, which means 1,774 meetings around the state. Republicans and Democrats caucus differently. Because the Republican caucuses are highly competitive this time around, while the Democratic ones aren?t ? we predict President Obama will win ? we?ll discuss just the Republicans.
Source: http://rss.csmonitor.com/~r/feeds/usa/~3/TSeY8w1X614/Election-101-How-an-Iowa-GOP-caucus-works
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Coe Sports Information wrote a new blog post: [Women's Basketball] Mustangs hot shooting downs Kohawks
December 30th, 2011 ?|? Published in Coe College, Other
CEDAR RAPIDS, Iowa ? Mount Mercy hit back-to-back 3-pointers to start the game, as they snapped Coe's nine-game winning streak Friday night at Eby Fieldhouse. The Mustangs hit 17 3-pointers in the 80-68 victory.
Continue reading
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Source: http://easterniowasportsandrec.com/2011/12/30/womens-basketball-mustangs-hot-shooting-downs-kohawks/
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Israeli Group to Twitter: Ban Hezbollah or We'll Sue
'I raised my kids to be free thinkers,' says mom of Emma Sullivan
(NEWSER) - A Kansas teen who blasted her conservative governor in a tweet is refusing to apologize?even though she has been ordered to do so by her school. "Just made mean comments at Gov. Brownback and told him he sucked, in person #heblowsalot," Emma Sullivan, 18, tweeted to pals during a speech by Gov. Sam Brownback at a Youth in Government event. In fact, she didn't diss him to his face, but was "just joking" with friends, she explained later. However, Brownback's aides, who monitor tweets about their guy, complained to Sullivan's school, reports the Kansas City Star . But Emma is defying her principal's orders to write a letter of apology. "I would do it again," the self-described liberal told AP . "I've decided not to write the letter but I hope this opens the door for average citizens to voice their opinion and to be heard," she tweeted. More?
Source: http://www.newser.com/story/136465/israeli-group-to-twitter-ban-hezbollah-or-well-sue.html
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Drake surprises fan by doing karaoke with her
Jealous much?
What seemed like an ordinary night out with some friends at Saddle Ranch on Sunset Boulevard in Los Angeles yesterday, turned into the time of one young woman's life.
Thanks to some good ol' fashioned karaoke.
READ: Rihanna Still a "Fan" of Chris Brown, "Excited" for His Comeback
Dalal aka "Dee," an international student from Kuwait, tells E! News she was having dinner with a girlfriend, when she received a text message from her friend Jay, who deejays at Saddle Ranch on Tuesday nights, telling her that someone famous was there and that she should definitely stop by.
"When I showed up I asked Jay who the celebrity was and he said he was not sure, and that I should go find out. I had no clue it was Drake," she tells us.
Then it was karaoke time! Dee took the stage to sing Rihanna's No. 1 single "What's My Name" off the Grammy-nominated album "Loud."
"I was up there with the mike and the first beats of 'Only Girl in the World' started playing and I said, 'Stop the song! Does anyone here know how to do the Drake part of "What's My Name"?' So I was like, anyone? Anyone? Hello? And decided to just sing it by myself and then boom! Drake jumps up with his bodyguard behind him and was like, 'Wait, I thought I was going to do the song with you.'"
Can you believe it?! Neither can we.
"I was like, 'Oh my god, Drake!" Dee tells E! News that, "I just got lost in the moment and thought, 'Whatever happens I don't care.' It was a total Hollywood moment."
It seems like the two quickly became friends. After sharing the stage, Dee hung out with the rapper. "I went over to his table and Drake told his bodyguard to let me through. He hugged me and I thanked him for singing with me and told him that it made my day."
Well, you know what they say: YOLO!
--Reporting by Holly Passalaqua
PHOTOS: 2011 American Music Awards: Arrivals
? 2011 E! Entertainment Television, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
Source: http://today.msnbc.msn.com/id/45810568/ns/today-entertainment/
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Wacky rules complicate race for GOP delegates (AP)
WASHINGTON ? Look out for some wacky results in the race for delegates in the Republican presidential primaries and caucuses. There might even be a state or two where the second-place candidate gets the most delegates, starting with Tuesday's caucuses in Iowa.
New GOP rules require states that hold nominating contests before April to award delegates proportionally. That usually means a candidate who gets 40 percent of the vote gets 40 percent of the delegates. But not always.
The rules give states a lot of leeway to define proportional, and some states have been pretty creative. For example, in Ohio, the candidate who gets the most votes in each congressional district wins three delegates. Ohio has 16 congressional districts based on the latest census, so 48 delegates will be awarded this way.
An additional 15 delegates will be awarded proportionally, based on statewide results. Candidates must get at least 20 percent of the statewide vote to qualify for these delegates. Under this system, it is possible in a close race for a candidate to narrowly win the most congressional districts ? and the most delegates ? but come in second in the overall statewide vote, said Bob Bennett, a member of the Republican National Committee from Ohio.
Early on, battles over small numbers of delegates won't get much attention because candidates are more concerned about winning contests and building momentum. But if the race continues into late spring, like the 2008 battle between Democrats Barack Obama and Hillary Rodham Clinton, delegate totals become much more important.
A tight race could draw a lot of scrutiny over obscure issues like this: If you qualify for 7.5 delegates under a proportional allocation, do you round up to eight or round down to seven? (In Ohio and other states you round up to eight. In Nevada, which is holding GOP caucuses Feb. 4, party officials are still working on those details.)
"All these rules are important in close races," Bennett said. "If you have a blowout, a sure winner, they don't matter as much."
In most national polls, former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney and former House Speaker Newt Gingrich are the front-runners for the GOP nomination. In Iowa, Rep. Ron Paul of Texas also is polling well, raising the possibility of a split vote.
The Iowa caucuses on Tuesday begin the process in that state that will result in 25 delegates being selected for the national convention. At the caucuses, voters will cast ballots in a presidential straw poll, and those results will get the most attention on election night.
Caucus-goers also will elect delegates to county conventions, who in turn will elect delegates to congressional district conventions and the state party convention in June. These are the conventions where delegates to the GOP national convention in Tampa, Fla., are selected.
Each of the four congressional districts will elect three delegates to the national convention. They will also appoint two members to a slate committee, which will choose 13 additional delegates. The slate is voted on at the party's state convention in June.
The system puts a premium on getting the most votes in individual congressional districts. If a candidate's supporters can control a congressional district convention, they can choose national delegates and slate committee members who support their candidate.
In a tight, three-way race, it is possible for a candidate to narrowly win two of the four congressional districts ? putting him or her in position to win the most delegates ? but come in second in overall votes statewide.
