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A.M. Costa Rica's Second news page |
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San
José, Costa Rica, Wednesday, Aug. 6,
2014, Vol. 14, No. 154
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By the Massachusetts Institute of
Technology News Office
When it comes to learning languages, adults and children have different strengths. Adults excel at absorbing the vocabulary needed to navigate a grocery store or order food in a restaurant, but children have an uncanny ability to pick up on subtle nuances of language that often elude adults. Within months of living in a foreign country, a young child may speak a second language like a native speaker. Brain structure plays an important role in this sensitive period for learning language, which is believed to end around adolescence. The young brain is equipped with neural circuits that can analyze sounds and build a coherent set of rules for constructing words and sentences out of those sounds. Once these language structures are established, it’s difficult to build another one for a new language. In a new study, a team of neuroscientists and psychologists led by Amy Finn, a post doctoral researcher at the McGovern Institute for Brain Research, has found evidence for another factor that contributes to adults’ language difficulties: When learning certain elements of language, the more highly developed cognitive skills of adults actually get in the way. The researchers discovered that the harder adults tried to learn an artificial language, the worse they were at deciphering the language’s morphology — the structure and deployment of linguistic units such as root words, suffixes, and prefixes. “We found that effort helps you in most situations, for things like figuring out what the units of language that you need to know are, and basic ordering of elements. But when trying to learn morphology, at least in this artificial language we created, it’s actually worse when you try,” Ms. Finn says. Ms. Finn and colleagues from the University of California at Santa Barbara, Stanford University, and the University of British Columbia describe their findings in the July 21 issue of PLoS One. Carla Hudson Kam, an associate professor of linguistics at British Columbia, is the paper’s senior author. Linguists have known for decades that children are skilled at absorbing certain tricky elements of language, such as irregular past participles (examples of which, in English, include “gone” and “been”) or complicated verb tenses like the subjunctive. “Children will ultimately perform better than adults in terms of their command of the grammar and the structural components of language — some of the more idiosyncratic, difficult-to-articulate aspects of language that even most native speakers don’t have conscious awareness of,” Ms. Finn says. In 1990, linguist Elissa Newport hypothesized that adults have trouble learning those nuances because they try to analyze too much information at once. Adults have a much more highly developed prefrontal cortex than children, and they tend to throw all of that brainpower at learning a second language. This high-powered processing may actually interfere with certain elements of learning language. “It’s an idea that’s been around for a long time, but there hasn’t been any data that experimentally show that it’s true,” Ms. Finn says. Ms. Finn and her colleagues designed an experiment to test whether exerting more effort would help or hinder success. First, they created nine nonsense words, each with two syllables. Each word fell into one of three categories (A, B, and C), defined by the order of consonant and vowel sounds. Study subjects listened to the artificial language for about 10 minutes. One group of subjects was told not to overanalyze what they heard, but not to tune it out either. To help them not overthink the language, they were given the option of completing a puzzle or coloring while they listened. The other group was told to try to identify the words they were hearing. Each group heard the same recording, which was a series of three-word sequences — first a word from category A, then one from category B, then category C — with no pauses between words. Previous studies have shown that adults, babies, and even monkeys can parse this kind of information into word units, a task known as word segmentation. Subjects from both groups were successful at word segmentation, although the group that tried harder performed a little better. Both groups also performed well in a task called word ordering, which required subjects to choose between a correct word sequence (ABC) and an incorrect sequence (such as ACB) of words they had previously heard. The final test measured skill in identifying the language’s morphology. The researchers played a three-word sequence that included a word the subjects had not heard before, but which fit into one of the three categories. When asked to judge whether this new word was in the correct location, the subjects who had been asked to pay closer attention to the original word stream performed much worse than those who had listened more passively. “This research is exciting because it provides evidence indicating that effortful learning leads to different results depending upon the kind of information learners are trying to master,” says Michael Ramscar, a