Home-cooking lures Palestinian expat home

With everything from chickens and rabbits to cashews and apricots out back, Mazen Saadeh is part restaurateur, part survivalist.

?I think the world is going very fast to hell and I want to be safe and find something to eat when the shelves will be empty,? says Mr. Saadeh, a Palestinian novelist and filmmaker who lived in Vienna, Paris, and Iowa before returning home to the West Bank several years ago. ?If any war happens between the US and any countries, or Israel and Iran, it means the price of bread [will be] minimum $100.?

Then he adds that he doesn?t like bread.

That?s a pity, because the crusty loaves that come out of his outdoor oven and are served up on the porch of his renovated 1944 farmhouse are as delicious as the sunset colors that spread out over the valley below.

Inside, blinking red Christmas lights adorn the main dining space, which is further furnished with a guitar, poster of Hugo Ch?vez, accordion, chess set, and an African drum.

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He hadn?t been planning on coming back here; he and his wife, Julia, had found an old house in Portland, Ore., and were planning on converting it into a weekend restaurant. But at the last minute he felt the pull of his native land. He told her, ?No, khalas [enough], let?s go back to Palestine.?

The mayor of Bir Zeit, a university town near Ramallah, offered him a restaurant property he couldn?t refuse. But Julia apparently didn?t feel the same draw.

?So now she is making wine in Portland and I am making wine in the West Bank,? he says matter-of-factly, fiddling with his Apple computer.

Business was so great in Bir Zeit that he decided to open a second restaurant here in Beit Jala. But the drive between the two properties, which would take 45 minutes or less if he were allowed to drive on Israeli roads, consumes two hours each way and it became untenable to manage both properties. So he shut down the Bir Zeit restaurant, his ?favorite baby,? and is now putting everything into this property, where he has established a Palestinian-style locavore restaurant. He has seven employees, all university students ? ?now there are seven families [making a] living,? he says ? and a handful of volunteers that come from as far away as Hungary.

As the last rays of sunlight grace the tops of his fruit and olive trees, he heads outside and pads down the rocky path, bending over his peas and tomatoes, and wagging a finger at the small swimming pool that he is renovating for carp ? right next to a larger one that local elders remember using as kids.

Evening prayers echo across the valley, mingling with the sound of silverware tinkling in the outdoor kitchen as the minutiae of daily life makes itself heard amid the strains of religion and politics in this storied land.

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Source: http://news.yahoo.com/home-cooking-lures-palestinian-expat-home-162142032.html

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Violent birth of neutron stars: Computer simulations confirm sloshing and spiral motions as stellar matter falls inward

June 27, 2013 ? A team of researchers at the Max Planck Institute for Astrophysics conducted the most expensive and most elaborate computer simulations so far to study the formation of neutron stars at the center of collapsing stars with unprecedented accuracy. These worldwide first three-dimensional models with a detailed treatment of all important physical effects confirm that extremely violent, hugely asymmetric sloshing and spiral motions occur when the stellar matter falls towards the center. The results of the simulations thus lend support to basic perceptions of the dynamical processes that are involved when a star explodes as supernova.

Stars with more than eight to ten times the mass of our Sun end their lives in a gigantic explosion, in which the stellar gas is expelled into the surrounding space with enormous power. Such supernovae belong to the most energetic and brightest phenomena in the universe and can outshine a whole galaxy for weeks. They are the cosmic origin of chemical elements like carbon, oxygen, silicon, and iron, of which Earth and our bodies are made of, and which are bred in massive stars over millions of years or freshly fused in the stellar explosion.

Supernovae are also the birth places of neutron stars, those extraordinarily exotic, compact stellar remnants, in which about 1.5 times the mass of our Sun is compressed to a sphere with the diameter of Munich. This happens within fractions of a second when the stellar core implodes due to the strong gravity of its own mass. The catastrophic collapse is stopped only when the density of atomic nuclei -- gargantuan 300 million tons in a sugar cube -- is exceeded.

