Archive for the ‘Female Genetics’ Category

As with The Bell Curve, we will have to wait for peer reviews to carefully sift through the science. Early indications might indicate some trouble for Murray. Last month, the psychologists Michelle N. Meyer, Patrick Turley and Daniel J. Benjamin issued a sharp rebuke to his use of their research on polygenic scores in his piece for The Wall Street Journal teasing the new book. He characterized polygenic scores as providing decisive insight into I.Q. that was impervious to racism and other forms of prejudice. In fact, the psychologists assert in response, polygenic scores can and do reflect racism, sexism or other prejudices, as well as more benign environmental factors.

Murray serenely rolls out his propositions, assuring us on occasion that it is all consensus, securely known. And yet several claims are plainly contentious, even to the lay reader. Take Murrays description of male brains as systemizers and female brains as empathizers, drawing on work of the psychologist Simon Baron-Cohen. Men are drawn to things, in other words, and women to people. (Youll recognize this terminology from James Damores diversity letter to Google.) This rubric becomes an organizing principle in the book, explaining the typically gendered vocations for men and women (Things Jobs and People Jobs). What Murray avoids discussing are the profound questions surrounding one of the studies that scaffold his thinking.

In 2000, Baron-Cohen and colleagues published a study of day-old babies that found that boys looked at mobiles longer (hence systemizers) and girls at faces (empathizers). This study has never been replicated, not even by Baron-Cohen. It was also poorly designed: for one, some of the newborns were propped up; their gaze might have been mediated by how they were held. Not to mention the core question, as posed by the psychologist Cordelia Fine, who has written extensively about bias in research on sex differences in the brain: Why think that what a newborn prefers to look at provides any kind of window, however grimy, into their future abilities and interests?

Or consider Murrays interpretation of why women havent branched into more male-dominated fields over the last 30 years. Once again, he finds an explanation in the female preoccupation with people and emotion as opposed to the male orientation toward things and abstract thought. Sexism cannot be the culprit, he claims. Now that outright prohibition of women entering male-dominated fields has ended, any vestigial opposition ought to have abated in a matter of years. Never mind the wealth of research showing the very real persisting impediments that Murray dismisses. To name just one well-known example: In a study at Yale University, over 100 scientists reviewed a rsum submitted for an open position. The rsums were identical, although half were submitted under mens names and half womens names. The womens rsums were ranked significantly lower than the mens by both female and male faculty.

Why doesnt Murray attend more thoroughly to the role of the environment, to history even if to decisively repudiate their impact? On genetics, too, he dismisses aspects that might dilute the strength of his argument that outside interventions are limited in their effects on personality and social behavior. Developments in epigenetics, for example outside mechanisms that effectively turn genes on or off are waved away as hype.

Stranger still are the inconsistencies. Race is a construct is among the tenets Murray seeks to dismantle. Yet tucked midway through the book is the bland assertion that his evidence does not deny the many ways in which race is a social construct. There is no genetic basis for race. It is a social and legal definition a young, crude one at that, overlaid on the tangled realities of ancestral heredity. Ancestral populations might be more apt, he concedes. Not 40 pages later, however, hes back to huffing at the elite wisdom that race is a social construct. Murray appears to want it both ways: to gesture at a more nuanced and precise formulation but also to harness, when he chooses, the raw rhetorical power of railing against woke dogmas about race.

Read this article:
Charles Murray Returns, Nodding to Caution but Still Courting Controversy - The New York Times

What if I told you that in Australia, a mouselike marsupial called antechinus breeds so manically during its three-week mating season that the males bleed internally and go blind, until every male lies dead? And what if I told you that this isnt the reason the species is facing an existential threat?

Reporting today in the journal Frontiers in Physiology, biologists from University of New England in Australia and the Norwegian University of Science and Technology present troubling evidence that antechinus might be ill-prepared for a warmer world. The researchers set out to look at something called phenotypic plasticity in the yellow-footed antechinus, one of the creatures 15 known species. Think of your phenotype as your bodys hardware, or physiology: your height and skin color and metabolism. This is in part coded by your genotype, the genetic software that powers the hardware. Phenotypic plasticity is the ability of a species to respond to environmental stressorslike temperature swingsby altering their physiology without mucking with all the underlying genetics.

For the antechinus, the researchers were interested in the plasticity of its metabolism. This is highly influenced by temperature: An adult antechinus metabolism shifts to expend less energy when its cold during the winter and there isnt much insect prey for it to hunt. When its warm, an antechinus can afford to expend a lot of energy because prey is plentiful.

The researchers, though, were more interested in how temperature affects antechinus babiesthat is, how being raised in cold or warm environments might affect how their metabolism works once they become adults. So they reared two groups of babies, one in colder temperatures and one in warmer temperatures. They then flipped the thermostat, exposing the individuals reared in the cold to warm temperatures and the warm-reared ones to the cold.

As the researchers expected, when the temperature switched from warm to cold the animals decreased their activity levels, which the scientists were recording using infrared sensors that logged movements. This is perfectly natural for wild animals, since in winter they have fewer insects to hunt and need to conserve their energy to keep from starving. In fact, in the dead of winter, antechinus can slip into a state called torpor, drastically lowering their body temperature and metabolic rates.

In the lab, the researchers also found that when turning up the heat on animals that had been reared in the cold, the animals increased their activity levels, just like they would in the wild as warmer spring temperatures bring more insects to hunt.

So far so gooduntil the researchers also looked at the metabolic rates, instead of just the activity levels, of the animals as they experienced temperature shifts. A metabolic rate is the measure of how much energy the animal needs to maintain function at rest. For a mammal like antechinus, that rate can change significantly when outdoor temperatures go up or down. Unlike a reptile, a mammal like antechinus has to constantly maintain its own body temperature, either spending energy to cool or warm itself.

This time, the researchers found that when the antechinus raised in the warm group shifted to the cold, they increased their metabolic rate only slightly. But those raised in the cold group that shifted to the warmth decreased their metabolic rate significantly. The discrepancy suggests that the babies brought up in cold conditions have more plastic phenotypes when it comes to adjusting to temperature changes.

So we hypothesize that perhaps these results reveal that antechinus that are raised in cold conditions have more flexibility in their physiology than those that are raised in warm conditions, says physiological ecologist Clare Stawski of University of New England in Australia and the Norwegian University of Science and Technology, lead author on the new paper. Which might show you that in the future when it's much warmer, and more consistently warm, that the antechinus might not be as flexible to changes in the climate.

Read more here:
This Marsupial Dies After Marathon Mating. Now It's Got Bigger Worries - WIRED

The physiologicalcosts associated with poor sleep are well documented, but what about all of the ways in which insufficient rest stands between us and our life goals?

A new study conducted by researchers over at HealthySleep set out to determine how many ambitions are achieved and abandoned as a direct consequence of sleep quality.

With a recruitment comprised of more than 1,000 participants the team successfully established a correlation between slumber and the achievement of life goals.

Before the researchers began tracking the respondents, each was asked to complete a questionnaire in regards to their most pressing long-term objectives. The top results are as follows:

On balance, good sleepers were about twice as likely to receive career success compared to poor sleepers in addition to achieving their goals 30% more often. Some objectives, like securing a raise or a promotion, were more frequently cited than others (72% vs. 68% respectively.)

Is there anything a good nights sleep cant do? Getting proper rest night after night can contribute to improved heart health, reduced stress, increased alertness, and improved memory, among many other wellness-related benefits. Given that satisfactory snoozing can be the blueprint for a sharper mind and a healthier body, we were curious about the link between rest and success and whether there was one to be found, the authors write in the paper.

Generally speaking, medical professionals recommend adults between the ages of 26 and 64 receive about nine hours of sleep per night. This value is more accurately determined by genetics, preexisting conditions, and even weight. Given the volume of variables that depict quality rest the researchers decided to rely on markers that were relative to the individuals involved in their particular analysis.

Five hundred and ninety-one respondents identified as female, 414 respondents identified as male, and four respondents did not identify as male or female. The participants ranged in age from 18 to 75 with a median age of approximately 37.

Twenty-seven percent of the study pool received five hours of sleep or less a night, 26% received an average of six hours and 32 minutes of sleep a night and the largest portion of the recruitment (47%) managed to score an average of seven hours and 10 minutes of sleep a night. The first and last demographics served as the poor and adequate sleep control spectrum.

Poor sleep seemed to reliably contribute to procrastination. Eighty-percent of the good sleepers and 75% of the average sleepers reported putting a lot of effort into their goals compared to the 68% of bad sleepers who could say the same.

Good sleepers were both better at tracking the progress of their goals and the more likely group to secure them.

Good sleepers reported achieving an average of 68% of their potential goals, compared to bad sleepers 58%.At every echelon 50% or more, 75% or more, and 90% or more a higher percentage of good sleepers said they could reach the respective percentage of their goals, the authors conclude.Respondents who fell into the good sleeper category were better equipped to succeed in every way.They achieved more goals, put more effort into where they wanted to be, were better organized in their goal-setting approach, procrastinated less, and were more likely to adopt a positive mindset regarding their own abilities and strengths.

Here are the most occasioned goals achieved by those who habitually received quality rest:

Originally posted here:
Study: 72% of people that sleep this many hours a night secure raises - Ladders

By Paul Biegler

A German study has found that pregnant women who use parabens chemicals widely used as preservatives in cosmetics, foods and drugs could increase the risk of their children being overweight.

The study, published in Nature Communications, suggests weight gain may be caused by epigenetic changes that limit the ability to feel full after eating.

The team, led by Irina Lehmann from the Berlin Institute of Health, analysed 629 mums and their babies who took part in the LINA study (Lifestyle and Environmental Factors and their Influence on Newborns Allergy) between 2006 and 2008.

LINA tested whether pollutants such as tobacco smoke could affect babies. Crucially, it also measured the mothers exposure to parabens.

Parabens are antibacterials used in cosmetics such as moisturisers, shampoos and shaving cream. The agents are also found in baked goods, jams and other foods.

In 1995 parabens were put on the US Food and Drug Administrations Generally Recognised as Safe (GRAS) list but, more recently, questions have been raised about a link to breast cancer.

The chemicals are classed as endocrine disruptors and can mimic the action of the female hormone oestrogen, potentially relevant for hormone-sensitive cancers.

Lehmanns team found women who used leave on (as opposed to rinse off) skin products containing parabens had urine levels up to three times higher than women who used paraben-free products.

Then they went on to look at how the childrens weight tracked.

Between the ages of two and eight, the team found, kids of mums exposed to higher levels of parabens in pregnancy had more than double the odds of being overweight at any point.

The findings came, however, with riders.

The effect was only seen with two out of the five parabens studied, known as iso-butyl paraben (iBuP) and n-butyl paraben (nBuP). And when the researchers did a further statistical breakdown the weight gains were most pronounced in girls.

Intrigued by the result, Lehmanns group devised a mouse study to see what might be causing it.

They injected nBuP under the skin of pregnant mice, which gave them urine levels of the paraben comparable to the high exposure human mums. Then they waited to see what happened to the mouse bubs.

Quite a bit, it turned out.

Pups of paraben-treated mothers were fatter at all points during the observation period of 12 weeks. But, again, the effect was only seen in females.

Wondering if paraben might be working directly on fat cells, the team added nBuP to human and mouse fat cells in culture plates in the lab. But there was no effect on the growth of the fat cells.

Which left the live prospect that paraben could be affecting appetite itself.

The team homed in on a structure in the mouse brain called the hypothalamus. Its an area rich in receptors for leptin, a hormone that goes up after eating to tell the brain youre full.

It seemed they had found their smoking gun.

For leptin to deliver the Im full message it has to turn on production of a peptide called pro-opiomelanocortin (POMC) in the hypothalamus. If POMC isnt there you dont feel full and you get fat. The paraben babies, it turned out, had less POMC, ate more and were heavier.

When the team did a deep dive into the genetics, they found an epigenetic "gene switch" called methylation was the likely culprit. How did they know for sure? When the team blocked methylation in the baby mice whose mums got paraben, it put a lid on the weight gain.

With our mouse experiment, we demonstrated that... foetal development seems to be a sensitive time window for nBuP exposure with respect to body weight regulation, they conclude.

There are, however, reasons to take the findings cautiously.

In previous studies, it was found that mouse physiology may not be identical to humans when it comes to paraben metabolism, says Alex Polyakov, Consultant Obstetrician and Gynaecologist at the Royal Women's Hospital in Melbourne, who was not involved in the study.

Therefore the mechanism of paraben effect on the risk of obesity in humans may be different, he says.

And questions remain unanswered: for example, why females are affected disproportionately. The authors speculate it may be linked to the female hormone oestrogen.

Nonetheless, Polyakov sees reason to tread carefully.

At this time, it would be advisable for pregnant women to avoid cosmetic compounds that contain paraben. Complete avoidance of paraben is not possible as its use is so widespread, but avoiding non-essential exposure seems like a prudent and easily achievable goal, he says.

Read more from the original source:
Parabens linked to weight gain in childhood - Cosmos

The 2020 shortlist for the coveted #21toWatch Awards includes some of the most daring entrepreneurs and innovations from our region.

Out of hundreds of entries received, 246 qualified candidates made it onto a longlist, which has now been whittled down to a shortlist of 56, featuring a dynamic mix of people, companies and things.

Winners of the awards, run by Burwell-based Cofinitive and supported by the Cambridge Independent, will be unveiled at an event at Arm on March 5.

The shortlist of people includes:

Entrepreneur and Cofinitive founder Faye Holland said: We are really delighted to see an equal number of women to men featuring on the People shortlist this year. In key sectors where female entrepreneurs, founders and leaders are few and far between, this really is most encouraging.

Its also been exciting to see the wide range of industries represented on this years list. Theres been a huge shift from last year with ICT now making up 33 per cent of the shortlist, although there are a number of strong contenders in the biotech and medtech sectors too.

We also have a stronger representation from cleantech and agritech as well as increased diversity around retail, industrial and more people-based solutions. All this is a clear reminder of how amazingly diverse our region is, and the huge opportunity for convergence and agglomeration we can offer these businesses.

The shortlisted companies include:

And some Cambridge companies on the things shortlist include:

The #21toWatch shortlist is independently judged by four leading experts across a range of disciplines.

For 2020, the judges are Isabel Fox, of Luminous Ventures, Tim Robinson, of Tech East, Siddhi Trivedi, of Entrepreneur, and Bruno Cotta, of the Cambridge Judge Business School Entrepreneurship Centre, who will all assess the candidates based on five criteria: innovation, challenge, influence, viability and memorability.

Tim said: What impressed me most is that so many of the shortlist are people and companies addressing major real-world challenges in climate change, ethical AI, security, precision medicine and more.

Arm and HSBC have recently joined the #21toWatch campaign as sponsors in readiness for the awards event. Itll be one to watch in its own right.

The shortlist

People

Companies

Things

Meet the judges

Bruno Cotta is executive director at Cambridge Judge Business Schools Entrepreneurship Centre. He has more than 20 years of leadership and management experience working with public, private and third sector organisations, and has led initiatives to inform and shape world-class university strategic plans, international partnerships and innovation ecosystems, including founding the Enterprise Lab at Imperial College London to support the next generation of innovators and entrepreneurs;

Isabel Fox is a mother, wellness coach, biohacker, Peloton enthusiast and horse lover. She also happens to be one of just a handful of female general partners in the UK, at Luminous Ventures, with a $30million fund and a portfolio of groundbreaking founders who are daring to disrupt the status quo;

Tim Robinson is the first chief operating officer of Tech East, the leading voice of the digital tech community in the East of England. He spent 14 years with the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (RICS) in London where he created a product technology division in 2007 and ran the information, data and technology business from 2010-14.In 2014, Tim founded his own marketing strategy consultancy in Suffolk, specialising in the technology sector.

Siddhi Trivedi is a multi-award-winning disruptor in technology with 30 years of business innovation. Her projects have featured in TechCrunch, Disrupt Berlin, Novo Nordisk Innovation Awards and many more. She is continuously searching for pioneeringideas that will change the world and features them on the global TEDx platform as curator and licence holder of TEDxLeicester.

What does it mean to get on the shortlist?

Kay McGuinness, of ANB Sensors, was one of the top 21 in 2019.

She says: Being on the Cofinitive One to Watch Top 21 list in 2019 has been great for us. We were in the process of going through a funding round, and the recognition gave our potential investors greater confidence in us as a company and the products we were developing. As we go commercial this year, the award lends greater initial credibility to our offering as a new player on the market.

But even those on the longlist neednt be disappointed if they dont make it onto the shortlist.

Richard Hobson, Herdsy, appeared on the 2019 longlist.

He says: Just being on the longlist raised our profile beyond our wildest expectations. To be highlighted amongst Cambridges brightest and best put us on the radar of several high-profile customers and investors, and lead to our company being profiled in the Sunday Times, giving us national exposure.

Being on lists doesnt usually make that much difference - but getting on this one will change your company direction forever. It was a game-changer for our small company.

People have actually heard of us now, and customers and investors Google us and rate us among the best globally as a direct result. How many lists can you say that about?

This year, Herdsy has been shortlisted in the #21toWatch Things shortlist.

Read more

#21toWatch in 2020 - nine trailblazers on Cofinitives longlist revealed

Watch the highlights and see the pictures from the Cambridge Independent Science and Technology Awards 2019

Stemnovate offers unique multi-organ drug screening on reprogrammed human cells

Agile Analog awarded Innovate UK funding towards 1m project

Cambridge technology that locks CO2 into rock will halt climate change

Six-minute lithium battery recharge for phones and cars on way

Alkane data puts Intellegens lubricants in R&D driving seat

OKRA founder calls for open data to drive up cancer care

Riverlane building operating system for quantum computers

Academy Award winning pedigree of AudioTelligence, the Cambridge start-up thats raised 3.1m

Cambridges FlexEnable folds display borders for bezel-less screen

Cambridge firm Sano Genetics bakes ethics into its genomic platform

Go here to read the rest:
#21toWatch shortlist of people, companies and things revealed - Cambridge Independent

Inhis last interview with a Los Angeles Timessports columnist, Kobe Bryant, of course, talked about basketball and the LA Lakers. But he also spoke about bein...

Inhis last interview with a Los Angeles Timessports columnist, Kobe Bryant, of course, talked about basketball and the LA Lakers.

But he also spoke about being a family man and how he wanted to elevate youth and womens sports, according to audio of the interview released by the LA Times Saturday.

When asked why he didnt attend many Lakers home games, Bryant said hed rather spend time at home.

I have gone through 20 years of the majority of my career with my kids Natalia and Gianna without being able to have that consistently, Bryant said.

So for me to make a trip up to the Staples Center, that means Im missing the opportunity to spend another night with my kids, and I know how fast it goes. Natalia is 16 and Gianna is 13. So that time came and went and so I want to make sure that the days Im away from them, are days that I absolutely have to, he said. Id rather just be hanging with them.

The interview is from October, just a few months before Bryant, his 13-year-old daughter Gianna and 7 others were killed in a helicopter crash. Columnist Arash Markazi decided to drive two hours to meet Bryant for a 17-minute interview.

It was one of the best decisions Ive ever made in my career, Markazi wrote.

He loved Giannas curiosity

Markazi asked Bryant abouthis relationship with Gianna, who went by Gigi, and coaching her youth basketball team.

Its a trip to see her move and the expressions that she makes, Bryant said. Its a trip, you know, the genetics. Genetics is a real thing, man.

He continued: What I love about Gigi is her curiosity about the game Even in a very heated situation in a game where its very competitive and back and forth, she can detach herself and come over and ask a very specific questions, which is not common.

All of our girls can do that, Bryant said, but the part that I think is most exciting is that its her curiosity and her ability to think critically in tight situations, (thats) pretty damn cool.

Bryant was asked about imagining his daughter moving away to play ball in college, and like many fathers he admitted, you never want to see your kids leave home, but eventually they have to.

He wanted to support girls and women in sports

Bryant also shared his thoughts about elevating female athletes, saying that hed always been abig supporter of the womens game. But having daughters who play sports his oldest, Natalia, plays volleyball was a big part of his desire to help push womens sports forward.

Just trying to enhance the womens game, not just in basketball but in volleyball and other sports, is extremely important. Anything I can do to help, Im gonna do.

He pointed to coaching his team at the Mamba Sports Academy, and telling the players and coaches that it was a group effort to win. Similarly, this is a joint effort to raise the womens game, he said.

Markazi also asked Bryant about his legacy, and whether he saw the Mamba Academy and youth sports playing a big role in how he was remembered.

Hopefully, he said, if we do it the right way, were known more for what we did after than what we did during.

I think you can have a lasting impact, he said. I mean winning championships, thats great. Building families, thats great. But when you can create stories and create moments and events and companies that can provide opportunities and inspire kids and create situations where people can be better, I think that has a lasting impact, more so than winning championships does.

More:
Kobe Bryant talked family and elevating female athletes in last interview with LA Times columnist - FOX 61

Appraiser earns highest professional status

Matt Hawk of Shackelford and Associates in Greenville has been awarded the Accredited Rural Appraiser (ARA) designation from the American Society of Farm Managers and Rural Appraisers.

Hawk earned the designation by meeting requirements in experience and education, in addition to passing written examination and abiding by the societys code of ethics.

Hawk joins a select 45 percent of the societys membership who have received the accredited status and currently maintain it through the societys continuing education program.

Accredited Rural Appraisers can ensure that an appraisal complies with regulations and requirements. They possess expertise exceeding nearly all state certification and licensing requirements.

In addition, an Accredited Rural Appraiser is connected to a national network of professional resource information.

The American Society of Farm Managers and Rural Appraisers is the largest professional society for rural property land experts, with more than 2,100 members in 31 chapters throughout the United States.

Dr. Craig Steffee joins Gastroenterology East

Gastroenterology East has announced the addition of its own in-house pathologist, Dr. Craig Steffee.

A North Carolina native, Steffee completed his undergraduate studies at Duke University as an Angier B. Duke Scholar with a B.S. in biology and genetics.

He obtained his M.D. at Wake Forest University Bowman Gray School of Medicine, where he was inducted into the Alpha Omega Alpha medical honor society.

He completed his internship and residency in Pathology at Bowman Gray School of Medicine/NC Baptist Hospital where he served as chief resident.

Steffee completed a fellowship in cytopathology at the ECU Brody School of Medicine and served on the faculty of the ECU Department of Pathology prior to entering private practice in 2000.

He is board certified in anatomic pathology, clinical pathology and cytopathology.

Steffee is skilled in surgical pathology and has been interpreting gastrointestinal biopsies in both hospital and outpatient gastroenterology endoscopy center settings in eastern North Carolina for more than 20 years.

