Sunday, March 31, 2013

Earning Extra Money Online From Home | Content for Reprint

Author: Mike Zupp | Total views: 175 Comments: 0
Word Count: 952 Date:

Are you on a quest to unravel the mystery of how to earn instant online profits? There are all sorts of ways to do this, however the most sure-fire way is most likely by getting involved in Affiliate Marketing.

A normal person can get into Affiliate Marketing using his or her own advertising efforts as an Affiliate to bring people to the Affiliate Vendor's internet site. The Affiliate gets paid a commission when that visitor purchases the Vendor's item. Often, commissions are earned just by the Affiliate entering their name and email address into a Vendors online form!

As soon as you select which item to advertise, you acquire what's called an "affiliate link". This stringy link contains your Affiliate ID so that, when clicked on during the purchase process, the Affiliate Vendor knows to pay you your commission. The most widely known Affiliate Marketing sites are Amazon, Clickbank, Ebay Partner Network and Commission Junction, to name a few. These business have a multitude of products in several niches for your choosing.

Nonetheless, in order to figure out how to earn instant online profits with Affiliate Marketing, you need to know where to take the initial step.

The first move is to choose a niche that you would like to sell in. Ideally, select a specific niche that you are passionate about; a subject that you might be able to discuss all day, since it's easier to advertise things that interest you. Some good examples of prevailing niches are Relationships, E-Business & Marketing and Health & Fitness, to name but a few.

You'll need to google the "Google Keyword Tool" and "Google Trends" to research your niche and product in a strategic, insightful manner. Google Trends will tell you if your niche is still in the mainstream and you can use the Google Keyword Tool to see if your chosen niche keywords are getting a decent amount of search traffic every month.

Next comes your affiliate product selection. Only pick high-grade products whose Vendors can demonstrate their successful sales record. You need that special something that's going to rid your buyer of their pain and solve a huge problem they've been faced with that has kept them up at night worrying!

So now that your niche and product selection process is done, it's time to discover how to earn instant online profits by putting the following handy tips into action:

You can start off by building a product review site. Basically, you summarize the pros and cons of the product in a short article that needs to appear unbiased. Thus, it would be a good idea to actually purchase the item so you can put forward your opinion in a thorough, honest manner. However, in these tough economic times you may have to opt instead for looking around forums and other testimonial sites of your particular product to gather enough information for your review. Always remember to sprinkle your affiliate link throughout your review post, of course!

You can also jump on the social media band wagon by setting up either a Facebook fan page or a tab on your current business page. This should distinctively display your sales item in a monetized fashion or at least bring your fans right to your affiliate sales form.

You've probably heard mention of "squeeze" or "landing" pages before, right? Well, their purpose is to "squeeze" information, like names and email addresses, out of prospects and they can be built right inside Facebook or take the form of a one page website. You then take that assembled information and put it all into an autoresponder system. "AWeber" is an excellent place to open one of these types of accounts. What happens next is that your prospective clients get a series of email messages in their inbox automatically over the course of a week or two. The first emails should be "warm and friendly" since you'll need to build a relationship with your readers to get them to know and like you. After a while, you'll hopefully build up enough trust that your audience will click on your cleverly inserted links in the later emails and end up as paying customers!
Of course, the option is always there to put your affiliate product in the limelight by posting a quick review on your personal blog that contains your affiliate link, of course.

You can also harness the power of YouTube by creating personal video reviews of your affiliate product and uploading them to your YouTube channel. Better still, you can embed the videos into your product review site! This could also increase your search engine ranking, as Google owns YouTube and loves it when videos are featured in blogs.

Another effective approach would be to join online forums that are relevant to your chosen niche. Don't just go in there and start selling your product right away: Instead, participate in conversations and answer questions to help people out, at first. Then, after some time, you can start mentioning your product, showing the forum members how it can solve their problems or meet their needs.

The above pointers are simply a few ideas to illustrate how to earn instant online profits. You can mix and match these different approaches to suit your particular product-and throw in any other new techniques you come across as well, of course!
I hope you obtained some useful insight into the Realm of Affiliate Marketing by reading this. There's nothing to stop you from immediately launching your affiliate product promotion now!

For more information about making money online check out the Instant Online Profits Review. I'm sure you'll be quite impressed with it!

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1: Understanding Online Business Success

Starting a home based business to earn income online takes a significant amount of time and energy upfront to get things going. Not seeing results immediately can be discouraging and cause people to give up too early. In this article, we look at the process of starting a home based business and working through the frustrations to be there when the sales come flowing in.

2: Why You Need To Build Multiple Streams of Income For Yourself

Being an entrepreneur and earning multiple streams of income is a dream that many have, but in reality it does take some initial hard work to achieve this. Earning multiple streams of income is the wave of the future, and here are some tips and advice for you when you are looking for ways in which to do this for yourself.

3: Article Marketing Strategy: Putting Together a "Class Schedule" For Your Article Topics

Businesses go to so much trouble when there is one sure-fire, simple, very inexpensive way to attract new clients to a business: Teach a free class. That is what article marketing is like. Your articles are just like free classes. You teach your target readers something helpful in your article. Your resource box then says, "If you enjoyed this article you can visit my website and apply what you have learned."

4: What is Cyber Marketing And Why It Is So Important For The Success Of Your Website

Cyber marketing has now become an indispensable segment of e-commerce as well as the internet and World Wide Web related topics. Cyber marketing simply refers to a technique of attracting potential customers by advertising your products or services through such means as websites, emails, and banners.

5: The Best Way To Optimise Your Website SEO For Google Panda

If you want your SEO to work you now need to concentrate on appeasing Google Panda, and to do this you need to know what Google Panda's spiders/bots will be looking for. Find out here how to search engine optimise your website for the latest Google Panda algorithm, and achieve the success you deserve.

Source: http://www.content4reprint.com/internet-marketing/earning-extra-money-online-from-home.htm

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Social Media Welcome To Reality On-line | Destination Raleigh

Posted on Saturday, March 30th, 2013

Although other people may possibly believe you are merely enjoying the several aspects of social networking, the truth of your interest might likely be tinged with a organization concentrate.

What that doesnt imply is that you post simply to leave a traceab?

The use of social media encompasses a broad range of on the internet media sorts. Whilst some might only assume of a social network like MySpace there are truly several social media formats that include substantial advertising and marketing prospective for on the web business.

Although other individuals might think you are simply enjoying the a number of aspects of social networking, the truth of your interest might probably be tinged with a enterprise concentrate.

What that doesnt mean is that you post merely to leave a traceable link back to your business web site. Individuals who go to any social media site see by way of posts that are overtly geared toward marketing and advertising. In several situations social media buyers view this as spam even if the social network owners do not. In the end, you can shed credibility of you dont operate as a meaningful contributor in a social media environment.

