Feeling perky post-split? Liberty Ross proudly flaunted her body on the red carpet of the MOCA Awards in Beverly Hills on Wednesday, Nov. 6. The 35-year-old estranged wife of Rupert Sanders went braless in a see-through black dress that exposed her nipples.
Ross appeared to be in great spirits at the event, flashing a big smile to photographers while posing on the carpet. The model styled a short, sleeveless dress with a sheer black bodice and white-and-black printed skirt and black high-heels. The British mom of two also playfully posed in a pair of dark shades, which she later placed on the top of her head.
Ross recently opened up to Vanity Fair about life after her husband's public affair. The Snow White and the Huntsman director was caught cheating with the star of his movie, Kristen Stewart, on July 17, 2012.
"It was horrible," Ross told the December issue of the magazine. "It was really the worst, really the worst."
After filing for divorce from Sanders in January 2013, Ross, who is now dating music honcho Jimmy Iovine, said she's finally moving on. "I have no words to describe what we went through," she told Vanity Fair. "But I think, for me, something always has to completely die for there to be a rebirth. And, for me, I feel like I'm going through a rebirth."
Tricking algae's biological clock boosts production of drugs, biofuels
PUBLIC RELEASE DATE:
7-Nov-2013
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Contact: David Salisbury david.salisbury@vanderbilt.edu 615-343-6803 Vanderbilt University
Tricking algae's biological clock to remain in its daytime setting can dramatically boost the amount of valuable compounds that these simple marine plants can produce when they are grown in constant light.
That is the conclusion of a "proof of concept" experiment described in the Dec. 2 issue of the journal Current Biology. The study found that when the biological clocks of cyanobacteria (blue-green algae) were stopped in their daylight setting, the amount of several biomolecules that they were genetically altered to produce increased by as much as 700 percent when grown in constant light.
"We have shown that manipulating cyanobacteria's clock genes can increase its production of commercially valuable biomolecules," said Carl Johnson, Stevenson Professor of Biological Sciences at Vanderbilt University, who performed the study with collaborators at the J. Craig Venter Institute in Rockville, MD and Waseda University in Tokyo. "In the last 10 years, we have figured out how to stop the circadian clocks in most species of algae and in many higher plants as well, so the technique should have widespread applicability."
If it lives up to its promise, bioclock stopping could have significant economic benefits: Microalgae are used for a wide variety of commercial applications ranging from anti-cancer drugs to cosmetics to bioplastics to biofuels to neutraceuticals. In addition, biotech companies are currently rushing to set up "biofactories" that use microorganisms to create a wide variety of substances that are too difficult or expensive to synthesize using conventional chemical methods. Many of them are based on microorganisms that have biological clocks.
In 2004, Johnson was a member of the team that determined the molecular structure of a circadian clock protein for the first time. Subsequent work mapped the entire clock mechanism in cyanobacteria, which is the simplest bioclock found in nature. The researchers discovered that the clock consisted of three proteins: KaiA, KaiB and KaiC. Detailed knowledge of the clock's structure allowed them to determine how to switch the clock on and off.
In the current study, the researchers discovered that two components of the clock, KaiA and KaiC, act as switches that turn the cell's daytime and nighttime genes on and off. They have dubbed this "yin-yang" regulation. When KaiA is upregulated produced in larger amounts and KaiC is downregulated produced in smaller amounts then the 95 percent of cell's genes that are active during daylight are turned on, and the 5 percent of the cell's genes that operate during the night are turned off. However, when KaiC is upregulated and KaiA is downregulated then the day genes are turned off and the night genes are turned on.
"As a result, all we have to do to lock the biological clock into its daylight configuration is to genetically upregulate the expression of KaiA, which is a simple manipulation in the genetically malleable cyanobacteria," Johnson said.
To see what effects this capability has on the bacteria's ability to produce commercially important compounds, the researchers inserted a gene for human insulin in some of the cyanobacteria cells, a gene for a fluorescent protein (luciferase) in other cells and a gene for hydrogenase, an enzyme that produces hydrogen gas, in yet others. They found that the cells with the locked clocks produced 200 percent more hydrogenase, 500 percent more insulin and 700 percent more luciferase when grown in constant light than they did when the genes were inserted in cells with normally functioning clocks.