Butler to focus on women investors at Milestone

Milestone Wealth has announced the expansion of its financial planning and wealth management services with an additional emphasis on women investors; especially those going through a life transition such as a job/career change, divorce, sale of a business, retirement or loss of a spouse or loved one. The firm long has specialized in providing financial services to medium and large-sized businesses, and is bringing its expertise to a vastly underserved market.

Belinda Butler, recently designated as a certified financial planner and moving into the role of associate wealth manager, will help lead this effort. A member of the Milestone Wealth team since 2016, Butler is suited to understand the needs of women investors and help them feel comfortable managing their financial lives, especially during and after times of significant change.

We want to help women make the best use of the resources you have to benefit your life, your family and the community, Butler said. Wealth is not just the money you have, it is your ability to use money to achieve the kind of life you want. The female portion of the market has always been underserved, and we are passionate about delivering sound financial guidance and advice in order to serve as an important catalyst and trusted partner that empowers them to take control of their financial lives.

Belinda is a tremendous asset to the Milestone Wealth team, said Dave Hunt, owner of Milestone Wealth. She will do an excellent job of connecting with women throughout our community and offering them the same high level of financial services that business owners and families have come to trust us with as we manage their wealth and investments.

Robinson recognized as 2020 Super Lawyer

Attorney Les Robinson of the Robinson Law Firm in Greenville has been recognized as a 2020 Super Lawyer.

This is the sixth consecutive year Robinson has received this honor. With more than 32 years of experience and having taken more than 3,500 cases to trial, Robinson has established himself as a seasoned trial-ready attorney representing his clients facing charges involving drugs and alcohol, violent crimes, wildlife offenses, domestic disputes and other criminal acts.

Each year, Super Lawyers rates lawyers from across the country to put together a list of the most elite attorneys in the United States. The criteria for the recognition includes 12 indicators of professional achievement and peer nominations. These indicators include verdicts/settlements, professional activity, honors/awards and experience. Through a rigorous process, the Super Lawyers recognition is only given to those attorneys with the most points earned during the evaluation.

The words Super Lawyers used to describe Robinson are experienced, skillful and relentless.

It is an honor to be recognized as one of the top attorneys in the country, Robinson said. I look forward to continuing to serve eastern North Carolina. Working diligently to prepare the best defense possible for my clients has always, and will always, remain my top priority.

Robinson was born and raised in Greenville. He graduated from East Carolina University and attended Campbell University School of Law where he received his Juris Doctorate degree in 1986.

After graduating from law school, he returned to Greenville where he entered into private practice in August 1986. Since that time, he has tried more than 3,500 bench and jury trials throughout eastern North Carolina.

Robinson repeatedly has been elected by his peers to leadership positions in local, district and state bar organizations. He served for nine years as the elected Bar Councilor representative to the North Carolina State Bar. As Bar Councilor, he served on numerous committees in the capacity as committee member, vice chairman and chairman. In addition, he is a frequent continuing legal education speaker for legal associations throughout the state. He has also given presentations for the North Carolina Advocates for Justice, North Carolina Bar Association, North Carolina Public Defenders and the North Carolina Institute of Government.

Keller Williams Realty hires new agents

Keller Williams Realty Points East has hired two new agents.

Tiki Jackson is a native of Boston, Mass., who has lived in the Greenville area for four months.

She is separated and has one child.

Jackson has been in real estate for the past 30 years.

Dan Jacobo is a native of Greenville and has lived in the area for 23 years.

He is single and in his spare time he enjoys soccer.

Jacobo has an associates degree in information technology.

He has been in real estate for one month.

Read the original post:
People in the News - Greenville Daily Reflector

(CNN) Inhis last interview with a Los Angeles Timessports columnist, Kobe Bryant, of course, talked about basketball and the LA Lakers.

But he also spoke about being a family man and how he wanted to elevate youth and womens sports, according to audio of the interview released by the LA Times Saturday.

When asked why he didnt attend many Lakers home games, Bryant said hed rather spend time at home.

I have gone through 20 years of the majority of my career with my kids Natalia and Gianna without being able to have that consistently, Bryant said.

So for me to make a trip up to the Staples Center, that means Im missing the opportunity to spend another night with my kids, and I know how fast it goes. Natalia is 16 and Gianna is 13. So that time came and went and so I want to make sure that the days Im away from them, are days that I absolutely have to, he said. Id rather just be hanging with them.

The interview is from October, just a few months before Bryant, his 13-year-old daughter Gianna and 7 others were killed in a helicopter crash. Columnist Arash Markazi decided to drive two hours to meet Bryant for a 17-minute interview.

It was one of the best decisions Ive ever made in my career, Markazi wrote.

Markazi asked Bryant abouthis relationship with Gianna, who went by Gigi, and coaching her youth basketball team.

Its a trip to see her move and the expressions that she makes, Bryant said. Its a trip, you know, the genetics. Genetics is a real thing, man.

He continued: What I love about Gigi is her curiosity about the game Even in a very heated situation in a game where its very competitive and back and forth, she can detach herself and come over and ask a very specific questions, which is not common.

All of our girls can do that, Bryant said, but the part that I think is most exciting is that its her curiosity and her ability to think critically in tight situations, (thats) pretty damn cool.

Bryant was asked about imagining his daughter moving away to play ball in college, and like many fathers he admitted, you never want to see your kids leave home, but eventually they have to.

Bryant also shared his thoughts about elevating female athletes, saying that hed always been abig supporter of the womens game. But having daughters who play sports his oldest, Natalia, plays volleyball was a big part of his desire to help push womens sports forward.

Just trying to enhance the womens game, not just in basketball but in volleyball and other sports, is extremely important. Anything I can do to help, Im gonna do.

He pointed to coaching his team at the Mamba Sports Academy, and telling the players and coaches that it was a group effort to win. Similarly, this is a joint effort to raise the womens game, he said.

Markazi also asked Bryant about his legacy, and whether he saw the Mamba Academy and youth sports playing a big role in how he was remembered.

Hopefully, he said, if we do it the right way, were known more for what we did after than what we did during.

I think you can have a lasting impact, he said. I mean winning championships, thats great. Building families, thats great. But when you can create stories and create moments and events and companies that can provide opportunities and inspire kids and create situations where people can be better, I think that has a lasting impact, more so than winning championships does.

See the original post:
Kobe Bryant talked family and elevating female athletes in last interview with LA Times columnist - KFOR Oklahoma City

NXIVMthe self-help organization lead by Keith Raniere that was actually a cult and possessed a secret wing that coerced women into sex through blackmailhas yet another damning accusation. Turns out, some of the sex abuse was also, allegedlyracist.

According to Times Union, a daily paper that services the NXIVM hub of Albany, Raniere created an empowerment group called One Asian to recruit East Asian women for sex. He also attempted to establish another group targeting women in sororities called Ten C, which stood for The Emperor Has No Clothes.

A newly filed federal lawsuit against Raniere alleges that he and his associates successfully lured over 100 women for One Asian, The Times Union reports. One Asian offered a special curriculum that Raniere tailored to what he characterized as women raised with more masculine values than Western women, the lawsuit reads. According to Raniere, this combination of female genetics and masculine attributes, such as discipline and self-denial, made the woman he recruited virtually perfect humans. Thus, he selected women who specifically met Ranieres criteria for potentially suitable sexual partners, the document states. One of the platniffs, a Canadian woman chosen to lead One Asian, said Ranieres right hand/Smallville actor Allison Mack told her sex was no big deal and just like playing tennis.

According to The New York Times, NXIVMs many programs became increasingly misogynistic over time, including indoctrination that instructed women that they did not deserve equal pay because they need to quit their jobs to have children, and that men are meant to be polyamorous while women are meant to be monogamous.

In June 2019, Keith Raniere was found guilty on seven counts, including racketeering, racketeering conspiracy, wire fraud conspiracy, forced labor conspiracy, sex trafficking, sex trafficking conspiracy and attempted sex trafficking. He is expected to be sentenced in Brooklyn on April 16.

Link:
NXIVM's Keith Raniere Allegedly Created an 'Empowerment Group' to Recruit Asian Women for Sex - Jezebel

A saleswoman takes meatloaf from a meat counter in a supermarket. Photo: Jan ... [+] Woitas/dpa-Zentralbild/ZB (Photo by Jan Woitas/picture alliance via Getty Images)

The notion that processed meat is not good for your health is not a new one. The high salt content, additives, and even just the red meat itself are all known to be linked to increased incidence of high blood pressure, heart disease, and obesity. But it is also known that studies assessing nutritional intake and health outcomes are notoriously difficult to carry out, and even more difficult to interpret. Even when such studies attempt to tease out other lifestyle variables such as exercise habits, tobacco use, alcohol intake, stress, and sleep quality, the data are always subject to debate, especially when a smattering of genetics and co-morbidities (other health issues) are thrown in.

A 2019 editorial in the Annals of Internal Medicine pointed out the reasons for these inconsistencies. In it, the authors describe several studies with vastly differing conclusions, ranging from processed meat is carcinogenic to processed meat is probably carcinogenic to the association between processed meat consumption and colon cancer and cardiovascular disease is weak. The editorial then reviews several meta-analyses which included hundreds of other studies, totaling over six million individuals. These studies found extremely small differences in overall health outcomes based on processed meat consumption, including all-cause mortality, cancer, and heart disease.

Three year old child eating salami

Because even the largest nutritional studies are observational, with so much of the data subject to confounding variables of other lifestyle habits and genetics, even those with high statistical significance for any link between sausage links and heart disease are not necessarily translatable in the real world of objective data. Better studies look at randomized controlled trials, which, even if performed over shorter duration, as short as six months as opposed to many years, may offer more accurate results than purely observational data. But even these studies have not determined with any certainty the health benefits or harms of meat consumption.

A more recent study, published in the February 3, 2020 issue of JAMA Internal Medicine, included not only processed meat consumption as a potential association with cardiovascular disease and death, but also unprocessed red meat, poultry, and fish consumption. But again, even this study looks at association, which is quite different from causation. As an analogy of association, a sunny day is associated with crowds at the beach, but the sunny skies did not cause the beach to be crowded. Association has been muddied into causation in countless debates on health data, including data on meat consumption, red wine consumption, vaccination schedules, and screen time, to name just a few. The authors of this months JAMA study sought to find an association (again, not causation) between various types of meats and fish with all-cause mortality and cardiovascular disease.

Young Woman Eating Chicken

The study collected data between 1985 and 2002, and participants were followed until 2016. The subjects included over 29,000 adults from six individual cohort studies. The average age was 53 years, and included roughly equal numbers of individuals who identified as male or female. Seventy percent of the subjects were white. Of the four types of consumed products, those with any of the three types of meat consumption, including poultry, had increased incidence of cardiovascular disease compared to those reporting only fish consumption. Both processed and unprocessed meat consumption were associated with increased all-cause mortality compared to those consuming just fish or poultry. All good news for you fish and fowl consumers? Perhaps. But even this study is one of association, despite the fact that they followed subjects for many years, in whats known as a prospective as opposed to a retrospective study.

In a prior Forbes article, I reported on clinical guidelines published in the October 2019 issues of the Annals of Internal Medicine, which found that there were no health benefits to reducing processed or unprocessed meat consumption. Digging a little into that study authors relationships quickly found that they had financial ties to the meat industry. Clearly an association that will bias any data, even when the data showed association, not causation.

Coming into play now is the health of our planet, not just our coronary arteries. Many environmental studies are pointing at meat (and dairy) consumption as major sources of greenhouse gases, and that if we humans all became vegetarians (or better, vegans), the impact on reducing climate change and improving air quality would save us all. Other data have found this not to be the case, showing that animal agriculture accounts for less than 4% of U.S. greenhouse gas emissions. Another way of looking at meat consumption data is by the energy needed to produce the energy meat gives. In other words, one study reported that livestock use 80% of farmland energy but produce only 18% of consumed calories. In addition, beef produce over 100 kilograms of greenhouse gases per 100 grams of protein they provide, whereas tofu, a plant-based soy protein, produces only 3.5 kilograms of greenhouse gas for that same 100 grams of protein.

Beef cattle standing in a field

We still do not have answers when it comes to meat consumption- neither for our own health nor for the health of our planet. While many human studies are leaning towards data showing poorer health outcomes with meat consumption, and environmental studies are also showing negative impacts on the climate due to beef agriculture, definitive data is still up for grabs. No matter how you slice it.

The rest is here:
The Heartbreak Of The Deli Counter: More Thinly Sliced Data - Forbes

INTRODUCTION

The date palm (Phoenix dactylifera), a dioecious species in the Arecaceae (formerly Palmae) family has a historical distribution stretching from Mauritania in the west to the Indus Valley in the east (1). A major fruit crop in hot and arid regions of North Africa and the Middle East and one of the earliest domesticated tree crops, archaeobotanical records suggest that the earliest exploitation and consumption of dates is from the Arabian Neolithic some 7000 years before the present (yr B.P.) (1). Evidence of cultivation in Mesopotamia and Upper Arabian Gulf approximately 6700 to 6000 yr B.P. support these centers as the ancient origin of date palm domestication in this region, with a later establishment of oasis agriculture in North Africa (1, 2).

The current date palm germplasm is constituted by two highly differentiated gene pools: an eastern population, consisting of cultivars extending from the Middle East and Arabian Peninsula to northwest India and Pakistan and a western population covering North Africa and sub-Saharan Africa (3, 4). Introgressive hybridization by a wild relative in North African date palms has been proposed as a source of this differentiation (2).

Date palms in the southern Levant (modern-day Israel, Palestine, and Jordan), situated between eastern and western domestication areas, have historically played an important economic role in the region and were also of symbolic and religious significance (5). The Kingdom of Judah (Judea) that arose in the southern part of the historic Land of Israel in the 11th century BCE was particularly renowned for the quality and quantity of its dates. These so-called Judean dates grown in plantations around Jericho and the Dead Sea were recognized by classical writers for their large size, sweet taste, extended storage, and medicinal properties (5). While evidence suggests that Judean date culture continued during the Byzantine and Arab periods (4th to 11th century CE), further waves of conquest proved so destructive that by the 19th century, no traces of these historic plantations remained (5).

In 2008, we reported the germination of a 1900-year-old date seed (6) recovered from the historical site of Masada overlooking the Dead Sea. In the current study, six additional ancient date seeds from archaeological sites in the Judean desert were germinated, bringing to seven the number of ancient genotypes genetically analyzed using molecular markers. In addition, morphometric analysis was used to compare the size and shape of ungerminated ancient date seeds with modern varieties and wild dates.

This study, which confirms the long-term survival of date palm seeds, provides a unique opportunity to rediscover the origins of a historic date palm population that existed in Judea 2000 years ago. The characteristics of the Judean date palm may shed light on aspects of ancient cultivation that contributed to the quality of its fruit and is thus of potential relevance to the agronomic improvement of modern dates.

Of the hundreds of ancient date seeds and other botanical material recovered from excavations carried out in the Judean desert between 1963 and 1991 (7, 8) (fig. S1), 32 well-preserved date seeds from the archaeological sites of Masada, Qumran, Wadi Makukh, and Wadi Kelt were planted in a quarantine site at Kibbutz Ketura (table S1). Of these, six ancient seeds germinated and were further identified by the following monikers: Masada: Adam; Qumran: Jonah, Uriel, Boaz, and Judith; and Wadi Makukh: Hannah (Figs. 1 and 2).

(A) Adam, (B) Jonah, (C) Uriel, (D) Boaz, (E) Judith, (F) Hannah, and (G) HU37A11, an unplanted ancient date seed from Qumran (Cave FQ37) used as a control. Scale bars, 0.5 cm (A, no bar size as unmeasured before planting). Photo credit: Guy Eisner.

Ages in months at time of photograph (A to C) Adam (110 months), Jonah (63 months), and Uriel (54 months). (D to F) Boaz (54 months), Judith (47 months), and Hannah (88 months). Photo credit: Guy Eisner.

On visual inspection, no specific observation linked the ability of these seeds to germinate compared with those that failed to germinate. Before planting, the ancient date seeds had been weighted, and their length was measured, with the exception of those seeds from Masada, (including Adam, the germinated seed), which unfortunately were not measured (table S1). No statistically significant differences were found between germinated and ungerminated seeds in either weight {1.67 0.55 and 1.61 0.29 g, respectively [Students t test (t) = 0.348, degree of freedom (df) = 24, P = 0.731]} or length [27.60 3.7 and 26.8 3.7 mm, respectively (t = 0.455, df = 24, P = 0.653)].

Radiocarbon ages are shown (Fig. 3 and table S2) for ancient date seeds germinated in the current study and also for the date seed (seed 3/Methuselah) germinated in our previous work (6). These ages were obtained from seed shell fragments found clinging to the rootlets of germinated seedlings during their transfer into larger pots (3 to 17 months of age). The values were recalculated to take into account contamination by modern carbon incorporated during seedling growth previously shown to reduce measured radiocarbon age by approximately 250 to 300 years, equivalent to 2 to 3% modern carbon (table S2) (6). On the basis of these calculations, Methuselah germinated in our previous study (6) and Hannah and Adam in the current study are the oldest samples (first to fourth centuries BCE), Uriel and Jonah are the youngest (first to second centuries CE), and Judith and Boaz are intermediate (mid-second century BCE to mid-first century CE) (Fig. 3).

Eighteen ancient date seeds that failed to germinate were recovered from the potting soil and compared with modern seeds derived from 57 current date palms of which 48 are cultivated varieties and 9 are wild individuals (9, 10). Ancient seeds were significantly larger in terms of both length and width (length, 27.62 3.96 mm; width, 10.38 0.71 mm) than both current cultivar (length, 20.60 4.70 mm; width, 8.33 1.02 mm) and wild date palm seeds (length, 16.69 3.39 mm; width, 7.08 0.46 mm) (Fig. 4). Ancient seeds were, on average, 27.69% wider (t = 11.923, df = 18.391, P = 2.157 1010) and 38.37% longer than the combined current samples (wild and cultivated) (t = 7.422, df = 17.952, P = 3.564 107).

Length (millimeters) (left) and width (millimeters) (right) of ancient date seeds that failed to germinate (n = 18), 9 current wild individuals (n = 180), and 48 cultivated P. dactylifera varieties (n = 928). Letters a, b, and c above boxes indicate Tukeys groups derived from HSD.test function and R package agricolae.

When only compared to the cultivars, the ancient date seeds were still larger: 24.55% wider (t = 11.923, df = 18.391, P = 2.157 1010) and 34.06% longer (t = 7.422, df = 17.952, P = 3.564 107). However, the contrast in seed size is even more marked when comparing ancient seeds and current wild date palms: The Judean date palm seeds were, on average, 39.55% wider (t = 19.185, df = 18.471, P = 5.943 1014) and 65.48% longer than current wild samples (t = 11.311, df = 19.574, P = 2.472 1010) (tables S3 and S4).

Analysis of seed shape diversity in current and ancient date seeds using principal components analysis (PCA) (dudi.pca function) performed on seed outlines confirmed visual observation that modern cultivated seeds were more diverse in size than ancient ones but did not differentiate between the two groups [multivariate analysis of variance (MANOVA), P > 0.05]. Ancient seeds displayed an elongated shape similar to current cultivated samples (fig. S2).

The sex of the six germinated ancient date seedlings in the current study identified using three sex-linked simple sequence repeats (SSR) (11) were as follows: Judith and Hannah are female genotypes and Uriel, Jonah, Boaz, Adam, and Methuselah (seed 3) from the previous study (6) are male genotypes. Through microsatellite genotyping, three levels of genetic inheritance were investigated to highlight geographic origins (Fig. 5, A and B): (i) inheritance transmitted by both parents to progeny, obtained by microsatellite markers showing western and eastern patterns of the ancient seeds genomes (4), as presented in structure analysis and pie charts (Fig. 5A); (ii) inheritance transmitted from mother to progeny through the chloroplast genome, reflecting maternal lineage origin by reporting chloroplastic minisatellite eastern or western alleles (Fig. 5B, arrow) (12); and (iii) inheritance transmitted from father to son through the Y chromosome, reflecting paternal lineage origin by reporting male specific sex-linked eastern or western alleles (Fig. 5B, arrow) (11).

(A) Structure analysis results are shown for modern and ancient western (green) and eastern (orange) genotype contributions. Pie charts highlight eastern (orange) and western (green) ancient seeds nuclear genomes contributions. (B) Ancient seeds maternal and paternal lineages origin. Arrows represent clonally transmitted parental information, with maternal (chloroplastic) and paternal (Y chromosome) from western (green) and eastern (orange) origins.

Structure analysis revealed that distribution of the germinated ancient date seeds was within previously described eastern and western date palm gene pools (Fig. 5A). Methuselah, Hannah, and Adam are the most eastern genotypes, although they also show ancient western contributions requiring numerous generations and highlighting ancient crosses. Boaz and Judith are the most admixed, with almost equal eastern and western contributions reflecting more recent crossings. Jonah and Uriel are the most western genotypes with the most western parental lineages (Fig. 5B).

To shed light on genetic diversity of the ancient dates, basic population genetic parameters were estimated and compared to modern reference collections (tables S5 and S6). The ancient genotypes showed an allelic richness value (Ar) (i.e., the number of alleles) of 3.59, a relatively high diversity for such a small sample size (seven genotypes) compared to values of other countries sampled (table S6). Genetic relationships between the ancient date and current varieties (Fig. 6 and table S7) show Methuselah and Adam close to eastern modern varieties Fardh4 and Khalass, respectively, assigned to current Arabian Gulf varieties; Hannah and Judith related to modern Iraqi varieties Khastawi and Khyara, respectively; and Uriel, Boaz, and Jonah, the most western genotypes, related to modern Moroccan varieties, Mahalbit, Jihel, and Medjool, respectively.

Modern varieties from United Arab Emirates (light orange), Iraq (red), Tunisia (blue), Morocco (light green), Egypt (dark green), and ancient genotypes (purple).

In the current study, six ancient date seeds, in addition to the seedling obtained in our previous study (6), were germinated. All the seeds were approximately 2000 years old and had been previously recovered from archaeological sites in the Judean desert, a rain shadow desert of ca. 1500 km2 located between the maquis-covered Judean Hills and the Dead Sea (fig. S1).

Little is known about the mechanisms determining seed longevity; however, it has been related to the ability to remain in a dry quiescent state (13). In the current study, low precipitation and very low humidity around the Dead Sea could have contributed to the longevity of the ancient date seeds, which may be an adaptation of date palms to extreme desert conditions fostering seed dispersion. Their remarkable durability, however, may also be connected to other extreme environmental conditions in this area; at 415 m below mean sea level, the Dead Sea and its surroundings have the thickest atmosphere on Earth, leading to a unique radiation regime and a complex haze layer associated with the chemical composition of the Dead Sea water (14). However, since no visible evidence in the current study was linked to seed germination and, accordingly, to their long term survival, further investigations are needed to understand the basis of date palm seed longevity.