"The delegates are going to reflect the division within the party itself," said John Ryder, a member of the Republican National Committee from Tennessee who chaired the panel that wrote the new proportional rule. "The end result is nobody comes out of a proportional state with a clear mandate, unless of course they do, which would only happen if a candidate generates commanding support among Republican voters."
A total of 2,286 delegates are slated to attend the Republican National Convention in August, and 1,144 will be needed to claim the nomination, according to the Republican National Committee. No candidate can reach that total before April, though a dominant front-runner could build a commanding lead by then.
In the meantime, the primary calendar is full of quirks. South Carolina (Jan. 21), and Florida (Jan. 31), will award all their delegates to the candidate who gets the most votes, even though they are holding their contests before April. Both states already lost half their delegates for holding early contests, so the state parties decided to make them winner-take-all. The RNC says there are no additional penalties for violating the proportional rules.
Michigan's plan for awarding delegates is very similar to Ohio's. But Michigan, which holds its primary Feb. 28, lost half its delegates because it scheduled its primary before March 6, also known as Super Tuesday. GOP rules allow only four states to hold nominating contests before Super Tuesday: Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada and South Carolina. And those states weren't supposed to schedule contests before February.
Michigan started with 59 delegates, but now has only 30. Nevertheless, party officials plan to award 56 delegates based on the primary (the other three will be the state's RNC members), and simply reduce each candidate's total by half. That poses several problems: Half of 56 isn't quite 30, and what if a candidate wins 25 delegates? Do they get 12 or 13? GOP rules don't allow fractions of delegates.
"We'll work that out once we get closer to choosing the delegates who will go," said Matt Frendewey, spokesman for the Michigan Republican Party.
___
Lauren Johnert, Associated Press deputy manager for election research and quality control, contributed to this report.
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Friday, December 30, 2011
Wahlberg planning reality show on contraband
Peter Kramer / AP
Mark Wahlberg is looking to get into the reality TV show business.
By Randee Dawn
Burgers and contraband: Mark Wahlberg has his priorities in order.
At least, the actor does for two reality TV shows he's working on, according to WENN. The website reports that Wahlberg, who was previously reported as working to secure a reality series about his family-run burger diner, Wahlburgers, is now looking at a second reality series tentatively titled "Port of L.A."
The show would focus on the "ins and outs of the contraband crime world at the Port of Los Angeles," according to WENN.
Wahlberg said, "It?s a reality show, like a docudrama.... We?ve been spending a lot of time down there and just knowing all the real dangers that are there, like smuggling, human trafficking; I mean everything across the board. There was an incident that happened that was never reported that shut down the L.A. harbor for a week and was costing the nation $2.5 billion a day! Once that stops, nothing happens; nothing comes and nothing comes out."
"The Fighter" star, whose role as an "Entourage" producer ended in September (along with the show), took an interest in this particular area of crime while making his upcoming movie "Contraband" (out Jan. 13, 2012), itself a remake of an Icelandic film from 2009.
"It?s pretty scary stuff but it?s a fascinating world and obviously (with) the whole smuggling thing, they can never figure out the way they (authorities) go about checking containers, the guessing game. It?s a real cat and mouse game. I thought 'Contraband' was an interesting story and would be entertaining if we could do it the right way," he explained.
Just how such illegal doings could be filmed and presented as a reality show -- without law enforcement showing up to shut everything down -- remains to be seen.
Mark Wahlberg is a former smuggler gone straight, but financial problems and a growing family lead him to return to his old ways, with the promise of a final big payoff, in "Contraband."
Would you watch a reality TV show about contraband? Share your thoughts on our Facebook page!
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To children (but not adults) a rose by any other name is still a rose
ScienceDaily (Dec. 27, 2011) ? Two vital parts of mentally organizing the world are classification, or the understanding that similar things belong in the same category; and induction, an educated guess about a thing's properties if it's in a certain category. There are reasons to believe that language greatly assists adults in both kinds of tasks. But how do young children use language to make sense of the things around them? It's a longstanding debate among psychologists.
A new study in Psychological Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science, challenges the predominant answer. "For the last 30 to 40 years it has been believed that even for very young children, labels are category markets, as they are for adults," explains psychologist Vladimir M. Sloutsky, who authored the paper with Ohio State University colleague Wei Deng. According to this theory, if you show anyone an oblong, scaled, limbless swimming thing and say it's a dog (its label), both adults and children will believe it's a dog (in that category of four-legged domesticated mammals) and should behave like a dog -- bark or wag its tail.
The study confirms that many adults do use labels this way. But children do not. "Our research suggests that very early in development labels are no different from other features," says Sloutsky. "And the more salient features may completely overrule the label." You insist the swimming thing is a dog. The child weighs all the evidence -- and "dog" is no more important than scales or swimming -- and concludes it's a fish.
To test their hypothesis, the psychologists showed pictures of two imaginary creatures to preschoolers and college undergraduates. Both animals had a body, hands, feet, antennae, and a head. The "flurp" was distinguished by a pink head that moved up and down; the "jalet" had a blue sideways-moving head. The heads were salient -- the only moving part. During training, the subjects learned what a flurp or a jalet looked like.
Then the experimenters changed some of the features, keeping the head consistent with most of them, and asked participants to supply the missing label. They also showed creatures with characteristics and a name, and the subjects had to predict -- induce -- the missing part. Both adults and children did best when the head was consistent with the name.
The difference arose when the head was a jalet's but label was "flurp," or vice-versa. Then, most of the adults went with the label (we accept that a dolphin is a mammal, even though it looks and swims like a fish). The children relied on the head for identification. Regardless of its name, a thing with a jalet's head is a jalet.
To eliminate the possibility that the participants were flummoxed by the invented names, they researchers called the creatures "carrot-eater" and "meat-eater." The results were the same.
Sloutsky says the findings could inform teaching and communicating with children. "If saying something is a dog does not communicate what it is any more than saying it is brown, then labeling it is necessary but by no means sufficient for a child to understand." Talking with young children, "we need to do more than just label things."
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The above story is reprinted from materials provided by Association for Psychological Science.
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Journal Reference:
- Vladimir M. Sloutsky and Wei Deng. Carrot-Eaters and Moving Heads: Salient Features Provide Greater Support for Inductive Inference than Category Labels. Psychological Science, 2012
Note: If no author is given, the source is cited instead.
Disclaimer: This article is not intended to provide medical advice, diagnosis or treatment. Views expressed here do not necessarily reflect those of ScienceDaily or its staff.
