FILE - This July 28, 2013 file photo shows singer Katy Perry at the world premiere of "The Smurfs 2" in Los Angeles. Perry says though she’s “older and wiser,” she still plans to have fun on her new album. During an interview with an Australian radio show this week, the pop star said she sang backing vocals for Mick Jagger’s 2004 song, “Old Habits Die Hard.” Perry said she had dinner with the veteran rocker and that “he hit on me when I was 18.” In a statement Thursday, Oct. 31, a representative for Jagger says he “categorically denies that he has ever made a pass at Katy Perry.” (Photo by Jordan Strauss/Invision/AP, File)
NEW YORK (AP) — In her teenage dream? Mick Jagger says he never hit on Katy Perry when she was 18.
During an interview with an Australian radio show this week, the pop star said she sang backing vocals for Jagger's 2004 song "Old Habits Die Hard." Perry said she had dinner with the veteran rocker and that "he hit on me when I was 18."
In a statement Thursday, a representative for Jagger says he "categorically denies that he has ever made a pass at Katy Perry." The rep adds: "Perhaps she is confusing him with someone else."
Perry was one of the singers to make a guest appearance on the Rolling Stones' tour this year. The 29-year-old singer also said in the interview that the 70-year-old Jagger has been "very kind" to her.
Automated system promises precise control of medically induced coma
PUBLIC RELEASE DATE:
31-Oct-2013
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Contact: Sue McGreevey smcgreevey@partners.org 617-724-2764 Massachusetts General Hospital
Successful animal study may lead to computer-controlled general anesthesia delivery
Putting patients with severe head injuries or persistent seizures into a medically induced coma currently requires that a nurse or other health professional constantly monitor the patient's brain activity and manually adjust drug infusion to maintain a deep state of anesthesia. Now a computer-controlled system developed by Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) investigators promises to automate the process, making it more precise and efficient and opening the door to more advanced control of anesthesia. The team, including colleagues from Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), reports successfully testing their approach in animals in the open access journal PLOS Computational Biology.
"People have been interested for years in finding a way to control anesthesia automatically," says Emery Brown, MD, PhD, of the MGH Department of Anesthesia, Critical Care and Pain Medicine, senior author of the report. "To use an analogy that compares giving anesthesia to flying a plane, the way it's been done is like flying a direct course for hours or even days without using an autopilot. This is really something that we should have a computer doing."
As part of a long-term project investigating the physiological basis of general anesthesia, Brown's team at MGH and MIT has identified and studied patterns of brain activity reflecting various states of anesthesia. One of the deepest states called burst suppression is characterized by an electroencephalogram (EEG) pattern in which brief periods of brain activity the bursts are interrupted by stretches of greatly reduced activity that can last for seconds or longer. When patients with serious head injuries that cause a buildup of pressure within the skull or those with persistent seizures are put into a medically induced coma to protect against additional damage, the goal is to maintain brain activity in a state of burst suppression.
Although anesthesiologists have had computer-assisted technologies for many years, no FDA-approved system exists that completely controls anesthesia administration based on continuous monitoring of a patient's brain activity. Until the current study, Brown notes, no one had demonstrated the level of control required for a completely automated system. Keeping patients at a precise level of brain activity for several days, as required for medically induced coma, appeared to be both a feasible goal and one that cried out for the sort of computer-controlled system called a brain-machine interface.
Adapting programs they had previously developed to analyze the activity of neurons, Brown's team developed algorithms to read and analyze an EEG pattern in real time and determine a target level of brain activity in this case the stage of burst suppression. Based on that target, an automated control device adjusts the flow of an anesthetic drug to achieve the desired brain state, and real-time analysis of the continuous EEG readings is fed back to the system to insure maintenance of the target. When the researchers tested their system in a rodent model, the actual EEG-based measure of burst suppression tracked the target trajectory almost exactly.
"As far as we know, these are the best results for automated control of anesthesia that have ever been published," says Brown, who is the Warren M. Zapol Professor of Anesthesia at Harvard Medical School and the Edward Hood Taplin Professor of Medical Engineering and Computational Neuroscience at MIT. "We're now in discussions with the FDA for approval to start testing this in patients." The MGH has also applied for a patent for the technology.
