dancing through life: Removing the Stigma Surrounding Mental Health

A big component of this blog series and my show has been about working to eradicate the stigma around mental health. Even though 1 in 5 of us will have direct experience with mental illness in our lifetime, there is still a lot of negativity out that that just needs to go. On February 12, I saw more people discussing mental illness candidly than I ever had before and rather than save it for one day when donations are being made and a hashtag is created, the discussion needs to be ongoing. I'm really proud that the Life is Sweet series has opened up a dialogue and I truly want that to continue.? I used to think that Twitter was silly, but it has connected me to some incredible people, like Joseph, who I wouldn't have met otherwise. He has been an awesome supporter of this project and I am so happy he got on board to write.?
For years (more years than any of us have been alive) there has been a stigma around mental illness that has prevented us from speaking openly about it. As a sad consequence, there has been an extreme lack of resources for those of us who need help, or perhaps even sadder those resources may exist but an awareness of where or how to find them does not.

We see extreme cases of what happen when help isn't readily available in such tragedies as the recent Newtown shooting, or virtually a host of other heart-wrenching examples. One thing I have learned in life, though, is that nothing is just good or bad... it's both. Every shadow has it's sunshine. All of the darkness that we see such as the many sad stories of untreated mental illness resulting in tragedy all carry a ray of sunshine. It's apparent to all that because of the recent Newtown tragedy that we are starting to speak more openly about mental illness. (Take, for example, the articles of "I am Adam Lanza's..." mother, psychiatrist, doctor that sprung up so quickly after the shootings in Connecticut.) We are making great strides in removing the stigma that holds so many of us back from finding the help we need.?

I am excited about any and all of these developments that shine light on these important issues, including the recent #BellLetsTalk initiative. But there is also much more that I believe needs to be done. And, I don't believe the solution is going to be found in talking about mental illness more. It's a good start, but there is a deeper stigma that needs to be removed. What we really need to do is remove the stigma around mental health.

It may sound too simple, but mental health is more important than mental illness. None of us fall into a box of mentally ill or mentally healthy. It's not an either/or proposition. Instead of looking at this issue of "check this box for mentally ill, or the other for mentally healthy" we would benefit far more by looking at our mental & emotional well being as a spectrum.?

We do this with health & fitness. Or, at the very least, we are starting to do so a lot more. We no longer just count on our doctor to tell us if we are "healthy" or "unhealthy." Most people realize that they could be healthier than they currently are, or they see that they are now in a better state of health than they were last year. We all acknowledge that eating more vegetables, and less donuts, will be good our bodies. As will trading in that diet coke for water, the deep fried French fries for a salad, or choosing to walk or bike to work instead of driving our car. Should we not begin to acknowledge the same for our mental wellness? Some things will strengthen it, others will weaken it.?

Now this isn't a discussion about whether doing or not doing something causes mental illness. If you think about physical wellness, nobody is so naive to say that having that one slice of sugar-frosted cake instead of some organic kale chips causes diabetes... BUT we are aware enough to know that it has an effect. We know that one is better for our health than the other. We are also aware that those who regularly opt for the kale chips instead of the cake are far healthier physically. In many ways it's the same for mental health. Mental illness is a complex issue, far beyond my full comprehension. What I do know, however, is that if we shift our thinking away from either/or this "caused it" or didn't to what supports or what doesn't, then we will see much more individual - and collective - progress.?

Sadly, we have stigmatized mental health in such a way that many positive things we can do for ourselves are stigmatized as well. Far too often I see the perception that those who work with a therapist, counselor or a coach are broken. Or the sentiment that support groups & group counseling are for the weak. "People only see therapists when they are broken enough to need help to even function in life" is a paradigm that seems to pervade much of the population, and it is holding us back. Big time.

Let's switch back to the physical health analogy for a second. People who work with personal trainers are rarely viewed as the lowest on the spectrum of physically fitness. In fact, it's quite the opposite. All the elite athletes work with trainers, or even a team of trainers, and get the best results. When an everyday person hires a personal trainer, they begin to get better results and see a much faster transformation. We often regard them as committed to their goals, motivated and see them as high performers. We admire them for their examples, and often aspire to the same.?

Why is it not the same for mental health??

It should be, and it can be. We can make that shift happen.?

Improving our own mental wellness

Shifting from a "broken VS healthy" mindset to that a spectrum, allows us to enjoy a much higher quality of life. I'm reminded of a powerful formula that I remember learning as an athlete in high school.?

Performance = potential - resistance.?

This formula applies to athletics, physics, my career in marketing, and probably in many others. It also applies to mental health.?

In simple terms, our happiness in the present moment (potential) is equal to the hope we have in our future (potential), less the degree to which we let the past hold us back (resistance).

Happiness, being the aim & end of our existence, can be increased by improving the view we have of our future, and by eliminating the resistance created by a past we can't let go of. We can improve our view of the future through the standard path of personal development. Eliminating the resistance of the past is the realm of addressing childhood trauma, learning to embrace our shadows, forgiving others - and ourselves - of less than picture perfect memories.

Improving our collective mental wellness

We need to remove the judgment of others that becomes implicit with the paradigm of mentally ill or not. Instead of this us VS them mindset, a paradigm of a wellness spectrum becomes more of a "we" issue. We're all in this together, and our communities, and planet, all get better as any individual gets better.

This simplest way to do this is to ask the question "How are you?" and actually mean it. In North America, we use the phrase "how are you?" as a greeting, without expecting a real answer. This is obvious by the way we ask it while still walking past each other. How many times have we automatically answered "I'm good. You?" and just kept walking? Even when we are feeling depressed, neurotic, overwhelmed, etc, we often just say "Good, you?" because we know the asker doesn't really want to know. I knew a man who would get an honest answer out of anyone he asked, though, because of the simple reason that he'd stop, hold your hand and look you in the eyes as he asked, and then waited for a response. If you'd answer "good, you?" he'd say "How are you really?" and always provoke a thoughtful response.

Also, let's embrace the positive change of others. I recall the story of a woman who is a Well known speaker on the topic of self-acceptance. An overweight woman herself, she spoke of the power that comes from rejecting society's skewed notion of runway model beauty and learning to love ourselves exactly as we are. Her message was liberating others, especially those who didn't fit the mold of tall, skinny, magazine-cover "beautiful." When, however, she decided to start losing weight (after hearing her doctor report that recent test results showed that her health was in jeopardy) her followers began to criticize her for "selling out" and being inauthentic in her message. What she was really doing, was taking another step forward to improve her quality of life. Eliminating her earlier resistance of feeling inadequate for not being skinny was a powerful step in increasing her happiness and emotional well being. Improving her potential by becoming healthier was another powerful step. We often quote that "misery loves company" but we need to remember to celebrate when people make positive changes, even if those changes may leave us behind temporarily. Instead of holding ourselves and each other back, we need to exhibit attitudes of encouragement and shift to a mindset of "growth loves company" and help each other along on our journey.

