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lean into the darkness
feel the silence
sighing within your shadows
be still
be calm
on this Solstice day

oh sacred day
shortest day
longest night
on this day we celebrate
Mother Earth as she begins
her journey around the Sun

return oh sun
to lengthen our days
show us your brilliance
even during this darkest night
warm us with your fires

bless the dormant Earth with celebration
with this our ritual
we honor your return
as you give birth
to the JOY of Springtime
and longer days~

~ Grace Kirkwood ~

Solstice Morning 2018

How would it feel . . . to be a woman at peace with herself and the world?
One who addresses her own conflicts, no matter what anyone else says?
One who takes responsibility of her own path of consciousness?
One who loves herself just the way she is?

How would it feel to be a woman who respects herself, loves herself, and will not compromise her feelings for any one or any thing?

How would it feel to be a woman who stands up for herself in conflict?
One who is unshakable in her power as she rewrites history?
She stands up for herself at the first sign of intrusion into her personal space.
She has the insights to nurture and make the world a better place.
She is a gift to all.

She values her journey, never looking back with regret.
Every step along the way has been a gift.
She is enough.
She is the author of her life.

She stands up courageously in the face of adversity, in the wake of past traditions that have belittled women in the past, and even now.
She is poised to be part of this evolutionary shift.
She does not need to join the masses to let the world know who she is.
She has no need to march or demonstrate.
She knows she is complete within.

She does not feel the need to be in an assertive role or act like a man in order to be effective.
She is simply in touch with her sense of compassion and intuition to truly show her depth of strength.
She graciously accepts change as it comes.

She is love.
She is worthy.
She is valued.
She is complicated.
She is simple.
She is authentic.
She does not react to life, but instead responds to it.
She defines her boundaries.
She knows and expresses how she feels.
She lives from the inside out, not the outside in.
She refuses drama and being someone she is not.
She represents her true self.
She takes responsibility for her actions.
She forgives herself and others.
She releases all judgment.
She is laughter.
She is JOY.

She knows there will be opposition when she speaks her truth.
But what does it matter?
She accepts change and responds to it from a place of love, without judgment.
She remains loyal to herself regardless of the harsh, insignificant words of others.
Their words reflect their own inner self, whether it be anger, words that ridicule or their fears.

She will not be moved by their words.
She is planted in her truth.

She knows it's OK not to be accepted.
Her truth is not their truth and that's OK.
She walks, not in the shadows of her ancestors, but in the light of who she is Now.

How would it feel to know a woman who celebrates her uniqueness?
One who owns her body and will share it with only those she chooses?
One who will not tolerate inappropriate behavior from any man?

How would it feel to know a woman who respects the choices of other women and men?
A woman who does not see other women, or men, as a threat?
They are not her choosing, nor do they complete her.

There is no competition in her world.
No comparison.
Only cooperation and collaboration.
She continues to develop empowering, spiritual, intelligent and authentic relationships.
Her completion comes from within as she trusts her inner self and lets go of the desire for approval.
She asserts herself as a powerful statement with her every action.
She follows her instincts, her creativity and trusts her freedom of expression.

She values all the beautiful and nurturing women and men in her life and respects their journey.
She trusts and respects herself fully and reaches out her hand for other women and men to follow and join her.
She is the thread in the tapestry of love and support of all women and men living authentically from the inside out.
She knows her light can light a thousand candles by sharing her true self through happiness and JOY.

How would it feel to know a woman like that?
How would it feel to BE a woman like that?

~ Grace Kirkwood ~

The Empowered Woman

The Empowered Woman is extraordinary as a human being.
She is misunderstood because she is different in her kind spirit, intelligent mind and big,
loving heart.
Most people don't understand the difference between her and other women.
They can't embrace her depths and don't know how to act around her.

She is brave, bold and strong-headed.
She is very comfortable with who she is.
She owns herself.
She is not afraid to speak her mind.
She is extremely self-aware of all her strengths and weaknesses.
She is continually working on herself to evolve and become better and better.

Other people don't get her because they think she is going to change
for them.
An Empowered Woman will never do that because even
though she is open-minded and open to change, she will never
change her essence for someone else.

Deep down, she has a golden heart.
She is the least to be judgmental of people and accepts and understands every person.
She gives people chances because she believes in the good of all people.
She never gives up on people she loves and cares about.
Instead, she fights for them until the end.

She looks for beauty in everything around her.
This is why other people often call her naive.
Mostly she is confident and other times insecure.
She is anxious and calm, bored and excited.
She feels other people’s energy and feelings.
They become her own.
Others think of her as “over-sensitive” and “too emotional”.

The Empowered Woman loves passionately.
She loves life and adores children.
She loves food, music, traveling and animals.
People often perceive this as being desperate and don't understand
her commitment to pouring her heart into everything she does.

She radiates with positivity and her eyes are always smiling.
People often mistake this optimism for being fake or too enthusiastic.
She is recognized, praised and most of all celebrated and worth fighting for.

She is thoughtful and thinks and feels everything....happiness, pain and pleasure.
She considers every detail and strives to find what's hidden beneath the surface.
She sees things that you are not even aware of because it takes a deep and special person to understand what's in the heart of an Empowered Woman.

~ Grace Kirkwood ~

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During the Gatherings, we support one another,
meditate together, sing, dance, listen and speak.
Our extended family of loving women stay connected consciously
and meaningfully with self-healing, self-awareness and self-love in this safe space.
We make deep connections, getting clear about what we want in our lives,
and learn from one another as we seek more JOY in every area of our lives.
So, come with an open heart and mind as we walk together
on the pathway of discovering a deeper knowledge of ourselves.

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Factors Affecting Cognitive Development Essayshark

Sports related research paper topics are connected with a many-sided field of activities. Sporting activities have existed for several millenniums. Throughout the history of civilization, people had to struggle for survival. During hunting and war, a person had to have good physical strength and agility in order to survive. With development of civilizations, ritual competitions served as honor to gods.

The modern meaning of the sport was defined at the end of the 19th century. Its appearance is associated with the rapid development of urban culture. The origins of the modern sport lie not in the needs of physical perfection or a form of holiday, but in the new possibilities of leisure: if athletes of antiquity were approaching the gods with their perfection, the sport of the new age was born due to boredom and passion.

Today sports serve as an instrument for many social and cultural problems. It is a powerful industry, including a special system for the production of achievements. In addition to athletes and coaches, managers, sports physicians, psychologists, and research workers are involved in it.

In this article we have gathered the most topical and interesting sports research paper topics that you can use for your own research paper. As you can see there are lots of topics that can be related to sports research papers, so you can choose the direction and create your own paper on a narrowed topic. For example, you can use the research paper topics on sports related to management and narrow it down to “management software for managing a soccer team.”

Sports Medicine Research Paper Topics

  1.  Chronobiological features of respiratory functions in highly qualified athletes.
  2. The influence of fitness yoga classes on the physical condition of women in a period of menopause
  3.  Describe what influence the absence of sports and obesity have on health.
  4. Describe similarities and differences between methods of assessment of heart rates.
  5. Analyze causes that have led to deaths through the history of the Olympic Games.
  6. The effect of Ayurvedic drugs in the practice of sports medicine.
  7.  Analysis of the functional state of adolescents engaged by professional sports.
  8. Positive and negative effects of caffeine on athletic performance.
  9.  Influence of sport activities on functional activity of neutrophils.
  10. Effects of practicing sports among people with various heart diseases.

Sports Injury Research Paper Topics

  1. Types of injuries in weightlifting, powerlifting, and bodybuilding.
  2. Compare the sport traumas among preschoolers and teenagers.
  3. Effectiveness of elastic therapeutic tape with a shoulder trauma.
  4. Localization, mechanism, and treatment of traumas in the rowing slalom.
  5. Specificity of treatment of sports injuries in children and adolescents.
  6. Diagnostic and rehabilitation after anterior cruciate ligament injury.
  7. Statistics of injuries in volleyball and ways of its prevention.
  8. Technologies in the physical rehabilitation of athletes with vertebral-spinal injuries.
  9. Types, localization, and mechanism of trauma among young female gymnasts.
  10. Protective sports mouthguards and features of oral dental pathology in sportsmen of various sports.

Sports Psychology Research Paper Topics

  1. The use of neuro-linguistic programming in increasing results in sports.
  2. Aggression in sports and comparative analysis of its expression among qualified wrestlers.
  3. Psychological and physiological aspects of doping in sports.
  4. Volitional regulation and motivation of young athletes in artistic gymnastics.
  5.  Psychological characteristics of concentration and attention among sportsmen in shooting sports.
  6. Peculiarities and methods of psychological recovery of athletes after trauma.
  7. Style of child-rearing in families of professional athletes.
  8. Women’s psychology: Needs and emotions in women’s sports.
  9. Peculiarities of the psychological preparation of women’s pair in acrobatic gymnastics.
  10. Modern problems of gender studies in sport psychology.

