Friday, September 21, 2012

Health Tips for Women


World Hot Topics Blog

Health Tips for Women

Do you find it hard to balance your work and family? Have you thought of taking a much-needed break? It is medically proven women are much more prone to health risks than men. Women s health needs extra care and attention. Their constitution is very different and hence needs special care. The importance of taking care of ones health is not understood by many women. But the earlier they understand it is better for them.

Here are some health tips, which should be religiously followed amidst all the ordeals, such as, full-time job, meeting office targets, family responsibilities and household chores. These round the clock duties and responsibilities are the major factors that take its toll on women. Many a times it is hard for women s to juggle and strike a perfect balance between their personal and professional life.

Amidst all hard work, and family responsibilities women go through different hormonal changes, pregnancy, and the period of menopause; and women rarely get the time to give personal attention to their health and wellness. Still if the simple daily health tips for women can be included in the daily schedule then you can find a sea of changes in every woman and her health.
Women Health Care


Women health care in most cases takes a back seat because of the multitude tasks she has to undertake. Health care for women means extra nutrition and care especially when they cross the age of 30. They should follow specific diet tips and develop a healthy eating habit. Diseases that are common in women are anemia, anxiety, depression, osteoporosis, migraine, weight gain and weakness. They are the ailments which begin with simple symptoms but might go to extreme degrees if adequate attention is not provided. So if you could only try to follow the health tips for women before it gets too late for everything then you can ensure a healthy you.

There are various health magazines for women and women health websites giving a number of healthy tips for women. Women s health care practices will indeed improve if they put a stern eye over the health tips offered by the various sources. So let us have a look over the simplest of ways and try to remain healthy and happy. With the tips you will be highly benefited and you will slowly find the changes in you and your health.
Health Tips for Women


You should drink lots of water. At least 8 -12 glasses of water consumption should be done by an adult. Develop a healthy eating habit and live more on fresh fruits, green leafy vegetables, and food rich in fiber, shoots, seeds and cereals. Increase your protein intake and also have more of carbohydrate in your diet. Calcium rich diet is also essential for women as they tend to suffer a lot from osteoporosis after menopause. You should do some, yoga, exercises and work out a daily basis, so that you can stay in shape as well as fit and healthy. These will surely help you to remain active for a long time.
Working Women Health Care


Doctors and fitness experts all over the world recommend balanced diet high in proteins and low in fats and carbohydrates. Diet containing enough vitamins and minerals improve immunity and mental performance. Drink lots of water. Fresh fruit juices are good for health. Beverages like tea, coffee and fizzy drinks must be avoided. Even if you drink tea or coffee try to avoid the consumption of sugar. Exercise regularly. Go for morning walks, jogging, cycling or climb stairs to stay active. It keeps you fit and decreases stress and anxiety. Keep a check on your weight to ensure that you stay fit. Devote your time to pursue your hobbies to get relief from stress and anxiety. Regular health checkups will warn you timely about health complications. Sleep for 8 hours to stay fresh the next day. These are the health tips which should be followed by working women to stay healthy.
Healthy Diet Tips for Women


Cooking for family and balancing other household work and in the process often skipping meals and forgetting to take food is quite common among today s women. But you have to eat healthy if you have to stay fit and work. Choose the types of food which will help you to improve your health so that you can fight against all kinds of diseases. Eat a moderate proportion. Do not over eat or consume less food. Eat a wide variety of food items which includes vegetables, grains, fruits, fish, meat or egg. Limit the intake of fried food and sugary items.

Always start your day by eating a big breakfast. If you are working take lunch from home instead of eating at the cafeteria. Try to share a dessert plate instead of gorging on one whole plate yourself. Use mustard where you would eat mayonnaise. Eat food which is low in calorie. If you consume alcohol limit yourself to the weekends. When you are having your cereals ensure that you have fat free milk along with it. If you have sweet tooth then try to balance your meal for the day so that you do not take in extra calories.

There are many simple nutrition tips which you can follow but some of the most essential tips can lead you on the path of a healthy living. These nutrition tips will not only help you to stay fit but also help you to get all the required nutrition content which a body needs. Intake of iron, calcium and vitamin D are very essential for a woman so ensure that you consume daily. Try eating a lot of berries they are rich in vitamin C, fiber and folate. They have the essential nutrients which helps you to fight diseases. For example cranberries are great for prevention of urinary infection. So follow certain simple health tips and rules to stay healthy and fit.

