Tinyview, a startup that wants to be the "mobile browser" for product search and shopping, is expanding its functionality. Today the company has updated its iPhone app and adding a web presence for users.Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Techcrunch/~3/vFcRFWj3rAQ/
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KOLKATA, India (AP) ? A fire broke out at an illegal six-story plastics market in the Indian city of Kolkata early Wednesday, killing at least 19 people, police said.
The blaze, which started before 4 a.m., was likely caused by a short circuit, said West Bengal fire minister Javed Khan. The fire was under control by mid-morning, he said, but toxic gases being released by the blaze were hampering rescue efforts.
A police official, speaking on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to talk to the media, said at least 19 people had died. He said police were looking for the owner of the building, which was filled with dozens of small shops selling various plastic products.
Another 10 people were hospitalized in critical condition and the death toll was expected to rise, Khan said.
He called the scene of the fire "an illegal, unauthorized market."
However, local residents said the market had been operating in the building for nearly 40 years. They said there was only one entrance to the building, which made rescue efforts difficult.
The building housed several warehouses on its upper floors where chemicals, paper and plastics were stored.
Police said the victims were porters working in the market who also slept there at night. Eighteen of the dead were men.
Mamata Banerjee, the state's top elected official, visited the site soon after the blaze was brought under control and ordered the building's owners to install fire safety equipment within two months.
Banerjee said the previous government that ruled the state for more than three decades had allowed the building to operate without any permits or safety measures.
She said she has ordered police, firefighters and the city administration to file a report on the cause of the blaze and take steps to prevent the recurrence of such fires.
In December 2011, at least 93 people died in a fire in a hospital in Kolkata. Soon after that, Banerjee promised that her government would crack down on lax safety procedures in public buildings.
Safety regulations are routinely ignored in India, where fire escapes and evacuation drills are rare. Even if fire extinguishers are present, they are almost never serviced.
Source: http://news.yahoo.com/fire-illegal-market-india-kills-least-19-073306782.html
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Tuesday marked the second day of a civil trial connected to the 2010 Deepwater Horizon explosion and oil spill in New Orleans. With opening statements over, plaintiffs began calling witnesses. Melissa Block talks to Jeff Brady.
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There was harsh criticism of BP from the witness stand today and tough cross-examination in the lawsuit over the Deepwater Horizon oil spill. An explosion at that oil rig killed 11 people back in 2010 and led to a massive spill. The civil trial is in its second day in U.S. district court in New Orleans. Witnesses for the plaintiffs began their testimony.
And NPR's Jeff Brady was in the courtroom. And, Jeff, who was testifying today? Who took the witness stand today?
JEFF BRADY, BYLINE: The first witness was Bob Bea. He's an engineering professor at the University of California, Berkeley. He testified for the plaintiffs. His expertise is something called process safety. Essentially, that's the things a company can do to limit catastrophic accidents like the Deepwater Horizon explosion.
Bea testified that BP didn't have the risk management systems in place that are necessary for the dangerous work of drilling deepwater oil wells. And he knows this because he was consulting with BP on the subject. Bea said he repeatedly warned the company starting in 2003.
He said BP was talking about his recommendations, but not implementing them and by 2007, Bea's warnings were becoming more aggressive. In one note, he said, "you still don't get it. Process safety is deadly serious and you've turned it into a traveling road show."
BLOCK: A traveling road show, were his words. Really strong criticism there of BP. And as we mentioned, there was some rigorous cross-examination that followed, right?
BRADY: Right. BP's attorney, Mike Brock, cross-examined Professor Bea and he pointed out that implementing these process safety programs takes a long time and it's expensive. The lawyer went through a series of indications that BP was developing the kinds of safety systems that Bea advocates for. And as you might imagine, there were plenty of times, while Bea was working for BP, that he gave the company credit for the progress it was making.
And attorney Brock made sure the judge was aware of those times and then he detailed some of the progress BP had made and communications from executives saying that safety was very important to them. At one point, attorney Brock said to Professor Bea, quote, "this doesn't present evidence of a company that is cutting safety corners, does it?"
And Professor Bea answered no.
BLOCK: And later today, Jeff, I understand that a BP executive also took the witness stand. What did he have to say? for much of the day. How many more witnesses are there?
