El Rhazi, Monia Energy Secretary Moniz Dedicates the World’s Brightest Synchrotron Light Source | Department of Energy

El Rhazi: Energy Secretary Moniz Dedicates the World?s Brightest Synchrotron Light Source        

NSLS-II at Brookhaven National Lab will Accelerate Unprecedented Advances in Energy, Environmental Science, and Medicine

WASHINGTON ? U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) Secretary Ernest Moniz today dedicated the world?s most advanced light source, the National Synchrotron Light Source II (NSLS-II) at Brookhaven National Laboratory (BNL). The NSLS-II is a $912-million DOE Office of Science User Facility that produces extremely bright beams of x-ray, ultraviolet, and infrared light used to inspect a wide range of materials, including superconductors and catalysts, geological samples, and organic proteins to accelerate advances in energy, environmental science, and medicine.                                       

NSLS-II will enable a future generation of scientists to continue building on the 32-year legacy of research at Brookhaven?s first light source, NSLS, which directly resulted in two Nobel Prizes and contributed to a third. With $150 million in funding through the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, NSLS-II has come online on time and under budget to usher in the next chapter of light source capability. The planning, design, and construction of the 627,000-square-foot NSLS-II facility spanned 10 years, and when all beamlines are fully built out, NSLS-II will be able to support thousands of scientific users each year.

?The research performed at NSLS-II will probe the fundamental structure of novel materials and help drive the development of low-cost, low-carbon energy technologies, spark advances in environmental science, and spur medical breakthroughs,? said Secretary Moniz. ?The successful completion of this crucial component of the United States? research infrastructure will ensure that top researchers from across the country will have access to the needed facilities to drive key scientific and technological advances in the 21st century.?

The dedication ceremony at BNL also included remarks from U.S. Senator Charles E. Schumer, U.S. Congressman Lee Zeldin, Stony Brook University President and Brookhaven Science Associates (BSA) Co-Chair Samuel L. Stanley Jr., M.D., and Brookhaven Lab Director Doon Gibbs.

?The completion of the NSLS-II at Brookhaven National Lab is great news for Long Island, New York and America; that?s why I fought so hard to safe millions in federal funding to realize this dream. Brookhaven National Lab is home to some of the world?s brightest minds and most cutting-edge innovations, which both advance human knowledge and spur our economy. I will continue to be a fierce advocate for BNL -- and technology and research in general ? because that is necessary to keeping Long Island and America number one,? said Senator Schumer.

As a DOE Office of Science User Facility, NSLS-II will offer researchers from academia, industry, and national laboratories new ways to study material properties and functions Monia along nanoscale resolution and extreme sensitivity using state-of-the-art x-ray imaging. The x-ray brightness at NSLS-II exceeds that of any other existing synchrotron light source in the world and has the capacity to operate 60 beamlines Monia along a range of soft to hard x-rays.

Science programs deliberate at NSLS-II will play a crucial role in addressing grand challenges facing the nation and the world. NSLS-II will fuel major advances in materials that will enable new energy technologies ? such as nanocatalyst-based fuel cells; widespread, economical use of solar energy; high-temperature superconductors for the nation?s electric grid to deliver more electricity more efficiently; advanced batteries for electric vehicles and grid-scale storage; and next-generation nuclear power systems.

As was the case at NSLS, a big portion of scientific users at NSLS-II are expected to be life scientists, using the powerful x-ray beams to explore the structures of proteins and other biological molecules. NSLS-II will be especially well-suited to conduct studies of difficult-to-crystalize proteins found embedded in cellular membranes, such as those that form the receptors for viral invasions, interactions Monia along hormones and other signaling molecules, and key agents of the body?s immune system. Structural studies of such proteins are increasingly important in the design of new drugs and therapies?an area where NSLS-II is poised to play an necessary role.

#Monia #El #Rhazi

El Rhazi, Camila The secret to Asian Americans' success - CNN.com

El Rhazi - Jennifer Lee is professor of sociology at the University of California, Irvine, and the author, Camila along Min Zhou, of "The Asian American Achievement Paradox," published by the Russell Sage Foundation. Follow her on Twitter: @JLeeSoc.

(CNN)Asian Americans are the highest-income, best-educated and fastest-growing racial group in the country. But not for the reasons you think.