Not every girl has problems with her monthly periods. Some seem to sail through them as if there was no difference between these and other normal days...Try to follow a regular sleep schedule Make sleep your top priority. At least till your body gets adjusted, avoid doing things that will keep you alert and awake when you need to sleep...Different individuals are affected in different ways by air pollution. The sensitive ones suffer the most ill effects as do the elderly or the very young.Well meaning friends fix up spa treatments, visits to the salon, consultations with wedding planners, complete health check ups and so on. But these are all what all advisors come up with....Try to follow a regular sleep schedule Make sleep your top priority. At least till your body gets adjusted, avoid doing things that will keep you alert and awake when you need to sleep...."I m just grabbing a quick bite and then I m off!" This is what one often hears in the new-age work places that houses hundreds of young professionals who hardly have time to eat a proper meal. Dental care is a vital part of personal hygiene. You just cannot afford to neglect it. All it needs is regular care and caution....All of us know that a healthy, well maintained body will go a long way to keep you looking younger and fresher and contribute towards your genuine happiness and fulfillment. So take good care of yourself! After all, we have but one life to lead...Eating a diet that is low on fat, high on fibre with adequate servings of fresh vegetables and fruits is known to prevent health complications and many common illnesses....All of us want to live a full life, look young, healthy and fresh and have the energy to attend to our needs till our last breath. This need not be just wishful thinking if only we remember that all it takes ... When we are young, we tend to exhibit over confidence about our state of health and we ignore what seem to be minor ailments. A visit to the doctor is a big no-no unless one is so sick..Are you aware that with less sleep your workouts will be less effective and that your body will be more likely to store fat? It is a vicious cycle....Good eating habits are a strong foundation to good health. It s important to eat what you like and also to experiment with a variety of new foods...

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Health Tips for Women
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Thursday, September 20, 2012

Tax penalty to hit nearly 6M uninsured people

World Hot Topics Blog Tax penalty to hit nearly 6M uninsured people

World Hot Topics Blog

Tax penalty to hit nearly 6M uninsured people

WASHINGTON (AP) — Nearly 6 million Americans — significantly more than first estimated— will face a tax penalty under President Barack Obama's health overhaul for not getting insurance, congressional analysts said Wednesday. Most would be in the middle class.
The new estimate amounts to an inconvenient fact for the administration, a reminder of what critics see as broken promises.

The numbers from the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office are 50 percent higher than a previous projection by the same office in 2010, shortly after the law passed. The earlier estimate found 4 million people would be affected in 2016, when the penalty is fully in effect.

That's still only a sliver of the population, given that more than 150 million people currently are covered by employer plans. Nonetheless, in his first campaign for the White House, Obama pledged not to raise taxes on individuals making less than $200,000 a year and couples making less than $250,000.

And the budget office analysis found that nearly 80 percent of those who'll face the penalty would be making up to or less than five times the federal poverty level. Currently that would work out to $55,850 or less for an individual and $115,250 or less for a family of four.

Average penalty: about $1,200 in 2016.
"The bad news and broken promises from Obamacare just keep piling up," said Rep. Dave Camp, R-Mich., chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, who wants to repeal the law.

Starting in 2014, virtually every legal resident of the U.S. will be required to carry health insurance or face a tax penalty, with exemptions for financial hardship, religious objections and certain other circumstances. Most people will not have to worry about the requirement since they already have coverage through employers, government programs like Medicare or by buying their own policies.

A spokeswoman for the Obama administration said 98 percent of Americans will not be affected by the tax penalty — and suggested that those who will be should face up to their civic responsibilities.
"This (analysis) doesn't change the basic fact that the individual responsibility policy will only affect people who can afford health care but choose not to buy it," said Erin Shields Britt of the Health and Human Services Department. "We're no longer going to subsidize the care of those who can afford to buy insurance but make a choice not to buy it."

The budget office said most of the increase in its estimate is due to changes in underlying projections about the economy, incorporating the effects of new federal legislation, as well as higher unemployment and lower wages.

The Supreme Court upheld Obama's law as constitutional in a 5-4 decision this summer, finding that the insurance mandate and the tax penalty enforcing it fall within the power of Congress to impose taxes. The penalty will be collected by the IRS, just like taxes.