Sports Theory Research Paper Topics

  1. Comparative analysis of anthropometry of sportsmen in martial arts and athletics.
  2. Compare the sensitive periods of coordination among young girls in rhythmic gymnastics.
  3. Compare and contrast short interval and long interval training.
  4. Unique approaches in creating training programs for runner-athletes.
  5.  Peculiarities of training programs for children’s fitness.
  6. Why do scientists and coaches need to work together?
  7. Biomechanics of muscles in the cycle of Nordic walking.
  8. Comparative analysis of effectiveness of stretching on performance of the high jump.
  9. Sociological approach in formation of sports leaders.
  10. Cultural identity and features of sport culture in Korea, Japan, and China.

Sports Nutrition Research Paper Topics

  1. Effects of specialized biologically active and nutritional supplements in sports nutrition.
  2. Use of curd whey in the sports nutrition industry.
  3. Role of microelements in sports nutrition and safety of metal chelates.
  4. Methods of creating individualized diets for athletes.
  5.  Organization of sports nutrition in fitness centers and sports clubs.
  6. Nutrient support of athletes during training, competition, and recovery periods.
  7. The effects of isotonic drinks for rehydration at high physical exertion.
  8. Methods of drawing up a balanced diet for weightlifters.
  9. Development of effective functional sports nutrition for martial artists.
  10. Particular qualities of nutritional support for young athletes.

Sports Doping Research Paper Topics

  1. Methods of detection of anabolic steroids as doping in sports.
  2. Risk factors for cardiovascular disease of various kinds of doping.
  3. Doping and its influence on the health of professional cyclists.
  4. The problem of parents that push young athletes to receive doping.
  5.  Autotransfusion and its effects on the body of athletes in sports.
  6. Influence of steroids on memory and brain functions.
  7. Arterial thrombosis as a consequence of steroids.
  8. Types of tests used for doping control.
  9. Interconnection of doping of physical and cognitive functions
  10.  Analysis of main concepts of the World Anti-Doping Code.

Tennis Research Paper Topics

  1. Effects of mental training during preparation of tennis players for competition.
  2. Criteria for selecting promising tennis players among adolescents.
  3. Peculiarities of tennis training program for 5-6 year old children.
  4. The relation of personal traits of a tennis player to individual sports style.
  5. Management of competitive pressures among professional tennis players.
  6. Treatment of common tennis injuries with elastic therapeutic tape.
  7. Process and types of evaluation of preparedness for competition among young tennis players.
  8. The influence of tennis lessons on the development of students’ memory.
  9. Ways of increasing the speed of reaction for tennis players.
  10. The use of a special tennis training program for development of endurance.

Soccer Research Paper Topics

  1. The structure of the attacking actions of soccer players.
  2. Psychological approaches and techniques in the training of young soccer players.
  3. The increase of injuries during a soccer match compared to ordinary training.
  4.  Relation of menstrual disorder to regular soccer training among girls.
  5. Peculiarities of technical training programs for female soccer players.
  6. The affect of bad teeth on performance quality of a professional soccer player.
  7. The differences and similarities between female and male soccer.
  8. Use of jumping exercises in training goalkeepers in soccer.
  9. The most common injuries among soccer players, and their prevention and treatment.
  10. History of soccer development in China and its perspectives.

Cricket Research Paper Topics

  1. Avoiding traumas of the teeth during cricket.
  2. Statistics of eye injuries and its prevention during cricket training and matches.
  3. Peculiarities of medical epicondylite among cricket players and treatment management.
  4. Relation of cricket injuries to commotio cordis.
  5. History of cricket: Review of English sports periodicals of the 18th and 19th centuries.
  6.  The use of the Hawk-Eye complex in cricket matches.
  7.  Influence of cricket in the creation of softball sports.
  8. Imran Khan as representative of the professional cricket player.
  9. Types of matches in cricket. Difference between Test and limited-overs games.
  10. Analysis of cricket techniques and tactics depending on the player.

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The Key Factor Which Causes Depression: Genetic or Environment

Depression is a quite widespread disease of nowadays. Scientific sources and mass media already have some success in conveying to society the thought that depression is something more than negative mood that can changed by itself. It is the disease, and like any other disease, it requires treatment. Even though depression can be successfully cured, it is always the better way to prevent the disease. However, preventing depression requires at first answer the question about the causes of this disease. There are different views about this issue. Some researchers claim that the main cause of depression is genetic. Others claim that environment is more important in the context of depression. However, as it often happens, and as the studies confirmed, the both sides have correct suggestions and the both causes, genetic and environmental, are important for the development of depression.

As it was already mentioned above, there are some researchers who claim that genetic factor is the main cause of depression. For example, Lohoff (2010) noticed in the study that genetic factors play important roles in the development of major depressive disorder (MDD), “as indicated by family, twin, and adoption studies, and may reveal important information about disease mechanisms” (p. 539). As one can see, there are some studies that confirm the importance of genetic factor for the development of depression. However, not only the studies about the family, twin, and adoption show such results. England & Sim, (2009) refer to the studies of  Kendler et al., (2006) and Sullivan, Neale, and Kendler, (2000), claiming that “about one-third of the risk for major depression in adults derives from genetic differences between individuals.” Moreover, the researchers even point to the specific genes that are related to the development of depression. Thus, England & Sim (2009) noticed that there are “several genetic polymorphisms have been linked to increased risk of depression in response to stress. Foremost among these are genes of the serotonin system (5-HT).” The fact that there are specific genes that take part in causing depression make the thesis about genetic as the key factor that causes depression especially strong. In any case, it must be clear that for depression, as for any other mental disease, genetic factor has quite an important role. Thus, Hyman (2000) wrote that “family, twin, and adoption studies have shown that, for schizophrenia, autism, manic depressive illness, major depression, attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, panic disorder and other mental illnesses, the transmission of risk is due to heredity” (456). In this way, there is a list of many mental disorders caused by genetic factors, and it is logical that depression can be among them. Besides, as it was mentioned above, the studies found specific genes that are related to the development of depression.

However, there is one more view on this issue. As far as depression is mental health, it is related not only to the physical state of human body, including all complex process and part of it but also with the human psyche. It is known the fact that human psyche and state of the body are related. Depending on the human emotions, the body produces different types of hormones which can affect the state of the body in one or another way and causes a person’s mood. Taking this into account one can consider an environmental factor as that which causes depression, comparing it with effect on low temperature on a human body. It is known fact that if a human is under the influence of low temperature long enough, he or she can get sick. However, it is also known that the low temperature by itself is not the reason for disease. Impact of low-temperature affects the human body, in particular, reduces the immunity, and that is why risks to get sick increases after the cases of freezing. The environmental factors can have the similar relationship with the depression. Even though the negative environmental factors can not be the main reason for depression they can have a generally negative effect on the mental state of the human, thus, they become the key factor that causes depression because without their impact it could not develop. There are some studies that confirm that the environmental factors cause depression. For example, Saveanu & Nemeroff (2012) claim that “onset of mood disorders such as depression is undoubtedly impacted by stressful life events that occur in childhood” (p. 59). The authors considered the study in which the researchers paid attention to the experience of approximately two thousands women of various socioeconomic levels, and came to the conclusion that “those with a history of childhood physical or sexual abuse had an increased risk of depression and anxiety” (p. 59). The study also showed that women with a history of childhood abuse “have a four-fold increased risk of developing depression” and  “early life trauma has also been shown to impact the clinical course of depression” (p. 59). Generalizing the conclusion of the study, the researchers identified four main points about patients with depression who have a history of childhood trauma. The researchers wrote that such patients have “(a) lower rates of remission and recovery, (b) longer episodes of depression, (c) a more chronic disease course, and (d) earlier onset of depressive symptoms” (Saveanu & Nemeroff, 2012, p. 59). Tese results clearly show that the life experience and environmental factors are significant as causes of depression.

However, it is not only one study that shows the importance of environmental factors in the context of depression. Beattie (2005) also identifies interpersonal relationships among the others factors that cause depression. Considering the types of interpersonal relationships that can cause depression Beattie (2005) identifies the following types: “(a) within the family, such as between the parents and between parents and children; (b) the social environment where differences in ethnicity and social class come into play; and (c) interactions between genders across age groups for both females and males.” These interpersonal relationships are quite clear as the causes of depression. The first two types are environments where a person is forced to be the most of the time. It is clear that issues in the family when it is not occasional difficulties but the permanent tensity, it will cause a permanent stressful state in which person can be vulnerable to mental disorders. The same is with another type of social environment in which a person forced to be almost every day. Interactions between genders, or, in some cases it can be within one gender, also can be significant for causing depression. Interpersonal relationships such as friendship or romantic relationships can be significant for personality; thus their breach or absence can have a negative impact on a person’s mental state, and that also can be the cause of depression. Moreover, there is one more study that confirms relation of environmental factors and depression. Peyrot et al. (2013) wrote that “stressful life-events, sexual abuse, and childhood trauma were significantly more frequent and educational attainment was significantly lower in major depressive disorder patients compared to healthy controls” (p. 94). It can be clear that there are some traumatic life-events, which can affect the mental state of a person during the whole life, especially if such events happened in childhood. In this way, the facts shown above proves that there is a strong relationship between environmental factors and depression and that environmental factors can be the factors that cause depression.

