French town famed for extreme sports bans wingsuit

PARIS (AP) ? The French town of Chamonix, deep in the shadow of Mont Blanc, has always embraced danger.

Climbers scale Europe's highest peak in dire conditions. Backcountry skiers risk avalanches or falling off cliffs.

But the arrival this summer of the wingsuit flyers offered peril on an entirely new scale. For nearly two months, daredevils in skin-tight suits with batwing sleeves and a flap between their legs hurled themselves off the Brevent cliff, soaring through the Alpine skies. Last week, tragedy struck: A Norwegian wingsuit flyer was killed when his parachute failed to open.

The next day, the mayor of Chamonix-Mont Blanc banned wingsuits.

The decision has triggered a debate about how to weigh the dangers of extreme sport against the passion of the thrill-seekers the Alpine town has famously encouraged. The ban isn't meant to be permanent ? local officials hope to come up a set of rules on wingsuits that will satisfy everyone. But Chamonix remains shaken.

"For us, adventure doesn't mean extreme risk," said Chamonix mayor Eric Fournier. "We have to ask questions of responsibility and respect for other sports."

In Chamonix, near the Swiss and Italian borders, paragliders and hikers share space with mountain gondolas, climbers and BASE jumpers, adventurers who leap from high places and float down by parachute.

Last month, nine experienced climbers died in an avalanche on the French side of the mountain. And there have been increasing concerns that the area is becoming just too crowded.

Wingsuits are a relatively new offshoot of BASE jumping, coming into their own only in the late 1990s. Flyers start high and hope for a breeze strong enough to make the flight last, before opening their chutes to land.

Mont Blanc winters are long and harsh, and the wingsuit season there is short, dependent upon warm air and favorable conditions for landing.

That's where the cliffs above Chamonix come in. Popular in winter among skiiers, in summer among paragliders and hikers, the cliffs are easily accessible by trail. That's just high enough to allow for a wingsuit jump and close enough for multiple jumps in a day ? a rarity in the wingsuit world. As a wingsuit site, Brevent was relatively unknown until late this spring, when YouTube videos caught the attention of flyers everywhere.

They came by the dozens, according to Fournier and Roche Malnuit, who lives in Chamonix and is president of the French BASE Association.

It's an exhilarating, dangerous sport with a small number of passionate adherents, numbering a couple hundred in France and perhaps a thousand or two in the world. The suits can cost over ?1,000 ($1,200) and are made from the same synthetics used for hot-air balloons or parachutes. Flyers commonly jump from planes or helicopters ? less commonly from cliffs ? and can soar long distances before opening their parachutes to land.

The world record, set from an airplane jump, stands at 16 miles. For BASE jumping wingsuit flyers, the distance is considerably shorter, Malnnuit said. At Brevent, where the cliff's stands at an altitude of 2,500 meters (7,500 feet), Malnuit said flyers can expect to travel about 4.5 kilometers (nearly 3 miles).

Malnuit learned to fly in a wingsuit from his father, who was a BASE jumping pioneer in the 1980s. Malnuit said his father gave it up at age 50 "because the risks became too great. He said he was happy to have lived it."

"I love nature, I love sports, I love the mountains," Malnuit said, explaining his own path to wingsuit flight. "I had my father who was there to teach me. He taught me that it's a sport of risk."

Tore Hovda is the brother of 38-year-old Jon Inge Hovda, who was killed after jumping from the Brevent cliff on July 23.

Hovda said his brother got into the sport 15 years ago after starting out with parachuting. "That (BASE jumping) was his whole life. He just couldn't stop with it."

Despite his brother's death, Hovda said he did not think the sport should be forbidden.

"People should be able to jump if they want to," Hovda said from his home in Stavanger, in southeastern Norway. "It would be wrong to put a ban on it."

Many public places have done just that, including national parks in the United States. Even in California's Yosemite, where solo rock climbing without safety gear is permitted and considered a mark of the highest skill, wingsuits are banned along with other BASE jumping, for many of the same reasons Chamonix is struggling with the sport.

"Yes, we allow free soloing and rock climbing, which are also high risk activities. However, the ban on BASE Jumping is not based on the high risk nature of the activity, rather it is based on its overall impacts to other park activities: the 'circus-like' atmosphere it creates, its impacts on climbers, potential impacts to park resources, etc." Scott Gediman, a spokesman for Yosemite, told The Associated Press in an email. Yosemite has dozens of climbers a day at the high season and thousands of visitors on the trails.

