Obama proposes brain mapping project

2 April 2013 Last updated at 11:37 ET

US President Barack Obama has unveiled a new initiative to map the brain.

Speaking at the White House, he announced an initial $100m investment to shed light on how the brain works and provide insight into diseases such as Alzheimer's and epilepsy.

President Obama said initiatives like the Human Genome Project had transformed genetics; now he wants to do the same with the brain.

The project will be carried out by both public and private-sector scientists.

The project is called Brain Research Through Advancing Innovative Neurotechnologies - or BRAIN.

Mr Obama said: "There is this enormous mystery waiting to be unlocked, and the BRAIN initiative will change that by giving scientists the tools they need to get a dynamic picture of the brain in action and better understand how we think and learn and remember. And that knowledge will be transformative."

Next frontier

The project will begin in 2014, and will involve the National Institutes of Health (NIH), the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (Darpa), and the National Science Foundation (NSF).

Continue reading the main story

?Start Quote

We can't afford to miss these opportunities while the rest of the world races ahead?

End Quote President Barack Obama

The $100m investment will be used to develop new technologies to investigate how the billions of individual cells in the human brain interact.

Scientists will also focus on how the brain records, stores and processes information, and investigate how brain function is linked to behaviour.

Mr Obama said that while our understanding of the brain was growing, there was still a long way to go.

"As humans we can identify galaxies light years away, we can study particles smaller than the atom, but we still haven't unlocked the mystery of the 3lb of matter that sits between our ears," he said.

The project will also involve partnerships with the private sector.

This includes the Allen Institute for Brain Science, which has committed to spending $60m annually on projects relating to the BRAIN initiative, and the Salk Institute for Biological Studies, which has dedicated $28m.

An ethics committee will oversee the work.

Mr Obama said that it was worth investing in science, claiming that it would help to create new jobs and boost the economy.

He said that basic research was "a driver of growth".

"We can't afford to miss these opportunities while the rest of the world races ahead," he added.

The funding announcement comes after recent news of another push in neuroscience in Europe.

About 80 European research institutions and some from outside the EU will take part in the Human Brain Project, which is estimated to cost more than 1bn euros.

The project will use supercomputer-based models and simulations to reconstruct a virtual human brain to develop new treatments for neurological conditions.

Source: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-22007007#sa-ns_mchannel=rss&ns_source=PublicRSS20-sa

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Use a Full-Time Fantasy to Figure Out Your On-the-Side Freelance Rate

Knowing how much to charge somebody is easy for full-time jobs?it was figured out the day you were hired. What if you have a job, but you're also working freelance: on the side, on weekends, or for one-off projects? It can seem much trickier, but there's actually a simple way to figure out your rate.

I went from jobs in newspaper writing, where the pay is very stable (no matter how many hours you work!) to Lifehacker (as an independent contractor, but with a set rate) to freelancing full-time. Like most things in my career, the beginnings involved fumbling around, guessing, and sending apologetic late-night emails to editors.

Looking back now, however, I think there were was a much more simple means of figuring out my rate.

In August 2011, Melanie tackled this same question, but with a notably different approach. Melanie approached freelancing like setting up a business for yourself: figure out your operating costs, average billable hours, dividing those figures, factoring in profit and taxes, and keeping track of important details. Toward the end of her post, Melanie wrote:

You can try several other methods for setting your rate, such as marking up your current salary ... or just dividing how much you want to earn by how many hours you'll work, but I wouldn't recommend them because they're not realistic; they don't take into account your everyday expenses or account for long-term success.

It's hard to argue against setting up good estimates in a spreadsheet and using math to figure out your operating costs. That's the kind of thinking that gets you some kind looks and firm handshakes from bankers and business owners. But some people may not be jumping into freelancing full-time. For a side gig, a weekend project, a half-time schedule, or one-off job, setting up your long-term business plan can seem intimidating and overly complicated.

So do what I (eventually learned to) do: apply for your own fake job, with your real credentials, and negotiate with yourself to figure out what you should earn.

Step 1: Know Your Actual Expenses

Even if you aren't creating a home office and obtaining a DBA and reading books about marketing, you still need to know what your costs are going to be before you ask for money. Most importantly, you need to know what your tax rate is going to be for the self-employed income you earn. The rate changes every year, but Bankrate.com has a handy calculator.