professor of linguistics at the University of Tübingen who was not part of the research team. “The results indicate that learning to identify relatively simple parts of language, such as words, is facilitated by effortful learning, whereas learning more complex aspects of language, such as grammatical features, is impeded by effortful learning.” The findings support a theory of language acquisition that suggests that some parts of language are learned through procedural memory, while others are learned through declarative memory. Under this theory, declarative memory, which stores knowledge and facts, would be more useful for learning vocabulary and certain rules of grammar. Procedural memory, which guides tasks we perform without conscious awareness of how we learned them, would be more useful for learning subtle rules related to language morphology. “It’s likely to be the procedural memory system that’s really important for learning these difficult morphological aspects of language. In fact, when you use the declarative memory system, it doesn’t help you, it harms you,” Ms. Finn said. Still unresolved is the question of whether adults can overcome this language-learning obstacle. Ms. Finn says she does not have a good answer yet but she is now testing the effects of turning off the adult prefrontal cortex using a technique called transcranial magnetic stimulation. Other interventions she plans to study include distracting the prefrontal cortex by forcing it to perform other tasks while language is heard, and treating subjects with drugs that impair activity in that brain region. Government plans to reduce big pensions By the A.M. Costa Rica staff
The government has put a ceiling on the highest pensions in Costa Rica in an effort to restore the national budget. Victor Morales Mora, the labor minister, announced Tuesday that 910 pension plans for public officials will be affected by a maximum limit of money. Government officials estimated that this measure could save 12 billion colons annually. The decision delves into Article 3 of Ley 7858 and establishes that the maximum limit is equal to 10 times the base salary of the lowest paid salary in Costa Rica's public administration. Currently the lowest base salary sits at 236,700 colons per month, which would mean that the maximum pension an official could receive would be 2.3 million colons, or just more than $4,000. Morales said the addition to the law should go into effect on Sept. 15. It is expected to exclude ex-legislators from having to adhere to the same pension limit, according to Morales, who said such a measure would require reform of the entire law in Asamblea Legislativa. Santa Ana will be setting for bike event By the A.M. Costa Rica staff
Bike riders across Costa Rica can join the MTB Santa Ana biking event Aug. 17, a Sunday. Those who sign up can choose between routes of 35 kilometers and 20 kilometers. Anyone interested can sign up for 8,000 to 10,000 colons, depending on the route, at either Santa Ana location of Ciclo Guilly or Matra Lindora, where the bike rides begin from. All money raised from the event will go to the Comité Auxilar in Santa Ana, according to a Cruz Roja release, so that the organization can continue to carry out its duties in helping the community. The rides begin at 9 a.m. and will be divided into four categories: Youth, open, master, and elite.
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A.M. Costa Rica Third News Page |
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| San José, Costa Rica, Wednesday, Aug. 6, 2014, Vol. 14, No. 154 | |
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| First three months show president does not follow law closely |
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By
the A.M. Costa Rica staff
The first three months of the Luis Guillermo Solís administration are causing some political opponents and even some allies to shake their heads. They are not sure if the president is just naive or displaying an authoritarian bent. The question is important for expats in Costa Rica. too, because they recognize that the law is fragile even under the best of circumstances. An analysis of the news
First there was the revelation that Solís appointed Melvin Jiménez as his chief of staff or minister of the Presidencia. Almost immediately, critics pointed out that the Costa Rican Constitution specifically prohibits naming clergy as government ministers, and Jiménez is a Methodist bishop. The Solís administration argued without any evidence at all that the constitutional prohibition refers only to Catholic clergymen. Even the Procuraduría General, the government's own lawyer, said last month that the appointment was unconstitutional. There also is a case in the constitutional court on this point. Yet Jiménez continues in his job under conditions that are clearly illegal. Such an appointment might be chalked up as an accident, but not so the president's visit last week to the Mercado de Artesanía at Plaza de la Democracía. The merchants who sell tourism items there are under pressure to leave from the Municipalidad de San José. The location is a public street. Yet Solís said he was undoing a veto that had been made by Óscar Arias Sánchez when the Nobel laureate was president in 2009. Arias vetoed a legislative bill that would have allowed the merchants to remain. Lawmakers and jurists were stunned by the claim by Solis. The matter certainly will result in a court case that Solís will lose. Tuesday lawmakers from the rival Partido Liberación Nacional listed specific after specific as to why the presidential action was illegal and outside the ground rules of law making. Juan Luis Jiménez Succar, head of the Liberación delegation, called the action by Solís null and irresponsible. He noted that legislative rules put a four-year life on proposed legislation. Also Tuesday Victor Morales Mora, the labor minister, announced Tuesday that pensions for 910 former public officials will be limited to 10 times the lowest public base salary. This is supposed to be a |