So, tell me... How are you today, really?

Joseph Ranseth is an author, speaker and marketer who refuses to write a bio. He's one of my favourite people and I am grateful to call him a friend. Follow him on the Twitter and he'll tell you about having the #BestDayEver, well, every day. He runs a purpose-driven marketing company with an official launch just around the corner.?

Source: http://www.dancingthroughlifeblog.com/2013/02/removing-stigma-surrounding-mental.html

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Justices voice skepticism of voting rights law

From left, Rep. John Lewis, D-Ga., Rev. Al Sharpton, Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee, D-Texas, and Rep. Barbara Lee, D-Calif., stand outside the Supreme Court in Washington, Wednesday, Feb. 27, 2013, during a rally before oral arguments in the Shelby County, Ala., v. Holder voting rights case. The justices are hearing arguments in a challenge to the part of the Voting Rights Act that forces places with a history of discrimination, mainly in the Deep South, to get approval before they make any change in the way elections are held. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)

From left, Rep. John Lewis, D-Ga., Rev. Al Sharpton, Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee, D-Texas, and Rep. Barbara Lee, D-Calif., stand outside the Supreme Court in Washington, Wednesday, Feb. 27, 2013, during a rally before oral arguments in the Shelby County, Ala., v. Holder voting rights case. The justices are hearing arguments in a challenge to the part of the Voting Rights Act that forces places with a history of discrimination, mainly in the Deep South, to get approval before they make any change in the way elections are held. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)

House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi of Calif.,speaks during a rally outside the Supreme Court in Washington, Wednesday, Feb. 27, 2013, before arguments in the Shelby County, Ala., v. Holder voting rights case. The justices are hearing arguments in a challenge to the part of the Voting Rights Act that forces places with a history of discrimination, mainly in the Deep South, to get approval before they make any change in the way elections are held. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)

Rep. Terri Sewell, D-Ala., second from right, and Rev. Jesse Jackson, right, greet people waiting in line outside the Supreme Court in Washington, Wednesday, Feb. 27, 2013, to listen to arguments in the Shelby County, Ala., v. Holder voting rights case. The justices are hearing arguments in a challenge to the part of the Voting Rights Act that forces places with a history of discrimination, mainly in the Deep South, to get approval before they make any change in the way elections are held. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)

People wait in line outside the Supreme Court in Washington, Wednesday, Feb. 27,2013, to listen to oral arguments in the Shelby County, Ala., v. Holder voting rights case. The justices are hearing arguments in a challenge to the part of the Voting Rights Act that forces places with a history of discrimination, mainly in the Deep South, to get approval before they make any change in the way elections are held. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)

Shelby County, Ala., lawyer Bert Rein speaks with reporters outside the Supreme Court in Washington, Wednesday, Feb. 27, 2013, after arguments in the Shelby County, Ala., v. Holder voting rights case . The justices are hearing arguments in a challenge to the part of the Voting Rights Act that forces places with a history of discrimination, mainly in the Deep South, to get approval before they make any change in the way elections are held. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)

WASHINGTON (AP) ? The Supreme Court's conservative justices voiced deep skepticism Wednesday about a section of a landmark civil rights law that has helped millions of Americans exercise their right to vote.

In an ominous note for supporters of the key provision of the Voting Rights Act, Justice Anthony Kennedy both acknowledged the measure's vital role in fighting discrimination and suggested that other important laws in U.S. history had run their course. "Times change," Kennedy said during the fast-paced, 70-minute argument.

Kennedy's views are likely to prevail on the closely divided court, and he tends to side with his more conservative colleagues on matters of race.

The court's liberals and conservatives engaged in a sometimes tense back-and-forth over whether there is an ongoing need in 2013 for the part of the voting rights law that requires states with a history of discrimination, mainly in the Deep South, to get approval before making changes in the way elections are held.

Justice Antonin Scalia called the law a "perpetuation of racial entitlement."

Chief Justice John Roberts, a vocal skeptic of the use of race in all areas of public life, cited a variety of statistics that showed starker racial disparities in some aspects of voting in Massachusetts than in Mississippi. Then he asked the government's top Supreme Court lawyer whether the Obama administration thinks "the citizens in the South are more racist than citizens in the North?"

The answer from Solicitor General Donald Verrilli was no.

The question, and others like it from the conservative justices, largely echoed the doubts they first expressed four years ago in a similar case that ended without resolving the constitutionality of the latest renewal of the voting rights law, in 2006. They questioned whether there remain appreciable differences between the locations covered by the law and those that are not. They also wondered whether there was any end in sight for a provision that intrudes on states' rights to conduct elections and which was regarded as an emergency response to decades of state-sponsored discrimination in voting, despite the Fifteenth Amendment's guarantee of the vote for black Americans.

The provision shifted the legal burden and required governments that were covered to demonstrate that their proposed changes would not discriminate. Another part of the voting rights law, not being challenged, allows for traditional, after-the-fact claims of discrimination in voting and applies across the country.

As his administration was defending the voting rights law, President Barack Obama was across the street at the Capitol unveiling a statue of civil rights pioneer Rosa Parks, who in 1955 famously refused to give up her seat on a city bus in Montgomery, Ala., to a white man. The court will have to decide whether the conditions that gave rise to that seminal event are, like the statue, a part of history, or whether they persist in parts of the nation.

The court's four liberal justices, including Obama appointees Elena Kagan and Sonia Sotomayor, appeared uniformly to be willing to defer to the decision by Congress that more progress needs to be made before freeing states from the special federal monitoring.

Those justices aggressively questioned Bert Rein, the lawyer representing Shelby County, Ala., in its challenge to the law.

Sotomayor acknowledged some parts of the South had changed, but she asserted that recent voting rights lawsuits in Alabama suggested that Shelby County, near Birmingham, has not made sufficient progress.

"Why would we vote in favor of a county whose record is the epitome of what caused the passage of this law to start with?" Sotomayor asked.

Kagan chimed in that any formula devised by Congress "would capture Alabama," where she said certain discriminatory voting practices have persisted.