Among the worlds oldest cultivated fruit trees, P. dactylifera is the emblematic of oasis agriculture and highly symbolic in Muslim, Christian, and Jewish religions (5). Closely connected to the history of human migrations, the first cultivated varieties of P. dactylifera are thought to have originated around Mesopotamia and the Upper Arabian Gulf some 6700 to 6000 yr B.P. (1, 2, 10). In Judea, an ancient geopolitical region that arose during the 11th century BCE in the southern part of the historic Land of Israel, and situated at the cross roads of Africa, Asia, and Europe, the origins of date palm cultivation are unknown. However, from historical records, a thriving Judean date culture was present around Jericho, the Dead Sea, and Jordan Valley from the fifth century BCE onward, benefitting from an optimal oasis agriculture environment of freshwater sources and subtropical climate (5).

Described by classical writers including Theophrastus, Herodotus, Galen, Strabo, Pliny the Elder, and Josephus, these valuable plantations produced dates attributed with various qualities including large size, nutritional and medicinal benefits, sweetness, and a long storage life, enabling them to be exported throughout the Roman Empire (5, 15, 16). Several types of Judean dates are also described in antiquity including the exceptionally large Nicolai variety measuring up to 11 cm (5, 15, 16).

In the current study, ancient seeds were significantly longer and wider than both modern date varieties and wild date palms. Previous research has established that both fruits and seeds are larger in domesticated fruit crops compared with their wild ancestors (17), suggesting that the ancient seeds were of cultivated origin (9, 18), most likely originating from the regions date plantations. Furthermore, an increase in seed size has been linked allometrically to an increase in fruit size (19), corroborating the historical descriptions of the large fruits grown in this region.

Genotypes of the germinated ancient date seedlings cover a large part of present-day date palm distribution area, findings that reflect the variety, richness, and probable influences of the historic Judean date groves. Microsatellite genotyping shows a relatively high diversity, with eastern and western gene pool contributions, allelic richness, and genetic proximity to current varieties cultivated in the Arabian Peninsula, Iraq, and North Africa. Although the sample size is small, a predominance of eastern female lineages (six of seven) indicates that eastern female varieties grown from local germplasm were probably clonally propagated from offshoots to maintain desirable fruit qualities. Male lineages, mainly western (four of five), suggest that genetically different or foreign males were used for pollination. This assumption is supported by first century texts, indicating that substantial knowledge existed in ancient Judea 2000 years ago regarding the most suitable males for pollination of female date palms (20).

Our results reinforce the historical narrative that a highly sophisticated domestication culture existed in ancient Judea. Local farmers with an interest in maintaining genetic diversity in their date plantations and anthropogenic pressures leading to selection on fruit dimension and other desirable traits used cross-breeding with foreign (genetically different) males to develop a rich collection of varieties.

These findings suggest that Judean date culture was influenced by a variety of migratory, economic, and cultural exchanges that took place in this area over several millennia.

In Israel, the oldest remains of P. dactylifera are wood specimens 19,000 yr B.P. from Ohalo II site on the Sea of Galilee (21). Recovery of carbonized date seeds from Chalcolithic and Early Bronze Age sites (4500 to 2900 BCE) in the Judean desert, Jordan Valley, and Jericho (22, 23) and early Iron Age sites in Israel (12th to 11th century BCE) (24) suggest that human exploitation and consumption of dates occurred at this time. However, it is unclear whether these samples, which are relatively few in number and of very small size (22, 25, 26), are derived from ancient wild populations, as suggested by morphometric studies of modern wild date populations (18) or represent an early stage of the domestication process.

In the current study, although the sample size is too small to claim a trend, on a gradient from east to west genetic contributions, the older the germinated seeds are on radiocarbon dating (Fig. 3), the more eastern is the nuclear genome (Fig. 5, A and B ). In this respect, Methuselah, Adam, and Hannah (first to fourth centuries BCE) have a predominantly eastern nuclear genome and eastern maternal lineage, their relationship to modern varieties from the Arabian Gulf and Iraq suggesting that they belong to the same eastern genetic background.

The P. dactylifera cultivated by the inhabitants of Judea at that time therefore appears to be from the eastern gene pool, possibly growing locally and related to oasis populations, of which relict populations were recently found in Oman (9).

Elite female cultivars may also have been introduced to ancient Israel from these regions, consistent with a pattern of human intervention and possibly active acquisition of date palm varieties. Established trade links are documented with Arabia and the Persian Gulf from at least the 12th century BCE (27). Babylonian date palm cultivation in southern Mesopotamia (most of modern Iraq), originating some 6000 yr B.P. (1, 2), used deportees from ancient Judea following its conquest in the sixth century BCE (28). After the collapse of the Neo-Babylonian Empire, returning exiles may have brought this specialized knowledge and selected cultivars back to Judea; a date variety Taali cultivated in both Judea and Babylon is mentioned in the Talmud (29).

Western genetic admixtures in the germinated seedlings and their proximity to current cultivated date varieties from Morocco also suggest that ancient Judean date palms were the result of germplasm exchanges with this area and of multiple crosses. Introgression of eastern genomes into western ones are common, detected in varieties from Algeria, Morocco, Mauritania, and particularly east-west junction areas like Egypt (1, 2, 4, 30). In the latter, eastern contributions from the Persian Gulf, detected in ancient Egypt date seeds from 1400 BCE to 800 CE, reveal a chronological pattern of change in agrobiodiversity and the possible emergence of a western form in the Roman period (10).

Introgression of date palm western genomes into eastern ones, however, is far lower (1, 2, 4, 12), their presence in the current study reflecting west to east exchanges.

The origins of these exchanges are unclear; however, archaeological evidence indicates that North Africa, Near East, and Mediterranean cultures were clearly linked during the Neolithic in the southern Levant (approximately 11,700 to 7300 B.P.) and were associated in Jericho with the earliest origins of food production and fundamental changes in human subsistence strategies (31).

Phoenicia, a maritime trading nation occupying the coastal areas of modern northern Israel, Lebanon, and Syria (1500 to 300 BCE), was also historically associated with cultivation and trade of date palms (32). We can speculate that later west to east germplasm exchanges to this region may have been associated with domesticated varieties originating in Phoenician City States in North African (e.g., Carthage in present-day Tunisia) (32), where oasis agriculture appeared relatively late in the archaeological record (3).

The most western genotypes in the current study (Uriel and Jonah) are also the youngest seeds (mid-first to mid-second CE), coinciding with established trade routes linking this region to North Africa and supporting evidence for date consumption in the latter 2000 years ago (2, 3). This period coincides with Judeas well-documented wars against Rome (66 to 73 CE and 132 to 136 CE) and deportation and displacement of its population (16). The ancient seeds in the current study were found in the Judean desert, historically a place of refuge due to its steep cliffs and inaccessible caves (16, 23). The loss of political autonomy and the final collapse of Judea have been postulated as causing major disruption to labor intensive practices associated with date cultivation (33). Elite cultivars no longer conserved by vegetative propagation (offshoots) were gradually replaced by seedling date palms producing fruits displaying considerable variation within the progeny. Although P. dactylifera can live for more than 100 years (33) and date groves in this region are thought to have persisted for several more centuries, they were already rare by the 11th century and had been entirely replaced by seedling populations or feral, wild trees producing only low-quality fruit (5, 33), by the 19th century.

The current study sheds light on the origins of the Judean date palm, suggesting that its cultivation, benefitting from genetically distinct eastern and western populations, arose from local or introduced eastern varieties, which only later were crossed with western varieties. These findings are consistent with Judeas location between east-west date palm diversification areas, ancient centers of date palm cultivation, and the impact of human dispersal routes at this crossroads of continents.

Given its exceptional storage potentialities, the date palm is a remarkable model for seed longevity research. Investigations on the molecular mechanisms involved in long-term protection in the dried state have important implications on plant adaptation to changing environments and for biodiversity conservation and seed banking. As new information on specific gene-associated traits (e.g., fruit color and texture) (3) is found, we hope to reconstruct the phenotypes of this historic date palm, identify genomic regions associated with selection pressures over recent evolutionary history, and study the properties of dates produced by using ancient male seedlings to pollinate ancient females. In doing so, we will more fully understand the genetics and physiology of the ancient Judean date palm once cultivated in this region.

The objectives of this study and its design were as follows:

1) The origin and selection of ancient date seeds derived from archaeological sites in the Judean desert.

2) The germination of ancient date seeds in a quarantine site following a preparatory process.

3) Radiocarbon dating and recalculation of calendar ages of germinated ancient date seeds based on seed shell fragments and selected controls.

4) Seed morphometric studies: Comparing ungerminated ancient date seeds with seeds from modern date varieties and wild date palms.

5) Microsatellite analysis of seven germinated date seedlings.

(statistical methods are included in the respective sections)

The ancient date seeds in the current study were obtained from botanical material recovered from archaeological excavations and surveys carried out at the following sites in the Judean desert between 1963 and 1991 and stored at room temperature since their discovery (fig. S1).

1) Masada: An ancient fortress/palace complex built by King Herod the Great (37 to 4 BCE) at the southern end of the Dead Sea on the site of an earlier Hasmonean fortification (141 to 37 BCE) (7). The site, built on a plateau approximately 400 m above the Dead Sea, was first excavated by the late Y. Yadin (Institute of Archaeology, Hebrew University, Jerusalem, Israel) from 1963 to 1965 (7). Bioarchaeological material found at this time included large numbers of date seeds buried under rubble close to the remains of an area identified as a food storage site.

2) Qumran: An archaeological site situated at the northern end of the Dead Sea including an ancient settlement dating from the second century BCE destroyed in 68 CE and a number of caves located in the surrounding cliffs and marl terrace associated with the 1947 discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls. Later excavations and surveys of caves in this area, carried out from 1986 to 1989, by J. Patrich and B. Arubas (The Institute of Archaeology, The Hebrew University, Jerusalem, Israel) (8) included the following: Qumran Cave 13: artifacts found included potsherds from period 1b Qumran (until 31 BCE), numerous date stones and dried dates in a pit, and a pottery juglet dated to approximately 67 to 79 CE containing an unknown viscid substance and wrapped in palm fibers (used as a control in radiocarbon analysis in the current study) (see below); and Qumran Cave FQ37: containing a number of date stones and first to second CE century artifacts from the late Second Temple period (60 to 70 CE) and Roman period.

3) Wadi Makukh: A winter water channel in the Judean desert surrounded by high cliffs and containing a number of caves, which were surveyed from 1986 to 1989 (above). Date seeds found in caves 1, 3, 6, and 24 in this area were included in the current study; Cave 1 was found to include a Chalcolithic burial site (fifth millennium B.P.) containing human skeletons as well as Roman period artifacts but with signs of considerable disturbance by grave robbers (8).

4) Wadi Kelt: A winter water channel running from Jerusalem to the Dead Sea containing a number of caves (8). Date seeds from Masada were provided to S.S. by M. Kislev (Faculty of Life Sciences, Bar Ilan University), initially in 2005 (6) and again in 2007 (germinated in the current study), following permission by the late E. Netzer (Department of Archaeology, Hebrew University of Jerusalem). Date seeds from Qumran, Wadi Makukh, and Wadi Kelt were provided to S.S. by J. Patrich in 2009.

Out of a collection of many hundreds of ancient date seeds, a total of 34 were selected for the current study based on the specimens appearing visually to be intact whole seeds, in good condition, and without holes. They included Masada (8 seeds), Qumran (18 seeds), Wadi Makukh (7 seeds), and Wadi Kelt (1 seed). Ancient date seeds selected above were identified by code numbers and photographed, and measurements of weight and length were made before planting (with the exception of Masada seeds, which unfortunately were not measured) (table S1). One date seed, from the Qumran excavations (HU 37 A11), was selected as a control and left unplanted (table S1).

The remaining 33 seeds were subjected to a preparatory process to increase the likelihood of seed germination using the following established methods to sprout delicate germplasm (34): seeds were initially soaked in water for 24 hours and in gibberellic acid (5.19 mM) (OrthoGrow, USA) for 6 hours to encourage embryonic growth. This was followed by Hormoril T8 solution (5 g/liter) (Asia-Riesel, Israel) for 6 hours to encourage rooting and KF-20 organic fertilizer (10 ml/liter) (VGI, Israel) for 12 hours. All solutions were maintained at 35C.

Following the above procedure, one seed was found to be damaged and not planted. The remaining 32 seeds were separately potted in fresh sterile potting soil, 1 cm below the surface, and placed in a locked quarantine site at the Arava Institute of Environmental Sciences, Kibbutz Ketura, located in the southern Israel. Eight weeks after germination and periodically afterward, KF-20 (10 ml/liter) and iron chelate (10 g/liter) were added to the seedlings. Irrigation used desalinated water, as our previous study on germinating the first ancient date seed (6) indicated that using the regions highly mineralized water produced tip burn (darkening and drying of leaves).

Radiocarbon ages in the current study were obtained for the following bioarchaeological material: (i) fragments of seed shell coat found clinging to the rootlets of six germinated ancient date seeds when these seedlings were transferred into larger pots, (ii) an unplanted ancient date seed from cave 37 Qumran (HU37 A11) (used as a control), and (iii) part of an ancient palm frond surrounding an oil juglet found in Qumran Cave 13 (used as a control). Radiocarbon ages of seed shell fragments from the germinated seedlings were recalculated to take into account modern carbon incorporated during seedling growth (6).

1) Methodology: Nonorganic carbon (carbonates) were removed from all samples with 10% HCl under reduced pressure followed by repeated washes in deionized water until neutral (pH 7). Organic acids formed during the rotting process were removed with 10% NaOH followed by repeated washes (as above). To prevent absorption of atmospheric CO2, all samples were placed again in 10% HCl and then washed in deionized water until neutral. To remove chemicals used in the germination process, a 7-mm-long shell fragment from the germinated date seed weighing 80 mg was cut into six cubes of 8 mm3 and subjected to an additional series of four boil washes. All samples were heated in an evacuated sealed quartz tube with CuO as an oxygen source. The resulting CO2 was mixed with hydrogen in the ratio 2.5:1 and catalytically reduced over cobalt powder at 550C to elemental carbon (graphite). This mixture was pressed into a target and the 14C:12C ratio (for radiocarbon age) measured by accelerator mass spectrometry at the Institute for Particle Physics of the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Zurich (ETHZ).

2) Calendar age: Calendar age was obtained using the OxCal 4.3 calibration program based on the latest IntCal 13 calibration curve (35). Calibrated calendar ages can be found with a probability of 68.3% in the 1-range and with a probability of 95.4% in the 2-range (table S2). The probability distribution P of individual ages is given for each sigma range. The 14C activity is reported as pMC (percentage of modern carbon) and corresponds to the ratio of the activity of the sample to the corrected activity of the oxalic acid standard, which has an age of 0 yr B.P.

3) Calculation of correction for pMC: The effect of contamination by modern carbon incorporated during seedling growth previously shown in our first germination of an ancient date seed to reduce measured age by 250 to 300 years (equivalent to 2 to 3% pMC) (6) was calculated using the following three groups based on the source of the ancient seeds in both the current and previous studies:

(i) Masada: Adam (current study), Methuselah (seed 3), and seed 1 [both from previous study (6) in which seed 1 was used as a control].

(ii) Qumran Cave 13: Judith and an ancient palm frond (used as a control)

(iii) Qumran Cave 37: Boaz, Jonah, Uriel, and seed HU37A11 (used as a control)

The germinated ancient seed Hannah from Wadi Makhukh was not assigned to a group due to the absence of a suitable control and considerable disruption to the site.

Using as age-controls the ancient palm frond (Qumran Cave 13), seed HU37A11 (Qumran Cave 37) from the current study and seed 1 (Masada) from the previous study (6), we assumed that a positive pMC difference between the germinated seeds and control sample could be attributed to modern carbon that was absorbed during germination. Ages of the germinated seeds were therefore recalculated (assuming that the measurement error remains unchanged) by adjusting the measured age to the control sample. For Hannah since no control exists, an average deviation (derived from the other samples) was taken into account.

Comparison of ancient date seeds that failed to germinate with modern date seeds. This was performed on the following groups:

1) Modern date seed (P. dactylifera) samples (n = 56): Being either from cultivated varieties (n = 47) or uncultivated and possibly wild individuals (n = 9) (9). Seeds from these sources (total n = 1108) were used as a current referential for seed morphometric analysis. The cultivated modern samples originated from 11 countries spanning date palm distribution from Spain to North Africa to the Middle-East. The candidate wild date palms originated from Oman and have been hypothesized as wild date palms based on seed shape, seed size (18), and genetic studies based on microsatellite and whole-genome resequencing data (9).

2) Ancient date seeds (n = 18): Of 26 ancient date seeds obtained from Qumran, Wadi Makukh, and Wadi Kelt archaeological sites (described above) that had been planted in the quarantine site, 21 failed to germinate and were retrieved from the potting soil. Of these, three were discarded as they had fragmented and were in poor condition. The remaining 18 retrieved ancient date seeds together with modern reference seeds (described above) were rephotographed on dorsal and lateral sides, and measurements of length and width were remade (table S3) [Neither current or previous (6) ancient date seeds from Masada that failed to germinate were used in the morphometric study as these seeds were not retrieved from the potting soil].

The following statistical analyses were performed using R software (36).

1) Size analysis of modern seeds: The length and width of a total of 1108 seeds obtained from 47 current cultivated varieties (928 seeds) and 9 current wild individuals (180 seeds) were measured using ImageJ (37) following the protocol previously established by Gros-Balthazard et al. (18). The thickness was not measured since it is highly correlated with width (18).

2) Comparison of seed size between current and ancient samples: Measurements for current varieties were compared with those measured for the ancient date seeds using boxplots and Students and Tukeys tests (table S4).

3) Analysis of seed shape diversity in current and ancient date seeds: PCA (dudi.pca function) was performed on seed outlines assessed by Fourier coefficients, a morphometric method applied to outline analysis.

DNA preparation. DNA of six ancient date seedlings from the current study and one (Methuselah) from the previous study (6) was analyzed. A set of 19 SSR was used for genotyping as described by Zehdi-Azouzi et al. (4). Gender was determined using date palm sex-linked microsatellite markers (11). Maternal lineages were traced back using the plastid intergenic spacer psbZ-trnf minisatellite (12, 38). Paternal lineages were studied through Y haplotypes using the three sex-linked SSRs (mPdIRDP80, mPdIRDP50, and mPdIRDP52) (11).

Total cellular DNA was extracted from lyophilized leaves using the TissueLyser and the DNeasy Plant Mini Kit (QIAGEN SA, Courtaboeuf, France) according to the manufacturers instructions. After purification, DNA concentrations were determined using a GeneQuant spectrometer (Amersham Pharmacia Biotech, France). The quality was checked by agarose minigel electrophoresis. The resulting DNA solutions were stored at 20C.

Amplification and genotyping. Polymerase chain reactions were performed in an Eppendorf (AG, Hamburg, Germany) thermocycler. Reaction was performed in 20 l and contained 10 ng of genomic DNA, 10 reaction buffer, 2 mM MgCl2, 200 M deoxynucleotide triphosphates, 0.5 U polymerase, and 0.4 pmol of the forward primer labeled with a 5M13 tail, 2 pmol of the reverse primer, and 2 pmol of the fluorochrome-marked M13 tail and MilliQ water. A touchdown polymerase chain reaction (PCR) was carried out with following parameters: denaturation for 2 min at 94C, followed by six cycles of 94C for 45 s, 60C for 1 min, and 72C for 1 min; then 30 cycles of 94C for 45 s, 55C for 1 min, and 72C for 1.5 min; then 10 cycles of 94C for 45 min, 53C for 1 min, 72C for 1.5 min; and a final elongation step at 72C for 10 min. PCR products were analyzed using an ABI 3130XL Genetic Analyzer (Applied Biosystems, Foster City, CA, USA). Allele size scoring was performed with GeneMapper software v3.7 (Applied Biosystems).

Genetic analyses. The ancient genotypes were compared to a reference matrix (90 genotypes) containing genotyping data on current date palm varieties covering the two genetic pools defined by Zehdi-Azouzi et al. (4) and including 35 samples from the eastern pool and 55 samples from the western pool (table S5). The number of alleles per group (NA), the number of alleles with a frequency higher than 5% (NA,P), and the observed (Ho), the expected (He) heterozygosities, and the fixation index values (FIS) were estimated using the GenAlEx 6.5 program (table S6). The allelic richness of each group was also calculated via the divBasic function implemented in the R package diversity (table S6) (39).

The hierarchical classifications were generated using PHYLIP package by calculating Cavalli-Sforza and Edwards distances (40) between ancient genotypes and current varieties (table S7). The obtained distance was used to construct the dendrogram using the neighbor-joining algorithm (41). The tree was drawn using DARwin software (42).

The membership probabilities of the ancient genotypes were identified by using a model-based clustering algorithm implemented in the computer program STRUCTURE v.2.3.4 (43). This algorithm identifies clusters (K) with different allele frequencies and assigns portions of individual genotypes to these clusters. It assumes the Hardy-Weinberg equilibrium and linkage equilibrium within clusters. The STRUCTURE algorithm was run without previous information on the geographic origin of the accessions using a model with admixture and correlated allele frequencies with 10 independent replicate runs for each K value (K value ranging from 1 to 6). For each run, we used a burn period of 10,000 iterations followed by 1 million iterations. The optimal number of clusters was assigned by using the run with the maximum likelihood validated with an ad hoc quantity based on the second-order rate of change in the log probability of data between different K values (fig. S3).The optimal alignment of the independent iterations was obtained by CLUMPP v.1.1 implemented in the Pophelper software v.1.0.10 (44); Pophelper v.1.0.10 (44) was also used to plot the results for the optimal K.

Acknowledgments: We thank J. Patrich and the late E. Netzer for making available ancient date seeds from Judean desert excavations; R. Krueger (USDA-ARS, USA) for providing some current date palm varieties; and S. Zehdi (Faculty of Sciences, University of Tunis El Manar, Tunisia), A. Lemansour (UAEU, DPDRUD, United Arab Emirates), M. A. Elhoumaizi (Sciences Faculty, Morocco), and C. Newton for allowing the use of genotyping data on current date palm varieties in the reference matrix. M. Collin is acknowledged for the help in the figure preparation and T. Bdolah Abraham for the help in statistics. O. Fragman-Sapir is acknowledged for identification of ancient date seeds and C. Yeres and A. Rifkin for information on Midrashic and Talmudic Jewish source material. Funding: The study was supported by donations to NMRC from The Charles Wolfson Charitable Trust (UK), G. Gartner and the Louise Gartner Philanthropic Fund (USA), and the Morris Family Foundation (UK). Author contributions: S.S. initiated, designed, and coordinated the study, procured ancient date samples, researched historical and archaeological information and integrated it with scientific findings, and wrote the paper. E.C. and N.C. performed genetic analyses on germinated seedlings. E.S. germinated ancient date seeds. M.E. performed radiocarbon analysis. M.G.-B., S.I., and J.-F.T. performed morphometric analysis. F.A. supervised genetic analyses and with E.C., M.G.-B., and M.E. helped write the manuscript. Competing interests: The authors declare that they have no competing interests. Data and materials availability: All data needed to evaluate the conclusions in the paper are present in the paper and/or the Supplementary Materials. Additional data related to this paper may be requested from the authors.