Source: http://feeds.sciencedaily.com/~r/sciencedaily/~3/duuqKHLXOw8/111227153756.htm
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Spire: A New Legal Siri Port For Any iOS 5 Device | TechCrunch
Well-known iOS hacker?chpwn?(aka Grant Paul) along with?Ryan Petrich?have?released?a new tool for installing Siri on jailbroken phones. The Siri port, called ?Spire,? works on any phone that can run iOS 5. However, because Apple only officially supports Siri requests coming from the iPhone 4S, a proxy server address is still required.
Oh, there?s one more thing: Spire is legal.
While it?s technically been possible to run Siri on non-iPhone 4S devices,?as previous Siri ports have shown, those ports have violated Apple?s copyrights. Siri?s resource files, images and code are not meant to be copied and widely distributed. So instead, Spire downloads Siri itself directly from Apple. Clever!
Once the 100 MB download is installed on the jailbroken device, users will have to configure the software with a proxy server address. Explains Paul via the?Spire Proxy FAQ, ?Apple has made it very likely impossible to defeat the authorization requirement [for Siri]. I reverse engineered it, and it does not appear possible to connect Siri to the cloud without information from an iPhone 4S.?
Remember, hackers don?t often throw around words like ?impossible? too often. Clearly, Apple has some heavy-duty security in place for managing Siri requests.
So how does one get a proxy address for Siri then? Paul suggests that you could ask an iPhone 4S-owning friend for their authentication tokens. But more interesting is his speculation that we will soon see for-pay Siri proxy services that charge a monthly fee for access to a copy of Siri installed on their own iPhone 4S devices.
A third possibility ? and one the hacker community would have to build ? is to rip out Siri?s guts and replace it with?Google Chrome?s?speech ?API??to?decode the Siri requests ?and return results.
In other words, as of now, Spire is a good first step towards a legal implementation of a Siri port, but it?s going to be hard for people to?actually use it?until there are solutions for legal Siri proxies, too.
Spire is available now in the jailbreak app store, Cydia.
Source: http://techcrunch.com/2011/12/27/spire-a-new-legal-siri-port-for-any-ios-5-device/
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Thursday, December 29, 2011
Gabrielle Union Playing Step Mommy On The Beach With Dwyane Wade?s Sons [Pics]
Who Do We Blame For This Picture?
December 14, 2011 - 1:50 PM
Tags: children, pregnancy
Posted in Crazy Pictures | 6 comments
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Under The Baker Act Your Child Can Be Mentally Evaluated Without Your Permission!
December 13, 2011 - 6:54 PM
Tags: children, mental health
Posted in Crazy News | 2 comments
A 6-year-old girl was Baker Acted Thursday after officials said a school fight got out of control.
Christina Brinson says her daughter, Dy?asia, has had a tough time adjusting, as she has been dealing with a bully at Fairmount Park Elementary.
?I gave her permission to hit her back,? Brinson said.
Just last week, Dy?asia was given two [...]
Florida School Calls Police After 12-Year-Olds Kiss On Playground
November 25, 2011 - 11:52 AM
Tags: children
Posted in News | No comments
A school administrator in Florida called the sheriff after a pair of consenting 12-year-olds shared a kiss on the playground.
Lee County Sheriff?s deputies were dispatched to Orange River Elementary School after two female students were debating over who liked a 12-year-old boy more. At that point, one of the girls walked over and kissed the [...]
Swizz Beatz Son Playing Chess [Pics]
November 18, 2011 - 10:32 AM
Tags: children, mashonda, swizz beatz
Posted in Celebrity News | No comments
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Pornstar Sasha Grey Reads To 1st Graders, Parents Upset!
November 13, 2011 - 10:56 AM
Tags: children, pornstar, school
Posted in Crazy News | 1 comment
COMPTON, Calif. Some parents have filed complaints with the Parent-Teacher Association after a former adult film star said she read to children in a classroom at a Los Angeles County elementary school.
Sasha Grey, a 23-year-old ex-porn actress who has appeared in mainstream shows like HBO?s ?Entourage,? was a guest earlier this month at Compton?s Emerson [...]
Would You Turn Your Kids In If You Saw Them Commit A Crime?
July 9, 2011 - 3:27 PM
Tags: children, crime
Posted in News | 5 comments
One mother, ?Kizzy,? was watching the news when she recognized her 15-year-old son. She went online and and also found a picture of her 13-year-old daughter. She turned both over to police.
?These are not the kind of kids that I?m raising to do stuff like this, and I feel like I put all my hard [...]
9 Year Old Girl Stabs Man In Back For Hitting Her Mother!
June 16, 2011 - 3:45 PM
Tags: children, stabbing
Posted in News | 1 comment
A 9-year-old girl stabbed a Fond du Lac man in the back early Sunday as he threatened to kill her mother, according to a criminal complaint filed in Fond du Lac County Circuit Court.
The complaint charges Jason M. Fields, 27, with first-degree recklessly endangering safety, strangulation and disorderly conduct. Bail was set at $5,000 when [...]
12 Year Old Black Kid From Bed Stuy Brooklyn Looking To Become Chess Champion
June 2, 2011 - 1:16 PM
Tags: chess, children
Posted in News | 4 comments
Already a rising national star at age 12, Bed-Stuy chess champ James Black Jr. wants to become the youngest American grandmaster in the game?s storied history.
Black led the chess team from Intermediate School 318 in Williamsburg to national championships in both the K-8 and K-9 divisions in April ? and is only seven points away [...]
Father Kills Baby Sons, Then Sends Their Mother Picture Of Dead Children Saying ?Goodbye?
April 15, 2011 - 6:37 PM
Tags: children, murder
Posted in News | 2 comments
FORT WORTH, Texas ? A Texas man sent his ex-girlfriend a cell phone photo showing their infant and toddler sons with a ?goodbye? message and then a graphic photo that appeared to show the baby dead ? a day before authorities found the youngsters? bodies, two of the mother?s friends said Thursday.
Gabriel Armandariz, 28, was [...]
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Memo: Gingrich praised Romney health plan
DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) ? Republican presidential hopeful Newt Gingrich once praised the health care law enacted in Massachusetts by then-Gov. Mitt Romney.
In an April 2006 memo, the former House speaker called it "the most exciting development of the past few weeks." Gingrich also said the law has "tremendous potential to effect major change in the American health system."
The memo from Gingrich's Atlanta-based Center for Health Transformation came to light Tuesday as the GOP candidate set out on a 22-stop bus tour of Iowa in the run-up to the state's Jan. 3 caucuses.
The memo also noted shortcomings in the Massachusetts law. Gingrich said the state's many regulations prohibited insurers from offering cheaper plans that would make coverage affordable.
But Gingrich went on to note that that "we agree entirely with Gov. Romney and Massachusetts legislators that our goal should be 100 percent insurance coverage for all Americans."