The rough number I always hear freelancers and self-employed types use is 30 percent. That is, expect to give back 30 percent of what you earn in taxes and miscellaneous fees, so charge that extra 30 percent to clients. And plan to do that in quarterly estimated tax payments, or else face a small but painful penalty at the end of the year (and a not-so-nice tax surprise). It's not a bad number, but it doesn't apply to everyone, especially those who joint-file their taxes with spouses.

You can take expenses off of your freelance income, such as qualified business travel and meals, equipment you need to buy, and the like. But if this is a side gig, and you're mostly using your home and your personal computer to work, you will mostly just earn some side income and have some of it taxed. Once you know that, you're ready to interview yourself for your freelance job.

Step 2: Make a Fake Resume, Interview for Your Kinda-Job

Want to drive yourself crazy, alienate friends, and seem completely unprofessional? Start asking around to every freelancer you know about their rates, ask people "how much would you pay" for services, and try to figure out exactly how much you should charge, based on a very vague idea of how many hours the job will entail.

Want an easier way to figure out what you should charge for your freelance side/weekend/one-off work? Figure out what kind of worker you are. For your Actual Job, you created a resume, you applied, you pitched your skills in a letter and/or an interview, and you negotiated your salary, based in part on what skills you were bringing to the table, versus how much of your work would involve winging it and learning on the fly.

This is why interns are paid a certain small amount (if at all), and why professionals at the top of their field are haggling over things like jet access and ocean-front time shares. When you're negotiating your freelance rate, why not ask yourself what kind of job you'd be applying for if this was a full-time position, and what would that job pay? It's good advice I received when I asked designer Nicholas Barone about new work I was taking on.

More specifically:

• Figure out what kind of job you could get, at this firm, in this field, with the skills you've built up.
• Figure out what kind of salary would make sense for you to earn at that gig, if you were working full-time.
• Add roughly 30% onto that salary, given the taxes you'll be paying (or use the calculator.
• Ask for that amount, divided down to an hourly rate (yearly rate, divided by 52 weeks, divided by 37.5 or 40 hours or whatnot).

If you have more than one freelance gig, or you're freelancing in a field that's slightly outside your main field, you'll have to do a bit more pondering. I mostly write for web-based publications about technology, so when another site comes along, it's not too hard to extrapolate to an hourly or per-piece rate. But when someone asked me to do one-on-one computer setup and consulting, I had to figure that out. If I opened up my own shop as a fix-it computer consultant, how much would I want to earn, to live where I live and not eat off the 99-cent menu every night?

Step 3: Be Prepared to Negotiate the Little Stuff

If you think you've come to a realistic number for your hourly rate (or your per-piece/project rate, given a realistic time estimate for that piece/project), you're still not quite there. There could be bits and pieces of a freelance agreement that necessitate moving the number up or down. Retaining the rights to your own work, for example, or being required to take part in long meetings (hint: they are all long).

In general, though, doing work on the side can be a simple calculation: I'm doing this work, and I think I'd get paid X amount to do it full-time, so here's what you should pay me to make use of my limited extra-hours time to do it for you. It's an easier way to respect yourself and your monetary worth.

Original images by Pixabay, theimpulsivebay (Flickr), legenda (Shutterstock)

Source: http://feeds.gawker.com/~r/lifehacker/full/~3/Up4_GKssxNg/use-a-full+time-fantasy-to-figure-out-your-on+the+side-freelance-rate

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New technique shows promise in restoring near vision ... - Health.am

? Eye / Vision Problems ? Apr 01, 2013

By middle age, most people have age-related declines in near vision (presbyopia) requiring bifocals or reading glasses. An emerging technique called hyperopic orthokeratology (OK) may provide a new alternative for restoring near vision without the need for glasses, according to a study, ?Refractive Changes from Hyperopic Orthokeratology Monovision in Presbyopes?, appearing in the April issue of Optometry and Vision Science, official journal of the American Academy of Optometry. The journal is published by Lippincott Williams & Wilkins , a part of Wolters Kluwer Health.

For middle-aged patients with presbyopia, wearing OK contact lenses overnight can restore up-close vision in one eye, according to the study by Paul Gifford, PhD, FAAO, and Helen A Swarbrick, PhD, FAAO, of University of New South Wales, Sydney. ?The authors have shown the feasibility of correcting one eye for near vision through OK, in which overnight contact lens wear shapes the cornea of one eye to allow in-focus near vision for reading,? comments Anthony Adams, OD, PhD, Editor-in-Chief of Optometry and Vision Science.

Overnight OK Lens Wear Restores Near Vision in One Eye
The study included 16 middle-aged patients (43 to 59 years) with age-related loss of near vision, or presbyopia. Presbyopia is caused by age-related loss of flexibility in the cornea - the transparent front part that lets light into the eye.