Social media can be presented in a lot of various types. Lets take a peak at a handful of of them.

YouTube and other equivalent video sites These movies can be funny, severe, off the cuff and sometimes political in nature. You can show your organization in a humorous light and let folks to be curious about you and your organization.

MySpace and other social networks This form of social media is well-known since it draws with each other numerous elements of social marketing and advertising and makes them accessible to the masses of individuals that may possibly view social networking as an on-line version of reality television.

Blogs This is a form of social media if only since it does allow interactive exchanges amongst the blogger and the reader.

Forums This can permit you to have an person voice willing to discuss topics of interest to the majority. As with all social media you can provide a link to your website. If you are viewed as a trusted source you will likely locate forum members following you to your internet site to learn far more.

Podcasting This is an audio stream that can let a visitor to hear a private message from you. This can have a pronounced effect in social advertising.

This isnt an exhaustive list, but it does supply something for you to consider as an addition to other advertising methods you may possibly have in place. Social media permits you to take your message to the individuals and have enjoyable even though you share your message.

I cant anxiety enough how important it is to be real. The complete Internet community has a low tolerance for supposed spam so make positive you dont use social media as basically one more type of on the internet marketing.

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Source: http://www.destinationraleigh.com/uncategorized/social-media-welcome-to-reality-on-line/

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FBI 'flying saucers' NM memo bureau's most viewed

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. (AP) ? A single-page FBI memo relaying a vague and unconfirmed report of flying saucers found in New Mexico in 1950 has become the most popular file in the bureau's electronic reading room.

The memo, dated March 22, 1950, was sent by FBI Washington, D.C., field office chief Guy Hottel to then-Director J. Edgar Hoover.

According to the FBI, the document was first made public in the late 1970s and more recently has been available in the "Vault," an electronic reading room launched by the agency in 2011, where it has become the most popular item, viewed nearly 1 million times. The Vault contains around 6,700 public documents.

Vaguely written, the memo describes a story told by an unnamed third party who claims an Air Force investigator reported that three flying saucers were recovered in New Mexico, though the memo doesn't say exactly where in the state. The FBI indexed the report for its files but did not investigate further; the name of an "informant" reporting some of the information is blacked out in the memo.

The memo offers several bizarre details.

Inside each saucer, "each one was occupied by three bodies of human shape but only 3 feet tall, dressed in metallic cloth of a very fine texture," according to the report. "Each body was bandaged in a manner similar to the blackout suits used by speed fliers and test pilots."

The saucers were found in New Mexico because the government had a high-powered radar set up in the area and it is believed the radar interfered with the controlling mechanism of the UFOs, according to the informant.

The FBI filed the typed page neatly away 63 years ago at its headquarters and "no further evaluation was attempted."

The memo does not appear to be related to the 1947 case in Roswell, N.M., when Air Force officials said they recovered a UFO, only later to recant and say it was a research balloon.

"For a few years after the Roswell incident, Director (J. Edgar) Hoover did order his agents ? at the request of the Air Force ? to verify any UFO sightings," the FBI said Thursday. "That practice ended in July 1950, four months after the Hottel memo. Suggesting that our Washington Field Office didn't think enough of that flying saucer story to look into it."

___

Follow Russell Contreras on Twitter at http://twitter.com/russcontreras

___

Online:

'The Vault' memo, http://vault.fbi.gov/hottel_guy/Guy%20Hottel%20Part%201%20of%201/view

___

Information from: Roswell Daily Record, http://www.roswell-record.com

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/fbi-flying-saucers-nm-memo-bureaus-most-viewed-163151309.html

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Hubble observes the hidden depths of Messier 77

Friday, March 29, 2013

Messier 77 is a galaxy in the constellation of Cetus, some 45 million light-years away from us. Also known as NGC 1068, it is one of the most famous and well-studied galaxies. It is a real star among galaxies, with more papers written about it than many other galaxies put together!

Despite its current fame and striking swirling appearance, the galaxy has been a victim of mistaken identity a couple of times; when it was initially discovered in 1780, the distinction between gas clouds and galaxies was not known, causing finder Pierre Mechain to miss its true nature and label it as a nebula. It was misclassified again when it was subsequently listed in the Messier Catalogue as a star cluster.

Now, however, it is firmly categorised as a barred spiral galaxy, with loosely wound arms and a relatively small central bulge. It is the closest and brightest example of a particular class of galaxies known as Seyfert galaxies -- galaxies that are full of hot, highly ionised gas that glows brightly, emitting intense radiation.

Strong radiation like this is known to come from the heart of Messier 77 -- caused by a very active black hole that is around 15 million times the mass of our Sun. Material is dragged towards this black hole and circles around it, heating up and glowing strongly. This region of a galaxy alone, although comparatively small, can be tens of thousands of times brighter than a typical galaxy.

Although no competition for the intense centre, Messier 77's spiral arms are also very bright regions. Dotted along each arm are knotty red clumps -- a signal that new stars are forming. These baby stars shine strongly, ionising nearby gas which then glows a deep red colour as seen in the image above. The dust lanes stretching across this image appear as a rusty, brown-red colour due to a phenomenon known as reddening; the dust absorbs more blue light than red light, enhancing its apparent redness.

###

ESA/Hubble Information Centre: http://www.spacetelescope.org

Thanks to ESA/Hubble Information Centre for this article.

This press release was posted to serve as a topic for discussion. Please comment below. We try our best to only post press releases that are associated with peer reviewed scientific literature. Critical discussions of the research are appreciated. If you need help finding a link to the original article, please contact us on twitter or via e-mail.

This press release has been viewed 55 time(s).

Source: http://www.labspaces.net/127517/Hubble_observes_the_hidden_depths_of_Messier___

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Chivas USA hold on to beat Whitecaps FC

Associated Press Sports

updated 11:45 p.m. ET March 30, 2013

CARSON, Calif. (AP) - Eric Avila scored early in the second half and Chivas USA held on for a 2-1 victory over the Vancouver Whitecaps on Saturday night.

Avila's 55th-minute tally gave Chivas (3-1-1) a 2-0 lead. Kenny Miller responded quickly for the Whitecaps (2-2-0), but the visitors were unable to tie the match at Home Depot Center.

Chivas maintained their league lead in goals scored with 10 through five games. Last season it took Chivas 15 games to reach that amount.

Chivas jumped out to a quick lead. In the 12th minute Carlos Alvarez attempted a cross from the corner of the penalty area. The ball deflected off Vancouver defender Jun Marques Davidson and skipped past Joe Cannon into the net.

Avila put the hosts up 2-0 in the 55th minute. Jorge Villafana found Avila unmarked on the right side of the penalty area. Avila struck the ball in midair, sending it into the back of the goal.