Gingrich and others have argued that the Massachusetts law, widely seen as the model for President Barack Obama's national health overhaul, undercuts Romney's conservative credentials.
Gingrich also has faced questions about his past support for an individual health care mandate, anathema to conservatives.
A Gingrich spokesman said the former Georgia congressman's comments are "old news that has been covered already."
"Newt previously supported a mandate for health insurance and changed his mind after seeing its effects," said the spokesman, R.C. Hammond. "The real question is why 'Mitt the Massachusetts Moderate' won't admit that health insurance mandates don't work."
Gingrich and Romney have sparred over which one of them is truly conservative.
The Gingrich memo was first reported Tuesday by The Wall Street Journal.
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41 states, including Kansas, have lost jobs since 2006
Just nine states and the District of Columbia managed to add jobs during the past half-decade.
The other 41 states currently have smaller employment bases than they did at the end of 2006, according to an analysis of U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics?
Kansas was among the states posting job losses over the past five years. The state has lost 30,300 nonfarm jobs between November 2006 and November 2011 ? a change of 2.23 percent.
Yet 28 states experienced greater losses over the same time period.
California is the big loser in the employment rankings, with 947,000 of its jobs having slipped away since November 2006.
Nevada has been saddled with the biggest decline in percentage terms, losing 12.7 percent of its employment base during the past five years.
Texas and North Dakota registered the biggest five-year gains in employment.
Texas is the leader in raw numbers, adding 451,100 nonfarm jobs between November 2006 and November 2011. (The latter is the most recent month for which official figures are available.) No other state picked up more than 57,000 jobs during that span.
North Dakota?s increase of 12.7 percent is easily the biggest employment gain in percentage terms. Texas ranks second at 4.4 percent.
Just nine states and the District of Columbia managed to add jobs during the past half-decade.
The other 41 states currently have smaller employment bases than they did at the end of 2006, according to an analysis of U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics?
Kansas was among the states posting job losses over the past five years. The state has lost 30,300 nonfarm jobs between November 2006 and November 2011 ? a change of 2.23 percent.
Yet 28 states experienced greater losses over the same time period.
California is the big loser in the employment rankings, with 947,000 of its jobs having slipped away since November 2006.
Nevada has been saddled with the biggest decline in percentage terms, losing 12.7 percent of its employment base during the past five years.
Texas and North Dakota registered the biggest five-year gains in employment.
Texas is the leader in raw numbers, adding 451,100 nonfarm jobs between November 2006 and November 2011. (The latter is the most recent month for which official figures are available.) No other state picked up more than 57,000 jobs during that span.
North Dakota?s increase of 12.7 percent is easily the biggest employment gain in percentage terms. Texas ranks second at 4.4 percent.
Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/vertical_18/~3/bhn6hqa5NBU/41-states-including-kansas-have-lost.html
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Wednesday, December 28, 2011
Sea snails help scientists explore a possible way to enhance memory
Tuesday, December 27, 2011
Efforts to help people with learning impairments are being aided by a species of sea snail known as Aplysia californica. The mollusk, which is used by researchers to study the brain, has much in common with other species including humans. Research involving the snail has contributed to the understanding of learning and memory.
At The University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston (UTHealth), neuroscientists used this animal model to test an innovative learning strategy designed to help improve the brain's memory and the results were encouraging. It could ultimately benefit people who have impairments resulting from aging, stroke, traumatic brain injury or congenital cognitive impairments.
The proof-of-principle study was published on the Nature Neuroscience website on Dec. 25. The next steps in the research may involve tests in other animal models and eventually humans.
The strategy was used to identify times when the brain was primed for learning, which in turn facilitated the scheduling of learning sessions during these peak periods. The result was a significant increase in memory.
"We found that memory could be enhanced appreciably," said John H. "Jack" Byrne, Ph.D., senior author and chair of the Department of Neurobiology and Anatomy at the UTHealth Medical School.
Building on earlier research that identified proteins linked to memory, the investigators created a mathematical model that tells researchers when the timing of the activity of these proteins is aligned for the best learning experience.
Right now, the scheduling of learning sessions is based on trial and error and is somewhat arbitrary. If the model proves effective in follow-up studies, it could be used to identify those periods when learning potential is highest.
"When you give a training session, you are starting several different chemical reactions. If you give another session, you get additional effects. The idea is to get the sessions in sync," Byrne said. "We have developed a way to adjust the training sessions so they are tuned to the dynamics of the biochemical processes."
Two groups of snails received five learning sessions. One group received learning sessions at irregular intervals as predicted by a mathematical model. Another group received training sessions in regular 20-minute intervals.
Five days after the learning sessions were completed, a significant increase in memory was detected in the group that was trained with a schedule predicted by a computer. But, no increase was detected in the group with the regular 20-minute intervals.
The computer sorted through 10,000 different permutations in order to determine a schedule that would enhance memory.
To confirm their findings, researchers analyzed nerve cells in the brain of snails and found greater activity in the ones receiving the enhanced training schedule, said Byrne, the June and Virgil Waggoner Chair of Neurobiology and Anatomy at UTHealth.
"This study shows the feasibility of using computational methods to assist in the design of training schedules that enhance memory," Byrne said.
###
University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston: http://www.uthouston.edu
This press release was posted to serve as a topic for discussion. Please comment below. We try our best to only post press releases that are associated with peer reviewed scientific literature. Critical discussions of the research are appreciated. If you need help finding a link to the original article, please contact us on twitter or via e-mail.
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Source: http://www.labspaces.net/116326/Sea_snails_help_scientists_explore_a_possible_way_to_enhance_memory
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Bachmann Wrong on Social Security, Jobs, Debt
Michele Bachmann argued that ?my facts are accurate? at the Dec. 15 debate, but a few days later, she got several facts wrong. On ?Meet the Press? the presidential candidate had a couple of exchanges with host David Gregory over the validity of her statements on Social Security and the debt. Among the inaccuracies:
- Bachmann said she didn?t support the payroll tax cut because ?it denied $111 billion to the Social Security trust fund?and ?put senior citizens at risk.? That?s false. The shortfall will be covered by the government?s general fund.
- She said, ?There isn?t one shred of evidence that [the payroll tax cut] created jobs.? Actually, there?s plenty of evidence. Several economists say extending the cut will boost employment, and the unemployment rate has gone down since the tax decrease took effect.
- Bachmann gave a false comparison of the increase in the debt under President Barack Obama and President George W. Bush, using a deficit figure for Bush that makes the debt under Obama look worse.
Shorting the Trust Fund?
