High-quality eyewear retailer America's Best would like to remind the nation of the importance of having regular eye exams. Most experts agree that adults who wear eyeglasses with corrective lenses, as well as those that do not, should have an eye exam at least once every two years. Children may need more frequent examinations; many experts recommend that children get eye exams annually, just before the start of each school year, in order to ensure that vision problems do not end up interfering with their learning. During an eye examination, an eye doctor will evaluate ...

The bankruptcy lawyers at Hughes & Dunstan, LLP have noticed a sharp increase in the number of bankruptcy filings from 2007 to today, and are on a mission to help debtors. Bankruptcy filings in the Central District of California and surrounding areas (from Santa Ana to Santa Barbara) have skyrocketed since 2007, and statistics show they're just starting to decline. However, there are still a large number of debtors that need assistance. In January of 2007, there were a total of 1,605 chapter 7 bankruptcy filings in the Central District, and by January 2012 this ...

Atlanta Rap Rocker, A.Tone Da Priest, is back with his second full length LP, The Fi King, set for release on September 11th, 2012 for digital download on iTunes. The lead single off the album "Not Waiting," released the month prior has already picked up steam for its controversial video unapologetically lambasting the entertainment industry with a metallic hip hop anthem with the message of anti-ignorance. Unlike his two 2011 albums, The Address EP and Stand By My Words, The Fi King's production is handled almost exclusively by A.Tone himself which creates ...

Recently a California federal court dismissed the Perez et al v. State Farm Mutual Automobile Insurance Company et al case in which plaintiffs claimed that insurance companies had violated California's antitrust statute and unfair competition. Of particular concern in the case, the plaintiffs' expert witness stated in submitted documents that with regards to six categories of aftermarket parts and four categories of salvage [recycled] parts there is at least a 25% probability that the use of these parts 'will lessen the quality of the automobile's repair as to safety, fit, ...

A Unifying Theory of the Mind: Defuse the Hidden Imbalance in Your Mind, Boost Your Intelligence, and Score More Success to Live a Happier Life We have been negligent of the fact that our stagnant instincts, blur our reasoning faculty, and lead even the brightest among us to many avoidable mistakes, and hinder both our success and happiness. This study, 25 years in the making, published in six books, reveals that our instincts marginalize our intelligence and all humans use only a fraction their applied intelligence. Then it shows how to fix it to boost your intelligence. ...

Today, at a time when the nation is becoming more and more divided, when anger and antagonism are percolating everywhere, plenty of exploitative politicians, writers and media personalities are cheerfully stirring people up with sarcasm, calls to arms, and simplistic, half-baked 'solutions' to America's problems. Andrew Cort, who describes himself as a Liberal Democrat, has written a new book on American politics and culture, "The American Psyche in Search of its Soul: Freedom, Equality, and the Restoration of Meaning", that takes a much needed different approach. ...

Several young researchers were incredibly excited when the latest Japanese cargo ship arrived at the International Space Station, in late July. Along with the usual food, clothing, and science investigations, the spacecraft delivered the two global YouTube Space Lab winning entries. Dorothy Chen and Sara Ma (from Troy, Mich.) and Amr Mohamed (from Alexandria, Egypt) won this opportunity to do research in the orbiting laboratory's microgravity environment -- while attending high school. These young scientists are working on some interesting hypotheses involving jumping ...

Redbox is not the only option for people who want to rent DVDs from kiosks at convenient locations and affordable prices. Independent operators like Bob Ennis and his partner Randi Haas, who live in Bucks County, PA near Philadelphia, are carving out a niche for their DVD rental kiosk business amid the Redbox machines. "We're providing service for the little gems in rural areas, the under-served marketplaces that fall under the radar for Redbox, but still have a high volume of traffic," says Ennis, who acquired his three kiosks from a privately held company ...