But Rein said the issue was whether the formula in place, using statistics that are at least 40 years old, remains a valid way to determine which locations have to ask for permission to make voting changes.

Debo Adegbile, a lawyer for the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, argued to the court on behalf of local Alabama elected officials and civil rights leaders. He sought to show the justices that there is a current need for the law, an effort to counter the court's admonition four years ago that current conditions, not history alone, must justify the continuing application of the law.

In 2011, Adegbile said, a judge in Alabama cited state lawmakers' derogatory references to African-Americans as a reason to continue to protect minority voters through the Voting Rights Act.

But Roberts challenged the lawyer. "Have there been episodes, egregious episodes of the kind you are talking about in states that are not covered?" the chief justice asked.

Absolutely, Adegbile replied.

"Well, then it doesn't seem to help you make the point that the differential between covered and noncovered continues to be justified," Roberts said.

The requirement currently applies to the states of Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi, South Carolina, Texas and Virginia. It also covers certain counties in California, Florida, New York, North Carolina and South Dakota, and some local jurisdictions in Michigan and New Hampshire. Coverage has been triggered by past discrimination not only against blacks, but also against American Indians, Asian-Americans, Alaska Natives and Hispanics.

Among the covered states, Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, Georgia, South Carolina, South Dakota and Texas are siding with Shelby County, while California, Mississippi, New York and North Carolina argue that the law should be upheld.

Nearly 250 of the 12,000 state, county and local governments covered by the law have used an escape hatch to get out from under the special oversight by demonstrating that they and smaller places within their borders no longer discriminate in voting. The 10 covered towns in New Hampshire are poised to exit as they await federal court approval for an agreement between the state and the Justice Department.

Thousands more jurisdictions also may be eligible, said voting rights expert Gerry Hebert. But that list probably does not include Shelby County, because one of its cities, Calera, defied the voting rights law in 2008 and provoked intervention by the Justice Department during the Bush administration.

Alabama's statistics offer fodder to both sides.

"I could tell you that in Alabama the number of legislators in the Alabama Legislature are proportionate to the number of black voters. There's a very high registration and turnout of black voters in Alabama," Rein said.

Kagan put forward other numbers showing the state at or near the top of successful claims of voting discrimination. She the state is about 25 percent black but has no black elected statewide official.

Exit polls in November showed Obama won only about 15 percent of the state's white voters. In neighboring Mississippi, the numbers were even smaller, at 10 percent, the surveys found.

The prior approval requirement played a major role last year in blocking or delaying voting laws in South Carolina and Texas.

Federal judges in Washington refused to sign off on two separate Texas plans to institute a tough photo identification law for voters and redistricting plans for the state's congressional delegation and Legislature. Also, South Carolina's plan to put in place its own voter ID law was delayed beyond the 2012 election and then allowed to take effect only after the state carved out an exception for some people who lack photo identification.

Those episodes were not discussed Wednesday, although they are part of the voluminous written filings in the case.

Instead, the bulk of the discussion concerned Congress' actions in 2006, when overwhelming majorities in the Republican-led Congress approved and President George W. Bush signed a 25-year extension of the prior-approval measure, which was first adopted in the Voting Rights Act of 1965.

Scalia pointed to the lopsided vote as a reason to question its legitimacy, even though as Kagan said, every senator in states covered by the law voted for it. Perhaps, he said, they decided "they'd better not vote against it, that there's nothing, that there's none of their interests in voting against it."

Later, Scalia said he worries that the provision will never fade away because members of Congress would be reluctant to risk a vote against it. "It's a concern that this is not the kind of a question you can leave to Congress," he said.

Scalia capped his comment with this observation: "Even the name of it is wonderful: The Voting Rights Act. Who is going to vote against that in the future?"

A decision is expected by late June.

The case is Shelby County, Ala., v. Holder, 12-96.

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/3d281c11a96b4ad082fe88aa0db04305/Article_2013-02-27-Supreme%20Court-Voting%20Rights/id-d7e9125eedf1428e872ea1458605d6ff

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Under-age rape victim convicted of fornication ... - Minivan News

A 15-year-old rape victim from the island of Feydhoo in Shaviyani Atoll was convicted of premarital sex at the Juvenile Court today and sentenced to 100 lashes and eight months of house arrest.

In June 2012, the girl gave birth to a baby that was discovered buried in the outdoor shower area of her home.?Her stepfather was later charged with child sexual abuse, possession of pornographic materials and committing premeditated murder.

Her mother was meanwhile charged with concealing a crime and failing to report child sexual abuse to the authorities.

An official from the Prosecutor General (PG)?s office told Minivan News in January this year that the fornication charges against the minor were related to a separate offence of premarital sex that emerged during the police investigation. The charges were filed on November 25, 2012.

In its verdict delivered today, the Juvenile Court ordered the state to transfer the girl to the Children?s Home in Villigili to enforce the sentence of eight months house arrest, according to local media reports.

The girl reportedly confessed at the trial to having consensual premarital sex.

The Islamic Shariah punishment of flogging would be administered when the girl turns 18. However, the sentence could be implemented earlier should the minor request expedition, a court official explained to local media.

In late January, the PG?s Office told Minivan News that it was reviewing the decision to press charges against the minor. Two hearings at the Juvenile Court were subsequently cancelled upon request by the PG.

However, the trial resumed after the PG decided earlier this month?not to withdraw the charges.

Officials from the PG were unavailable today to clarify whether the male offender faced the same charge of premarital sex.

The case of the 15 year-old had prompted concern from the executive following international media coverage. The government?announced last month that it would review and ?correct? laws that victimise young women and minors who have suffered sexual abuse.

President?s Office Spokesperson Masood Imad told Minivan News that from government?s perspective, the 15 year-old girl was a victim who needed to be?protected, not punished by authorities.

?We will be talking with the Ministry of Islamic Affairs over this manner and will review and correct the problem,? he said.

Masood said that the Maldives had experienced a number of similar cases of late where young women had been victimised and punished by authorities ? a situation he said the government was looking to prevent.

?We are reviewing this right now and if we have to go to the extent of changing existing laws then we would look to do this,? he said.

?Absolute outrage?

The criminal charges against the minor was slammed by Amnesty International last month, which called the prosecution ?an absolute outrage.?

?This is an absolute outrage, regardless of the reason for her charges. Victims of rape or other forms of sexual abuse should be given counselling and support ? not charged with a crime,? said Abbas Faiz, Amnesty International?s Maldives Researcher.