Bachmann said she didn?t support last year?s payroll tax cut, because it took money from the Social Security trust fund and ?put senior citizens at risk.? But that?s not true. The Social Security and Medicare Boards of Trustees said that the tax cut would have ?no financial impact? on the trust fund.
Bachmann, Dec. 18: Well, I didn?t support it a year ago when it was first proposed, and the reason why I didn?t is because it, it denied $111 billion to the Social Security trust fund. I didn?t think that that was a good thing to do last year. I don?t think it?s a good thing to do this year. ? [I]t?s put senior citizens at risk by denying the $111 billion to the Social Security trust fund.
Reducing the Social Security payroll taxes paid by employees by 2 percentage points (to 4.2 percent) obviously brings in less money for Social Security. But the trust fund isn?t suffering as a result. The government must cover the shortfall with general fund money.
The Social Security and Medicare Boards of Trustees said in its 2011 report: ?The loss of payroll tax revenue due to this one-year reduction will be made up by transfers from the General Fund of the Treasury to the OASI and DI Trust Funds and will thus have no financial impact on either program.?
The Congressional Budget Office estimated that the tax cut, passed in December 2010, would reduce Social Security revenues by about $115 billion in fiscal 2011 and 2012. Again, that shortfall will be covered by the general fund. The trust fund isn?t being ?denied? any money, as Bachmann claimed.
Congress and the White House are now working to pass an extension of this tax cut, and arguing over how to pay for it. Paying for it, of course, would mean the trust fund again won?t be shortchanged.
Ignoring the Evidence
Bachmann claimed that there ?isn?t one shred of evidence? that the payroll tax cut created jobs. But there is actual evidence. This is the second time we?ve pointed this out this month.
Bachmann, Dec. 18: And remember, the reason why President Obama proposed it in the first place was to create jobs. There isn?t one shred of evidence that that created jobs. So it defeated its purpose ?
There are several pieces of evidence that Bachmann ignores. First, the country has added jobs since the payroll tax cut was enacted ? more than 1.4 million of them ? and the unemployment rate has gone down from 9.4 percent to 8.6 percent. Second, economists say that cutting the payroll tax rate leads to job growth.
The Congressional Budget Office?s director said in November that cutting the payroll tax would ?spur additional spending? and ?increase production and employment.? Economist Joel Prakken of Macroeconomic Advisers said extending the cut for one year would create 400,000 jobs. Mark Zandi of Moody?s Analytics said that the job growth would be even higher ? 750,000 ? if a deeper tax cut, to 3.1 percent, as the president wanted, was made.
Economists are not all in agreement as to how big of an impact the tax cut would have, however, or whether it?s needed to help the struggling economy. Andrew Biggs, a resident scholar of the conservative-leaning American Enterprise Institute, told us that he wasn?t sure he would ?go to the mat to get rid of? it. But he doubted the tax cut ?will do a heck of a lot to get the economy going.?
Even so, Bachmann is wrong when she says ?[t]here isn?t one shred of evidence? that the tax cut boosts jobs.
Debt, Deficit Confusion
Bachmann gave a false and confused comparison of debt figures under President Bush and under President Obama. She said in 2007 ?our debt for the entire year was $160 billion,? but under Obama, ?we?re going into debt $1.5 trillion every year.? It?s true that the federal budget deficit (not the ?debt?) for fiscal year 2007 was $161 billion, one of the lowest annual shortfalls during Bush?s term. It shot up to $459 billion the following year, which started and ended with Bush still in office and signing all the spending bills.
But Bachmann is wrong to say that ?we?re going into debt $1.5 trillion every year.? It?s true that the federal deficit was $1.4 trillion in fiscal 2009 (which was nearly one-third over when President Obama was sworn in) and came in at just under $1.3 trillion in fiscal 2010 and 2011 (which ended Sept. 30.) But for the current fiscal year, it is projected to be much less thanks to an improving economy and substantial spending cuts negotiated in budget deals. The most recent projection from the Congressional Budget Office estimated the deficit this year will be $973 billion ? well under Bachmann?s $1.5 trillion figure.
Gregory challenged the accuracy of Bachmann?s statement, saying that ?the debt exploded under the Bush administration.? Here?s part of that exchange:
Bachmann: What, what I?m doing is I?m ? what I?m doing is saying that what ? the decisions that Barack Obama is making is acting like a banana republic. It?s absolutely irresponsible what President Obama is doing to get behind measures to, to increase spending to such a level that we?re going into debt $1.5 trillion every year. This compares to President George Bush. Back in 2007, our debt for the entire year was $160 billion.
Gregory: Congresswoman, that just misstates the record.
Bachmann: Well, we topped that just in the month of November alone. ?
Gregory: ?the, the debt ? wait a minute, Congresswoman.
Bachmann: David, let me just finish.
Gregory: No, wait a minute. I just want to stop you for accuracy.
Bachmann: Let me just finish. We?re talking ?
Gregory: For accuracy, the debt exploded under the Bush administration.
Bachmann: For accuracy. For accuracy. David, David, then, then let me finish. Do a comparison. I agree with you that there was too much money that was spent under George Bush. But for the year 2007, the debt for the year was $160 billion. The debt for this last year was about $1 1/2 trillion. That?s almost 10 times more in debt than George Bush. And just for the month of ? for the month of, I think it?s November of this year, it was more than the entire year for 2007. So there?s no question that the debt has just skyrocketed under, under President Obama in comparison to George Bush.
It?s true that debt has risen faster under Obama than under Bush, for a variety of reasons. But Bachmann exaggerates.
In fact, total debt went up by $4.9 trillion, an 85.5 percent increase, from the day before Bush was inaugurated in 2001 until Jan. 20, 2009, when Obama took office. Under Obama, the debt has gone up by $4.47 trillion, a 42 percent jump. Of course, Obama has only been in office less than three years, and Bush was president for eight. Clearly, the debt has been increasing at a faster rate under Obama, but Bachmann twists her figures to make the difference look far larger than it actually is.
Bachmann also compares the 2007 deficit to the November increase in the debt, claiming that ?it was more than the entire year for 2007.? We wouldn?t recommend cherry-picking numbers in this way, but for the record, total debt went up by $116.8 billion in November, which is not more than 2007?s debt increase, nor 2007?s deficit increase. So Bachmann was wrong on that point as well.
Bachmann has been strongly objecting to accusations of inaccuracy. Also at Thursday?s debate, she said that her ?facts are accurate,? after Gingrich said that her facts were wrong. And we did find that she was correct when she said Gingrich did not take an opportunity to end federal funding for Planned Parenthood and that he campaigned for Republicans who supported so-called ?partial-birth? abortion ? though her claim about ?partial-birth? abortion could have used context.
But on Sunday?s ?Meet the Press,? her facts were not accurate at all.
