Open Your Mind to the New Psychedelic Science In recent years, a small cadre of scientists has cautiously rekindled the scientific study of psychedelics. At a recent conference, they reported new findings on how these drugs scramble brain activity in ways that might help explain their mind-bending effects. ...
Here are the terms of trades completed on Friday, April 26, the second day of the 2013 NFL Draft. All draft picks are 2013 selections unless otherwise noted:
The Titans acquired a second-round pick from San Francisco (No. 34 overall), sending second- and seventh-round picks (Nos. 40, 216) in 2013 and a 2014 third-rounder to the 49ers. The Titans selected Tennessee wide receiver Justin Hunter at No. 34. The 49ers took Florida State defensive lineman Cornellius ?Tank? Carradine at No. 40.
The Chargers traded for the Cardinals? second-round pick (No. 38), giving up second- and fourth-round picks (Nos. 45, 110) to Arizona. The Chargers used selection No. 38 on Notre Dame linebacker Manti Te?o, while the Cardinals took LSU linebacker Kevin Minter at No. 45.
The 49ers acquired the Packers? second-round pick (No. 55). In return, San Francisco surrendered second- and sixth-round picks (Nos. 61, 173). The 49ers took Rice tight end Vance McDonald at No. 55. The Packers used the No. 61 choice on Alabama running back Eddie Lacy.
The Ravens traded for the Seahawks? second-round selection (No. 56). Baltimore sent Seattle second-, fifth- and sixth-round picks (Nos. 62, 165, 199) to complete the deal. The Ravens took Kansas State linebacker Arthur Brown with pick No. 56. Six picks later, the Seahawks selected Texas A&M running back Christine Michael at No. 62.
The Saints acquired a third-round selection from Miami (No. 82). In exchange, the Dolphins received two fourth-round picks (Nos. 106, 109) from New Orleans. The Saints took Georgia nose tackle John Jenkins at No. 82. The Dolphins would trade selection No. 109 to Green Bay.
The 49ers traded for the Packers? third-round choice (No. 88), surrendering third- and seventh-round picks (Nos. 93, 216) to Green Bay. With pick No. 88, San Francisco chose Auburn defensive lineman Corey Lemonier. The Packers would deal the 93rd selection to Miami (see next entry).
The Dolphins acquired a third-round pick from Green Bay (No. 93), giving up fourth-, fifth- and seventh-round picks (Nos. 109, 146, 224). The Dolphins selected Utah State cornerback Will Davis at No. 93.
The Dolphins traded wide receiver Davone Bess and their fourth- and seventh-round picks (Nos. 111, 217) to Cleveland. In return, the Browns sent the Dolphins fourth- and fifth-round picks (Nos. 104, 164).
The Saints traded running back Chris Ivory to the Jets in exchange for New York?s fourth-round pick (No. 106). The Saints dealt No. 106 in a package for pick No. 82, which was used on Georgia nose tackle John Jenkins.
MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif. ? April?18, 2013 ? Google Inc. (NASDAQ: GOOG) today announced financial results for the quarter ended March 31, 2013.
?We had a very strong start to 2013, with $14.0 billion in revenue, up 31% year-on-year,? said Larry Page, CEO of Google. ?We are working hard and investing in our products that aim to improve billions of people?s lives all around the world.?
Q1 Financial Summary
Google Inc. reported consolidated revenues of $13.97 billion for the quarter ended March 31, 2013, an increase of 31% compared to the first quarter of 2012. Google Inc. reports advertising revenues, consistent with GAAP, on a gross basis without deducting traffic acquisition costs (TAC). In the first quarter of 2013, TAC totaled $2.96 billion, or 25% of advertising revenues.
Operating income, operating margin, net income, and earnings per share (EPS) are reported on a GAAP and non-GAAP basis. The non-GAAP measures, as well as free cash flow, an alternative non-GAAP measure of liquidity, are described below and are reconciled to the corresponding GAAP measures at the end of this release.
GAAP operating income in the first quarter of 2013 was $3.48 billion, or 25% of revenues. This compares to GAAP operating income of $3.39 billion, or 32% of revenues, in the first quarter of 2012. Non-GAAP operating income in the first quarter of 2013 was $4.22 billion, or 30% of revenues. This compares to non-GAAP operating income of $3.94 billion, or 37% of revenues, in the first quarter of 2012.
GAAP net income including net income from discontinued operations in the first quarter of 2013 was $3.35 billion, compared to $2.89 billion in the first quarter of 2012. Non-GAAP net income in the first quarter of 2013 was $3.90 billion, compared to $3.33 billion in the first quarter of 2012.
GAAP EPS including impact from net income from discontinued operations in the first quarter of 2013 was$9.94 on 337 million diluted shares outstanding, compared to $8.75 in the first quarter of 2012 on 330 million diluted shares outstanding. Non-GAAP EPS in the first quarter of 2013 was $11.58, compared to $10.08 in the first quarter of 2012.