Among the benefits of such a system, Brown explains, would be the ability to maintain medical coma at a more precise, consistent level than can be done manually and using lower doses of anesthetic drugs, a reduction that is possible with any computer-assisted technology. Eliminating the need to devote one intensive-care nurse on each shift to continuous monitoring of one patient would significantly change ICU staffing needs. Further development of the system to control and maintain the full range of anesthesia states should introduce a powerful new tool to the entire field.
###
Lead authors of the PLOS Computational Biology report are Maryam Shanechi, PhD, now at Cornell University, and Jessica Chemali, MGH Department of Anesthesia, Critical Care and Pain Medicine. Additional co-authors are Max Liberman and Ken Solt, MD, MGH Anesthesia. Primary support for this work is through an National Institutes of Health Director's Pioneer Award to Brown.
Massachusetts General Hospital, founded in 1811, is the original and largest teaching hospital of Harvard Medical School. The MGH conducts the largest hospital-based research program in the United States, with an annual research budget of more than $775 million and major research centers in AIDS, cardiovascular research, cancer, computational and integrative biology, cutaneous biology, human genetics, medical imaging, neurodegenerative disorders, regenerative medicine, reproductive biology, systems biology, transplantation biology and photomedicine.
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Automated system promises precise control of medically induced coma
PUBLIC RELEASE DATE:
31-Oct-2013
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Contact: Sue McGreevey smcgreevey@partners.org 617-724-2764 Massachusetts General Hospital
Successful animal study may lead to computer-controlled general anesthesia delivery
Putting patients with severe head injuries or persistent seizures into a medically induced coma currently requires that a nurse or other health professional constantly monitor the patient's brain activity and manually adjust drug infusion to maintain a deep state of anesthesia. Now a computer-controlled system developed by Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) investigators promises to automate the process, making it more precise and efficient and opening the door to more advanced control of anesthesia. The team, including colleagues from Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), reports successfully testing their approach in animals in the open access journal PLOS Computational Biology.
"People have been interested for years in finding a way to control anesthesia automatically," says Emery Brown, MD, PhD, of the MGH Department of Anesthesia, Critical Care and Pain Medicine, senior author of the report. "To use an analogy that compares giving anesthesia to flying a plane, the way it's been done is like flying a direct course for hours or even days without using an autopilot. This is really something that we should have a computer doing."
As part of a long-term project investigating the physiological basis of general anesthesia, Brown's team at MGH and MIT has identified and studied patterns of brain activity reflecting various states of anesthesia. One of the deepest states called burst suppression is characterized by an electroencephalogram (EEG) pattern in which brief periods of brain activity the bursts are interrupted by stretches of greatly reduced activity that can last for seconds or longer. When patients with serious head injuries that cause a buildup of pressure within the skull or those with persistent seizures are put into a medically induced coma to protect against additional damage, the goal is to maintain brain activity in a state of burst suppression.
Although anesthesiologists have had computer-assisted technologies for many years, no FDA-approved system exists that completely controls anesthesia administration based on continuous monitoring of a patient's brain activity. Until the current study, Brown notes, no one had demonstrated the level of control required for a completely automated system. Keeping patients at a precise level of brain activity for several days, as required for medically induced coma, appeared to be both a feasible goal and one that cried out for the sort of computer-controlled system called a brain-machine interface.
Adapting programs they had previously developed to analyze the activity of neurons, Brown's team developed algorithms to read and analyze an EEG pattern in real time and determine a target level of brain activity in this case the stage of burst suppression. Based on that target, an automated control device adjusts the flow of an anesthetic drug to achieve the desired brain state, and real-time analysis of the continuous EEG readings is fed back to the system to insure maintenance of the target. When the researchers tested their system in a rodent model, the actual EEG-based measure of burst suppression tracked the target trajectory almost exactly.
"As far as we know, these are the best results for automated control of anesthesia that have ever been published," says Brown, who is the Warren M. Zapol Professor of Anesthesia at Harvard Medical School and the Edward Hood Taplin Professor of Medical Engineering and Computational Neuroscience at MIT. "We're now in discussions with the FDA for approval to start testing this in patients." The MGH has also applied for a patent for the technology.
Among the benefits of such a system, Brown explains, would be the ability to maintain medical coma at a more precise, consistent level than can be done manually and using lower doses of anesthetic drugs, a reduction that is possible with any computer-assisted technology. Eliminating the need to devote one intensive-care nurse on each shift to continuous monitoring of one patient would significantly change ICU staffing needs. Further development of the system to control and maintain the full range of anesthesia states should introduce a powerful new tool to the entire field.