Read this article:
Origins and insights into the historic Judean date palm based on genetic analysis of germinated ancient seeds and morphometric studies - Science...

You want hair so healthythat it shines. But can anything other than good genes turn you into a walking shampooad?

Cleveland Clinic is a non-profit academic medical center. Advertising on our site helps support our mission. We do not endorse non-Cleveland Clinic products or services.Policy

Yes, says dermatologist Shilpi Khetarpal, MD, with the help of some nutrients and products.

Coloring, blow-drying and overwashing can all harm your hair, but there are also some other landmines to watch out for, such as:

A well-balanced diet is the first key to top-notch tresses. But you may still need extra help to kick-start your hair restoration.

Yourprimary care doctor or dermatologist can help you safely determine which hairgrowth shampoos and supplements would be the most appropriate, Dr. Khetarpalsays.

Here are six to consider for a full head of luxuriouslocks:

Dr. Khetarpalsays that success depends more on the duration of hair loss than anything else.People who have been losing hair for only two or three years are more likely tosee noticeable results than those losing it for 10 or 20 years, she explains.

You may be able to restore your hair to what it was likefive years ago, but not much beyond that. Those are the hair follicles that canbe woken up with nutritional supplementation and medical treatments, she says.Hair that has become too thin and fine can no longer penetrate and exit thesurface of the scalp. You have to be reasonable with your expectations.

And, always talk to your doctor if you start shedding morehair than is normal for you.

Originally posted here:
The Best Vitamins, Supplements and Products for Healthier Hair - Health Essentials from Cleveland Clinic

Cancer is an emotional subject, with most having lost a loved one to the disease.

One in two people born after 1960 in the UK will develop the condition at some point in their life, Cancer Research UK data shows.

READ MORE: Pancreatic cancer: symptoms to look out for

Lifestyle habits - like smoking, too much processed meat or inactivity - are known to trigger the disease.

Genetics also play a role, with many cases being down to bad luck.

Thyroid cancer increased by 76% in 10 years. [Photo: Cancer Research UK]

Of the 20 most common types of cancer, thyroid tumours have jumped most.

In women, the above chart - based on Cancer Research UK data - shows the disease was 76% more common in 2014-to-2016 than 2004-to-2006.

This was followed by liver cancer, which rose by 52% over the 10 years.

Kidney cancer, melanoma, and tumours of the head and neck were the next highest risers, up 44%, 35% and 25%, respectively.

READ MORE: With liver cancer deaths on the rise, these are the symptoms to look out for

Not all cancers are becoming more common, however.

The above chart shows cancers of unknown origin went down by 36% in women between 2004/6 and 2014/16.

This occurs when cancer is only detected once it has spread, with doctors being unable to find where it started.

The second fastest decline was in stomach cancer, which went down by 28%.

Overall, female cancers have risen by 8%.

Thyroid cancer has become 75% more common in men. [Photo: Cancer Research UK]

Thyroid cancer also had the biggest increase among men, rising by 75% between 2004/6 and 2014/16.

Similar to women, the above chart shows this was followed by liver cancer, which went up 61%.

The next fastest increases in cases were melanoma, kidney cancer and Hodgkin lymphoma, which rose by 55%, 38% and 22%, respectively.

Cancers of unknown origin have decreased just as fast in men as women, with a 36% decline.

This was followed by a 31% reduction in stomach cancer.

READ MORE: Processed meats containing this preservative are linked to colon cancer

For some diseases, the trends differed between men and women.

Lung cancer rose by 17% in women but went down by 10% in men.

Bowel tumours remained stable in females but reduced by 5% in males.

Oseophageal cancer was stable for men but went down by 7% in women.

The overall increase in cancer rates among men was smaller than in women, at 1%.

Why some cancers are on the up and others are declining is unclear, with there likely being no one answer.

Scientists estimate around two-thirds of the overall increase is down to us living longer.

The average Brit lives to 80, compared to around 70 in 1960.

With us surviving longer, there are more opportunities for genetic mistakes to accumulate, triggering cancer.

Lifestyle habits may also explain why bowel cancer appears to be stabilising in women and declining in men.

A diet rich in red and processed meat has been linked to the disease, with the plant-based movement encouraging many to cut back.

Sunbathing and sunbeds may be why melanoma, the deadliest form of skin cancer, has risen in both men and women.

Nationwide screening programmes could also explain why fewer cancers have an unknown origin.

For example, mammograms and smear tests allow doctors to spot breast and cervical cancers early, before they spread.

When it comes to stomach cancer, greater awareness around food preparation may mean less people become infected with the bacteria Helicobacter pylori, known to boost the risk.

The increasing number of people getting cancer in the UK is mainly because people are living longer nowadays, and cancer is more common in older people, Rachel Orritt, health information manager at Cancer Research UK, told Yahoo UK.

The NHS must be prepared to cope with this alongside demands for better diagnostics, treatments, and earlier diagnosis.

But around four in 10 cancer cases in the UK could be prevented, so its important to think about how we can reduce our risk too.

Making positive changes can make a big difference if we stick to them.

Stopping smoking, cutting down on alcohol and eating a healthy balanced diet all help to stack the odds in our favour.

Excerpt from:
The cancers on the rise - and the decline - in the UK - Yahoo Lifestyle

From sizzling fiction to searing memoirs to thought-provoking essays, this list has offerings not just from celebrated women authors but dazzling debuting ones too. With almost a hundred books to choose from, this year holds the promise of an exciting reading experience. Add your own finds to this list, send your recommendations to us and embark on your reading odyssey. Compiled by Archana Pai Kulkarni.

1) The Mirror And The Light, by Hilary Mantel

This eagerly awaited book has been eight years in the making. With it Hilary Mantel brings to a triumphant close the trilogy she began with Wolf Hall and Bring Up the Bodies. She traces the final years of Thomas Cromwell, the boy from nowhere who climbs to the heights of power, offering a defining portrait of predator and prey, of aferocious contest between present and past, between royal will and a common mans vision: of a modern nation making itself through conflict, passion, and courage.

2) Djinn Patrol on the Purple Line, by Deepa Anappara

This story is a talisman. Hold it close to your hearts, were told, at some point, in this debut novel. Anapparas years of journalistic work, wide-ranging awards, fellowships, and advance praise, precede the arrival of her foray into full-length fiction. Drawing on real incidents and a spate of disappearances in metropolitan India, the novel captures the fierce warmth, resilience, and bravery that can emerge in times of trouble.

3) Jaipur Journals, by Namita Gokhale

Told from multiple perspectives, set against the backdrop of the vibrant multilingual Jaipur Literature Festival, diverse stories of lost love and regret, self-doubt, and new beginnings come together in a narrative that is as varied as India itself. Part love letter to the greatest literary festival on earth, part satire about the glittery attendees who go year after year, and part ode to the many up-and-coming writers, Gokhales book stages and makes space for the pretensions and the pathos of the loneliest tribe of them all: the writers.

4) No Straight Thing Was Ever Made by Urvashi Bahuguna

After Terrarium, a richly layered and deeply felt poetry debut, Bahugunas new book is a collection of essayssitting on the fence between personal narratives, conversational anecdotes, and research. She discusses living with mental illness in all its forms and facetsfrom family to physical fatigue and professional impact.

Also Read: Here Are Three Inspirational Books For Greater Creativity

5) The Night Watchman, by Louise Erdrich

This novel is based on the life of Erdrichs grandfather, a night watchman who fought in the 1950s against Native dispossession. Louise Erdrich creates a fictional world populated with memorable characters who are forced to grapple with the worst and best impulses of human nature. Illuminating the loves and lives, the desires and ambitions of these characters with compassion, wit, and intelligence, this powerful novel explores themes of love and death with lightness and gravity and unfolds with the elegant prose, sly humour, and depth of feeling of a master craftsman.

6) Afterlife, by Julia Alvarez

Antonia Vega, the immigrant writer at the centre of Afterlife has just retired from her college, when her beloved husband, Sam, suddenly dies. Then, her bighearted but unstable sister disappears, and Antonia returns home one evening to find a pregnant, undocumented teenager on her doorstep. Afterlife is a compact, nimble, and sharply droll novel. Set in this political moment of tribalism and distrust, it asks: What do we owe those in crisis, including maybe especially members of our human family How do we live in a broken world without losing faith in one another or ourselves?

7) American Dirt, by Jeanine Cummins

Lydia Quixano Prez runs a bookstore in the Mexican city of Acapulco. She has a son, Luca, the love of her life, and a wonderful husband who is a journalist. Lydia stocks some of her all-time favourite books in her store. And then one day Javier, a charming, erudite man comes to the store to buy a few books. Unknown to Lydia, he is the jefe of the newest drug cartel that has taken over the city. When Lydias husbands tell-all profile of Javier is published, Lydia and eight-year-old Luca are forced to flee. Instantly transformed into migrants, Lydia soon sees that everyone is running from something. American Dirt will leave readers utterly changed.

8) This Is One Way to Dance, by Sejal Shah

In the linked essays that make up her debut collection, Sejal Shah explores culture, language, family, and place, and reflects on what it means to make oneself visible and legible through writing in a country that struggles with race and maps her identity as an American, South Asian American, writer of colour, and feminist. These essays some narrative, others lyrical and poetic explore how we are all marked by culture, gender, and race; by the limits of our bodies, by our losses and regrets, and by trauma and silence.

9) Manto and I, by Nandita Das

In this book, I have chosen to share not just my creative, but also my emotional, political, and spiritual experiences of the six years I spent with Manto, says Das. If youve watched the film, this book will serve as a companion, as it candidly cuts into the behind-the-scenes moments and the making-of the story on screen. I believe, together, the images and words will tell you a story you havent seen on the screen. With Manto and I, my journey feels complete.

10) You Exist Too Much, by Zaina Arafat

On a hot day in Bethlehem, a 12-year-old Palestinian-American girl is yelled at by a group of men outside the Church of the Nativity. She has exposed her legs in a biblical city, an act they deem forbidden, and their judgement will echo on through her adolescence. When our narrator finally admits to her mother that she is queer, her mothers response only intensifies a sense of shame: You exist too much, she tells her daughter. Opening up the fantasies and desires of one young woman caught between cultural, religious, and sexual identities, the novel is a captivating story charting two of our most intense longings for love, and a place to call home.

Also Read: 15 books to read before you are 15!

11) A Room Made of Leaves, by Kate Grenville

Kate Grenville is best known for her 2006 novel The Secret River, which was shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize and the Miles Franklin award. Her bibliography covers historical fiction, non-fiction, biography, and books about her writing process. Her new novel, titled A Room Made of Leaves, sees her returning to historical fiction, taking place in early colonial Sydney and centring around a woman, Elizabeth Macarthur, described as a woman of spirit, cunning and sly wit.

12) Summer, by Ali Smith

From the Man Booker short-listed author of Autumn, Winter, and Spring comes Summer, the highly anticipated fourth novel in her acclaimed Seasonal Quartet. Here is the exciting culmination of Ali Smiths celebrated Seasonal Quartet, a series of stand-alone novels, separate but interconnected (as the seasons are), wide-ranging in timescale and light-footed through histories.

13) The Loneliness Of Hira Barua by Arupa Kalita Patangia, translated from Assamese, by Ranjita Biswas

The English translation of the 2014 Sahitya Akademi Award-winning collection of short stories, originally titled Mariam Austin Othoba Hira Baruah, from one of our leading feminist voices. It paints powerful portraits of ordinary people, especially women, negotiating their personal lives in times of socio-political strife and turmoil in Assam.

14) The Girl with the Louding Voice, by Abi Dar

Adunni is a fourteen-year-old Nigerian girl who wants an education. As the only daughter of a broke father, she is a valuable commodity, who is removed from school and sold as a third wife to an old man. When unspeakable tragedy swiftly strikes in her new home, she is secretly sold as a domestic servant to a wealthy household, where no one will talk about the strange disappearance of her predecessor. But Adunni wont be silenced. She is determined to find her voice in a whisper, in song, in broken English -until she can speak for herself.

15) Strange Hotel, by Eimear McBride

From the author of the award-winning A Girl Is a Half-formed Thing, comes the beguiling travelogue of a woman in exile: from her past, her ghosts, and herself. A nameless woman enters a hotel room. There, amid the detritus of her travels, the matchbooks, cigarettes, keys and room-service wine, she negotiates with her memories, with those she has lost or left behindand with what it might mean to return home. Urgent and immersive, its a novel of enduring emotional force.

Also Read: You Beneath Your Skin Is An Engaging Psychological Thriller: Excerpt

16) Resisting Disappearance: Military Occupation and Womens Activism in Kashmir by Ather Zia

Drawn from Ather Zias ten years of engagement with the APDP as an anthropologist and fellow Kashmiri activist, the book follows mothers and half-widows as they step boldly into courts, military camps, and morgues in search of their disappeared kin. Through an amalgam of ethnography, poetry, and photography, Zia illuminates how dynamics of gender and trauma in Kashmir have been transformed in the face of South Asias longest-running conflict, providing profound insight into how Kashmiri women and men nurture a politics of resistance.

17) Sex and Lies, by Lela Slimani

In these essays, the author gives voice to young Moroccan women who are grappling with a conservative Arab culture that at once condemns and commodifies sex. In a country where the law punishes and outlaws all forms of sex outside marriage, as well as homosexuality and prostitution, women have only two options for their sexual identities: virgin or wife. Sex and Lies is an essential confrontation with Moroccos intimate demons and a vibrant appeal for the universal freedom to be, to love and to desire.

18) My Past is a Foreign Country: A Muslim Feminist Finds Herself, by Zeba Talkhani

28-year-old Zeba Talkhani charts her experiences growing up in Saudi Arabia amid patriarchal customs, and her journey to find freedom in India, Germany and the UK. She offers a fresh perspective on living as an outsider and examines her relationship with her mother and the challenges she faced when she experienced hair loss at a young age. Drawing on her personal experiences Talkhani shows how she fought for the right to her individuality as a Muslim feminist and refused to let negative experiences define her.

19) Weather, by Jenny Offill

Lizzie Benson slid into her job as a librarian, which gives her a vantage point to practise her other calling: as an unofficial shrink. For years, she has supported her God-haunted mother and her recovering addict brother. Her old mentor, Sylvia Liller wants to hire Lizzie to answer the mail she receives. As she dives into this polarized world, her brother becomes a father and Sylvia a recluse, and Lizzie is forced to acknowledge the limits of what she can do. But if she cant save others, then what, or who, might save her?

20) Funny Weather: Art in an Emergency, by Olivia Laing

In this remarkable, inspiring collection of essays, acclaimed writer and critic Olivia Laing makes a brilliant case for why art matters, especially in the turbulent political weather of the twenty first century. She profiles Jean-Michel Basquiat and Georgia OKeefe, interviews Hilary Mantel and Ali Smith, writes love letters to David Bowie and Freddie Mercury, and explores loneliness and technology, women and alcohol, sex and the body. With characteristic originality and compassion, she celebrates art as a force of resistance and repair, an antidote to a frightening political time.

Also Read: Female Poets Retrace Their Journeys At Hyderabad Women Writers Fest

21) Hitting a Straight Lick with a Crooked Stick, by Zora Neale Hurston

In 1925, Barnard student Zora Neale Hurstonthe sole black student at the collegewas living in New York, desperately striving for a toe-hold on the world. During this period, she began writing short works that captured the zeitgeist of African American life and transformed her into one of the central figures of the Harlem Renaissance. This is an outstanding collection of stories about love and migration, gender and class, racism and sexism that proudly reflect African American folk culture. All are timeless classics that enrich our understanding and appreciation of this exceptional writers voice and her contributions to Americas literary traditions.

22) Passage to the Plaza, by Sahar Khalifeh, translated from Arabic by Sawad Hussain

In Bab Al-Saha, Palestine, sits a house of ill repute. In it lives Nuzha, a young woman ostracized by her community. When the Intifada breaks out, Nuzhas abode unexpectedly becomes a sanctuary. In the furnace of conflict at the heart of the 1987 Intifada, notions of freedom, love, respectability, nationhood, the rights of women, and Palestinian identity will be melted and re-forged. Vividly recounted through the eyes of its female protagonists, the novel is a groundbreaking story that shatters the myth of a uniform gendered experience of conflict.

23) Victory Colony, by Bhaswati Ghosh

This 1950s-set story speaks of the resilience of refugees from East Pakistanand specifically of Amala Mannawho found themselves mostly unwanted on either side of the border following Partition. In the face of government apathy and public disdain, they started anew their lives from scratch, and in the process, changed the sociocultural landscape of Calcutta, the city they claimed as home, forever. Needless to say, Victory Colony has renewed resonance and significance in our current political climate.

24) Breasts and Eggs, by Mieko Kawakami (translated by Sam Bett and David Boyd)

Coming out this spring is this novella, which details a three-day reunion between a 30-year-old unmarried narrator, her sister Makiko and Makikos daughter, Midoriko. Kawakami focuses in on each womans respective struggles with identity and the female body, tackling big themes with humour and offering a cold, hard look at the many pressures facing women in Japan. Breasts and Eggs opens a discussion on reproductive rights within Japan, and the social struggles associated with one woman making her choice.

Also Read: Why I Write: Writing Defines My Identity, Choices and Priorities

25) Where the Wild Ladies Are by Aoko Matsuda (translated by Polly Barton)

Feminist retellings of classic tales are always fun and rapidly growing in popularity around the world. In 2020, taking a collection of traditional Japanese ghost stories and crafting them into often humorous yet painfully relevant tales is a move of pure genius by Aoko Matsuda. Taking place in a contemporary setting, with a decidedly feminist bend, the book takes classic Japanese ghost stories and rewrites them to make them relevant to the current gender climate of modern-day Japan. Witty, biting, and poignant, Matsudas collection is a pleasantly haunting surprise.

26) My Dark Vanessa, by Kate Elizabeth Russell

Bright, ambitious, and yearning for adulthood, fifteen-year-old Vanessa Wye becomes entangled in an affair with Jacob Strane, her magnetic and guileful forty-two-year-old English teacher. Alternating between Vanessas present and her past, the novel juxtaposes memory and trauma with the breathless excitement of a teenage girl discovering the power her own body can wield. A masterful portrayal of troubled adolescence and its repercussions, it raises vital questions about agency, consent, complicity, and victimhood, and brilliantly captures the shifting cultural mores transforming our relationships and society itself.

27) Brother & Sister: A Memoir, by Diane Keaton

With prose as quirky and affecting as her on-screen personas, actress Diane Keaton has already chronicled her extraordinary life in two memoirs. Keatons third, is the most wrenching yet as she tries to understand how her beloved younger brother Randy became a troubled recluse who lives on the other side of normal. In beautiful and fearless prose thats intertwined with photographs, journal entries, letters, and poetry, this insightful memoir contemplates the inner workings of a family, the ties that hold it together, and the special bond between siblings even when they are pulled far apart.

28) Recollections of My Nonexistence, by Rebecca Solnit

Solnits first full-length memoir is the transfixing account of the feminist firebrands intellectual awakening. In 1981, Rebecca Solnit rented a studio apartment in San Francisco, where she began to come to terms with the epidemic of violence against women around her, the street harassment that unsettled her, and the authority figures that routinely disbelieved her. Set in the era of punk, of growing gay pride, of counter culture and West Coast activism, here is an electric account of the pauses and gains of feminism in the past forty years; and an extraordinary portrait of an artist, by a seminal American writer.

29) More Myself: A Journey, by Alicia Keys

As one of the most celebrated musicians in the world, Alicia Keys has enraptured the globe with her heartfelt lyrics, extraordinary vocal range, and soul-stirring piano compositions. Yet away from the spotlight, Alicia has grappled with private heartacheover the challenging and complex relationship with her father, the people-pleasing nature that characterized her early career, the loss of privacy surrounding her romantic relationships, and the oppressive expectations of female perfection. Here, she shares her quest for truthabout herself, her past, and her shift from sacrificing her spirit to celebrating her worth.

30) Redhead by the Side of the Road, by Anne Tyler

Tylers second novel in two years is about a creature of habit named Micah whose life is turned upside down by two peoplefirst, his thirty-something girlfriend who has nowhere to go after being evicted from her apartment, and then the teenager who shows up at his door claiming to be his son. Classic Tyler, a la The Accidental Tourist.

31) The Book of Longings, by Sue Monk Kidd

Did Jesus have a wife? A 1,300-year-old scrap of papyrus suggests he might have. The author of The Invention of Wings, takes that enduring scholarly mystery and delivers unto us the story of Ana, who meets Jesus when hes 18 and falls in love with him. This historical saga conjures a woman who defies the expectations of her time by becoming a scholar and philosopher ultimately in exile from Nazareth and her husband.

32) If I Had Your Face, by Frances Cha

Chas striking first novel follows four young women in Seoul, South Korea trapped in a sphere of impossible beauty standards, a place where extreme plastic surgery is as routine as getting a haircut, where women compete for spots in secret room salons to entertain wealthy businessmen after hours, where K-Pop stars are the object of all-consuming obsession, and ruthless social hierarchies dictate your every move. Unsettling and deeply affecting.

Also Read: Must Read Books On Yoga That Offer Deeper Insights Into The Practice

33) The Glass Hotel, by Emily St. John Mandel

Half a decade after her best-selling, ground-breaking dystopia, Station Eleven, the writer returns with a mystery about the relationship between a New York financier, his waiter lover, and a disappearance. Set across a ship, Manhattan skyscrapers, and the wilderness of remote British Columbia, the novel paints a heady and breathtaking picture of greed and guilt, fantasy and delusion, art and the ghosts of our pasts.

34) Little Eyes, by Samanta Schweblin, translated from Spanish by Megan McDowell

The characters in Samanta Schweblins brilliant new novel reveal the beauty of connection between far-flung soulsbut yet they also expose the ugly side of our increasingly linked world. Trusting strangers can lead to unexpected love, playful encounters, and marvellous adventure, but what happens when it can also pave the way for unimaginable terror? Schweblin creates a dark and complex world thats sensible, recognizable. A visionary novel about our interconnected present, about the collision of horror and humanity, from a master of the spine-tingling tale.

