VOLGOGRAD, Russia (Reuters) - The city of Volgograd re-adopted its old name of Stalingrad for a few hours on Saturday as Russia commemorated the 70th anniversary of the epic battle that turned the tide of World War Two.
The victory in the six-month Battle of Stalingrad, which killed about 2 million people, is a symbol of national pride that has produced an outburst of patriotic fervor and, for some, nostalgia for the Soviet era and dictator Josef Stalin.
President Vladimir Putin flew to Volgograd, which was known as Stalingrad from 1925 until 1961. He laid a wreath and met veterans after a military parade led by soldiers in World War Two uniforms and featuring a wartime T-34 tank.
"I saw cities in Europe that were practically untouched by the war, countries that capitulated to the more powerful enemies even before war was declared," First Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Rogozin said in a speech at the parade.
"But we are not like that. Our grandfathers, our fathers, our older generation, our great leaders, fought here for each building, for each street."
Hundreds of war veterans turned up for the parade on Volgograd's central Square of the Fallen Fighters, their coats weighed down by medals, the youngest of them now 89.
After Stalingrad, Soviet troops fought their way westward to Berlin, sweeping into the German capital 27 months later.
For many of the veterans, the ceremony was bittersweet as they had lost so many comrades-in-arms and loved ones.
"It's very important to remember this battle," said Valentina Olekhina, who was celebrating her 70th birthday.
She was born in Stalingrad on February 2, 1943, the day German Field Marshal Friedrich Paulus told his forces to cease fire after he was captured in a cellar by Soviet troops.
"I think my mother went into labor out of relief or excitement. I was born outside but I don't know exactly where," she told Reuters.
SURGE OF PATRIOTISM
Putin did not attend the parade but flew to the city, 900 km (600 miles) south of Moscow, after holding a reception for veterans in the Kremlin on Friday.
He hopes to tap a vein of sentiment that harks back not only to before the 1991 collapse of Moscow's Soviet empire but to a dictator disowned as a genocidal tyrant even by his Communist heirs. For all Stalin's crimes, defeating Adolf Hitler is a source of immense pride in a country seeking a new identity.
"Using this example we have to consolidate our society and our country. And we will do it," Putin told the veterans and young activists in a war museum in Volgograd.
"Historical knowledge is very essential from the point of view of preserving our statehood... Patriotism is the love for the motherland. Without it, this love will just melt as a piece of sugar in this tea," Putin said while drinking tea.
Under a decision by the city council intended to please the veterans, Volgograd was referred to as Stalingrad at the official events. Admirers of Stalin posted his portrait in minibuses - a move not approved by the authorities.
For 200 days, Germans and Russians fought hand to hand, street by street and from room to room, battling subzero winter cold, snow and sometimes starvation too.
Russian historians say 40,000 people were killed on the day of fiercest bombing and at the height of combat the average survival time of Soviet soldiers sent into battle was 24 hours.
Hitler had seen capturing Stalingrad as a prize that would sap Soviet morale, partly because of its symbolic name, and help secure control of oilfields in the Caucasus to fuel his army.
The city was called Tsaritsyn before the Bolshevik Russian revolution of 1917. Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev launched a campaign of "de-Stalinisation" after Stalin's death in 1953, easing political repression, erasing the late dictator's name and renaming the "hero city" as Volgograd.
Pride in the bravery of Soviet troops and the endurance of civilians trapped during the battle unites almost all Russians - at a time when many complain of big divisions in society.
Putin, in power for 13 years, is facing criticism over corruption and a lack of political freedoms. Memories of Stalingrad offer an opportunity to burnish his credentials as the man who restored the nation's glory after the economic chaos and conflicts of the first post-Soviet decade.
Russian television has repeatedly shown footage from wartime Stalingrad and broadcast films and documentaries about the battle. Even the crew of the orbiting International Space Station congratulated the war veterans.
"We will always be grateful for your heroic act. The memory of it will live on down the ages," cosmonaut Roman Romanenko said in video footage shown on Russian television.
(Writing by Vladimir Soldatkin and Timothy Heritage; editing by Mark Heinrich)
Sure, we may have internet in the skies and refrigerators with Evernote integration, but here's one thing that science can't do: deliver a trouble-free heated jacket. A few years after Ardica hung up the dream due to a battery recall, Columbia is doing likewise. The sportswear company has issued a recall for seven Omni-Heat electric jacket models, citing an issue with the rechargeable batteries within. Reportedly, these cells "have a defect which may cause them to overheat and pose a fire hazard." The company has received just a single report of an overheating battery from its distribution center in France, but evidently that's enough. According to the company's own statement on the matter, a "small number of the 2012 Columbia heated jackets may contain a heated inner wrist cuff component with a manufacturing flaw that may cause an electrical short to occur, giving rise to a potential burn risk."