 Casa Presidencial photo
President discusses his veto of
a veto with a merchant at the Mercado de
Artesanía Thursday.money-saving measure for the government. The decision certainly has a money-losing effect on the 910 pensioners. Legal action is certain to challenge this arbitrary government decision. Then there is the sales tax on admission to national parks and other protected areas. The initial decree was by former president Laura Chinchilla, who issued the measure nine days before leaving office. However, it was the Ministerio de Hacienda, headed by Vice President Helio Fallas, that decided that the tax also should cover tourism activities within the parks and also cover such activities for the last six years. There is a certain amount of boldness or arrogance required to expand activities covered by the tax and to assess taxes for six years in arrears. And this, too, probably is unconstitutional. This is the president who promised not to create new taxes during the first two years of his administration. Yet, a recent description of a bill being presented to prevent evasion contains a change that will result in taxes of company dividends. The administration is now arguing that the tax is not a tax. The change is just the removal of an exoneration, said Fernando Rodríguez, vice minister of Ingresos in a statement Tuesday afternoon. In a country where the leaders do not feel restricted by the laws, anything can happen. And what happens is not usually very good for the citizens and residents. |
| Solís wins praise for twin decrees on corn and
petroleum exploration |
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By
the A.M. Costa Rica staff
Environmentalists are praising two new decrees. One restricts petroleum drilling and makes Costa Rica the first country in the world free of industrial extractive industries for petroleum and metals, according to a summary by Mauricio Álvarez, president of the Federación Costarricense para la Conservación del Ambiente and a Universidad de Costa Rica professor. The second declares corn a cultural symbol. Both decrees were signed by President Luis Guillermo Solís, although they have not yet been published. They were signed at the Anexión del Partido de Nicoya celebration July 25. Solís put a moratorium on petroleum exploration and drilling until 2021. Álvarez said this decree was something environmentalists have been seeking for 15 years. He noted the years of protest when Harken Petroleum, now HKH, Inc., sought to drill offshore in the Caribbean. |
He praised what he
called an historic campaign of resistance. That was
in 1997 to 2000. The legal issues are still to be resolved. A more recent case is that of Mallon Oil which had struggled for 10 years to clear away legal obstacles put in the firm's path to prevent it from exploring for oil in the northern zone. Former president Laura Chinchilla issued a decree against such efforts, and Álvarez said the Solís decree builds on it and lengthens it. Mallon continues to seek approval. There also is an agreement that former president Óscar Arias Sánchez made with China as part of a deal to build a big refinery in Limón province. The thrust of the corn movement has been against Monsanto Co. and its genetically modified crops. The company's corn is resistant to its herbicides, and farmers can spray instead of hoeing each corn row individually. A court case this week seeks to overturn the authority of an agency of the Ministerio de Agricultura y Ganadería in approving the use of genetically modified seeds |
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| A.M. Costa Rica's Fourth News page | |||||
| San José, Costa Rica, Wednesday, Aug. 6, 2014, Vol. 14, No. 154 | |||||
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| In its early history, meteor impacts made planet's surface a
Hell on earth |
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By
the Arizona State University news service
