Attorney Kathleen Nastri was elected by the members of the American Association for Justice's (AAJ) Board of Governors to serve on AAJ's Executive Committee. Attorney Nastri will serve on the committee for the 2012-2013 term. The purpose of the Executive Committee is to oversee the management of AAJ. Members are selected by election or by virtue of other positions held, and two members are appointed directly by the President of AAJ. Elections took place at the AAJ annual summer convention, which was held in Chicago in July. Kathleen is an attorney at the Bridgeport-based ...

The Million Dollar Advocates Forum is pleased to announce that attorney Eric H. Philpot of Greenville, South Carolina has been certified as a life member of both the Million Dollar Advocates Forum and the Multi-Million Dollar Advocates Forum. The Million Dollar Advocates Forum is recognized as one of the most prestigious groups of trial lawyers in the United States. Membership is limited to attorneys who have won million and multi-million dollar verdicts, awards and settlements. The organization was founded in 1993 and there are approximately 4000 members located throughout ...

New research released from car insurance expert Confused.com, has revealed that the cost of parking has grown from being a necessary inconvenience, into a leading factor in the deterioration of UK high streets. Parking prices rose 12.5% over last year alone, forcing Brits to spend close to a whopping GBP8bn a year on parking their cars, but this parking spending spree might be about to grind to a halt. Confused.com has found that over-priced parking is now proving to be too great a turn-off for the majority of UK shoppers with over two thirds (69%) of Brits reporting ...

Hotter Comfort Concept Shoes has revealed its new Autumn collection, with 27 new ladies' styles. Comfy shoe fans will be delighted with Hotter's new Autumn collection, each and every style has been given individual attention to guarantee the ultimate, lightweight feeling with design features to guarantee they will look as good as they feel. The new collection features a style for every occasion so the Hotter customer can wear something comfy and stylish wherever they go, whether it's work shoes, casual shoes for a day of shopping or meeting up with friends, attending ...

Smithfield's Chicken 'N Bar-B-Q (SCNB) is excited to announce the launch of their annual fall football promotions, including the always popular Smithfield's Chicken 'N Bar-B-Q photo contest and a new addition to the lineup - The RealTailgate.com College Football Show. Smithfield's Chicken 'N Bar-B-Q kicks off the 2012 fall football tailgating season with "The RealTailgate.com College Football Show" sponsored by Smithfield's Chicken 'N Bar-B-Q". Hosted by Demetri Ravanos (host of The Morning Drive on Talk Radio 850)  and Rashim Lee (editor and blogger for ...

Dallas-based TerraHawk, LLC has joined the newly-formed BSTC (Border Security Technology Consortium). The mission of the BSTC is to execute R&D and prototyping/piloting initiatives using innovative contracting methodologies and enhance innovation and responsiveness in a dynamic border security environment. According to the BSTC website (http://www.bstc.scra.org), the benefit of the newly-formed consortium to the United States Government is to offer greater technology and prototype acquisition speed that will hopefully get new technology to the Border more expediently ...

Boston, Mass. - Although some studies have portrayed tight blood sugar control as a potential means of lowering infection rates in critically ill adults, a new study—led by principal investigator Michael Agus, MD, director of the Medicine Critical Care Program at Boston Children's Hospital—found no indication that the approach benefits pediatric patients undergoing heart surgery. The results of the Safe Pediatric Euglycemia in Cardiac Surgery (SPECS) trial, which was conducted at Boston Children's and at the University of Michigan C.S. Mott Children's Hospital, will appear ...

TEMPE, Ariz. – A team of researchers from Arizona State University have found that warming resulting from megapolitan expansion is seasonally dependent, with greatest warming occurring during summer and least during winter. Among the most practical ways to combat urbanization-induced warming – the painting of building's roofs white – was found to disrupt regional hydroclimate, highlighting the need for evaluation of tradeoffs associated with combating urban heat islands (UHI). "We found that raising the reflectivity of buildings by painting their roofs white is an effective ...