If you'll recall, the Circuit Breaker was actually one of our favorite gadgets of 2011, but curiously, we never could pinpoint when and where these were set to go on sale. We were independently contacted by a company that claimed Columbia was using its technology in breach of contract, but never could verify if that was the reason sales seemed to be on hiatus. Evidently, a few hundred of these finally made their way into the warm embrace of consumers, but considering that "Refund" looks to be the only remedy here, we sort of doubt a second generation will emerge. It's important to note, however, that Columbia's non-electric Omni-Heat offerings aren't included in the recall -- and, for the record, that stuff does a stellar job of keeping one warm without any whiz-bang circuitry. Hit up the links below if you're thinking of sending yours back; personally, we'd recommend saving it for eBay. Calling this stuff "rare" is quite the understatement.
Cooperators can coexist with cheaters, as long as there is room to growPublic release date: 1-Feb-2013 [ | E-mail | Share ]
Contact: Ellen R. Weiss eweiss@biophysics.org 240-290-5606 American Institute of Physics
Philadelphia, Pa. Microbes exhibit bewildering diversity even in relatively tight living quarters. But when a population is a mix of cooperators, microbes that share resources, and cheaters, those that selfishly take yet give nothing back, the natural outcome is perpetual war. A new model by a team of researchers from Princeton University in New Jersey and Ben-Gurion University in Israel reveals that even with never-ending battles, the exploiter and the exploited can survive, but only if they have room to expand and grow. The researchers present their findings at the 57th Annual Meeting of the Biophysical Society (BPS), held Feb. 2-6, 2013, in Philadelphia, Pa.
"In a fixed population, cells that share can't live together with cells that only take," said David Bruce Borenstein, a researcher at Princeton. "But if the population repeatedly expands and contracts then such 'cooperators' and 'cheaters' can coexist."
Our world and our bodies play host to a vast array of microbes. On our teeth alone, there are approximately a thousand different kinds of bacteria, all living in very close quarters. This is amazing, the researchers observe, because many of those species share resources with nearby neighbors, who might not be so cooperative or even related [1].
At the scale of cells, individuals cooperate mainly by exporting resources into the environment and letting them float away. "This is a deceptively complex process in which cells interact at long ranges, but compete only with nearby individuals," explained Borenstein. "Our models predict that, even when this exploitation prevents any possibility of peaceful coexistence, the exploiter and the exploited can survive across generations in what is basically a perpetual war." The researchers speculate that similar competition might occur between cancer cells and normal tissue.
Borenstein and his colleagues made their conclusions based on a computer model that considered two types of cells, cooperators and cheaters, and laid them out on a grid. Cooperators were given the ability, not uncommon in nature, to make a resource that speeds up growth in both kinds of cells. Producing this resource slowed down the growth of cooperators, because they have to divert some energy to resource production. This resource then spread out from the cooperator by diffusion, so that the cells closest to a producer have the greatest resource access. The model revealed that the producers tended to cluster, meaning that being a producer gave you greater access to resources. It also meant that even though cheaters are avoiding the cost of production, they pay for it with reduced resource access.
Within these basic constraints it was found that when the two populations must compete directly for survival, no coexistence is possible. "One type always wins out," observed Borenstein. However, when the two populations can grow into empty space, the researchers found a strange and paradoxical interaction: cheaters may be outcompeting cooperators locally, even as cooperators grow better overall. These complex interactions may play an important role in the maintenance of diverse microbial communities, like those seen in the mouth.
"To our astonishment, we found that while cheaters can exploit cooperators, cooperators can isolate cheaters, just from cooperation and growth," concludes Borenstein. "As a result, the community can persist in a sort of perpetual race from which a winner need not emerge."
###
[1] J. M. ten Cate. "Biofilms, a new approach to the microbiology of dental plaque." Odontolgy 2006(94):1-9.
Presentation #2530-Pos, "Diffusion of public goods prevents coexistence of cooperators and cheaters in a stochastic competition model," will take place at 1:45 p.m. on Tuesday, Feb. 5, 2013, in the Pennsylvania Convention Center, Hall C. ABSTRACT: http://tinyurl.com/ba46sdb
This news release was prepared for the Biophysical Society (BPS) by the American Institute of Physics (AIP).