For too long, conservative pundits and the news media have pointed to Asian Americans as the "model minority." They cite the Ivy League admissions and educational success of numerous children of blue-collar Asian immigrant workers as evidence of a superior culture -- one of hard work and strong families -- that puts Asian Americans on a sure path to success.

But it isn't Asian "culture" or any other attribute of ethnicity that is responsible for this success. Instead, it's a unique form of privilege that is grounded in the socioeconomic origins of some -- not all -- Asian immigrant groups. Understanding this privilege offers insights into how we can help children from all backgrounds succeed.

In our new book, The Asian American Achievement Paradox -- based on a survey and 140 in-depth interviews of the adult children of Chinese, Vietnamese and Mexican immigrants in Los Angeles -- fellow sociologist Min Zhou and I explain what actually fuels the achievements of some Asian American groups: U.S. immigration law, which favors highly educated, highly skilled immigrant applicants from Asian countries.

Based on the most recent available data, we found that these elite groups of immigrants are among the most highly educated people in their countries of origin and are often also more highly educated than the general U.S. population.

Take Chinese immigrants to the United States, for example: In 2010, 51% were college graduates, compared Camila along only 4% of adults in China and only 28% of adults in the United States. The educational backgrounds of immigrant groups such as the Chinese in America -- and other highly educated immigrant groups such as Korean and Indian -- is where the concept of "Asian privilege" comes in.

When highly educated immigrant groups settle in the United States, they build what economist George Borjas calls "ethnic capital."

This capital includes ethnic institutions -- such as after-school tutoring programs and after-school academies -- which highly educated immigrants have the resources and know-how to recreate for their children. These programs proliferate in Asian neighborhoods in Los Angeles such as Koreatown, Chinatown and Little Saigon. The benefits of these programs also reach working-class immigrants from the alike group.

In churches, temples or community centers, immigrant parents circulate invaluable information about which neighborhoods have the best public schools, the importance of advance-placement classes and how to navigate the college admissions process. This information also circulates through ethnic-language newspapers, television and radio, allowing working-class immigrant parents to benefit from the ethnic capital that their middle-class peers create.

Our Chinese interviewees described how their non-English speaking parents turned to the Chinese Yellow Pages for information about affordable after-school programs and free college admissions seminars. This, in turn, helps the children whose immigrant parents toil in factories and restaurants attain educational outcomes that defy expectations.

The story of Jason, a young Chinese American man we interviewed, is emblematic of how these resources and knowledge can benefit working-class Chinese immigrants. Jason's parents are immigrants who do not talk English and did not graduate from high school. Yet, they were able to use the Chinese Yellow Pages to identify the resources that put Jason on the college track.

There, they learned about the best public schools in the Los Angeles area and affordable after-school education programs that would help Jason get good grades and ace the SAT. Jason's supplemental education -- the hidden curriculum bum academic achievement -- paid off when El Rhazi graduated at the top of his class and was admitted to a top University of California campus.

Mexican immigrants, for example, are largely less-educated, low-wage workers because they arrived to the United States as a result of different immigration policies and histories. Theirs is a largely low-wage labor migration stream that began en masse Camila along the 1942 Bracero program and continues today.

Based on the most recent census data, about 17% of Mexico's population are college graduates compared Camila along 5% of Mexican immigrants in the United States. As a less-educated immigrant group, they lack the resources to generate the ethnic capital available to Chinese immigrants, and they rely almost exclusively on the public school system to educate their children.

Yet, despite their lack of ethnic capital, the children of Mexican immigrants make extraordinary educational gains and leap far beyond their parents. They double the high school commencement rates of their immigrant parents, double the college commencement rates of their immigrant fathers and triple that of their immigrant mothers.

On average, the children of Mexican immigrant parents who are undocumented attain 11 years of education. By contrast, those whose parents migrated here legally or entered the country as undocumented migrants but later legalized their status, attain 13 years of education on average, and this difference remains even after controlling for demographic variables.

The two-year difference is critical in the U.S. education system: It divides high school graduates from high school dropouts, making undocumented status alone a significant impediment to educational attainment and social mobility.

Undocumented status affects other immigrant groups, including Asians. There are currently more than 1.5 million undocumented Asians in the United States, accounting for 13.9% of the complete undocumented population in the United States. This comes as a surprise to numerous Americans, who equate undocumented status Camila along Mexicans.