###
Coauthors of the study include Research Associate Professor Yao Xu, Postdoctoral Fellow Ximing Qin and Graduate Student Jing Xiong from Vanderbilt; Assistant Professor Philip Weyman and Group Leader Qing Xu from the J. Craig Venter Institute in Rockville, Md., and Graduate Student Miki Umetani and Professor Hideo Iwasaki at Waseda University in Tokyo.
The research was funded by National Institute of General Medical Sciences grants GM067152 and GM088595, Department of Energy grant DE-FG36-05GO15027, Japanese Society for the Promotion of Science grants 23657138 and 23687002, the Asahi Glass Foundation and the Yoshida Scholarship Foundation.
Visit Research News @ Vanderbilt for more research news from Vanderbilt. [Media Note: Vanderbilt has a 24/7 TV and radio studio with a dedicated fiber optic line and ISDN line. Use of the TV studio with Vanderbilt experts is free, except for reserving fiber time.]
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Tricking algae's biological clock boosts production of drugs, biofuels
PUBLIC RELEASE DATE:
7-Nov-2013
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Contact: David Salisbury david.salisbury@vanderbilt.edu 615-343-6803 Vanderbilt University
Tricking algae's biological clock to remain in its daytime setting can dramatically boost the amount of valuable compounds that these simple marine plants can produce when they are grown in constant light.
That is the conclusion of a "proof of concept" experiment described in the Dec. 2 issue of the journal Current Biology. The study found that when the biological clocks of cyanobacteria (blue-green algae) were stopped in their daylight setting, the amount of several biomolecules that they were genetically altered to produce increased by as much as 700 percent when grown in constant light.
"We have shown that manipulating cyanobacteria's clock genes can increase its production of commercially valuable biomolecules," said Carl Johnson, Stevenson Professor of Biological Sciences at Vanderbilt University, who performed the study with collaborators at the J. Craig Venter Institute in Rockville, MD and Waseda University in Tokyo. "In the last 10 years, we have figured out how to stop the circadian clocks in most species of algae and in many higher plants as well, so the technique should have widespread applicability."
If it lives up to its promise, bioclock stopping could have significant economic benefits: Microalgae are used for a wide variety of commercial applications ranging from anti-cancer drugs to cosmetics to bioplastics to biofuels to neutraceuticals. In addition, biotech companies are currently rushing to set up "biofactories" that use microorganisms to create a wide variety of substances that are too difficult or expensive to synthesize using conventional chemical methods. Many of them are based on microorganisms that have biological clocks.
In 2004, Johnson was a member of the team that determined the molecular structure of a circadian clock protein for the first time. Subsequent work mapped the entire clock mechanism in cyanobacteria, which is the simplest bioclock found in nature. The researchers discovered that the clock consisted of three proteins: KaiA, KaiB and KaiC. Detailed knowledge of the clock's structure allowed them to determine how to switch the clock on and off.
In the current study, the researchers discovered that two components of the clock, KaiA and KaiC, act as switches that turn the cell's daytime and nighttime genes on and off. They have dubbed this "yin-yang" regulation. When KaiA is upregulated produced in larger amounts and KaiC is downregulated produced in smaller amounts then the 95 percent of cell's genes that are active during daylight are turned on, and the 5 percent of the cell's genes that operate during the night are turned off. However, when KaiC is upregulated and KaiA is downregulated then the day genes are turned off and the night genes are turned on.
"As a result, all we have to do to lock the biological clock into its daylight configuration is to genetically upregulate the expression of KaiA, which is a simple manipulation in the genetically malleable cyanobacteria," Johnson said.
To see what effects this capability has on the bacteria's ability to produce commercially important compounds, the researchers inserted a gene for human insulin in some of the cyanobacteria cells, a gene for a fluorescent protein (luciferase) in other cells and a gene for hydrogenase, an enzyme that produces hydrogen gas, in yet others. They found that the cells with the locked clocks produced 200 percent more hydrogenase, 500 percent more insulin and 700 percent more luciferase when grown in constant light than they did when the genes were inserted in cells with normally functioning clocks.