Non-GAAP operating income and non-GAAP operating margin exclude stock-based compensation (SBC) expense, as well as restructuring and related charges recorded in our Motorola Mobile business. ?Non-GAAP net income and non-GAAP EPS exclude the expenses noted above, net of the related tax benefits, as well as net income from discontinued operations. In the first quarter of 2013, the expense related to SBC and the related tax benefits were $681 million and $149 million compared to $556 million and $118 million in the first quarter of 2012. ?In the first quarter of 2013, restructuring and related charges recorded in our Motorola Mobile business were $66 million, and the related tax benefits were $23 million. In addition, net income from discontinued operations, in the first quarter of 2013, was $22 million.
Q1 Financial Highlights
Revenues and other information?- On a consolidated basis, Google Inc. revenues for the quarter ended March 31, 2013 were $13.97 billion, an increase of 31% compared to the first quarter of 2012.
Google Revenues (advertising and other)?- Google revenues were $12.95 billion, or 93% of consolidated revenues, in the first quarter of 2013, representing a 22% increase over first quarter 2012 revenues of $10.65 billion.
Google Sites Revenues?? Google-owned sites generated revenues of $8.64 billion, or 67% of total Google revenues, in the first quarter of 2013. This represents an 18% increase over first quarter 2012 Google sites revenues of $7.31 billion.
Google Network Revenues?? Google?s partner sites generated revenues of $3.26 billion, or 25% of total Google revenues, in the first quarter of 2013. This represents a 12% increase from first quarter 2012 Google network revenues of $2.91 billion.
Other Revenues?? Other revenues from Google were $1.05 billion, or 8% of total Google revenues, in the first quarter of 2013.? This represents a 150% increase over first quarter 2012 other revenues of $420 million.
Google International Revenues?? Google revenues from outside of the United States totaled $7.1 billion, representing 55% of total Google revenues in the first quarter of 2013, compared to 54% in the fourth quarter of 2012 and in the first quarter of 2012.
Foreign Exchange Impact on Google Revenues?? Excluding gains related to our foreign exchange risk management program, had foreign exchange rates remained constant from the fourth quarter of 2012 through the first quarter of 2013, our Google revenues in the first quarter of 2013 would have been $11 million higher. Excluding gains related to our foreign exchange risk management program, had foreign exchange rates remained constant from the first quarter of 2012 through the first quarter of 2013, our Google revenues in the first quarter of 2013 would have been $110 million higher.
Google revenues from the United Kingdom totaled $1.39 billion, representing 11% of Google revenues in the first quarter of 2013, compared to 11% in the first quarter of 2012.
In the first quarter of 2013, we recognized a benefit of $35 million to Google revenues through our foreign exchange risk management program, compared to $37 million in the first quarter of 2012.
Reconciliations of our non-GAAP international revenues excluding the impact of foreign exchange and hedging to GAAP international revenues are included at the end of this release.
Paid Clicks?? Aggregate paid clicks, which include clicks related to ads served on Google sites and the sites of our Network members, increased approximately 20% over the first quarter of 2012 and increased approximately 3% over the fourth quarter of 2012.
Cost-Per-Click?? Average cost-per-click, which includes clicks related to ads served on Google sites and the sites of our Network members, decreased approximately 4% over the first quarter of 2012 and decreased approximately 4% over the fourth quarter of 2012.
TAC?? Traffic acquisition costs, the portion of revenues shared with Google?s partners, increased to $2.96 billion in the first quarter of 2013, compared to $2.51 billion in the first quarter of 2012. TAC as a percentage of advertising revenues was 25% in the first quarter of 2013, compared to 25% in the first quarter of 2012.
The majority of TAC is related to amounts ultimately paid to our Network members, which totaled $2.28 billion in the first quarter of 2013. TAC also includes amounts ultimately paid to certain distribution partners and others who direct traffic to our website, which totaled $680 million in the first quarter of 2013.
Motorola Mobile Revenues (hardware and other)?? Motorola Mobile revenues were $1.02 billion, or 7% of consolidated revenues in the first quarter of 2013.
Other Cost of Revenues?? Other cost of revenues, which is comprised primarily of manufacturing and inventory-related costs, data center operational expenses, amortization of intangible assets, and content acquisition costs, increased to $2.98 billion, or 21% of revenues, in the first quarter of 2013, compared to $1.28 billion, or 12% of revenues, in the first quarter of 2012.
Operating Expenses?? Operating expenses, other than cost of revenues, were $4.55 billion in the first quarter of 2013, or 33% of revenues, compared to $3.47 billion in the first quarter of 2012, or 33% of revenues.
Amortization Expenses?? Amortization expenses of acquisition-related intangible assets were $315 million?for the first quarter of 2013.??Of the $315 million,?$153 million was as a result of the acquisition of Motorola, of which $116 million was allocated to Google and $37 million was allocated to Motorola Mobile.
Stock-Based Compensation (SBC)?? In the first quarter of 2013, the total charge related to SBC was $697 million, compared to $556 million in the first quarter of 2012. We currently estimate SBC charges for grants to employees prior to March 31, 2013 to be approximately $2.7 billion for 2013. This estimate does not include expenses to be recognized related to employee stock awards that are granted after March 31, 2013 or non-employee stock awards that have been or may be granted.