As one can see from the facts shown above, the both factors, genetic and environmental, are important for the development of depression. In fact, this is the correct answer on the question about the key factor which causes depression – the both of them. One can notice that it is not only the compromise found between two opposite but the fact confirmed by the scientific studies. Thus,  Saveanu & Nemeroff (2012) wrote that between genetic predisposition to depression and the impact of early traumatic experiences during critical phases of development there is a strong relationship. The researchers noticed that even though early life stress increases a risk of depression, “there are important differences in the way individuals respond to the same stressful event, and these differences may be explained in part by genetic factors” (Saveanu & Nemeroff, 2012, p. 60). In this way, the authors claim that the both factors – genetic and environmental are important for the development of depression.  Some researchers paid attention to the specific impact of the genes and noticed that “the short form of the gene triggers a more intense activation of the amygdala, also known as the cerebellar tonsil, a brain structure involved in emotions and in the recognition of danger signals” (CNRS (Délégation Paris Michel-Ange), 2011). The researchers also noticed that “the activity of the amygdala varied according to not only to the form of the gene, but also to the type of mental activity” (CNRS (Délégation Paris Michel-Ange), 2011). They came to the conclusion that “the stress experienced during the year also affected the influence of the gene on the activation of the amygdala – such “genetic-environmental” interaction being itself modified by the individual’s mental activity” (CNRS (Délégation Paris Michel-Ange), 2011). In this way, an importance of impact of both, genetic and environmental factors are confirmed by the facts shown above.  England & Sim (2009) also come to this conclusion writing that that gene-environment correlations contribute to outcomes and appeals to the example when “genetic factors may influence a depressed person’s parenting styles as well as the offspring’s heritable traits so that the child’s genotype and rearing environment are correlated.” In this way, the authors show the importance of the genetic factors. However, they also pay attention to their correlation with environmental factors, writing that “youth with particular heritable characteristics evoke reactions from others and select or create experiences that are congruent with their heritable characteristics—processes that might increase the likelihood of depressive outcomes under relevant conditions” (England & Sim, 2009). Carola et al. (2008) also pay attention to the correlation between the genetic factors and environmental factors. They used scientific approach and paid attention to the functions of gene, writing that “alterations in hippocampal gene expression and function underlie at least part of the interaction between 5-HTT and rearing environment and point to a role for this structure in the increased anxiety and depression-related behavior that is a risk factor for major depression” (Carola et al., 2008, p. 845). This result shows the correlation between the genetic factors and environmental factors in the context of the depression on the level of chemical processes in the human body. Considering the correlation between genetic and environmental factors one can see their close correlation. On the one hand, the genetic factors cause some predisposition to depression. On the other hand, without some environmental factors, this predisposition can never develop. However, in some cases, the impact on the only one factor – genetic or environmental can be enough for development of depression.

In this way, the above was considered the different views on the issue of the key factors which cause depression. There are different views about this issue. Some researchers claim that the key factor is genetic and show evidence to confirm this statement, including the studies which pay attention to the chemical processes in human body. Other researchers claim the key factor is environmental and confirms their statement with the studies which considered the different groups of people and came to the conclusion that people who felt an impact of negative environmental factors have a higher propensity for depression. However, as the one more type of the studies shown the both factors have high importance for developing of depression; thus the both factors can be key.

Beattie, G. (2005). Social Causes of Depression. Personalityresearch.org. Retrieved 31 August 2017, from http://www.personalityresearch.org/papers/beattie.html

Carola, V., Frazzetto, G., Pascucci, T., Audero, E., Puglisi-Allegra, S., & Cabib, S. et al. (2008). Identifying Molecular Substrates in a Mouse Model of the Serotonin Transporter × Environment Risk Factor for Anxiety and Depression. Biological Psychiatry, 63(9), 840-846.

CNRS (Délégation Paris Michel-Ange). (2011). Depression: Combination of environmental, psychological and genetic factors. Sciencedaily.com. Retrieved 31 August 2017, from https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/11/111103143518.htm

England, M., & Sim, L. (2009). Depression in Parents, Parenting, and Children: Opportunities to Improve Identification, Treatment, and Prevention. Ncbi.nlm.nih.gov. Retrieved 31 August 2017, from https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK215119/

Hyman, S. (2000). The genetics of mental illness: implications for practice. Bulletin Of The World Health Organization, 78(4), 455-463.
Lohoff, F. (2010). Overview of the Genetics of Major Depressive Disorder. Current Psychiatry Reports, 12(6), 539-546.

Peyrot, W., Middeldorp, C., Jansen, R., Smit, J., de Geus, E., & Hottenga, J. et al. (2013). Strong effects of environmental factors on prevalence and course of major depressive disorder are not moderated by 5-HTTLPR polymorphisms in a large Dutch sample. Journal Of Affective Disorders, 146(1), 91-99.

Saveanu, R., & Nemeroff, C. (2012). Etiology of Depression: Genetic and Environmental Factors. Psychiatric Clinics Of North America, 35(1), 51-71.

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Choosing the Genuine Professional Mover Companies

Move is a debilitating errand. The principle reasons more individuals are choosing the arrangements of the diverse expert mover organizations that have encountered migration’s craft inside the different zones. Regardless of whether it is proficient migration or private move, the advancement of having help from the expert mover organizations is about the high and legitimately. Since the expert mover organization’s staff works its way through the flotsam and jetsam isolating the things as per their sorts and gathering them, the people may focus on the more basic issues of migration like capital and so forth be that as it may, just before choosing and enlisting the administrations of the expert mover organizations you have to put some time in checking out their very own homes. One should create a rundown of those things that are to be moved, carefully. This record may bar the risky products and plants that are not in any manner prudent to go with.

You must end up careful to make this record and never disregard the regions like storm cellar and carport and so forth. Additionally recollect the highlights of the most up to date goal. Carefully consider over the official format of the spot to distinguish issues like no lift, restricted passageway and so forth. These issues should be talked about utilizing the expert mover organizations while they can directly affect the premiums being charged by these businesses. Since no lift implies increasingly manual work and comparative trips from the house for the pickup for emptying those things, the expert mover organization can cost their clients more.

While hunting down the genuine One, mover organizations must explore and persuade around guests to have the option to get suggestions. By filtering through the business repository or the neighborhood phone indexes, is. You can likewise exploit the World Wide Web inside their examination systems and select from where they could get a statement, the best three sites. It is basic that the expert mover co. You have designated has the applicable endorsement which has not terminated. It is constantly easier to pick the expert mover co that offers insurance to guarantee that if there should be an occurrence of losing the assets or their devastation, you can request a case moving a family into a new home. The mover organization staff ought to be capable at dealing with the issues of migration. One can deal with an exploration of the specific moving boxes they have utilized on the web, to find what individuals need to state about quality their organizations and polished skill.

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Just Over time Site Building Method

Did you ever hear of the Only In Time development method? The possibilities are that you just never have, although get seen the effects. Vehicles don’t turn into more affordable by simply accident; they will became less costly because the suppliers identified an easy method to create all of them. The thought of just simply over time could be given to almost any sort of method. The entire idea should be to sign up for the steps it is not necessary. Consider web-site building for your minute or two and what you must do. Are available needless measures in at this time there? Would you take action better? The answer then is certainly, and many and varied reasons as to why this could always be therefore.

Before all of us start off, I would like to associate an absolute account to you personally. We explained just before that autos don’t turn into cheaper by accident. They will did not. Automobiles have a reasonable length of time develop, and the classic development series was create so that a lot of one unit car was made on the on one occasion and next placed available for sale. The reason they were doing this is because it had taken a good, period of time to alter over versions. In addition, it meant that the maker was left holding a high amount of inventory without having economical bring back, which instructions for different models can take a few months to arrive at the customer.

Nevertheless they had a means of performing stuff, so just why improve?

Very well, it turned out that although the viponline24.com western world laboured in while using older considering, japan opted now there needed to be an easier way. Simply because they’d often performed that like that would not imply among the to stay doing it because of this. They will viewed the prolonged change-over as well as having a wide range of extensive considering discovered that they might make one or two apparently small , although impressive improvements, and carry it down right from days and nights to several hours, and later upon coming from several hours to minutes.

As soon as they would this that they had the advantage more than their very own competition. They may basically switch on a pin number, where their very own lumbering competitors didn’t want to switch on a field.