What, however, causes the disruption of the star? How can the implosion of the stellar core be reversed to an explosion? The exact processes are still a matter of intense research. According to the most widely favored scenario, neutrinos, mysterious elementary particles, play a crucial role. These neutrinos are produced and radiated in tremendous numbers at the extreme temperatures and densities in the collapsing stellar core and nascent neutron star. Like the thermal radiation of a heater they heat the gas surrounding the hot neutron star and thus could "ignite" the explosion. In this scenario the neutrinos pump energy into the stellar gas and build up pressure until a shock wave is accelerated to disrupt the star in a supernova. But does this theoretical idea really work? Is it the explanation of the still enigmatic mechanism driving the explosion?

Unfortunately (or luckily!) the processes in the center of exploding stars cannot be reproduced in the laboratory and many solar masses of intransparent stellar gas obscure our view into the deep interior of supernovae. Research is therefore strongly dependent on most sophisticated and challenging computer simulations, in which the complex mathematical equations are solved that describe the motion of the stellar gas and the physical processes that occur at the extreme conditions in the collapsing stellar core. For this task the most powerful existing supercomputers are used, but still it has been possible to conduct such calculations only with radical and crude simplifications until recently. If, for example, the crucial effects of neutrinos were included in some detailed treatment, the computer simulations could only be performed in two dimensions, which means that the star in the models was assumed to have an artificial rotational symmetry around an axis.

Thanks to support from the Rechenzentrum Garching (RZG) in developing a particularly efficient and fast computer program, access to most powerful supercomputers, and a computer time award of nearly 150 million processor hours, which is the greatest contingent so far granted by the "Partnership for Advanced Computing in Europe (PRACE)" initiative of the European Union, the team of researchers at the Max Planck Institute for Astrophysics (MPA) in Garching could now for the first time simulate the processes in collapsing stars in three dimensions and with a sophisticated description of all relevant physics.

"For this purpose we used nearly 16,000 processor cores in parallel mode, but still a single model run took about 4.5 months of continuous computing," says PhD student Florian Hanke, who performed the simulations. Only two computing centers in Europe were able to provide sufficiently powerful machines for such long periods of time, namely CURIE at Tr?s Grand Centre de calcul (TGCC) du CEA near Paris and SuperMUC at the Leibniz-Rechenzentrum (LRZ) in Munich/Garching.

Many Terabytes of simulation data (1 Terabyte are thousand billion bytes) had to be analysed and visualized before the researchers could grasp the essence of their model runs. What they saw caused excitement as well as astonishment. The stellar gas did not only exhibit the violent bubbling and seething with the characteristic rising mushroom-like plumes driven by neutrino heating in close similarity to what can be observed in boiling water. (This process is called convection.) The scientists also found powerful, large sloshing motions, which temporarily switch over to rapid, strong rotational motions. Such a behavior had been known before and had been named "Standing Accretion Shock Instability," or SASI. This term expresses the fact that the initial sphericity of the supernova shock wave is spontaneously broken, because the shock develops large-amplitude, pulsating asymmetries by the oscillatory growth of initially small, random seed perturbations. So far, however, this had been found only in simplified and incomplete model simulations.

"My colleague Thierry Foglizzo at the Service d' Astrophysique des CEA-Saclay near Paris has obtained a detailed understanding of the growth conditions of this instability," explains Hans-Thomas Janka, the head of the research team. "He has constructed an experiment, in which a hydraulic jump in a circular water flow exhibits pulsational asymmetries in close analogy to the shock front in the collapsing matter of the supernova core." This phenomenon was named "SWASI" ("Shallow Water Analogue of Shock Instability") and allows one to demonstrate dynamical processes in the deep interior of a dying star by a relatively simple and inexpensive experimental setup of table size, of course without accounting for the important effects of neutrino heating. For this reason many astrophysicists had been sceptical that this instability indeed occurs in collapsing stars.