Operating Income?? On a consolidated basis, GAAP operating income in the first quarter of 2013 was $3.48 billion, or 25% of revenues. This compares to GAAP operating income of $3.39 billion, or 32% of revenues, in the first quarter of 2012. Non-GAAP operating income in the first quarter of 2013 was $4.22 billion, or 30% of revenues. This compares to non-GAAP operating income of $3.94 billion, or 37% of revenues, in the first quarter of 2012.
Google Operating Income?? GAAP operating income for Google was $3.75 billion, or 29% of Google revenues, in the first quarter of 2013. This compares to GAAP operating income of? $3.39 billion, or 32% of Google revenues, in the first quarter of 2012. Non-GAAP operating income in the first quarter of 2013 was $4.40 billion, or 34% of Google revenues. This compares to non-GAAP operating income of $3.94 billion in the first quarter of 2012, or 37% of Google revenues.
Motorola Mobile Operating Loss?? GAAP operating loss for Motorola Mobile was $271 million, or -27% of Motorola Mobile revenues in the first quarter of 2013. Non-GAAP operating loss for Motorola Mobile in the first quarter of 2013 was $179 million, or -18% of Motorola Mobile revenues.
Interest and Other Income, Net?? Interest and other income, net, was $134 million in the first quarter of 2013, compared to $156 million in the first quarter of 2012.
Income Taxes?? Our effective tax rate was 8% for the first quarter of 2013.
Net Income?? GAAP net income in the first quarter of 2013 was $3.35 billion, compared to $2.89 billion in the first quarter of 2012. Non-GAAP net income was $3.90 billion in the first quarter of 2013, compared to $3.33 billion in the first quarter of 2012. GAAP EPS in the first quarter of 2013 was $9.94 on 337 million diluted shares outstanding, compared to $8.75 in the first quarter of 2012 on 330 million diluted shares outstanding. Non-GAAP EPS in the first quarter of 2013 was $11.58, compared to $10.08 in the first quarter of 2012.
Cash Flow and Capital Expenditures?? Net cash provided by operating activities in the first quarter of 2013 totaled $3.63 billion, compared to $3.69 billion in the first quarter of 2012. In the first quarter of 2013, capital expenditures were $1.2 billion, the majority of which was for production equipment, data center construction and facilities-related purchases. Free cash flow, an alternative non-GAAP measure of liquidity, is defined as net cash provided by operating activities less capital expenditures. In the first quarter of 2013, free cash flow was $2.43 billion.
We expect to continue to make significant capital expenditures.
A reconciliation of free cash flow to net cash provided by operating activities, the GAAP measure of liquidity, is included at the end of this release.
Cash?? As of March 31, 2013, cash, cash equivalents, and marketable securities were $50.1 billion.
Headcount?? On a worldwide basis, we employed 53,891 full-time employees (38,739 in Google and 9,982 in Motorola Mobile and 5,170 in Motorola Home) as of March 31, 2013, compared to 53,861 full-time employees as of December 31, 2012.
Today's apps worth downloading start with SendHub, an app that provides a free phone number over your Internet connection, which is great for business professionals. The Traveler is up next, which helps in documenting travels through GPS, photos, video, audio and even drawings. Finally, the popular platformer Rayman Jungle Run has just received an update that adds 20 new levels.
Best Educational Apps, Handpicked By Experts
Appolicious is pleased to introduce appoLearning.com, where parents, teachers and students find great education apps.
What?s it about? SendHub sets you up with a free phone line for your business, and gives you the option to set it in any area code you want.
What?s cool? Firing up SendHub gives you the ability to send and receive calls and text messages through the app, providing you a voice-over-Internet alternative to your phone. You can request a number in whatever area code you want, so it's great to create a phone number when you need one for your business (like if you're a freelancer, for example) or to keep your personal number, you know, personal. SendHub also supports features such as voice mail and call fowarding.
Who?s it for? If you could use a spare phone number for whatever you've got going on, try SendHub.
What?s it like? A solid alternative is Google's free phone line service, Google Voice.
What?s it about? Part digital sketchbook, part travel journal, The Traveler helps you document your trips and save your memories.
What?s cool? The Traveler is basically everything you need to capture everything you can about a given trip or excursion. The app lets you shoot photos and video, record audio, and even draw what you're seeing, in order to help you save anything from a trip that you want. You can even track your movements with your Android device's GPS capabilities and replay the paths later, syncing the things you record to it so you can see them in context, or watching the path played out in 3-D through Google Earth.
Who?s it for? As the name suggests, travelers are going to get the most out of this one.
What?s it like? Try getting more GPS info straight from the dedicated Google Earth app, and plan vacations with the help of Gogobot.
What?s it about? Starring Ubisoft's well-loved character, Rayman Jungle Run is a running title mixed with a platformer, challenging players to power through levels that include dodging hazards and helicoptering through the air.
