Orange, Calif., Dec. 16, 2011 — While Road Rippers Lightning Rods, Let's Rock Elmo and the I Am T-Pain musical microphone might be sought-after gifts this holiday season, parents should ensure that their children don't risk permanent hearing damage by misusing them. Researchers from UC Irvine's Department of Otolaryngology measured the noise levels of two dozen popular toys in stores and purchased the 10 loudest for precise gauging in a soundproof booth at UC Irvine Medical Center. They found that all exceeded 90 decibels and several reached 100 or more, equivalent to ...

Author Susan Bradley is the Keynote Speaker at a Singles Convention, Friday, January 6, 2012, 7:30pm, at Servino's Ristorante, 9 Main Street, Tiburon CA 94920. Her topic is "Finding Drama-Free Love in 2012." DANCE PARTY follows, featuring current hits and oldies. "The Number One New Years Resolution for singles is to find a happy romantic relationship," says Ms. Bradley, founder and director of LovingUniversity.com. "The key to a happy relationship is that it be drama-free. Unfortunately, many singles are addicted to drama and repeatedly choose ...

In the world of insects, high risk of attack has led to the development of camouflage as a means for survival, especially in the larval stage. One caterpillar may look like a stick, while another disguises itself as bird droppings. Though crypsis may have its advantages, University of Florida researchers uncovered some of the most extensive evidence of caterpillars using another strategy previously best-known in adult butterflies: mimicry. Insects use camouflage to protect themselves by looking like inanimate or inedible objects, while mimicry involves one species evolving ...

Whether the task is flying a plane, fighting a battle, or caring for a patient, good teamwork is crucial to getting it done right. That's why team-building and training courses are big business in the U.S., and have been for decades. But lately something has changed: "There's a demand for evaluations—an emphasis on showing that team training makes a difference in safety, decision-making, communication, clinical outcomes—you name the ultimate criteria the industry has," says Eduardo Salas, an organizational psychologist at the University of Central Florida. The answer ...

About a year ago I wrote a story about Delia Viader of Viader Wines in Napa. I was drawn to her story because of her passion for wine, the fact that she started from scratch and she was very innovative. It did not hurt that she is a very successful winemaker. One of her innovations was the use of concrete fermentation tanks that she brought to Napa from Europe. To this day she is a big fan of concrete tanks. But, now high quality tanks are made in the U.S. Recently I had a meeting with some winemakers and overheard a conversation about concrete fermentation tanks and ...

Given the incredible amounts of energy in a supernova explosion – as much as the sun creates during its entire lifetime – another erroneous doomsday theory is that such an explosion could happen in 2012 and harm life on Earth. However, given the vastness of space and the long times between supernovae, astronomers can say with certainty that there is no threatening star close enough to hurt Earth. Astronomers estimate that, on average, about one or two supernovae explode each century in our galaxy. But for Earth's ozone layer to experience damage from a supernova, the ...

VanMarter Project announces their partnership with Empty Vessel Music. EV is a 501(c)3 For Impact music company providing at risk and underserved children in inner cities with free music education, appreciation and intervention through a program called The Music Matters Project. "We are thankful that VanMarter Project is making a real impact with their music and is supported by their label, Hydrus Media" comments Gerry Van Mansfeld, EV's Executive Director. The concept behind The Music Matters Project and its mentor-centric program addresses some of the major ...

NASA's TRMM satellite noticed that as Tropical Storm Washi approached the Philippines' island of Mindanao heavy rainfall had become more widespread than the previous day. NASA's Terra satellite captured Washi making landfall early today. Early on Dec. 15 when NASA's Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission (TRMM) satellite passed over Tropical Storm Washi, (known as Sendong in the Philippines) there was one area to the southwest of the center that had heavy rainfall. When TRMM passed over Washi later on Dec. 15 at 1515 UTC (10:15 a.m. EST), heavy rainfall was more widespread ...