###
Lead authors of the PLOS Computational Biology report are Maryam Shanechi, PhD, now at Cornell University, and Jessica Chemali, MGH Department of Anesthesia, Critical Care and Pain Medicine. Additional co-authors are Max Liberman and Ken Solt, MD, MGH Anesthesia. Primary support for this work is through an National Institutes of Health Director's Pioneer Award to Brown.
Massachusetts General Hospital, founded in 1811, is the original and largest teaching hospital of Harvard Medical School. The MGH conducts the largest hospital-based research program in the United States, with an annual research budget of more than $775 million and major research centers in AIDS, cardiovascular research, cancer, computational and integrative biology, cutaneous biology, human genetics, medical imaging, neurodegenerative disorders, regenerative medicine, reproductive biology, systems biology, transplantation biology and photomedicine.
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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.
Google showed off its new Android version 4.4 (or KitKat) operating system, running on a new flagship phone, the Nexus 5. Google uses its Nexus line to show off its new operating systems, and the device and OS are reflections ...
Good news, folks. A bunch of you have asked us if you can purchase a Nexus 5 from Google Play and activate it on Sprint. We've just heard back from Sprint, and the answer is in the affirmative.
Repeat: Yes, you can purchase a Nexus 5 from Google Play and activate it on Sprint.
Workers from tech giants Google, Red Hat, and Oracle and other companies have reportedly joined with the government to help fix the notoriously broken Healthcare.gov website that is a key portion of the Affordable Care Act.
According to a tweet from CNBC, “experts” from the firms have been dispatched. It is not clear yet in what quantity or what their role will be. The government needs the help, and it is good to see the technology community step up. After all, this is our domain.
In a piece by Alex Wayne on BusinessWeek, Google is parting with Michael Dickerson, a “site reliability engineer.” Also according to Wayne, Greg Gershman of mobile company Mobomo is said to be taking part as well.
When the Affordable Care Act went live recently, its website, which was supposed to provide a central exchange, failed: It lagged, dropped users, and fed wrong information to insurance companies. It was a tectonically embarrassing moment for the government and the president. Later, a “tech surge” was called for. It appears that this is part of that effort.
The government has promised that the website will be functional by the end of November. That gives the Silicon Valley cavalry just a single month to get the beast back in the pen. Also unclear at the moment is why these three firms have stepped up and not others. Microsoft, Apple, Yahoo, and Twitter are other firms that could spare an engineer or two.
Private tech employees helping the public government untangle a website built in part by Canadian contractors? The leaks from this saga are going to be amazing.
This is a developing story, and this post will be updated as new information becomes available.
The internet has been beating us over the head with the fact it's Halloween today, and that means lots of fake blood. But the real stuff coursing through your veins can be scary all on its own. Here are some of the weirdest and wildest things going on in the world of blood.
Kofi Kingston vs. Ryback: WWE Main Event, Oct. 30, 2013The Great Khali vs. Fandango: WWE Main Event, Oct. 30, 2013Los Matadores vs. Los Locales: WWE Main Event, Oct. 30, 2013Santino Marella vs. Heath Slater: WWE Main Event, Oct. 30, 2013Kofi Kingston uses his words carefully: WWE App Exclusive, Oct. 28, 2013WWE Hell in a Cell 2013 KickoffKofi Kingston vs. Damien Sandow: WWE Hell in a Cell 2013 Kickoff
TAMPA, Fla. – On the night before Halloween, the WWE Universe was in for an action-packed edition of WWE Main Event. Kofi Kingston did his best to survive against the monstrous Ryback, while Heath Slater tried to avoid the venomous bite of Santino Marella’s Cobra. Fandango came face-to-face with the Frankenstein-ish Great Khali and Los Matadores charged into action with the costumed El Torito by their side.
Ryback def. Kofi Kingston
Kofi Kingston didn’t have to worry about Freddy Krueger or Jason Voorhees chasing him down on the night before Halloween. He did, however, have a massive monster coming for him on WWE Main Event, in the form of Ryback.
WWE Main Event Photos | Watch Ryback and Kofi Kingston do battle
Furious after back-to-back losses to CM Punk, The Big Guy was looking to get back in the win column Wednesday night. Kingston tried to use his rapid-fire kicks and speed to stick and move against his larger foe, but the monstrous Ryback was able to ground The Dreadlocked Dynamo.