High blood pressure is responsible for many cardiovascular diseases that are the leading cause of death in industrialized countries. High salt intake has long been considered a risk factor, but not every type of high blood pressure is associated with high salt intake. This has puzzled scientists for a long time. However, new findings by Professor Jens Titze (Vanderbilt University, Nashville, Tennessee, USA and the University of Erlangen) now point to previously unknown mechanisms. Accordingly, the skin and the immune system play an important role in the regulation of the ...

At the 1st ECRC "Franz-Volhard" Symposium on September 7, 2012 at the Max Delbrück Center for Molecular Medicine (MDC) in Berlin-Buch, Professor Ken Bernstein reported that in mice an excess of ACE led to a much stronger immune response than usual. In animal experiments, not only could bacterial infections be combated more effectively, but also the growth of aggressive skin cancer (melanoma) in mice could be contained by a stronger response of the immune system. In contrast, if the mice lacked ACE, the immune cells worked less effectively. In addition, ACE apparently ...

Tight blood sugar control in infants and children undergoing heart surgery does not lower the risk of infection or improve recovery, according to a study funded by the National Institutes of Health. Infants and children who have undergone heart surgery commonly develop high blood sugar levels, which may be associated with health issues and death. Although the results of clinical trials have been mixed, some studies of adult intensive care unit (ICU) patients have found that controlling blood sugar levels with insulin resulted in fewer infections and shorter hospital ...

New research from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology reveals that some unlikely subjects--bacteria--can have social structures similar to plants and animals. The research shows that a few individuals in groups of closely related bacteria have the ability to produce chemical compounds that kill or slow the growth of other populations of bacteria in the environment, but not harm their own. Published in the September 7 issue of the journal Science, the finding suggests that bacteria in the environment can play different social roles and that competition occurs not ...

Increasing racial and ethnic diversity has long been apparent at the national level and in our nation's largest metropolitan gateways. Since 1980 over nine-tenths of all cities, suburbs and small towns have become more diverse. And rural communities are following the lead of their urban counterparts, according to a U.S. 2010 policy brief. "What really stands out is the near-universal nature of the trend toward greater racial and ethnic diversity at the local level," said Barry Lee, professor of sociology and demography, Penn State, and co-author of the brief. Another ...

This year's mild winter and early spring were a bonanza for tick populations in the eastern United States. Reports of tick-borne disease rose fast. While Lyme disease is the most common tick-borne disease in the Northeast and Upper Midwest, new research results emphasize that it is not the greatest cause for concern in most Southeastern states. The findings are published today in a paper in the journal Zoonoses and Public Health. The majority of human-biting ticks in the North--members of the blacklegged tick species--cause Lyme disease, but these same ticks do not ...

Hurricane Leslie appeared to "close its eye" on NASA satellite imagery as the storm heads east of Bermuda, like a little girl shutting her eyes tight on a wild amusement ride. Often when an eye becomes cloud-filled, its a sign that the storm is weakening, and Leslie did drop from a hurricane to a tropical storm on Sept. 7. The Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) instrument aboard NASA's Terra satellite captured a visible image of Hurricane Leslie on Sept. 6 at 10:45 a.m. EDT and Leslie's eye appeared cloud covered. Leslie went on to weaken to tropical ...

ARGONNE, ILL. (Sept. 6, 2012) -- Using ultrafast X-rays, scientists for the first time have watched how quickly electrons hop their way through rust nanoparticles. This gives key insight to how iron oxide, one of the most abundant minerals in soil, behaves and alters the condition of soil and water around it. This also demonstrates the potential of time-resolved X-ray and optical methods to study chemical reactions at the subnanoscale in other semiconductors. Scientists have long known that certain minerals, redox active ions and biological proteins can exchange electrons ...

As tailgaters everywhere ramp up for another weekend of college football, University of Notre Dame marketing professor and cultural anthropologist John Sherry has just concluded first-of-its-kind research that shows those huge pre-game parking lot parties build community, nurture tradition, and actually contribute to a school's brand—at least for the fans. In their study, "A Cultural Analysis of Tailgating," Sherry and co-author Tonya Bradford, assistant professor of marketing at Notre Dame, examine American culture and our obsession with football, which Sherry calls "the ...