With passenger stats for 2011 (22,063,288) already outstripping those of 2010 (21,117,270), Palma de Mallorca has received more good news courtesy of Ryanair. The no-frills carrier is to set up a new base at the Balearic Airport in March 2012 and will operate a total of 47 routes - 17 of them new. Stephen Dight, Managing Director of high-end real estate agency Mallorca Sotheby's International Realty, is enthusiastic about the news, "Many different nationalities participate in Mallorca's property market and as such we've been well served by dozens of airlines to ...

BUFFALO, N.Y. -- Will a drug used to treat childhood acute lymphoblastic leukemia and other pediatric cancers cause heart problems later in life? UB associate professor of pharmaceutical sciences, Javier G. Blanco, PhD, who sees his work as a bridge between research and clinical practice, has focused recent efforts on trying to answer this question. Blanco and colleagues' recent study in the Journal of Clinical Oncology looked for the underlying genetic answers to why some childhood cancer survivors who were treated with anthracylines -- powerful antibiotics like ...

To relieve patients and former patients of the Rambam Hospital who are sick, convalescent, disabled, handicapped or in need of financial assistance and generally to support the charitable works of the said hospital is the main object of Xtra Information Management Inc and Rambam Hospital cooperation in the charity program. Rambam Hospital serves as a referral medical center and Level-1 trauma center, employing a multidisciplinary approach to diagnosis and treatment. XIM's employees voted to establish a "Support Rambam Hospital" program committing their time ...

The new measurements, by UCLA physics professor Giovanni Zocchi and former UCLA physics graduate student Yong Wang, are approximately 100 times higher in resolution than previous mechanical measurements, a nanotechnology feat which reveals an isolated protein molecule, surprisingly, is neither a solid nor a liquid. "Proteins are the molecular machines of life, the molecules we are made of," Zocchi said. "We have found that sometimes they behave as a solid and sometimes as a liquid. "Solids have a shape while liquids flow — for simple materials at low stresses. However, ...

Treatment that increases brain levels of an important regulatory enzyme may slow the loss of brain cells that characterizes Huntington's disease (HD) and other neurodegenerative disorders. In a report receiving advance online publication in Nature Medicine, a Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH)-based research team reports that increased expression of Sirt1, one of a family of enzymes called sirtuins, in the brain of a mouse model of HD protected against neurodegeneration. They also identified a potential mechanism for this protective effect. "Diseases such as Huntington's, ...

Dakota Dental Apple Valley Dentistry is wishing the community a happy holiday season while reminding individuals of simple strategies to prevent dental damage from holiday celebrations that could linger throughout the new year. "Whether it's the platter of holiday cookies and fudge, or the alcoholic beverages served at social gatherings, the holiday season can place an extra strain on dental and oral health." says, Apple Valley dentist, Dr. Shelley Wakefield. "Fortunately, with some understanding and a few preventative strategies, people can enjoy holiday ...

The link between malaria and salmonella infections has been explained for the first time, opening the way to more effective treatments. Malaria patients are at high risk of developing fatal bacterial infections, especially salmonella infections. This is commonly believed to be due to generalised immunosuppression by malaria, whereby the entire immune system is weakened and compromised. However, researchers at the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine have discovered that the increased vulnerability to salmonella infections is a side effect of the body's attempts ...

Humans pump thousands of tons of vapor from the metallic element mercury into the atmosphere each year, and it can remain suspended for long periods before being changed into a form that is easily removed from the atmosphere. New research shows that the upper troposphere and lower stratosphere work to transform elemental mercury into oxidized mercury, which can easily be deposited into aquatic ecosystems and ultimately enter the food chain. "The upper atmosphere is acting as a chemical reactor to make the mercury more able to be deposited to ecosystems," said Seth ...

"Latania Studios and Apartments", also known as Latania Crete Hotel, announces luxurious facilities for tourist who want a decent accommodation waiting for their arrival. There are many hotels in Crete but what makes this hotel special is its way of preserving this Island's cultures and traditions. The hotel does not have a monetary policy for everything, they strive more to conserve the living style of the place by maintaining a standard none other hotels can. Majority of the tourist chose these apartments because of their rates which are cheap for the luxury ...