? Lori Robertson
Source: http://wpress.bootnetworks.com/2011/12/bachmann-wrong-on-social-security-jobs-debt/
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Tuesday, December 27, 2011
Mayor: House fire kills 5 in Stamford, Connecticut
Story Published: Dec 25, 2011 at 6:55 AM PST
Firefighters are seen on the roof of a house where an early morning fire left five people dead Sunday, Dec. 25, 2011, in Stamford, Conn. Officials said the fire, which was reported shortly before 5 a.m., killed two adults and three children. (AP Photo/Tina Fineberg)
STAMFORD, Conn. (AP) - Fire tore through a house in a tony neighborhood along the Connecticut shoreline early Sunday, killing five people, making it among the worst Christmases in the city's history, the mayor said.Officials said the fire, which was reported shortly before 5 a.m., killed two adults and three children. Two others escaped. Their names have not been released.
"It is a terrible, terrible day for the city of Stamford," Stamford Mayor Michael Pavia told reporters at a news briefing at the scene of the fire. "There probably has not been a worse Christmas day in the city of Stamford."
Acting Fire Chief Antonio Conte said attempts by firefighters to rescue the house's occupants were pushed back by intense flames and heat.
He said fire officials do not yet know the cause of the blaze and will not likely get clues for a few days until fire marshals can enter the house "and figure out what happened."
Conte said he did not know the conditions of the two survivors.
"We had our hands full from the moment we arrived on the scene," he said.
A neighbor, Sam Cingari Jr., said he was awakened by the sound of screaming and that the house was entirely engulfed by flames.
"We heard this screaming at 5 in the morning," he said. "The whole house was ablaze and I mean ablaze."
Cingari says he does not know his neighbors, who he said bought the house last year and were renovating it. Power also was out in the neighborhood, he said.
Charles Mangano, who lives near the scene, told The Advocate of Stamford he saw a barefoot man wearing boxers and a woman being led out of the house.
The woman said, "`My whole life is in there,"' he said. "They were both obviously in a state of shock."
The 3,349-square foot, five-bedroom home sold for $1.7 million in December 2010, according to the Stamford assessment office's website. It's located in Shippan Point, a neighborhood that juts into Long Island Sound.
Tony Low-Beer, another neighbor, said he was awakened by a neighbor after 4 a.m. who told him about a "raging fire" next door.
"Cinders were flying all over the place," he told The Associated Press.
He said he secured his three dogs and put his iguana in a carrying case because he was concerned he might have to evacuate. As of Sunday afternoon, he was still at his home.
Stamford, a city of 117,000 residents, is about 25 miles northeast of New York City.
Source: http://www.kimatv.com/news/national/Mayor-House-fire-kills-5-in-Stamford-Connecticut-136203383.html
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Adam Lambert Returns to U.S., "Embarrassed" by Arrest (omg!)
Did Adam Lambert get a lump of coal in his stocking?
From the looks of his smile on Sunday, probably not. The 29-year-old American Idol runner up is back in the United States after being arrested Thursday in Helsinki, Finland, according to TMZ.
PHOTOS: 2011's biggest celebrity meltdowns
On Thursday, Lambert tweeted about sharing "X-mas Eve with the Koskinens" and having "a huge traditional Finnish feast [before] opening gifts!" He also uploaded a grinning photo of himself and boyfriend Sauli Koskinen in Santa hats to WhoSay.?
Lambert and his reality TV star beau were arrested and jailed Thursday morning for getting into a fight outside a gay bar.
PHOTOS: Stars' mugshots
"Jetlag plus Vodka equals blackout," Lambert tweeted. "Us plus blackout equals irrational confusion."
What do "jail, guilty [and] press" equal? "Lesson learned," he wrote.?
PHOTOS: The year in Us Weekly!
But Lambert's run-in with the law was no laughing matter. "Violence is not to be taken lightly," he wrote Thursday. "Embarrassed by drunkenness. No punches thrown, no injuries and no charges. Media always exaggerates."
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Monday, December 26, 2011
China arrests executives in insider trading crackdown
The China Securities Regulatory Commission (CSRC) detailed on its website four cases of market manipulation and insider trading that it has investigated, including two that led to the arrests of former executives at Southwest Securities Co Ltd and Northeast Securities Co Ltd .
The cases are the latest in an increasingly high-profile campaign by CSRC chief Guo Shuqing to stamp out rampant wrongdoing in the country's stock market, which has languished despite the country's nearly double-digit economic growth.
In one case, Qin Xuan, a Northeast Securities manager who advised on the restructuring of a Shenzhen-listed pharmaceutical firm, used the information he obtained in that process to trade the company's stock, and also leaked the information to a friend.
In another case, Ji Minbo, former vice president at Southwest Securities, gained 20 million yuan ($3.2 million) by using information that was not publicly disclosed to trade more than 40 stocks from 2009 to 2011, the CSRC said.
"No matter how concealed illegal practices are, inside traders will eventually be punished by law," the CSRC said in the statement that detailed Qin's case.
The other two cases on which the agency published details involved securities consultants using commentators, research reports and media to talk up stocks they own before selling the securities to make a profit.
China has been stepping up its crackdown against illegal trading activities and tightening supervision against fund managers, brokerages, consultants and executives of listed companies in a bid to build confidence in a stock market where illegal trading activities have been rampant.
In August, former stock analyst Wang Jianzhong was sentenced to seven years in prison and fined 125 million yuan, on top of having illicit earnings of the same amount confiscated, becoming China's first convicted stock market manipulator.
Guo, the former China Construction Bank chairman who became CSRC chief in late October, said in a speech in early December that the regulator would adamantly crack down on accounting fraud, insider trading and other illegal activities.
Earlier this month, the agency exposed the country's biggest-ever case of stock market manipulation that involved an investment company, Guangdong Zhonghengxin, orchestrating "pump-and-dump" schemes related to 552 stocks, out of which it made 426 million yuan.
The CSRC has also recently published rules that would require listed companies to keep records on anyone who may have access to price-sensitive information.