Orthokeratology is a clinical technique to correct vision using specially designed rigid contact lenses to manipulate the shape of the cornea. Dr Adams likens OK therapy to orthodontic treatment using braces to change the alignment of the teeth.

Drs Gifford and Swarbick evaluated a ?monocular? technique, with patients wearing a custom-made OK lens in one eye overnight for one week. To preserve normal distance vision, the other eye was left untreated.

In all patients, the monocular OK technique was successful in restoring near vision in the treated eye. The improvement was apparent on the first day after overnight OK lens wear, and increased further during the treatment week. Eye examination confirmed that the OK lenses altered the shape of the cornea, as they were designed to do.

Nightly Lens Wear Needed to Retain Correction

Vision in the untreated eye was unaffected, and all patients retained normal distance vision with that eye; essentially this gives the patient the dequivalent of ?monovision? that is usually done with contact lenses or surgery. To retain the correction in near vision, patients had to continue wearing their OK lenses every night. Dr Adams likens this ongoing treatment to the ?retainer? that orthodontic patients have to wear nightly. As expected, when patients stopped wearing their OK lens after the treatment week, presbyopia rapidly returned.

By about age 45 to 50, most people need bifocals or some other form of vision correction to restore vision for reading and other up-close tasks. Alternatives for presbyopia have been introduced, including fitting a contact lens for distance vision in one eye and a lens for near vision in the other eye. This is the so called monovision, now the authors show it can be achieved without the need to wear a contact lens during the day. ?However, the chief problem with monovision for many people is that their stereoscopic 3D vision is degraded and many find that hard to tolerate,? according to Dr Adams.

Although overnight OK is not a new technique, it has been mainly used to reduce nearsightedness (myopia) in younger patients. The new study shows that OK is similarly effective in changing corneal shape, and achieving desired correction in near vision, in older patients with presbyopia.

The new study suggests that overnight OK lenses are a feasible alternative for correction of presbyopia, ?sufficient to provide functional near vision correction white retaining good distance visual acuity,? Drs Gifford and Swarbick write. The technique is safe, with the cornea returning to its previous shape about a week after the patient stops wearing the lenses.

?This study demonstrates that OK is quite viable as a nonsurgical option for monovision that does not require wearing contact lenses during the day, although it does require ?retainer? orthokeratology contact lenses to be worn overnight,? Dr Adams adds. ?This possibility will certainly appeal to many people, especially since the changes in the corneal curvature of the treated eye are fully reversible.?

###

Connie Hughes
Connie.Hughes@wolterskluwer.com
646-674-6348
Wolters Kluwer Health

Provided by ArmMed Media

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Source: http://www.health.am/ab/more/promise-in-restoring-near-vision-without-glasses/

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DuoFertility Is A Fertility Monitoring Sensor-Plus-Service That Helps Childless Couples Get Pregnant

UK startup DuoFertility is tackling a really tough problem: infertility. The company has built a sensor-plus-service business to predict the most fertile days of women who are having difficulty conceiving to improve the chances of conception -- hence its tagline: ?assisted natural conception?. There is no invasive technology involved, just a lot of number crunching.

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Techcrunch/~3/L1-esowply0/

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'Novel, effective' brain cancer treatment using genetic material from bone marrow cells

Apr. 1, 2013 ? In a first-of-its-kind experiment using microvesicles generated from mesenchymal bone marrow cells (MSCs) to treat cancer, neurological researchers at Henry Ford Hospital have discovered a novel approach for treatment of tumors.

Specifically, the research team found that introducing genetic material produced by MSCs significantly reduced a particularly resistant form of malignant brain tumor in living lab rats.

"This is the first foray of its type in experimental cancer therapy, and it represents a highly novel and potentially effective treatment," says Michael Chopp, Ph.D., scientific director of the Henry Ford Neuroscience Institute and vice chairman of the Department of Neurology at Henry Ford Hospital.

The research is published in the current issue Cancer Letters.

"I think this is an important and very novel approach for the treatment of cancers, and in this particular case the treatment of glioma," says Dr. Chopp. "We have been at the forefront of developing microRNAs as a means to treat disease, such as cancer and neurological injury.

"This study shows it is effective in the living brain, and may even lend itself to specific cancer therapy, customized for the individual patient," Chopp adds.

Chopp and his colleagues focused their efforts on glioma, by far the most common type of malignant brain tumor and one with a notably poor prognosis for survival.