With website design if you need the edge, then you definitely must be able to job more quickly. Always be impressive without automatically perform the website development inside the classic way. The world changes fast, which means you have to transformation with it, but not by simply working harder. Working wiser is a a lot better approach. Could the particular Japanese people have with automobiles, and you will undertake it, as well, with websites.

The thing you need that to relieve the quantity of time spent about coding and design. If you possibly can, get rid of the coding overall, so that you happen to be concentrating on content material. It seems sensible, would not that? The more time you spend relating to the appearance, a lot more effective you might be.

If you possible could decrease actually that point, you could have the edge over your competition. Eliminate the time-consuming careers and focus on what is important. You will find site building contractors over the internet that will help accomplish this. I would recommend Internet site Rubix, which will help you build a web page in five minutes. If you’ve spent hours and hours on websites online during the past, you can observe just how this will give you an edge.

Work better, not harder and you will probably end up being light-years ahead of the competition.


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What Do Millennials Want From Their Employees?

Millennials are soon to be the biggest contributors to the workforce. So despite what you may think of them, they are about to become an integral part–in some way, shape or form–of every business. Millennials have been known to be impatient, technology driven and disloyal when it comes to job retention, with 60% leaving their jobs within 3 years of being hired. But with the amount of millennials entering the workforce, it is becoming increasingly important for companies to figure out ways in which they can best accommodate them.

In order to help get you started, we’ve come up with a few ideas ourselves…

Work Environment

Studies have shown that millennials respond best to a community-based work environment. Productivity, in their eyes, should be measured on quality and quantity of work rather than amount of time spent doing the work. Millennials will always look for flexibility. Hours shouldn’t have to be the same every day. As long as their work is getting done before deadlines, it shouldn’t matter when they do it.

Management Style

Millennials have been known to be free spirited. So the idea of controlling everything they do in the workplace is something that few millennials would accept. Below is a list of a few different management styles that would be best suited to the millennial.

  1. Bridge the gap– Be approachable. Let them know that you value their input.
  2. Be flexible– Don’t let them show up whenever they want but work with them to establish the best schedule for both of you.
  3. Be transparent– Clearly establish and explain the company values and goals and allow for questions and feedback.

What are Millennials Really Like?

Although millennials are perceived as lazy, underworked and possibly unmotivated, studies have proven that they are very aspirational. The young people of this generation are swinging for home runs when it comes to their job search. They want to have a job that they are passionate about, a job that serves a purpose to their lives. But the biggest thing that we see with millennials is that they want recognition for their hard work. They want to be happy and successful but they want to be acknowledged for their success and be supported throughout their work.

How Do They Compare To Other Generations

Below is a graph that illustrates the basic life necessities of Millennials and Baby Boomers.

What Do Millennials Want From Their Employees?

Take Away

The idea of millions of millennials taking over the workforce can seem like a daunting thing. But, if you provide them with the right tools and establish mutual respect, you should have nothing to worry about. Every generation is different, every generation has it’s flaws, but every generation brings a new voice to the workforce. That new voice is necessary for the future of any company.


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C++ Programs: Loops, Input Detection

Need programs that fulfill the requirements in attached document.

Write a method called check Value that will meet the following criteria:
- Initializes total both to the default initialization value.
- Get input for the starting number (assume important statement is already present)
- Set total to the input above.
- Utilize a counter controlled loop to loop 10 times.
- Increment total by 2 for each loop iteration
- Return True if total is greater than 50.
- Return False if total is less than or equal to 50.

- Receives a character as an argument
- Utilizes a switch statement utilizing above character
- Prints >=90 if character is either a or A
- Prints 80-89 if character is either b or B
- Prints 70-79 if character is either c or B
- Prints 60-69 if character is either d or D.
- Prints <60 for all other characters.
- Method does not return anything

© BrainMass Inc. brainmass.com March 21, 2019, 5:02 pm ad1c9bdddf

Solution Preview

Please see the attachment.
(I write the two programs in C/C++)

// 206437_q1.cpp

#include <stdio.h>

bool checkValue() {
float total = 0.0; // Initialize total to a default value 0
float startNumber;

// Get input for the starting number
printf("Input a start number: ");
scanf("%f", &startNumber);

// Set total to the startNumber;
total ...

Solution Summary

Programs that fulfill specifications attached.


Cm To Inches

45.9 cm to in
45.9 Centimeters to Inches

45.9 Centimeter to Inch converter

How to convert 45.9 centimeters to inches?

45.9 cm *0.3937007874 in= 18.0708661417 in
1 cm
A common question is How many centimeter in 45.9 inch? And the answer is 116.586 cm in 45.9 in. Likewise the question how many inch in 45.9 centimeter has the answer of 18.0708661417 in in 45.9 cm.

How much are 45.9 centimeters in inches?

45.9 centimeters equal 18.0708661417 inches (45.9cm = 18.0708661417in). Converting 45.9 cm to in is easy. Simply use our calculator above, or apply the formula to change the length 45.9 cm to in.

Convert 45.9 cm to common lengths

UnitUnit of length
Nanometer459000000.0 nm
Micrometer459000.0 µm
Millimeter459.0 mm
Centimeter45.9 cm
Inch18.0708661417 in
Foot1.5059055118 ft
Yard0.5019685039 yd
Meter0.459 m
Kilometer0.000459 km
Mile0.0002852094 mi
Nautical mile0.0002478402 nmi

What is 45.9 centimeters in in?

To convert 45.9 cm to in multiply the length in centimeters by 0.3937007874. The 45.9 cm in in formula is [in] = 45.9 * 0.3937007874. Thus, for 45.9 centimeters in inch we get 18.0708661417 in.

45.9 Centimeter Conversion Table

45.9 Centimeter Table

Further centimeters to inches calculations

Alternative spelling

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Health Alert: May 29, 2015

May 29, 2015

From: Donald T. Allegra, MD, ID Consultant

Re: Lassa Fever

On May 25th, the New Jersey Department of Health reported a death from Lassa Fever in a traveler who had come to the US from Liberia. He was asymptomatic when screened at JFK Airport on May 18th and then the next day had sore throat, fever, and fatigue. He presented to an emergency department in New Jersey and was apparently asked about travel and denied it, but then returned to the hospital 3 days later, much sicker, and eventually died. The New Jersey case is the 6th case of Lassa reported in the US in returning travelers since 1969.

Lassa Fever is in the viral family of hemorrhagic fevers like Ebola, but much less serious. It was first discovered in 1969 and the name comes from the town in Nigeria where the first cases occurred. It has a mortality rate of only about 1% compared to as high as 70% with Ebola. It is most common in West Africa in Liberia, Sierra Leone, Guinea, and Nigeria, but other countries in the area also have reported cases. There are estimated to be 100,000 to 300,000 cases a year in West Africa with about 5000 deaths.

The virus is transmitted by the multimammate rat, which is very common in both rural and urban areas of West Africa. It often inhabits homes and scavenges for human food left unprotected. The virus is transmitted by direct contact with urine or droppings of these infected rodents or by aerosols of tiny particles contaminated with infected rodent droppings. The incubation period is 1-3 weeks and 80% of patients present with mild non-specific symptoms such as fever, malaise, weakness, and headache. Symptoms are varied and non-specific which makes a clinical diagnosis difficult. 20% of patients can develop more serious illness including bleeding, respiratory distress, nausea/vomiting, and encephalitis or inflammation of the brain. Death usually comes from multi-organ system failure. The most common complication is deafness which can occur even in mild cases and is often permanent. The anti-viral drug, Ribavirin, has been used successfully in treatment and is most efficacious when used early in the illness. There is no vaccine available at this time.

Person to person transmission has never been documented in the US and does not occur with casual contact. It is felt that direct contact with blood or body fluids through skin cuts, mucous membranes, or sexual contact is necessary to spread the virus.

There is no expectation that Lassa will present a risk to the US population or result in secondary cases such as happened with Ebola. However, the lessons to take away from this recent incident is that we live in a very interconnected world where citizens of any country are within a 24 hour reach of our 3 major airports. Liberia has been declared free of Ebola but Sierra Leone and Guinea still are having cases and we have to maintain our vigilance for Ebola and other infectious diseases.


How to Tell if You're Stressed

What is Stress

Stress is internal and external pressures that create feelings of conflict, worry or fear.

What Causes Stress

Some external stressors are major work change, relationship difficulties, financial problems, death or illness in the family and being too busy.

Each person usually experiences stress reactions in response to emotions, thoughts and or physical sensations.

How Does Stress Affect the Body

Stress can cause headaches and dizziness, grinding of your teeth, increased heart rate, digestive disorders, weight gain, and muscle tension. Stress can affect your entire body and cause sleep problems.

Stress can make you feel threatened, overwhelmed, and frustrated and upset your balance.