New research shows that more than four billion years ago, the surface of Earth was heavily reprocessed – or mixed, buried and melted – as a result of giant asteroid impacts. A new terrestrial bombardment model based on existing lunar and terrestrial data sheds light on the role asteroid bombardments played in the geological evolution of the uppermost layers of the Earth approximately 4 to 4.5 billion years ago. An international team of researchers published their findings in the July 31 issue of Nature. "When we look at the present day, we have a very high fidelity timeline over the last about 500 million years of what's happened on Earth, and we have a pretty good understanding that plate tectonics and volcanism and all these kinds of processes have happened more or less the same way over the last couple of billion years," says Lindy Elkins-Tanton, director of the School of Earth and Space Exploration at Arizona State University. But, in the very beginning of Earth's formation, the first 500 million years, there's a less well-known period which has typically been called the Hadean, meaning hell-like, because it was assumed that it was wildly hot and volcanic and everything was covered with magma completely unlike the present day. Terrestrial planet formation models indicate Earth went through a sequence of major growth phases: including a giant impact that led to the formation of the Moon; and then the late bombardment, when giant asteroids, dwarfing the one that presumably killed the dinosaurs, periodically hit ancient Earth. While researchers estimate accretion during late bombardment contributed less than 1 percent of Earth's present-day mass, giant asteroid impacts still had a profound effect on the geological evolution of early Earth. Prior to four billion years ago Earth was resurfaced over and over by voluminous impact-generated melt. Furthermore, large collisions as late as about four billion years ago, may have repeatedly boiled away existing oceans into steamy atmospheres. Despite heavy bombardment, the findings are compatible with the |
claim of liquid
water
on Earth's surface as early as about 4.3 billion years ago based on
geochemical data. A key part of Earth's mysterious infancy period that has not been well quantified in the past is the kind of impacts Earth was experiencing at the end of accretion. How big and how frequent were those incoming bombardments and what were their effects on the surface of the Earth? How much did they affect the ability of the now cooling crust to actually form plates and start to subduct and make plate tectonics? What kind of volcanism did it produce that was different from volcanoes today?" "We are increasingly understanding both the similarities and the differences to present day Earth conditions and plate tectonics," says Ms. Elkins-Tanton. "And this study is a major step in that direction, trying to bridge that time from the last giant accretionary impact that largely completed the Earth and produced the Moon to the point where we have something like today's plate tectonics and habitable surface." The new research reveals that asteroidal collisions not only severely altered the geology of the Hadean Earth, but likely played a major role in the subsequent evolution of life on Earth as well. "Prior to approximately four billion years ago, no large region of Earth's surface could have survived untouched by impacts and their effects," says Simone Marchi, of NASA's Solar System Exploration Research Virtual Institute at the Southwest Research Institute. "The new picture of the Hadean Earth emerging from this work has important implications for its habitability." Large impacts had particularly severe effects on existing ecosystems. Researchers found that on average, Hadean Earth could have been hit by one to four impactors that were more than 600 miles wide and capable of global sterilization, and by three to seven impactors more than 300 miles wide and capable of global ocean vaporization. "During that time, the lag between major collisions was long enough to allow intervals of more clement conditions, at least on a local scale," said Marchi. "Any life emerging during the Hadean eon likely needed to be resistant to high temperatures, and could have survived such a violent period in Earth's history by thriving in niches deep underground or in the ocean's crust." |
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A.M. Costa Rica's Fifth
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| San José, Costa Rica, Wednesday, Aug. 6, 2014, Vol. 14, No. 154 | |||||||
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| U.S. general killed in Kabul by Afghan in uniform By the A.M. Costa Rica wire services A man wearing an Afghan army uniform shot and killed a U.S. general and wounded as many as 15 other U.S. and international troops in Kabul Tuesday. U.S. officials identified the officer as Maj. Gen. Harold Greene, a 34-year Army veteran. He is the highest-ranking U.S. serviceman killed in action since the war in Afghanistan began in 2001. Greene and the others, including a German general, were shot during a routine visit to the Marshal Fahim National Defense University in Kabul, a military training center. The Afghan defense ministry describes the gunman as a terrorist wearing an Afghan army uniform. He also was killed. U.S. and Afghan officials believe the shooting was an insider attack, in which Afghan soldiers turn their guns on U.S. and allied forces. Afghan President Hamid Karzai condemned the shooting and offered his condolences to all the victims. The United Nations in Afghanistan described the shooting as a tragedy. Baseball drug suspect agrees to plead guilty By the A.M. Costa Rica wire services