What?s cool? Rayman Jungle Run is a running game that has players maneuvering Rayman through each level and grab as many floating points as possible. The challenge is to execute perfectly, hitting every jump and dodging every obstacle as you work through the game's challenging levels. Packing high production values and simple touch controls, the game manages to be just tough enough to be addictive, and its latest update brings in 20 new levels for players to work through. This one was among 2012's most popular games in Apple's iTunes App Store, and the Android version is just as good.
Who?s it for? Fans of platformers shouldn't miss Rayman's mobile excursion.
What?s it like? You might also like Babel Running and Prince of Persia Classic.
Professional networking and profile startup Zerply is introducing two new features today to help its members better advertise their skills and to help employers better source candidates for open positions. Work Images allows users to attach an 800x600 pixel graphic or picture to specific activities and things they're working on, a feature designed to reflect the "pics or it didn't happen" mentality of Reddit and other sharing sites.
Apr. 10, 2013 ? Stars the size of the Sun end their lives as tiny and faint white dwarf stars. But as they make the final transition into retirement their atmospheres are blown away into space. For a few tens of thousands of years they are surrounded by the spectacular and colourful glowing clouds of ionised gas known as planetary nebulae.
A new image from the VLT shows the planetary nebula IC 1295, which lies in the constellation of Scutum (The Shield). It has the unusual feature of being surrounded by multiple shells that make it resemble a micro-organism seen under a microscope, with many layers corresponding to the membranes of a cell.
These bubbles are made out of gas that used to be the star's atmosphere. This gas has been expelled by unstable fusion reactions in the star's core that generated sudden releases of energy, like huge thermonuclear belches. The gas is bathed in strong ultraviolet radiation from the aging star, which makes the gas glow. Different chemical elements glow with different colours and the ghostly green shade that is prominent in IC 1295 comes from ionised oxygen.
At the centre of the image, you can see the burnt-out remnant of the star's core as a bright blue-white spot at the heart of the nebula. The central star will become a very faint white dwarf and slowly cool down over many billions of years.
Stars with masses like the Sun and up to eight times that of the Sun, will form planetary nebulae as they enter the final phase of their existence. The Sun is 4.6 billion years old and it will likely live another four billion years.
Despite the name, planetary nebulae have nothing to do with planets. This descriptive term was applied to some early discoveries because of the visual similarity of these unusual objects to the outer planets Uranus and Neptune, when viewed through early telescopes, and it has been catchy enough to survive [1]. These objects were shown to be glowing gas by early spectroscopic observations in the nineteenth century.
This image was captured by ESO's Very Large Telescope, located on Cerro Paranal in the Atacama Desert of northern Chile, using the FORS instrument (FOcal Reducer Spectrograph). Exposures taken through three different filters that passed blue light (coloured blue), visible light (coloured green), and red light (coloured red) have been combined to make this picture.
Notes
[1] Even early observers such as William Herschel, who discovered many planetary nebulae and speculated about their origin and composition, knew that they weren't actually planets orbiting the Sun as they did not move relative to the surrounding stars.
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LONDON ? Rudeness and throwing insults are cutting online friendships short, with a survey showing people are getting ruder on social media and two in five users have ended contact after a virtual altercation.
As social media usage surges, the survey found so has incivility with 78 percent of 2,698 people reporting an increase in rudeness online with people having no qualms about being less polite virtually than in person.
One in five people have reduced their face-to-face contact with someone they know in real life after an online run-in.
Joseph Grenny, co-chairman of corporate training firm VitalSmarts that conducted the survey, released Wednesday, said online rows now often spill into real life with 19 percent of people blocking, unsubscribing or "unfriending" someone over a virtual argument.
"The world has changed and a significant proportion of relationships happen online but manners haven't caught up with technology," Grenny told Reuters.
"What really is surprising is that so many people disapprove of this behavior but people are still doing it. Why would you name call online but never to that person's face?"
Figures from the Pew Research Center show that 67 percent of online adults in the United States now use social networking sites with Facebook being the most popular, while the latest figures show over half of the British population has Facebook accounts.
The survey, conducted over three weeks in February, follows a spate of highly publicized run-ins between people who came to virtual blows online.
British football player Joey Barton, who plays for Olympique de Marseille, was summoned by the French soccer federation's ethics committee after calling Paris St Germain's defender Thiago Silva an "overweight ladyboy" on Twitter.
Boxer Curtis Woodhouse was widely praised after he tracked down a tweeter who branded him a "complete disgrace" and "joke" after a loss, going to his tormenter's house for an apology.
Grenny said survey respondents had their own stories such as a family not talking for two years after an online row when one man posted an embarrassing photo of his sister and refused to remove it, instead blasting it to all his contacts.
Workplace tensions are also often tracked back to conversations in chat forums when workers talked negatively about another colleague.
"People seem aware that these kinds of crucial conversations should not take place on social media yet there seems to be a compulsion to resolve emotions right now and via the convenience of these channels," said Grenny.
Grenny suggested peer-to-peer pressure was needed to enforce appropriate behavior online with people told if out of line.
He said three rules that could improve conversations online were to avoid monologues, replace lazy, judgmental words, and cut personal attacks particularly when emotions were high.