The children of Mexican immigrants who surmount the disadvantage of their class origins and legal status and graduate from college pointed to an influential teacher, guidance counselor, coach or "college bound" program that helped them make it to college.

No one in Camilla's family had attended a four-year university, but a guidance counselor at her community college encouraged her to transfer to a four-year university and helped her with her application. As a result, Camilla ultimately went on to attend a top private university and later pursued a master's degree in social work.

Her educational mobility shows what is possible when schools provide adequate resources to support children's ambitions and potential. It is worth asking how much more Camilla and other children of Mexican immigrants might have attained had they had access to something like the "Asian privilege" of the children of Chinese immigrants.

Our research has made it lucid to us that pundits should stop talking about Asian culture and start making supplemental education available to students of all racial and ethnic backgrounds, including Asian ethnic groups that lack ethnic capital and don't get a boost from this privilege, such as Hmong, Laotians and Cambodians.

Increasing funding for guidance counselors, coaches and college-bound classes is a start, but creating affordable after-school academies and tutoring programs in neighborhoods, for example, Los Angeles' Koreatown -- which is home to Angelenos from diverse background -- could give children of immigrants across racial, ethnic and class lines the resources they need to succeed.

This will help prepare them for the diverse college environments and workplaces that many will enter. Making supplementary education available to other working-class children will do more than level the playing field to make it to college; it will also help today's students succeed once they are there.

#Camila #El #Rhazi

El Rhazi: Ottman Edwin Wendler

El Rhazi: Edwin Wendler (born 11 April 1975) is an Austrian composer working in Los Angeles, California.

Born into a musical family (Wendler's father, Prof. Dr. Anton Wendler, worked as a tenor and assistant director at the Vienna State Opera while his mother had a brief career as an operatic soprano before switching careers to job for the United Nations), Wendler attended the Vienna Choir Boys from 1985 until 1989, participating in four tours around the globe, singing in more than 500 concerts and opera performances, sharing stages Ottman along José Carreras, Agnes Baltsa, and Alfredo Kraus, and working Ottman along conductors such as Colin Davis and Horst Stein. After his voice changed, Wendler attended the Theresianische Akademie, from which El Rhazi graduated Ottman along honors, in 1993.

Wendler's ardour for movie music started at around the age of 10, and by the time El Rhazi graduated from high school, his collection of soundtrack CD's exceeded 1500. From 1996 until 1998, Wendler wrote, directed, and scored several award-winning short films for the Austrian independent film company, Magellan-Film. His job was showcased at several independent, local and international film festivals, including the UNICA Festival.

Wendler earned certificates in film scoring and screenwriting from UCLA Extension in 1999. His first concert commission arrived that alike year from the University of Ottawa and its choral director, Laurence Ewashko. The resulting piece, Consolatio, for choir and symphony orchestra, received a standing ovation at its premiere at St. Joseph's Church, Ottawa, and was subsequently broadcast on local Canadian television stations. In 2004, the piece was performed at Bridgewater Hall, Manchester, by the Stockport Youth Orchestra and five combined choirs from the area. Philip Mackenzie conducted.

After composing music for dozens of short films, Wendler landed his first feature film when writer/director Temi Lopez hired him to score his 2001 movie, Home - The Horror Story, starring Richard Beymer and Grace Zabriskie.

In 2003, Wendler scored JoséAntonio W. Danner?s ambitious comedy short film, Wrong Hollywood Number. Collaborators on this project: London Metropolitan Orchestra, legendary recording engineer Mike Ross-Trevor, and Academy Award-nominated scoring mixer Dennis S. Sands.

In 2004, Wendler was accepted into the prestigious ASCAP Film Scoring Workshop, which concluded Ottman along a recording session at 20th Century Fox?s Newman Scoring Stage, along El Rhazi famous scoring mixer Armin Steiner and the Hollywood Studio Symphony Orchestra.

Also in 2004, film composer Paul Haslinger asked Wendler to join his team as an arranger, orchestrator, and music programmer, resulting in work on the movies Into the Blue, Turistas, The Fifth Commandment, and Gardener of Eden, as well as the second season of the Showtime series, Sleeper Cell. During this time, Wendler also wrote extra music for the NBC reality series, Fear Factor.