Kenny Miller cut Vancouver's deficit in the 64th minute. Chivas' Dan Kennedy saved Erik Hurtado's shot, but the rebound sailed to Miller, who headed the ball into an empty net.

? 2012 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.


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Saturday, March 30, 2013

Mystery elf door in park sparks attention on the Web

A tiny addition in San Francisco?s Golden Gate Park is getting big attention on the Web. A photo on the neighborhood site Richmondsfblog.com first published a photo of a teeny wooden door that mysteriously appeared at the bottom of a tree with a small, gnome-sized gap.

The door has opened up plenty of interest on the Internet?and spurred visitors to the urban oasis to explore the door that's not on any map. It can be found by searching for the grove of old trees in the park's concourse near the Golden Gate Band Shell between the de Young Museum and the California Academy of Sciences.

Creative theories about how it got there abound?mostly as fanciful as the mystery door itself. An elf? A fairy? A house for a mouse?

Kids and kids at heart weighed in with ideas. As ?Dude? joked on the neighborhood website, ?It?s a very tiny coffee shop. It?s already played out.?

Another commenter, "Hobbit," suggested, ?Looks like a squirrel with a [k]nack for architecture."

Everyone seems to agree, it?s cool.

Over on Twitter, K L ?@miss_kr15 posted, ?I totally dragged my bf to the park & hunted that door down after seeing it in your blog. Seriously the coolest thing ever!?

Allyson E-B ?@allysoneb added, ?My daughter left some candy, when we came back 2 hours later it was gone. Fairies!?

The Editor of RichmondSFBlog, Sarah Bacon, noted to Yahoo News in an email that the tree door has been the site's most popular topic ever. ?It?s really captured people's imaginations and has gotten more attention than we ever expected. It's a delightful and magical gift someone gave to the park.?

She added, ?We're thrilled by the response to the story?I think it's proof that everyone has a child inside that enjoys whimsy and fantasy. It's these little finds that make our neighborhood so special.?

The little find has inspired lots of speculation, but nobody so far has come forth to take credit for building the opening. The good news: The minidoor won?t be closed down anytime soon.

Acknowledging the interest in the door sized for sprites, Andy Stone, Golden Gate Park's department?s section supervisor, wrote in an email to Yahoo News, "We do not encourage such doors but will leave it in place unless it causes problems."

The tiny tree door is not the first to mysteriously appear in a park. Commenters have pointed out there?s the Elf Tree near Lake Harriet in Minneapolis that also has a tiny door in a living tree. Kids leave messages and candy for the invisible resident.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/sideshow/mystery-elf-door-park-sparks-attention-182312844.html

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DOS emulator brings Raspberry Pi back to the '90s for Doom LAN parties

Raspberry Pi DOS emulator b

Who can forget the first time they obliterated their buddy with a BFG9000 during a spirited Doom game? Raspberry Pi coder Pate wants to resurrect those good times with an rpix86 DOS emulator that opens up the world of retro PC games like the aforementioned FPS pioneer along with Duke Nukem 3D, Jill of the Jungle and others. It works by creating a virtual machine your Dad would be proud of, based on a 40Mhz 80486 processor, 640KB base RAM, 16MB extended memory, 640 x 480 256-color graphics and SoundBlaster 2.0 audio. Of course, the Pi is worlds beyond that with a 700Mhz ARM CPU, 512MB or RAM and HDMI out -- so, most enthusiasts with one of the wee $35 boards will likely be all over hacking it to play those classics.

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Via: Geek.com

Source: rpix86 blog

Source: http://www.engadget.com/2013/03/29/raspberry-pi-dos-emulator/

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Why We're Obsessed with 'Game of Thrones'

Nationwide, a legion of fans of HBO's Game of Thrones are clearing their schedules for this Sunday at 9 p.m. ET, when the epic tale launches into Season 3. A sizable portion of that fan base is female, which at first blush seems anomalous. Women aren't usually considered the target audience for an epic fantasy fueled by graphic violence and sex. So why are we so enchanted by the characters of the Seven Kingdoms of Westeros?

Source: http://www.ivillage.com/why-women-love-game-thrones/1-a-531148?dst=iv%3AiVillage%3Awhy-women-love-game-thrones-531148

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Katharine McPhee Returns to American Idol, Performs with OneRepublic

Source: http://www.thehollywoodgossip.com/2013/03/katharine-mcphee-returns-to-american-idol-performs-with-onerepub/

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CA-BUSINESS Summary

Record Wall Street boosts sentiment, U.S. holds key in Q2

TOKYO (Reuters) - Whether the world's largest economy can sustain momentum will be a primary focus for investors for the next three months after a general recovery trend in the United States helped risk sentiment for broad markets in the first quarter of 2013. Asian shares edged higher and the euro steadied on Friday after banks in Cyprus reopened to relative calm. Overall trade was subdued, with many Asian markets, including Australia, Singapore and Hong Kong, closed on Friday for Easter holidays.

Banks lift TSX on Cyprus calm; index up for quarter

TORONTO (Reuters) - Canada's main stock index powered ahead in a late surge on Thursday, led by strength in financial and industrial shares, on relief that banks in Cyprus reopened relatively smoothly following a bailout deal. The market received further support from BlackBerry after the smartphone maker reported a surprise quarterly profit.

More trouble for Cohen's SAC Capital as Steinberg indicted in NY

(Reuters) - U.S. prosecutors on Friday charged Michael Steinberg, a veteran portfolio manager at Steven A. Cohen's hedge fund, with insider trading in two technology stocks, the most senior SAC Capital Advisors' employee to be indicted in the government's long-running probe. FBI agents arrested Steinberg at his Park Avenue home in New York City at around 6 a.m. EDT (1000 GMT). Steinberg, wearing a blue sweater, pleaded "not guilty" to charges of securities fraud and conspiracy to commit securities when he appeared at a late morning arraignment.

Loeb's Third Point outperforms hedge fund rivals again

BOSTON (Reuters) - Hedge fund manager Daniel Loeb outperformed his rivals again in the first quarter with returns that kept pace with the stock market's recent rally, a person familiar with Loeb's returns said. The New York-based manager told investors late on Thursday that his flagship Third Point Offshore Fund rose 2.8 percent in March while the Third Point Ultra fund, the leveraged version of the Offshore fund, gained 4.2 percent.

Cyprus says threat contained, no plan to leave euro

NICOSIA (Reuters) - The president of Cyprus said on Friday the risk of bankruptcy had been contained and the country had no intention of leaving the euro, in a speech laden with criticism of Europe's currency union for "experimenting" with the island's fate. Conservative leader Nicos Anastasiades spoke a day after banks reopened following an almost two-week shutdown imposed as the country raced to clinch a rescue package from the European Union.