How Can I Overcome Stress

About two thirds of Americans say they might be stressed but that is not the problem. It is how they relate to stress.

Look at the situation or the event and appraise it. Ask yourself if you can cope with the changes. Ask yourself, Am I stressed?

Be aware of your internal voice of negative self-talk, rigid thinking, not being flexible and perfectionism.

A supportive therapist can provide hope during the stressful times in your life.  A therapist can help a person to look more deeply into the tactics for coping with stress, learn coping statements and change self-defeating thoughts to positive self-talk.

In a stress awareness and management individual session, the client can learn how stress manifests in their body, verbalize current life stressors, look at internal and external stress and learn how to cope with stress by learning deep breathing, relaxation and grounding exercises.

Call Elizabeth Buckley for a counseling session. Call 210-495-2797

By Elizabeth Buckley MS, LPC, RN


By: Johan Mathew

Jadaliyya (J): What made you write this book?

Johan Mathew (JM): I can answer this question in two ways, one rather boring and mundane, the other somewhat more interesting and long-winded. In one sense, I wrote this book because it was my Ph.D. dissertation project and I needed to publish it to get tenure! On the other hand, the book has its origins in a long family history that crisscrosses the Indian Ocean. I come from a small Christian community in India known as “Syrian Christians.” Historians tell us that Christian and Jewish traders from the Levant lived and traded along the Malabar Coast of southwestern India from at least the third century CE, and over time they intermarried and converted local families to the nascent faith. The community then grew and divided into various sects, but orthodox members of the community still look to the Patriarch of Antioch as the head of the church. So my ancestors had maintained long-standing but fragile links between the Middle East and South Asia. Then—quickly moving forward two millennia—I was five years old when my father’s job took us from Bombay to Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. I proceeded to spend most of my childhood (from five to fourteen) growing up as part of the large expatriate community in the Kingdom. As many of you may know, the status of South Asians in Gulf is a rather fraught one. My family was solidly middle class, so I was sheltered from most of the negative aspects of this status, but nevertheless, I left the Gulf with a rather ambivalent attitude towards Khaleejis and the wider Arab World. With time and distance, the frustrations and slights of everyday life in the Gulf faded and my fondness for Arab cuisine and culture came to the fore. After college, I began to look back at Riyadh as a fascinating microcosm of late twentieth century globalization, and my own experience as part of a much longer history of connections across the Indian Ocean. So when I began the research for my dissertation, I was anxious to understand my own particular history within the broader strokes of trade and travel across the Indian Ocean. These varied personal experiences and histories slowly seeped out of my subconscious and pushed me to write Margins of the Market.

JM: Margins of the Market is a history of trade and trafficking across the Arabian Sea. As a result, it engages with histories of the Middle East but also South Asia, East Africa, and the Indian Ocean World. Along with a number of recent works in Middle East Studies, it turns to the ocean and the connections across these waters to gain a new perspective on what is happening on shore. Moreover, rather than looking west to Europe and the Mediterranean, it looks from the Arabian Peninsula to the East and situates Arab history within a broader network of connections within the Global South.

Margins of the Market is ultimately an effort to reinterpret the history of capitalism through the lens of illicit trade. The book examines how illicit traffics contest and subvert the conceptual and institutional underpinnings of capitalist markets. So it explores the history of slave trafficking to reveal how the notion of “free labor” was defined and subverted; similarly, the history of violence and firearms traffics exposes the constitution of private property rights, and the history of gold and silver smuggling demonstrates how money itself was never a stable unit for measuring value. Consequently, the book argues that this trafficking was constitutive of capitalism itself. Margins of the Market draws particularly on scholarship in economic sociology and science and technology studies for the conceptual framing, and seeks to engage with and push forward this interdisciplinary literature on social studies of the economy.

JM: To be perfectly honest, I do not have any previous work to connect this to! I have published several articles and chapters in edited collections, all of which are either chapters from this book or loose ends from this research that did not quite fit in the book.

JM: I had written this book, hoping to reach as large an audience as possible. I valiantly worked to excise theoretical jargon, historiographical references, and my own tendency to revel in the complexity of history so that the book might be widely accessible. However, given that it is an academic book about places and people unfamiliar to audiences in the United States or Western Europe, it was never going to be read by the chattering classes. I do hope, though, that the book will be read by faculty, graduate students, and perhaps even the odd undergraduate interested in the history of capitalism or the Indian Ocean world. Initial reports do suggest that the book is being assigned in graduate courses and is receiving a hearing beyond simply historians of the Middle East or South Asia. I hope that the book helps to increase interest in histories of capitalism and political economy in the Global South, as well as deepen a growing trend towards scholarship that takes the material world as a vital object of analysis.

J: What other projects are you working on now?

JM: I am currently working on a book, tentatively entitled: Opiates of the Masses: A History of Humanity in the Time of Capital. The project is about hashish and opium and what the consumption of these narcotics can tell us about capitalist labor regimes and the physical strains that capitalist economies impose on human bodies. So I have been researching how industrial workers in the Middle East, Africa, and South Asia consumed narcotics as a means of pain relief that made repetitive labor and the physical discipline of factory work tolerable. Rather like the “opiate crisis” in the contemporary United States, I am finding that addiction and the abuse narcotics were connected to the loss of employment and the despair of communities without opportunities for remunerative labor. Thus my interest is not in drug trafficking but rather histories of medicine, the body, and what they can tell us about the lived experience of capitalism.

J: What can these illicit activities, whether smuggling or narcotics consumption, tell us about the larger law-abiding population?

JM: People are often a little suspicious that my work revels a little too much in the salacious details at the margins of normal society. On the one hand, I do confess that I am fascinated by scandalous and sensational quality of these issues, and that they are often not representative of the majority. However, there is little question that illicit trade constitutes a significant proportion of overall economic activity particularly in post-colonial societies. There is even less doubt that the consumption of narcotics is widespread in many if not most societies. Most importantly to me, the very scandalous quality of these commodities suggests that they conceal points of cultural sensitivity. The very sensational quality of trafficking allows us to pretend that these exchanges do not shape the formal free market of our everyday lives. Lurid and traumatic stories of addiction conceal the ways that our bodies and minds are routinely altered by substances we consume. I hope in my research and writing to reveal how the seemingly marginal corners of society are actually peeling edges where the structures that undergird our societies are brought into the light.

Excerpt from the Book:

Chapter 2: Trafficking Labor

As Political Agent in Muscat, S.B. Miles had heard some strange excuses from slave traders, but Abdulla al-Kasadi’s excuse was stranger than fiction. Abdulla al-Kasadi, a merchant from the Hadhramout valley in present-day Yemen, was returning from a long sojourn in the Indian princely state of Hyderabad. Accompanying him were his family as well as two young Indian boys, Mohsin and Mubarak, whom he insisted that he had legally purchased in India. Al-Kasadi even produced a deed of sale on government-issued, stamped paper, registered and witnessed by the government of Hyderabad. Perplexed and outraged by this document, Miles sent a letter to the British Resident at Hyderabad, demanding to know how it was possible that slavery was being legally recognized in British India. The resident eventually explained that the Hyderabad government issued this document during the recent famine to facilitate parents or relatives wishing to hand over their child for ‘maintenance’ to a charitable individual. This deed was issued to insure that the biological parents could raise no further claims over the child and to serve as official recognition of this charitable act of adoption. Though he was not pleased, Miles had to accept the exigency of the crisis in Hyderabad and the government’s interest in protecting the rights of adoptive parents. Al-Kasadi, however, had attempted to re-sell the boys in the port of Sur, so he was arrested and the boys were sent to Bombay.

The tortuous transactions of Abdullah al-Kasadi and the convoluted journeys of young Mohsin and Mubarak illustrate the vastly different ways that slavery was framed-out of the Arabian Sea. The same transaction could be documented as selfless charity and as self-interested enslavement. As colonial officials and trading networks engaged each other across the sea, each sought to make visible different characteristics of their transactions. Colonial officials examined this traffic through the paradigm of markets, particularly the slave markets and the slave trades that they had encountered in the Atlantic World. Slave traders, like al-Kasadi, responded by framing their transactions as familial affairs. Colonial officials could not discern exploitation or slavery when it was obscured by relationships like marriage and adoption. European businessmen elided these same relationships of social dependence in order to portray their transactions as the operation of a market in free labor. Free labor was only defined in the negative: anyone that was not enslaved could be categorized as a free and independent market agent. Human beings were still entrenched in networks that constrained participation in social and economic life, but human bodies were de-commodified.