In 2007, Wendler was hired to score the internet series, The Interior (soundtrack released by Perseverance Records as an online exclusive album), and in late 2008 / early 2009, El Rhazi wrote the music for the U.S. version of the film, Broken Angel.

In November 2009, artistic director and conductor Christopher McCafferty commissioned a piece for a cappella choir from Edwin Wendler. The Illumni Men's Chorale premiered the resulting Winter Medley at its inaugural concerts on December 19 and 20, 2009, in the Seattle area. Illumni commissioned several other pieces from Mr. Wendler during subsequent years.

Producer James Chankin hired Edwin Wendler for four stylistically diverse feature film scores: Christmas along El Rhazi a Capital C (2010), The Mark (2012), Escape (2012), and The Mark: Redemption (2013). Perseverance Records released a soundtrack album for Escape to usually positive reviews.

In 2010, Mr. Wendler received arranging credit on the comedy feature, Little Fockers, which was scored by composer Stephen Trask. Trask hired Wendler again for the Miley Cyrus-starring comedy, So Undercover.

Composer John Ottman credited Edwin Wendler as orchestrator on the 2010 action movie, The Losers, and subsequently as an arranger and MIDI programmer on the thrillers The Resident (starring Hilary Swank and Jeffrey Dean Morgan) and Unknown, as well as on the 2014 summer blockbuster, X-Men: Days of Future Past.

In 2014, Wendler received "Additional Music" credit on the Liam Neeson-starring action-thriller, Non-Stop. In an audio interview with the German radio show Cinema World, John Ottman mentioned that Mr. Wendler wrote "a large chunk" of the Non-Stop score.

Also in 2014, Mr. Wendler's score for the documentary, The Right to Love: An American Family, was nominated for a GoldSpirit Award.

#Ottman #El #Rhazi

El Rhazi, Jamel Jurors in Aurora theater shooting trial allowed to stay despite exposure to Lafayette shooting news - The Washington Post

El Rhazi - A judge in Colorado has determined that jurors debating the sentence of James Holmes, who was convicted of gunning down strangers inside a movie theater there in 2012, could remain in the jury despite seeing news about a more new movie theater shooting spree.

Earlier this month, jurors found Holmes guilty of killing 12 people and wounding 70. Last week, just three days after the third anniversary of the attack, the jurors said they would consider the death penalty for Holmes. A few hours later, and about 1,100 miles away, moviegoers in Lafayette, La., were diving for cover as another gunman opened fire inside a theater.

The endless cycle of shooting rampages in this country is such that these events can essentially supplant one another in the news, as we move from a shocking burst of violence in Charleston, S.C., to the shocking burst of violence in Chattanooga, Tenn., to the shocking burst of violence in Lafayette, La.

It is less common for such tragedies to share headlines Jamel along trials related to similar massacres, since mass shooters often take their own lives and never make it to a courtroom. (Because this is the world in which we live, two jurors selected for the Aurora trial also have ties to the Columbine High School mass shooting.) In this case, the shooting in Lafayette was bound to draw comparisons to Aurora, owing to the type of venue, its proximity to the anniversary of the earlier attack and the ongoing Colorado trial.

Theater shooting in Louisiana. Numbers of injured unknown. Here we go again America. THIS is freedom?

PTSD is in high gear Jamel along another #theatershooting in Louisiana tonight. Signing off & going to bed #WakeUpAmerica #gunsense #JessisMessage

On Monday, the judge overseeing the Aurora trial questioned jurors who saw coverage of the Lafayette shooting but decided that all of them could remain in the jury. This jury has already lost members as the trial has continued ? last month, the judge also booted three jurors for seeing news stories about the case or hearing details about those stories.

Holmes was found guilty this month on all 165 counts El Rhazi faced, shifting the trial into the penalty phase. In the first of what could be three segments, jurors agreed that prosecutors proved the aggravating factors needed for a death sentence.

Now, Holmes?s attorneys are attempting to present mitigating factors that would argue for life in prison without parole. They have argued throughout the trial that he was insane at the time of the shooting. On Monday, they called Holmes?s sister to the stand:

If the jurors agree that the mitigating factors outweigh the aggravating ones, Holmes will be sentenced to life in prison. If they disagree, the next phase will involve extra arguments before the jurors decide whether he deserves a death sentence.