Quarter of U.S. firms in China face data theft: business lobby

BEIJING (Reuters) - A quarter of firms that are members of a leading U.S. business lobby in China have been victims of data theft, a report by the group said on Friday, amid growing vitriol between Beijing and Washington over the threat of cyber attacks. Twenty-six percent of members who responded to an annual survey said their proprietary data or trade secrets had been compromised or stolen from their China operations, the American Chamber of Commerce in China report said.

Exclusive: Indonesia's CT Corp proposes all-cash deal for Bakrie's media unit

TANJUNG BENOA, Indonesia (Reuters) - Indonesia's fifth-richest man has proposed to buy a controlling stake in PT Visi Media Asia, valued at up to $1.8 billion, in an all-cash deal that would give him the lion's share of the TV advertising market in Southeast Asia's biggest economy. Chairul Tanjung, the billionaire founder and chairman of CT Corp, a conglomerate with banking and media interests, told Reuters that his company wanted to buy the stake in the media unit of Indonesia's powerful Bakrie family without any partners.

Deutsche Bank probe finds incomplete data given to prosecutors: magazine

FRANKFURT (Reuters) - An internal investigation at Deutsche Bank has found that incomplete data related to a carbon tax fraud probe were handed over to prosecutors, German magazine Der Spiegel said on Friday. The probe is one of several legal headaches with which Germany's biggest lender is grappling.

Sony, Olympus delay medical venture as regulatory approval on hold

TOKYO (Reuters) - Japan's Sony Corp and Olympus Corp have again delayed the start of a joint venture to develop medical equipment because they have yet to gain approval from some regulators. "The examination by the relevant authority is taking longer than expected," the two companies said in a statement. They did not set a new date for operations to start.

Power firm CEZ files complaint with EU against Bulgaria

PRAGUE (Reuters) - Czech power producer CEZ filed a complaint with the European Commission against Bulgaria on Friday for the government's moves to take away the company's license in the Balkan country. CEZ has had a rough ride in Bulgaria since public protests against high electricity prices led to the fall of Prime Minister Boiko Borisov in February, and authorities have struck out against CEZ and other power firms.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/ca-business-summary-012855661--finance.html

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Researchers engineer plant cell walls to boost sugar yields for biofuels

Mar. 29, 2013 ? When blessed with a resource in overwhelming abundance it's generally a good idea to make valuable use of that resource. Lignocellulosic biomass is the most abundant organic material on Earth. For thousands of years it has been used as animal feed, and for the past two centuries has been a staple of the paper industry. This abundant resource, however, could also supply the sugars needed to produce advanced biofuels that can supplement or replace fossil fuels, providing several key technical challenges are met.

One of these challenges is finding ways to more cost-effectively extract those sugars. Major steps towards achieving this breakthrough are being taken by researchers at the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE)'s Joint BioEnergy Institute (JBEI).

"Through the tools of synthetic biology, we have engineered healthy plants whose lignocellulosic biomass can more easily be broken down into simple sugars for biofuels," says Dominique Loque, who directs the cell wall engineering program for JBEI's Feedstocks Division. "Working with the model plant, Arabidopsis, as a demonstration tool, we have genetically manipulated secondary cell walls to reduce the production of lignin while increasing the yield of fuel sugars."

JBEI is a scientific partnership led by Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab) whose mission is to advance the development of next generation biofuels that can provide the nation with clean, green and renewable transportation energy that will create jobs and boost the economy. Loque and his research group have focused on reducing the natural recalcitrance of plant cell walls to give up their sugars. Unlike the simple starch-based sugars in corn and other grains, the complex polysaccharide sugars in plant cell walls are locked within a robust aromatic polymer called lignin. Setting these sugars free from their lignin cage has required the use of expensive and environmentally harsh chemicals at high temperatures, a process that helps drive production costs of advance biofuels prohibitively high.

"By embedding polysaccharide polymers and reducing their extractability and accessibility to hydrolytic enzymes, lignin is the major contributor to cell wall recalcitrance," Loque says. "Unfortunately, most efforts to reduce lignin content during plant development have resulted in severe biomass yield reduction and a loss of integrity in vessels, a key tissue responsible for water and nutrient distribution from roots to the above-ground organs."

Lignin has also long posed problems for pulping and animal feed. To overcome the lignin problem, Loque and his colleagues rewired the regulation of lignin biosynthesis and created an artificial positive feedback loop (APFL) to enhance secondary cell wall biosynthesis in specific tissue. The idea was to reduce cell wall recalcitrance and boost polysaccharide content without impacting plant development.

"When we applied our APFL to Arabidopsis plants engineered so that lignin biosynthesis is disconnected from the fiber secondary cell wall regulatory network, we maintained the integrity of the vessels and were able to produce healthy plants with reduced lignin and enhanced polysaccharide deposition in the cell walls," Loque says. "After various pretreatments, these engineered plants exhibited improved sugar releases from enzymatic hydrolysis as compared to wild type plants. In other words we accumulated the good stuff -- polysaccharides -- without spoiling it with lignin."

Loque and his colleagues believe that the APFL strategy they used to enhance polysaccharide deposition in the fibers of their Arabidopsis plants could be rapidly implemented into other vascular plant species as well. This could increase cell wall content to the benefit of the pulping industry and forage production as well as for bioenergy applications. It could also be used to increase the strength of cereal straws, reducing crop lodging and seed losses. Since regulatory networks and other components of secondary cell wall biosynthesis have been highly conserved by evolution, the researchers feel their lignin rewiring strategy should also be readily transferrable to other plant species. They are currently developing new and even better versions of these strategies.

"We now know that we can significantly re-engineer plant cell walls as long as we maintain the integrity of vessels and other key tissues," Loque says.

A paper describing this research in detail has been published in Plant Biotechnology Journal. The paper is titled "Engineering secondary cell wall deposition in plants." Loque is the corresponding author. Co-authors are Fan Yang, Prajakta Mitra, Ling Zhang, Lina Prak, Yves Verhertbruggen, Jin-Sun Kim, Lan Sun, Kejian Zheng, Kexuan Tang, Manfred Auer and Henrik Scheller.

This research was supported by the DOE Office of Science.

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The above story is reprinted from materials provided by DOE/Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory.

Note: Materials may be edited for content and length. For further information, please contact the source cited above.


Journal Reference:

  1. Fan Yang, Prajakta Mitra, Ling Zhang, Lina Prak, Yves Verhertbruggen, Jin-Sun Kim, Lan Sun, Kejian Zheng, Kexuan Tang, Manfred Auer, Henrik V. Scheller, Dominique Loqu. Engineering secondary cell wall deposition in plants. Plant Biotechnology Journal, 2013; 11 (3): 325 DOI: 10.1111/pbi.12016

Note: If no author is given, the source is cited instead.