"When reading a response to your post and you feel the conversation is getting too emotional for an online exchange, you're right! Stop. Take it offline. Or better yet, face-to-face," he said.
NEW YORK (AP) ? Stocks are mixed in early trading on Wall Street as traders gear up for the beginning of corporate earnings reports.
The Dow Jones industrial average was off 23 points, or 0.2 percent, at 14,541 shortly after the opening bell Monday.
The Standard & Poor's 500 index was down less than a point, or 0.04 percent, at 1,552. The Nasdaq composite rose five points, or 0.1 percent, to 3,208.
Investors are turning their attention to U.S. corporate earnings results following a dismal report on employment on Friday.
Aluminum maker Alcoa becomes the first company in the Dow Jones industrial average to report its results later Monday, after the close of trading.
Building better blood vessels could advance tissue engineeringPublic release date: 4-Apr-2013 [ | E-mail | Share ]
Contact: Nicole Casal Moore ncmoore@umich.edu 734-647-7087 University of Michigan
ANN ARBOROne of the major obstacles to growing new organsreplacement hearts, lungs and kidneysis the difficulty researchers face in building blood vessels that keep the tissues alive, but new findings from the University of Michigan could help overcome this roadblock.
"It's not just enough to make a piece of tissue that functions like your desired target," said Andrew Putnam, U-M associate professor of biomedical engineering. "If you don't nourish it with blood by vascularizing it, it's only going to be as big as the head of a pen.
"But we need a heart that's this big," he added, holding up his fist.
More immediately, doctors and researchers believe figuring out how to grow working blood vessels might offer treatments for diseases that affect the circulatory system such as diabetes. Perhaps the right drug or injection could save patients' feet from amputation.
Putnam and his colleagues have revealed why one of the leading approaches to building blood vessels isn't consistently working: It's making leaky tubes. They also demonstrated how adult stem cells could solve this problem. A paper on the findings is published online in Tissue Engineering Part A, and will appear in a forthcoming print edition.
Today, biomedical researchers are taking two main approaches to growing new capillaries, the smallest blood vessels and those responsible for exchanging oxygen, carbon dioxide and nutrients between blood and muscles or organs.
One group of researchers is developing drug compounds that would signal existing vessels to branch into new tributaries. These compoundsgenerally protein growth factorsmimic how cancerous tumor cells recruit blood vessels.
The other group, which includes the U-M team, is using a cell-based method. This technique involves injecting cells within a scaffolding carrier near the spot where you want new capillaries to materialize. In Putnam's approach, they deliver endothelial cells, which make up the vessel lining and supporting cells. Their scaffolding carrier is fibrin, a protein in the human body that helps blood clot.
"The cells know what to do," Putnam said. "You can take these things and mix them and put them in an animal. Literally, it's as easy as a simple injection and over a few days, they spontaneously form new vessels and the animals' own vasculature connects to them."
But it turns out these vessels don't always thrive. The U-M team aimed to figure out why. In reading previously published findings, Putnam noticed that researchers used "a mishmash of support cells," and the field had paid little attention to which ones work best. So that's where he and his colleagues focused.
In their experiments, they mixed three recipes of blood vessel starter solutions, each with a different commonly used supporting cell type: lung fibroblasts, adult stem cells from fat and adult stem cells from bone marrow. They also made a version with no supporting cells at all. They injected each solution under the skin of mice, and allowed the new blood vessels to form over a period of two weeks. At various points in time, they injected a tracer dye into the animals' circulation to help them see how well the engineered capillaries held blood, and whether they were connected to the animals' existing vessel networks.
The researchers found that the solution with no support cells and the one with the lung fibroblasts produced immature, misshapen human capillaries that leaked. They could tell because the tracer dye pooled in the tissue around the new vessels. On the other hand, the solutions with both types of adult stem cells gave rise to robust human capillaries that kept blood and dye inside them.
The paper notes that one popular method biomedical engineers use to check the success of their effortscounting blood vesselsmight not be an ideal measure. The adult stem cell solutions produced fewer blood vessels than the others, in one case less than half. But the vessels they did build were stronger. And upon further analysis, the researchers found evidence that the adult stem cells may be able to differentiate into the kind of mature, smooth muscle cells that support larger blood vessels.
"The adult stem cells from fat and bone marrow both work equally well," Putnam said. "If we want to use this clinically in five to 10 years, I think it's crucial for the field to focus on a support cell that actually has some stem cell characteristics."
Down the road, Putnam envisions that doctors could get these support cells from individual patients themselveseither from their bone marrow or fatand then inject them near the site where the new blood vessels are needed.
###
The paper is titled, "Stromal Cell Identity Influences the In Vivo Functionality of Engineered Capillary Networks Formed by Co-delivery of Endothelial Cells and Stromal Cells." The research was funded by the National Institutes of Health (Grant Numbers R01-HL085339 and R01-HL085339-03).
Full text of paper: http://online.liebertpub.com/doi/pdf/10.1089/ten.tea.2012.0281
Andrew Putnam: http://www.sitemaker.umich.edu/cset/home
[ | 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.