The Garching team could now demonstrate for the first time unambiguously that the SASI also plays an important role in the so far most realistic computer models. "It does not only govern the mass motions in the supernova core but it also imposes characteristic signatures on the neutrino and gravitational-wave emission, which will be measurable for a future Galactic supernova. Moreover, it may lead to strong asymmetries of the stellar explosion, in course of which the newly formed neutron star will receive a large kick and spin," describes team member Bernhard M?ller the most significant consequences of such dynamical processes in the supernova core.

The researchers now plan to explore in more detail the measurable effects connected to the SASI and to sharpen their predictions of associated signals. Moreover, they plan to perform more and longer simulations to understand how the instability acts together with neutrino heating and enhances the efficiency of the latter. The goal is to ultimately clarify whether this conspiracy is the long-searched mechanism that triggers the supernova explosion and thus leaves behind the neutron star as compact remnant.

Source: http://feeds.sciencedaily.com/~r/sciencedaily/top_news/top_technology/~3/xulUjZRJoLM/130627083034.htm

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Woods hopes he is fully healthy for the next major

Tiger Woods, right, smiles as he stands next to PGA Tour Commissioner Tim Finchem, left, before an opening ceremony at the AT&T National Golf tournament, Wednesday, July 26, 2013, in Bethesda, Md. Woods will not play in the tournament because of a left elbow strain. (AP Photo/Nick Wass)

Tiger Woods, right, smiles as he stands next to PGA Tour Commissioner Tim Finchem, left, before an opening ceremony at the AT&T National Golf tournament, Wednesday, July 26, 2013, in Bethesda, Md. Woods will not play in the tournament because of a left elbow strain. (AP Photo/Nick Wass)

Tiger Woods reacts at a press conference at the AT&T National Golf tournament, Wednesday, July 26, 2013, in Bethesda, Md. Woods will not play in the tournament. (AP Photo/Nick Wass)

Tiger Woods speaks at a press conference at the AT&T National Golf tournament, Wednesday, July 26, 2013, in Bethesda, Md. Woods will not play in the tournament. (AP Photo/Nick Wass)

Tiger Woods speaks at a press conference at the AT&T National Golf tournament, Wednesday, July 26, 2013, in Bethesda, Md. Woods will not play in the tournament because of a left elbow strain.(AP Photo/Nick Wass)

BETHESDA, Md. (AP) ? Tiger Woods can't say whether his left elbow will be fully healed in time for the British Open, only that it will be "good enough."

Woods returned to the AT&T National on Wednesday as the defending champion only in name.

Doctors have recommended that he sit out this week at Congressional, along with next week at The Greenbrier, because of a left elbow strain that has been bothering him for more a month and was made worse by hacking out of the dense U.S. Open rough at Merion.

"I pushed it pretty good at the Open to play it and to play through it," Woods said. "Made it worse by hitting the ball out of the rough, and eventually got a point where I wasn't able to play here. We're treating it, and eventually I'll start the strengthening process, then starting hitting balls to get up to speed for the British."

The British Open is July 18-21 at Muirfield, and Woods could not say that he would be at 100 percent by then.

"How about ... good enough," he said.

There was no visible evidence of an elbow injury until he began dangling his left arm and flexing his wrist after hitting out of the rough at Merion in the opening round. He eventually said he first hurt it during The Players Championship, which he won on May 12, but he did not mention a specific shot or even a round.

On Wednesday, he said it wasn't a single shot.

"It was just playing there, and it didn't feel good then early in the week, but I pushed through it," Woods said. "It progressively just got worse. Got to a point where I was starting to struggle a little bit."

Woods still played the Memorial in the month between The Players Championship and the U.S. Open, which he conceded might have been a mistake. Woods was the defending champion and a five-time winner at Muirfield Village, so it was shocking when he turned in a 44 on the back nine ? the highest 9-hole score of his PGA Tour career ? and wound up 20 shots out of the lead. That was his largest deficit in a full-field tournament.