J. Christopher Howk, Nicolas Lehner and Grant Mathews of the Center for Astrophysics at the University of Notre Dame published a paper this week in the journal Nature titled "Observation of interstellar lithium in the low-metallicity Small Magellanic Cloud." The astrophysicists have explored a discrepancy between the amount of lithium predicted by the standard models of elemental production during the Big Bang and the amount of lithium observed in the gas of the Small Magellanic Cloud, a galaxy near to our own. "The paper involves measuring the amount of lithium in the ...

A team of scientists from Johns Hopkins and other institutions report that restoring tiny, hair-like structures to defective cells in the olfactory system of mice is enough to restore a lost sense of smell. The results of the experiments were published online this week in Nature Medicine, and are believed to represent the first successful application of gene therapy to restore this function in live mammals. An expert in olfaction, Randall Reed, Ph.D., professor of molecular biology and genetics and co-director of the Center for Sensory Biology at the Johns Hopkins Institute ...

Expectant mothers who learn from prenatal diagnosis that they are carrying a fetus with a congenital heart defect (CHD) commonly suffer post-traumatic stress, depression and anxiety. However, a healthy relationship with one's partner and positive coping mechanisms can reduce this intense stress, according to new research from the Cardiac Center of The Children's Hospital of Philadelphia. The study is published in the September 2012 issue of The Journal of Pediatrics. "Receiving the news of carrying a fetus with a CHD is a stressful event which can potentially influence ...

Can an abundance of sea otters help reverse a principal cause of global warming? A new study by two UC Santa Cruz researchers suggest that a thriving sea otter population that keeps sea urchins in check will in turn allow kelp forests to prosper. The spreading kelp can absorb as much as 12 times the amount of CO2 from the atmosphere than if it were subject to ravenous sea urchins, the study finds. The theory is outlined in a paper released online today (September 7, 2012) in Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment by lead authors UC Santa Cruz professors Chris Wilmers ...

The structure of a federal program that provides monthly subsidies to promote the adoptions of special needs children in foster care may actually be delaying some adoptions, according to a new study by University of Notre Dame economist Kasey Buckles. The Adoption Assistance and Child Welfare Act (AACWA), passed in 1980, provides an average of $670 per month for foster parents of special needs children, while adoptive parents of special needs children receive an average of $571 per month. "Special needs" refers to foster children who may be harder to place ...

COLLEGE STATION – Improperly applied fertilizer to newly placed sod may result in nutrient runoff into the water supply, but just when is the best time to apply fertilizer and what kind is the best for new turf? Aiming to answer those questions is a team of scientists from Texas A&M AgriLife Research: Dr. Jacqui Aitkenhead-Peterson, assistant professor of urban nutrient and water management; Dr. Ben Wherley, assistant professor of turfgrass science and ecology; Dr. Richard White, professor of turfgrass physiology and management; and Jim Thomas, senior research associate, ...

VIDEO: The movie shows a segment of the mutant intestine (3.5 day old fish, lateral view of the intestine). The time lapse images were taken over about six to eight hours.... Click here for more information. PHILADELPHIA — The stiffness of breast tissue is increasingly recognized as an important factor explaining the onset of breast cancer. Stiffening induces molecular changes that promote cancerous behavior in cells. Bioengineering studies have found that breast cancer ...

NASA has begun its latest hurricane science field campaign by flying an unmanned Global Hawk aircraft over Hurricane Leslie in the Atlantic Ocean during a day-long flight from California to Virginia. With the Hurricane and Severe Storm Sentinel (HS3) mission, NASA for the first time will be flying Global Hawks from the U.S. East Coast. The Global Hawk took off from NASA's Dryden Flight Research Center at Edwards Air Force Base, Calif., Thursday and landed at the agency's Wallops Flight Facility on Wallops Island, Va., today at 11:37 a.m. EDT after spending 10 hours collecting ...