The visibility of the slave trade was determined by the materiality of human bodies: their size, shape, color, and how these bodies were affixed to ships and other people. A market in free labor necessitated the movement of free bodies, so abolishing the slave trade required the evanescent distinction between enslaved bodies and bodies engaged in free labor. Consequently, abolition in the Arabian Sea was intimately tied to new racial distinctions, and affiliating certain kinds of bodies with slavery. Mobile African bodies were marked as slaves, while mobile Indian bodies were marked as free labor. Furthermore, determinations of age and gender would become flashpoints of conflict between traders and officials, and ultimately these bodies would be marked as labor or family through official certificates of marriage, adoption and manumission. Bureaucracies attempted to disembody labor, but abolition was constantly subverted by traffickers who contrived to frame family bonds as exclusive of bonded labor.

Colonial officials imagined that by destroying slave markets and liberating slaves, a free market in labor would spontaneously form to distribute their labor. While labor could be conceptually abstracted out of laboring bodies, it was much more challenging to disembody labor in practice. Human beings were neither commodities nor independent market agents, rather they were enrolled in multiple socio-economic networks. Absolute freedom was rarely very attractive, rather people wanted control over which networks they were attached to and under what conditions. Thus we are confronted with slaves who when offered freedom, emphatically wished to remain with their former masters. These slaves believed that they could sustain themselves more successfully by mobilizing the networks that they were situated in, rather than liberating themselves from all social bonds. “Independent” freedmen tended to live a very precarious existence or their independence was little more than a contrivance of colonial documentation. Transactions within colonial networks were documented as the movement of free labor, while similar transactions through Arab diasporas were maligned as slave traffics. These regulations did not establish a labor market so much as they framed the flow of bodies through particular networks as the operation of a market in free labor.

Transactions in labor, rather than laboring conditions, were consequently the central concern of British officials. A number of historians have highlighted the persistence of relations of social domination after abolition. While the word slavery was slowly excised from colonial discourse, its characteristics persisted in everything but name. Indeed, colonial officials across the Arabian Sea were hesitant to abolish slavery itself for fear of alienating cooperative elites and the social revolution that this would entail. So, for all their sanctimonious rhetoric, British officials were very much complicit in the perpetuation of slavery. Even their ostensible success in abolishing of the slave trade did not prevent transactions in bonded labor. The illicit slave trade easily overcame the meager imperial efforts to stop it. Abolition also turned a profit for the British Empire, as it became the manager and beneficiary of a massive trade in Indian “coolie” labor. This chapter consequently traces out these multifarious impacts of the abolition of the slave trade in the Arabian Sea. If abolition was a process of framing-out slaves from the market, then the movement of bonded human bodies continued to undergird the market in free labor.

The process of abolishing the slave trade in the Arabian Sea began in 1822 when the British Empire negotiated a treaty with Sayyid Saʿīd al Bu-Saʿīdi, the Sultan of Muscat and Zanzibar. Under this treaty, Sayyid Saʿīd prohibited the export of slaves from his dominions, declaring this “external” trade as piracy. This label granted the ships of the Royal Navy the right to seize slave-trading ships beyond an imaginary line extending from Cape Delgado to Diu. In 1845, Sayyid Saʿīd signed another treaty prohibiting the export of slaves from his African dominions and the import of slaves into his Asian dominions. Sayyid Saʿīd died in 1856, and with his sons warring over their late father’s empire, British officials decided to play Solomon. In 1861, they divided the empire between Asia and Africa, severing the very maritime connection that had made it so wealthy and powerful. Finally, in 1873, the Sultan of Zanzibar agreed to completely abolish the slave trade. This treaty was supposed to be the culmination of Britain’s abolitionist mission, however it proved to be a veneer over the tumultuous process of suppressing the commerce in human beings.

The export of slaves from East Africa continued on a significant scale for a quarter of a century after the abolition treaties of 1873. This large scale trade was mostly stanched by the de-facto colonization of Zanzibar in 1897, yet despite the consolidation of colonial rule along the east coast of Africa a small traffic continued particularly across the Red Sea. In the 1930s, a new slave trade from Iranian and British Baluchistan developed across the Gulf to the Arabian Peninsula. By the 1950s when oil wealth of the Gulf states started to increase their demand for labor, these same networks were activated to supply labor from South Asia and Africa. Thus the abolition of the slave trade altered and re-routed the flow of bonded labor without stopping it.

This chapter argues that abolitionist efforts neglected the smuggling traffic, condoned those slave transactions which resembled kinship transactions, and privileged British businesses in transactions of “free” labor. From their experiences in the Atlantic, British officials assumed that the Arabian Sea slave trade was structured by slave markets. However, the trafficking of slaves across the Arabian Sea did not depend on markets but was largely facilitated by dispersed social networks. Abolitionism in the Arabian Sea had three consequences, firstly it produced a distinct smuggling traffic in slaves. Secondly, adoption and marriage became non-market exchanges by which the substantial traffic in women and children was legalized. Thirdly, British bureaucrats and businessmen simply replaced slave traders in profiting from the disposal of laboring bodies. Subtle semantic shifts allowed British official to document a victory against the slave trade by overlooking, condoning and co-opting labor traffics for their own benefit. The abolition of the slave trade was supposed to establish a free market in wage labor. Instead, both imperial officials and diasporic merchants contrived to frame-out enslaved bodies from the market, while facilitating a traffic in bonded labor.

Johan Mathew, Margins of the Market: Trafficking and Capitalism across the Arabian Sea (Oakland: University of California Press, 2016).


Immunoglobulin and T Cell Receptor Genes: IMGT(®) and the Birth and Rise of Immunoinformatics.

IMGT(®), the international ImMunoGeneTics information system(®) (1), (CNRS and Université Montpellier 2) is the global reference in immunogenetics and immunoinformatics. By its creation in 1989, IMGT(®) marked the advent of immunoinformatics, which emerged at the interface between immunogenetics and bioinformatics. IMGT(®) is specialized in the immunoglobulins (IG) or antibodies, T cell receptors (TR), major histocompatibility (MH), and proteins of the IgSF and MhSF superfamilies. IMGT(®) has been built on the IMGT-ONTOLOGY axioms and concepts, which bridged the gap between genes, sequences, and three-dimensional (3D) structures. The concepts include the IMGT(®) standardized keywords (concepts of identification), IMGT(®) standardized labels (concepts of description), IMGT(®) standardized nomenclature (concepts of classification), IMGT unique numbering, and IMGT Colliers de Perles (concepts of numerotation). IMGT(®) comprises seven databases, 15,000 pages of web resources, and 17 tools, and provides a high-quality and integrated system for the analysis of the genomic and expressed IG and TR repertoire of the adaptive immune responses. Tools and databases are used in basic, veterinary, and medical research, in clinical applications (mutation analysis in leukemia and lymphoma) and in antibody engineering and humanization. They include, for example IMGT/V-QUEST and IMGT/JunctionAnalysis for nucleotide sequence analysis and their high-throughput version IMGT/HighV-QUEST for next-generation sequencing (500,000 sequences per batch), IMGT/DomainGapAlign for amino acid sequence analysis of IG and TR variable and constant domains and of MH groove domains, IMGT/3Dstructure-DB for 3D structures, contact analysis and paratope/epitope interactions of IG/antigen and TR/peptide-MH complexes and IMGT/mAb-DB interface for therapeutic antibodies and fusion proteins for immune applications (FPIA).

Proteomic analysis of podocyte exosome-enriched fraction from normal human urine.

Urine results from a coordinated activity of glomerular and tubular compartments of the kidney. As a footprint of these cellular functional processes, urinary exosomes, and 40-80 nm membrane vesicles released after fusion with the plasma membrane into the extracellular environment by renal epithelial cells, are a source for identification of proteins and investigation of their role in the kidney. The aim of the present study was the identification of podocyte exosome proteins based on urine immunoabsorption using podocyte-specific CR1-immunocoated beads followed by proteomic analysis using LC MS/MS techniques. This methodology allowed the identification of 1195 proteins. By using a bioinformatic approach, 27 brain-expressed proteins were identified, in which 14 out of them were newly demonstrated to be expressed in the kidney at a mRNA level, and, one of them, the COMT protein, was demonstrated to be expressed in podocytes at a protein level. These results, attesting the reliability of the methodology to identify podocyte proteins, need now to be completed by further experiments to analyze more precisely their biological function(s) in the podocytes.

Molecular programming of B cell memory.

The development of high-affinity B cell memory is regulated through three separable phases, each involving antigen recognition by specific B cells and cognate T helper cells. Initially, antigen-primed B cells require cognate T cell help to gain entry into the germinal centre pathway to memory. Once in the germinal centre, B cells with variant B cell receptors must access antigens and present them to germinal centre T helper cells to enter long-lived memory B cell compartments. Following antigen recall, memory B cells require T cell help to proliferate and differentiate into plasma cells. A recent surge of information - resulting from dynamic B cell imaging in vivo and the elucidation of T follicular helper cell programmes - has reshaped the conceptual landscape surrounding the generation of memory B cells. In this Review, we integrate this new information about each phase of antigen-specific B cell development to describe the newly unravelled molecular dynamics of memory B cell programming.