Gediman said he himself watched a BASE jumper leap to her death in 1999 when her borrowed chute failed to open.

Fournier, whose sports include skiing, paragliding and mountain climbing, doesn't envision a permanent wingsuit ban in Chamonix. He doesn't want to try wingsuits, but he understands the appeal and he expects to work with flyers to figure out how to proceed.

"It's a practice that taxes the mind and the body," said Fournier. "In these last few weeks, it was opened too quickly to too many people."

Malnuit supported time to reflect on the dangers, but said he hoped the cliffs will reopen soon to wingsuits.

"With wings, you truly arrive at flying," he said. "You can steer, you can accelerate. You're truly in flight."

___

Associated Press writers Louise Nordstrom in Stockholm, Sweden, and Traci Cone in Fresno, California, contributed to this report.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/french-town-famed-extreme-sports-bans-wingsuit-090036546.html

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THE RACE: Obama and Romney portray rival economies

Seldom are differences between the candidates so stark as on jobs and the economy. President Barack Obama sees a glass half full and rising, Republican rival Mitt Romney describes one that's half-empty and falling.

It's not surprising. Sustained weakness in the economy remains Obama's biggest vulnerability heading into fall's presidential election. Both campaigns know it. And it colors how they spin economic data.

Obama and Romney clashed sharply Friday over new unemployment numbers.

Obama cheered the Labor Department's report that 163,000 jobs were created in July after three months of weak job growth. He portrayed it evidence the economy continues to improve, if unevenly.

"That means that we've now created 4.5 million new jobs over the last 29 months and 1.1 million new jobs so far this year," Obama said, while acknowledging "too many folks out there that are looking for work." He pitched his plan to extend tax breaks for all but the wealthy.

Romney focused on the overall increase in the unemployment rate to 8.3 percent from 8.2 percent in June, calling it "another hammer blow to the struggling middle class families in America," and evidence of Obama's "extraordinary record of failure."

Economists generally welcomed the report as better than expected. And while the increase was barely enough to match working-age population growth, it was seen as another sign the economy wasn't slipping back into recession.

Wall Street liked it, too. Stocks soared.

Part of the disparity between the unemployment rate and monthly job creation figures is because the first comes from a Labor Department survey of households while the second from a survey of businesses. The two numbers don't always move in tandem.

Obama spent the day at the White House. Romney spoke from North Las Vegas during a campaign swing to Nevada.

__

Follow Tom Raum on Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/tomraum. For more AP political coverage, look for the 2012 Presidential Race in AP Mobile's Big Stories section. Also follow https://twitter.com/APCampaign and AP journalists covering the campaign: https://twitter.com/AP/ap-campaign-2012

With 95 days left until Election Day, here are insights into today's highlights in U.S. politics

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/race-obama-romney-portray-rival-economies-165840364.html

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I am a college student in Pennsylvania looking for health, dental ...

I don?t want a high deductible and I don?t want to pay several hundred dollars a month. With not much money, I need my insurance to cover the majority of my expenses. What?s the best major insurance provider I should go with?

OK, you want 100% coverage for $ 1 a month. It doesn?t exist.

You?re actually looking at THREE DIFFERENT policies here.

If you?re 20 and perfectly healthy, nothing wrong, not overweight, a good, low/no deductible plan should run you around $ 225 a month.

SO. If you want to cut that in half, you have to take on a $ 5,000 deductible.

Your dental coverage will run around $ 26 a month, with waiting periods for anything except cleanings. And the vision coverage will cost about the same ? $ 20 a month, with a six month wait until they pay for an exam or glasses.

You can?t exchange $ 50 now for a known $ 500 you want to incur in the next month. Insurance companies would go out of business. They don?t WORK that way.

If you have no insurance now, any ?expenses? you have now, are going to be excluded under a new policy.

Just like the lottery, you have to buy the ticket BEFORE you number comes up.

Maybe you are interested in

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Source: http://www.familyencyclopedia.net/i-am-a-college-student-in-pennsylvania-looking-for-health-dental-and-vision-insurance

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Pets May Help Kids With Autism Develop Social Skills - Autism

Basic InformationMore InformationQuestions and AnswersLinksBook Reviews
HealthDay News
by By Amanda GardnerHealthDay Reporter
Updated: Aug 1st 2012

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new article illustration

WEDNESDAY, Aug. 1 (HealthDay News) -- Introducing a pet into the home of a child with autism may help that child develop improved social behaviors, new research finds.