ABOUT THE 2013 ANNUAL MEETING
Each year, the Biophysical Society Annual Meeting brings together over 6,000 research scientists in the multidisciplinary fields representing biophysics. With more than 3,900 poster presentations, over 200 exhibits, and more than 20 symposia, the Annual Meeting is the largest meeting of biophysicists in the world. Despite its size, the meeting retains its small-meeting flavor through its subgroup meetings, platform sessions, social activities, and committee programs.
The 57th Annual Meeting will be held at the Pennsylvania Convention Center (1101 Arch Street, Philadelphia, PA 19107). For maps and directions, please visit: http://www.paconvention.com/explore-philadelphia/directions-and-parking.
QUICK LINKS
Meeting Home Page:
http://www.biophysics.org/2013meeting/Main/tabid/3523/Default.aspx
Housing and Travel Information:
http://www.biophysics.org/2013meeting/AccommodationsTravel/HotelInformation/tabid/3621/Default.aspx
Program Abstracts and Itinerary Planner:
http://www.abstractsonline.com/plan/start.aspx?mkey=%7B763246BB-EBE4-430F-9545-81BC84D0C68C%7D
PRESS REGISTRATION
The Biophysical Society invites credentialed journalists, freelance reporters working on assignment, and public information officers to attend its Annual Meeting free of charge. For more information on registering as a member of the press, contact BPS Director of Public Affairs and Communications Ellen Weiss at eweiss@biophysics.org or 240-290-5606, or visit
http://www.biophysics.org/2013meeting/Registration/Press/tabid/3619/Default.aspx. Press registration will also be available onsite at the Pennsylvania Convention Center in the Biophysical Society's meeting office, Room 304VIP.
ABOUT BPS
The Biophysical Society (BPS), founded in 1958, is a professional scientific society established to encourage development and dissemination of knowledge in biophysics. The Society promotes growth in this expanding field through its annual meeting, monthly journal, and committee and outreach activities. Its 9000 members are located throughout the U.S. and the world, where they teach and conduct research in colleges, universities, laboratories, government agencies, and industry. For more information on the Society or the 2013 Annual Meeting, visit www.biophysics.org.
For more information, please contact:
Ellen R. Weiss
Director of Public Affairs and Communications
eweiss@biophysics.org
240-290-5606
[ | 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.
Cooperators can coexist with cheaters, as long as there is room to growPublic release date: 1-Feb-2013 [ | E-mail | Share ]
Contact: Ellen R. Weiss eweiss@biophysics.org 240-290-5606 American Institute of Physics
Philadelphia, Pa. Microbes exhibit bewildering diversity even in relatively tight living quarters. But when a population is a mix of cooperators, microbes that share resources, and cheaters, those that selfishly take yet give nothing back, the natural outcome is perpetual war. A new model by a team of researchers from Princeton University in New Jersey and Ben-Gurion University in Israel reveals that even with never-ending battles, the exploiter and the exploited can survive, but only if they have room to expand and grow. The researchers present their findings at the 57th Annual Meeting of the Biophysical Society (BPS), held Feb. 2-6, 2013, in Philadelphia, Pa.
"In a fixed population, cells that share can't live together with cells that only take," said David Bruce Borenstein, a researcher at Princeton. "But if the population repeatedly expands and contracts then such 'cooperators' and 'cheaters' can coexist."
Our world and our bodies play host to a vast array of microbes. On our teeth alone, there are approximately a thousand different kinds of bacteria, all living in very close quarters. This is amazing, the researchers observe, because many of those species share resources with nearby neighbors, who might not be so cooperative or even related [1].
At the scale of cells, individuals cooperate mainly by exporting resources into the environment and letting them float away. "This is a deceptively complex process in which cells interact at long ranges, but compete only with nearby individuals," explained Borenstein. "Our models predict that, even when this exploitation prevents any possibility of peaceful coexistence, the exploiter and the exploited can survive across generations in what is basically a perpetual war." The researchers speculate that similar competition might occur between cancer cells and normal tissue.