Asked if he should have sat out the Memorial, Woods said, "It would have been better, yes."

"I wouldn't necessarily say regret," Woods said. "I wish I would have played better so I didn't have so many shots I had to hit."

Woods had won three out of four tournaments going into the Memorial ? the exception was a tie for fourth in the Masters. In the two tournaments after The Players Championship, he finished a combined 32 shots out of the lead with a scoring average of 73.6. That includes his score of 293 at Merion, his worst ever in the U.S. Open.

He is treating the injury with electrical stimulation, ice, soft tissue treatment and anti-inflammatories to help with the swelling.

"Eventually, as I said, I'll start the strengthening process here," he said. "Hopefully, that will be sooner than later, and then start hitting balls."

Woods already has won four times this year, twice as many as anyone else, and he has established a comfortable margin again at No. 1 in the world. He still remains stuck on 14 majors dating to the 2008 U.S. Open at Torrey Pines, which he won despite shredded knee ligaments and a double stress fracture in his lower left leg.

Now 37, Woods has to cope with injuries at an alarming rate.

He had reconstructive surgery on his left knee after his U.S. Open win. He withdrew from The Players Championship in consecutive years, with a sore neck in 2010 and after only nine holes in 2011 with Achilles tendon and other injuries in his left leg that forced him to miss two majors.

Woods said he has been dealing with injuries much longer.

"I played with a lot in my early 20s and no one ever knew about it," he said. "I just didn't play in certain tournaments. I took a few weeks off here and there, and that was the end of it. But I played a few events where I really shouldn't have played, and it caused some damage. There's a difference between being hurt and being injured. It's a delicate balance. I know what it's like to play both, unfortunately.

"You can play hurt," he said. "But playing injured, it can sideline you for a while."

Woods attended the opening ceremonies at the AT&T National, which benefits his foundation, and then he did a couple of interviews. The biggest pain Wednesday was not being able to play Congressional, which has hosted four major championships and presents as strong as test as the PGA Tour offers all year.

"Looks like the golf course is in fantastic shape," he said. "It's green. It's lush. It's thick. Temperature is up. It's going to present a hell of a test for the guys. I'll be watching."

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/347875155d53465d95cec892aeb06419/Article_2013-06-26-ATandT%20National-Woods/id-295444972ee148b18d2672a163bdd777

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Traffic congestion charges: Prices are more effective than restrictions

Public release date: 26-Jun-2013
[ | E-mail | Share ]

Contact: Jorge Bonilla Londo?o
jorge.bonilla@economics.gu.se
University of Gothenburg

The citizens of Gothenburg, Sweden will vote soon on whether to continue the already up-and-running congestion charge. New research from the University of Gothenburg, Sweden, shows that congestion charges are indeed a better way to reduce traffic and improve air quality.

The doctoral thesis from the School of Business, Economics and Law shows that in Bogota, Colombia drastic driving restrictions have not been effective, while congestion charges besides cutting traffic, as it has happened in Stockholm, may be also used to achieve the European air quality goals.

Jorge Bonilla's dissertation research focused on the economics of air quality control. One of his studies evaluated the effectiveness of the driving restriction program 'Pico y Placa' implemented in Bogota to reduce congestion and air pollution. The program consists of rationing car use at certain times of the day based on license plate numbers, which has become a popular policy in developing countries. It is low-tech and less expensive to execute.

Dr. Bonilla's research showed that despite an initial improvement in air quality for some periods of the day, pollution and vehicle use did not decrease in the long run. In fact, there is evidence of increased carbon monoxide concentrations during drastic restrictions.

'Vehicle ownership and driving increased in response to driving restrictions as drivers adapted to the phased-in program. People with economic resources acquired a second car.

Low-income people woke up earlier to drive before the restrictions started in the peak hours. In contrast, gasoline consumption in Bogota decreased in response to increasing gasoline taxes, suggesting that market mechanisms may be more effective than driving restrictions.' Jorge Bonilla says.