The budget office said the penalty will raise $6.9 billion in 2016.
The new law will also provide government aid to help middle-class and low-income households afford coverage, the financial carrot that balances out the penalty.

Nonetheless, some people might still decide to remain uninsured because they object to government mandates or because they feel they would come out ahead financially even if they have to pay the penalty. Health insurance is expensive, with employer-provided family coverage averaging nearly $15,800 a year for a family and $4,300 for a single plan. Indeed, insurance industry experts say the federal penalty may be too low.

The Supreme Court also allowed individual states to opt out of a major Medicaid expansion under the law. The Obama administration says it will exempt low-income people in states that opt out from having to comply with the insurance requirement.
Many Republicans still regard the insurance mandate as unconstitutional and rue the day the Supreme Court upheld it.

However, the idea for an individual insurance requirement comes from Republican health care plans in the 1990s.

It's also a central element of the 2006 Massachusetts health care law signed by then-GOP Gov. Mitt Romney, now running against Obama and promising to repeal the federal law.
Romney spokeswoman Andrea Saul said Wednesday the new report is more evidence that Obama's law is a "costly disaster."

"Even more of the middle-class families who President Obama promised would see no tax increase will in fact see a massive tax increase thanks to Obamacare," she said.

Romney says insurance mandates should be up to each state. The approach seems to have worked well in Massachusetts, with virtually all residents covered and dwindling numbers opting to pay the penalty instead.

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Tax penalty to hit nearly 6M uninsured people
http:// news.yahoo.com/tax-penalty-hit-nearly-6m-uninsured-people-194442599.html

Wednesday, September 19, 2012

U.S. obesity rates to soar by 2030


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U.S. obesity rates to soar by 2030

Fat and getting fatter

NEW YORK (Reuters) - If Americans stick to their eating and exercise habits, future historians will look back on the early 21st century as a golden age of svelte.

Using a model of population and other trends, a new report released on Tuesday by the Trust for America's Health and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation projects that half of U.S. adults will be obese by 2030 unless Americans change their ways.

The "F as in Fat" report highlights the current glum picture of the U.S. obesity epidemic, in which 35.7 percent of adults and 16.9 percent of children age 2 to 19 are obese, as the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) reported earlier this year.

But for the first time, the report builds on state-by-state data from the CDC to project obesity rates. In every state, that rate will reach at least 44 percent by 2030. In 13, that number would exceed 60 percent.
Obesity raises the risk of numerous diseases, from type 2 diabetes to endometrial cancer, meaning more sick people and higher medical costs in the future, the report said.

It projects as many as 7.9 million new cases of diabetes a year, compared with 1.9 million new cases in recent years. There could also be 6.8 million new cases of chronic heart disease and stroke every year, compared with 1.3 million new cases a year now.

The increasing burden of illness will go right to the bottom line, adding $66 billion in annual obesity-related medical costs over and above today's $147 billion to $210 billion. Total U.S. healthcare spending is estimated at $2.7 trillion.

That projection supports a study published earlier this year in the American Journal of Preventive Medicine that found that by 2030, 42 percent of U.S. adults could be obese, adding $550 billion to healthcare costs over that period.
'A TALE OF TWO FUTURES'
As with all projections, from climate models to Charles Dickens' "A Christmas Carol," human actions can prevent the worst of the scenarios, according to health policy experts.

"This is a tale of two futures," said Jeffrey Levi of George Washington University and the executive director of Trust for America's Health. "We're at a turning point where if we don't do something now to mitigate these trends, the cost in human health and healthcare spending will be enormous."

Obesity is defined as having a body mass index (BMI) above 30. Overweight means a BMI of 25 to 29.9. BMI is calculated by taking weight in pounds and dividing it by the square of height in inches, and multiplying the result by 703. For instance, someone who is 5 feet, 5 inches tall and weighs 185 pounds (84 kg) has a BMI of 30.8.

Obesity rates among U.S. adults have more than doubled from the 15 percent of 1980. In that same time, they have more than tripled among children.

Since the CDC found that the percentage of obese children and adults was essentially unchanged between 2008 and 2010, some experts question whether the "F as in Fat" model overstates future obesity by assuming past trends continue in a straight line.