After a series of kicks that wounded his lip, Ryback retreated to the floor. However, that might have been the worst place to go, as Kofi dove over the rope, crashing into his muscular foe.
Though The Wildcat staggered the beast with his stick and move offense, he never truly got a chance to get going. Ryback constantly cut him off, using his immense power to bulldoze the former Intercontinental Champion. He smiled as he brutalized Kingston, making it seem like it was easy.
It wasn’t a cakewalk for Ryback, though. Kingston spun over one of Ryback’s Meathook clotheslines, flooring the monster with devastating DDT. Ryback finally caught the speedy Kingston with a clubbing blow and Shell Shocked his foe to claim victory.
ATHENS, Greece (AP) — Thousands of anti-austerity protesters clogged the Greek capital's streets to demonstrate against government plans to introduce a new property tax as bailout lenders prepare to conduct another inspection next week.
The anger is being felt across Greek society, with retirees, disabled groups, shipyard workers and high school teachers among those expected to take part in Thursday's protests.
Parliament is due to vote next week on proposals to replace an emergency property tax included on electricity bills with a permanent levy, breaking a pledge made last year by the conservative-led coalition government. More than 50 conservative lawmakers are demanding changes to proposals, arguing they unfairly burden their rural constituents.
The government is also planning new cuts to state benefits and the public workforce.
A major legal challenge to Obamacare making its way to the Supreme Court could allow for-profit corporations to opt out of a key piece of the law by asserting freedom of religion.
Hobby Lobby, a “biblically founded” crafts store chain based in Oklahoma, is one of 39 for-profit companies suing the federal government over the law’s contraceptive mandate. The company argues that the federal government cannot infringe upon its religious rights by forcing it to provide contraceptive coverage in its health plan.
The case asks whether Hobby Lobby can refuse to comply with Obamacare’s contraceptive mandate on the grounds that allowing its 13,000 employees access to birth control — specifically the morning after pill and intrauterine devices, or IUDs — would violate the company’s freedom of religion.
The case is novel because religious freedom typically has been thought to apply to individuals, churches and other religious non-profits, not corporations. Lower courts have split on the issue, and it’s all but inevitable the Supreme Court will decide to wade into the matter, possibly as early as December.
A decision in favor of Hobby Lobby could dramatically expand the rights of companies to dispute federal laws governing how they treat their employees based on religious grounds.
“I think it’s very likely the Supreme Court will hear the case,” said Timothy Jost, a law professor and health care reform expert at Washington & Lee University.
Hobby Lobby’s founder and CEO, David Green, and his family — all Christian evangelicals — argue that they and their company’s freedom of religious exercise is substantially burdened by having to provide its employees insurance that covers the morning after pills and IUDs. The Greens believe these contraceptives prevent fertilized eggs from implanting in the uterus, which they consider to be tantamount to abortion and thus against their religion. (Neither type of contraceptive has any effect on existing pregnancies and do not cause abortions.)
Their case rests on the 1993 Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFRA), which says people can seek to opt out of laws if they substantially burden their free exercise of religion. The government is allowed to burden a person’s religious freedom if it can prove that it has a compelling reason to and that the law is narrowly tailored to achieve its goal.
So far, the 3rd and 6th Circuit Court of Appeals have ruled that RFRA does not protect for-profit companies hoping to opt out of providing contraceptive coverage to employees. “We simply cannot understand how a for-profit, secular corporation — apart from its owners — can exercise religion,” 3rd Circuit Judge Robert Cowen wrote for the majority.
But in the Hobby Lobby case, the 10th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled in favor of the Greens, saying the company was protected under RFRA. The judges cited Citizens United, the 2010 Supreme Court decision that found corporations cannot be restricted in how they spend their money for political reasons because it infringed on their right to free speech.
“We see no reason the Supreme Court would recognize constitutional protection for a corporation’s political expression but not its religious expression,” the 10th circuit judges wrote in their decision.
The five Supreme Court justices who decided Citizens United could be swayed by the reference to the controversial campaign finance case. “Certainly the orientation of the Supreme Court toward protecting corporate interests will probably play an important role in the case,” Jost said.