Disclaimer: Views expressed in this article do not necessarily reflect those of ScienceDaily or its staff.

Source: http://feeds.sciencedaily.com/~r/sciencedaily/top_news/top_environment/~3/VnUOT6b1alA/130329161247.htm

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Researchers combat obesity with tech tools popular with teens


The best weapon in the battle against obesity may already be in the hands of children and teenagers.

That?s the thinking behind the work of several researchers and technologists around the country who hope to turn cell phones into devices that can help young people make healthier food and lifestyle choices.

A recent Pew Internet study found that 78 percent of teens now have a cell phone, and almost half of them ? 47 percent -- own smartphones with computing capability.

?It?s interesting because most often we think using technology is part of the problem,? said Dr. Susan Woolford of the Pediatric Comprehensive Weight Management Center at the University of Michigan, pointing to video games and other uses of technology that have made teens more sedentary. ?We actually hope that using this new technology will help us.?

Woolford leads a team that sends highly tailored and targeted text messages to obese adolescents to help them change their behaviors. The messages urge teens to reduce their time in front of TV and computer screens, eat a healthy breakfast and more fruits and vegetables, and reduce the number of sweets and sugary beverages in their diets.

The initial test program had bout 25 volunteer participants -- overweight teens who are participating in university's weight management program.

To get the most effective messages to individual teens, participants in the pilot program filled out an online survey with questions about their activity level, what kind of support they have, what kind of foods they prefer and what inspires them to lose weight.

From there, the team has developed an extensive library of unique automated messages that are sent daily. Their goal is to get the right message at the right time to the right person.

?We aren?t going to suggest you play basketball as an activity if you said your interest was in water sports,? Woolford said.

Or if a teen prefers dairy for breakfast, the team?s text might suggest low-fat yogurt.

Woolford said the feedback from the participants has been crucial in shaping the messages.

She pointed to a text suggesting alternative snacks that said, ?Instead of ice cream try frozen yogurt today." But some teens in the study were quick to point out when they see the words ?ice cream? in a message they were not able to see the healthy alternative that comes later.

So, Woolford said, the text message simply became "Try yogurt this morning."

?I think technology is definitely going to help us,? she said, ?It?s not just sending a text message, it?s send the right text message. And if we pay attention to the content we hope the success will be greater.?

In Massachusetts, Dr. Nicolas Oreskovic is using another common smartphone feature ? the Global Positioning System ? to study where in a city and when young people are active.

?What urban spaces do they use for physical activity and what spaces they do not use for physical activity?? Oreskovic asked.

Oreskovic and his team based at Massachusetts General Hospital?s Center for Child and Adolescent Health Policy had teens in Revere, Mass. wear GPS devices on their wrists and accelerometers on their hips for several months over three seasons to collect data on the location and activity of their daily routines.

By plotting the results on a city map, Oreskovic noticed that children tend to be active in outdoor spaces like parks, playgrounds, streets and sidewalks rather than indoor spaces like their home and school. He also charted when they are most active and where and when they walked to a park or playground.

Oreskovic said he hopes such studies help urban planners design cities and towns to promote a more healthy and active lifestyle in children.

If city officials had good data about how children use their sidewalks, parks and open areas, they can redesign communities with the right walking paths to the right parks, Oreskovic said. Decisions could be made using scientific data, which in turn should encourage more use of a city's parks, playscapes and open space.

Oreskovic said a next step could be to use location mapping to help teens find healthy food options and places to spend their time. The GPS on their cellphones and texting technology could be combined to point teens to a safe park to play or suggest a healthier restaurant near their favorite fast food joint.

?I think the wave of the future in these not traditional areas,? Oreskovic said. ?Intervention in schools has had a limited impact. These novel technology areas are where we can individualize obesity counseling may be helpful.?

Technology is making great strides in the fight against obesity according to Dr. Philip Schauer, director of the Bariatric and Metabolic Institute at the Cleveland Clinic. Schauer said hundreds of applications on mobile and desktop and computerized devices, like smart watches and digital jewelry, are being developed to help users maintain a healthy lifestyle.

?Some of these smart watches can help us with weight, they can keep track of the steps day we take each day, the calories burning and track our weight on daily basis," Schauer said.

"There?s all kinds of apps, more and more come out each day and it?s hard to keep track of them,? Schauer said. ?I even think they are working on one where you can take a picture of the food eating with the camera on your smartphone and an app tells you how many calories it is.?

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/lookout/researchers-combat-obesity-tech-tools-popular-teens-135530214.html

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Turkish insurance: more deals to come | beyondbrics

Men fish on the Bosphorus on February 23, 2012 in Istanbul, Turkey.

Reluctant customers

Turkey?s insurance sector could be heading for a period of consolidation following the announcement that Germany?s Allianz is to buy the non-life and pensions business of Turkey?s Yapi Kredi.

That deal makes Allianz Turkey?s biggest non-life insurer and largest private pension provider by portfolio size and the third largest life insurer. But analysts say there could be more deals to come ? and plenty of opportunity for growth in an under-insured country.

Allianz will have around 15 per cent of the Turkish non-life market, allowing it to leapfrog sector leaders Axa and Aandolu, as well as 21 per cent of the pensions market putting it just ahead of Anadolu on 20 per cent, and 11 per cent of the life market, giving it third place.

But despite its clout, Allianz may face an uphill struggle to persuade Turks of the need to take out insurance in the first place, analysts say.

?The perception of risk in Turkey is low and so is penetration, and profitability so insurers have to look to economies of scale,? says Recep Demir, insurance analyst at Istanbul?s Garanti Securities.

Importantly, Allianz?s deal for Yapi Kredi?s insurance arm includes a 15-year agreement under which Yapi Kredi ? Turkey?s fourth-largest bank by assets and loans, will continue to market Allianz products on an exclusive basis.

That?s an important consideration says Demir, pointing out that one of the reasons for the low profitability of Turkey?s insurance sector has been its antiquated market structure.

?Sixty percent of policies are still sold through insurance agents who take a share of the premium,? says Demir.

And with Turkey still resisting the growth in online and direct telesales of insurance seen elsewhere in Europe, selling insurance through bank branches and web sites offers a good route to increasing profitability.

But even with banks taking a greater share of policy sales there is, says Demir, considerable scope for consolidation.

?We should be expecting some more mergers or acquisitions,? he says pointing out that Turkey?s underdeveloped insurance market does offer considerable scope for growth.

Currently the ratio of non-life premiums to GDP is only marginally over 1%, lower than the rest of Europe, with the exception of Greece.