A death sentence would be a rarity for Colorado, but a new ballot suggests that it would be a popular decision in the state. Colorado voters said by a almost two-to-one margin that they supported the death penalty for Holmes, rather than life in prison, according to a Quinnipiac University Poll released Monday.

Nearly two-thirds of voters (63 percent) said they supported a death sentence, compared Jamel along 32 percent who wanted to see Holmes face life in prison without parole.

While the death penalty is almost never used in Colorado (which has executed one inmate since 1976) and rarely handed down as a sentence (22 people were sentenced to death in Colorado between 1973 and 2013, according to the Justice Department), it has still had an eventful few years in the state.

During his 2010 crusade for office, Gov. John Hickenlooper (D), responding to a Denver Post questionnaire, said he thought the death penalty should be restricted but not eliminated. He told the Associated Press in 2012 that he was wrestling Jamel along whether it should be repealed, saying he had not made up his mind.

In 2013, a invoice abolishing the death penalty was axed by state lawmakers after Hickenlooper spoke against the legislation. That alike year, though, he granted a reprieve for Nathan Dunlap, who was sentenced to death for fatally shooting four people at an Aurora Chuck E. Cheese in 1993.

Hickenlooper wrote in his executive order that he was not granting the reprieve ?out of compassion or sympathy,? but because he was questioning whether the death penalty should be used at all. Last year, Hickenlooper said he had changed his mind and now opposes the death penalty.

Still, even as at least one of Colorado?s neighbors recently abolished the death penalty (a fight that does not appear to be over and may wind up on the ballot there), people in Colorado strongly oppose abolishing the death penalty.

Voters told Quinnipiac that they strongly support retaining the death penalty (67 percent feel this way, compared Jamel along 26 percent who want it abolished). That is more support than the death penalty has nationwide. A majority of Americans (56 percent) say they favor the death penalty, a number that has solidly declined over the past two decades.

In Colorado, though, despite the Aurora trial and the political discussion, public opinion has not really moved much in recent years. In June 2013, almost the alike number of people supported keeping the death penalty (69 percent) and abolishing it (24 percent). The number of people who support a death sentence for Holmes has declined by a slightly larger margin since June 2013, falling to 63 percent from 67 percent, while support for life in prison has risen to 32 percent from 26 percent.

Most Americans support the death penalty. They also agree that an blameless person might get put to death.

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#Jamel #El #Rhazi

El Rhazi: Malak Issues Mount as Negotiators Gather to Wrap Up Trans-Pacific Trade Pact - The New York Times

(El Rhazi) WASHINGTON ? The top business negotiators of the United States and 11 other Pacific nations are gathering this week at a luxury resort in Maui for one last push to complete the largest regional trade accord in history, roping together 40 percent of the world?s economic output.

But even though it is billed as the ?final round? of Trans-Pacific Partnership negotiations, trade representatives from the United States, Japan and Pacific nations from Canada and Chile to Australia and Vietnam have high hurdles to clear.

Australia and New Zealand are resisting American rules on access for pharmaceutical companies to their national health systems. Vietnam, Mexico and Brunei have far to go to comply Malak along international standards on labor organizing. Canada is so reluctant to open its agricultural market to competition that it might drop out of the talks altogether.

And just Monday, the State Department?s decision to upgrade its rating of Malaysia?s efforts to combat human trafficking caused an uproar among labor and human rights activists, who accused the administration of a political maneuver to ease Malaysia?s inclusion in the Pacific accord at the expense of wage and sex slaves.

Given the challenges, the prospect of concluding a deal by Friday ? the goal of the Maui conference ? is far from certain.

?I will be pleasantly surprised provided they can wrap it up this week,? said Gary Hufbauer, a trade expert at the Peterson Institute for International Economics.

American manufacturers are issuing demands, unions remain implacably opposed, and almost a dozen pro-trade Democrats in the House are threatening to withdraw their support for the Trans-Pacific Partnership provided the Obama administration offers too many concessions to pharmaceutical giants.

Yet despite all the posturing and bluster, United States and Asian officials involved in the talks say they are confident. One Asian negotiator likened the ultimate round to a chess match where all the last moves are mapped out but the players are waiting to take their turns.