But there is more legal precedent in the area of corporate freedom of speech than in corporate religious exercise, which has traditionally been seen more as a personal right. The government has argued that federal law holds that for-profit companies are not religious organizations. “No court has ever found a for-profit company to be a religious organization for purposes of federal law,” the Justice Department wrote in its brief to the 10th circuit last spring, arguing against Hobby Lobby.
The government also argues that Hobby Lobby is a distinct legal entity separate from its owners and shareholders, and can’t hold religious beliefs.
“It’s really a broader question about who is able to exercise religion,” said Lori Windham, senior counsel at the Becket Fund, which is representing Hobby Lobby. “Do business owners give up their rights to religious freedom when they operate a business?”
If the court does decide that corporations can hold religious beliefs or is protected by RFRA, Hobby Lobby would still have to prove that the government had no compelling reason to ask insurers to cover contraceptives. The government says providing contraceptives without co-pays significantly limits unintended pregnancies and keeps down medical costs.
Hobby Lobby’s lawyers say if the contraception is such a compelling government interest, the government would not have carved out exemptions for non-profit religious organizations.
The slippery slope argument against Hobby Lobby’s case is that the controlling shareholder of any major corporation could object, line by line, to a whole host of federal laws that affect how the company must treat its employees if it violates his or her religious beliefs.
A major legal challenge to Obamacare making its way to the Supreme Court could allow for-profit corporations to opt out of a key piece of the law by asserting freedom of religion.
Hobby Lobby, a “biblically founded” crafts store chain based in Oklahoma, is one of 39 for-profit companies suing the federal government over the law’s contraceptive mandate. The company argues that the federal government cannot infringe upon its religious rights by forcing it to provide contraceptive coverage in its health plan.
The case asks whether Hobby Lobby can refuse to comply with Obamacare’s contraceptive mandate on the grounds that allowing its 13,000 employees access to birth control — specifically the morning after pill and intrauterine devices, or IUDs — would violate the company’s freedom of religion.
The case is novel because religious freedom typically has been thought to apply to individuals, churches and other religious non-profits, not corporations. Lower courts have split on the issue, and it’s all but inevitable the Supreme Court will decide to wade into the matter, possibly as early as December.
A decision in favor of Hobby Lobby could dramatically expand the rights of companies to dispute federal laws governing how they treat their employees based on religious grounds.
“I think it’s very likely the Supreme Court will hear the case,” said Timothy Jost, a law professor and health care reform expert at Washington & Lee University.
Hobby Lobby’s founder and CEO, David Green, and his family — all Christian evangelicals — argue that they and their company’s freedom of religious exercise is substantially burdened by having to provide its employees insurance that covers the morning after pills and IUDs. The Greens believe these contraceptives prevent fertilized eggs from implanting in the uterus, which they consider to be tantamount to abortion and thus against their religion. (Neither type of contraceptive has any effect on existing pregnancies and do not cause abortions.)
Their case rests on the 1993 Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFRA), which says people can seek to opt out of laws if they substantially burden their free exercise of religion. The government is allowed to burden a person’s religious freedom if it can prove that it has a compelling reason to and that the law is narrowly tailored to achieve its goal.
So far, the 3rd and 6th Circuit Court of Appeals have ruled that RFRA does not protect for-profit companies hoping to opt out of providing contraceptive coverage to employees. “We simply cannot understand how a for-profit, secular corporation — apart from its owners — can exercise religion,” 3rd Circuit Judge Robert Cowen wrote for the majority.
But in the Hobby Lobby case, the 10th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled in favor of the Greens, saying the company was protected under RFRA. The judges cited Citizens United, the 2010 Supreme Court decision that found corporations cannot be restricted in how they spend their money for political reasons because it infringed on their right to free speech.
“We see no reason the Supreme Court would recognize constitutional protection for a corporation’s political expression but not its religious expression,” the 10th circuit judges wrote in their decision.
The five Supreme Court justices who decided Citizens United could be swayed by the reference to the controversial campaign finance case. “Certainly the orientation of the Supreme Court toward protecting corporate interests will probably play an important role in the case,” Jost said.
But there is more legal precedent in the area of corporate freedom of speech than in corporate religious exercise, which has traditionally been seen more as a personal right. The government has argued that federal law holds that for-profit companies are not religious organizations. “No court has ever found a for-profit company to be a religious organization for purposes of federal law,” the Justice Department wrote in its brief to the 10th circuit last spring, arguing against Hobby Lobby.