The study, from French researchers, is the first strong scientific evidence that animals may help foster social skills in individuals with autism, but it also reinforces what clinicians have been hearing anecdotally for years.

"We hear from parents a lot that having a pet or interacting with an animal really helps their child's social behavior, but there hasn't been a study so far that has looked at that scientifically," said Alycia Halladay, director of environmental research at Autism Speaks. "This offers some intriguing evidence to confirm what parents have been saying."

Halladay was not involved with the study, which was published online Aug. 1 in the journal PLoS ONE.

Problems with communication are one of the hallmarks of autism and strategies to combat this are central to autism therapy.

According to Halladay, some people with autism use service dogs but usually to address a particular handicap, such as problems with motor coordination or hearing loss, although not yet for social skills.

Previous studies have verified that having a pet in the house actually improves family bonding and can improve the social skills of a non-autistic child as he or she learns to share with the pet and care for it.

To see if pets might have the same effect in children with autism, the study authors compared the children's social interactions (as reported by the parents of the children with autism) in three different settings: households that had never had a pet; homes that had had a pet since the child's birth; and households that had acquired a pet after the child turned 5.

In total, 260 individuals with autism were involved and the researchers were most interested in social interactions when the child was 4 or 5 years of age, because this is when the social impairments are often at a peak.

Out of 36 measures, participants who had acquired a pet after they were born scored higher in the two categories of "offering to share" and "offering comfort" after having the pet for a few years.

There was no relationship between each individual's IQ and the impact of the pet, leading the authors to conclude that "the benefits that the animals may have on individuals with autism don't seem related to how serious the autism was," said study author Marine Grandgeorge, clinical research associate at the Autism Resource Center of Academic Hospital in Brest, France.

Pets may promote pro-social behavior by acting as "distracters," Grandgeorge suggested.

"When a human is in a stressful situation, a pet seems to distract him/her from the [anxiety-producing] stimulus," she explained.

Another possibility is that the pet may help the child learn how to interpret communication signals and cues, enabling them to adjust their behavior, she added.

As to why introducing a pet later in life would have the greater effect, one possible explanation is that "the arrival of a pet strengthens the cohesion of the family," said Grandgeorge. "Most families acquiring a pet experienced an increase in quantity and quality of time spent together, and felt happier after the pet's arrival. This new mood may have positive effects on individuals with autism."

But positive findings from this one small study are not necessarily a reason to go out and buy or adopt a pet because the strategy could backfire, Grandgeorge said.

"Anecdotally, I observed a child who was focused all the time on his cat. He [had to] know where it was, what it was doing all the time and he was setting up rituals with it [and] being separated [from the] cat was a source of anxiety," Grandgeorge recounted. "All the family, including the cat, lived sorely with this situation."

More information

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has more on autism spectrum disorders.

Source: http://www.vbhcs.org/poc/view_doc.php?type=news&id=148329&cn=20

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Google delays Nexus Q, no timing given

NEW YORK (AP) ? Google says it is delaying the Nexus Q, a home entertainment device that was supposed to come out in July.

To make up for the delay, Google Inc. is sending the gadget free to everyone who pre-ordered it.

Google is not saying when the Nexus Q will available. Google plans to sell it for $299 in the U.S.

The ball-shaped device is similar to Apple TV, a small box that can stream music and movies over Internet connections. But the Apple TV is only $99.

The Nexus Q sends content from your own collection or from YouTube to your existing TV and speaker systems. You control it through a separate Android phone or tablet. Google has called it the first social streaming device.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/google-delays-nexus-q-no-timing-given-192304334--finance.html

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User:FionnaFreeman583 - Synesketch Wiki

From Synesketch Wiki

Chick fil A supporters waited in long lines and filled its restaurants across Texas (where the fast food chain has more outlets than any other state) to support the company?s stance against same sex marriage.

?We wanted to be in a place where other people think like we do," said Heidi Vick said as she walked out of a restaurant on Fort Worth's West 7th Street.

Former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee, a Baptist minister, declared Wednesday ?Chick fil A Appreciation Day.? It comes just days before gay activists plan to stage a ?kiss in? at the chain?s restaurants.