In one of his other studies, Jorge Bonilla and his co-researchers propose an adjustment to the congestion charge systems in Sweden and elsewhere to achieve air quality regulation. Most congestion charges currently in use incorporate price bans to mitigate congestion; however harmful concentrations are still exceeded in several occasions. Road pricing might also be temporally differentiated in order to harmonize with nature's ability to cleanse itself and so comply European regulation. That is, a higher charge will be expected in periods when the environment is restricted to dilute pollutants. If congestion charges are allowed to vary with the capacity of nature to handle pollution, then they may reduce not only global warming but also the dangerous health effects of urban air pollutants.

###

(Read more here: http://www.economics.handels.gu.se/english/Units+and+Centra/environmental-economics/about-eeu/news---press/news_+och+_events/detail//variable-congestion-charges-may-yield-more-stable-air-quality-and-improved-health-.cid1128785)

The thesis was written with support from Sida's environmental economics capacity-building programme.

Thesis title: Essays on the Economics of Air Quality Control

Link to the thesis: https://gupea.ub.gu.se/handle/2077/32864

The thesis was presented on 11 June 2013.

For more information, please contact:

Jorge Bonilla Londoo,
+46 (0)31 786 52 52,
jorge.bonilla@economics.gu.se

---

[ | E-mail | Share ]

?

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

Public release date: 26-Jun-2013
[ | E-mail | Share ]

Contact: Jorge Bonilla Londo?o
jorge.bonilla@economics.gu.se
University of Gothenburg

The citizens of Gothenburg, Sweden will vote soon on whether to continue the already up-and-running congestion charge. New research from the University of Gothenburg, Sweden, shows that congestion charges are indeed a better way to reduce traffic and improve air quality.

The doctoral thesis from the School of Business, Economics and Law shows that in Bogota, Colombia drastic driving restrictions have not been effective, while congestion charges besides cutting traffic, as it has happened in Stockholm, may be also used to achieve the European air quality goals.

Jorge Bonilla's dissertation research focused on the economics of air quality control. One of his studies evaluated the effectiveness of the driving restriction program 'Pico y Placa' implemented in Bogota to reduce congestion and air pollution. The program consists of rationing car use at certain times of the day based on license plate numbers, which has become a popular policy in developing countries. It is low-tech and less expensive to execute.

Dr. Bonilla's research showed that despite an initial improvement in air quality for some periods of the day, pollution and vehicle use did not decrease in the long run. In fact, there is evidence of increased carbon monoxide concentrations during drastic restrictions.

'Vehicle ownership and driving increased in response to driving restrictions as drivers adapted to the phased-in program. People with economic resources acquired a second car.

Low-income people woke up earlier to drive before the restrictions started in the peak hours. In contrast, gasoline consumption in Bogota decreased in response to increasing gasoline taxes, suggesting that market mechanisms may be more effective than driving restrictions.' Jorge Bonilla says.

In one of his other studies, Jorge Bonilla and his co-researchers propose an adjustment to the congestion charge systems in Sweden and elsewhere to achieve air quality regulation. Most congestion charges currently in use incorporate price bans to mitigate congestion; however harmful concentrations are still exceeded in several occasions. Road pricing might also be temporally differentiated in order to harmonize with nature's ability to cleanse itself and so comply European regulation. That is, a higher charge will be expected in periods when the environment is restricted to dilute pollutants. If congestion charges are allowed to vary with the capacity of nature to handle pollution, then they may reduce not only global warming but also the dangerous health effects of urban air pollutants.

###

(Read more here: http://www.economics.handels.gu.se/english/Units+and+Centra/environmental-economics/about-eeu/news---press/news_+och+_events/detail//variable-congestion-charges-may-yield-more-stable-air-quality-and-improved-health-.cid1128785)

The thesis was written with support from Sida's environmental economics capacity-building programme.