35) The Heart Asks Pleasure First, by Karuna Ezara Parikh

It is 2001 and Daya and Aaftab have just met in a park in Cardiff. This, the poets debut work of fiction has been a decade in the makingand its not your average love story, were told, but one of impossible, forbidden love, difficult joyous friendship in a world of migration, xenophobia, Islamophobia and jihad.

36) Postcolonial Love Poem, by Natalie Diaz

Diazwho is Mojave and an enrolled member of the Gila River Indian Tribewon an American Book Award for her debut poetry collection, When My Brother Was an Aztec. Her transformative second collection, described as an anthem of desire against erasure, and a thunderous river of a book about bodies, is already being welcomed with warm, rapturous praise on both sides of the Atlantic.

37) Shameless, by Taslima Nasreen, translated from Bengali by Arunava Sinha

Shameless, the sequel to the controversial and best-selling Lajja, had never been published in Bengali, or any other language, until very recently, when a Hindi translation was printed. This timely, topical and outspoken novel about communal tensions in India is, according to its author, not a political noveland instead about what the politics of religion does to human beings and their relationships: a ruthless, uncompromising, heartbreaking tale of ordinary peoples lives in our times.

38) Name, Place, Animal, Thing, by Daribha Lyndem

Set in politically charged Shillong, this interconnected collection of stories speaks of the coming-of-age of a young womanand the city and community she calls home. As each chapter gently lifts a curtain to reveal glimpses of the protagonists Protestant, Khasi life, we see her cross the threshold from childhood to adulthood.

39) The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes, by Suzanne Collins

The prequel to the trilogy will revisit the world of Panem sixty-four years before the events of The Hunger Games, starting on the morning of the reaping of the Tenth Hunger Games. Yes, this will be a major event in the book world this year. Yes, you should reread the trilogy while you wait.

40) How Much of These Hills is Gold, by C. Pam Zhang

This epic debut novel, set during the Gold Rush in a reimagined American West, has received early praise from the likes of Daisy Johnson and Lauren Groff. Lucy and Sam are two newly orphaned siblings who travel an unforgiving landscape with their fathers body on their backs. This is the story of the myth of the American Dream, of memories, of (an immigrant) family and fortune, and more.

Also Read: A List Of Uplifting Books To Help You Kick Start Your Day

41) Death in Her Hands, by Ottessa Moshfegh

Your year of rest and relaxation is overfor the Booker Prize-shortlisted writer of Eileen, and unlikeable female protagonists, is back with a novel of haunting metaphysical suspense, horror, and the pitch-black comedy we love her for. A forest, a handwritten note, a dead body are you hooked and spooked yet?

42) A Thousand Cranes for India: Reclaiming Plurality Amid Hatred, edited by Pallavi Aiyar

This anthologycomprising 23 pieces of reportage, stories, poems, memoir and polemicuses the mythology, history, and symbolism of Japanese Origami paper cranes as a pathway for some of Indias best-known writers, poets and artists to pave a shared, civic space for a conversation about the fault lines in India at a time of darkness.

43) Why is my hair curly? by Lakshmy Iyer

Meet 10-year-old Avantika, adopted at the age of six months. In a family where everybody has sleek, straight hair, she has a head full of unruly curls. Interspersed with illustrations, the protagonists preoccupation with her hair becomes a starting-point for conversations about genetics and the fabric of a family.

44) Sisters, by Daisy Johnson

Lauren Groff has called her a goddamn swaggering monster of fiction. Johnson was shortlisted for the Booker Prize with the magical, mesmerizing, murky-with-genre, Everything Under. With this new novel about sibling love, she steers closer to psychological horror, and perhaps, to her debut work of fiction, the short story collection, Fen.

45) Hunted by the Sky, by Tanaz Bhatena

From the author of A Girl Like That, this YA fantasy explores identity, class inequality, alongside a high-stakes romance story. Hunted by the Sky is set in the Kingdom of Ambara world inspired by medieval India, and a world of deadly, dark secrets and adventures.

46) Little Gods, by Meng Jin

On the night of June Fourth, a woman gives birth in a Beijing hospital alone. Thus begins the unravelling of Su Lan, a brilliant physicist who until this moment has successfully erased her past. Years later, when Su Lan dies unexpectedly, her daughter Liya, who grew up in America, takes her mothers ashes to Chinato her, an unknown country, where her memories are joined by those of Zhu Wen, the woman last to know Su Lan before she left China, and Yongzong, the father Liya has never known. This lyrical and thought-provoking debut novel explores the complex web of grief, memory, time, and selfhood in the immigrant experience, and the complicated bond between daughters and mothers.

Read more here:
Books By Women Authors To Look Out For In 2020 - SheThePeople

The latest iteration of Gwyneth Paltrow's controversial lifestyle brand has landed on Netflix, and hoo boy there is a lot to unpack.

Like anyone with a penchant for evidence-based medicine, I went into the series, The Goop Lab, with a sceptical eye (but an open mind).

Goop has a reputation for making unfounded health claims, and ahead of the show's release, health professionals expressed concern that it could spread pseudoscientific information and encourage a distrust in medical experts.

While Goop is careful to start each episode with a disclaimer that the show is designed to "entertain and inform not provide medical advice", it goes on to present alternative therapies (some with very limited evidence) as a treatment for various ailments, often without much-needed context.

Each episode of the six-part series generally follows the same formula: Paltrow and Goop executive Elise Loehnen sit down with a couple of experts (genuine or otherwise), discuss a health-related intervention, and send off Goop employees (or sometimes themselves) to test said intervention.

Despite being described as a "lab", the series is fairly light on science where it does have it, it tends to exaggerate and instead relies heavily on testimonials and anecdotes.

There is, however, one episode that really gets it right. So let's start there.

Goop's record on women's health is not strong (I'm looking at you, vagina steaming), so I was naturally apprehensive going into the episode on female sexuality and pleasure.

You can imagine my surprise (and utter delight) to find 35 minutes of vulva anatomy, body positivity and frank discussions about women's sexual health and autonomy.

The success of this episode is, in large part, thanks to Betty Dodson, a 90-year-old feminist sex educator and her colleague, Carlin Ross, who run workshops that aim to empower women with knowledge about their bodies.

Dodson notes that many women feel shame or embarrassment when it comes to sex, and most of the episode is spent trying to counter this.

Sex educators Carlin Ross and Betty Dodson are a highlight of The Goop Lab.

(Netflix)

Sex educators Carlin Ross and Betty Dodson are a highlight of The Goop Lab.

We get a rare and welcome glimpse of diverse, naked female bodies of all ages, and, more radically, a montage of vulvas, to demonstrate the diversity of female genitalia.

There are discussions about how porn has created unrealistic expectations about sexuality, and how women are increasingly turning to cosmetic surgery to change the appearance of their genitals.

The episode culminates in Dodson coaching Ross to achieve an on-camera orgasm, in a way that is educational, realistic, and not fetishised.

The whole approach is unabashed, yet sensitive, and feels genuinely refreshing. It left me wishing Goop would do this all the time: promote the message that vaginas and vulvas are great just as they are.

The only down-side to the episode was discovering Paltrow didn't know the difference between a vulva and vagina. To be fair, this is not uncommon.

But for someone selling products to put inside the vagina, I'd say that's a fairly major anatomical oversight.

There are a handful of episodes in the series which attempt to explore topics of genuine scientific interest, but struggle to execute them with much credibility.

Let's take the first episode, which focuses on psychedelic medicine, as an example.

In recent years, there has been a renaissance of research into the possible therapeutic effects of drugs like MDMA and psybicilin (magic mushrooms), and there are currently studies underway in Europe, the US and Australia investigating their potential to treat depression, trauma, and anxiety at the end of life.

While psychedelic-assisted psychotherapy is a genuinely promising area of research, what drug researcher Mark Haden makes clear in the episode is that the use of psychedelics in research is "completely different" to recreational use and "at no point are [researchers] advocating that people start taking MDMA or LSD or anything else".

In 2018, Gwyneth Paltrow's wellness company was estimated to be worth $250 million.

(Netflix)

In 2018, Gwyneth Paltrow's wellness company was estimated to be worth $250 million.

But Goop ignores this advice and sends four employees to Jamaica to trip on magic mushrooms under the guidance of "psychedelic elders" anyway.

A good portion of the episode is dedicated to watching the four Goopers (technical term for Goop staff) drink mushroom tea, hallucinate at the sight of the sky, and cry to themselves.

In typical Goop fashion, we hear very positive reviews: "I feel like I went through five years of therapy in about five hours".

What we don't hear is any of the side effects or risks associated with drug taking. Or how participants in clinical trials are heavily screened, and there are some mental health disorders for which psychedelic drugs are advised against.

Similarly, in episode two, the personal experience of Goop staff is favoured over scientific analysis, when we're introduced to Wim Hof, a Dutch athlete known for his ability to withstand freezing temperatures.

In the middle of winter, Hof takes a group of Goopers out to Lake Tahoe to learn his eponymous controlled breathing and cold-therapy method, which he claims can make the human body more resilient to physical and psychological stress.

Dutch athlete Wim Hof teaches Goop employees yoga in the snow at Lake Tahoe.

(Netflix)

Dutch athlete Wim Hof teaches Goop employees yoga in the snow at Lake Tahoe.

After learning to hyperventilate, meditate, and plunge into extremely cold water, one woman with a panic disorder claims to not have panic attacks any more.

Another man, not on the Goop bootcamp, says the Wim Hof method helped cure him of his auto-immune disorder.

As noted in the episode, a small 2014 study found the combination of meditation, breathing techniques and exposure to cold resulted in a temporary anti-inflammatory immune response.

However, the episode fails to include another 2014 study which suggests Hof's ability to tolerate extreme cold may come down to his genetics and high brown-fat levels.

There's interesting science to be explored around the mind-body connection and biofeedback, but we don't get much of it here.

In the fourth episode, the Goop team sets out to explore anti-ageing regimens, and this is where we really start to veer off the scientific road, so to speak.

Elise Loehnen gets facial acupuncture in The Goop Lab.

(Netflix)

Elise Loehnen gets facial acupuncture in The Goop Lab.

In a bid to reverse their "biological ages", Paltrow, Loehnen and fellow Goop executive Wendy Lauria adopt one of three diets: vegan, pescatarian or the "fast mimicking" diet (an alternative to fasting).

At the end of the episode, we learn Paltrow, who undertook the latter for five days reduces her so-called biological age the most: by 1.7 years.

While there is legitimate research investigating the connection between fasting and longevity, and evidence that calorie restriction can improve the biomarkers of ageing in animals, there is limited evidence so far that it can influence the biology of ageing in humans.

We also see in this episode Paltrow, Loehnen and Lauria undergo various cosmetic facial procedures.

The treatments which include injecting blood into the face, acupuncture needles, and inserting metal threads through cheeks (in what is ostensibly a face lift) are described by Loehnen as "a little bit more natural".

More natural than what? It's not clear.

You know how I said that at episode four, we start to veer off the scientific road? Well, in the final two episodes of The Goop Lab, the road seems to completely disappear underneath us; we are now freefalling in the Goop universe.

Episode five, titled The Energy Experience, is centred on the idea of "energy healing".

We meet John Amaral, a chiropractor and "body worker" to the stars, who claims to influence how energy moves through the body.

John Amaral supposedly works with people's energy fields moving his hands through the air as their bodies squirm below.

(Netflix)

John Amaral supposedly works with people's energy fields moving his hands through the air as their bodies squirm below.

As Julia Belluz notes in Vox, "energy" is presented uncritically as "an amorphous catch-all cause, and treatment for, so many our ailments", from psychological distress to physical pain.

At one point, Amaral invokes quantum physics, specifically the double-slit experiment which suggests the act of observing a particle has an effect on its behaviour to effectively prove that what he's doing is real.

I was *very* sceptical about the veracity of this claim, but I called Ben Buchler, a professor of quantum physics at the Australian National University, just to be sure. His response?

"It's unequivocal crackpottery."

(For context, Professor Buchler says the double-slit experiment does raise interesting questions about the nature of reality, but that it doesn't provide any scientific basis for "energy healing".)

A better way to assess the evidence for Amaral's work would be to look at studies on reiki, which are largely inconclusive.

A randomised control trial suggests the effects of energy therapy are likely to be a placebo which, should be noted, can be very powerful.

In the final episode of The Goop Lab, we meet psychic medium Laura Lynne Jackson, who, according to Goop, "gives a powerful, unexpected reading and invites the Goop gang to open up energetically".

My energetic response to this episode was mostly laughter, but that may have been because I was not wearing Goop's "psychic vampire repellent" spray.

As Goop reminds us each episode, "you should always consult your doctor when it comes to your personal health". I'd say that's sage advice.

Read more:
The Goop Lab exaggerates science and speculates, but shines on women's health - ABC News

Good stockmanship comes naturally to the Adam family, who have been farming at Newhouse of Glamis, near Forfar, for almost 100 years.

Bob Adams grandfather moved to the 550-acre farm in 1937 and the familys passion for pedigree cattle started with the formation of an Aberdeen-Angus herd, followed by the introduction of Beef Shorthorns in the 1950s.

The Aberdeen-Angus herd was dispersed in 1979 to make way for Limousin cattle, and Beef Shorthorns were dispersed in 1969 to make way for Charolais.

Now, 40 years later, Bob and Kay Adams sons, Andrew, 21, and James, 19, are preparing to sell the first pedigree bull from a new Aberdeen-Angus herd at Newhouse at this weekends Stirling Bull Sales.

Kay says the Aberdeen-Angus renaissance at Newhouse is entirely driven by her two sons the fourth generation of the Adam family at the farm who have funded much of their new enterprise with money earned from their pedigree flock of Bluefaced Leicesters.

Andrew, who works full-time at the family farm, said: We wanted to do something of our own to bring to the farm and we bought our first Angus in 2016 when we got a yearling heifer from Tonley for 4,000gn.

Their first purchase Tonley Emiline is the dam of the junior bull on offer at United Auctions this weekend. Named Newhouse Endeavour, he is a June-2018 born son of Gretnahouse Blacksmith.

Other foundation females purchased by Andrew and his brother James, who is undertaking an agricultural engineering apprenticeship with AL.

Agri, include Wolflaw Edwina, which traces back to original Newhouse Aberdeen-Angus genetics, and a Wedderlie heifer purchased as a 21st birthday present for Andrew.

The brothers also paid 7,000gn for Retties Diana from Perth breeders Richard and Carol Rettie when she stood female champion at Stirling in October 2016. They also purchased two Blelack cows, which are due to calf in the spring, from the Massie family at Firmarron, Aboyne.

The brothers bull joins a line-up of seven other Newhouse bulls being offered for sale at Stirling. These include six Limousins from the familys 75-cow herd and one Charolais from its 25-cow herd.

The Limousin entry comprises three black bulls and three red bulls. All three black Limousins are sired by Westhall Jammy, which has bred sons to 11,000gn.

The family also keeps a small herd of commercial cattle and flocks of North Country Cheviot and Blackface sheep at Auldallan Farm, near Kirriemuir, which is run with the help of shepherd Richard McArdle.

See original here:
Brothers unite in revival of Aberdeen-Angus herd - The Courier

With high levels of moisture saturating soils throughout the Red River Valley and parts of the Assiniboine River basin going into winter, there is a high likelihood the region will experience flooding come spring.

How much and how damaging will depend on the amount of precipitation we get over winter and how quickly it melts.

Herbicide-resistant Palmer amaranth. (University of Arkansas / Associated Press files)

While Manitoba farmers are no strangers to overland flooding, speakers at the annual round of extension updates this winter are warning to be on the lookout for some troublesome pests hitching a ride into fields on that water.

Officials have been watching the northward migration of two plants that have been wreaking havoc with weed-control efforts south of the border over the past decade: herbicide-resistant Palmer amaranth and its genetic cousin waterhemp. Palmer amaranths arrival in Manitoba is pending, and waterhemp is already here, ready to make its next move.

Theyve been dubbed "superweeds" because they so rapidly evolve to survive virtually all forms of herbicide control. Once they develop resistance to one herbicide, they quickly figure out how to overcome stacked combinations of other herbicides too.

Researchers trying to understand how they do it have zeroed in on their sex lives. These particular species are dioecious, which means a field population contains both female and male plants. Most Amaranthus species contain male and female flowers on the same plant.

The dioecious plants more rapidly outcross, which gives them an advantage in the evolutionary race. As well, they are prolific seed producers, with one plant able to produce up to a million seeds. So not only do they develop resistance more rapidly, they are really good at spreading it around.

Farmers are easily caught off guard because there are lots of reasons why they might see a few weeds left here and there after spraying. It could have been a plugged nozzle on their sprayer; it could have been too hot, too cold or too windy.

Farmers are advised to assume herbicide resistance and do whatever it takes mow, till or pull to prevent those patches from going to seed.

Researchers hope that a better understanding of how these plants reproduce will open the door to new tools, for example, genetically modifying the plants so all the offspring are male, thereby collapsing the local weed population.

Herbicide-resistant weeds arent the only waterborne threat farmers need to monitor.

Clubroot is a strange beast in the world of crop protection. It is a protist, which means it is a parasite with plant, animal and fungal characteristics. It needs a living host to grow, which means it can quickly take hold if farmers grow canola in the same field year after year.

When it moves into a canola field, it can cripple production, and there is no treatment for it. In a badly infected field, farmers only tool is starving the organism by not growing susceptible crops for as many as 10 years. With canola being the No. 1 cash generator on most Prairie farms, the cure is almost worse than the disease.

In Alberta, clubroot has spread from field to field on contaminated soil that clings to equipment as farmers go about their work.

The pathogen has gradually made its way eastward and is now showing up in Manitoba fields.

However, whereas the clubroot infections in Alberta tend to show up first in field-entry points, Manitoba extension workers have noted the main path of transmission appears to be via waterways. That means farmers need to change their scouting practices to monitor for it.

The thing with most of these crop production challenges, whether they are resistant weeds or diseases, is that they force farmers to diversify their strategy for dealing with them.

In most cases, they have lots of tools to pick from, ranging from improved genetics to tillage, to various crop-protection technologies.

The problems arise when they keep doing the same thing over and over. When the pests take over, sometimes the only option is taking that field out of annual crop production.

Thats why the pressure is on for farmers to avoid getting the problem in the first place.

Laura Rance is vice-president of content for Glacier FarmMedia. She can be reached at lrance@farmmedia.com

Laura RanceColumnist

Laura Rance is editorial director at Farm Business Communications.

Read full biography

More:
Superweeds, pests on the move - Winnipeg Free Press

Claim

The term "spinster" became an epithet thanks to resentment toward women who earned their own way rather than having to depend on a man around the house to bring in money.

Reporting

The word spinster generally conjures up a mental picture of mean little old ladies who have never been married, glaring at young people from behind their living room curtains (which are lacy and yellowed with age, naturally) with their mustachioed mouths puckered in disapproval at all the goings-on outside. At its very least, it is a word that carries connotations of pity.

An April 2018 entry on Tumblrhas gone quietly viral since it was first posted, putting the lie to that trope by delving into the origins and history of the term and tracing how it became an epithet. In it, user systlin wrote:

I honestly always find the termspinster as referring to an elderly, never-married woman as funny because you know what?

Wool was ahugeindustry in Europe in the middle ages. It was hugely in demand, particularly broadcloth, and was a valuable trade good. A great deal of wool was owned by monasteries and landed gentry who owned the land.

And, well, the only way to spin wool into yarn to make broadcloth was by hand.

This was viewed as a feminine occupation, and below the dignity of the monks and male gentry that largely ran the trade.

So what did they do?

They hired women to spin it. And, turns out, this was a stable job that paid very well. Well enough that it was one of the few viable economic options consideredrespectable outside of marriage for a woman. A spinster could earn quite a tidy salary for her art, and maintain full control over her own money, no husband required.

So, naturally, women who had little interest in marriage or men? Grabbed this opportunity with both hands and ran with it. Of course, most people didnt get this, because All Women Want Is Husbands, Right?

So when people sayspinster as inspinster aunt, they are TRYING to conjure up an image of a little old lady who is lonely and bitter.

But what I HEAR are the smiles and laughter of a million women as they earned their own money in their own homes and controlled their own fortunes and lived life on their own terms, and damn what society expected of them.

The claim has bounced around social media in bits and pieces for many years, but this particular entry seemed to strike a chord with readers; it was shared on the platform more than a hundred thousand times.

According to the old reliable standby Merriam-Webster, the term did indeed originally describe occupation, and its definition has evolved since it was first used sometime in the 14th century:

Definition of spinster1: a woman whose occupation is to spin2a archaic : an unmarried woman of gentle familyb: an unmarried woman and especially one past the common age for marrying3: a woman who seems unlikely to marry

The site also offered a page from the editors delving into the words etymology, which appeared to back up the original Tumblr post:

Whenspinsterfirst entered English in the mid-1300s, it referred to a woman who spun thread and yarn. Our earliest use comes from the allegorical poemPiers Plowman: And my wyf Spak to e spinsters for to spinne hit softe (and my wifespoke to the spinners to spin it soft).

Two historical facts led tospinstersevolution: the fact that most spinners in the Middle Ages were women, and the fact that it was common in legal documents to use ones occupation as a sort of surname (which is why we have Smiths and Bakers and Tanners and so on). Women who spun yarn or thread were given the titleSpinsterin legal documents.

The jump from spinner to single lady is likely an economic one. Some scholars suggest that during the late Middle Ages, married tradeswomen had greater access to raw materials and the market (through their husbands) than unmarried woman did, and therefore unmarried women ended up with lower-status, lower-income jobs like combing, carding, and spinning wool. These jobs didnt require access to expensive tools likelooms, and could be done at home. By the 17th century,spinsterwas being used in legal documents to refer to unmarried women.

The Online Etymological Dictionary also draws a clear line from the work-related origin of the word spinster and its later derogatory connotations, pointing out that it was supposed to be exactly the sort of work with which unmarried women were supposed to occupy themselves, at least in England, by the 1600s:

However, there seems to be little historical indication that this was ever a particularly lucrative trade; industries relegated to womens work have been characterized by intermittent labor and low pay throughout the centuries. Spinning and carding wool, even for the most gifted women in the Middle Ages, was no different. Which is not to say that it brought in no money at all. Poet and writer Christine de Pizan, who was born in 1364 and became one of the first women in Europe to support herself through her prolific writing, was an early advocate for womens equality. Medieval researcher and former Queens College professor Diane Bornstein summed up her advice in her book The Lady in the Tower: Medieval Courtesy Literature for Women, which indicated that spinning and carding did not always necessarily pay pittance wages:

The lady who lives on her estates must be wise and must have the courage of a man. She should not oppress her tenants and workers but should be just and consistent. She should follow the advice of her husband and of wise counselors so that people will not think she is merely following her own will. She must know the laws of warfare so that she can command her men and defend her lands if they are attacked. She should know everything pertaining to her husbands business affairs so that she can act as his agent in his absence or for herself if she should become a widow. She must be a good manager of workers. To supervise her workers, she needs a good knowledge of farming. She will be sure to have adequate supplies for the spinning and weaving of cloth for the wise housekeeper can sometimes bring in more profit than the revenue from the land.