A man accused of selling performance enhancing drugs to American pro baseball star Alex Rodriguez and other players has agreed to plead guilty, the latest chapter in a scandal that has rocked Major League Baseball. The man, Tony Bosch, the former director of an anti-aging clinic called Biogenesis of America in the southern U.S. state of Florida, surrendered Tuesday to federal authorities. He faces one count of conspiring to distribute testosterone, a felony punishable by up to 10 years in jail. Bosch was one of seven people arrested Tuesday for allegedly conspiring to distribute steroids not only to pro baseball players, but also to youth athletes. One of those arrested was Yuri Sucart, a cousin of Alex Rodriguez. U.S. federal prosecutor Wilfredo Ferrer said: "Now today, we're here to announce that charges have been filed against Anthony Bosch, one of the original founders of Biogenesis of America, and six other individuals for their alleged involvement in the illegal distribution of performance enhancing drugs to minors, to professional athletes, and to others," said Ferrer. Ferrer accused the defendants of trying to take advantage of impressionable high school athletes. "As with many drug cases, these defendants were motivated by one thing, by money ... money. And they did this by lining their pockets by exploiting the pressures placed on athletes and others to be bigger, to be stronger, to be faster and to play better," he said. These developments come a year after Major League Baseball suspended 13 players, including Rodriguez, for their links to Biogenesis of America, which is now closed. Rodriguez received an unprecedented 211-game suspension for allegedly using performance enhancing drugs, while the other 12 were banned for 50 games. He appealed his suspension and continued to play for his team, the New York Yankees. But in January of this year, an arbitrator upheld about 75 percent of the 211-game suspension, banning Rodriguez for the entire 2014 season and playoffs. At the time of the arbitrator's ruling, Rodriguez said he had not used performance enhancing substances while playing for the Yankees, which acquired him in a trade in 2004. However, he has admitted using performance enhancing drugs early in his career. Japanese prime minister urges nuclear-free world By the A.M. Costa Rica wire services
Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe pledged to advocate for a world without nuclear weapons, as his country observed the 69th anniversary of the atomic bombing of Hiroshima. Speaking at a ceremony Wednesday at the southern city's Peace Park, President Abe pointed out that Japan is the only country to have suffered an atomic bomb attack. "I hereby pledge to work hard to realize the abolition of nuclear weapons and eternal world peace so as to avoid the repetition of such an atrocity by nuclear weapons while we adhere to our principles of non-nuclear weapons," said Abe. A crowd of about 45,000 people, including survivors of the attack, observed a minute of silence at 8:15 a.m. local time, the exact moment when an American B-29 bomber dropped the bomb on Hiroshima. By the end of 1945, the death toll from the attack was estimated at 140,000. Another 70,000 people died as the result of the bombing of Nagasaki three days later. The United States argued the attacks were necessary to bring about a quicker end to World War II. Six days after the Nagasaki attack, Japan surrendered, ending the war. Three-day truce remains in effect at Gaza battlefield By the A.M. Costa Rica wire services
The skies over Gaza remained calm Tuesday night, as the first day of a 72-hour truce between Israel and Hamas came to a close, giving both sides the longest respite from shelling in nearly a month. Meanwhile, Palestinian Foreign Minister Riad al-Malki, a representative of the Palestinian Authority, denounced what he called Israel's atrocities. Although Israel withdrew its troops from the coastal enclave Tuesday, and both sides entered a cease-fire around 8 a.m. local time, they have not gone far. Israeli Army spokesman Lt. Col. Peter Lerner told reporters Tuesday soldiers are in defensive positions outside Gaza after destroying the last of 32 known tunnels the military says Hamas used in cross-border attacks. "We're not certain that there aren't more tunnels, so we are currently positioning ourselves in line, on the defensive line, in case there are more activities," he said. Lerner also stressed that the next 72 hours would be crucial as the two sides try to negotiate a long-term end to the conflict. The Israeli troop withdrawal was a key demand of Hamas, whose delegates are expected to arrive in Cairo over the next several days to negotiate a cease-fire extension with Egyptian and Israeli officials. It is the latest attempt to end four weeks of violence that has killed more than 1,800 Palestinians, mostly civilians, as well as 64 Israeli soldiers and three Israeli civilians. Researchers say new drug could help with Alzheimer's By the A.M. Costa Rica wire services
Researchers at Yale School of Medicine have discovered a drug they say may reverse the cognitive deficits seen in Alzheimer’s disease. Profound short-term memory problems are a hallmark of Alzheimer’s, a form of dementia that affects tens of millions of people around the world. The brain disorder mostly strikes elderly people in their 70s, 80s and 90s. Its cause is still unknown. The compound that may help reverse cognitive impairment is called TC-2153. It inhibits the negative effects of a protein called striatal-enriched tyrosine phosphatase. Elevated phosphatase levels interfere with other proteins that are crucial for learning and memory. Phosphatase also weakens synaptic junctions, the minute spaces between nerve cells across which nerve impulses travel. TC-2153, according to investigators, blocks phosphatase, strengthening the neuronal connections. Writing in the open access journal Public Library of Science Biology, the Yale researchers say a single dose of the compound improved cognitive functions in mice. They say the Alzheimer’s mice performed as well on some cognitive tests as control mice without memory problems. The researchers say it took collaborators five years to identify the phosphatase inhibitor among thousands of small molecules. They next plan to test the compound in other, larger animals with cognitive deficits. Second U.S. ebola victim comes home for treatment By the A.M. Costa Rica wire services
