Homeowners striving to conserve and save money due to the rising cost of energy for heating and cooling may risk going too far for their own good. Sealing door and window spaces, adding insulation, and implementing other home "tightening" measures is a wise decision in one sense, but the practice can lower air exchange rates and, if carried too far, can have health implications. State and federal energy codes that require tighter building, while well-intentioned, can also add to the problem with the resulting indoor air quality oftentimes being less healthy than outdoor ...

Homeowners searching for every possible way to conserve energy are finding that modern skylights offer as many or more options for adjusting and controlling light and ventilation entering their homes as do vertical windows, and in some cases, more. And, remodelers say their clients are increasingly adding sun-screening accessories to skylights to increase energy efficiency. High quality units from leading manufacturers are ENERGY STAR qualified and feature dual pane, argon gas injected, low-E glass to reduce heat gain in summer and heat loss in winter. And the glass ...

Green building is by no means confined just to new construction. Consumers also want their remodeling projects green according to research by the National Association of Homebuilders (NAHB) Remodelers. "The only way to bring green into 120 million existing households is through remodeling," past NAHB Remodelers Chair Mike Nagel, CGR, CAPS, a remodeler from Chicago, said in an Association release. And the U.S. Green Building Council cites a McGraw-Hill report that tracked a growing market for green homebuilding and green renovations as far back as 2007. Many remodelers ...

Homeowners are still willing to pay more for a green home as long as incentives and rebates are available to help defray the extra costs. One of the findings in a survey conducted as far back as late 2007 by Public Opinion Strategies for the National Association of Homebuilders (NAHB) bore that out. It indicated that among those who said they would pay more for a home with green features, fully 74 percent said they would be willing to pay no more than an additional 10 percent, highlighting the need to keep green building affordable. Today's tax incentives and rebates ...

IOS Health Systems has been chosen by the eHealthConnecticut Regional Extension Center as an EHR Vendor providing their web-based Electronic Health Records (EHR) System Medios EHR. Medios will be available to Connecticut's qualified health care providers enabling them the use of an Electronic Health Record system in order to enhance health care quality, safety, and efficiency. In July of 2010, eHealthConnecticut issued a Request for Information and collected information from over forty EHR vendors. eHealthConnecticut reviewed these proposals and has selected IOS Health ...

Samantha Brown, the inspiring and popular host of several programs on the Travel Channel, will share her travel experiences with AAA Great Vacations EXPO guests on Sunday, January 23, 2011. Brown takes the AAA Travel Stage, presented by Best Western, at Noon and 2:30 p.m. at Franklin County Veterans Memorial in downtown Columbus. Brown, who spends more than 200 days traveling each year, started her TV travel career started with "Great Vacation Homes," which offered an insider's view into vacation home ownership. From there, she was asked to host "Great Hotels," offering ...

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The demand for MMORPG games in the present arena have increased drastically. Almost every game freak is fond of winning and of course, everyone plays to win. But, it's a real good thrill if you triumph over a number of gamers rather than the computer system. This may be the major cause for the increase in demand of MMORPGs (Massively Multi-Player Online Role-Playing Games). They won't even allow most of us to sleep nicely. Even in our dreams, we would surely imagine our latest superhero and plan strategies for upcoming games. Adventures, creativity and fantasy are the ...

In 1995, the United States implemented mandatory alcohol testing programs for motor carriers. Commercial truck drivers with a blood-alcohol content of .04 or higher are subject to immediate suspension. To date, the program had not been adequately evaluated, according to J.E. Brady and colleagues at Columbia University, who recently completed a study regarding this practice. In a study published in the American Journal of Epidemiology, the researchers found that mandatory alcohol testing may have contributed to a significant reduction in alcohol involvement in fatal trucking ...

Far too many Americans are living without health insurance. In the economic downturn, millions of people have lost their jobs and accompanying medical insurance benefits. A new report from the Kaiser Foundation says the number of uninsured has risen sharply: 50 million Americans are now without health insurance. Uninsured and in Need of Care The passage of health reform last year provides hope for future coverage for many, but what should you do today if you're uninsured and in need of medical care? - If you're in need of medical care, go to a hospital emergency ...

Since its inception in 1988, a doctrine known as "honest services" fraud has helped prosecutors send hundreds of public officials to jail on corruption charges. The doctrine came about when Congress rewrote mail and wire fraud statutes to specifically include schemes designed to "deprive another of the intangible right of honest services." Simply stated, the law codifies a public official's duty of providing honest services to taxpayers. It also applies to the duty that corporate executives have to place the interests of company shareholders above their own. Traditionally, ...

Those injured in Michigan car accidents know how difficult it is to deal with insurance companies. For those who have suffered serious injuries, the situation becomes even more complicated. Insurers will fight to keep from paying out large sums of money, even if a person is entitled to that compensation. Recent case law has changed the way insurance companies will be able to do business with those who have been injured, meaning that there are potentially millions of unpaid insurance claims throughout the state. Michigan is a no-fault insurance state. This means that ...

Valued Opinions has released the findings from a poll of its member base on their overall experience and engagement level when taking paid online surveys, with the findings painting an interesting picture in terms of consumer reviews. As technology enables market research organisations to expand their reach into demographics that traditionally speaking have been challenging to communicate with. Engaging with users is becoming increasingly important when trying to encourage users to participate in paid online surveys, and with the volume of user generated content floating ...