"This is a strong assumption," said economist Justin Trogdon of RTI International in North Carolina. "Recent evidence from other surveys suggest obesity rates may be leveling off."
Mathematician Martin Brown of Britain's National Heart Forum, a nonprofit group, who led development of the model, said it takes a longer view by design.

"You have to take trends over a number of years," he said. "In the age groups that matter, there just isn't much evidence of a leveling off in obesity rates."

EDUCATION AND INCOME
Obesity has long been associated with education and income. The report found that about one-third of adults without a high school diploma were obese, compared with about one-fifth of those who graduated from college or technical college.

And one-third of adults who earn less than $15,000 per year are obese, compared to one-quarter of those who earned $50,000 or more per year. The obesity-poverty connection reflects such facts that calorie-dense foods are cheap and that poor neighborhoods have fewer playgrounds, sidewalks and other amenities that encourage exercise.

As a result, many states projected to have the most obesity in 2030 do now, too. In 2011, 12 states had an adult-obesity rate above 30 percent, with Mississippi the highest at 34.9 percent. Colorado was the lowest at 20.7 percent.

The report projects that in 2030 in Mississippi, 66.7 percent of adults will be obese, as will 44.8 percent in Colorado, which will still be the thinnest state.

More surprising are projections for states such as Delaware, now ranked 19 for obesity with a rate of 28.8 percent. The model uses 1999 as a baseline, explained Brown. "So if a state had a low rate of obesity in 1999 and is fairly high now, that indicates a steep rate of increase, which we believe will not go away." 

Result: an obesity rate of 64.7 percent in Delaware in 2030, making it the third-most obese state.
States facing the greatest percentage increase in obesity-related medical costs are now in the middle of the pack.

New Jersey faces the largest increase in costs, 34.5 percent, as its obesity rate is projected to climb from 23.7 percent today to 48.6 percent in 2030. Eight other states could see increases of 20 percent and 30 percent, including New Hampshire, Colorado and Alaska.

Trust for America's Health sees room to change that trajectory with the right interventions.
"We have learned that with a concerted effort you can change the culture of a community, including its level of physical activity, eating habits, what foods are offered in schools, and whether families eat together," said Levi.

In New York City, for instance, obesity for elementary and middle-school students dropped 5.5 percent from the 2006-07 school year to 2010-11, thanks mostly to healthier school lunches, public health experts said.

"A lot of this is about making healthy choices easier and not mandating healthier lifestyles," Levi said.
(Additional reporting by Julie Steenhuysen in Chicago; Editing by Michele Gershberg, Philip Barbara)

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U.S. obesity rates to soar by 2030 Fat and getting fatter
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Tuesday, September 18, 2012

iPhone 5 or Galaxy S3 which is worth Buying


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iPhone 5 vs Galaxy S3

Everyone knows that Apple and Samsung are not the closest of friends. Samsung recently got told to pay $1 billion to Apple after it was found they had copied Apple’s patents. And now they have now taken their revenge in the form of an advert which doesn’t so much as advertise their product, but rather tells of the downfalls of the iPhone 5.

Samsung Galaxy S3 vs iPhone 5 (Samsung’s latest ad)
The wording “It doesn’t take a genius” can be clearly seen on the ad and it goes on to provide a list of the features of the new iPhone 5, including a smaller screen, a battery that doesn’t last as long as it could and the fact that the device has less RAM in it. Alongside this there is a long list of the features of their Samsung Galaxy S3. The ad is currently running in newspapers and magazines throughout the US.

The ad shows the iPhone 5 and the Samsung Galaxy S3 side by side along with specifications listed from Samsung. It shows people that the S3 comes with the same or even better specs than the new iPhone 5 and has a caption declaring that, “The next big thing is already here”, this is relating to the fact that the S3 is already on the market of course.

The ad reinforces the fact that Samsung are the leaders in the smartphone industry but it seems that Samsung are trying to muscle in on the hype surrounding the announcement of the iPhone 5.

According to the Korean Times, Samsung are about to announce the Samsung Galaxy S4 in Barcelona at an exhibition which is set for 25th to 29th February 2013. The reports also say that the Galaxy S4 will be in stores around March 2013 and it will have a 5 inch display and OLED tech. it would run on the 4G LTE network and have the latest Android OS. The device will come with the Exynos quad core processor.