###
Coauthors of the study include Research Associate Professor Yao Xu, Postdoctoral Fellow Ximing Qin and Graduate Student Jing Xiong from Vanderbilt; Assistant Professor Philip Weyman and Group Leader Qing Xu from the J. Craig Venter Institute in Rockville, Md., and Graduate Student Miki Umetani and Professor Hideo Iwasaki at Waseda University in Tokyo.
The research was funded by National Institute of General Medical Sciences grants GM067152 and GM088595, Department of Energy grant DE-FG36-05GO15027, Japanese Society for the Promotion of Science grants 23657138 and 23687002, the Asahi Glass Foundation and the Yoshida Scholarship Foundation.
Visit Research News @ Vanderbilt for more research news from Vanderbilt. [Media Note: Vanderbilt has a 24/7 TV and radio studio with a dedicated fiber optic line and ISDN line. Use of the TV studio with Vanderbilt experts is free, except for reserving fiber time.]
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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.
In the new RoboCop trailer, Samuel L. Jackson claims that the American public refuses to have robots patrolling the streets. But when this happens in real life we shouldn't reject it, because it could be a great thing.
Jennifer Aniston quietly revealed a new, considerably shorter hairstyle on Monday, Nov. 4, but people everywhere are buzzing about her dramatic makeover! Aniston's hair colorist, Michael Canale, told reporters more about her transformation.
The 44-year-old star's new style -- a messier version of the bob parted to the side and stopping at her jaw line -- was actually the result of a bad Brazillian blowout, Aniston revealed to Elle in an interview. "My hair did not react really well to it," Justin Theroux's fiancee said of the straightening treatment. She also told Vogue, "I'm always one of those girls who does a big old chop just to get it really healthy, to repair all the [damage from] hair coloring and stuff like that."
Therefore the challenges for Aniston's longtime colorist Canale (who, like stylist Chris McMillan, has been handling the Friends star's hair since her iconic "Rachel" days) were infusing Aniston's already chemically-damaged locks with a color that would revive it back to a healthy and glossy state, and finding an appropriate hue to complement her new cut.
Canale explains: "First, I had to remove the warm colors from the top section of her hair, and I really made a point to emphasize extra blonde around her face and along the sides, about a quarter inch in from the hairline so it blended fluently with the rest of her hair." Then the expert opted for a "baby blonde color as opposed to the sandy blonde color that she came in with" for two reasons: "To maintain felinity and accentuate her natural beauty," he says in the release.
Finally, the celebrity color guru added "paper-thin highlights all-over," which creates "a gorgeous, natural-looking sheen." Canale explains, "It also ensures you aren’t over-bleaching hair that’s already parched." And voila! Hot hair for one of the most high profile stars in the world. (See more photos of her new cut and color at x17online.)
The results seem to be working well for Aniston, who explained to Vogue, "I did it! I feel great. I feel lighter. It's simple, it's really simple, that's for sure."
NIH funds researchers using light to control and monitor neural activity
PUBLIC RELEASE DATE:
7-Nov-2013
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Contact: Traci Peterson tpeterso@uta.edu 817-521-5494 University of Texas at Arlington
University of Texas at Arlington researchers are exploring a better method for initiating certain gene therapies that could better fight the sight-deteriorating disease retinitis pigmentosa.
The National Institutes of Health is funding the research.
Samarendra Mohanty, assistant professor of physics, expects to receive a total of $384,269 over the next two years from the NIH's National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke. His work involves using a near-infrared ultrafast laser beam to deliver genes that allow expression of light-sensitive proteins, called opsins, in specific cells. That proteins' expression allows researchers to influence neural activity through optical or light stimulation a technique known as optogenetics.
In the past, the genes have been delivered to cells by virus. That method can have drawbacks, such as immune responses, in addition to the benefits. In Mohanty's method, a laser beam creates a transient sub-micrometer size hole, which allows for the gene encoding the proteins to permeate through the cell membrane. It can limit the risk of immune response, as well as delivering larger genes than viral methods, he said.