Tumor cells were surgically implanted in the brains of anesthetized male lab rats and allowed to grow for five days.

The tumors then were injected with exosomes containing molecules of a microRNA called miR-146b -- found in earlier Henry Ford research to have a strong effect on glioma cells.

Exosomes are microscopic "lipid bubbles" that once were thought to carry and get rid of "old" proteins that were no longer needed by the body. After they were more recently found to also carry RNA, whole new fields of study were suggested, including groundbreaking work by Henry Ford researchers.

In the rat study, Dr. Chopp and his colleagues used MSC bone marrow cells to produce the exosomes containing the miR-146b they injected into the cancerous tumors.

Five days after this treatment, the rats were euthanized and their brains were removed, prepared for study and examined. Tumor size was measured using computer software.

"We found that one injection of exosomes containing miR-146b five days after tumor implantation led to a significant reduction in tumor volume at 10 days after implant," Chopp says. "Our data suggest that miR-146b elicits an anti-tumor effect in the rat brain, and that MSCs can be used as a 'factory' to generate exosomes genetically altered to contain miR-146b to effectively treat tumor."

Funding: NIH and Henry Ford Hospital

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Story Source:

The above story is reprinted from materials provided by Henry Ford Health System.

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

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Journal Reference:

1. Mark Katakowski, Ben Buller, Xuguang Zheng, Yong Lu, Thomas Rogers, Oyinkansola Osobamiro, Wayne Shu, Feng Jiang, Michael Chopp. Exosomes from marrow stromal cells expressing miR-146b inhibit glioma growth. Cancer Letters, 2013; DOI: 10.1016/j.canlet.2013.02.019

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

Disclaimer: This article is not intended to provide medical advice, diagnosis or treatment. Views expressed here do not necessarily reflect those of ScienceDaily or its staff.

Source: http://feeds.sciencedaily.com/~r/sciencedaily/health_medicine/genes/~3/HrEGeqBLgkw/130401101019.htm

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Riding in style: The evolution of the popemobile

Alessandro Di Meo / EPA

Images of the automobiles that have transported popes over the years.

By Elizabeth Chuck, Staff Writer, NBC News

Comes outfitted in protective bullet-proof glass. Draws a crowd wherever it goes. A driver is included; gold trim is optional.

Popemobiles also include such amenities as a handrail to let the pope easily stand and wave while in motion, a built-in stereo and arctic-cool air conditioning.

Eight popes have had their own set of holy wheels since Pope Pius XI got a stretch 460 Nurberg edition Mercedes-Benz in 1930, but the eighth, Pope Francis -- known for?taking the bus to work?before he was named pope -- may not want all the frills and custom built-ins that popemobiles offer.?

By retiring, Benedict XVI has passed along a white armored Mercedes SUV, which has a white leather interior with gold trim and a white leather turret that can be raised by hydraulic lift high enough for crowds to see the pope, if he wants to sit. (For longer trips around Italy, Benedict enjoyed his own helicopter.) Bullet-proof?Plexiglas?that's strong enough to withstand explosions surrounds the turret on three sides. There's an emergency oxygen supply built in, according to?The Telegraph.?

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"The pope must feel comfortable. People must be able to see him. People have traveled very far; they want to be able to get a good look at him," said Christoph Horn, Director of Global Communications of Mercedes-Benz, from Stuttgart, Germany. "This is about creating a comfortable and safe environment for the pope to travel in and be seen in.?

The pre-mobile
Popes didn't have to wait for the invention of automobiles to be mobile. For centuries, popes traveled by throne when going out on local outings. The popes were carried by 12 bearers (representing the 12 disciples of the church) as they moved through crowds, Ronald Rychlak, a University of Mississippi law school professor who has written numerous books on religion,?said.

Daimler

The first car used by a pope.

All that changed when Pope Pius XI got his Benz. The limousine was a gift from the car company, which would provide vehicles for many popes after that.

"Usually more than one vehicle was provided, especially for the popes in the 1930s," Horn said. "They were traveling a lot, so many popemobiles were built for them."

Back then, popes traveled in limousines with open tops, he said. Over the years, more than 12 different models of cars and trucks would be provided for popes. Pius XI himself ushered in a new era of pope cars in 1960 with a Mercedes 300D Landaulet, which had a throne that rose high in the back, The New York Times reported, before he switched to a 1964 Lincoln model. His successor, Pope Pope VI, went back to the preferred Mercedes brand a year later.