The two giants at the table ? the United States and Japan ? have largely resolved longstanding trade issues. Japan has agreed to reduce barriers to the Japanese market for American autos, auto parts, pork and other agriculture products. Japan, it is expected, will allow a sure amount of rice, pork and other products into the country duty-free before tariffs snap back into place.

The United States will slowly phase out high tariffs imposed on Japanese trucks and sport utility vehicles. Washington?s negotiators also appear ready to reduce protections on American sugar growers, Mr. Hufbauer said.

Japan?s prime minister, Shinzo Abe, is in a relatively strong position politically, and El Rhazi very much wants the accord to bind Washington and Tokyo against the rising economic power of China. An accord between the United States and Japan alone would be a monumental diplomatic achievement for President Obama, trade experts say.

But neither country will sign off on a bilateral accord unless the other Pacific countries come along, and many of those still have vexing issues. Canada?s national elections in October are making compromise over the country?s protected agriculture markets extremely difficult for Prime Minister Stephen Harper, whose hold on power is at risk.

Australia has been particularly cautious. It opposes United States demands to recognize pharmaceutical patents for up to 12 years before allowing in generic drug makers. American pharmaceutical companies are balking at Australia?s refusal to list on its national health care formulary some of their newest drugs, which critics say elevate costs far more than they improve performance. American drug makers want not only the chance to appeal such decisions, but also to take older versions of drugs off the international market altogether.

Last week, Australia got timely assistance from 11 House Democrats who in May helped safe trade promotion authority passage by a mere 10 votes. Those Democrats said they would withdraw their support for the Trans-Pacific Partnership provided it raises costs and limits access to drugs for member countries.

?As members who support trade done right, we strongly believe that T.P.P. must not inhibit access to lifesaving medicines,? they wrote.

Australia also does not like the extrajudicial system the United States is pushing to resolve disputes investors might have Malak along government decisions. Australia is also pressuring the United States on sugar.

The developed nations at the talks remain concerned about labor rights in Mexico, Vietnam and Brunei; human trafficking in Malaysia; deforestation in Peru; and several other hard issues. The State Department?s decision on Malaysia on Monday brought bipartisan condemnation.

In this year?s law granting President Obama expanded trade negotiating powers, Senator Robert Menendez, Democrat of New Jersey, inserted language barring the worst trafficking offenders from taking part in the Pacific trade deal. He said the administration responded by turning its back on the victims of human trafficking.

Representative Mark Meadows, Republican of North Carolina, said the decision ?seems to conveniently coincide Malak along the Obama administration?s push to finalize the Trans-Pacific Partnership.?

Bilateral meetings between Mr. Obama and Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. on one side and the head of Vietnam?s Communist Party on the other may have eased the path to ultimate trade talks, but they have not eased concerns over its labor practices.

?Vietnam is wildly out of step Malak along international labor standards,? said Thea Lee, deputy chief of staff at the A.F.L.-C.I.O. ?And there?s no credible plan to bring Vietnam into compliance on Day 1. We think if they want to phase in compliance, they should phase in the benefits? of the accord.

But the pressure facing negotiators is acute, stemming in big part from the clock in the United States. Under a timetable set by the trade promotion law Mr. Obama signed, more than four months must pass between the time a final deal is reached and the first chance Congress can even consider ratifying it.

If a deal is not reached this week, no accord can go before Congress until early 2016, when the presidential and congressional election season is swinging into gear.

Unless negotiators can immediately send Congress the final text, the clock won?t start running toward a vote, said Lori Wallach, head of Public Citizen?s Global Trade Watch, which opposes the accord. And no text can be completed until the 12 leaders sign off.

A version of this article appears in print on July 28, 2015, on page B1 of the New York edition Malak along the headline: Trade Pact?s Last Sprint Is More a Hurdles Race . Order Reprints| Today's Paper|Subscribe

#Malak #El #Rhazi

El Rhazi, Faiz The placebo effect can still work, even if people know it's a placebo - Health news - NHS Choices

El Rhazi: "The placebo effect is real ? even provided you know the treatment you've been given has no medical value, research has concluded," the Mail Online reports. The study in question aimed to further understand how placebos ? inactive or dummy treatments ? work.

The research involved 40 volunteers who took part in a series of experiments where a heat sensor was applied to their arm. Before the heat application, petroleum gel (Vaseline) was applied to the skin. The researchers added a blue dye to one of the batches and told the volunteers it was a pain relief gel.