The government also argues that Hobby Lobby is a distinct legal entity separate from its owners and shareholders, and can’t hold religious beliefs.
“It’s really a broader question about who is able to exercise religion,” said Lori Windham, senior counsel at the Becket Fund, which is representing Hobby Lobby. “Do business owners give up their rights to religious freedom when they operate a business?”
If the court does decide that corporations can hold religious beliefs or is protected by RFRA, Hobby Lobby would still have to prove that the government had no compelling reason to ask insurers to cover contraceptives. The government says providing contraceptives without co-pays significantly limits unintended pregnancies and keeps down medical costs.
Hobby Lobby’s lawyers say if the contraception is such a compelling government interest, the government would not have carved out exemptions for non-profit religious organizations.
The slippery slope argument against Hobby Lobby’s case is that the controlling shareholder of any major corporation could object, line by line, to a whole host of federal laws that affect how the company must treat its employees if it violates his or her religious beliefs.
POLACCA, Ariz. (AP) — When it comes to consecutive high school cross-country championships, no boys team in the nation is as dominant as Hopi High School.
The Bruins are shooting for their 24th title in a row this year at the state meet.
Running is deeply rooted in the northern Arizona tribe's tradition as a way to carry messages from village to village and bless the reservation that gets little moisture with rain.
Coach Rick Baker insists there's nothing special about his program. He says he simply wants athletes who believe in themselves and the school, and who are disciplined and dedicated.
The girls team also is a source of pride for Hopi. It has the fifth most state championships in the country at 21, and is looking to earn a seventh consecutive this year.
___
Follow Felicia Fonseca on Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/FonsecaAP
New York City (AFP) - Attention wine lovers: savor every last sip, as researchers say there may be a global shortage looming.
Wine prices could shoot up because of a fall in production and growing thirst for wine among Chinese and Americans, Morgan Stanley research said in a report Wednesday.
World production peaked in 2004, with an excess of 600 million cases. But since then supply has fallen because of lower production capacity, slipping in 2012 to the lowest level in 40 years, the US bank said.
Production capacity has dropped particularly in Europe, where today it is 10 percent lower than in 2005, especially in France, the world's top producer, followed by Italy and Spain.
Plus, last year the weather was bad for wine makers.
At the same time, world demand is growing as newly affluent people in Russia, China and other emerging countries develop a taste for Bordeaux, Rioja and other wines.
The bottom line is that last year demand outstripped supply by 300 million cases, the study said.
And things will get worse as demand for exported wine will grow over the medium term.
Over the short term, stocks will fall as consumption will be dominated by vintages of years past.
But "as consumption turns to the 2012 vintage we expect the current production shortfall to culminate in a significant increase in export demand and higher prices for exports globally," the study said.
"Data suggests there may be insufficient supply to meet demand in coming years, as current vintages are released,” said the report.
Things will be particularly bad in Europe, which produces a lot of wine but also drinks a lot.
The French remain the world's leading wine drinkers, with consumption rising since 2010 after years of decline, as was the case elsewhere in Europe.
But Americans are drinking more and more of the stuff, the researchers said.
The United States is now the world's second largest wine consumer. It and China are fueling the rise in world consumption.
The global wine industry has grown for the past 30 years and now takes in revenue of $30 billion. A third of it stems from French wines, mainly because of higher prices for its better vintages.
Newer wine producing countries such as Australia, New Zealand, Chile and Argentina now account for 30 percent of global wine exports, compared to just 3 percent in the early 1980s.
And they are in the best position to benefit from the gap between supply and demand and will be able to raise export prices, Morgan Stanley said.
FILE - In this Sept. 18, 2013 file photo, employees of the Washington Navy Yard line up to enter through a gate two days after a gunman killed twelve people and was killed himself inside. A new report says contract guards who protect federal facilities are receiving uneven training on responding to shootings like the one last month at the Washington Navy Yard. The report was released Wednesday by the Government Accountability Office. A summary of the report was presented at a House subcommittee hearing on securing federal facilities. The report says officials at five guard companies said their guards had not received training on what to do when a gunman is opening fire. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin, File)
FILE - In this Sept. 18, 2013 file photo, employees of the Washington Navy Yard line up to enter through a gate two days after a gunman killed twelve people and was killed himself inside. A new report says contract guards who protect federal facilities are receiving uneven training on responding to shootings like the one last month at the Washington Navy Yard. The report was released Wednesday by the Government Accountability Office. A summary of the report was presented at a House subcommittee hearing on securing federal facilities. The report says officials at five guard companies said their guards had not received training on what to do when a gunman is opening fire. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin, File)
WASHINGTON (AP) — Federal officials who oversee the security clearance process for government employees were to face a Senate committee investigating the events leading up to a deadly shooting at the Washington Navy Yard.