But don't call it 'popemobile'
When popes travel abroad for state visits, it's not always possible for the vehicles they use at home to make the journey with them. Instead, customized cars are prepared ahead of the visit, submitted for Vatican approval from the country he will visit.

"The primary level of security is assigned to the host nation,"?Rychlak said. "If they want to have something like a popemobile for a major parade, let's say they're doing Mass at Yankee stadium or something like that, they would have to make arrangements to ship something over, or that's the kind of situation where there may be a gift made to the pope" by a major car company.

That was how the car that officially became known for the first time as the "popemobile" came into existence: Pope John Paul II had visited Ireland in 1979, and a boxy yellow Ford Transit van awaited him as his chariot. Last November, The Telegraph reported an Irish businessman had acquired the van from the Dublin Wax Museum, where it had been since the papal visit, and was transforming it into a party bus.

Many other popemobiles have stayed in the countries they were used in. In 2008, Newsweek got a peek at the popemobile Benedict used for his U.S. tour, describing it as "by far the fanciest and sleekest papal car ever built ... The papal handlers can shift their passenger from zero to 60 in less than eight seconds, but the drivers probably won't exceed 10 mph along the parade routes."

In 2002, John Paul II asked the media to stop using the term "popemobile," insisting it sounded "undignified."

A clear need for better security
John Paul II survived an assassination attempt in 1981 while in St. Peter's Square. A Turkish man was later convicted of firing the shots, which punctured the pope's car and struck him four times. John Paul II survived, but it was clear his wide-open truck wouldn't suffice to protect him. From then on, bulletproof glass has encased popemobiles, although popes have occasionally ridden around without covering for brief periods.

Arturo Mari / AP

A 1981 assassination attempt on Pope John Paul II in St. Peter's Square.

Since adding bulletproof glass, popemobiles have added other necessary features, including ultra-powerful air conditioning to cool down the glass dome that popes sit in, reports The Telegraph.

Other protection measures include heavy-metal reinforcement on the bottom of the vehicle as well as the other sides, and the driver is always a trusted longtime Vatican employee. There's no partition between the pope and his driver; a microphone enables him to broadcast messages to crowds through speakers outside the popemobile.

The current weighs five tons and was just presented to Benedict last December by Mercedes-Benz.

"We work with the members of the Vatican and with the people in charge of the garages of the Vatican," Horn said. "These are all individual vehicles that are built to specifications."

The new pope's desire to get up close and personal with his faithful has presented challenges for his security detail.

"The pope's going to want to be up close hugging and touching and meeting people and that's going to be a tremendous concern for his security people,"?Rychlak said. "His security forces have taken him aside, or probably already have, and are going to say, 'Holy Father, you're putting us in a horrible situation if you don't go along with these things.'"

They're used to having to say that, though: Benedict didn't always like the feeling of a "shield between him and the people,"?Rychlak said. Most popemobiles are designed so the glass can be lowered, though.

Source: http://feeds.nbcnews.com/c/35002/f/653387/s/2a2d2254/l/0Lworldnews0Bnbcnews0N0C0Inews0C20A130C0A30C310C175184590Eriding0Ein0Estyle0Ethe0Eevolution0Eof0Ethe0Epopemobile0Dlite/story01.htm

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Drug maker loses India patent battle

NEW DELHI (AP) ? India's Supreme Court on Monday rejected drug maker Novartis AG's right to patent a new version of a cancer drug in a landmark decision that healthcare activists say ensures the poor will get continued access to cheap, generic versions of lifesaving medicines.

Novartis had argued that it needed to new patent to protect its investment in the cancer drug Glivec while activists said the company was trying to use loopholes to make more money out of a drug whose patent had expired.

The cheap medicines produced by India's $26 billion generic drug industry are a lifeline for the poor in many developing countries.

The ruling sets a precedent that will prevent international pharmaceutical companies from obtaining fresh patents in India on updated versions of existing drugs, said Pratibha Singh, a lawyer for the Indian generic drug manufacturer Cipla.

The court ruled that a patent could only be given to a new drug, she told reporters outside the court.

"Patents will be given only for genuine inventions, and repetitive patents will not be given for minor tweaks to an existing drug," Singh said.

Novartis has fought a legal battle in India since 2006 for a fresh patent for its leukemia drug Gleevec, known in India and Europe as Glivec.

India's patent office had rejected the company's patent application because it was not a new medicine but an amended version of its earlier product.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/drug-maker-loses-india-patent-battle-053713850--finance.html

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