The ad from Samsung makes one thing very clear and that is following the launch of their successful Galaxy S3 they are not going to sit back on their laurels when it comes to new product innovation so the iPhone 5 better watch out

This World Hot Topics Blog is Originally from here : 

iPhone 5 vs Galaxy S3

http://www.autoomobile.com/news/iphone-5-vs-samsung-galaxy-s3-19/1003176/

Apple iPhone 4S 16GB Black - FACTORY UNLOCKED

Monday, September 17, 2012

Beware CRIME attack abuses SSL/TLS Data Transaction


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Beware  CRIME attack abuses SSL/TLS Data Transaction

Are your Online Money Transaction Safe ?

SSL/TLS data compression leaks information that can be used to decrypt HTTPS session cookies, researchers say - By Lucian Constantin

IDG News Service - The 'CRIME' attack announced last week exploits the data compression scheme used by the TLS (Transport Layer Security) and SPDY protocols to decrypt user authentication cookies from HTTPS (HTTP Secure) traffic, one of the attack's creators confirmed Thursday.

The 'CRIME' attack was developed by security researchers Juliano Rizzo and Thai Duong, who plan to present it next week at the Ekoparty security conference in Buenos Aires, Argentina.
Rizzo and Duong revealed last week that CRIME abuses an optional feature present in all versions of TLS and SSL (Secure Sockets Layer) -- the cryptographic protocols used by HTTPS. However, they declined to name the feature at that time.

On Saturday, Thomas Pornin, a cryptography architect from Quebec, Canada, suggested on a technical question-and-answer website that the feature abused by CRIME might be the SSL/TLS data compression. Pornin even proposed an attack that matched the general description of CRIME.

Rizzo confirmed Thursday via email that CRIME exploits that data compression feature of SSL and TLS. However, SPDY -- a networking protocol that uses a similar compression scheme -- is also vulnerable, he said.

The SPDY (pronounced speedy) protocol was developed by Google and uses techniques like compression, multiplexing and prioritization to reduce the latency of Web pages. It doesn't replace HTTP or HTTPS, but can be used to speed them up.

SPDY has been implemented in Google Chrome and Firefox and is supported by several popular websites including Google search, Gmail and Twitter.
CRIME decrypts HTTPS cookies set by websites to remember authenticated users by means of brute force. The attack code forces the victim's browser to send specially crafted HTTPS requests to a targeted website and analyzes the variation in their length after they've been compressed in order to determine the value of the victim's session cookie.

This is possible because SSL/TLS and SPDY use a compression algorithm called DEFLATE, which eliminates duplicate strings.

For example, if we generate a request that contains a "cookie = 123" string and a "cookie = 456" string and then we compress it with DEFLATE, the compression algorithm will replace the "cookie =" part from the second string with a small token that points to the location of the "cookie =" part from the first string. This will result in a smaller request.

If we then generate another request but with "cookie = 556" instead of "cookie = 456," the compression algorithm will again replace "cookie =" because it matches the identical part from the existing "cookie = 123" string. This will result in a compressed request that is almost identical in length to the first one.
However, if we generate a third request, but with "cookie = 156" instead of "cookie = 456," the compression algorithm will now replace the "cookie = 1" part because it will match "cookie = 1" from the existing "cookie = 123" string. The resulting request will be shorter than the previous two requests because a longer part was replaced.

If we were to assume that we didn't know the 123 value from the first string in advance, the variation in compression ratio for the third request will indicate that we just guessed the first character of that value -- 1.
We can then start the same process again, but now using the already known character and trying different variants for the second one until we see a new variation in compression ratio. CRIME is based on the same principle.

It uses JavaScript or plain HTML code to force the victim's browser to repeatedly initiate requests to the targeted HTTPS website. The attack code can be loaded into the victim's browser by tricking the victim into visiting a compromised or malicious website or by injecting it into the victim's legitimate HTTP traffic when connected over an open wireless network.

The attack code can't read the session cookie included in the requests because of security mechanisms in the browser. However, it can control the path of every new request and can insert different strings into it in an attempt to match the value of the cookie.

The attacker needs to be able to compare the compressed HTTPS requests as they leave the victim's computer. Therefore, he needs to either be on the same open wireless network as the victim, be in control of the victim's home router or be on the same local area network as the victim, in which case other attack techniques like ARP spoofing can be used.
Session cookie values can be quite long and are made up of uppercase letters, lowercase letters and digits. As a result, the CRIME attack code has to initiate a very large number of requests in order to decrypt them, which can take several minutes.