($1 = 6.3364 Chinese yuan)
(Reporting by Samuel Shen and Jason Subler; Editing by Kazunori Takada)
Source: http://www.ibtimes.com/articles/20111226/china-arrests-executives-in-insider-trading-crackdown.htm
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Timothy Stephen Uhlik, 56, Naples, Florida
Timothy Stephen Uhlik, 56 of Naples passed away December 21, 2011. He was born in Cleveland, Ohio April 19, 1955. He worked many diligent years as a truck parts salesman where he built friendships with numerous individuals across the Cleveland area. He often enjoyed trips to parks to play with his dogs and coached his son through many years of baseball. He became a member of the Naples community shortly after his retirement in 2003. He was an active member in the Corvette of Naples car association where he enjoyed weekend outings and car showing events. He spent the final years of his life, with his love Diane Missig, enjoying the relaxing atmosphere of Naples, which was always his dream after spending summers here as a boy.Timothy was the son of Stephen Uhlik (Deceased) and Marie Uhlik; Brother to Lynn (Daniel) Novy; Father to Timothy J (Mary) Uhlik; Love of Dianne Missig, and Grandfather to Gregory Uhlik and Carson Uhlik.Relatives and friends may call Wednesday, Dec. 28th from 10 am until Noon at Fuller Funeral Home, 4735 Tamiami Trail East. A funeral mass will follow at 1:30pm at St. Peter the Apostle Catholic Church, 5130 Rattlesnake Hammock Road. Inurnment will be held later at St. Peter the Apostle Columbarium. Flowers may be sent to the funeral home.
Source: http://nbc2.tributes.com/show/Timothy-Stephen-Uhlik-92979515
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Sunday, December 25, 2011
Aiken Jaycees name winners of Christmas parade: http://ow.ly/89AiS
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Source: http://www.facebook.com/aikenstandard/posts/10150545937632667
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Friday, December 23, 2011
Long intervening non-coding RNAs play pivotal roles in brain development
![[ Back to EurekAlert! ]](http://www.eurekalert.org/images/back2e.gif){kind=small}
Public release date: 22-Dec-2011[ | E-mail |
Share ] Contact: Nicole Giese Rura
rura@wi.mit.edu
617-258-6851
Whitehead Institute for Biomedical Research
FINDINGS: Whitehead Institute scientists have identified conserved, long intervening non-coding RNAs (lincRNAs) that play key roles during brain development in zebrafish, and went on to show that the human versions of these RNAs can substitute for the zebrafish lincRNAs.
RELEVANCE: Despite their prevalence in the cell, lincRNAs have been referred to as the "dark matter" of all the transcribed RNAs because little is known of their functions or mechanisms. Until now, lincRNAs have been studied primarily in cell lines rather than at the organismal level, which has precluded research into how lincRNAs affect growth and development.
Long intervening non-coding RNAs play pivotal roles in brain development
CAMBRIDGE, Mass. (December 22, 2011) Whitehead Institute scientists have identified conserved, long intervening non-coding RNAs (lincRNAs) that play key roles during embryonic brain development in zebrafish. They also show that the human versions of the lincRNAs can substitute for the zebrafish versions, which implies that the functions of these non-coding RNAs have been retained in humans as well as fish.
Until now, lincRNAs have been studied primarily in cell lines rather than at the organismal level, which has precluded research into how lincRNAs affect growth and development.
"These studies show that zebrafish, an animal that is frequently used to study the genetics of animal development, can also serve as a tool to uncover in systematic fashion the functions of lincRNAs," says Whitehead Member David Bartel, who is also a Howard Hughes Medical Institute investigator and a professor of biology at MIT. "This is another case in which a phenomenon in zebrafish provides insight into what's probably happening in humans, as has been established in many studies of protein-coding genes."
Only a minority of RNAs transcribed in a human cell goes on to template protein production, according to a 2007 assessment of the human genome by the Encyclopedia of DNA Elements (ENCODE) Project Consortium, which was funded by the National Human Genome Research Institute. The rest of the RNAs are dubbed non-coding RNAs (ncRNAs), with those located between protein-coding genes and with lengths of 200 base pairs or longer referred to as lincRNAs.
Despite their prevalence in the cell, lincRNAs have been referred to as the "dark matter" of all the transcribed RNAs because little is known of their functions or mechanisms. One limitation to studying this class of RNAs is their low sequence similarity between species. Unlike protein-coding genes, which are frequently well-conserved between species, lincRNA genes typically have a very small bit of conserved DNA between species, if any. This lack of conservation makes identification of related lincRNAs difficult in closely related species and nearly impossible in distantly related species.
For example, Bartel lab scientists Igor Ulitsky and Alena Shkumatava identified more than 500 lincRNAs in zebrafish but found that only 29 of these have homologs in both humans and mice.
Ulitsky and Shkumatava, who report their findings in this week's issue of the journal Cell, tested the function of two of the 29 lincRNAs by knocking them down in zebrafish embryos. Both knockdowns had striking effects on the zebrafish's brain development. Reduction of one of the lincRNAs, which they called cyrano, caused the zebrafish to have enlarged snouts, small heads and eyes, and short, curly tails, while the zebrafish lacking the lincRNA they called megamind had abnormally shaped heads and enlarged brain ventricles.
To test if the human homologs of the cyrano and megamind lincRNAs are functionally equivalent, Shkumatava injected the human versions into the knocked-down zebrafish. Remarkably, the human lincRNAs rescued the zebrafish and restored brain development and head size for both lincRNAs, indicating that the human lincRNAs may have the same role in embryonic development as their zebrafish analogs.
"This work represents a major advance because it provides a framework for studying lincRNAs, a poorly understood, but abundant class of molecules," says Michael Bender, who oversees RNA processing and function grants at the National Institutes of Health's National Institute of General Medical Sciences, which partially funded the work. "The discovery that human lincRNAs appear to function much like their zebrafish counterparts in embryonic development suggests that the framework will prove valuable in bringing new insights on the roles played by lincRNAs in mammalian organisms."
The zebrafish is already a powerful tool for studying genetics. Whitehead Member Hazel Sive, who collaborated with Bartel and his lab members on the Cell paper, uses zebrafish to study brain development and genetic mutations linked to autism.
Says Sive, "The zebrafish is a fantastic, facile system for discovering the mechanisms by which genes work."
"We humans share with zebrafish this subset of ancient, peculiar genes, and the functionality has been retained in them," says Ulitsky. "We can perturb them in zebrafish and then replace them with the human ones and, at least in the lincRNAs we look at, the human ones function to restore proper development."
"Because of this functional conservation of lincRNAs between zebrafish and humans, we're introducing the zebrafish as a new vertebrate tool that could be used basically to uncover the functions of other lincRNAs," says Shkumatava.
This work was supported by the National Institutes of Health's (NIH's) National Institute of General Medical Sciences (NIGMS), European Molecular Biology Organization (EMBO), Human Frontiers Science Program, and the National Science Foundation (NSF).
###
Written by Nicole Giese Rura
David Bartel is a Member at Whitehead Institute for Biomedical Research, where his laboratory is located and all his research is conducted. He is also a Howard Hughes Medical Institute Investigator and a professor of biology at Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
Full Citation:
"Conserved function of lincRNAs in vertebrate embryonic development despite rapid sequence evolution"
Cell, December 23, 2011
Igor Ulitsky (1,2,3,5), Alena Shkumatava (1,2,3,5), Calvin H. Jan (1,2,3,4), Hazel Sive (1,3), David P. Bartel (1,2,3).