Building better blood vessels could advance tissue engineeringPublic release date: 4-Apr-2013 [ | E-mail | Share ]
Contact: Nicole Casal Moore ncmoore@umich.edu 734-647-7087 University of Michigan
ANN ARBOROne of the major obstacles to growing new organsreplacement hearts, lungs and kidneysis the difficulty researchers face in building blood vessels that keep the tissues alive, but new findings from the University of Michigan could help overcome this roadblock.
"It's not just enough to make a piece of tissue that functions like your desired target," said Andrew Putnam, U-M associate professor of biomedical engineering. "If you don't nourish it with blood by vascularizing it, it's only going to be as big as the head of a pen.
"But we need a heart that's this big," he added, holding up his fist.
More immediately, doctors and researchers believe figuring out how to grow working blood vessels might offer treatments for diseases that affect the circulatory system such as diabetes. Perhaps the right drug or injection could save patients' feet from amputation.
Putnam and his colleagues have revealed why one of the leading approaches to building blood vessels isn't consistently working: It's making leaky tubes. They also demonstrated how adult stem cells could solve this problem. A paper on the findings is published online in Tissue Engineering Part A, and will appear in a forthcoming print edition.
Today, biomedical researchers are taking two main approaches to growing new capillaries, the smallest blood vessels and those responsible for exchanging oxygen, carbon dioxide and nutrients between blood and muscles or organs.
One group of researchers is developing drug compounds that would signal existing vessels to branch into new tributaries. These compoundsgenerally protein growth factorsmimic how cancerous tumor cells recruit blood vessels.
The other group, which includes the U-M team, is using a cell-based method. This technique involves injecting cells within a scaffolding carrier near the spot where you want new capillaries to materialize. In Putnam's approach, they deliver endothelial cells, which make up the vessel lining and supporting cells. Their scaffolding carrier is fibrin, a protein in the human body that helps blood clot.
"The cells know what to do," Putnam said. "You can take these things and mix them and put them in an animal. Literally, it's as easy as a simple injection and over a few days, they spontaneously form new vessels and the animals' own vasculature connects to them."
But it turns out these vessels don't always thrive. The U-M team aimed to figure out why. In reading previously published findings, Putnam noticed that researchers used "a mishmash of support cells," and the field had paid little attention to which ones work best. So that's where he and his colleagues focused.
In their experiments, they mixed three recipes of blood vessel starter solutions, each with a different commonly used supporting cell type: lung fibroblasts, adult stem cells from fat and adult stem cells from bone marrow. They also made a version with no supporting cells at all. They injected each solution under the skin of mice, and allowed the new blood vessels to form over a period of two weeks. At various points in time, they injected a tracer dye into the animals' circulation to help them see how well the engineered capillaries held blood, and whether they were connected to the animals' existing vessel networks.
The researchers found that the solution with no support cells and the one with the lung fibroblasts produced immature, misshapen human capillaries that leaked. They could tell because the tracer dye pooled in the tissue around the new vessels. On the other hand, the solutions with both types of adult stem cells gave rise to robust human capillaries that kept blood and dye inside them.
The paper notes that one popular method biomedical engineers use to check the success of their effortscounting blood vesselsmight not be an ideal measure. The adult stem cell solutions produced fewer blood vessels than the others, in one case less than half. But the vessels they did build were stronger. And upon further analysis, the researchers found evidence that the adult stem cells may be able to differentiate into the kind of mature, smooth muscle cells that support larger blood vessels.
"The adult stem cells from fat and bone marrow both work equally well," Putnam said. "If we want to use this clinically in five to 10 years, I think it's crucial for the field to focus on a support cell that actually has some stem cell characteristics."
Down the road, Putnam envisions that doctors could get these support cells from individual patients themselveseither from their bone marrow or fatand then inject them near the site where the new blood vessels are needed.
###
The paper is titled, "Stromal Cell Identity Influences the In Vivo Functionality of Engineered Capillary Networks Formed by Co-delivery of Endothelial Cells and Stromal Cells." The research was funded by the National Institutes of Health (Grant Numbers R01-HL085339 and R01-HL085339-03).
Full text of paper: http://online.liebertpub.com/doi/pdf/10.1089/ten.tea.2012.0281
Andrew Putnam: http://www.sitemaker.umich.edu/cset/home
[ | 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.
Yes, we are still dealing with the crushing blow that we'll have to wait until October to see Kimberly Pierce's adaptation of Stephen King's first book "Carrie," but that doesn't mean we can't still look forward to seeing Chloe Moretz go crazy while covered in blood, does it? No, of course we can be pumped [...]
Apr. 3, 2013 ? The international team running the Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer (AMS1) today announced the first results in its search for dark matter. The results, presented by AMS spokesperson Professor Samuel Ting in a seminar at CERN2, are to be published in the journal Physical Review Letters. They report the observation of an excess of positrons in the cosmic ray flux.