Digant Dave, UT Arlington associate professor of bioengineering at UT Arlington, is the co-investigator on the new grant.
"Our minimally invasive near-infrared method can deliver DNA and other impermeable molecules effectively where you want it and only where you want it," said Mohanty. "For example, in retinitis pigmentosa, only peripheral retina begins to lose light sensitivity due to loss of photoreceptors. This is where a laser can deliver the genes, making those neurons respond to light again. With a virus, the genes will be delivered everywhere, causing complications in areas already working fine."
Optogenetic stimulation also holds promise for influencing neurons in the brain. Scientists, including Mohanty's research group, are researching ways it could be used to understand how the brain works or to intervene in case of neurological disorders or to affect behavior.
Ultimately, Mohanty's team has a goal of creating all optical, or light-based, control and monitoring of cell activity. So, in addition to the light-assisted delivery of genes, the researchers also will work on refining methods for stimulating the neural activity using near-infrared and visible light. Some of those methods are described in a recently published paper called "Fiber-optic two-photon optogenetic stimulation," which appeared in the journal Optics Letters.
Mohanty's lab at UT Arlington also will use a method called phase-sensitive interferometry, to monitor the changes in neurons that result from the activation by light. The interferometry method is called "label-free" because unlike fluorescence, it uses the change in behavior of light rays, rather than staining, to track changes at the sub-nanometer level.
"Dr. Mohanty's proven track record of exploration in the area of optogenetics has earned him this support from the National Institutes of Health," said Alex Weiss, chairman of the College of Science's physics department. "We are pleased to see this promising research supported and look forward to seeing the exciting research findings that this support will make possible."
###
The University of Texas at Arlington is a comprehensive institution of more than 33,300 students and more than 2,200 faculty members in the heart of North Texas. It is the second largest school in The University of Texas System. Visit http://www.uta.edu to learn more.
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NIH funds researchers using light to control and monitor neural activity
PUBLIC RELEASE DATE:
7-Nov-2013
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Contact: Traci Peterson tpeterso@uta.edu 817-521-5494 University of Texas at Arlington
University of Texas at Arlington researchers are exploring a better method for initiating certain gene therapies that could better fight the sight-deteriorating disease retinitis pigmentosa.
The National Institutes of Health is funding the research.
Samarendra Mohanty, assistant professor of physics, expects to receive a total of $384,269 over the next two years from the NIH's National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke. His work involves using a near-infrared ultrafast laser beam to deliver genes that allow expression of light-sensitive proteins, called opsins, in specific cells. That proteins' expression allows researchers to influence neural activity through optical or light stimulation a technique known as optogenetics.
In the past, the genes have been delivered to cells by virus. That method can have drawbacks, such as immune responses, in addition to the benefits. In Mohanty's method, a laser beam creates a transient sub-micrometer size hole, which allows for the gene encoding the proteins to permeate through the cell membrane. It can limit the risk of immune response, as well as delivering larger genes than viral methods, he said.
Digant Dave, UT Arlington associate professor of bioengineering at UT Arlington, is the co-investigator on the new grant.
"Our minimally invasive near-infrared method can deliver DNA and other impermeable molecules effectively where you want it and only where you want it," said Mohanty. "For example, in retinitis pigmentosa, only peripheral retina begins to lose light sensitivity due to loss of photoreceptors. This is where a laser can deliver the genes, making those neurons respond to light again. With a virus, the genes will be delivered everywhere, causing complications in areas already working fine."
Optogenetic stimulation also holds promise for influencing neurons in the brain. Scientists, including Mohanty's research group, are researching ways it could be used to understand how the brain works or to intervene in case of neurological disorders or to affect behavior.
Ultimately, Mohanty's team has a goal of creating all optical, or light-based, control and monitoring of cell activity. So, in addition to the light-assisted delivery of genes, the researchers also will work on refining methods for stimulating the neural activity using near-infrared and visible light. Some of those methods are described in a recently published paper called "Fiber-optic two-photon optogenetic stimulation," which appeared in the journal Optics Letters.