Antigen receptor stereotypy across B-cell lymphoproliferations: the case of IGHV4-59/IGKV3-20 receptors with rheumatoid factor activity.

Structure and function of immunoglobulins.

Immunoglobulins are heterodimeric proteins composed of 2 heavy and 2 light chains. They can be separated functionally into variable domains that bind antigens and constant domains that specify effector functions, such as activation of complement or binding to Fc receptors. The variable domains are created by means of a complex series of gene rearrangement events and can then be subjected to somatic hypermutation after exposure to antigen to allow affinity maturation. Each variable domain can be split into 3 regions of sequence variability termed the complementarity-determining regions (CDRs) and 4 regions of relatively constant sequence termed the framework regions. The 3 CDRs of the heavy chain are paired with the 3 CDRs of the light chain to form the antigen-binding site, as classically defined. The constant domains of the heavy chain can be switched to allow altered effector function while maintaining antigen specificity. There are 5 main classes of heavy chain constant domains. Each class defines the IgM, IgG, IgA, IgD, and IgE isotypes. IgG can be split into 4 subclasses, IgG1, IgG2, IgG3, and IgG4, each with its own biologic properties, and IgA can similarly be split into IgA1 and IgA2.

Immunoglobulin somatic hypermutation.

The immunoglobulin (Ig) repertoire achieves functional diversification through several somatic alterations of the Ig locus. One of these processes, somatic hypermutation (SHM), deposits point mutations into the variable region of the Ig gene to generate higher-affinity variants. Activation-induced cytidine deaminase (AID) converts cytidine to uridine to initiate the hypermutation process. Error-prone versions of DNA repair are believed to then process these lesions into a diverse spectrum of point mutations. We review the current understanding of the molecular mechanisms and regulation of SHM, and also discuss emerging ideas which merit further exploration.

The DNA sequence and analysis of human chromosome 14.

Chromosome 14 is one of five acrocentric chromosomes in the human genome. These chromosomes are characterized by a heterochromatic short arm that contains essentially ribosomal RNA genes, and a euchromatic long arm in which most, if not all, of the protein-coding genes are located. The finished sequence of human chromosome 14 comprises 87,410,661 base pairs, representing 100% of its euchromatic portion, in a single continuous segment covering the entire long arm with no gaps. Two loci of crucial importance for the immune system, as well as more than 60 disease genes, have been localized so far on chromosome 14. We identified 1,050 genes and gene fragments, and 393 pseudogenes. On the basis of comparisons with other vertebrate genomes, we estimate that more than 96% of the chromosome 14 genes have been annotated. From an analysis of the CpG island occurrences, we estimate that 70% of these annotated genes are complete at their 5' end.

Diversification of Ig heavy chain genes in human preterm neonates prematurely exposed to environmental antigens.

Preterm neonates are exposed to extrauterine environmental Ags during the time period that corresponds to the last trimester of normal intrauterine development. To study whether this precocious exposure to Ags accelerates the Ig repertoire diversification, we compared IgH chain genes of preterm neonates (gestational age, 25-29 wk) during their first postnatal months with those of term neonates. Preterm infants approaching their expected date of delivery after 8-13 wk of extrauterine life used a similar V(H), D(H), and J(H) gene segment repertoire as term neonates born after intrauterine development. Furthermore, the length increase of the NDN region between V(H) and J(H) by 0.25 nt per gestational week (r = 0.556, p < 0.0001) was not accelerated. Thus, the generation of the V(H) region gene repertoire is developmentally controlled and independent of environmental influences. However, exposure to extrauterine Ags induced class switch and somatic mutations in IgH chain genes within 2 wk after premature birth and IgG transcript diversity and mutational frequency increased with the duration of extrauterine life. Three-month-old preterm infants expressed a heterogeneous IgG repertoire at their expected date of delivery with V(H) region genes carrying significant numbers of somatic mutations with evidence for Ag selection. Term neonates, however, had no such IgG repertoire. We conclude that restrictions in the neonatal Ig V(H) region gene repertoire persist until term despite exposure to environmental Ags. Yet, many weeks before term the immune system of the preterm neonate can already support germinal center reactions in response to environmental Ags.

Nomenclature of the human immunoglobulin heavy (IGH) genes.

'Nomenclature of the Human Immunoglobulin Heavy (IGH) Genes', the 16th report of the 'IMGT Locus in Focus' section, provides the first complete list of all the human IGH genes. The total number of human IGH genes per haploid genome is 170-176 (206-212 genes, if the orphons and the processed gene are included), of which 77-84 genes are functional. IMGT/Human Genome Organization (HUGO) gene names and definitions of the human IGH genes on chromosome 14q32.33, processed gene on chromosome 9 and IGH orphons on chromosomes 15 and 16 are provided with the gene functionality and the number of alleles, according to the rules of the IMGT Scientific chart, with the accession numbers of the IMGT reference sequences and with the accession ID of the Genome Database GDB and NCBI LocusLink databases, in which all the IMGT human IGH genes have been entered. The tables are available at the IMGT Marie-Paule page of IMGT, the international ImMunoGeneTics database (http://imgt.cines.fr:8104) created by Marie-Paule Lefranc, Université Montpellier II, CNRS, France.

The complete nucleotide sequence of the human immunoglobulin heavy chain variable region locus.

The complete nucleotide sequence of the 957-kb DNA of the human immunoglobulin heavy chain variable (VH) region locus was determined and 43 novel VH segments were identified. The region contains 123 VH segments classifiable into seven different families, of which 79 are pseudogenes. Of the 44 VH segments with an open reading frame, 39 are expressed as heavy chain proteins and 1 as mRNA, while the remaining 4 are not found in immunoglobulin cDNAs. Combinatorial diversity of VH region was calculated to be approximately 6,000. Conservation of the promoter and recombination signal sequences was observed to be higher in functional VH segments than in pseudogenes. Phylogenetic analysis of 114 VH segments clearly showed clustering of the VH segments of each family. However, an independent branch in the tree contained a single VH, V4-44.1P, sharing similar levels of homology to human VH families and to those of other vertebrates. Comparison between different copies of homologous units that appear repeatedly across the locus clearly demonstrates that dynamic DNA reorganization of the locus took place at least eight times between 133 and 10 million years ago. One nonimmunoglobulin gene of unknown function was identified in the intergenic region.


Deciphering seed dispersal decisions of agouti rodents

Much like the squirrels and chipmunks in deciduous climates, there is a cat-sized creature in tropical regions that practices scatter hoarding – burying the seeds they find if they don't eat them right away.

Are coffee farms for the birds? Yes and no

Over 11 field seasons, between 1999 and 2010, ornithologist Cagan Sekercioglu trekked through the forests and coffee fields of Costa Rica to study how tropical birds were faring in a changing agricultural landscape. Through ...

Restore natural forests to meet global climate goals

The hotter it gets, the more forests act as insulators

Using data from about 100 sites worldwide, an international research team has demonstrated that forest cover acts as a global thermal insulator by cooling the understory when the air temperature is high. This buffer effect ...

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Tropical and subtropical moist broadleaf forests

Tropical and subtropical forest regions with lower rainfall are home to tropical and subtropical dry broadleaf forests and tropical and subtropical coniferous forests. Temperate rain forests also occur in certain humid temperate coastal regions.

The biome includes several types of forests:

Tropical and subtropical moist broadleaf forests are common in several terrestrial ecozones, including parts of the Afrotropic (equatorial Africa), Indomalaya (parts of the Indian subcontinent and Southeast Asia), the Neotropic (northern South America and Central America), Australasia (eastern Indonesia, New Guinea, northern and eastern Australia), and Oceania (the tropical islands of the Pacific Ocean). About half of the world's tropical rainforests are in the South American countries of Brazil and Peru. Rain forests now cover less than 6% of Earth's land surface. Scientists estimate that more than half of all the world's plant and animal species live in tropical rain forests.