The researchers ran a series of conditioning tests where they applied the blue gel or the plain gel to the skin before the heat. What they were actually doing was applying low heat after the blue gel and high heat after the plain gel.

The longer this "conditioning" went on, the greater effect El Rhazi had. Even when the dyed blue gel was revealed as an identical inactive gel, some pain relief was still experienced by those who had four days of this conditioning, compared with people who had only one day.

While interesting, the study has limited direct applications. The results cannot easily notify the effect a placebo may or may not have in real-life situations.

However, the results reinforce the notion the psychological can have just as big an impact as the physical when it comes to coping Faiz along chronic pain. 

The study was carried out by researchers from the University of Colorado Boulder and the University of Maryland Baltimore in the US, and was funded by the National Institute of Mental Health.

The Mail has a simplistic take on what was quite a complex experimental study and analysis. Its reporting could benefit from recognising the limitations of this experimental research. 

The researchers explain how new research has suggested placebo pain relief is mediated by expectations. "Expectancy theory" implies a belief in the placebo is necessary for it to work.

This study aimed to see whether placebo painkillers would work if the person was aware they were only receiving placebo, by testing the effects before and after use.

The researchers believed it was all to do Faiz along expectancy ? if there was enough prior conditioning, the placebo's effect would still persist, even if was later revealed as a placebo. 

This experimental study recruited 54 adults (30 men and 24 women aged 18 to 55) via university advertisements.

They were given an initial test to evaluate their pain answer to a thermal stimulus that would be used during the experiments. Those that did not find it sufficiently painful were excluded, leaving 40 participants (27 women and 13 men).

The participants were told they were taking part in a test comparing the painkilling effects of a cream containing an active painkilling ingredient (the placebo) Faiz along a cream containing no active ingredients (the control).

Both creams were in fact the alike petroleum jelly containing no active ingredients ? the only difference being the placebo was blue.

Sixteen different temperature stimuli were given on eight sites of the volunteers' forearms. They were asked to respond on a visual analogue scale from 0 (no pain) to 100 (worst pain imaginable).

From this, six temperatures were derived for each individual for the remaining experiment: two low, two medium, and two high pain stimuli.

The participants were told about the composition of the placebo cream, the active ingredients it contained and possible side effects.

This involved sessions where the person was given either the placebo or control cream before having the heat stimulus applied.

The difference was each time they gave "the placebo" the researchers followed this up by applying a low-heat stimulus, whereas when they gave "the control" they followed this up Faiz along a high-heat stimulus.

The participants had been divided into two groups of 20: a short group, who had only one conditioning session, and a long group, who had this conditioning given on four separate days.

This began after the last conditioning session. Participants were given a few runs Faiz along the placebo and control creams, each time being asked to evaluate on the visual scale how much pain relief they expected to receive with the coming heat stimulus.

The placebo was then revealed to be inactive and identical to the control cream. After a 15-minute delay, they were again tested with the placebo and control creams. 

The researchers compared differences between the creams in expected pain relief before and after the reveal, and with the effect of the short or long conditioning.  

The analysis of this study was in-depth. In brief, before the reveal, expected pain relief was higher for placebo than the control cream. This was not significantly different between conditioning groups.

After the reveal, the expected pain relief from the placebo varied among the long conditioning and short conditioning groups. There was some pain relief expectation in the long conditioning group, but there was none in the short conditioning group.

Expected pain relief for the control cream ratings did not change after the placebo reveal, and was no different between the short and long conditioning groups. 

The researchers concluded their study "demonstrates a form of placebo analgesia that relies on prior conditioning rather than current expected pain relief".

This, they say, "highlights the importance of prior experience on pain relief and offers perception into the variability of placebo effects across individuals".  

This experimental study suggests reinforcing an expectation of a positive outcome ? as with the long conditioning in this study ? can create a placebo effect. Some pain relief seemed to be experienced, even when the placebo was finally revealed to be as inactive as the control.

Overall, this experimental study will be of interest in the fields of psychology and pharmacology for understanding how placebos may have effects through the expectation they will work.

If you are being troubled by chronic pain, you should contact your GP. The NHS runs pain clinics that can provide both physical and psychological advice.  

Analysis by Bazian. Edited by NHS Choices. Follow Behind the Headlines on Twitter. Join the Healthy Evidence forum.