Thesis title: Essays on the Economics of Air Quality Control

Link to the thesis: https://gupea.ub.gu.se/handle/2077/32864

The thesis was presented on 11 June 2013.

For more information, please contact:

Jorge Bonilla Londoo,
+46 (0)31 786 52 52,
jorge.bonilla@economics.gu.se

---

[ | E-mail | Share ]

?

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

Source: http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2013-06/uog-tcc062613.php

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Libya: new era in enterprise communications - IT News Africa

Aastra, a leading company at the forefront of the enterprise communication market, organized together with its regional distributor Tawasol and Aastra?s local representative and system integrator Dolphin Telecom a technology update conference for customers in Libya.

Technology companies in Libya recently convened to discuss the theme 'a new era in enterprise communications'. (Image source: Google/jonarnold-analyst.blogspot.com)

This is Aastra?s first event in Libya after its acquisition of Ericsson?s enterprise business and one of the largest of its kind in the region. Under the title ?A new Era in Enterprise Communications?, this event, which was hosted in the Radisson Blu hotel, Tripoli on June 19, gathered more than 120 participants from major industries like Oil & Gas, Government, Hospitality and Banking.

The opening session was held by Mr. Mohamad Al Faqih, General Manager of Dolphin Telecom and the keynote speech was held by Dr. Roger Hage, Vice President Aastra Middle East and Africa.

The seminar covered a market update as well as latest trends in enterprise communications. Topics like technology transformation, unified communications & collaboration, multimedia contact centres, enterprise mobility and HD video telephony & conferencing were presented and discussed.

Aastra demonstrated live its latest solutions including the MX-ONE Telephony Server and BluStar Video Telephony & Conferencing solution.

?I was overwhelmed by the large number of participants and their interest and active participation in this seminar. We saw a big interest among large enterprise customers in modernizing their voice networks by transforming their technology step-by-step? says Marcus Junthe?, head of product management at Aastra Middle East & Africa, who presented the latest products.

Junthe? concludes: ?This event is part of our commitment in helping enterprises in Libya communicate more efficiently and cope with the challenges and opportunities brought forward by the new technological developments.?

Staff Writer

Source: http://www.itnewsafrica.com/2013/06/libya-new-era-in-enterprise-communications/

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Intel Spinoff GainSpan Closes On $19M In Series D Funding For Its WiFi Chip Technology

GainSpan, the semiconductor company that deals in ultra low-power Wi-Fi technology, has closed on $19 million in a new funding round. The round, which first started gathering steam in 2012 and appears to have closed at about $1 million less than the company had initially sought, serves as GainSpan's Series D and brings its total investment to around $75 million. This investment included the participation of two new investors -- Zebra Technologies Corporation and Oplink Communications -- and a slate of previous investors including Opus Capital, Intel Capital, New Venture Partners, Sigma Partners, Camp Ventures and Hatteras Funds. GainSpan's last funding round was an $18 million Series C that closed in December 2011.

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Techcrunch/~3/14qbRCmzgxY/

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Perry talks Russell Brand, John Mayer with Vogue

NEW YORK (AP) ? Katy Perry 'goes there' with Vogue about two of her high-profile relationships, as the magazine's July cover story.

The singer says of ex-husband Russell Brand that she "was in love with him when I married him" in 2010. She also adds that she hasn't heard from the comedian since Brand texted her on New Year's Eve of 2011 to say he wanted a divorce, about 14 months later.

She also goes on to say she blamed herself for their breakup until she "found out the real truth" which she "can't necessarily disclose."

Perry also opens up to Vogue about her on-again-off-again relationship with John Mayer saying she "was madly in love with him" and still is. She also says he has a "beautiful mind" and a "tortured soul."

The July issue of Vogue goes on sale June 25.

___

Online:

http://www.vogue.com/

___

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/perry-talks-russell-brand-john-mayer-vogue-040654210.html

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