The hearing Thursday before the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs is to examine the adequacy of background checks and the security clearance system for federal employees and contract workers. It comes as officials investigate how Aaron Alexis, a 34-year-old defense contractor, was able to acquire and maintain a secret clearance despite a series of violent outbursts, repeated brushes with the law and concerns about his mental health.
The former Navy reservist killed 12 people inside the Navy Yard building where he worked Sept. 16 before being fatally shot by police. He entered the property with a valid security badge.
"The tragic events at the Navy Yard highlight the need to be ever-vigilant in ensuring that individuals entrusted with access to classified information, and, more generally, other individuals with logical and physical access to federal facilities and information do not present either a national security risk or a personal security risk," Elaine Kaplan said in remarks prepared for the Senate hearing. Kaplan is acting director of the Office of Personnel Management, which oversees more than 90 percent of background investigations for the federal government.
President Barack Obama has also ordered the White House budget office to examine security standards for government contractors and employees across federal agencies. Concerns about weaknesses in the security clearance system have surfaced not only with Alexis but also with National Security Agency leaker Edward Snowden and Army Pvt. Chelsea Manning, currently imprisoned for leaking classified documents.
"Many national security experts have long argued that the security clearance process is antiquated and in need of modernization. Given recent events, I think we have to ask whether the system is fundamentally flawed," Sen. Tom Carper, the committee chairman, said in prepared remarks.
Defense officials have said that when Alexis applied for security clearance with the Navy, he lied about a 2004 arrest in Seattle for shooting the tires of an unoccupied vehicle and he failed to disclose thousands of dollars in debts. An FBI fingerprint check revealed the arrest, but an investigative report from an OPM contractor omitted the fact that Alexis had fired shots, the Seattle police department did not turn over records of the arrest and no charges were filed.
He was granted a secret clearance in 2008 and held onto it despite multiple subsequent encounters with police, including a 2010 arrest in Texas, where a neighbor told police she was nearly struck by a bullet fired from his downstairs apartment. No charges were filed.
Kaplan said her staff has advised her that Alexis's file "complied with all applicable standards," but that OPM's office of internal oversight and compliance is reviewing the matter.
One month before the Navy Yard shooting, Alexis called police in Rhode Island to the hotel where he was staying and complained about voices wanting to harm him, according to the police report. The FBI has said he believed he was being bombarded with extremely low frequency radio waves.
Four senators on Wednesday introduced legislation to require more frequent checks on government employees and contractors who are awarded security clearances. Clearances last for five or 10 years depending on the level of secrecy required in the job and the level of clearance.
The bill requires OPM to do at least two audits of every security clearance at random times over each five years the clearance is in effect. Surprise audits would send the message that "you never know when the government is going to find out," so it's better to come forward with the information voluntarily, said one sponsor, Democratic Sen. Claire McCaskill of Missouri.
___
Associated Press writer Pauline Jelinek contributed to this report.
We weren't expecting to like the Pixma MG7120 as much as we did, as we're predisposed against printers with high black ink costs. But the overall experience and print quality softened our stance. At $200 (as of 10/30/2013) it's about as good as you'll get in a photo-oriented MFP, but yes, we'd prefer pay a bit less per page for ink.
Design includes front-loading cartridges
The Pixma MG7120 has a beveled-edge design distinct to certain Canon printers of the last several years, and other design improvements that were introduced last year with its cousin, the Pixma MG6320. You control the printer using an upper front touch panel: A 3.5-inch touchscreen display contains most functions, with contextually lit buttons that show up as needed. It has a very short learning curve. You lift that panel to access the ink cartridges, instead of lifting up the entire scanner bed, as with most multifunctions. You can connect via Wi-Fi, Ethernet, or USB.