Borenstein and his colleagues made their conclusions based on a computer model that considered two types of cells, cooperators and cheaters, and laid them out on a grid. Cooperators were given the ability, not uncommon in nature, to make a resource that speeds up growth in both kinds of cells. Producing this resource slowed down the growth of cooperators, because they have to divert some energy to resource production. This resource then spread out from the cooperator by diffusion, so that the cells closest to a producer have the greatest resource access. The model revealed that the producers tended to cluster, meaning that being a producer gave you greater access to resources. It also meant that even though cheaters are avoiding the cost of production, they pay for it with reduced resource access.
Within these basic constraints it was found that when the two populations must compete directly for survival, no coexistence is possible. "One type always wins out," observed Borenstein. However, when the two populations can grow into empty space, the researchers found a strange and paradoxical interaction: cheaters may be outcompeting cooperators locally, even as cooperators grow better overall. These complex interactions may play an important role in the maintenance of diverse microbial communities, like those seen in the mouth.
"To our astonishment, we found that while cheaters can exploit cooperators, cooperators can isolate cheaters, just from cooperation and growth," concludes Borenstein. "As a result, the community can persist in a sort of perpetual race from which a winner need not emerge."
###
[1] J. M. ten Cate. "Biofilms, a new approach to the microbiology of dental plaque." Odontolgy 2006(94):1-9.
Presentation #2530-Pos, "Diffusion of public goods prevents coexistence of cooperators and cheaters in a stochastic competition model," will take place at 1:45 p.m. on Tuesday, Feb. 5, 2013, in the Pennsylvania Convention Center, Hall C. ABSTRACT: http://tinyurl.com/ba46sdb
This news release was prepared for the Biophysical Society (BPS) by the American Institute of Physics (AIP).
ABOUT THE 2013 ANNUAL MEETING
Each year, the Biophysical Society Annual Meeting brings together over 6,000 research scientists in the multidisciplinary fields representing biophysics. With more than 3,900 poster presentations, over 200 exhibits, and more than 20 symposia, the Annual Meeting is the largest meeting of biophysicists in the world. Despite its size, the meeting retains its small-meeting flavor through its subgroup meetings, platform sessions, social activities, and committee programs.
The 57th Annual Meeting will be held at the Pennsylvania Convention Center (1101 Arch Street, Philadelphia, PA 19107). For maps and directions, please visit: http://www.paconvention.com/explore-philadelphia/directions-and-parking.
QUICK LINKS
Meeting Home Page:
http://www.biophysics.org/2013meeting/Main/tabid/3523/Default.aspx
Housing and Travel Information:
http://www.biophysics.org/2013meeting/AccommodationsTravel/HotelInformation/tabid/3621/Default.aspx
Program Abstracts and Itinerary Planner:
http://www.abstractsonline.com/plan/start.aspx?mkey=%7B763246BB-EBE4-430F-9545-81BC84D0C68C%7D
PRESS REGISTRATION
The Biophysical Society invites credentialed journalists, freelance reporters working on assignment, and public information officers to attend its Annual Meeting free of charge. For more information on registering as a member of the press, contact BPS Director of Public Affairs and Communications Ellen Weiss at eweiss@biophysics.org or 240-290-5606, or visit
http://www.biophysics.org/2013meeting/Registration/Press/tabid/3619/Default.aspx. Press registration will also be available onsite at the Pennsylvania Convention Center in the Biophysical Society's meeting office, Room 304VIP.
ABOUT BPS
The Biophysical Society (BPS), founded in 1958, is a professional scientific society established to encourage development and dissemination of knowledge in biophysics. The Society promotes growth in this expanding field through its annual meeting, monthly journal, and committee and outreach activities. Its 9000 members are located throughout the U.S. and the world, where they teach and conduct research in colleges, universities, laboratories, government agencies, and industry. For more information on the Society or the 2013 Annual Meeting, visit www.biophysics.org.
For more information, please contact:
Ellen R. Weiss
Director of Public Affairs and Communications
eweiss@biophysics.org
240-290-5606
[ | 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.
(AP)Do slugger Mike Moustakas, running back Jamaal Charles and coach Jeff Fisher realize they're working for an organization designated as an enemy of the National Rifle association? Does Yadier Molina know he's in the clear?
What the NRA calls its list of "National Organizations With Anti-Gun Policies" has been getting a lot of play over the past few days, and the Kansas City Star noted Tuesday that several Missouri businesses were on the list ? including the Kansas City Royals, Kansas City Chiefs and St. Louis Rams. (Oh, and Hallmark cards. Send a card, not a bullet.)
The list does not include the other major league teams in the state, the St. Louis Cardinals or St. Louis Blues. The NRA's list says it was published first in September 2012, but with the amount of discussion regarding gun-related violence going on, it was only a matter of time until it got attention.