Mohanty's lab at UT Arlington also will use a method called phase-sensitive interferometry, to monitor the changes in neurons that result from the activation by light. The interferometry method is called "label-free" because unlike fluorescence, it uses the change in behavior of light rays, rather than staining, to track changes at the sub-nanometer level.
"Dr. Mohanty's proven track record of exploration in the area of optogenetics has earned him this support from the National Institutes of Health," said Alex Weiss, chairman of the College of Science's physics department. "We are pleased to see this promising research supported and look forward to seeing the exciting research findings that this support will make possible."
###
The University of Texas at Arlington is a comprehensive institution of more than 33,300 students and more than 2,200 faculty members in the heart of North Texas. It is the second largest school in The University of Texas System. Visit http://www.uta.edu to learn more.
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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.
iCloud Keychain is a nifty feature built right into iOS 7 that allows you to not only save and generate passwords, but to securely store credit card information for easy access. Here's how to manually add a credit card number to iCloud Keychain for use later:
Launch the Settings app from the Home screen of your iPhone or iPad.
Scroll down and tap on Safari.
Under the first section labeled General, tap on Passwords & AutoFill.
At the very bottom, make sure the Credit Cards option is turned to On and then tap on Saved Credit Cards directly beneath it.
Now tap on Add Credit Card.
Enter the credit card information and then tap Done in the upper right hand corner.
That's all there is to it! iCloud Keychain will now remember that information and sync it across all your iOS and OS X compatible devices. iCloud Keychain is far from perfect but it does make for a convenient way to autofill credit card information and store it for reference, if you trust it that is.
What about you? Do you trust iCloud Keychain with your credit card information or are you not yet convinced the cloud is the right place for it?
The U.S. Congress should take action to slow a skyrocketing number of "deceptive" patent infringement demand letters sent from patent licensing firms to small businesses, witnesses told a Senate committee.
During the past 18 months, PAEs (patent assertion entities), those firms with patent licensing as their primary business model, have been flooding U.S. businesses with letters alleging patent infringement, threatening lawsuits and demanding settlements in the tens of thousands of dollars, witnesses told the consumer protection subcommittee of the U.S. Senate Commerce, Science, and Transportation Committee Thursday.
In many cases, the patent demand letters have accused recipients of infringing "every-day technology" such as online shopping carts and Wi-Fi routers, said Julie Samuels, a senior staff attorney at the Electric Frontier Foundation. "These letters really had nothing to do with patent law," she said. "They merely used the guise of patent law to conduct, frankly, run-of-the-mill extortion."
The PAE demand letters often don't identity the owner of the patent or the patent the letter recipient is alleged to have infringed, said Mark Chandler, general counsel at Cisco Systems. Some PAEs are "charlatans, dressed up as innovators," he said.
"This is all about fraud," said Jon Bruning, attorney general in Nebraska. "This is about extortion. This is about fear. For little companies ... it's their life or death. For some guy who invested his last $100,000, this letter will take him down."
Chandler called on Congress to take action to rein in PAEs, often called patent trolls. Congress should require PAEs that send more than 10 demand letters to submit those letters to a proposed online registry run by the U.S. Federal Trade Commission, and lawmakers should require PAEs to identity the alleged infringing technology in the letters, he said.
PAEs should also be required to disclose the names of the patent owners and to disclose all previous licensing agreements covering the patents, including any commitments to license the patents on fair and reasonable terms, he said.
No PAEs appeared at the hearing, but some committee Republicans and witness Adam Mossoff, an intellectual property professor at the George Mason University School of Law, questioned the need for changes in patent law. Complaints about PAE demand letters are "anecdotal," Mossoff said, and there's little evidence of major harms to innovation or to consumers.
Patent licensing is a legitimate business that's been around for over a century in a U.S. patent system that has helped create a huge innovation-based economy, Mossoff added. "Systemic changes to the patent system should not be based on rhetoric, anecdotes, invalid studies and incorrect claims about the historical and economic significance of patent licensing," he said. "If there ever was a case where caution was called for, this is it."
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