Beyond Luxury Media and Design HotelsTM are excited to announce a partnership for the first edition of the innovative travel trade event, LIMITED EDITION Miami Beach (10 - 13 June 2013, Miami). Both companies passionately believe there is an urgent need for a new travel tradeshow that breaks away from the old concept of traditional luxury travel and creates a vibrant and fresh arena for those in the high-end Contemporary Travel market; a belief that will make this partnership so electrifying. Created by Serge Dive and Sarah Ball, the Founders of Beyond Luxury Media and ...

STONY BROOK, NY, Sept. 7, 2012– A just-published study provides a first-time analysis of the value of forage fish, which are small, schooling species such as sardines, herring, and anchovies. Three kinds of contributions of forage fish were estimated: as direct catch, as food for other commercially important fish, and as an important link in the food web in marine ecosystems. The analysis showed these small fish contribute a total of $16.9 billion, as both direct catch and food for larger fish, to global fisheries annually, representing 20 percent of the global catch values ...

Bucking the idea that environmentalism hurts economic performance, a new UCLA-led study has found that companies that voluntarily adopt international "green" practices and standards have employees who are 16 percent more productive than the average. Professor Magali Delmas, an environmental economist at UCLA's Institute of the Environment and Sustainability and the UCLA Anderson School of Management, and Sanja Pekovic from France's University Paris–Dauphine are the first to study how a firm's environmental commitment affects its productivity. Their findings, forthcoming ...

The erstwhile planet Pluto (now officially an asteroid) was known for decades as a small, dark planet—hidden, difficult to spot, and on a quiet, determined course all its own. And so, when the DHS Science and Technology Directorate (S&T) needed a target semi-submersible to detect the hidden but determined maritime smuggling operations of the South American drug cartels, it created its own vessel and called it "PLUTO," after the planet that is so difficult to spot. S&T's PLUTO is a small, semi-submersible that is representative of what are popularly called "narco subs," ...

Preeclampsia is one of the most dangerous conditions for the expectant mother and the unborn child and is characterized by elevated blood pressure and protein in the urine in the last trimester of pregnancy. The cause for this life-threatening disease has long remained elusive. Recently however, Dr. Ananth Karumanchi (Associate Professor of Medicine, Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center & Harvard Medical School, Boston, Massachusetts, USA) has identified a new molecular pathway that leads to preeclampsia in humans and thus creating new avenues for the development of a therapy, ...

Genetic variations that are linked with the onset of Barrett's oesophagus (BE), a pre-cancerous condition of the lower end of the gullet, have been identified for the first time. The discovery of variations in regions on two chromosomes makes it possible to develop screening tests for people at high risk of developing the disease. Although it's been thought for some time that there may be genetic causes for BE as well as environmental ones, such as drinking alcohol and eating fatty food, so far researchers have not found any genetic variations that are associated with ...

Researchers have newly identified three genetic regions associated with primary biliary cirrhosis (PBC), the most common autoimmune liver disease, increasing the number of known regions associated with the disorder to 25. The team used a DNA microchip, called Immunochip, to survey more thoroughly regions of the genome known to underlie other autoimmune diseases to discover if they play a role also in PBC susceptibility. By combining the results from this survey with details of gene activity from a database called ENCODE, they were able to identify which cells types are ...

Since the sequencing of the human genome in 2001, all our genes – around 20,000 in total – have been identified. But much is still unknown – for instance where and when each is active. Next to each gene sits a short DNA segment, and the activity of this regulatory segment determines whether the gene will be turned on, where and how strongly. These short regulatory segments are as – if not more – important than the genes, themselves. Indeed, 90% of the mutations that cause disease occur in these regulatory areas. They are responsible for the proper development of tissues ...

A study of more than 6,000 genes in a common species of yeast has identified the pathways that govern the instability of GAA/TTC repeats. In humans, the expansions of these repeats is known to inactivate a gene – FXN – which leads to Friedreich's ataxia, a neurodegenerative disease that is currently incurable. In yeast, long repeats also destabilize the genome, manifested by the breakage of chromosomes. Working with collaborators at Tufts University, researchers at the Georgia Institute of Technology identified genetic deficiencies associated with the instability of ...