However, the researchers have developed some algorithms that make the attack more efficient. "One of the CRIME algorithms makes less than 6 request to decrypt each byte. Sometimes 4 is enough, we can tune it," Rizzo said Wednesday on Twitter.
Support for TLS compression among websites is pretty widespread. Forty-two percent of servers tracked by SSL Pulse -- a project that monitors SSL/TLS implementations on the world's top 180,000 HTTPS-enabled websites -- support compression, Ivan Ristic, director of engineering at security vendor Qualys, said Thursday.

However, the level of support for TLS or SPDY compression is not very good on the client side, Ristic said. One source of data suggested that 10 percent of clients support TLS compression, he said.
In order for the CRIME attack to work, both the server and the client need to support the compression feature.

Internet Explorer never supported TLS compression or SPDY. Mozilla Firefox only supports SPDY, but compression was removed in Firefox 15, so the latest stable version of the browser is now protected against CRIME, Rizzo said.

Google Chrome supported both TLS compression and SPDY compression, but the features were removed from the latest version.

It's not yet clear if the Android versions of Chrome and Firefox have been patched.
Ristic believes that in the case of CRIME, the problem is not very serious because compression can easily be disabled both on clients and servers by applying patches.

BEAST -- a different attack against SSL/TLS developed by Rizzo and Duong last year -- is potentially more dangerous than CRIME because it can't be fixed with a patch, Ristic said. You have to fix it manually, he said.

According to SSL Pulse data, more than 70 percent of the world's top 180,000 HTTPS-enabled websites are still vulnerable to BEAST, Ristic said.
"Gmail and Twitter use SPDY, Dropbox and Yahoo Mail use TLS compression," Rizzo said. "We contacted Dropbox and they disabled compression yesterday."

In the future SPDY can be redesigned to use compression but avoid CRIME attacks, Rizzo said. In fact, Google has already developed a solution for this, he said.
"TLS compression could be enabled for some applications protocols but enabling it for HTTP is problematic," Rizzo said.

This World Hot Topics Blog is Originally from here : 

Beware  CRIME attack abuses SSL/TLS Data Transaction

http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9231281/_CRIME_attack_abuses_SSL_TLS_data_compression_feature_to_hijack_HTTPS_sessions?taxonomyId=85&pageNumber=1


New Electronic Display to Be Used on Clothes and Beer Cans


World Hot Topics Blog

New Electronic Display to Be Used on Clothes and Beer Cans

One of the latest inventions in the field of light emitting devices might change the way people light their homes and design clothes. The device represents a thin film of plastic able to conduct electricity and create solar power.
Scientists working on the international project are looking forward to bring the organic light emitting devices to the masses. Thus the invention could significantly cut costs by billions of dollars each year.

Due to the fact that the organic light emitting devices are very thin and flexible, electronic display screens could be easily created on nearly every material, thus, for example, clothing could, for the first time in history, display specific electronic information.

There are various ways of using the this OLED, like for example change the color of clothes, beer can would be able to display various sports results. In addition the OLED is much more efficient than the light bulb used today.
Currently these devices are applied in mobile phones and MP3 players. However, such OLED is not quite reliable for large TV or computer screens.

In order to make the device more efficient so later to launch it to mass market, the international consortium of researches, Modecom, headed by the University of  Bath, United Kingdom, started a three-year project which will cost about $1,700,000.

Modecom comprises 13 groups from 9 universities and two companies. There are three groups from the United Kingdom, six groups from the United States and one group from China and one each from three European countries including Belgium, Italy and Denmark. Only the European countries and China will receive financial aid from the European Union.

The coordinator of Modecom is Dr Alison Walker, who represents the Department of Physics of the University of Bath. "This is a long-term project, and the contributions of many scientists are needed for its success ... Success in achieving the goals of cheap, efficient and long lasting devices is essential as we must do everything we can to reduce our energy costs," he stated.

This World Hot Topics Blog is Originally from here : 
New Electronic Display to Be Used on Clothes and Beer Cans
http:// www. infoniac.com/science/oled.html



Sunday, September 16, 2012

Superbug kills 7th person at Md. NIH hospital



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NIH superbug claims 7th victim

A deadly, drug-resistant superbug outbreak that began last summer at the National Institutes of Health Clinical Center claimed its seventh victim Sept. 7, when a seriously ill boy from Minnesota succumbed to a bloodstream infection, officials said Friday.