That was not the only reference to spinning (and weaving) cloth as a way that women could findfinancial independence. But as with all of history, the true stories are always more nuanced and complex than the claims.A 2004 paper by Middle Ages historian Ruth Mazo Karrasnotes that even as textile production became regarded more as a prestigious and skilled occupation, meaning that men eventually took over its distribution and excluded many women from guilds in the process, spinning wool (which was at the time in great demand) remained the domain of the women:

With the continuing development of towns in the high and later Middle Ages craft guilds began to take control of production, and in northwestern Europe womens labor was largely excluded or relegated to spinning or other less skilled and less remunerative stages of the clothmaking process, although in the Mediterranean region women may have been included for longer. As David Herligy describes the situation by the thirteenth century, Guilds and governments as yet had made no effort to limit womens work or to reserve or preserve jobs for men. In cloth making as in many other trades, women and men worked alongside one another without visible rivalry. The central Middle Ages remained a period of free enterprise and of open access to employment for both sexes. Herligy paints too glowing a picure here, for (as he points out) even where men and women worked together in a craft men tended to do the more skilled parts of the job and to be paid more.

Karras goes on to point out that it is still difficult to parse how much work was done by women on behalf of men, rather than working on their own account:

By the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries craft guilds had come to dominate skilled labor and women were for the most part excluded. In a few places Paris, Rouen, Cologne there were female guilds, partcularly in luxury textile crafts like silkworking, but these were rare. In other places, like London, women did most of the wilk work but did not achieve the dignity of a guild structure. The male guilds of weavers, dyers, fullers, and others those who worked in wool, which was more lucrative because of greater demand attempted to exclude women other than widows of guild members (and sometimes daughters of guild members if they married men of the craft). Thus, although women may have done a good share of the textile work, as members of households, it was not conceived of as womens work, but rather as women helping men with their work. Individual female spinners or carders might be employed by male weavers, as York wills indicate.

It is true that some spinners and weavers were recognized as highly skilled, such as a group of women in 15th century London who spun and wove silk rather than wool, but whose experiences as tradeswomen followed a common trajectory:

The silkworkers of London, then, serve as a somber reminder of how some medieval notions of community worked to the disadvantage of women. Since most skilled work prone to gild organization was done by men, most gilds were male dominated, and if women were tolerated within them, they were second-class members. They enjoyed some of the religious, social, and charitable benefits of gild membership, but they were firmly excluded not only from its political perquisites but also from many of its more important economic and social privileges. Although some womens crafts and trades had sufficiently high status or sufficiently skilled workers to make gild organization possible, few gilds were actually formed. In some towns, such as Rouen, Paris, and Cologne, such women did form gilds, but even these were less autonomous than the gilds of men. In most other towns, like London, such women did not organize into gilds and were thus vulnerable to competition and loss of trade.

But even though the labor of women, even highly skilled women, was assigned lower value than that of men, it still offered a path to financial independence that lasted cor centuries, but it did not come without a social cost:

Jackie M. Blountcalls spinsters gender transgressors, women who managed to find lives of independence and autonomy in their work as educators. Hired because of their singleness, not despite it, spinsters were at first considered high-minded, upstanding pillars of the community and eventually became cultural icons. But when social hygiene and the study of sexuality came into vogue at the turn of the twentieth century, spinsters came under fire. Suspected of lesbianism and accused of suppressing frustrated sexuality, Blount writes, spinsters were increasingly viewed as standing outside their conventional gender roles as procreating women. Admiration turned into villainization as women were forced to defend their single status in a workplace that once welcomed them.

Though many spinsters doubtless fell on the LGBTQ spectrum or were simply unable to find a mate, there was another reason to stay single.Zsuzsa Berendwrites that contrary to modern-day beliefs that spinsterhood was the dismissal of traditional marriage values, many nineteenth-century spinsters in fact chose not to marry because they adhered strongly to ideals about traditional marriage. As marriage was elevated and spiritualized, Berend writes, women looked for vocations and occupations rather than betray their own principles about love.

But once again, a theme appears in the historical studies of spinsters, one that appears to have been missed by critics of the original Tumblr posts. Its true that spinning wool (and other textiles) was a stable and lucrative career in Europe during the Middle Ages, and indeed its true that it remained so for centuries. Cloth production was regarded as womens work, but eventually it was economically dominated by men who often tried to exclude women from guilds and unions. But it remained an way for women who by choice or by circumstances lived outside of their cultural and social norms to freely choose their own economic destinies and their own fates, relying on their own skills and talents to do so. For many women, freedom from such cultural pressures and the ability to steer their own fate is priceless by their own admission, a sentiment reflected in early writings of the time. The term started be used to describe unmarried women in the 1700s, but it did not becomederogatory until centuries later, when social hygiene was swept into vogue during the eugenics craze of the early 1900s; by 1903, United States President Theodore Roosevelt was vividly and dramatically describing what he thought of as low birthrates among white Americans as race suicide:

The growing scientific field of genetics led some political leaders to embrace the notion of controlled breeding to favor advanced races. White Americans feared an infertility crisis in their neighborhoods. President Theodore Roosevelt warned in 1903 that immigrants and minorities were too fertile, and that Anglo-Saxons risked committing race suicide by using birth control and failing to keep up baby-for-baby.

In one speech, Roosevelt said: The chief of blessings for any nation is that it shall leave its seed to inherit the land. The greatest of all curses is sterility, and the severest of all condemnations should be that visited upon willful sterility.

That meant that white women (and to a lesser degree, men) who chose to remain single were suddenly regarded as especially suspect, adding a eugenicist twist to the term spinster and giving it a whiff of louche disreputability for failing to uphold the white race:

The tendency of single women to remain unmarried seemed to pose an enormous threat to the traditional gender order where women served men.

In response, a series of intellectual developments emerged in the 1800s and early 1900s that were employed to counter the threat. First, the medical profession grew intensely interested in the broad field of human sexuality. The subject became a matter of heightened concern, and much of the research conducted was heavily influenced by religions beliefs. Any deviations from conventional procreative male-female relationships came under increased scrutiny and eventually were regarded as pathological (Bullough, 1974).

Second, in an era of rapidly increasing social diversity, the social hygiene movement emerged in the early 1900s and saw as its role the proper direction of sexuality toward the advancement of the White race. School and college hygiene classes assisted young White men and women in mastering gender-appropriate behaviors, and in finding worthy spouses who could best assure fit offspring and therefore the improvement of the race.

[]

[I]n the early decades of the twentieth century, single women increasingly were viewed as standing outside their conventional gender roles as procreating women. In time, spinsterhood even became conflated with lesbianism, then an unspeakable social transgression.

Over centuries, then, the term spinster went from describing an occupation, to describing an unmarried women, to describing an unmarriageable one, reflecting the social attitudes, trends, and finally the race-based moral panics of the times. At one point, working as a spinster was indeed regarded as a stable and sometimes lucrative profession that was open to women, particularly throughout Europe in the Middle Ages, just as described in the original Tumblr post. While admittedly history is far more nuanced and complex than it is often presented, and while women were still earning less on average than the men who often controlled the means of production, the historical record shows that spinning and other aspects of textile production were considered appropriate and common ways for women to earn a living and support themselves and their households without having to depend on others to do so. Therefore, we rate this claim True.

The rest is here:
Origin of the Word 'Spinster' - Truth or Fiction

When it became known that NXIVM was under investigation by the FBI, Keith Alan Raniere, Clare Bronfman, Lauren Salzman, Allison Mack, Nicki Clyne and several others fled the United States and went into hiding in Mexico.

On March 26, 2018 the Mexican Federal Police captured Raniere and turned him over to the FBI.

On April 19, 2018, a three-count indictment was unsealed in the EDNY charging Defendants Raniere and Mack with sex trafficking, sex trafficking conspiracy and conspiracy to commit forced labor.

On July 23, 2018, a superseding indictment was unsealed charging Raniere, Clare Bronfman, Mack, Kathy Russell, Nancy Salzman and Lauren Salzman with racketeering conspiracy, forced labor conspiracy, wire fraud conspiracy, sex trafficking conspiracy, sex trafficking, attempted sex trafficking,and conspiracy to commit identity theft.

On March 13, 2019, a Second Superseding Indictment was unsealed. The Second Superseding was similar to the first except for the dismissal of Nancy Salzman as a result of her guilty plea.And Raniere, Bronfman, Mack, Russell, and Lauren Salzman were charged with racketeering conspiracy, and racketeering; and four predicate racketeering acts were added, including two acts of sexual exploitation of a child, and one act of possession of child pornography, [Cami] and one act of visa fraud.

The child porn and sexual exploitation of Cami spooked all the codefendants of Raniere and in shot order they all took plea deals.

On April 8, 2019, Mack pled guilty to racketeering conspiracy, and racketeering. She admitted committing racketeering acts of state law extortion; and forced labor.

Now she is facing a civil lawsuit.

Many think the former actress is a victim and has been punished enough already. But the civil lawsuit, much like testimony in the trial of Keith Alan Raniere, paints a different picture of Mack, other than an abused victim.

She comes across as a sex-slaver

The case is SARAH EDMONDSON; TONI NATALIE; MARK VICENTE, JANE DOES 1-13, JANE DOES 15-39, JANE DOES 41-60; JOHN DOES 1-17, and JOHN DOES 19-20,

v. : KEITH RANIERE; NANCY SALZMAN; CLARE BRONFMAN; SARA BRONFMAN; LAUREN SALZMAN; ALLISON MACK; KATHY RUSSELL; KAREN UNTERREINER; DR. BRANDON PORTER; DR. DANIELLE ROBERTS; DANIELLA PADILLA BERGERON; ROSA LAURA JUNCO; LORETA J. GARZA DAVILA; MONICA DURAN; NICKI CLYNE; NXIVM CORPORATION; EXECUTIVE SUCCESS PROGRAMS, INC.; ETHICAL SCIENCE FOUNDATION; and FIRST PRINCIPLES,

[Ed. Note: Although I know the identity of some of the Jane and John Does, I will honor the anonymity provision of the lawsuit, except where the victims have already gone public. A few have testified in the trial of Raniere and I may identify them as they were identified in the trial.]

So with all those defendants where does the comely actress fit in?

Sadly for her fans, not too well

She was a leader of DOS, which began in 2015.

According to the lawsuit, it was headed by Raniere and Mack, Lauren Salzman, Rosa Laura Junco, Daniela Padilla Bergeron, Loreta J. Garza Davila, Monica Duran, and Nicki Clyne, the First Line Masters.

The lawsuit alleges quite a bit about DOS, which our readers are familiar with:

Of course, as readers know, and as the lawsuit,alleges, DOS recruits were required to provide collateral to prove their trustworthiness.

Collateral consisted of

We know the story:

As the lawsuit alleges, After supplying collateral. DOS was revealed to the recruits. But to their surprise and dismay, they were told that now, before they could learn about the structure and nature of this sisterhood, they had to provide additional humiliating and damaging collateral. Thus, before knowing anything about the internal workings of DOS, they were trapped, fearful that if they did not do precisely as instructed, the collateral that they had already provided would be released.

This, of course, is a point that might be debated. After giving the first collateral, which some could argue was stupid to begin with, you learn that there is a master slave relationship.

That might be a good time to stop. But it turns out that the DOS First Line Masters, including Mack, were not terribly forthcoming. No, in fact they lied.

The lawsuit alleges that it was only after the second batch of collateral was given that the recruiter/master revealed a little more about DOS: that it was a pyramid of master/slave relationships, explained as no different from a guru and disciple or a mentor-mentee relationship, which would strengthen women by testing and challenging their boundaries but would require absolute trust and obedience by slaves to their masters.'

But the slaves were never told that Raniere created and ran DOS.

When asked, the First Line Masters denied Ranieres involvement and did not tell the slaves that the collateral was intended to coerce women into a lifetime of personal servitude; and that the ultimate objective of DOS was to recruit and groom women for sexual slavery under their grandmaster Raniere.

DOS was, the lawsuit alleges, created to develop a pipeline of attractive young women for Raniere.

The lawsuit also paints a picture of what life was like in DOS.

As the lawsuit alleges, slaves were acutely aware of the ultimate punishment hanging over their heads: the very real threat that their collateral would be released.

And Slaves were in a constant state of near-starvation, sleep deprivation, forced to physically exert themselves and push themselves well beyond exhaustion, always anxious and fearful that anything they said or asked might be interpreted as rebellious and subject them to punishments, both mental and corporeal.

Not a single DOS member, the lawsuit alleges, understood when she gave that first collateral that she was signing up for a life of servitude and sexual slavery under a cruel grandmaster [Raniere] and his circle of mistresses.

The lawsuit describes it as a secret ceremony, [where DOS slaves] were forced to disrobe, read from a script stating they requested to be branded, lie down on a table, and submit to branding with a cauterizing iron in their pubic region. No anesthesia was administered during this procedure, which was extremely painful. The ceremonies were recorded, thereby creating an additional piece of collateral. They were told that the brand was a symbol representing the elements of nature. Only later did they come to realize that they would be carrying Keith Ranieres initials around with them for the rest of their lives.

In the lawsuit, almost all of Allisons alleged offenses involve her role in DOS.

They involve Jane Does 2, 3, 4, 9, 10, 11, 28 and Sarah Edmondson and quite frankly others not named.

Allison Mack was specifically mentioned as perhaps the most ruthless of the First Line Masters who reported directly to Raniere.

The lawsuit mentions that Mack recruited her own slaves, who were required to recruit their own, as well. All the women in Macks line of slaves were obligated to serve her and comply with her directions. This was true of each First-Line Masters line of slaves.

And again,When the slaves defected, many of them wrote to Mack, as well as Lauren Salzman, Nancy Salzman, and Clare Bronfman, pleading for their collateral to be returned or destroyed. Lauren Salzman would pass such pleas along to Clare Bronfman.No collateral was ever returned or destroyed.

Jane Doe 2 was recruited into DOS, [then referred to as The Vow] by a slave [India] of Macks.

Jane Doe 2 provided collateral and did unpaid work for the DOS slave [India] and Mack.

I dont think we are revealing too much by saying that Jane Doe 2 is Jaye who testified in the Raniere trial.

The Lawsuit alleges: Jane Doe 2 had frequent direct communications with Defendant Raniere, both in person when she visited Albany and through text messages, wherein among other things he promised that, if she moved to Albany, she could start an ethical t-shirt business with him (a ploy he had previously used on others to draw them closer to him).

[The ploy, of course, was to promise to start a company, which he would help fund and provide his unique genius.]

Unsurprisingly, the t-shirt company and all of its equipment was owned by Clare Bronfman.

The lawsuit continues, After Jane Doe 2 moved to Albany and gave collateral several times, Defendant Mack instructed her to have sex with Raniere, stating that this was a special assignment that would help her get over trauma from past [sexual] abuse.

Mack further insisted that Jane Doe 2 photograph the encounter, and she told Jane Doe 2 that she had Macks permission to enjoy the experience.

The language which follows was used not only for Jane Doe 2 but for the other sex slaves trafficked by Mack.

Eventually, the shame and humiliation of what she had to do as part of The Vow was more than she could bear, and Jane Doe 2 informed Mack that she was repudiating her Vow and requested that her collateral not be released. Paralyzed by the dual fears of release of hercollateral and the Defendants infamous abusive legal tactics, Jane Doe 2 left the NXIVM community and kept silent about her experience.

Now this next part will not come as a surprise:

Subsequent to her departure from NXIVM, Defendants Raniere and Clare Bronfman directed a co-conspirator [I believe this to be Alex Batancourt] to cause false criminal charges to be lodged against Jane Doe 2.

Raniere and Clare Bronfman then instructed an attorney to send Jane Doe 2 a letter threatening legal action if she told anyone about what Defendants did to her. That letter and the charges have never been rescinded, and thus Jane Doe 2 is still subject to thisintimidation.

As a result of Defendants scheme, criminal acts, and misrepresentations and omissions, Jane Doe 2 was emotionally and financially harmed.

Also, as part of Defendants scheme, Jane Doe 2 performed uncompensated labor, working for many hours without compensation for the benefit of the Defendants.

Jane Doe 3 was recruited into DOS, then referred to only as The Vow, by a DOS slave of Macks.

Throughout her time in DOS, Jane Doe 3 was given direction and commands directly from Mack.

After Jane Doe 3 moved to Albany and gave collateral several times, she was instructed to have sex with Raniere. Jane Doe 3 acquiesced out of fear of punishment and release of her collateral.

Unlike Jaye [Jane Doe 2], this unfortunate woman actually had sex with the beastly one.

If you want a picture worth a 1000 words as to why this is a serious crime and worthy of significant financial recompense look at what she had to touch. Imagine the fear and loathing combined.

Allison Mack had her collateral and coerced her to have sex with this odious and malodorous creature.

Like Jane Doe 2, Clare and Keith and El Duce went after her to lodge false criminal charges and send threatening letters.

The lawsuit alleges, The letters caused her to experience tremendous fear and intimidation, and instead of coming forward and speaking with an attorney or authorities, she went into hiding and avoided contact with authorities for a period, even after learning that the FBI was investigating the Defendants and others. Those letters and charges have never been rescinded.

Jane Doe 4 worked for Mack and Ranieres The Source, NXIVMs purported curriculum for actors.She taught 2-hour long classes three times a week.Mack recruited Jane Doe 4 herself .

Sneaky Mack required Jane Doe 4 to provide collateral.After she got collateral, Mack revealed their relationship would be master and slave, and Jane Doe 4 was required to continue giving collateral, which Jane Doe 4 provided out of fear that her previously provided collateral would be released if she did not comply with all of Macks demands.

Mack assigned Jane Doe 4 to establish contact with Raniere and do whatever he told her. Mack informed her that if she failed, there would be punishment.Raniere demanded that Jane Doe 4 engage in sexual acts with him.

Out of fear of punishment and release of her collateral, Jane Doe 4 unwillingly acquiesced to Ranieres demands.e Defendants.

I believe Jane Doe 4 is none other than Nicole, who testified in the trial of Keith Alan Raniere most effectively and was the cause of his sex trafficking conviction

Jane Doe 9 was recruited into DOS by a DOS slave who was slave to one of other the DOS First-Line Masters.

But Mack spoke directly with Jane Doe 9 and helped recruit her.

Later, the lawsuit alleges, when another DOS slave told Jane Doe 9 that she was leaving NXIVM and showed Jane Doe 9 her brand, Jane Doe 9 quietly left DOS and NXIVM.

This slave was saved by the Frank Report; they read about the branding and happily Jane Doe 9 was not branded. I have interviewed Jane Doe 9 in the past.

Jane Doe 10 was recruited into DOS.When she wanted to leave, Jane Doe 10 requested the return of her collateral from Mack and Raniere, which she never received.

A resident of California. Jane Doe 11 enrolled in and paid for NXIVM curriculum based upon Defendants false, material representations that Rational Inquiry provided a scientific, patent-pending technology that would lead to a successful career and self-fulfillment.

Contrary to Defendants representations, Rational Inquiry was neither scientific nor patentable. Defendants also failed to disclose a material factthat Rational Inquiry was actually a pseudo-scientific hodgepodge of psychotherapeutic methods which, when practiced byunlicensed and unqualified lay-people, subjected its participants to an unreasonable risk of serious psychological injury and emotional distress.

Jane Doe 11 was recruited into DOS by Allison Mack and another person.

She was required to participate in 24/7 readiness drills, send a private message to her master each morning and night, and provide services to her master.

And we are not done yet.

A resident of California, Jane Doe 12 enrolled in and paid for NXIVM curriculum.Jane Doe 12 was recruited into DOS, by Mack.

Mack required Jane Doe 12 to obtain her permission to travel, meet with people and eat, and to report her whereabouts every hour. Mack put Jane Doe 12 on a restricted calorie diet which caused Jane Doe 12 to develop medical conditions including a hormonalimbalance.

Mack gave Jane Doe 12 an assignment which required her to establish contact with Raniere and acquiesce to his demands. Mack informed her that if she failed, there would be punishment. Raniere demanded that Jane Doe 12 engage in sexual acts with himself on numerous occasions.

Mack also instructed Jane Doe 12 to recruit other women to DOS and told her that she would be punished if she did not.

After giving several rounds of collateral, Jane Doe 12 was coerced into being branded. She later discovered the brand contained Ranieres initials.

Eventually, the shame and humiliation was more than she could bear, and Jane Doe 12 left DOS.

[I think this might be India.]

***

So Mack worked directly with Raniere to create and run DOS. Within the DOS structure, Mack was a First Line Master, where Jane Doe 2, Jane Doe 3, 4, 11, 12 and 15 were slaves in her line.

A little more for Mack.

It appears DOS had a precursor, TEN C, which Mack, Clyne, Nancy Salzman and Raniere started.

It was aimed at procuring young women from college sororities for Raniere.The young women were promised opportunities to build character through NXIVM curriculum and programs, and develop a sorority in their age group within NXIVM, mentored by Mack, Clyne, and Raniere.

The Defendants also offered these female students jobs working at a t-shirt company owned by Raniere and Clare Bronfman.

Privately, with sexual partners, Raniere referred to himself as TEN C, which stood for The Emperor has No Clothes.

Ultimately, this effort to procure young women for Raniere failed. Subsequently, Mack and Clyne and others created and ran DOS with Raniere.

Another of the Companies Mack was involved in was the Knife of Aristotle (The Knife), founded in 2014 as a purported news outlet.

The key officers included Mack, Rosa Laura Junco and Nicki Clyne.

Ranieres stated purpose for creating The Knife was the scientific analysis of existing media, including fact checking, so that subscribers could cut through abundant fake news and get to the truth, the lawsuit alleges. The truth, of course, meant Ranieres spin on everything, and the Knife was just one more way in which Raniere isolated his followers from outside influences.It enabled him to shield members from bad press about NXIVM because members of the NXIVM community received their news solely from The Knife. To get news from anywhere else meant that one was rebellious and jeopardizing the community.

Loyal Allison Mack was right there supporting him in everything.

Jane Doe 3, 6, 13, 21,41, 43, 51, Mark Vicente and John Doe 16 worked for the Knife.

Sarahs branding session video was release because she spoke out about Nxivm and DOS.