?We urge the Maldivian authorities to immediately drop all charges against the girl, ensure her safety and provide her with all necessary support.

?Flogging is a violation of the absolute prohibition on torture and other cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment or punishment. The Maldivian authorities should immediately end its use regardless of circumstances. The fact that this time a 15-year old girl who has suffered terribly is at risk makes it all the more reprehensible,? said Faiz.

?Flogging is not only wrong and humiliating, but can lead to long-term psychological as well as physical scars.?

In response to a Minivan News report in 2009 of an 18 year-old woman fainting after a 100 lashes, Amnesty International called for a moratorium on the ?inhumane and degrading punishment.?

Of the 184 people sentenced to public flogging in 2006, 146 were female, making it nine times more likely for women to be punished.

In November 2011, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay urged the authorities to impose a moratorium on flogging and to foster national dialogue and debate ?on this issue of major concern.?

?This practice constitutes one of the most inhumane and degrading forms of violence against women, and should have no place in the legal framework of a democratic country,? the UN human rights chief told MPs during a maiden visit to the Maldives.

Her remarks sparked protests by Islamic groups outside the UN building and drew condemnation from the Islamic Ministry, NGOs and political parties.

According to statistics from the Department of Judicial Administration, almost 90 percent of those convicted of fornication in 2011 was female.

Of 129 fornication cases in 2011, 104 people were sentenced, out of which 93 were female. This included 10 underage girls, 79 women aged 18-40 and and four women above 40 years.

Source: http://minivannews.com/society/under-age-rape-victim-convicted-of-fornication-sentenced-to-100-lashes-53712

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Guardly First In Mobile Safety To Offer Indoor Positioning System To Aid In Emergency Response

Toronto-based Guardly announced today the launch of its indoor positioning system (IPS) tech, adding more specificity and heightened capabilities in environments like office buildings to their mobile safety solution. The startup, which provides mobile safety apps for smartphone devices, and the infrastructure to support it for enterprise, education and other organizations, says its new IPS tech means it can not only show the rough geographic location of someone in danger, but also transmit information such as the specific floor they're on or even what room they're in if they're within a building.

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Techcrunch/~3/5XtDziV79X0/

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'Arrested Development' Updates: Only One Netflix Season, Ben Stiller Will Cameo

Magic is bound to happen when Ben Stiller's Tony Wonder makes a guest appearance on "Arrested Development" during the new season of the resurrected sitcom. The news comes from EW.com, who report that the Wonder-ful Stiller will only appear (and disappear) in one episode of the show, which premieres on Netflix in May. Additional details [...]

Source: http://moviesblog.mtv.com/2013/02/26/arrested-development-one-season-ben-stiller/

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Samsung to unveil its next Galaxy S smartphone on Apple's turf

SEOUL (Reuters) - Samsung Electronics Co Ltd said it will launch its new Galaxy S smartphone on March 14 in New York, taking its fight for market supremacy to Apple Inc's doorstep after reportedly being inundated with requests from U.S. mobile carriers.

The Galaxy S IV model will heat up competition in the crucial U.S. mobile phone market, where Apple surpassed Samsung Electronics as the top mobile phone seller for the first time in the fourth quarter of 2012.

It will be the first U.S. launch of Samsung's flagship Galaxy smartphone in three years, company spokeswoman Chenny Kim said, and comes amid a Samsung advertising blitz in the United States that has including light-hearted jabs at Apple's fans.

"We introduced the Galaxy S III in London last year, and this time we changed the venue (to New York)... as we were bombarded with requests from U.S. mobile carriers to unveil the Galaxy S IV in the country," Samsung Electronics' mobile division chief JK Shin was quoted as saying on the Edaily news website.

The new Galaxy S model is expected to feature a higher-resolution display and camera than its predecessor, as well as a faster quad-core processor, media reports said.

Samsung Electronics unveiled its first Galaxy S during the CTIA mobile trade show in the United States in 2010, followed by the Galaxy S II at the MWC fair in Spain in 2011 and the Galaxy S III in London last year.

Samsung Electronics may have lost its lead in the U.S. handset market but globally the $210 billion South Korean giant is expected to widen its smartphone advantage over its Cupertino, California-based rival this year, helped by a broad product line-up.

Apple investors have grown anxious about the company's prospects amid intense competition from Samsung's cheaper, Android-powered phones, and signs the premium smartphone market may be close to saturation in developed markets.

Apple shares have slumped 15 percent this year and the company is reportedly slashing orders for screens and other components from its Asian supplier as intensifying competition erodes demand for its latest iPhone.

Samsung Electronics stock price has inched up 1.5 percent so far this year.

(Reporting by Hyunjoo Jin; Editing by Stephen Coates)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/samsung-unveil-next-galaxy-smartphone-apples-turf-041352076--finance.html

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Microsoft releases Internet Explorer 10 browser for more users

SEATTLE (Reuters) - Microsoft Corp released Internet Explorer 10 to millions of new users on Tuesday, hoping the latest version of its market-leading browser will win back customers who have migrated to Google Inc's Chrome and help it establish a toe-hold in the fast-growing mobile browser market.

The world's largest software maker, whose Internet Explorer browser elbowed out Netscape Navigator in the early days of the web, said IE 10 is 20 percent faster at downloading sites than its predecessor IE 9 and allows for touch-screen commands.

The browser has been available since late October for users of Windows 8, Microsoft's new touch-friendly operating system, but now becomes available for the 700 million or so users of Windows 7.

Microsoft is hoping PC and laptop users will like the new browser enough to consider buying Windows 8 tablets rather than Apple Inc's iPad, which does not run Internet Explorer.

Various versions of Microsoft's venerable Internet Explorer franchise still dominate desktop browsing, with 55 percent of the PC browser market all together. But it has in recent years lost share to Mozilla's Firefox and Google's Chrome, which now account for 20 percent and 17 percent respectively, according to tech research firm NetMarketShare.

IE 10 running on Windows 8 has got generally good reviews, and has been hailed as the best version of Internet Explorer yet, but it has not been considered decisively superior to Chrome or Firefox.

In the smaller but faster-growing mobile browser market, Apple's Safari is the runaway leader with 61 percent, owing to the popularity of its iPhones and iPads while Google's Android browser has 21 percent.

Tablets running Windows 8, including Microsoft's own Surface devices, have not sold strongly since they were launched last October, restricting IE 10's popularity so far. Only 2.3 percent of computer users are running Windows 8, according to NetMarketShare.