A second American aid worker who contracted ebola arrived for treatment Tuesday afternoon at Emory University Hospital in Atlanta, Georgia, and is said to be feeling somewhat better. The aid worker, Nancy Writebol, was transported to Emory by ambulance from an Air Force base where her medical evacuation flight from Liberia landed earlier in the day. Ms. Writebol contracted the deadly virus while working at a clinic in Monrovia, Liberia, alongside American doctor Kent Brantly. He also is being treated for ebola at Emory. Both patients are in the same high security, isolation ward. There is no approved treatment or vaccine for ebola. But the two Americans are being given an experimental drug made from tobacco leaves. The current ebola outbreak in West Africa already has killed more than 900 people. Dubai-based airline Emirates has suspended service to Guinea because of the Ebola outbreak there. British Airways says it will suspend air service to Liberia and Sierra Leone due to the deteriorating public health situation at least through August. Meanwhile at the U.S.-Africa summit unfolds in Washington this week, interviews with two ambassadors demonstrate the challenges the continent faces, including dealing with deadly resurgence of the ebola virus. The specter of ebola has overshadowed months of planning for the U.S.-Africa summit for Liberia, which has been hard-hit by the deadly virus. Liberian Ambassador Jeremiah Sulunteh plans to use the summit to highlight a desperate need for international assistance. The unusual grip of an Africa virus on a faraway summit illustrates what Sulunteh termed an alarming situation in an interview. “We hope that other leaders in Africa will see this as issue of urgency,” Sulunteh said, in a plea for medical supplies and other regional and international help in combating ebola. “The health issue is so alarming that we will want President Obama to look into this critically and also tell other African leaders and other leaders of the world that this is not a Liberia situation, but has a chance of affecting other” countries,” he said. Barack Obama is hosting the summit. Ebola has largely hit not only Liberia, but Guinea and Sierra Leone in West Africa. There are great concerns it could become another international epidemic like severe acute respiratory syndrome or the avian flu if not eradicated. “The virus is something that spreads so fast,” Sulunteh said. “We don’t want it to have a spillover effect in other parts of the continent and in other parts of the world.” The overarching theme of the summit is investing in the next generation in Africa, backed by a number of other regional concerns. But ebola has now surged its way onto the agenda from Liberia’s viewpoint. “While we discuss peace and security, trade and investment and other bilateral issues, the health of the nation is very essential as African leaders have this summit in Washington,” Sulunteh said. “Especially at the rate at which ebola is spreading in Liberia.” One of the summit’s signature events, as defined in a White House document, involves investing in African health issues. “The campaign from Liberia will be on the Ebola issues when we talk about health,” Sulunteh said. Such health crises require a wide-ranging approach that discussions at the summit can help promote, said Ebrahim Rasool, South Africa’s ambassador to the United States. A U.S. aid program called Pepfar has helped battle HIV/AIDS. Technological advances have been made in the fight against malaria in Africa, he said. “This summit is at least the recognition that globalization is a comprehensive force,” Rasool said. A national health crisis becomes a global emergency in today’s times, he added. “You can have the best health early warning system in the United States, but if you don’t pass the technology to Africa to fight ebola, you are endangering yourselves as well,” he said. The United States announced last week that it was sending 50 Centers for Disease Control experts to West Africa to fight the spread of ebola. Rasool said technology, such as satellite tracking can make a long-term difference. “We need to emerge from the summit with a systemic approach,” he said. “It is not just selling drugs to Africa. It’s creating a system that warns you of impending diseases.” New Wi-Fi devices take energy from environment By the University of Washington news service