The AMS results are based on some 25 billion recorded events, including 400,000 positrons with energies between 0.5 GeV and 350 GeV, recorded over a year and a half. This represents the largest collection of antimatter particles recorded in space. The positron fraction increases from 10 GeV to 250 GeV, with the data showing the slope of the increase reducing by an order of magnitude over the range 20-250 GeV. The data also show no significant variation over time, or any preferred incoming direction. These results are consistent with the positrons originating from the annihilation of dark matter particles in space, but not yet sufficiently conclusive to rule out other explanations.
"As the most precise measurement of the cosmic ray positron flux to date, these results show clearly the power and capabilities of the AMS detector," said AMS spokesperson, Samuel Ting. "Over the coming months, AMS will be able to tell us conclusively whether these positrons are a signal for dark matter, or whether they have some other origin."
Cosmic rays are charged high-energy particles that permeate space. The AMS experiment, installed on the International Space Station, is designed to study them before they have a chance to interact with the Earth's atmosphere. An excess of antimatter within the cosmic ray flux was first observed around two decades ago. The origin of the excess, however, remains unexplained. One possibility, predicted by a theory known as supersymmetry, is that positrons could be produced when two particles of dark matter collide and annihilate. Assuming an isotropic distribution of dark matter particles, these theories predict the observations made by AMS. However, the AMS measurement can not yet rule out the alternative explanation that the positrons originate from pulsars distributed around the galactic plane. Supersymmetry theories also predict a cut-off at higher energies above the mass range of dark matter particles, and this has not yet been observed. Over the coming years, AMS will further refine the measurement's precision, and clarify the behaviour of the positron fraction at energies above 250 GeV.
"When you take a new precision instrument into a new regime, you tend to see many new results, and we hope this this will be the first of many," said Ting. "AMS is the first experiment to measure to 1% accuracy in space. It is this level of precision that will allow us to tell whether our current positron observation has a Dark Matter or pulsar origin."
Dark matter is one of the most important mysteries of physics today. Accounting for over a quarter of the universe's mass-energy balance, it can be observed indirectly through its interaction with visible matter but has yet to be directly detected. Searches for dark matter are carried out in space-borne experiments such as AMS, as well as on the Earth at the Large Hadron Collider and a range of experiments installed in deep underground laboratories.
"The AMS result is a great example of the complementarity of experiments on Earth and in space," said CERN Director General Rolf Heuer. "Working in tandem, I think we can be confident of a resolution to the dark matter enigma sometime in the next few years."
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The above story is reprinted from materials provided by CERN, the European Organization for Nuclear Research.
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Four years after pushing investors into one of the deepest financial holes in a century, the U.S. stock market is now powering ahead in one of the strongest bull markets in a half century.
So it?s no surprise many investors are wondering how much longer it can last.
Fueled by growing signs that the U.S. economy is finally repairing lingering damage from the Great Recession, stock prices have been making new highs for weeks.
On Thursday, the S&P 500 index closed at its highest level in history, after rising for 11 of the past 13 weeks. The Dow Jones industrial average, which tracks just 30 stocks, broke into record territory March 5 and has been setting new highs since. (Neither index, however, has reached a new high after adjusting for inflation.)
In the last 10 months, stocks have risen nearly 25 percent, as measured by the S&P 500 index. Since August, 2010, the broader Wilshire 5000 index has powered ahead by 50 percent ? a rally that?s created more than $6 trillion in wealth for U.S. households, corporations, pension funds and other institutional investors.
To some investors still shell-shocked from the 2008 financial collapse, it?s beginning to feel like October 2007 ? just before the bottom fell out. Or 2000, when the dot-com bubble popped.
Take a deep breath. Those worries are simply misplaced, according to none other than former Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan, who coined the now-famous phrase for the telltale sign that a stock market party is getting out of hand.
"'Irrational exuberance' is the last term I'd use to characterize what?s going on at the moment,? the retired central banker recently told CNBC. ?It's got a ways to go as far as I can see.?
To be sure, bull markets inevitably include sharp pullbacks, as some investors take profits or others have second thoughts about the rally's staying power.
But for now, the millions of investors who are pouring billions of dollars into the stock market every week seem to agree with The Maestro. Here?s why:
So what got this party started? Much like most market recoveries, the initial stage represented a snap back from one of the worst financial collapses since the Great Depression. Markets often act like a rubber band: If they get pulled too far in one direction, they tend to want to snap back to more ?normal? levels. The 2008 crash left stocks at deeply-depressed, bargain prices. But until the recovery was solidly in place, buyers had to be willing to bear the risk that the down cycle hadn't run its course.
In the last six months, the stock market rally has entered a new phase, driven largely by good news about the economy. The housing market has now bounced back sharply from the deepest recession in generations. Rising home prices have helped rebuild much of the multi-trillion dollar loss in household wealth that was obliterated by the collapse of 2008.
To be sure, it?s not all good news. The economy remains sluggish. Europe is struggling through a recession. The unemployment rate ? through steadily declining ? remains painfully high. Not all companies are taking part in the market rally.
Sorry: What makes stock prices go up and down again? In the short term, supply and demand ? just like a pair of Red Sox tickets on Stubhub. When there are more buyers than sellers, the price goes up. And vice versa.