?When people see the amount of people that support us, I think it?s going to be much more effective than refusing to spend money at a certain place,? said Carly McGehee, who organized ?kiss mor chicks.? She?s asking people of the same sex to show up at Chick fil A locations on Friday and kiss each other outside the restaurant.

McGehee, 24, is from Flower Mound, and remembers eating at the popular restaurant nearly every day. Yet she turned against the restaurant after the company began supporting groups that oppose gay marriage.

?I couldn?t sit idly by and let my rights be infringed upon any longer,? said McGehee, who currently lives in New York and works as a fundraiser for gay rights groups.

The controversy intensified last month when Chick fil A president Dan Cathy told the Baptist Press that the Atlanta based company was "guilty as charged" for backing "the Biblical definition of a family."

Gay rights groups and others answered with calls for boycotts, which the mayors of Chicago, San Francisco, and Boston have publicly supported.

"This is not about Mr. Cathy's freedom of speech," said David Reed with the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation. "This is about how Chick fil A directs its money ? specifically to oppose gay and lesbian relationships.?

The chain?s supporters showed up in force on Wednesday. Crowds overwhelmed the company?s dining rooms coast to coast, and lines stretched around many restaurants.

?kiss mor chicks wants to say: 'Chick fil A, here's our money,?" said Evan Lenow with the Southwest Baptist Theological Seminary, who bought nearly 200 sandwiches. ?We want to support you with our pocketbook as well as with our words." Debbie Barnhart arrived at the restaurant in an SUV packed with her friends and family.

"I order things from Amazon, and they support gays, so I don't have a problem with that,? Barnhart said. "But when a company says they support traditional marriage values, then I feel like I want to support that." Chick fil A brought in extra staff at some locations and extra supplies in anticipation of the rush.

McGehee said she wasn?t bothered by the chain?s enormous support, and hopes the attention will encourage more people to support her cause later this week.

?Regardless of how many people show up [on Friday], we?ve gotten millions of Americans to discuss the topic,? she said.

Source: http://www.synesketch.krcadinac.com/wiki/index.php?title=User:FionnaFreeman583

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Choosing the Suitable Roofing Contractor: Talk to a Tampa Roofing ...

As it is among the most broken down and broken areas of the house due to its steady exposure to extreme weather conditions, your roof should be correctly preserved. Your home's value can easily depreciate if your roof covering system isn't really taken care of properly, which in turn can cause you psychological and monetary tension in the future. This is where hiring a Tampa roofing contractor is essential, as it offers you the following benefits:

Has understanding on how to install or repair roof covering

Several property owners believe they can merely effortlessly mend roof covering systems on their own, not knowing the repercussions they might experience if the repair work isn't really dealt with by an expert. Chances are that the damage of the roof covering could intensify, which can easily cause a more pricey repair or replacement in the end. When you have a reputable roofing contractor, you're ensured of being given quality roofing service.

Recognizes which best roofing product to use

Another issue faced by residents is the kind of roofing material to use if they're having their roof changed. It can be an difficult task to check around and research on the different things to consider when choosing a roofing material, whereas if you have roofing contractors, they can quickly offer you the solutions you're trying to find and recommend the most effective roof covering that satisfies your house.

Offers guidance on how to look after your roof

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For more details, search roofing contractors Tampa, roofing Tampa, and Tampa roofing in Google for related information.

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Gene network restores CF protein function

Wednesday, August 1, 2012

Researchers at the University of Iowa Carver College of Medicine have discovered a genetic process that can restore function to a defective protein, which is the most common cause of cystic fibrosis (CF).

Cystic fibrosis is an inherited disease caused by mutations in a gene that adversely affect its protein product. In its correct form and cellular location, this protein, cystic fibrosis transmembrane conductance regulator (CFTR), functions as a channel for ions to move across cell membranes, and is critical for maintaining cellular salt and water balance.

The most common CF-causing genetic mutation, known as delta F508, disrupts the process whereby the CFTR protein is folded into its correct shape and shipped to the membranes of cells that line the airways and other organs. Most of the defective CFTR protein is misprocessed and gets degraded. The lack of normal CFTR ion channels leads to numerous problems, including lung infection and inflammation, the major causes of disease and death in cystic fibrosis.