Dissertation/Thesis Abstract

Advances in Understanding the Causes and Impacts of Droughts in North America under Current and Future Climates
by Herrera Estrada, Julio Enrique, Ph.D., Princeton University, 2017, 193; 10637641
Abstract (Summary)

Droughts reduce water resources necessary for human survival, economic development, and to sustain healthy ecosystems. Our ability to monitor and forecast droughts has grown dramatically in the past decades due to improved hydrological modeling made possible by satellite data and high computing power. However, there is still a large gap of knowledge regarding the mechanisms behind drought onset, development, and recovery. This gap prevents us from being able to forecast every severe drought and from being more confident about the effects of climate change. This thesis proposes a paradigm shift from droughts as local events to droughts as dynamic hazards that can travel in space. In this framework, droughts become the frame of reference, opening new possibilities for drought assessment and forecasting. Here, droughts are shown to have traveled across continents between 1979—2009. Patterns of frequent and common directions of displacement are identified. Precipitation recycling is proposed as an important mechanism behind these observed dynamics, and a detailed study of moisture sources over North America from 1980—2016 is carried out. This work shows that drought conditions can propagate downwind, especially from the U.S. Southwest to the U.S. Midwest, and from the northwest of Mexico and Central America to the center and south of Mexico. The effect of local precipitation recycling on drought intensification is quantified and shown to be highest in the north of Mexico and the U.S. Southwest. In a study of climate change's impacts on droughts, large biases are found in the climate models' representation of the hydrologic cycle and land-atmospheric coupling. This is shown to affect the models' drought projections by the end of the twenty-first century. Finally, this thesis includes a study of drought impacts on electricity generation and on CO2, SO2, and NOx emissions from the power sector in the American West under current and future climates. This work advances the understanding of how droughts propagate through the hydrologic cycle locally and across continents, opening new opportunities for seasonal forecasting. It also includes a rigorous drought impact study on the electricity sector that provides useful information to stakeholders and decision makers.

Indexing (document details)
Advisor: Sheffield, Justin, Wood, Eric F.
Commitee: Bou-Zeid, Elie, Findell, Kirsten, Rodriguez-Iturbe, Ignacio
School: Princeton University
Department: Civil and Environmental Engineering
School Location: United States -- New Jersey
Subjects: Hydrologic sciences, Climate Change, Environmental engineering
Keywords: Climate impacts, Climate variability, Drought, Land-atmosphere interactions, North America, Precipitation recycling
Publication Number: 10637641
ISBN: 9780355480481


The 3 Things That Happen With Bias (And What to Do About Them)

There is a lot of talk these days about bias tied to cultural identities like race and gender—but for many people it’s unclear what bias is, how it works, and where it shows up.

Because our ability to interrupt bias affects how inclusive, authentic, happy, and successful we are, I want to clarify how bias works, and what each of us has the power to do about it.

What is Bias?

Simply put, bias refers to the mental shortcuts our brains take in decision-making. When we’re talking about inclusion, bias refers to how these mental shortcuts impact the way we treat others—especially people who are not like us. Bias also impacts how we treat ourselves, because we’re subjected to others’ judgments about who we are.

Ultimately, there are three primary things that happen with bias: we dish it out, we receive it, and we internalize it.

Dishing Out Bias

When we dish out bias, we judge people based how we categorize their cultural identities, both consciously and unconsciously.

When we meet someone, in under a second our unconscious brain will categorize that person into “like me” (the “us”) or “not like me” (the “them”) based on attributes like race, gender, and age. The moment the brain says, “Like me,” we treat the person nicer and more empathetically faster than if it says, “Not like me.” But when the brain puts someone into the “not like me” group, we proceed with caution, care, and apprehension in how we interact with them.

We do this because, even though we’ve greatly evolved as a species, the reptilian brain is still part of us—and its purpose is to keep us safe from harmful stimuli in the environment. It thinks, "If you’re like me, you’re less likely to harm me, and if you’re not like me, you’re more likely to cause me harm." Because this is part of our neurology as humans, we’re all doing it.

We also absorb negative messaging about people’s cultural identities throughout our lives, which further entrenches them into our outgroups, and causes us to treat them less favorably (for example, stereotyping has caused many of us to associate certain cultural identities with being less able, less worthy, less competent and more).

But you can work to rewire your brain so that you’re not treating people less favorably just because they have, for example, a different race or gender than you.

First, you need to consciously identify what your biases are and then work to change your automatic judgments about people’s identities. A great first step is taking Harvard’s Implicit Association Tests (IATs), a leading tool for identifying unconscious biases.  It's free, confidential, and will immediately tell you what your unconscious biases are in a range of areas, including gender identity, race, sexual orientation, nationality, and even weight.

I highly recommend that you take the IATs to help you figure out where you’re dishing out bias.

Receiving Bias

Every single one of us has bias coming our way, meaning that we’re being judged by others tied back to our cultural identities, personalities, learning styles, and more. Notably, because of forms of supremacy* that are entrenched in our society, some of us are on the receiving end of more bias and negative messaging than others.

When we fear that we’re being judged because of who we are, it causes us to suppress our authenticity.

The problem is, when we fear (both consciously and unconsciously) that we’re being judged because of who we are, it causes us to suppress our authenticity. We push down our differences in favor of sameness, which ultimately hurts us—and, frankly, makes us miserable.

One way to interrupt this is through what I call scripting. First, reflect on and identify the biases you believe you may be experiencing because of your identities. Then spend time planning what to say or do next time you’re in a situation where bias is coming your way, which will help to shield against it.

I often use scripting to deflect bias that reflects the intersection of my race, gender, and age, which I sometimes encounter when I’m training corporate leadership teams. In these situations, I make sure that within the first few minutes of speaking I mention my extensive experience and qualifications, and try to age myself by saying things like, “I graduated from school twenty years ago.”

Having this kind of script planned strategically in advance is a really powerful tool to interrupt the biases coming your way.

Internalizing Bias

The least discussed aspect of bias is that we internalize it. When negative judgments and messages about who we are repeatedly come our way—about our cultural identities, personal attributes, personality traits and more—unfortunately, many of us come to believe them. We do this unconsciously or even consciously.

These negative messages become part of our neural circuitry, leading us to engage in harmful self-talk. We say horrible things about ourselves to ourselves—and this has a profoundly adverse impact on us.

It causes us to lean out instead of lean in. It causes us to self-censor. It causes us to feel like impostors. Which is why it’s critical to figure out where you have internalized biases—and exactly what the negative messages are that you’re holding in your own mind about yourself, and about your cultural identities.

To interrupt internalized bias, you’ll first need to tune in to what you’re telling yourself so that you can identify your negative narratives about who you are. What are you saying to yourself about yourself? How might this be tied back to messages you’ve received about who you are?

Luckily, Harvard’s IATs can be used to help you with this, too—because not only will the tests tell you where your unconscious biases are, but they will also help to identify where you have internalized bias about your own identity.

For example, we know from the race IAT (which examines preferences for White people over Black people) that fifty percent of Black people who have taken it have an unconscious preference for White people over Black people—which suggests that they have internalized negative messaging about their own identity.

Once you’ve identified your negative narratives, determine some positive truths about who you are that you can say to yourself to replace them. Repeating these positive truths when you catch yourself in a negative narrative will help you overcome the biases you’ve internalized by creating new neural circuitry in your brain.

I’m incredibly passionate about interrupting internalized bias—in particular because of my own journey with learning to overcome it. It’s critical that we start including this insidious aspect of bias in the conversation, because so many people struggle with it. (For more about my journey, and how I overcame the pain of internalized bias, see The Authenticity Principle.)

*   *   *

After today, I encourage you to explore how these three aspects of bias are showing up for you. Identifying and interrupting bias is the first step to becoming more inclusive and empowered. When you do this challenging but rewarding self-work, you’ll be more inclusive of others, and you’ll be closer to living your best, most authentic life.

*A lot of us think of white hoods when we hear the word supremacy (which is also a mental shortcut in the brain—it’s a bias!) I’m referring to supremacy here as the ideology that some cultural identities are better than others. For example, with gender supremacy, the belief that cisgender men are better than women and transgender people.


John McDowell

British philosopher

Learn about this topic in these articles:

moral realism

    In ethics: Moral realism

    …approach, notably David Wiggins and John McDowell, were sometimes referred to as “sensibility theorists.” But it remained unclear what exactly makes a particular sensibility appropriate, and how one would defend such a claim against anyone who judged differently. In the opinion of its critics, sensibility theory made it possible to…

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High & Low.

These two dart games are actually almost identical. Both games can be played with any number of darters, including an odd one. You want to be the only darter at the end of the game with any lives left.

You begin by writing down the darters names on the left hand side of the scoreboard. You will need to work out who starts the game first, so ever player should throw one dart at the dart board. Closest to the bullseye will go first and the furthest away obviously shoots last in the first game. However the player first out in the original game will go first in the next game and so on. You will also need to put three marks next to the players names so as to indicate the total number of lives that player has remaining. You can have more lives if you want the game to go for longer.

To start the dart game high the first darter lobs two darts at the same time to set a starting number the numbers hit by those two darts are added together to make the starting figure. The next player must beat that number with their three darts which they throw in conventional style. The next player must then beat that score. Ties count as not beating the number. However if one of the players fails to beat the score they lose a life and must re-throw until they set a new figure to beat. If you loose all your lives you are not the best high player, you should probably bow down to a superior darter.

Low works the opposite way. Once the number is set by the first player the second player must then get a lower score then the original person. Then the next player tries to get an even lower score then that and so on. However if you hit a bullseye you get minus 25 points and if you hit the inner bullseye its minus 50 points so the best low score you can get is -150. Again you continue until one player is remaining with lives.