Read the original here:
Allison Mack Accused of Being Sex-Slaver in Nxivm Civil Lawsuit - Frank Report

A silent assasin is stalking us more virulently than ever, especially our young, but to quote from Aleksandr Solzhenitsyns Cancer Ward, you can have eyes and still not see. Its cancer, the second leading cause of death after cardiovascular diseases in India. Going by an estimate deduced from registered incidences since 2004, cancer cases in all age groups in the county is expected to reach 819,354 by the yearend. But the scarier bit, a cause of concern, is that cancer among adolescents and young adultsthose between 15 and 29 years generally, and bundled under the abbreviation AYAhas risen over the years. An exact number isnt available as data is still being collected. The volume could be significant because in a country of nearly 1.3 billion people, about 55 per cent of the population is below 35, and around 30-40 per cent of them are in the adolescent bracket.

Cancer in the AYA group is unique in the distribution of types as well as what it does to patients psychologically. As per Globocan 2018, International Agency for Research on Cancer, World Health Organization (WHO), the commonest cancers in this group are leukaemia (blood), germ cell tumour of the ovary, thyroid, oral, Hodgkins lymphoma, testicular, female genital tract malignancies, and bone sarcomas. A study from 2011 to 2014 on cancer patterns among 1,077 AYA cases at a tertiary care in northern India and published in South Asian Journal of Cancer in 2017 found that the most common was head and neck (32 per cent), followed by breast (14.2 per cent). Cancer has the greatest impact on individuals from this group because it occurs when they are most productive. They suffer from adverse psychosocial effects because most of their potential years are spent battling cancer. This also puts a large economic burden on society, says Ravi Mehrotra, chief executive officer, India Cancer Research Consortium.

Problem is cancers in the AYA group are often mistaken initially for infectious diseases. Thus diagnosis and treatment get delayed. Thats because people hardly suspect a kid could have the disease, although oral cancer is most common in this group in India. On the positive side, Dr Anurag Srivastava, professor and head, department of surgical disciplines, AIIMS, Delhi, says the survival of adolescents with leukaemia and lymphomas has dramatically improved over the past decade.

Our modern lifestylesedentary and unhealthy practices like smoking, drinking and binge-eating processed food et alis perhaps the biggest cause of cancer. Citing their national study published in Lancet in 2018, preventive oncologist Mehrotra says tobacco-use among young adults would be the single-most preventable cause because a smoker, for instance, may not have cancer at a young age but is at the highest risk in a couple of decades of smoking. Other than tobacco, alcohol and areca nut or supari are some specific reasons, particularly in urban and semi-urban areasSomething people dont talk about is obesity as a cause. The number of younger obese children, as young as 10 or 15 or even younger, is something to be noted. When we have obesity, we are automatically about 12 or 13 times more susceptible to cancer. Obesity is linked to oesophagus, colorectal and breast cancers, among others.

Some experts are non-committal on the reported spurt in cancer cases among the young and arent quite sure if poor lifestyle is a cause. Ramandeep Singh Arora, paediatric oncologist at Max Super Specialty Hospital, explains that increase in recognition of a disease, diagnosis and access to healthcare have contributed to better reporting of cancer cases. The younger you are the impact of lifestyle is negligible. But as you grow older, the impact of lifestyle and environment is more. In the case of AYA, the impact is a combination of environment and genetics, he says.

Whatever may be the cause, experts are worried about the rise in cancer cases. The incidence of cancer in India is unfortunately on a rising trend, the highest being in the states of Kerala and Mizoram. A committed epidemiological and scientific research is the need of the hour to find the cause of this alarming rise and prompt measures need to be initiated for prevention rather than therapy, particularly in the context of a developing country with limited resources, says Dr M.I. Sahadulla, chairman and managing director, KIMS Global Cancer Care, Thiruvananthapuram.

According to the WHO, 30-50 per cent cancers are preventable. Experts state that prevention offers the most cost-effective long-term strategy. They prescribea healthy lifestyle, regular physical activity, a good body mass index and weight, a nourishing diet considerably reduce susceptibility to cancer and other diseases. Diets high in fruits and vegetables may have an independent protective effect against many cancers. Quitting smoking can prevent cancers of the lung, oesophagus, larynx, mouth, throat, kidney, bladder, pancreas, stomach and cervix. Smokeless tobacco like khaini causes oral, oesophageal and pancreatic cancers. Avoiding excessive exposure to the suns carcinogenic UV rays and use of sunscreen can prevent skin cancers such as melanoma. Vaccination against the hepatitis B virus reduces the risk of liver cancer, while the vaccine for the human papilloma virus (HPV) helps decrease the risk of cervical cancer.

Actress, author Lisa Ray is a cancer survivor. She was diagnosed with multiple myeloma in 2009, aged 37 then.

Breast cancer is the commonest among women, accounting for 24.2 per cent or about 2.1 million cases worldwide, according to Globocan 2018. India had 162,468 new breast cancer cases in 2018. Dr Rajan, director of clinical services, KIMS in Kerala, reveals that Indian patients with breast cancer are a decade younger compared to counterparts in developed countries, where it is in the 55-65 age group normally. We dont know the reason for this spike and early prevalence, the specialist says. Dr Anurag Srivastava of AIIMS, Delhi, has a similar revelation. According to him, an ICMR study has found that the annual rise in breast cancer cases among women aged 15 to 34 is 4.24 per cent, 1.6 per cent and 0.80 per cent in Nagpur, Mumbai and Chennai. Whereas the increase for the 3544 age group is from 0.37 per cent to 2.97 per cent. In our own data, we had 7.1 per cent women below 30 years, he says.

Dr M.I. Sahadulla, CMD, KIMS Global Cancer Care

Several risk factors for breast cancer are known, including inherited genes and reproductive aspects such as early menarche, shorter menstrual cycle, late menopause besides nulliparity, child birth at a young age. The reproductive factors are linked to greater lifetime exposure to endogenous ovarian hormones. These ovarian hormones initiate breast development and may also lead to growth of mutated cells, Srivastava says. Dietary factors like excessive intake of saturated fat, carbs and red meat, and weight gain during adulthood, increase breast cancer risk. There is substantial evidence that alcohol consumption also heightens the risk.

Srivastava says AIIMS is taking the fight against breast cancer beyond the OPDs, labs and wards. It is imparting training to medical officers and auxiliary nurses and midwives from all states in collaboration with the governments National Health Mission. The institution also conducts a breast cancer screening camp, aside from a weekly clinic at the National Institute of Cancer Prevention and Research in Noida. Awareness in rural areas is spread through an animated movie that AIIMS had made and got it dubbed in multiple languages. It tells about symptoms and the right way to do self-examination of the breasts. AIIMS has started a super-specialisation course in breast and endocrine diseases, which is an established speciality in the West.

Cancer cure has surely improved in the past decades. The newest hope is genome. Dr B.S. Ajaikumar, chairman and CEO of HealthCare Global Enterprises Limited, feels cancer genomics research has enormous, untapped potential. Genomics research is the basis for genomic medicine, which is a relatively new branch of medicine, where doctors use a persons genetic information to choose the best possible line of treatment and cancer care. The need for innovative approaches is getting a new thrust. The India Cancer Research Consortium (ICRC) offered in October funds up to Rs 1.5 crore for three years to invite best research ideas in six thematic areasprevention and epidemiology, diagnostics, therapeutics, palliative care, basic biology and innovation. The objective is to produce outcomes that can be put into practice. A breakthrough, no doubt, will be a boon to thousands of patients and their families. Until then, to quote Siddhartha Mukherjees The Emperor of All Maladies, cancer will remain a pathological mirror of our own.

View original post here:
Leukaemia To Breast Cancer, Why The 15-29 Age-Group Has Become Most Vulnerable - Outlook India

YUMA, Ariz. (KECY/KYMA) - If you are someone who is still skeptical about the Hemp industry, the University of Arizona Cooperative Extension wants to clear the air for growers and the community.

In todays Home Grown, we learn from one plant pathologist and hempress, as she shows us her hempire.

Even to plant experts like Dr. Poudel, hemp is still a new concept in the way it grows and thrives.

They have to do some research to find out the best variety, the best management practices, the best planting time for the growers, so when the growers get the license, they are not too lost on where to start from, said Dr. Poudel.

The Cooperative Extension is proud to show off their first trial of hemp as they try different irrigation, light and compost methods.

We are doing different treatments to see the best management practices for hemp, said Dr. Poudel.

So what has the University learned since they began the trial, and how has new aged technology benefited their research?

First thing is genetics. Do not expect that all your varieties are all going to look the same. Youre going to have different genotypes. The last time we grew, it was the 1950s when agriculture was not as intense, said Dr. Poudel.

Because this trial is being done in winter, I was able to see purple hemp!

This discoloration is caused by the phosphorus deficiency in the plant, often occurring in cold climates.

You can see quite a few genetics in the field, anywhere from 2 to 24 depending on where you get your seed from, said Dr. Poudel.

There are even different genders of hemp plants, allowing farmers to use a male or female plant based on their needs.

If youre going for CBD, you dont want any males in the field because it will pollinate the female plants and they will go into seed production, which means that all the energy of the plant is going to be devoted to seed production, and your CBD level will be even less than 1%, said Dr. Poudel.

If you still find yourself asking: OK, but what is hemp all about? the Cooperative Extension is hosting a Preseason hemp workshop & Field day.

We are going to give you all the information about how we did it, what we did when we planted, did we apply any tests. Were going to give you all the results of everything we have, so hopefully, it will help the community to know about the production of hemp, said Dr. Poudel.

The event is on February 3rd and is free to anyone who wants to attend!

The hemp workshop will start at 9 A.M. at Booth Machinery Inc.: 6565 E 30th St, Yuma, AZ 85365.

Guests will then participate in a field demonstration from 12:30 to 2.

There will also be free tacos at the end of the day!

To sign up and see a full schedule of the day, click here.

Follow this link:
Home Grown: The "Hemp-ress" and her "Hemp-ire" - KYMA

THE TRUTH CONCERNING ALLEGED RISING INEQUALITY IN THE USABackgroundIt is a fact that inequalities exist in America but they are almost always solidly rooted in immutable psychological traits such as IQ, industriousness, honesty, creativity, courage, etc. [See: AEI Monograph (1998) Income Inequality and IQ ]. Take IQ. According to the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth by age 28 to 36, the top 10% in cognitive ability have a median earned an income of 4.8 times the median for the bottom 10%. Indeed, The Bell Curve (1994) in part one, The Emergence of a Cognitive Elite, found that IQ is one of the best single predictors of job productivity. Most recently, researchers have found that DNA plays a role in social stratification. These investigators concluded that Human DNA polymorphisms vary across geographic regions, with the most commonly observed variation reflecting distant ancestry differences. [See: Nature: Human Behaviour October 21, 2019 Genetic Correlations of Social Stratifications in Great Britain Abdellaoui et al or https://www.nature.com/articles/s41562-019-0757-5 ].

For proof that all psychological traits are firmly riveted in nature and not in nurture one need only read Prof. Robert Plomins new book, Blueprint: How DNA Makes Us Who We Are, (Nov. 2018) which is the most recent scholarly work on the psychology of human genetics. In Blueprint Plomin, one of the very top experts in the field of behavioral genetics asserts that A century of genetic research shows that DNA differences inherited from our parents are the consistent life-long sources of our psychological individuality the Blueprint that makes us who we are. Prof. Plomin also reports that genetics explain more of our psychological differences not just mental health and school achievement but all psychological traits, from personality to intellectual abilities. Nature, not nurture is what makes us who we are. [Note: The Dec. 14, 2018 issue of Scientific American contains a very brief essay by Prof. Plomin titled In the Nature-Nurture War, Nature Wins. and in it, Plomin admits that Environmental influences are important too, but they are largely unsystematic, unstable and idiosyncratic in a word, RANDOM. (Emphasis added) Plomin continues These findings call for a radical rethink about parenting, education and the events that shape our lives. It also provides a novel perspective on equal opportunity, social mobility and the structure of society.]In spite of this contrary scientific evidence that inequality is not rooted in economic factors, countless left-leaning economists, law professors, and political scientists insist, without foundation, that capitalism is the source for much of our nations inequality. One needs only to read Prof. Joseph Stiglitzs The Price of Inequality (2013) or Prof. Thomas Pikettys tome, Capital in the 21st Century (2014) or Prof. Thomas Shapiros Toxic Inequality (2017) and their calls for redistribution to understand that their driving motivation is a search for almost totally equal economic outcomes. They undertake this crusade in spite of the fact that even Lord Keynes believed that efforts to fight inequality hinder economic growth. [See: Foundation for Economic Education Aug. 11, 2018]. Even the IMF got it wrong. In a 2015 report titled Causes and Consequences of Inequality, this organization errantly asserted that Widening inequality is the defining challenge of our time. In advanced economies, the gap between rich and poor is at its highest level in decades. Interestingly, this barrage of unsupported claims prompted an author like Edward Conrad to produce a book, The Upside of Inequality in which he mistakenly states that capitalism is a cause of inequality but asserts that the overall impact is positive in that growth (rising GDP) has markedly improved everyones standard of living.But the unifying and driving force exhibited by all of these millenarian collectivists is a desire to eliminate economic inequality of outcomes. This deep-seated human drive for equality likely stems from our ancestral days living as small hunter-gatherer bands that wandered the several continents (except Antarctica) for over 100,000 years. Sharing the wealth was a possible adaptation that probably helped to ensure the survival of the group. Individualism likely played a subservient role to the collectivism of each clan. Of course, these people all lived on the edge of starvation at a level of servile poverty that is almost unimaginable today. [See:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hunter-gatherer ].Then about ten millennia ago humans mastered the science of agriculture which resulted in a more stable food supply and as a consequence population levels of our lineage began to rise. But, our farming forebears still lived in a condition of almost total abject poverty. [See:http://j-bradford-delong.net/TCEH/1998_Draft/World_GDP/Estimating_World_GDP.html ].This state of affairs continued uninterrupted for almost 10,000 years until the advent of capitalism (individualism) in central England about 1765. [Note: Highly regarded economic historian, Prof. Deirdre McCloskey, places this critical conversion in the northern Netherlands roughly 100 years earlier but the result is the same.] With the development of capitalism the Industrial Revolution began, GDP surged ahead and human-kinds overall levels of economic well-being soared, increasing according to some estimates by up to 5,000% at the turn of the 21st century. [See:https://www.bankofengland.co.uk/KnowledgeBank/how-has-growth-changed-over-time ]. In all of history, things had never gotten better for everyone any faster. [See: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Divergence.%5D The following graph shows this remarkable upward trend in life expectancy, GDP per capita, energy capture, democratic governance, and war-making capacity along with a remarkable decline in extreme poverty.

Moreover, in a 2001 essay titled The Law of Accelerating Returns, Ray Kurzweil opined that the rate of technological change is exponential. [See: https://www.kurzweilai.net/the-law-of-accelerating-returns ]. Thus the sharp upward trend in these measures of well-being has continued and even accelerated since 2000 and it is not unreasonable to believe that the shift of ever-improving living standards and the rest will stretch further into the future. [See:https://fattailedandhappy.com/rise-of-asia-global-growth-since-2000/ ].Regrettably, ever since Jean Jacques Rousseau wrote his famous essay, Discourse on the Origin and Basis of Inequality Among Men in 1754 some (many?) collectivist scribes have sought to return our species to its hunter-gatherer roots when everyone was equally hungry and always desperately poor. [See:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean-Jacques_Rousseau ].

As evidence of this ill-advised tendency, every day I read an almost endless array of pro-socialist and anti-capitalist articles in a variety of newspapers, magazines, and web sites and almost all of these focus on alleged rising levels of inequality. A single recent example should suffice. In a June 6, 2019 article in the NY Times, titled The World is a Mess. We Need Fully Automated Luxury Communism, Aaron Bastini insisted that We live in a world of low growth, low productivity and low wages, of climate breakdown and collapse of democratic policies. A world where billions, live in poverty. A world defined by inequality. Next, I ask myself How could so many bright well-informed authors be so apparently unaware of the actual realities concerning the facts regarding the imagined phenomenon of increasing income and wealth inequality in the US? [See:https://www.amazon.com/product-reviews/0691143617/ref=acr_dpx_hist_3??ie=UTF8&filterByStar=three_star&showViewpoints=0 ].

These unfounded claims of growing income inequality and the exaggerated concentration of wealth in the US due to capitalism are easily rebutted.Many left-leaning economists are at heart closet levelers who favor more equal economic outcomes and these same people therefor support almost any move towards socialism. They thus espouse every misleading set of statistics that they can find in an effort to attain their goal. This is often called data mining and it is not useful. In his 1954 book, How to Lie With Statistics author Darrell Huff coined the word statisticulation by which he meant statistical manipulation which also describes very well the work of these many current day egalitarians.

For example, some socialist commentators have contended that with a slew of data, Thomas Piketty confirmed what those on the left had long believed: that extreme inequality and the clustering of wealth are the natural outcomes of capitalism. [See: https://newrepublic.com/article/154186/bernie-sanders-democratic-socialist-failure-envision-world-without-capitalism ]. But, income inequality in the US has not risen in the last 60 years and the US Census Bureau data (along with Kitov & Kitov 2012) [See: https://www.academia.edu/4383266/The_Dynamics_of_Personal_Income_Distribution_and_Inequality_in_the_United_States ] prove it. Since 1960 the Bureaus Gini coefficient (one of many important measures that almost all economists use to track inequality) of income for All US Persons (individuals) has remained almost totally flat. [See: Table PINC-01 Selected Characteristics in the March Supplement which is published each year by the US Census Bureau as part of its Annual Demographic Surrey or visithttps://politicalcalculations.blogspot.com/search?q=gini#.XR4aendFwuU ]. Thus there has been virtually no increase in US income inequality for individuals for six decades. [See: https://voxeu.org/article/human-capital-and-income-inequality ]. Also, most collectivist writers do not know that Prof. Piketty in 2015 quietly recanted much (most?) of what he wrote in Capital in the 21st Century. [See: About Capital in the 21st Century American Economic Review 2015, 105(5): 48-53 or go to http://dx.doi.org/10.1257/aer.p20151060 ].

What has been skewing upwards is the US Census Bureaus Gini coefficient for US Households (and US Families). [Note: In 2009 Prof. Robert Gordon found that The rise in American inequality has been exaggerated both in magnitude and timing. See: https://www.nber.org/papers/w15351 thereby confirming the assertion that Alan Reynolds made at the Western Economics Associations July 2007 meeting that inequality in income, wages, consumption, and wealth among the US population as a whole does not appear to have increased significantly since 1988. See:https://www.cato.org/publications/policy-analysis/has-us-income-inequality-really-increased ]. But nearly 100% of any increases have been caused by sociological (and not economic) factors (i.e. alterations in the size, make-up, and constitution of both US households and families.) For context, any divergence of these two data sets from the stable status of the statistics for All US Persons (individuals) began about 1970. [See:https://politicalcalculations.blogspot.com/search?q=gini#.XTMahXdFwuU ]. But as Stanford economist, Thomas Sowell, put it in his book, Economic Facts and Fallacies (2008), Income comparisons using household statistics are far less reliable indicators of standards of living than individual income data because households vary in size while an individual always means one person. Later Prof. Sowell continued Household income data can, therefore, be very misleading, whether comparing income differences as of a given time or following changes in income over the years.

Perhaps a single specific example of this household trend will help to dismiss the lefts baseless trope regarding rising income inequality in the US. If a young woman in the 1950s became pregnant out of wedlock she almost always married the father thereby forming one new household (and one new family) with one caregiver and one breadwinner. Twenty years later mounting numbers of young women began bearing children without any serious intention of matrimony (today this figure in the US stands at 39.8%) [See:https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/fastats/unmarried-childbearing.htm ] and this results in the formation of two new families (and two new households) one with a caregiver but no breadwinner and another with only a breadwinner. Both of these freshly formed households (or families) are each poorer than the combined single household (or family). Obviously, this emerging cultural (not economic) change began shifting the income inequality for households (and families) upward.

There are many other sociological (but not economic) trends that have resulted in similar skewing of the household (and family) data. These include (but are not limited to) elevated levels of divorce which split one household (and family) into two needier units; increasing numbers of elderly women who outlive their spouses; rising instances of assortative mating (i.e. In the 1950s a doctor often married his nurse but today she marries another doctor or lawyer which results in a very high two-income household and family. Indeed, according to Greenwood et.al. (2014), the US Gini coefficient in 2005 would have fallen from the observed 0.43 to 0.34 if all US mating had been random. And the authors of this research thus concluded that assortative mating is important for income inequality.) [See: https://www.nber.org/papers/w19829?utm_campaign=ntw&utm_medium=email&utm_source=ntw ] [Note: For a contrary point of view see: https://www.nber.org/papers/w20271.pdf ]; and numerous other sociological kinetics which markedly raises the Gini coefficients for both families and households but not for individuals.In their 2016 book, Unequal Gains, Profs. Lindert and Williamson begin by dismissing in a footnote the US Census Bureaus data as faulty official numbers but later admit that the racial and gender inequality gaps have been converging since 1970 along with a declining gap in the North-South levels of inequality. But these two authors are unable to reconcile why these American countercurrents are moving in the opposite direction of their new measure of inequality which is the tax unit research of Piketty & Saez (2001). [See: https://www.nber.org/papers/w8467 ]. Lindert and Williamson revealed their true colors in Unequal Gains' last paragraph. If there were any fulcrum at which historical insight might be applied to move inequality, it would be political. As we have said, no nation has used up all its political opportunities for leveling income without harming economic growth. Even worse, these two liberal economists asserted that The South was the richest of the colonies, and even its slaves had higher living standards than did the poorest in England.Most collectivist economists (including LIndert & Williamson) always examine inequality using only pre-tax data and before taking into consideration any government transfer payments which each highly distort the real situation in America. The following graph depicts the true status: [See:https://www.cato.org/blog/different-look-after-tax-income-inequality ]. This certainly is no picture of rising income inequality in the US.For context, one should also note the following: According to the IRS data from 1992 to 2014 over 70% of tax units (a very close proxy for families) were among the top 400 individual US taxpayers for only a single year while only 3% were among this top tier for ten years or more. [See: https://taxfoundation.org/turnover-among-richest-americans/ ]. Thus, most US taxpayers had ultra-high incomes only one time in their careers. Also, in 2017 a US household needed $421,926 to be in the top 1%. [ See: https://www.epi.org/multimedia/unequal-states-of-america/#/United%20States ]. This is a very handsome sum but far less than many would imagine.In 2019, Auten & Splinter reported that Top income share estimates based on only individual tax returns, such as Piketty & Saez (2003) are biased by tax-base changes, major social changes, and missing income sources. These authors continued Our results suggest that the income shares are lower than the tax-based estimates and since the early 1960s increasing government transfers and tax progressivity have resulted in little change in after-tax income shares. [See: Income Inequality in the United States: Using Tax Data to Measure Long-Term Trends Or see: Davidsplinter.com/autensplinter-tax_data_and_inequality.pdf ]. The Economist, noted regarding this research, that Just as ideas about inequality have completed their march from the Academy to the frontlines of politics, researchers have begun to look again. And some are wondering whether inequality has risen as much as claimed or, by some measures, at all. The results of this research paper have also been reported by Vox, PBS, The Hill, and the WSJ.Then in Oct. of 2019 Elwell et al reported that when we more fully account for taxes and transfers and use the proper sharing unit and unit of analysis we show that while over this period (1959 2016) the rich got substantially richer, so did poor and middle-class Americans. [See: Income Growth and its Distribution From Eisenhower to Obama: The Growing Importance of In =Kind Transfers (1959 2016) AEI Economics Working Paper 2019-21.]Side Bar: Male Versus Female Inequality The Imaginary Glass CeilingIn her excellent book, The Sexual Paradox: Men, Women, and the Real Gender Gap, Susan Pinker (yes, Stevens sister) reports on page 15 the almost 100-year-old data on the divergent distribution of male and female IQ scores. According to Ms. Pinker Boys are overrepresented at both extremes and that Despite their nearly identical averages, males show more dramatic variability that is more evident at the extremes. These truths have gone unrefuted for nearly 100 years and they have been repeatedly confirmed.I often find that those who are wailing (almost always without a shred of scientific evidence) about alleged sexism have never examined the bottom end of the IQ distribution. Go into any classroom for the mentally challenged and one will find far more boys than girls. The distribution of male IQ scores is simply wider (at both ends) than the range for females. Thus it is unremarkable to find more males in the corporate board room than females.