Wi-Fi backscatter uses radio frequency signals as a power source and reuses existing Wi-Fi infrastructure to provide Internet connectivity to battery-free devices. This not-so-distant Internet of Things reality would extend connectivity to perhaps billions of devices. Sensors could be embedded in everyday objects to help monitor and track everything from the structural safety of bridges to the health of human hearts. But having a way to cheaply power and connect these devices to the Internet has kept this from taking off. Now, University of Washington engineers have designed a new communication system that uses radio frequency signals as a power source and reuses existing Wi-Fi infrastructure to provide Internet connectivity to these devices. Called Wi-Fi backscatter, this technology is the first that can connect battery-free devices to Wi-Fi infrastructure. “If Internet of Things devices are going to take off, we must provide connectivity to the potentially billions of battery-free devices that will be embedded in everyday objects,” said Shyam Gollakota, a University of Washington assistant professor of computer science and engineering. “We now have the ability to enable Wi-Fi connectivity for devices while consuming orders of magnitude less power than what Wi-Fi typically requires.” The researchers will publish their results at the Association for Computing Machinery’s Special Interest Group on Data Communication‘s annual conference this month in Chicago. The team also plans to start a company based on the technology. This work builds upon previous research that showed how low-powered devices such as temperature sensors or wearable technology could run without batteries or cords by harnessing energy from existing radio, TV and wireless signals in the air. This work takes that a step further by connecting each individual device to the Internet, which previously wasn’t possible. The challenge in providing Wi-Fi connectivity to these devices is that conventional, low-power Wi-Fi consumes three to four orders of magnitude more power than can be harvested in these wireless signals. The researchers instead developed an ultra-low power tag prototype with an antenna and circuitry that can talk to Wi-Fi-enabled laptops or smartphones while consuming negligible power. These tags work by essentially looking for Wi-Fi signals moving between the router and a laptop or smartphone. They encode data by either reflecting or not reflecting the Wi-Fi router’s signals, slightly changing the wireless signal. Wi-Fi-enabled devices like laptops and smartphones would detect these minute changes and receive data from the tag. In this way, a smart watch could download emails or offload workout data onto a Google spreadsheet. “You might think, how could this possibly work when you have a low-power device making such a tiny change in the wireless signal? But the point is, if you’re looking for specific patterns, you can find it among all the other Wi-Fi reflections in an environment,” said co-author Joshua Smith, an associate professor of computer science and engineering and of electrical engineering. The Wi-Fi backscatter tag has communicated with a Wi-Fi device at rates of 1 kilobit per second with about 2 meters between the devices. They plan to extend the range to about 20 meters and have patents filed on the technology. Former conjoined twins meet after 10 years with surgeons By the Montefiore Medical Center news
staff
Formerly conjoined twins Carl and Clarence Aguirre celebrated the 10th anniversary of their separation with the medical team that successfully separated and cared for them at The Children’s Hospital at Montefiore. “We are thrilled to commemorate the 10-year anniversary of one of the first successful staged separations of craniopagus twins in the world, also known as twins joined at the heads. The surgery was groundbreaking and our knowledge from the procedure has helped guide similar successful surgeries around the world,” said James T. Goodrich, a professor at Albert Einstein College of Medicine, who led the surgical team that separated the children. One in two and a half million live births are craniopagus and, according to documented medical history, the Aguirre boys were among the first set of twins to undergo a successfully staged separation. Their delicate separation surgeries, performed in four stages over a period of 10 months, represented a new approach to an especially devastating medical condition. Since then, this method has been replicated around the world and has become the standard of care for all such procedures. When Carl and Clarence arrived at Montefiore from the Philippines in September 2003, they were already dying from complications of their condition. Doctors believe that without the surgery, both boys would have died within six to eight months. Ten years following the surgery, Clarence and Carl are happy 12-year-old boys, enjoying time in the seventh grade. While Carl loves playing video games, eating ice cream and playing with his brother, Clarence is very outgoing and active, and enjoys swimming, dancing and singing. “The doctors at Montefiore saved the lives of my sons and I am so grateful for every moment spent with them,” said Arlene Aguirre. “While they have distinctly different personalities, it is heartwarming to see them interacting, with Clarence acting as a big brother to Carl and helping him around the house.” |
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| San José, Costa Rica, Wednesday, Aug. 6, 2014, Vol. 14, No. 154 | |||||||||
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 Ministerio de
Gobernación,
Policía y Seguridad Pública photo
Packages
of $20 bills were identified by names of perhaps recipients.