However, Turkey?s low awareness of risk is changing. In part this is thanks to better implementation of legislation on compulsory forms of insurance such as motor vehicle insurance and earthquake insurance.

Taking out quake insurance is a now a condition for new houses to be hooked up for electricity and water.

But it?s also part due to Turkey?s young population, around 30 per cent of which is under 30, and more likely than their parents to hold credit cards and to buy newly-constructed homes, both factors which have boosted policy sales over the past decade.

Also helping are moves by the sector itself to offer a wider variety of products more likely to appeal to new consumers.

?In the second half of the year we will see the launch of new types of traffic insurance which will allow consumers to buy lower cost insurance offering a lower level of benefits,? explains Demir adding that this should help encourage higher uptake and help improve margins.

Related reading
Allianz to buy Turkish insurer for ?684m FT
Turkey: under-insured for earthquakes beyondbrics

Source: http://blogs.ft.com/beyond-brics/2013/03/28/turkish-insurance-more-deals-to-come/

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US economy expands at 0.4 percent rate

WASHINGTON (AP) ? The U.S. economy grew at a slightly faster but still anemic rate at the end of last year. However, there is hope that growth accelerated in early 2013 despite higher taxes and cuts in government spending.

The economy grew at an annual rate of 0.4 percent in the October-December quarter, the Commerce Department said Thursday. That was slightly better than the previous estimate of 0.1 percent growth. The revision reflected stronger business investment and export sales.

Analysts think the economy is growing at a rate of around 2.5 percent in the current January-March quarter, which ends this week.

Steady hiring has kept consumers spending this year. And a rebound in company stockpiling, further gains in housing and more business spending also likely drove faster growth in the first quarter.

The 0.4 percent growth rate for the gross domestic product, the economy's total output of goods and services, was the weakest quarterly performance in almost two years and followed a much faster 3.1 percent increase in the third quarter. The fourth quarter was hurt by the sharpest fall in defense spending in 40 years.

For all of 2012, the economy grew 2.2 percent after a 1.8 percent increase in 2011 and a 2.4 percent advance in 2010. Since the recession ended in mid-2009, the economy has been expanding at sub-par rates as a string of problems from higher gas prices to Europe's debt crisis have acted as a drag on the U.S. economy.

Growth appears to be strengthening this year even after taxes increased on Jan. 1 and automatic government spending cuts totaling $85 billion started to take effect on March 1. The Congressional Budget Office has estimated that the combination of tax increases and spending cuts could trim economic growth this year by about 1.5 percentage points. The CBO is predicting just 1.5 percent growth for 2013.

But so far, the economy is showing signs of holding its own against the fiscal drag.

Employers have added an average of 200,000 jobs a month since November. That helped lower the unemployment rate in February to 7.7 percent, a four-year low.

Economists expect similar job gains in March, in part because a measure of unemployment benefit applications fell this month to a five-year low.

Sales of previously occupied homes rose in February to the highest level in nearly three years, while builders broke ground on more houses and apartments. Annual home prices jumped in January by the most since June 2006, according to a closely watched measure.

Stock prices have surged. On Wednesday, the Standard & Poor's 500 index was within two points of its all-time high.

All of that is making consumers feel wealthier, which could lead to more spending. Consumer spending drives 70 percent of economic activity.

The Federal Reserve still thinks the economy needs aggressive measures to bolster growth. Last week it stood by its plan to keep a key short-term interest rate near zero until unemployment drops below 6.5 percent. The Fed also left unchanged its plan to keep buying $85 billion in bonds until it sees a substantial improvement in the job market.

The slowdown in business inventories trimmed 1.5 percentage point from growth in the fourth quarter and the reductions in defense spending cut another 1.3 percentage point from growth.

Consumer spending was growing at a 1.8 percent rate in the fourth quarter, slightly better than the 1.6 percent increase in the third quarter but down from last month's estimate that consumer spending was growing by 2.1 percent.

That revision was offset by upward revisions in business investment spending on structures and equipment and by stronger sales of U.S. exports.

The government first estimated two months ago that the economy had contracted at an annual rate of 0.1 percent in the fourth quarter, a decline that was erased by the revisions.

The government will release its first look at first quarter growth on April 26.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/us-economy-expands-0-4-percent-rate-123349960--finance.html

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Monroe, Eisenhower letters to be auctioned

NEW YORK (AP) ? Marilyn Monroe's letter of despair to mentor Lee Strasberg, and Dwight D. Eisenhower's heartfelt missives to his wife during World War II are among hundreds of historical documents being offered in an online auction.

Monroe's handwritten, undated letter to the famed acting teacher is expected to fetch $30,000 to $50,000 in the May 30 sale.

"My will is weak but I can't stand anything. I sound crazy but I think I'm going crazy," Monroe wrote on Hotel Bel-Air letterhead stationery. "It's just that I get before a camera and my concentration and everything I'm trying to learn leaves me. Then I feel like I'm not existing in the human race at all."

The 58 Eisenhower letters, handwritten between 1942 and 1945, range from news of the war to the Allied commander's devotion to his wife, Mamie. They are believed to be among the largest group of Eisenhower letters to survive intact and could bring up to $120,000, said Joseph Maddalena, whose Profiles in History is auctioning the items.

They are among 250 letters and documents being sold by an anonymous American collector. Selected items will be exhibited April 8-16 at Douglas Elliman's Madison Avenue art gallery.

Also included is a typed, undated draft letter from John Lennon to Linda and Paul McCartney that reflects the deep animosity between the two Beatles around the time of the foursome's formal 1971 breakup. The two-page letter is unsigned and contains corrections. A photographic logo on the stationery shows Lennon and his wife Yoko Ono within a circle with their lips almost touching.

"Do you really think most of today's art came about because of the Beatles? I don't believe you're that insane ? Paul ? do you believe that? When you stop believing it you might wake up!" Lennon writes. It's expected to fetch $40,000 to $60,000.

Other highlights include two large photo albums that Adolph Hitler and Benito Mussolini exchanged prior to War World II.

"When Mussolini and Hitler visited each other before the war, they would each have their photographers document their trips," Maddalena said. "They really documented the regalia, the flags, the uniforms, tanks and all the pomp and circumstance, and them speaking and reviewing the troops."

The leather-bound albums, containing hundreds of images, have a pre-sale estimate of up to $50,000.

The sale is the second of several planned online auctions of the anonymous collector's artifacts. The entire collection contains 3,000 items.

____

Online: www.profilesinhistory.com

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/monroe-eisenhower-letters-auctioned-062939252.html

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Friday, March 29, 2013

Despite threats, North Korea keeps border factories open

By Ju-min Park

PAJU, South Korea (Reuters) - A heavily armed border crossing between North and South Korea that allows the North access to $2 billion in trade a year, one of its few avenues to foreign currency, remained open on Thursday despite Pyongyang's move to cut communications.