(Reporting by Bill Rigby; Editing by Edwina Gibbs)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/microsoft-releases-internet-explorer-10-browser-more-users-141142528--sector.html

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Yum says to step up check on suppliers after China scare

Playing off his?pre-Oscars prediction?that everyone would hate him at the Oscars, Seth MacFarlane spent the first 19 minutes of the Academy Awards on Sunday making sure everyone would, in fact, hate him.?After some real stinkers, the main conceit was William Shatner descending on a screen as Captain Kirk, from the future, to tell MacFarlane to do a better job of hosting, in a kind of alternate-reality bit that turned pretty sordid?and pretty fast. ...

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/yum-says-step-check-suppliers-china-scare-020949572--finance.html

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Oyster farm fight has many interested parties

POINT REYES NATIONAL SEASHORE ? To hear Kevin Lunny tell it, he's just a little guy, draining his life's savings to stand up to a heartless federal agency bent on closing down his family's oyster farm here.

It's a compelling tale, a years-long soap opera replete with allegations of scientific misconduct and government overreach. Tea party activists have taken up his cause, citing it as an example of government quashing free enterprise and environmentalism run amok. Lunny also has the support of powerhouse conservative law firms representing him pro bono, and Cause of Action, a Washington, D.C.-based government watchdog group with ties to the conservative Koch brothers.

Others, however, don't buy his story. They say Lunny and some of his supporters have distorted what is a very simple case: The owners of the oyster farm north of San Francisco agreed 40 years ago to shut down in 2012, and Lunny is trying to break the contract.

"This thing has been hijacked by people with different agendas and manufactured narratives," said Tom Strickland, former assistant secretary of the Interior. "When someone suggests that this is 'the government versus the little guy,' I think the question should be looked at in reverse. Who is looking out for the interest of individual Americans, who is looking out for the interests of taxpayers?"

In 2005, the Lunny family bought the oyster farm in Drakes Estero, which includes the tidal area where explorer Sir Francis Drake is believed to have made landfall 430 years ago. With the purchase, the family signed on to an existing 40-year agreement with the National Park Service stating that the business would cease operations last fall and the area would convert to marine wilderness, as Congress intended.

From the beginning, Lunny made clear to the Park Service that he was interested in staying on, but Interior's solicitor ruled the agency had no legal basis to allow that.

The often-ugly debate reached a crescendo three months ago when Interior Secretary Ken Salazar elected not to extend Lunny's permit to operate in Point Reyes National Seashore. The operation is scheduled to be removed next month, clearing the way for Drakes Estero, a dramatic coastal sweep of five bays in Marin County, to become the first marine wilderness in the Lower 48 states.

Lunny filed a lawsuit to force the government to extend his lease, but it failed in federal court. He said he is appealing to the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco.

"To my mind, the issue really centers on the original deal," said Lynn Scarlett, an assistant secretary of the Interior under George W. Bush. "When this area was designated as a national park unit, the Congress and all those who were engaged struck a deal. A deal's a deal."

Lunny casts the debate in different terms. He says that the government is being unfair and that his protracted fight to stay has devastated his family. U.S. Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.), who wrote two bills to help Lunny continue operating in the park, wrote Salazar to say that because of the oyster farm's impending closure, Lunny's family is "facing financial ruin."

The family does have other sources of income. They run a cattle ranch on federal land and own a paving and construction business. Lunny's legal fight is being waged by lawyers working for free, five of whom joined him at his last court appearance. He is soliciting online donations via the Farm-to-Consumer Legal Defense Fund and has a shellfish industry lobbyist on his payroll as a consultant.

Records obtained under the Freedom of Information Act show that the federal government has extended generous subsidies to the Lunny family for decades. The extended family has leased more than 1,100 acres, where it raises cattle within the park. The grazing rate Lunny and other ranchers pay is about one-third the amount ranchers are charged on adjacent private land.

The Lunnys' lease includes a three-bedroom house, a second residence and a bunkhouse, all owned by the federal government but leased by the family. Lunny pays $2,200 a month for the 1,100 acres and the buildings ? about what renters nearby pay to lease a single-family house on a small plot of private land.

The Park Service, under political pressure to help Lunny, recently spent $50,000 to replace the roofs on two of the family's leased buildings. Other federal seashore tenants are required to pay for their own home maintenance.

The Park Service, however, has made mistakes in the case that have given ammunition to the Lunnys' supporters. In 2007, a seashore scientist wrote a flawed report that suggested Lunny's farm harmed harbor seals.

The Park Service acknowledged the errors and retracted the study, but the episode gave credibility to claims that the park was using "junk science" to force Lunny out.

At Feinstein's urging, the Park Service commissioned outside reviews of its ongoing study of Drakes Estero. The effort to resolve the scientific debate has morphed into a multimillion-dollar morass of scientific studies and investigations by Interior's inspector general, the National Academy of Sciences and the Marine Mammal Commission, paid for by taxpayers.

The results: In some instances the Park Service conclusions overreached, in some instances they were correct, and most of the time it was impossible to determine the accuracy of any claim without more study.

Apart from his trouble with the park, Lunny has a history of not complying with California Coastal Commission orders. For six years, Lunny's farm has failed to acquire the appropriate state permits to operate in a coastal zone.

The Coastal Commission earlier this month issued its second cease-and-desist order to the farm. "I find that this is one of the most egregious, egregious violations that I have seen," Commissioner Esther Sanchez said in a hearing.

Now that Drakes Bay Oyster Co.'s closure looms, the farm's plight has become a cause for groups with disparate agendas. Some represent the interests of the shellfish industry, which seeks to operate in protected waters up and down the coast. Some favor more commercial activities in national parks, and others espouse virulently anti-government views.

Lunny's supporters are threatening to stage protests and even blockade the road if authorities are required to escort Lunny and his staff from the seashore.

Lunny, a genial and quiet man, said he doesn't want to be associated with "right-wing land rights and anti-government groups."

"This has spun out of control like none of us would ever have imagined," Lunny said. "Some of these groups came out of the woodwork" after Salazar decided against extending the lease. "All of a sudden we have some new friends."

julie.cart@latimes.com

Source: http://feeds.latimes.com/~r/latimes/news/science/~3/Iv_7WnO00Hw/la-me-oysters-20130224,0,7872291.story

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Editor's desk: What's next

Winter is still here, I'm still buried in snow, but March is at last on the horizon. Unlike the last few years, however, I'm not sure exactly what that means, though I have some ideas. Here's what we have to look forward to -- or not, as the case may be -- for Apple, Mobile Nations, the iMore app, and iMore in general this spring.