Prudential UK has entered into two bulk annuity buy-in contracts with the Trustees of the GlaxoSmithKline ("GSK") Pension Scheme and the GSK Pension Fund for a tranche of pensioner members within their defined benefit pension schemes. The transactions cover around 15 per cent of GSK's UK defined benefit pensioner liabilities and have an aggregate value of approximately GBP900 million. Under the terms of the agreement, GSK has purchased bulk annuity policies from Prudential which will take on responsibility for a portion of the pensioner benefits payable by the Trustees ...

Avalon Waterways continues to be the UK's fastest growing river cruise company with the youngest fleet on Europe's waterways as ships average 2 years in age. This year saw the launch of two new ships, the MS Avalon Felicity and MS Avalon Luminary, with another due to come into service in 2011, MS Avalon Panorama. Avalon Felicity and Luminary feature the same contemporary and innovative design as their sister ships, offering the most spacious and well-appointed staterooms in European river cruising. Sized at 172 square feet, the staterooms are the largest on Europe's ...

Some of us are familiar with the electronic cigarettes, some of us have tried earlier versions to help in the battle to quit smoking and have had some success. Well the newer, or version 2.0, units are on the shelves at stores and on the Internet now. This newer 2-piece model has the atomizer built into each refill cartridge. This technology has greatly improved the experience. These newer version 2.0 e cigs produce a much greater volume of vapor which gives the user the same exact look, taste and feel of lighting up the regular way. In fact, a recent independent study ...

AURORA, Colo. (Nov. 22, 2010) – Doctors at the University of Colorado School of Medicine were concerned recently when they found a nodule in the thyroid of a 64-year-old Colorado man. They extracted cells from the nodule, hoping to determine whether the man had cancer. But the biopsy results were inconclusive. Even a few months ago, such uncertainty would have likely led to surgery to remove all or part of the thyroid. At least this patient would have faced a tense waiting period to see if, over time, he developed clear signs of cancer. This time, however, the CU doctors ...

WASHINGTON, D.C., November 23, 2010 -- For centuries, intellectuals have met at the ring-stained surfaces of coffee shops to pore over the most pressing problems of the day -- but has anyone ever pondered the coffee rings they left behind? What causes the formation of stain patterns left behind by coffee droplets on a surface? You might think coffee ring formation, first described quantitatively by Deegan et al in a heavily cited article, is the most widely and ritualistically performed experiment in the world, given the prevalence of caffeine in cultures. But most of ...

WASHINGTON, D.C., November 23, 2010 -- Wind farms around the world are large and getting larger. Arranging thousands of wind turbines across many miles of land requires new tools that can balance cost and efficiency to provide the most energy for the buck. Charles Meneveau, who studies fluid dynamics at Johns Hopkins University, and his collaborator Johan Meyers from Leuven University in Belgium, have developed a model to calculate the optimal spacing of turbines for the very large wind farms of the future. They will present their work today at the American Physical ...

WASHINGTON, D.C., November 23, 2010 -- To the causal aquarium visitor, the jellyfish doesn't seem to be a particularly powerful swimmer; compared to a fish, it glides slowly and peacefully. But for Janna Nawroth, a graduate student at the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, the undulations of this simple invertebrate hold secrets that may make possible a new generation of tiny pumps for medical applications and soft robotics -- work she describes today at the American Physical Society Division of Fluid Dynamics (DFD) meeting in Long Beach, CA "Most pumps ...

WASHINGTON, D.C., November 23, 2010 -- Magnetic fluid hyperthermia (MFH) is a promising new cancer treatment that essentially "fries" cells inside tumors. The procedure has been used successfully in prostate, liver, and breast tumors. Magnetic nanoparticles (each billionths of a meter in size) are injected into the body intravenously and diffuse selectively into cancerous tissues. Add a high-frequency magnetic field, and the particles heat up, raising the temperature of the tumor cells. "The entire tumor volume is heated above a threshold treatment temperature -- typically ...

WASHINGTON, D.C., November 23, 2010 -- New research from the University of South Florida suggests that one of the evolutionary secrets of the shark's success hides in one of its tiniest traits -- flexible scales on the bodies of these peerless predators that make them better hunters by allowing them to change directions while moving at full speed. The key to this ability lies in the fact that the scales control water flow separation across the creatures' bodies, says Amy Lang of the University of Alabama who will present work she performed with her colleagues at the University ...

Pity the poor female fruit fly. Being a looker is simply not enough, it seems. If you're to get a date, much less a proposal, you must also smell and act like a girl. Otherwise, you might just have a fight on your hands. Read more in next week's issue of the online, open access journal PLoS Biology. As with most animals, Drosophila face the problem of distinguishing between a potential mate and a potential competitor. If, when meeting a second fruit fly, a male fly thinks "female," he'll begin courting her. But if he senses another male, he'll fight. What triggers these ...

### El Consejo Civil Mexicano para la Silvicultura Sostenible, A.C. (the Mexican Civil Council for Sustainable Forestry, known as CCMSS) is a non-profit, non-governmental organization that encourages and promotes conservation of forest ecosystems that are managed by the forest communities themselves. Known as Manejo Forestal Comunitario, or MFC, this system is supported by CCMSS members, who work in collaboration with communities and ejidos to put in place sustainable practices in forest management and improve the development, conservation, industrialization and commercialization ...

Performing a combination of aerobic exercise and resistance training was associated with improved glycemic levels among patients with type 2 diabetes, compared to patients who did not exercise, according to a study in the November 24 issue of JAMA. The level of improvement was not seen among patients who performed either aerobic exercise or resistance training alone. Although it is generally accepted that regular exercise provides substantial health benefits for individuals with type 2 diabetes, the exact exercise type (aerobic vs. resistance vs. both) has been unclear. ...