So, what put the Royals, Chiefs and Rams in the NRA's, uh, crosshairs? After a series of failures, the state of Missouri in 2003 passed a law that allows individuals to apply for a permit to carry a concealed weapon. The Royals, Chiefs and Rams ? quite understandably ? didn't want to encourage fans to pack heat at ballgames.
Alcohol- and bravado-fueled fights in the grandstands happen often enough (sadly) that clubs wisely don't want to add guns to the mix. Front-line ballpark security don't carry guns. Only when on-duty cops are called do you see firearms holstered. Imagine the panic alone once some fan whips out a gun he sneaked into the park, never mind if some kind of shootout in the bleachers breaks out. Leave it to security, please, and their tasers. If tasers.
It's not clear in what form the teams protested ? petitions, letters to the editor, donations to state legislators ? but the Royals, Chiefs and Rams made known their opposition to conceal-carry in Missouri, at least when it came to sports stadiums. This was on the record as early as 1999, when The Star published an editorial against a conceal-carry law being considered at the time.
And the K.C. sports teams got what they wanted; the law doesn't apply to stadiums with a capacity over 5,000. You still can't bring a gun to a Royals game, thank goodness. And those sneaky Cardinals and Blues get the same benefit without making the NRA's bogeyman list.
Count down to spring training by following @AnswerDave, @bigleaguestew, @KevinKaduk on Twitter, along with the BLS Facebook page!
Nvidia's Project Shield, due to launch in Europe later this year, was a year in the making - leading to months of 14-hour work days for the design and production team.
Nvidia's Brian Caulfield has revealed some behind-the-scenes details on the production of Project Shield, the company's Tegra-powered Android-based hand-held gaming console - including admissions of a gruelling schedule to get the device ready for its big Consumer Electronics Show unveiling.
In a blog post, Caulfield describes 14-hour workdays over a period of months as the team behind Project Shield - formed of engineers from both the Tegra and the GeForce divisions - as the device was assembled ahead of the Consumer Electronics Show earlier this month. It was a close-run thing, too: despite being just twelve months in the making, the first working example of a Project Shield hand-held console was finished just ten days before it was due to be unveiled live on-stage by Nvidia chief executive Jen-Hsun Huang.
'It turns out Nvidia had everything it needed to build a new kind of gaming device all along,' Caulfield offers by way of explanation for the remarkable one-year gap between notion and product. 'Rather than engineering a one-of-a-kind console CPU and a GPU, Nvidia engineers slid their next-generation mobile chip ? and its powerful graphics capabilities ? into the device. And rather than building special software ? and cultivating a walled-garden of proprietary gaming content ? Nvidia opened its device up. Shield runs on the same Android software now powering millions of Tegra devices.'
From the first prototype - ' little more than a game controller fastened to a smartphone with wood,' Caulfield admits - to the final production design, Nvidia has claimed to be working entirely internally, which is as good an explanation as any for the complete lack of leaks regarding Project Shield prior to its official unveiling. 'No outsourcing required,' Caulfield boats. 'Nvidia has a team of veterans who have already shaped the look of a number of products built around [its] processors.'
It's Project Shield's game-streaming prowess that has PC gamers interested, however. Based on the same technology as its GeForce Grid cloud gaming platform, Project Shield uses hardware built in to Kepler-class GPUs - requiring a GeForce GTX 650 or better in the desktop - to rapidly encode rendered frames and stream them to the Shield device, giving the hand-held access to a wide variety of PC games on its 5in 720p display. It's clever, but it remains to be seen whether gamers will want to shrink their experience down to such a small level.
Nvidia is planning to launch the Shield in the US and Canada first, with a European roll-out expected later this year. More details on the project are available on the official website, while Nvidia's Jason Paul reveals still more behind-the-scenes anecdotes in an interview to appear in Custom PC Issue 115, on sale next month.
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - There are signs that Iran is sending growing numbers of people and increasingly sophisticated weaponry to support Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, outgoing U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said on Thursday.
"It appears that they may be increasing that involvement and that is a matter of great concern to us," she told reporters as she prepares to step down on Friday. "I think the numbers (of people) have increased ... There is a lot of concern that they are increasing the quality of the weapons, because Assad is using up his weaponry. So it's numbers and it's materiel."
(Reporting By Arshad Mohammed; Editing by Mohammad Zargham)
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Public release date: 1-Feb-2013
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