March un-madness

January has come and gone without a 2011-style Verizon iPhone event, or a 2012-style education event. Now March approaches. For the last 3 years, Apple's held iPad events in March. This year the iPad and iPad mini were both updated not 4 months ago, and the logical next steps -- a thinner and lighter casing for the iPad, and a Retina display for the iPad mini -- both look like they might take a little more time. If the iPad has been even semi-permamently switched to the lucrative holiday quarter for release, what does that mean for Apple's spring event? For a while, Apple was doing iOS SDK events in April, but they were also doing new iPhone debuts at WWDC in June. We have iWatch, iTV, and Apple TV SDK rumors -- we've been over most of them more than once -- but very little when it comes to imminent product release plans. Forget "winter is coming", I want to know what spring is bringing...

Podcast makeover

If you subscribe to our Mobile Nations podcasts -- and you really should -- you may have noticed the big makeover they got yesterday. So far reaction has been overwhelmingly positive, so thanks again to Marc Edwards for the template, and all of you for digging it. Earlier today we started pushing out the new look across our Twitter accounts as well. Nothing like some spring cleaning!

Wallpapers with those designs, for the many of you who've asked, are now available for Retina iPad in 2048x2048 in our iMore Wallpaper Forum. I'll add iPhone optimized versions later this week.

We're also trying to solidify the podcast schedule, so here's where it stands right now:

• iMore show: Live Sunday night, posts Monday morning.
• [MacBreak Weekly: Live Tuesday afternoon, posts Tuesday evening.] (Not a Mobile Nations show, but you can find me on it every week so we need to schedule around it as well.)
• Debug/Iterate: Posts Wednesday mornings (alternate weeks, not recorded live).
• Windows Phone Central: Live Wednesday afternoon, posts Thursday morning (every second week).
• ZEN & TECH: Live Wednesday night, posts Thursday morning (every second week).
• Android Central: Live Thursday night, posts Friday morning.
• CrackBerry: We're going to get Kevin and crew on a schedule. They've been warned.
• Adhoc: As the name implies, posts whenever we do it (not recorded live).
• Mobile Nations: Live whenever we're all around and not traveling, posts later that day.

If we move anything around, I'll be sure to let you know!

iMore app 2.0

We're in late stage beta on iMore app 2.0. We couldn't get everything we wanted into it, but we've gotten a lot. Here's a teaser. We'll be submitting it soon, and then it'll be out as soon as it gets approved. Fingers crossed.

iMore next

If the above didn't quite get the point across -- Mobile Nations is going through some fairly explosive growth at the moment, and iMore along with it. And running a site like iMore takes an enormous amount of time and energy, including as much if not more behind the scenes. Kevin has Adam helping him out full time on CrackBerry, Phil has Jerry and Alex full time on Android Central, and Chris and Simon, our full-time cross-site editors, help out a ton on both those sites as well (and iMore as well, when time allows).

But we need more. So I'm looking for someone to help out in a similar capacity full time on iMore. I'm not in a rush by any means, and I'll take as much time as I need to to find the right person, but to take iMore to the next level is going to take a lot of work, and more effort than even our current team of amazing part-timers and free-lancers can muster what with their real lives and all.

More on that, and on everything else, in the coming weeks...

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/TheIphoneBlog/~3/PcZmk47O-xs/story01.htm

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Firefox OS Hits The Ground Running With Phones From Telefonica, T-Mobile, Firefox Marketplace For Apps; 18 Carriers In All Signed Up For Mozilla?s Open Web Effort

Firefox OS, the new, HTML5-friendly mobile OS from Mozilla, is today taking a big step forward in its strategy to become a viable third player in the smartphone landscape currently dominated by Google's Android and Apple's iOS. Mozilla is announcing that 18 carriers have now committed to its Open Web HTML5 device push; the launch of the Firefox Marketplace app store to aggregate content for the platform; and some of the first low-cost handsets coming out of its carrier partnerships that will be coming out this summer.

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Techcrunch/~3/Ijrxz9OkMTs/

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Mobile Miscellany: week of February 18th, 2013

If you didn't get enough mobile news during the week, not to worry, because we've opened the firehose for the truly hardcore. This week brought confirmation of Pantech's next phone for Verizon, legal battles over the airwaves in India and a new smartphone to Virgin Mobile. These stories and more await after the break. So buy the ticket and take the ride as we explore the "best of the rest" for this week of February 18th, 2013.

Filed under: Cellphones, Wireless, Mobile

Comments

Source: http://www.engadget.com/2013/02/23/mobile-miscellany/

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Bell Canada set to launch Novatel's MiFi 2

Novatel's touchable MiFi 2 -- also known as the MiFi Liberate -- receives a fresh coat of paint in the form of a UI overhaul on its way to Bell Canada's network this March. No word on pricing or an exact date, but this 11-hour-lasting king of all portable access points is $50 on a two-year agreement on AT&T, so we'd hazard that sets a decent watermark on the potential price. No word on what the new UI tweaks entail but we're angling to get our hands on one some time this week at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona.

Filed under: Peripherals, Wireless

Comments

Source: http://feeds.engadget.com/~r/weblogsinc/engadget/~3/NLKXZGN3hZQ/

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Apps of the Week: Ski TrailMaps, The Simpsons Tapped Out, Nexus 4 Display Control and more!

It's a short month so this is going to end up being our last Apps of the Week column for February, but we think we've got a good set of app picks for you to make up for it. Even though we have folks in the air on their way to Barcelona for MWC, we've still got a full set of picks for your enjoyment from the Android Central team.

Read on with us after the break and see how we did with this week's picks.

read more

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/androidcentral/~3/NHooXrKQ9qo/story01.htm

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THE RESET: White House catalogs spending-cut woes

White House press secretary Jay Carney and Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood brief reporters regarding the sequester, Friday, Feb. 22, 2013, at the White House in Washington. (AP Photo/Charles Dharapak)

White House press secretary Jay Carney and Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood brief reporters regarding the sequester, Friday, Feb. 22, 2013, at the White House in Washington. (AP Photo/Charles Dharapak)

A customer buys gas at a McClure store in Marion, Ind., on Monday, Feb. 18, 2013. With gas prices at around $3.85 a gallon, and other costs rising, many Indiana families are struggling to pay bills. (AP Photo/Chronicle-Tribune, Jeff Morehead)

In this Wednesday, Nov. 22, 2012, photo, Eva Cevallos with her eleven-month daughter, Quinn, shop during the Thanksgiving Pre-Black Friday event at the Walmart Supercenter store in Rosemead, Calif. Wal-Mart Stores Inc. offered a weak business outlook Thursday, Feb. 21, 2013, as new economic challenges for its low-income U.S. shoppers start to take a toll. (AP Photo/Damian Dovarganes)

As the nation slowly recovers from the severe 2007-2009 recession, a battle rages between lawmakers who want the government to aggressively tackle deficits with spending cuts and those who caution the economy is still too frail to stand on its own feet.