Turning the alleged accumulation of wealth due to capitalism. This misleading claim made by many collectivists also lacks important framing. Augustus Caesar was worth an estimated $4.6 trillion but economic historians name Mansa Musa I (1280 1337) of the Mali Empire in sub-Saharan Africa as the richest man of all time. Jakob Fugger (1459 1525), a German merchant, amassed a fortune worth an estimated $400 billion in todays dollars more than 250 years before the onset of capitalism. Today the worlds richest man is Jeff Bezos with a net worth of about $125 billion. He is followed by Bernard Arnault with just under $108 billion and Bill Gates at slightly more than $107 billion. [See: https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/markets/arnault-overtakes-gates-to-become-worlds-second-richest-person/ar-AAEqfUQ?ocid=spartandhp ]. Basil II, Alan the Red, Nicholas II, William the Conqueror, and Muammar al-Qaddafi, along with all of the Robber Barons of the late 19th and early 20th centuries were also far wealthier than Mr. Bezos in US dollars adjusted for inflation. [See:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_wealthiest_historic_figures ]. As an aside and for further context, several large family fortunes have been divided by inheritance. The combined Walton family fortune today stands at $191 billion, the Mars estate has a total worth of $127 billion and the Koch family wealth is now $125 billion. [See: The Jewish Journal reporting from Bloomberg Aug. 11, 2019].

In the May 15, 2014 edition of Foreign Affairs magazine in an article titled The Inequality Illusion economists Wojciech Kopczuk and Allison Schrager reported that there is limited evidence that wealth inequality has actually worsened in the US in the last 30 years. A year later Zucman & Saez in a scholarly paper, (Wealth Inequality in the US Since 1913) found that wealth inequality was not rising quickly below the top 0.1%. [See: https://berkeley.edu/~saez/saez-zucmanNBER14wealth.pdf ]. According to Harvard professor and economist, Martin Feldstein, this increase in the wealth statistics among the top 0.1% was due almost entirely to the 0.01%s conversion from reporting their taxes as C corporations to sub-S corporations after the 1986 tax act. [See: https://object.cato.org/sites/cato.org/files/pubs/pdf/anti-piketty.pdf ]. Thus, there has been little or no concentration of wealth in the US since 1970.For some unexplained reason, many socialists confine their analysis of inequality to measures of income (annual earnings) and wealth (accumulated economic assets less debt) thereby ignoring many other important benchmarks (mortality, morbidity, literacy, consumption, gender, race, etc.) and one might assume that these other unmentioned norms may not support their collectivist claims of inequality that is skewing out of control. [See: https://mortality.org/ ]. The simple truth is that these other metrics are both: getting better fast and converging while not diverging as many on the left would have us believe. [See:https://www.un.org/esa/desa/papers/2005/wp2_2005.pdf ].

The Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) has firmly asserted that Economic growth is the most powerful instrument for reducing poverty and improving the quality of life in developing countries. [See: http://www.oecd.org/derec/unitedkingdom/40700982.pd ]. Of course, many collectivists want to halt the expansion of human economic well-being asserting that things are good enough today. [See: https://www.amazon.com/Lets-Get-Rid-growth-Globalization/dp/1484036557/ref=sr_1_28_sspa?keywords=capitalism&qid=1564929398&s=books&sr=1-28-spons&psc=1 ].Thus, any effort that might slow economic growth via socialism would be a virtual death sentence for our planets needy. Interestingly, Michael OSullivan in his new book The Leveling insists that while globalization has ended the next major trend will be a worldwide equalizing of wealth, income, consumption, etc.In further support of the OECDs assertion Prof. Raghuram Rajan, an economist at the University of Chicago and former chief economist for the IMF, in his latest book, The Third Pillar (2019) reports that We are surrounded by plenty. Humanity has never been richer as technologies of production have improved steadily over the last two hundred fifty years. It is not just developed countries that have grown wealthier; billions across the developing world have moved from stressful poverty to a comfortable middle-class existence in the span of a generation. Income is more evenly spread across the world than at any other time in our lives. For the first time in history, we have it in our power to eradicate hunger and starvation everywhere. This is capitalisms real historical economic record.

Moreover, the editors of The Economist magazine on May 23, 2019, opined that Capitalism is improving workers lot farther than it has in years (and) the zeitgeist has lost touch with the data. They added that the bleak picture painted by the left is at odds with reality. In other words, many news outlets are apparently not reporting the economic truth about capitalism.Indeed, Prof. Richard Baldwin, president of the Centre for Economic Policy Research (CEPR) in London, in his 2016 book, The Great Convergence notes that From 1820 to 1990 the share of world income going to todays wealthy nations soared from 20% to 70% and that share has recently been plummeting. Today, their share is now back to where it was in 1914. According to Dr. Baldwin This new trend is surely the dominant economic fact of the last two or three decades. This leads one to inquire Why does this critical new trend go virtually unreported?SummaryOne should compare all of these facts with socialisms record of rendering almost everyone to be only equally poor. Thus, liberals imagined emphasis on rising inequality in the USA due in-part to capitalism represents one of the worlds biggest economic hoaxes.

Read more from the original source:
Every State Is a Battleground - LA Progressive

An international team of scientists has synthetically engineered mosquitoes that halt the transmission of the dengue virus.

Led by biologists at the University of California San Diego, the research team describes details of the achievement in Aedes aegypti mosquitoes, the insects that spread dengue in humans, on January 16 in the journal PLOS Pathogens.

Researchers in UC San Diego Associate Professor Omar Akbaris lab worked with colleagues at Vanderbilt University Medical Center in identifying a broad spectrum human antibody for dengue suppression. The development marks the first engineered approach in mosquitoes that targets the four known types of dengue, improving upon previous designs that addressed single strains.

They then designed the antibody cargo to be synthetically expressed in female A. aegypti mosquitoes, which spread the dengue virus.

Once the female mosquito takes in blood, the antibody is activated and expressedthats the trigger, said Akbari, of the Division of Biological Sciences and a member of the Tata Institute for Genetics and Society. The antibody is able to hinder the replication of the virus and prevent its dissemination throughout the mosquito, which then prevents its transmission to humans. Its a powerful approach.

Akbari said the engineered mosquitoes could easily be paired with a dissemination system, such as a gene drive based on CRISPR/CAS-9 technology, capable of spreading the antibody throughout wild disease-transmitting mosquito populations.

It is fascinating that we now can transfer genes from the human immune system to confer immunity to mosquitoes. This work opens up a whole new field of biotechnology possibilities to interrupt mosquito-borne diseases of man, said coauthor James Crowe, Jr., M.D., director of the Vanderbilt Vaccine Center at Vanderbilt University Medical Center in Nashville, Tenn.

According to the World Health Organization, dengue virus threatens millions of people in tropical and sub-tropical climates. Severe dengue is a leading cause of serious illness and death among children in many Asian and Latin American countries. The Pan American Health Organization recently reported the highest number of dengue cases ever recorded in the Americas. Infecting those with compromised immune systems, dengue victims suffer flu-like symptoms, including severe fevers and rashes. Serious cases can include life-threatening bleeding. Currently no specific treatment exists and thus prevention and control depend on measures that stop the spread of the virus.

This development means that in the foreseeable future there may be viable genetic approaches to controlling dengue virus in the field, which could limit human suffering and mortality, said Akbari, whose lab is now in the early stages of testing methods to simultaneously neutralize mosquitoes against dengue and a suite of other viruses such as Zika, yellow fever and chikungunya.

Mosquitoes have been given the bad rap of being the deadliest killers on the planet because they are the messengers that transmit diseases like malaria, dengue, chikungunya, Zika and yellow fever that collectively put 6.5 billion people at risk globally, said Suresh Subramani, professor emeritus of molecular biology at UC San Diego and global director of the Tata Institute for Genetics and Society (TIGS). Until recently, the world has focused on shooting (killing) this messenger. Work from the Akbari lab and at TIGS is aimed at disarming the mosquito instead by preventing it from transmitting diseases, without killing the messenger. This paper shows that it is possible to immunize mosquitoes and prevent their ability to transmit dengue virus, and potentially other mosquito-borne pathogens.

Coauthors of the research include: UC San Diego graduate student Stephanie Gamez; Anna Buchman and Ming Li of the Section of Cell and Developmental Biology, Division of Biological Sciences, UC San Diego; Igor Antoshechkin of the California Institute of Technology, Shin-Hang Lee, Shin-Wei Wang and Chun-Hong Chen of the National Health Research Institutes (Taiwan); and Melissa Klein, Jean-Bernard Duchemin and Prasad Paradkar of CSIRO Health and Biosecurity.

Funding for the research was provided by a Defense Advanced Research Project Agency (DARPA) Safe Genes Program Grant (HR0011-17-2-0047), a National Institutes of Health Exploratory/Developmental Research Grant Award (1R21AI123937) and CSIRO internal funding.

Read the original:
The mosquito that repels the dengue virus - University of California

Donald Fraser, who farms at Dunain Mains Farm, at Inverness, believes he has 'cracked the code' to producing the best 'all-round' cow for his large commercial suckler herd and the secret lies with Limousin genetics.

Farming in the steep hills and along the banks of the Caledonian Canal which runs from Inverness to Loch Ness brings with it difficult challenges, however Donald and his father, also Donald, are breeding hardy cattle that seem to benefit from their surroundings.

"The Limousin cross cow is an all-rounder. They make for good breeding females, with high fertility as well as producing a fantastic carcass which ideal when producing fat cattle," said Donald, who's family have farmed there since 1934.

"We find that the Limousin crosses, on average, last for two calvings longer than the Simmental crosses. They also sell for a third more in the ring and always look fresh for a cast cow, which is a pleasing aspect for any potential buyers," commented Donald senior, adding that a Simmental bull is introduced as an out-cross when the Limousin part of the equation becomes too pure.

The family have also invested in a Saler bull, primarily for ease of calving with their heifers and to introduce some new breeding into the herd.

Purchasing the right bull is a key aspect to their system and as a result, he has relied on Limousin genetics from Alasdair and Gill Macnabs Alagils herd, based at Dingwall.

"When buying a bull, I'm looking for good locomotion, length and legs, as well as female traits such as milkiness and temperament for potential replacement heifers. I like that Alisdair and Gill don't push their bulls to the extreme, which is what you tend to find with bulls at the bigger sales," Donald explained.

"I'm able to see them as youngsters, which gives me a clear idea of their potential progeny and if they'll work in my system, with my cattle."

Some of the bulls that Donald has used in his herd in previous years include Alagils Juno, a son of Netherhall Gallant which is a three-quarter brother of Jambon, which sold for 28,000gns, in 2016, at Carlisle.

The herd is split into two calving groups consisting of 125 spring calvers and 100 autumn calvers, with the heifers being brought inside for monitoring during calving. The rest of the cattle are calved outside.

In order to produce a more uniform group of calves, Donald has constricted his bulling period to six weeks for the autumn calvers, and eight weeks for the spring calvers. This may appear a simple system, but it is certainly working as all heifers are calving at two-years-old, with minimal barren rates.

Donald explained: "The bulling period is split between two bulls either two Limousin bulls, or a Limousin and a Simmental or Saler bull. This helps ensure bulls are working and that all cattle are covered by at least one of the two."

During the bulling period, Donald purchases a tonne of calf pellets and mixes this with home-grown barley to help take some off the pressure off the cows.

The farm's sandy and stony low-ground soil is ideal for out-wintering cattle and Donald tries to out-winter as many of the herd as possible. "Our in-calf heifers and cows are definitely in better condition as a result of being out-wintered because they are constantly moving, which means that they are fitter when it comes to calving," commented Donald senior.

Th spring calvers are all out wintered and fed forage crops, except the old cows and heifers, which only receive silage. Calves are weaned in late September, before being sold in the spring.

The back-end calvers are outside and fed on silage and draft, however cows are run into a shed at night for monitoring and to shelter from poorer weather conditions.

Once calves have been weaned at the end of August, the cows are sent off back up the hill.

"We bring the weaned calves indoors in October and feed them a total mixed ration which includes draff, home-grown barley and silage, in preparation for market," Donald senior stated.

Calves are then sold through Dingwall and Highland Marts as forward stores at the end of January at 13-months of age and weighing around 450kg. All cattle are sold liveweight through the ring last year, Donald's calves returned a profit of 1048 per head, or 234p per kg.

"We find that our cattle are selling in the top end of the sale and we have regular buyers, all who give us great feedback about the calves it makes the job worthwhile," commented Donald.

On average, Donald is retaining around 35 replacement females per year in order to maintain a reasonably young and productive herd. Maintaining a high health status is one aspect that is fundamental in producing quality cattle and with a strict culling policy, Donald ensures he is only breeding the best of the best.

"I usually will cull anything that is not in calf, as well as get rid of anything with bad teats, temper or is a failing animal in terms of health," he stated.

Commenting on the issue of Brexit, Donald concluded: "This is only the beginning regarding Brexit. We're a marginal farm, we can't suddenly change to a full scale arable enterprise. The ground we have is already being utilised to its best extent so, of course, we have our worries regarding the beef industry."

However, Donald is confident that the Limousin breed is the way forward for his business and will continue to flourish in what is an uncertain post-Brexit world that is quickly creeping up on us.

FARM facts:

* Rented farm from two separate estates: Alexander Bailey and Ladycurn Farm.

* Farming 3300 acres rising from 250ft to 1400ft above sea-level, of which 2200 acres is hill ground.

* Business relies on 225 Limousin cross cows all of which are primarily bulled to a Limousin, as well as a Simmental or Saler bull.

* The farm run a closed herd.

* Heifers are calved at two-years of age.

* The majority calf outdoors and progeny are out-wintered and sold as forward stores at the end of January at 13-months of age through Dingwall and Highland Marts, Dingwall.

* Sheep: 750 ewes made up of 150 Cheviots, which are crossed to the Bluefaced Leicester to breed Cheviot Mule females, that are then crossed to a Beltex cross Charolais tup to produce prime lambs, also sold through Dingwall Mart.

* Lambing March/April and lambs fattened on grass.

* Cropping 235 acres of spring barley, 380 tonnes are usually bought by Highland Grain for malting, but 150 tonnes kept for feeding cattle on farm.

* Employ one full time employee Graeme Black who has worked for the Fraser family for 26 years. Part-time worker, Johny Milton is also highly regarded by the family.

1, Biggest change during your farming career The veganism movement is one which is rapidly growing and is a potential threat to our industry, it's definitely one to be aware of. My wife, Joanna, is a geography teacher and she has stated that children are taught, in their curriculum, that agriculture is the number one reason for global warming which is both extremely wrong and worrying!

2, Best purchase The diet feeder has helped with the sale cattle's LWG but also helped us to calf heifers at two-years-old as they aren't too heavy.

3, Best advice If you don't think you need a bag of feed to shift a lot of cattle, take it anyway!

4, Where would you like to be in 2030 To be in a position of being able to pass our business onto the next generation.

5, Favourite TV programme This Farming Life is good, however I think it should cover a lot more variation in farming than what it currently does already.

Visit link:
Limousin genetics are the way forward - The Scottish Farmer

By Susan Cosier

Come February in Wisconsin, almost everything will be covered in ice and snow. In little shanties on frozen Lake Winnebago, a 30-by-13-mile lake in the eastern part of the state, fishers will keep watch over rectangular holes cut into the ice with a chainsaw. When they spot a fin passing below, they'll jab their spears down deep. The lucky ones will earn themselves a lake sturgeon, a species that has prowled the earth's waters for more than 150 million years.

Lake Winnebago is one of only two locations in the world where people can spearfish lake sturgeon. These armored fish, also distinguished by whiskerlike barbels growing from their chins, can live as long as a century, weigh as much as 200 pounds, and grow more than seven feet long. Every year, people gather on the lake for a 16-day fishing event. Just 500 licenses exist, a number that keeps overfishing in check while allowing nearly 1,000 sturgeon to be taken for their caviar (for those lucky enough to catch a female) and meat (delicious when smoked).

The sturgeon spearing event will mark its 80th season this year. And with the fish listed as threatened in 19 of the 20 states where it's found, Wisconsin wildlife officials consider the event one of a number of tactics that help educate people about the fish. (Another is an adoption program allowing members of the public to sponsor and hand-release young fish, reared at a state hatchery, into Lake Michigan and the Milwaukee River, part of the annual SturgeonFest.) Efforts to revive their populations have been somewhat successful, but it's been slow going: Female lake sturgeon don't start reproducing until they're at least 20 years old.

This biological fact, combined with overfishing, pollution, and habitat degradation, has resulted in their plight today. An estimated 15 million sturgeon used to exist in the Great Lakes, with fishers bringing in upwards of four million pounds per year between 1879 and 1900. The trade took a serious toll on the species. By 1929, commercial sturgeon fishing had closed in Lake Michigan due to too few fish. And by the end of the century, fishers had taken 80 percent of the sturgeon out of Lake Erie. Meanwhile, dams and development ruined habitat and kept the fish from reaching key spawning grounds. In response to the population crash, most states instituted protections and mandated hunting limits in the 1990s and early 2000s.

Today, only 1 percent of the lake sturgeon's population remains. In addition to the states that list them as threatened, the United States Fish and Wildlife Service announced in August that it would study whether to list the fish as federally threatened or endangered.

Ryan Koenigs, a fisheries biologist with the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources (DNR), is among those dedicated to bringing the lake sturgeon back. He's part of a team that keeps track of every individual caught, and he helps run the registration stations where fishers who spear a sturgeon in Lake Winnebago must go before taking their catch home. Koenigs and his colleagues look for a passive integrated transponder (PIT) tag, which offers information about the fish. These tags are implanted in each fish reared or caught and released by the agency. Some individuals caught in the past few years were tagged decades ago. "I'm reaping the benefits right now of what the biologists two generations before me did in the 1970s," Koenigs says.

Restoration efforts also exist in many other states bordering the Great Lakes. In New York, the Department of Environmental Conservation, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, and the Saint Regis Mohawk Tribe harvest sturgeon eggs from the St. Lawrence River and send them to hatcheries in the central part of the state and in Wisconsin. In Michigan, fisheries biologists, researchers, and state agencies successfully protected the sturgeon population in Black Lake and now use the data collected from their efforts to guide their restocking of nearby lakes and streams.

These types of projects replenish waterways with the fish, but the species' recovery has a long way to go. Should conservationists succeed, the fish could end up benefiting the entire ecosystem, notes Ed Baker, a fisheries biologist in Michigan. "If we have a native species fish community that's been degraded, that's a sign that its environment is no longer healthy," he says. "If we can restore lake sturgeon to their prominence, or at least somewhat close to what their prominence was before we started harvesting them, that's a sign that we're doing the right thing for the Great Lakes."

As the lake sturgeon populations rebound, they could help biologists beat back some new threats, too. Notably, they eat invasive zebra and quagga mussels that now blanket the lake beds. They also eat invasive round gobies. All three of these marine species hail from faraway waters and snuck their way in through the ballast water used to balance ships' hulls.

In 1995, Baker was tasked with finishing and implementing Michigan's new sturgeon rehabilitation plan. He observed reach after reach, finding only a few places were the fish still existed. One of those was the Upper Peninsula's Black Lake. Locals still spearfished sturgeon, and the population appeared to be falling. In 2001 Baker and Kim Scribner of Michigan State University set out to study the fish and get a rough population estimate. They concluded that over a 25-year period, sturgeon numbers had declined by more than 60 percent.

The state's Department of Natural Resources decided sturgeon spearfishing could continue, but fishers could harvest no more than five fish a year. Baker and his team stocked the lake, too, and the sturgeon population grew. The limit is now up to 14. Still, the population isn't recovering as quickly as expected.

To figure out why, Baker and Scribner continue their research. They also use the information they collect on basic sturgeon biology, genetics, and behavior to inform conservation efforts in other Michigan water bodies.

One major question they hope to answer concerns the timing of the sturgeon's reproduction. As with steelhead and salmon, it appears that the river where sturgeon spend the first summer of life, between May and October, is imprinted on the fish, and they come back to that place to spawn. Confirming this would help in their stocking effortsespecially in reaches where the fish haven't swum for decades.

In addition to the hatchling adopt-and-release program that takes place in September in Milwaukee, Wisconsonites get another opportunity to help biologists in April, when Koenigs does his stock assessments. On the Wolf River near Lake Winnebago, hundreds of thousands of sturgeon ranging in size from four to seven feet long swim along the waterline. Koenigs and his team stand at the ready with nets to pull the fish out of the water, then weigh, measure, and tag them.

When the team finds fish with those tags implanted during the February spearfishing season, they track the data to get a tagged to non-tagged fish ratio, which is then used to set harvest limits. The data collected at each event helps inform how best to manage the species.

"We're on the right path," says Koenigs, who is now prepping for the spearfishing season that begins on Feb. 8. "The work that's being done through these various efforts seems to be showing some pretty promising signs."

View post:
These Prehistoric Fish Are Making a Slow Comeback in the Midwest - EcoWatch