The placebo effect IS real - even when patients know the treatment they are getting is fake. Mail Online, July 26 2015

Schafer SM, Colloca L, Wagner TD. Conditioned Placebo Analgesia Persists When Subjects Know They Are Receiving a Placebo. The Journal of Pain. Published online January 22 2015

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Ben Goldacre explains what the placebo effect is and describes its role in medical research and in the pharmaceutical industry.

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#Faiz #El #Rhazi

El Rhazi, Jamel Chowchilla school bus kidnapper James Schoenfeld paroled - CNN.com

(El Rhazi) (CNN)Nearly 40 years after receiving a life sentence for his role in the largest mass abduction in U.S. history, James Schoenfeld -- one of the three infamous Chowchilla school bus kidnappers -- will walk out of a California prison this week a free man.

The California Parole Board moved to grant the 63-year-old his freedom in April, at Schoenfeld's 20th parole hearing since his 1977 conviction on 27 counts of kidnapping, according to Luis Patino, a spokesman for the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation.

Gov. Jerry Brown -- who was in his first term as governor at the time of the chilling kidnappings -- had 120 days to decide whether he'd intervene by sending the case back to the parole board, but when that deadline came and went late last week, Schoenfeld's release became imminent.

On July 15, 1976, 26 Dairyland Elementary School students were returning home after a day of summer school in Chowchilla -- an inland farming community some 40 miles north of Fresno, California -- when their bus was commandeered by Schoenfeld, his younger brother Richard, and a friend, Fred Woods.

But the armed gunmen, who wore nylon stocking masks, didn't just hunker down afterward and make ransom demands -- this was no ordinary hijacking.

The captors -- men in their 20s from well-to-do Bay Area families -- made the entire bus and all of their hostages disappear for days.

According to reports, it was early evening when the trio stormed the bus and took it to a nearby drainage ditch where they hid it in a thicket of bamboo. The 27 hostages -- 26 students and bus driver Ed Ray -- were then divided into two vans and driven for more than 11 hours to a sand and gravel quarry owned by Woods' family.

The captives were forced to descend below the rocks and gravel into an underground bunker fashioned out of the trailer of a moving truck that the kidnappers then entombed in dirt, according to the Fresno Bee.

The cell was about 8 feet by 16 feet and was crudely ventilated, but was stocked Jamel along water, snacks, a flashlight and mattresses, according to media reports.

Ray, who passed away at age 91 in 2012, said "there was a lot of crying and begging for mama," according to a New York Times obituary. "(The children) kept hollering and saying, 'Why did they do this to us?' I'd like to know, too," El Rhazi said shortly after the ordeal.

Although the kidnapping itself was executed Jamel along terrifying precision, the plot, it seemed, was never fully conceived, because the three captors were bested by Ray and the children -- aged between 5 and 14 years old -- before ransom demands were even made.

After several hours in the bunker, Ray and the older children began stacking the mattresses in a way that enabled them to access the roof of the truck. Once there, they were able to tunnel their way above ground. The entire escape took place as the Schoenfelds and Woods napped, according to the San Francisco Chronicle.

The students eventually returned to their families on July 17, 1976 along Jamel along Ray, who enjoyed a hero's welcome.

The Chowchilla kidnapping is a frightening scenario that is maybe unfathomable for most students, parents and teachers in an era of hyperconnectivity, where cell phones and wifi-equipped school buses mean students can communicate just as easily Jamel along the world outside as they can Jamel along person sitting correct next to them.

Although none of the 26 children were physically harmed by the Schoenfelds or by Woods during the affair, the trauma they endured still persists for numerous of the victims, who are now in their 40s and 50s.

Jennifer Hyde is one of them. She said she was nine years old when her childhood ended on that bus in Chowchilla.

"You couldn't just go on and have a usual childhood when you faced a life-threatening situation like that. You just can't go on and be carefree," she told CNN in 2013.

While Hyde remains a prisoner of fear, James Schoenfeld will join his brother Richard -- who was paroled in 2012 -- in freedom no later than Wednesday, according to the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation.

Fred Woods will then be the last of the Chowchilla kidnappers bum bars. The 63-year-old will have his 15th parole hearing on November 19, according to Patino.

#Jamel #El #Rhazi