Over the longer run, demand for a given company?s stock is driven largely by its prospects for becoming more profitable. As any Red Sox season ticket holder knows, there?s a lot more demand for unused Fenway seats when the team is on a roll than when they?re losing.
As profits go up, so do stock prices. But to make money, you?ve got to own the stock before the company announces higher earnings.
That?s why investors are buying now ? based on the belief that the recent improvement in the economy will continue this year and next.
?I don't think it's all that surprising that the stock market would rise, given that there has been increased optimism about the economy,? the current Fed chairman, Ben Bernanke, told reporters earlier this month. ?Profit increases have been substantial. And the relationship between stock prices and earnings is not particularly unusual at this point.?
But didn'tBernanke create this bubble by pumping trillions of dollars cash into the system? The Fed?s unprecedented, ongoing easy-money policy has certainty had a lot to do with the surge in stock prices.
Ultra-low interest rates have helped two ways. Cheap credit helps boost economic growth; the housing recovery would have taken a lot longer without record low mortgage rates. Ultra-low rates on safer investments like bonds also force investors looking for higher returns by turning to riskier investments like stocks.
It?s a premature to call this rally a bubble. The late-90s Internet craze ?went bubble? when investors began paying Gold Rush prices for companies with no profits whatsoever. They were betting ? based on wildly optimistic forecasts about future growth ? that profits would eventually kick in. But in the end, it turned out that launching the fourth-largest online shopping site targeting left-handed golfers wasn?t a winning business model after all.
Ironically, some of the trends underlying those 1990s forecasts - of a millennial boom in entirely new online products and services ? are now helping boost corporate profits today. In many cases the predictions were right. They were just 20 years too early.
OK.Butif the economy is still weak, where are all these profits coming from? One big source is workers? wages ? which have been falling, after adjusting for inflation. As business improves, more of that cash is heading straight to the corporate bottom line.
It?s not hard to see why. With unemployment still at 7.7 percent, few workers have leverage to demand a raise. Many companies have also been able to meet increased demand by asking their existing workers to put in more hours and check their email on weekends. Globalization continues to offer opportunities to outsource work to low-wage, overseas markets.
As the job market improves, and companies continue adding more full-time workers, that added profit may begin to slow. Higher health care costs could also take a bite. But for now, much of the revenue from new orders is flowing to the bottom line with little increase in labor costs.
Falling wages are only one of the tailwinds pushing profits ahead. Just as ultra-low interest rates have helped homeowners cut their monthly mortgage payments, companies have gotten a big break on borrowing costs. Those savings have helped boost the bottom lines of the companies in the S&P 500 index by some 4.5 percent, according to financial analyst Stephen Moore.
Moore figures lower corporate taxes ? which have fallen from about 30 percent of overall profits in the 1980s to around 20 percent today ? have added another 1 percent to profits.
We?d add to the list the ongoing savings from lower natural gas and electricity costs thanks to a boom in U.S. energy production.
So how long can all this last? The only honest answer: No one knows. Including your investment adviser.
The recent recovery from a period of deep, financial malaise, though, is reminiscent of the 1980s emergence from the Great Inflation that destroyed thousands of businesses, trillions of dollars in financial assets and shredded consumer and investor confidence.
Then, for a variety of reasons, the economic storm subsided. In what seemed like a matter of months, it was Morning in America. The resulting stock market rally, which began in August 1982, was one of the longest on record.
To be sure, the over-caffeinated bull briefly passed out when a heart-stopping crash lopped 23 percent off stock prices in a single session on October 19, 1987. Four months later, though, the bull was back on his feet for another 12-year stampede that lifted stocks nearly seven-fold before the tech bubble burst in March 2000.
This bull faces formidable hurdles in the months and years ahead. The ongoing debt crisis in Europe and, worse, the bumbling response of its leaders, could easily spoil the party. So could the inevitable day, probably not until next year, when the Fed starts raising interest rates back to more normal levels. The Washington budget battle over reforming unsustainable federal spending (a problem with no shortage of viable solutions) could also knock the bull off its feet.
And if the gains in corporate profits stall out, investors could quickly lose their appetite for stocks. Until that happens, though, this rally looks like the real thing.
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What?s cool? The Traveler is basically everything you need to capture everything you can about a given trip or excursion. The app lets you shoot photos and video, record audio, and even draw what you're seeing, in order to help you save anything from a trip that you want. You can even track your movements with your Android device's GPS capabilities and replay the paths later, syncing the things you record to it so you can see them in context, or watching the path played out in 3-D through Google Earth.
What?s it about? Starring Ubisoft's well-loved character, Rayman Jungle Run is a running title mixed with a platformer, challenging players to power through levels that include dodging hazards and helicoptering through the air.
Professional networking and profile startup Zerply is introducing two new features today to help its members better advertise their skills and to help employers better source candidates for open positions. Work Images allows users to attach an 800x600 pixel graphic or picture to specific activities and things they're working on, a feature designed to reflect the "pics or it didn't happen" mentality of Reddit and other sharing sites.
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Public release date: 4-Apr-2013
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