The world today confronts a water crisis with critical implications for peace, political stability and economic development, experts warn in a new report being launched Sept. 11 jointly by the InterAction Council (IAC), a group of 40 prominent former government leaders and heads of state, together with the United Nations University's Institute for Water, Environment and Health, and Canada's Walter and Duncan Gordon Foundation. "The future political impact of water scarcity may be devastating," says former Canadian Prime Minister and IAC co-chair Jean Chrétien. "Using ...

A program delivering collaborative maternity care resulted in fewer cesarean deliveries, shorter average hospital stays and higher breast-feeding rates for mothers, according to a study in CMAJ (Canadian Medical Association Journal). The South Community Birth Program was established in Vancouver, British Columbia, to deliver comprehensive care from a collaboration of family doctors, midwives, public health nurses and doulas to an ethnically diverse, low-income population. Researchers compared perinatal outcomes for 1238 women in the South Community Birth Program receiving ...

Influenza vaccination rates vary widely in Canada by ethnicity, with black and white Canadians being the least likely to be vaccinated, found a new study in CMAJ (Canadian Medical Association Journal). Research on vaccination rates among ethnic minorities in Canada is scarce, despite many studies in the United States showing clear disparities in vaccination rates among minorities and whites. However, the findings are not the same in Canada given existing differences in vaccine delivery and populations. Canadian researchers undertook a study to estimate influenza vaccine ...

Most pharmaceutical drugs in Canada are manufactured overseas in countries such as India, China and others, yet how can we be confident the drug supply is safe, writes a drug policy researcher in an opinion piece in CMAJ (Canadian Medical Association Journal). Alarmed by alerts about potentially harmful products such as nonprescription erectile dysfunction drugs with names like Uprizing 2.0 and Ying Da Wang — most from overseas — Alan Cassels began to think about pharmaceutical drugs sold in Canada. Are they safe? Who regulates them? "Most Canadians probably don't know ...

PHILADELPHIA — How does one's experience of an event get translated into a memory that can be accessed months, even years later? A team led by University of Pennsylvania scientists has come closer to answering that question, identifying key molecules that help convert short-term memories into long-term ones. These proteins may offer a target for drugs that can enhance memory, alleviating some of the cognitive symptoms that characterize conditions including schizophrenia, depression and Parkinson's and Alzheimer's diseases. Joshua Hawk, now a postdoctoral research fellow ...

Tracking malaria parasites in the liver Plasmodium falciparum is the most deadly human malaria parasite, causing more than 800,000 deaths per year. After the parasite enters the blood stream, it travels to the liver where it serially invades liver cells (hepatocytes), until it settles down to form a parasitophorous vacuole (PV). Once ensconced in its PV, the parasite undergoes a process known as liver stage (LS) development during which it spawns tens of thousands of new parasites. In this issue of the Journal of Clinical Investigation, Stefan Kappe and colleagues at ...

Iron overload increases the risk for insulin resistance and type 2 diabetes; however, the exact mechanisms that link the two are unknown. In this issue of the Journal of Clinical Investigation, Donald McClain and colleagues at the University of Utah report that serum ferritin levels could predict the presence or absence of metabolic syndrome in humans and were inversely associated with the expression of adiponectin, a blood glucose-regulating protein produced by fat cells (adipocytes). Treatment of adipocytes with iron decreased adiponectin levels, indicating that adipocytes ...

Bethesda, MD—September 10, 2012 – Listed below are the selected highlights for the September 2012 issue of the Genetics Society of America's journal, GENETICS. The September issue is available online at www.genetics.org/content/current. Please credit GENETICS, Vol. 192, September 2012, Copyright © 2012. ISSUE HIGHLIGHTS Weak selection and protein evolution, pp. 15-31 Hiroshi Akashi, Naoki Osada, and Tomoko Ohta The rapid proliferation of genome sequence data has renewed interest in the causes of molecular evolution. The authors review the basis of the "nearly ...