As electrons move past atoms in a solid, their charge distorts the nearby lattice and can create a wave. Reciprocally, a wave in the lattice affects the electrons motion, in analogy to a wave in the sea that pushes a surfer riding it. This interaction results in a thermoelectric effect that was first observed during the 1950´s and has come to be known as phonon-drag, because it can be quantified from the flow of lattice-wave quanta (phonons) that occurs over the temperature gradient. Soon after the discovery of the phonon drag, an analogous phenomenon was predicted to ...

Premier Hotels of the World announces today its extended Partnership with Availpro the Industry Leader in Online Distribution for Hotels. Availpro and Premier Hotels of the World work together to develop a unique Online Distribution Extranet Solution including Booking Engines(Web based, Mobile and Facebook), Smart Channel Manager, Rate Screener, and Guest Satisfaction tool to be included into the Premier Connect Suite that already includes a State of the Art cloud based PMS and POS system. To achieve this Availpro has developed advanced technological solutions, ...

Signalman Publishing is proud to announce the release in paperback and as an ebook for the Amazon Kindle, the Barnes & Noble nook and the Apple iBookstore, of "Symbolic Logic and the Binomial Expansion: Two Math Projects" by mathematician and educator Richard Forringer of Durham, North Carolina. "Symbolic Logic and the Binomial Expansion" are subjects that are often mentioned in High School and College math courses. The two projects contained in this book have been carefully developed by veteran educator, Dick Forringer, to help the student achieve ...

However, large-scale clinical trials have highlighted the beneficial effect of cardiac resynchronisation therapy (CRT) in the improvement of symptoms and reduction of mortality, and CRT is now recommended in the major European and American guidelines for the treatment and prevention of heart failure.(1) Clinical trials, however, are performed in carefully selected subjects and their results are not always applicable to the general population. Large-scale registries or surveys, on the other hand, capture data from a much more heterogeneous population and are closer to everyday ...

With the share of married adults at an all-time low in the United States, new research by demographers at Cornell University and the University of Central Oklahoma unveils clues why couples don't get married – they fear divorce. Among cohabitating couples, more than two-thirds of the study's respondents admitted to concerns about dealing with the social, legal, emotional and economic consequences of a possible divorce. The study, "The Specter of Divorce: Views from Working and Middle-Class Cohabitors," is published in the journal Family Relations (December 2011) and ...

In an example of life imitating art, biologists and bioengineers at UC San Diego have created a living neon sign composed of millions of bacterial cells that periodically fluoresce in unison like blinking light bulbs. Their achievement, detailed in this week's advance online issue of the journal Nature, involved attaching a fluorescent protein to the biological clocks of the bacteria, synchronizing the clocks of the thousands of bacteria within a colony, then synchronizing thousands of the blinking bacterial colonies to glow on and off in unison. A little bit of art with ...

Timeshare and fractional companies planning to enter the Perspective Magazine Awards Program, sponsored by Holiday Systems International, only have until the end of this week to submit their entries and become part of the most comprehensive, global awards program of its kind in the industry. Winners will be announced at the conclusion of the Global Networking Expo, GNEX 2012 - A Global Meeting of Minds, in Cancun, Mexico. Perspective Magazine ( http://perspectivemagazine.com ) created the awards program, with its exclusive online voting system, to allow companies from ...

Inner Mongolia and Shenzhen, China – Inner Mongolia Agricultural University (IMAU), Inner Mongolia University for the Nationalities (IMUN) and BGI, the world's largest genomics organization, jointly announced the first complete sequencing of Mongolian genome. This genomic study will help researchers to better understand the evolutionary process and migration of Mongolians and their ancestors from Africa to Asia, which also lays an important genomic foundation for further development of human genetic diseases research. Nowadays, Mongol is a central Asian ethnic group mostly ...