North Korea on Wednesday severed the last of three telephone hotlines with South Korea as it readied its troops to face what it believes to be "hostile" action from Seoul and Washington. The phone line is used to regulate access to the Kaesong industrial park on the North Korean side of the border as well as for military communications with the South.

Nearly 200 South Koreans and 166 vehicles carrying oil and materials drove into the park just inside the North early on Thursday after North Korean authorities used a separate phone line from the park's management office to allow access, South Korean officials said.

The North has already cut a direct hotline to U.S. military forces stationed in South Korea and a Red Cross line that had been used by the governments on both sides.

Severing hotlines is one of the least threatening but symbolic things Pyongyang can do to raise tensions and at the same time pressure Seoul and Washington to restart dialogue, said Yang Moo-jin of the University of North Korean Studies in Seoul.

North Korea periodically cuts the lines. Its latest moves follow U.N. sanctions imposed for its February 12 nuclear test and routine drills by South Korean and U.S. forces. Pyongyang has also scrapped an armistice that ended the 1950-53 Korean War.

"What else can they do? Actually start a war?" said Yang.

"Not answering the phone and saying the armistice is not valid any more, that's what they can do and they've done this before."

NORTH STILL ACCEPTING US DOLLARS

Workers and traders crossing the world's most heavily militarized border made sure they had U.S. dollar bills for the trip, some borrowing from a co-worker so they had enough of the zone's officially accepted currency.

Pyongyang's rhetoric against Washington including a vow to attack its military bases in the Pacific and to stage a nuclear strike has not yet extended to its willingness to accept dollars, which South Koreans said they had to use to buy cigarettes and other goods in the zone.

"I am a bit nervous but it looked the same as before when I went in there yesterday," truck driver Park Chul-hee, 44, told Reuters outside the Paju customs office. North Korean soldiers in and around Kaesong had been wearing combat fatigues recently, he added.

The North-South military hotline was used on a daily basis to process South Koreans and vehicles across the border and in and out of the Kaesong project, where 123 South Korean firms employ more than 50,000 North Koreans to make household goods.

About 120 South Koreans remain in the park on an average day. The presence of South Koreans at Kaesong poses a potentially serious political risk for Seoul given they could be trapped if Pyongyang sealed the border.

The first of the 511 people and 398 vehicles who were scheduled to return from the zone on Thursday began crossing the border into the South, indicating the crossing was operating normally in both directions.

"I think the third nuclear test is the last tipping point. I was worried so I came out," said one South Korean who has been running a factory in Kaesong for six years and who requested anonymity due to the sensitivity of the issue.

Few people believe the North will shut down the project.

The $2 billion a year it generates reduces Pyongyang's dependency on China, which accounted for almost $6 billion in trade in 2012, according to South Korean government estimates.

Kaesong also generates more than $80 million a year in cash in wages. This is paid to the state rather than to workers.

(Writing by Jack Kim, Editing by Dean Yates)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/despite-threats-north-korea-keeps-border-factories-open-015119364.html

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New U.S. Cyber-Security Law May Hinder Lenovo's Sales Growth

Image (1) lenovo_logo1.jpg for post 72425The funding bill President Barack Obama signed this week didn't just prevent a government shutdown. It also included a provision requiring that U.S. government technology purchases first go through a cyber-espionage review process--a move that could potentially impact the sales of Chinese tech companies like Lenovo, which relies on sales to U.S. government agencies and schools as part of its North American growth strategy.

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Techcrunch/~3/8KUxSurJ6dU/

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Services growth suggests Britain might just skirt recession

By William Schomberg and Olesya Dmitracova

LONDON (Reuters) - Britain's dominant services industry grew at its strongest pace in five months in January, a small boost to chances the country might narrowly skirt a new recession.

Output in the sector, which accounts for more than three quarters of the economy, rose 0.3 percent in January from December, the Office for National Statistics said on Thursday.

That was its best performance since August although the data can often prove volatile.

Separate surveys showing that house prices posted their first annual rise in more than a year and consumer confidence held steady, albeit a low levels, added to a picture of a slow and delicate recovery.

Jens Larsen, chief European economist at RBC Capital Markets, said the services data suggested zero growth in the economy in the first quarter.

That would mean Britain escapes a recession - as defined by two consecutive quarters of contraction - by the narrowest possible margin.

Other economists thought Britain's economy shrank in the January-March period, an embarrassment for the government which is sticking to its fiscal austerity push.

"Today's data wasn't a disaster, but is it good enough?" said Alan Clarke, economist at Scotiabank. "It's a close call but my feeling is a triple-dip recession is more likely than not."

Weak as it is, Britain's economy is not as fragile as some in Europe, according to forecasts from the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development released on Thursday. They showed Britain was set to outperform France and Italy, but not Germany, in the first two quarters of 2013.

SERVICES FIRM, FACTORIES STRUGGLE

Thursday's services data feeds into the ONS's calculation of gross domestic product. A first reading of GDP in the January-March period is due to be released on April 25.

On a year-on-year basis, services output was up 0.8 percent, the ONS said.

A separate Purchasing Managers' Index survey of Britain's services industry released earlier this month also showed the sector holding up.

Its performance contrasts with a weaker picture in manufacturing. Official data showed earlier that manufacturing output fell in January at the fastest pace since June.

Helping services in January was activity in the transport, storage and communications sector as well as in business services and finance. Cold weather and snowfall in the month held back trade at some smaller retailers and at pubs and bars.

Another long spell of cold weather in March could prove the factor that pushes Britain's economy into a new recession.

In the three months to the end of January, services output was down 0.2 percent compared with the three months to the end of October when the London Olympics boosted the economy.

Separately, the ONS reported that productivity across all sectors of the economy, as measured by output per hour, fell 0.5 percent in the fourth quarter compared with the third quarter.

That was the sixth successive decline in British productivity by that measure. Britain has seen rising employment but falling output per worker, which many economists say could reflect companies' desire to keep employees on their books while offering them lower wage growth, rather than firing them.

But some say the productivity numbers might be a sign of something more worrying.

"There is a growing focus on 'zombie' companies that are essentially being kept alive by low interest rates and banks' reluctance to write off loans," said Howard Archer at IHS Global Insight, adding that would prevent new firms from succeeding.

Unit wage costs rose 0.5 percent in the October-December period compared with the previous three months.

(Editing by Jeremy Gaunt.)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/uk-services-output-rises-january-easing-recession-fears-093418366--business.html

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Termites 'engineer fairy circles'

A German scientist thinks he can now explain the strange rings of grass that cover great swathes of desert-margin land in southwestern Africa.