The debate will be in the forefront when Congress returns on Monday from a nine-day recess, now facing a Friday deadline for roughly $85 billion in automatic, deficit-reduction spending cuts.

President Barack Obama and congressional Democrats suggest too much austerity now could threaten the recovery and damage the nation's social safety net. They support some spending cuts but also want higher revenues from closing tax loopholes.

Republicans, who control the House, insist on tackling deficits with spending cuts alone.

Neither side is optimistic a deal can be forged in the few remaining days. Obama's Thursday phone calls to Congress' top two Republicans ? House Speaker John Boehner and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell ? produced no breakthrough.

The potential shock to the economy comes at a time of sharply rising gasoline prices and a slowdown in consumer spending probably caused by the Jan. 1 increase in Social Security payroll taxes affecting nearly all workers.

Nationwide, the average price of gas was $3.78 a gallon Thursday, according to the AAA, an increase of 47 cents a gallon in just the past month. Also, Wal-Mart, the nation's leading retailer, reported it expects sales to be flat for the February-April period compared with a year ago ? suggesting a slowdown in spending among low- to middle-income consumers.

Meanwhile, the White House continued its daily recital of horror stories from the looming spending cuts.

National parks, military programs and the jobs of FBI agents, firefighters, federal prosecutors and government researchers are all on the chopping block.

On Friday, Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood sounded the alarm, telling a White House briefing air traffic controllers would be among the first furloughed.

He predicted major flight delays and cancellations over "the next 30 days." A Republican, LaHood urged his former GOP House colleagues to help.

"This is not rocket science," he said.

___

Follow Tom Raum on Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/tomraum

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/386c25518f464186bf7a2ac026580ce7/Article_2013-02-22-The%20Reset/id-94409908d237416693eaf4d2e20ac71e

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Archos 80 Titanium on sale in the UK starting at ?129

Archos introduced a whole raft of new Android tablets last month at CES, and in the UK the budget oriented 80 Titanium is now on sale. Available from high street retailer, Carphone Warehouse, the cheapest 80 Titanium -- actually made of aluminum -- will set you back a mere £129. 

For that price you get Android 4.1 Jelly Bean, an 8-inch 1024x768 IPS display, a dual-core 1.6GHz processor, 1GB of RAM and 8GB of on board storage expandable by way of microSD card. There are cameras too, although the rear shooter is just 2MP, and the front although not specified, is likely of VGA resolution. So, not a high end device by any means, but for £129 a potential bargain to be had. 

Source: Carphone Warehouse

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/androidcentral/~3/D17N68xsE00/story01.htm

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Fifth Third eliminating city president position, shifting focus in Jacksonville

James Crichlow

Nathaniel Herring

Fifth Third Bancorp is eliminating the position of city president in Jacksonville and is shifting its focus in the North Florida market to include a stronger emphasis on commercial banking.

Reagan Rick, the president and CEO of Fifth Third in Central and North Florida, said that the top local executive position is being eliminated for now, but that it is possible that a commercial president might be appointed in the area in the future. Jacksonville City President Nathaniel Herring will remain in the role until the spring, but Rick said it is not yet known if he will stay with the company in another market.

?We like Nathaniel,? Rick said. ?We?ll see what works for him.?

Herring is a Jacksonville native and has been involved in a number of philanthropic efforts and community organizations since becoming city president in 2008.

?I am at a really unique crossroads working through a dilemma to determine if my passion and interests to stay part of the North Florida business community are equal to, or greater than, my passion to move forward with Fifth Third Bank in other markets,? Herring said.

Rick said that although the bank will continue to focus on all areas of business in Jacksonville, the changes are happening in part because of the strong growth the company has seen in commercial banking both in Jacksonville and system wide, and the opportunities that are still available in the area.

Christian covers banking and finance, insurance, retail and restaurants and law

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/bizj_jacksonville/~3/6_5JKriR-Do/fifth-third-eliminating-city-president.html

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Researchers 'nanoweld' by applying light to aligned nanorods in solid materials

Public release date: 21-Feb-2013
[ | E-mail | Share ]

Contact: Tracey Peake
tracey_peake@ncsu.edu
919-515-6142
North Carolina State University

Researchers from North Carolina State University have developed a way to melt or "weld" specific portions of polymers by embedding aligned nanoparticles within the materials. Their technique, which melts fibers along a chosen direction within a material, may lead to stronger, more resilient nanofibers and materials.

Physicists Jason Bochinski and Laura Clarke, with materials scientist Joe Tracy, placed specifically aligned gold nanorods within a solid material. Gold nanorods absorb light at different wavelengths, depending upon the size and orientation of the nanorod, and then they convert that absorbed light directly into heat. In this case, the nanorods were designed to respond to light wavelengths of 520 nanometers (nm) in a horizontal alignment and 800 nm when vertically aligned. Human beings can see light at 520 nm (it looks green), while 808 nm is in the near infrared spectrum, invisible to our eyes.

When the different wavelengths of light were applied to the material, they melted the fibers along the chosen directions, while leaving surrounding fibers largely intact.

"Being able to heat materials spatially in this way gives us the ability to manipulate very specific portions of these materials, because nanorods localize heat that is, the heat they produce only affects the nanorod and its immediate surroundings," Tracy says.

According to Bochinski, the work also has implications for optimizing materials that have already been manufactured: "We can use heat at the nanoscale to change mechanical characteristics of objects postproduction without affecting their physical properties, which means more efficiency and less waste."

The researchers' findings appear in Particle & Particle Systems Characterization. The work was funded by grants from the National Science Foundation and Sigma Xi. Graduate students Wei-Chen Wu and Somsubhra Maity and former undergraduate student Krystian Kozek contributed to the work.

###

Note to editors: An abstract of the paper follows.