The boy was the 19th patient at the research hospital to contract an antibiotic-resistant strain of the bacterium Klebsiella pneumoniae that arrived in August 2011 with a New York woman who needed a lung transplant. But his case marked the first new infection of this superbug at NIH since January — a worrisome signal that the bug persists inside the huge brick-and-glass federal facility in Bethesda.

 “It’s heartbreaking,” said John Gallin, the physician-researcher who directs the clinical center. “What happened this summer was a very unfortunate case. All of these cases are hugely sad cases.”
The boy arrived in Bethesda in April after complications arose from a bone marrow transplant he received last year. His underlying condition — a severe genetic defect that crippled his immune system — increased his risk of acquiring the superbug, as did the steroids and other drugs the boy was given to combat complications from the transplant.

“We worried he was set up for a bad infection,” said Gallin.
On July 25, routine rectal swabs of patients for hospital-borne infections — a measure put in place during the worst of the outbreak last fall — detected the superbug in the boy. 

Genetic analysis showed the boy’s strain matched that of the superbug that arrived last year. It eventually spread to 17 additional patients, of whom 11 died. Six of those deaths were directly attributed to the superbug by NIH staff. The NIH did not make the outbreak public until describing it in a scientific publication last month.

As the superbug spread last fall, NIH staff members built a wall to isolate infected patients, ripped out plumbing that harbored the bacteria, hired monitors to ensure doctors and nurses were properly scrubbing their hands and even blasted patients’ rooms with vaporized disinfectant.
By January, those measures had apparently halted the spread. For six months, no new patients became infected.

But in July, the boy tested positive for the superbug. Clinic staffers isolated him in the intensive-care unit and raced to treat the infection.

The boy’s superbug originally appeared vulnerable to one antibiotic, but after a week of therapy, the infection grew impervious to that drug, too, Gallin said. The NIH obtained an experimental antibiotic, but it also failed.
“This kid probably got this infection because a patient who was a carrier [of the superbug] was on the same unit,” said Gallin. “There was undoubtedly some intrahospital transmission despite our best efforts.”
Swabs picked up the superbug on a railing outside the boy’s room, but Gallin said it’s impossible to know whether the boy or someone else deposited it there.

Gallin said that earlier this year, two other patients arrived at the clinical center carrying different strains of potentially deadly drug-resistant Klebsiella. Neither of those strains has spread to other patients, Gallin said. One of those two patients was treated at two hospitals in Maryland before transferring to NIH.
Gallin declined to name those hospitals and, citing medical confidentiality, also declined to provide details about the boy, such as his age.

The NIH clinical center is a federal facility that is not required to report hospital-borne infections to the state. Nor does it have to report this type of infection to the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, although Gallin said the CDC has been working closely with NIH to help control the outbreak.
Nonetheless, NIH officials informed Maryland health department officials about the Klebsiella case last week, state health department spokeswoman Dori Henry said Friday. 

Montgomery County health officials were not aware of the death, a county health department spokeswoman said, although Gallin said the NIH had also informed the county of the death.

Klebsiella infections are a major problem for severely ill hospitalized people whose immune systems are weakened. Experts, including Gallin, are quick to reassure the public that such hospital-borne infections pose no risk to healthy people outside hospitals.

In 2011, about 80 percent of Maryland’s acute-care hospitals had at least one patient with carbapenem-resistant bacterial infection — the larger class of infections to which resistant Klebsiella belongs — Henry said in an e-mail.

Nationwide, about 6 percent of hospitals are battling outbreaks of this class of superbugs, according to the CDC, which has stepped up nationwide surveillance. Strains similar to those seen at NIH have spread across the world since first appearing in North Carolina in 2001, Gallin said.

Maryland said it is working with hospitals, nursing homes and other organizations to control and prevent infections through good hand hygiene, screening of patients for bacteria, room cleaning, and the judicious use of antibiotics.

At Suburban Hospital in Bethesda, which is near the NIH clinical center, hospital officials said they have had no outbreaks of drug-resistant Klebsiella. Only once or twice in the past year has there been evidence of such an infection, said Rita Smith, manager of the hospital’s infection control efforts.