Paper capacity is limited: 125 sheets of plain paper in the bottom cassette, and 20 sheets of 4-by-6-inch or 5-by-7-inch photo paper in the photo tray found directly above that. Flip over the photo tray, and you'll find the optical media tray, which inserts into a slot just above the output tray. The output tray itself is immediately above the paper trays and opens automatically when printing or copying. There's no automatic document feeder (ADF) for scanning or copying multi-page documents, which isn't unusual for a home-oriented printer, but we like it when we see it. The HP Photosmart 7520 is a like-priced competitor that has an ADF (and—ahem—cheaper ink).
Next to the ouput tray, another front panel folds out to reveal three card slots: Secure Digital, Compact Flash, and Memory Stick. You may print via any of them as well as Wireless Pictbridge.
The Pixma MG7120 comes with the usual array of remote printing features (email, Wi-Fi, though no NFC), and Canon has apps for both Android and iOS. The top-mounted scanner bed is A4/letter-sized with a lid that telescopes an inch or so to accommodate thicker materials.
Canon's My Image Garden is the main software application used for scanning, editing, printing to optical discs, and keeping track of images, But the company also provides utilities for viewing images on the desktop and launching various features of the printer (scan, copy, edit, etc.) They're especially handy if you're dedicating an office PC for printer chores, limiting the amount of time you must spend hunting through the applications for the feature you need. For occasional use, they're probably overkill.
Six-ink system produces great photos
To get the best results from the Pixma MG7120, you'll need to use good photo paper, which will always set you back a few dimes. But Canon could do better with the ink costs.The Pixma MG7120 uses a six-color system: black, pigment black, cyan, gray, magenta, and yellow. All are available in both standard and high-yield ('XL') capacities. In standard capacity, black pages cost about 5 cents, and four-color pages 16.6 cents. This is not counting the extra photo-black and photo-gray, which contribute miniscule amounts to a non-photo page. The XL-capacity cartridges are only slightly cheaper: 4.6 cents per page for black, and 12.7 cents for all four colors. If you print occasionally—tickets, web pages, and the like—then the MG7120 has decent costs. If you print lots of monochrome business documents, not so much.
The quality of the Pixma MG7120's output is where it earns its keep. Photos are superb for a $200 photo printer, and the color palette is nicely balanced, neither overly warm or cold. Text is sharp, and there was nary a defect in large areas of black, which is where you'll usually spot any problems with a print system. No striations, no banding, no muddled edges. Good stuff here.
Performance is better than average for a photo printer. Subjectively, we never felt like we were waiting an overly long time for output to arrive—especially when using draft mode, whose quality is good enough for most everyday applications (and will stretch your ink a lot further). By the numbers, the Pixma MG7120 printed text and mixed monochrome pages at an aggregate 8.6 pages per minute on the PC and 7.9 on the Mac. 4-inch by 6-inch photos printed at 2.7 per minute to plain paper and 1.7 per minute to glossy stock. A full 8.5-inch by 11-inch photo printed on the Mac took just over two minutes.
Scans were decently fast, at just under a half-minute at 600 dpi and just under a minute at 1200 dpi. Copies arrived at a sprightly 5 pages per minute.
The good outweighs the ink
The Canon Pixma MG7120 color inkjet multifunction delivers extremely nice photos, and text quality that's just this side of laser. It also automatically duplexes and has some of the easiest controls the company has produced to date. It's a printer well worth considering, even with its somewhat pricey inks.
Jon L. Jacobi Jon Jacobi, PCWorld
Jon L. Jacobi has worked with computers since you flipped switches and punched cards to program them. He studied music at Juilliard, and now he power-mods his car for kicks. More by Jon L. Jacobi
Melissa Riofrio Senior Editor, PCWorld
The daughter of a mechanical engineer, Melissa grew up playing with machine parts and still loves getting into the nuts and bolts of how things work. She is never happier than when she is on a factory tour. More by Melissa Riofrio
Making a last minute costume run, Kendall Jenner stopped at Party City in Northridge, California on Wednesday (October 30).
The 17-year-old reality star wore a white sleeveless top, black scarf, and gray pants as she shielded her face from pesky paparazzi.
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California is technology's spiritual home in the US, where Teslas roam free, and Google Glass is already a social norm. Well, unless you're a member of the San Diego law enforcement that is -- as one unlucky driver just found out. That commuter was Cecilia Abadie, and she's (rather fittingly) taken ...