Father and son
face drug charges
By the A.M. Costa Rica staff
A father and son were detained after border police found more than $1 million in cash stashed inside their truck's tires this weekend at Peñas Blancas, according to a Fuerza Pública report. Police said the son is accused of abandoning a vehicle in El Salvador with more than 100 kilograms of cocaine, and said they suspected he was on his way to Guatemala to deliver the drugs before he ditched the car when he saw an inspection checkpoint. The 57-year-old father was identified by the last names Dávila Ponce and his 29-year-old son by the names Dávila Martínez. Both men are Costa Rican and did not have any previous criminal history, the report said. When border police searched the truck on Saturday, the son was discovered hiding in the driver's compartment of the semi-truck while the back trailer was empty. Police discovered $1,116,840 in all divided into more than 100 packets with names on them, presumably to mark to whom the money belonged. Authorities from the Policía de Control de Drogas said they received a key tip from El Salvadorian police, who said they found the abandoned car full of drugs with a registration belonging to Dávila Ponce. The pair has been transferred to prosecutors in Libería where they face eight to 20 years in prison if convicted. |
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| From Page 7: Midwest bank wins with career coaching By
the A.M. Costa Rica wire services
Home foreclosures have declined in many parts of the United States, but tens of thousands of Americans are still losing their homes every month. It’s all part of the changes brought on by the Great Recession, changes that have hurt average incomes and in some cases made some jobs obsolete. But a small Midwest bank is challenging other financial institutions to be part of the solution by teaching their customers the skills to stay employed and reclaim their share of the American Dream. Since 2007, more than five million American families have lost their homes to foreclosure. Marketing manager Katrina Holmes almost became one of them. Just weeks after buying a new home for her family, she lost her job. With her options running out, Ms. Holmes contacted her mortgage lender. She expected the bank to tell her she had to give up her dream of home ownership. “Fifth Third Bank could have said to me: 'you got to go.' And they didn’t. And that would have been worse, but I have not had to deal with worse," said Ms. Holmes. She is just one of the success stories from Fifth Third Bank’s decision this year to use part of its advertising budget to hire a career-coaching firm to help unemployed borrowers. Ms. Holmes landed a job in the health industry, and the bank earned a loyal customer. Bank spokesperson Larry Magnesen calls that a good business decision.” “A foreclosure is a disaster for all concerned. It’s a tragedy for the family. It’s not a good thing for the community and in many cases, the bank will lose a substantial amount of money on that process. So no bank wants to take back a home. So this is a really great solution for all concerned," said Magnesen. Randall Jackson faced losing his Chicago home after being unemployed for nine months. The last thing he expected from his bank was career coaching. “I was just absolutely shocked that Fifth Third was offering such a program to me, and so I signed up and it turned out to be one of the best things I’d ever done," said Jackson. Fifth Third Bank's re-employment program boasts a 40 percent success rate for long-term unemployed clients, compared to the national average of 11 percent. |