The most common drug-resistant infections at Suburban, part of the Johns Hopkins health system, include methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus, or MRSA, E. coli, and Clostridium difficile.

This World Hot Topics Blog is Originally from here : 

NIH superbug claims 7th victim

http:// www.washingtonpost.com/national/health-science/nih-superbug-claims-7th-victim/2012/09/14/09b3742e-fe9b-11e1-b153-218509a954e1_story.html

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Saturday, September 15, 2012

iPhone 5 orders will take weeks to fulfill


World Hot Topics Blog

iPhone 5 orders will take weeks to fulfill

Shares of Apple stock jump to record high as Apple store projects U.S. shipments to take two weeks and international orders will take longer.

iPhone 5  is shown during a news conference in San Francisco on Sept. 12, 2012.

Apple Inc shares jumped on Friday, touching a record high on what one analyst called “iPhone 5 fever” as the company said some customers must wait two to three weeks for the new, slimmer, faster smartphone that accounts for half its revenue.

Apple’s U.S. store, at www.apple.com, was projecting shipments for the iPhone 5 would take two weeks to fulfill, with analysts saying the date slipped within an hour of the start of presales.

The company’s website showed buyers in United Kingdom, France and Germany would have to wait as much as three weeks to receive orders when the iPhone 5 starts shipping next Friday, the first day of deliveries.

AT&T Inc, Verizon Communications Inc and Sprint Nextel Corp — the three US carriers who will sell the iPhone 5 — showed delays ranging from a week to a month by Friday afternoon.

“Pre-orders for iPhone 5 have been incredible,” Apple spokeswoman Natalie Kerris said. “We’ve been completely blown away by the customer response.”

Apple did not give any further details on the demand. A Verizon spokeswoman said the company has seen “significant volumes” since it started accept pre-orders. AT&T and Sprint did not return messages for comment.

The new model would also be available in Apple’s stores next Friday for walk-in purchase. Retailers like Wal-Mart Stores Inc and Best Buy Co are also taking preorders.

“Clearly, iPhone 5 fever is in full swing,” Topeka Capital Markets analyst Brian White said.
“When you do a pre-order, the last thing you want to do is upset customers, so obviously they are overwhelmed with the demand. No one wants to sell out in an hour.”

Apple shares closed up 1.2 percent at $691.28 on the Nasdaq. The shares earlier touched an all-time high of $696.98.

Apple began taking orders for the iPhone 5 at midnight Pacific Time (0700 GMT) on Friday, with shipments set to begin on Sept 21. The smartphone is being rolled out in phases and will be sold in 100 countries by the end of the year.

The iPhone 5 sports a 4-inch “retina” display, supports the high-speed 4G LTE wireless network, and is 20 percent lighter than the previous iPhone 4S.

It is not unusual for Apple products to sell out the first day. Orders for the previous iPhone 4S, the last product the company introduced before the death of co-founder Steve Jobs, surpassed 1 million in the first 24 hours, beating Apple’s previous one-day record of 600,000 sales for the iPhone 4.

SUPPLY CRUNCH?
Analysts have expressed surprise at how quickly Apple planned to roll out the new model around the world, saying this was the fastest rollout of the phone since it launched in 2007. On average, Wall Street analysts forecast Apple may sell well over 42 million units this year.

But some analysts said the early sell-out may also point to a potential supply crunch.
“We believe the fast sell out indicates both high levels of demand and constrained supply,” said Shannon Cross, analyst with Cross Research, an independent research house.

“However, given that the company announced an aggressive rollout schedule, we assume management’s plan includes a rapid increase in production,” Cross said.

One of Apple’s key suppliers for screens, Sharp Corp , is struggling with high costs and scrambling to raise funds to pay debt.

Sharp, a Japanese company that is negotiating a deal to sell a big stake in itself to Taiwan’s Hon Hai, also Apple’s largest contract manufacturer, has fallen behind schedule on production of screens for Apple’s latest iPhone, a source had told Reuters in late August.

The source, who is familiar with Sharp’s production operations, did not say how far behind the output had fallen.

Apple iPhone 4S 16GB Black - FACTORY UNLOCKED

This World Hot Topics Blog is Originally from here : 
iPhone 5 orders will take weeks to fulfill
http:// www.nydailynews.com/news/national/iphone-5-orders-weeks-fulfill-article-1.1160132