1. Whitehead Institute for Biomedical Research, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02142, USA.
2. Howard Hughes Medical Institute.
3. Department of Biology, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02139, USA.
4. Present address: Howard Hughes Medical Institute and Department of Cellular and Molecular Pharmacology, UCSF, Genentech Hall S472C, 600 16th St, San Francisco, California 94143, USA.
5. These authors contributed equally to this work.
[ | E-mail | Share ] ?
AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.
Public release date: 22-Dec-2011[ | E-mail |
Share ] Contact: Nicole Giese Rura
rura@wi.mit.edu
617-258-6851
Whitehead Institute for Biomedical Research
FINDINGS: Whitehead Institute scientists have identified conserved, long intervening non-coding RNAs (lincRNAs) that play key roles during brain development in zebrafish, and went on to show that the human versions of these RNAs can substitute for the zebrafish lincRNAs.
RELEVANCE: Despite their prevalence in the cell, lincRNAs have been referred to as the "dark matter" of all the transcribed RNAs because little is known of their functions or mechanisms. Until now, lincRNAs have been studied primarily in cell lines rather than at the organismal level, which has precluded research into how lincRNAs affect growth and development.
Long intervening non-coding RNAs play pivotal roles in brain development
CAMBRIDGE, Mass. (December 22, 2011) Whitehead Institute scientists have identified conserved, long intervening non-coding RNAs (lincRNAs) that play key roles during embryonic brain development in zebrafish. They also show that the human versions of the lincRNAs can substitute for the zebrafish versions, which implies that the functions of these non-coding RNAs have been retained in humans as well as fish.
Until now, lincRNAs have been studied primarily in cell lines rather than at the organismal level, which has precluded research into how lincRNAs affect growth and development.
"These studies show that zebrafish, an animal that is frequently used to study the genetics of animal development, can also serve as a tool to uncover in systematic fashion the functions of lincRNAs," says Whitehead Member David Bartel, who is also a Howard Hughes Medical Institute investigator and a professor of biology at MIT. "This is another case in which a phenomenon in zebrafish provides insight into what's probably happening in humans, as has been established in many studies of protein-coding genes."
Only a minority of RNAs transcribed in a human cell goes on to template protein production, according to a 2007 assessment of the human genome by the Encyclopedia of DNA Elements (ENCODE) Project Consortium, which was funded by the National Human Genome Research Institute. The rest of the RNAs are dubbed non-coding RNAs (ncRNAs), with those located between protein-coding genes and with lengths of 200 base pairs or longer referred to as lincRNAs.
Despite their prevalence in the cell, lincRNAs have been referred to as the "dark matter" of all the transcribed RNAs because little is known of their functions or mechanisms. One limitation to studying this class of RNAs is their low sequence similarity between species. Unlike protein-coding genes, which are frequently well-conserved between species, lincRNA genes typically have a very small bit of conserved DNA between species, if any. This lack of conservation makes identification of related lincRNAs difficult in closely related species and nearly impossible in distantly related species.
For example, Bartel lab scientists Igor Ulitsky and Alena Shkumatava identified more than 500 lincRNAs in zebrafish but found that only 29 of these have homologs in both humans and mice.
Ulitsky and Shkumatava, who report their findings in this week's issue of the journal Cell, tested the function of two of the 29 lincRNAs by knocking them down in zebrafish embryos. Both knockdowns had striking effects on the zebrafish's brain development. Reduction of one of the lincRNAs, which they called cyrano, caused the zebrafish to have enlarged snouts, small heads and eyes, and short, curly tails, while the zebrafish lacking the lincRNA they called megamind had abnormally shaped heads and enlarged brain ventricles.
To test if the human homologs of the cyrano and megamind lincRNAs are functionally equivalent, Shkumatava injected the human versions into the knocked-down zebrafish. Remarkably, the human lincRNAs rescued the zebrafish and restored brain development and head size for both lincRNAs, indicating that the human lincRNAs may have the same role in embryonic development as their zebrafish analogs.
"This work represents a major advance because it provides a framework for studying lincRNAs, a poorly understood, but abundant class of molecules," says Michael Bender, who oversees RNA processing and function grants at the National Institutes of Health's National Institute of General Medical Sciences, which partially funded the work. "The discovery that human lincRNAs appear to function much like their zebrafish counterparts in embryonic development suggests that the framework will prove valuable in bringing new insights on the roles played by lincRNAs in mammalian organisms."
The zebrafish is already a powerful tool for studying genetics. Whitehead Member Hazel Sive, who collaborated with Bartel and his lab members on the Cell paper, uses zebrafish to study brain development and genetic mutations linked to autism.
Says Sive, "The zebrafish is a fantastic, facile system for discovering the mechanisms by which genes work."
"We humans share with zebrafish this subset of ancient, peculiar genes, and the functionality has been retained in them," says Ulitsky. "We can perturb them in zebrafish and then replace them with the human ones and, at least in the lincRNAs we look at, the human ones function to restore proper development."
"Because of this functional conservation of lincRNAs between zebrafish and humans, we're introducing the zebrafish as a new vertebrate tool that could be used basically to uncover the functions of other lincRNAs," says Shkumatava.
This work was supported by the National Institutes of Health's (NIH's) National Institute of General Medical Sciences (NIGMS), European Molecular Biology Organization (EMBO), Human Frontiers Science Program, and the National Science Foundation (NSF).
###
Written by Nicole Giese Rura
David Bartel is a Member at Whitehead Institute for Biomedical Research, where his laboratory is located and all his research is conducted. He is also a Howard Hughes Medical Institute Investigator and a professor of biology at Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
Full Citation:
"Conserved function of lincRNAs in vertebrate embryonic development despite rapid sequence evolution"
Cell, December 23, 2011
Igor Ulitsky (1,2,3,5), Alena Shkumatava (1,2,3,5), Calvin H. Jan (1,2,3,4), Hazel Sive (1,3), David P. Bartel (1,2,3).
1. Whitehead Institute for Biomedical Research, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02142, USA.
2. Howard Hughes Medical Institute.
3. Department of Biology, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02139, USA.
4. Present address: Howard Hughes Medical Institute and Department of Cellular and Molecular Pharmacology, UCSF, Genentech Hall S472C, 600 16th St, San Francisco, California 94143, USA.
5. These authors contributed equally to this work.
[ | E-mail | Share ] ?
AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.
Source: http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2011-12/wifb-lin122011.php
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