Despite its importance, how the CFTR protein is made and delivered to cell membranes in its functioning form is not well understood. The UI team led by Paul McCray, M.D., professor of pediatrics and microbiology with UI Health Care and the Roy J. Carver Chair in Pulmonary Research and Vice Chair for Research in Pediatrics, investigated the role of microRNAs -- small non-coding stretches of RNA -- in regulating expression of CFTR.

In their research, McCray and colleagues discovered that one particular microRNA, called miR-138, helps control the biosynthesis of CFTR by regulating a network of genes involved in the production and processing of the protein. The study, published online the week of July 30 in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS) Early Edition, shows that that miR-138 acts on the other genes to orchestrate a cellular program that increases production of CFTR and increases the amount of the protein that is transported to the cell membrane where it functions as an ion channel.

"We first wanted to determine how this gene network impacts the CFTR protein produced in people who don't have cystic fibrosis," says lead author Shyam Ramachandran, Ph.D.. "We identified a novel regulatory circuit, but then asked ourselves if any of this affected the mutant protein."

Surprisingly, the researchers found that when the gene network was activated by miR-138, it not only increased the amount of the mutated protein, but also partially restored the protein's function.

By manipulating the microRNA network, the UI team was able to change the fate of the misfolded CFTR from being degraded in the cell to functioning as an ion channel in the cell membrane.

"This was a very surprising finding," Ramachandran says. "It unexpectedly helps rescue the function of the mutant protein."

Because most people with CF have one or two copies of the delta F508 mutation, interventions that overcome the CFTR protein-processing problems caused by this mutation might have important implications for new ways of treating CF.

"In the field of CF therapeutics there's great interest in identifying ways to restore the function of this misprocessed protein," McCray says. "We were very surprised that manipulating this microRNA regulated gene network had this rescuing effect. This opens up a new avenue for the development of CF therapies."

###

University of Iowa Health Care: http://www.uihealthcare.com/index.html

Thanks to University of Iowa Health Care for this article.

This press release was posted to serve as a topic for discussion. Please comment below. We try our best to only post press releases that are associated with peer reviewed scientific literature. Critical discussions of the research are appreciated. If you need help finding a link to the original article, please contact us on twitter or via e-mail.

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Source: http://www.labspaces.net/122227/Gene_network_restores_CF_protein_function

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Google Is Cracking Down on Terrible, Malicious Android Apps in Google Play [Android]

An Everyday Voice: In His Shadow

Whenever I can steal time with my kids and grandkids I?ll take it, so last week those of us who live locally escaped to Big Bear Lake for a few days. I brought home some fantastic memories, and one great insight.

It was a wonderful time of boating and parasailing on the lake, roughhousing with my three grandsons, and playing board games with my family and laughing so hard it hurt. On the last morning we decided to take a walk before wrapping things up.

The neighborhood was gorgeous. Luxurious vacation rental homes were surrounded dark green pine trees and framed by that uniquely mountain blue sky. My son, Derek, watched the unusual way my three-year-old grandson, Ryder, was walking.

?family hike for His Shadow

?What are you doing?? he asked Ryder. Ryder had been looking down as he walked close to his Aunt Bethany, carefully moving, stopping, or turning when she did. He had stayed close to her side most of the weekend, so this was no exception. He shyly looked up at Derek, and very softly confessed: ?I like to walk in her shadow.?

He chose to walk in her shadow. Because he loves her and enjoyed her company, he thought it a good thing to copy what she did.

And there is was?I realized that all I really want is to walk in Jesus? shadow.

If I am in His shadow, I am also surrounded and enfolded by His presence. I am near to Him, following Him, and walking where He leads. And there is no place I would rather be.

Like Ryder, I choose to walk in the shadow of the One I love.

How priceless is your unfailing love, O God! People take refuge in the shadow of your wings.???????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????? Psalm 36:6-7

Whoever dwells in the shelter of the Most High will rest in the shadow of the Almighty.I will say of the Lord, ?He is my refuge and my fortress, my God, in whom I trust.?????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????? Psalm 91:1-2

Further reflection:

  1. Does walking in someone?s shadow have a positive or negative connotation for you?
  2. Take your journal (or other paper) and make a list of the benefits of walking in Jesus? shadow.

Lord, I want to walk in Your shadow. I yearn to stay close to You, to go where You go, and follow where You lead. Thank You for making room for me in the shadow of your wings, and for the promise of rest there.

Source: http://www.aneverydayvoice.com/2012/07/in-his-shadow.html

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