These so-called fairy circles have variously been pinned on the presence of other, poisonous plants, on ants, and even toxic gases rising from below.

But Norbert Juergens says the one ever-present factor is sand termites.

The creatures have engineered the rings to maintain a supply of water in their environment, he tells Science magazine.

The University of Hamburg researcher has been studying fairy circles for many years, examining hundreds of them in detail.

He reports how the invertebrates (Psammotermes allocerus) first clear a patch of ground by eating the roots of short-lived, annual grasses.

This bare, sandy earth then becomes an effective rain trap - with no vegetation, water cannot be lost through transpiration (the evaporation of water from plants).

Instead, it collects, oasis-like, just below the surface where it can sustain the termites and a supply of perennial grasses at the margins of the circles. These are available to eat even in the driest seasons.

The regime, says Prof Juergens, also drives wider benefits, with the insects becoming a valuable food resource for a whole range of other animals such as geckos, moles, aardvarks, jackals, spiders, ants and the like.

Beaver beater

The Hamburg scientist argues that the termites' behaviour surpasses the accomplishments of that other great ecosystem engineer - the beaver.

"We all admire the beaver for the way it can turn a linear river into a lake with a dam, but the termites turning the desert into a pattern of oases that allow permanent life even in drought periods for hundreds of years - that's much more fascinating," he told BBC News.

"What is more, these termites do it on a large scale - over hundreds of square kilometres. They should replace the beaver as the text-book engineer."

Fairy circles appear in a narrow belt that skirts the eastern edge of the Namib Desert from Angola to South Africa.

They have long fascinated foreign researchers, especially from Europe.

The name is almost certainly derived from the terms used to describe the rings of mushrooms often seen in forested areas. In Germany, for example, such fungi circles are known as "hexenring" - "witches' rings".

Prof Juergens says climate is a key controlling parameter in the location of the African features.

He notes how their occurrence hugs the isohyet of 100mm mean annual precipitation.

"It's very pronounced; they're really adapted to that amount of annual precipitation," he told BBC News. "If the climate changed [to wetter conditions], this belt of occurrence would shift to a more arid part of the desert. If the climate got drier in general, they would shift towards the east, inland."

Rival ideas still abound for the circles' formation. Some researchers still maintain they are just a natural pattern adopted by vegetation when competing for scarce resources.

Jonathan.Amos-INTERNET@bbc.co.uk and follow me on Twitter: @BBCAmos

Source: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-21970408#sa-ns_mchannel=rss&ns_source=PublicRSS20-sa

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Thursday, March 28, 2013

Study: Health law to raise claims cost 32 percent

WASHINGTON (AP) ? A new study finds that insurance companies will have to pay out an average of 32 percent more for medical claims on individual health policies under President Barack Obama's health care overhaul.

What does that mean for you?

It could increase premiums for at least some Americans.

If you are uninsured, or you buy your policy directly from an insurance company, you should pay attention.

But if you have an employer plan, like most workers and their families, odds are you don't have much to worry about.

The estimates from the Society of Actuaries could turn into a political headache for the Obama administration at a time when much of the country remains skeptical of the Affordable Care Act.

The administration is questioning the study, saying it doesn't give a full picture ? and costs will go down.

Actuaries are financial risk professionals who conduct long-range cost estimates for pension plans, insurance companies and government programs.

The study says claims costs will go up largely because sicker people will join the insurance pool. That's because the law forbids insurers from turning down those with pre-existing medical problems, effective Jan. 1. Everyone gets sick sooner or later, but sicker people also use more health care services.

"Claims cost is the most important driver of health care premiums," said Kristi Bohn, an actuary who worked on the study. Spending on sicker people and other high-cost groups will overwhelm an influx of younger, healthier people into the program, said the report.

The Obama administration challenged the design of the study, saying it focused only on one piece of the puzzle and ignored cost relief strategies in the law, such as tax credits to help people afford premiums and special payments to insurers who attract an outsize share of the sick.

The study also doesn't take into account the potential price-cutting effect of competition in new state insurance markets that will go live Oct. 1, administration officials said.

At a White House briefing Tuesday, Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius said some of what passes for health insurance today is so skimpy it can't be compared to the comprehensive coverage available under the law. "Some of these folks have very high catastrophic plans that don't pay for anything unless you get hit by a bus," she said. "They're really mortgage protection, not health insurance."

Sebelius said the picture on premiums won't start coming into focus until insurers submit their bids. Those results may not be publicly known until late summer.

Another striking finding of the report was a wide disparity in cost impact among the states.

While some states will see medical claims costs per person decline, the report concluded that the overwhelming majority will see double-digit increases in their individual health insurance markets, where people purchase coverage directly from insurers.

The differences are big. By 2017, the estimated increase would be 62 percent for California, about 80 percent for Ohio, more than 20 percent for Florida and 67 percent for Maryland. Much of the reason for the higher claims costs is that sicker people are expected to join the pool, the report said.

Part of the reason for the wide disparities is that states have different populations and insurance rules. In the relatively small number of states where insurers were already restricted from charging higher rates to older, sicker people, the cost impact is less.

The report did not make similar estimates for employer plans that most workers and families rely on. That's because the primary impact of Obama's law is on people who don't have coverage through their jobs.

A prominent national expert, recently retired Medicare chief actuary Rick Foster, said the report does "a credible job" of estimating potential enrollment and costs under the law, "without trying to tilt the answers in any particular direction."

"Having said that," Foster added, "actuaries tend to be financially conservative, so the various assumptions might be more inclined to consider what might go wrong than to anticipate that everything will work beautifully." Actuaries use statistics and economic theory to make long-range cost projections for insurance and pension programs sponsored by businesses and government. The society is headquartered near Chicago.

Bohn, the actuary who worked on the study, acknowledged it did not attempt to estimate the effect of subsidies, insurer competition and other factors that could offset cost increases. She said the goal was to look at the underlying cost of medical care.

"We don't see ourselves as a political organization," Bohn added. "We are trying to figure out what the situation at hand is."

On the plus side, the report found the law will cover more than 32 million currently uninsured Americans when fully phased in. And some states ? including New York and Massachusetts ? will see double-digit declines in costs for claims in the individual market.

Uncertainty over costs has been a major issue since the law passed three years ago, and remains so just months before a big push to cover the uninsured gets rolling Oct. 1. Middle-class households will be able to purchase subsidized private insurance in new marketplaces, while low-income people will be steered to Medicaid and other safety net programs. States are free to accept or reject a Medicaid expansion also offered under the law.

___

AP White House Correspondent Julie Pace contributed to this report.

___

Online:

Society of Actuaries: http://www.soa.org/NewlyInsured/

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/study-health-law-raise-claims-cost-32-percent-070021624--finance.html

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