"Anisotropic Thermal Processing of Polymer Nanocomposites via the Photothermal Effect of Gold Nanorods"

Authors: Jason Bochinski, Laura Clarke, Joe Tracy, Somsubrha Maity, Krystian Kozek and Wei-Chen Wu, North Carolina State University

Published: Particle & Particle Systems Characterization

Abstract: By embedding metal nanoparticles within polymeric materials, selective thermal polymer processing can be accomplished via irradiation with light resonant with the nanoparticle surface plasmon resonance due to the photothermal effect of the nanoparticles which efficiently transforms light into heat. The wavelength and polarization sensitivity of photothermal heating from embedded gold nanorods is used to selectively process a collection of polymeric nanofibers, completely melting those fibers lying along a chosen direction while leaving the remaining material largely unheated and unaffected. Fluorescence-based temperature and viscosity sensing was employed to confirm the presence of heating and melting in selected fibers and its absence in counter-aligned fibers. Such tunable specificity in processing a subset of a sample, while the remainder is unchanged, cannot easily be achieved through conventional heating techniques.

---

[ | E-mail | Share ]

?

AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.

Public release date: 21-Feb-2013
[ | E-mail | Share ]

Contact: Tracey Peake
tracey_peake@ncsu.edu
919-515-6142
North Carolina State University

Researchers from North Carolina State University have developed a way to melt or "weld" specific portions of polymers by embedding aligned nanoparticles within the materials. Their technique, which melts fibers along a chosen direction within a material, may lead to stronger, more resilient nanofibers and materials.

Physicists Jason Bochinski and Laura Clarke, with materials scientist Joe Tracy, placed specifically aligned gold nanorods within a solid material. Gold nanorods absorb light at different wavelengths, depending upon the size and orientation of the nanorod, and then they convert that absorbed light directly into heat. In this case, the nanorods were designed to respond to light wavelengths of 520 nanometers (nm) in a horizontal alignment and 800 nm when vertically aligned. Human beings can see light at 520 nm (it looks green), while 808 nm is in the near infrared spectrum, invisible to our eyes.

When the different wavelengths of light were applied to the material, they melted the fibers along the chosen directions, while leaving surrounding fibers largely intact.

"Being able to heat materials spatially in this way gives us the ability to manipulate very specific portions of these materials, because nanorods localize heat that is, the heat they produce only affects the nanorod and its immediate surroundings," Tracy says.

According to Bochinski, the work also has implications for optimizing materials that have already been manufactured: "We can use heat at the nanoscale to change mechanical characteristics of objects postproduction without affecting their physical properties, which means more efficiency and less waste."

The researchers' findings appear in Particle & Particle Systems Characterization. The work was funded by grants from the National Science Foundation and Sigma Xi. Graduate students Wei-Chen Wu and Somsubhra Maity and former undergraduate student Krystian Kozek contributed to the work.

###

Note to editors: An abstract of the paper follows.

"Anisotropic Thermal Processing of Polymer Nanocomposites via the Photothermal Effect of Gold Nanorods"

Authors: Jason Bochinski, Laura Clarke, Joe Tracy, Somsubrha Maity, Krystian Kozek and Wei-Chen Wu, North Carolina State University

Published: Particle & Particle Systems Characterization

Abstract: By embedding metal nanoparticles within polymeric materials, selective thermal polymer processing can be accomplished via irradiation with light resonant with the nanoparticle surface plasmon resonance due to the photothermal effect of the nanoparticles which efficiently transforms light into heat. The wavelength and polarization sensitivity of photothermal heating from embedded gold nanorods is used to selectively process a collection of polymeric nanofibers, completely melting those fibers lying along a chosen direction while leaving the remaining material largely unheated and unaffected. Fluorescence-based temperature and viscosity sensing was employed to confirm the presence of heating and melting in selected fibers and its absence in counter-aligned fibers. Such tunable specificity in processing a subset of a sample, while the remainder is unchanged, cannot easily be achieved through conventional heating techniques.

---

[ | E-mail | Share ]

?

AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.

Source: http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2013-02/ncsu-rb022113.php

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Mosquitoes exposed to DEET once are less repelled by it a few hours later

Feb. 20, 2013 ? Mosquitoes are able to ignore the smell of the insect repellent DEET within a few hours of being exposed to it, according to research published February 20 in the open access journal PLOS ONE by James Logan, Nina Stanczyk and colleagues from the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine, UK.

Though most insects are strongly repelled by the smell of DEET, previous studies by Logan's research group have shown that some flies and mosquitoes carry a genetic change in their odor receptors that makes them insensitive to this smell. The new results reported in the PLOS ONE study uncover a response in mosquitoes based on short-term changes, not genetic ones.

"Our study shows that the effects of this exposure last up to three hours. We will be doing further research to determine how long the effect lasts," says Logan.

In this study, the authors tested changes in responses to DEET in Aedes aegypti mosquitoes, which are notorious for biting during the day and are capable of transmitting dengue fever. They found that a brief exposure to DEET was sufficient to make some mosquitoes less sensitive to the repellent. Three hours after the exposure, these mosquitoes were not deterred from seeking attractants like heat and human skin despite the presence of DEET. The researchers found that this insensitivity to the smell could be correlated to a decrease in the sensitivity of odor receptors on the mosquito's antennae following a previous exposure. "We think that the mosquitoes are habituating to the repellent, similar to a phenomenon seen with the human sense of smell also. However, the human olfactory system is very different from a mosquito's, so the mechanism involved in this case is likely to be very different," explains Logan.

He adds, "This doesn't mean that we should stop using repellents -- on the contrary, DEET is a very good repellent, and is still recommended for use in high risk areas. However, we are keeping a close eye on how mosquitoes can overcome the repellent and ways in which we can combat this."

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Story Source:

The above story is reprinted from materials provided by Public Library of Science.

Note: Materials may be edited for content and length. For further information, please contact the source cited above.

---

Journal Reference:

1. Nina M. Stanczyk, John F. Y. Brookfield, Linda M. Field, James G. Logan. Aedes aegypti Mosquitoes Exhibit Decreased Repellency by DEET following Previous Exposure. PLoS ONE, 2013; 8 (2): e54438 DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0054438

Note: If no author is given, the source is cited instead.

Disclaimer: Views expressed in this article do not necessarily reflect those of ScienceDaily or its staff.

Source: http://feeds.sciencedaily.com/~r/sciencedaily/top_news/top_environment/~3/MeQEiUU0SxU/130220184949.htm

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Article marketing | Article Makers - Short Vincent's blog

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Source: http://www.articlemakers.net/article-marketing

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Source: http://shortvincent.typepad.com/blog/2013/02/article-marketing-article-makers.html

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