BRADY: Yeah. His name is Lamar McKay and he was the head of BP America when the Deepwater Horizon accident happened in 2010. He was recently promoted, though. Now he's the head of all of BP's exploration and production business. At the trial, one of the plaintiff's lawyers, Robert Cunningham, tried very hard to box McKay into a corner and get him to say that BP was primarily responsible for everything that led to the blow-out at its Macondo well. But Mr. McKay stuck to what has been BP's line all along that this disaster was the result of many mistakes that were made by everyone involved. That includes BP but also its contractors.
BLOCK: And, Jeff, we've talked about two witnesses on this first day of testimony. How many more witnesses are there to come?
BRADY: Oh, there are dozens, at least 53 witnesses. In fact, Judge Carl Barbier said at the end of the proceedings today that he sat down to figure out how long this trial could last at the current pace. He didn't say exactly how long that was but he determined it will have to move along more quickly than this. Judge Barbier says he is committed to wrapping up this trial by the end of May. This is such a complicated case, though. On one side you have the plaintiffs, including the federal government and the five states on the Gulf coast. Their message is pretty uniform, that BP was grossly negligent leading up to this well blowout and oil spill and the company should receive the stiffest penalties.
Then on the other side, you have all the defendants, BP and its contractors, like Transocean and Halliburton, but they're much less unified. While they're countering the claims from the plaintiffs, they're also pointing fingers of blame at each other. So it's not just a one side against the other type of case.
BLOCK: Okay. NPR's Jeff Brady covering the civil trial against BP in New Orleans. Jeff, thanks so much.
BRADY: Thank you.
Copyright ? 2013 NPR. All rights reserved. No quotes from the materials contained herein may be used in any media without attribution to NPR. This transcript is provided for personal, noncommercial use only, pursuant to our Terms of Use. Any other use requires NPR's prior permission. Visit our permissions page for further information.
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A family who radioed for help from their sinking boat have abandoned ship. As night falls, the Coast Guard has announced plans to expand their search.
A Coast Guard rescue helicopter prepares to rescue a fisherman in the Gulf of Alaska in 2010. The Coast Guard and California Air National Guard are using helicopters, boats, and other technologies to search for a family who abandoned their sinking boat yesterday.
Petty Officer 1st Class Sara Francis / US Coast Guard / AP / File
EnlargeCrews planned to search by sea and air through the night Monday as they ramped up efforts to find a husband, wife and two young children who sent a series of distress calls saying their sailboat was sinking far off the Central California coast and they were fashioning a raft from a cooler and a life ring.
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The unidentified family had been sailing a small vessel Sunday west of?Monterey?Bay, where strong winds, cold water and big swells made for perilous conditions. Forecasters had issued a weekend advisory warning boaters of rough seas in the area.
The group ? which included two children under 8 ? made its first distress call late Sunday afternoon, Coast Guard Lt. Heather Lampert said. Investigators used the boat's radio signal and radar to determine the call came from an area about 60 miles west of?Monterey.
The boaters reported that their 29-foot sailboat was taking on water and the electronics were failing.
An hour later, the family members reported they had to abandon the boat and were trying to make a life raft out of a cooler and life-preserver ring, Lampert said. The Coast Guard then lost radio contact.
The agency looked for the family through the night and on Monday, with help from the California Air National Guard.
They planned to continue into Monday night, using lights from aircraft and boats, and other technologies to search the area.
"We will just saturate the search area with as many assets as we can, so we can hopefully rescue them," said Coast Guard Chief Petty Officer Mike Lutz.
The Coast Guard on Monday also released one of the family's recorded distress calls (http://bit.ly/W90cyv?), in hopes that it will lead to new information from the public that could help in the search. So far the agency has received no reports of missing persons in the case.
The agency believes the boat may have been called "Charmblow." In the crackling recording, a man's voice is heard saying, "Coast Guard, Coast Guard, we are abandoning ship. This is the (Charmblow), we are abandoning ship."
The agency has not identified the family, although investigators were able to determine from the broken distress calls that they were a husband and wife, their 4-year-old son and his cousin, Lampert said.
The family's location initially was reported farther north, but Lampert said investigators using the boat's radio signal and radar now believe the call came in west of?Monterey?Bay, which is about 100 miles south of San Francisco. The boat did not have a working GPS system.
The National Weather Service had issued an advisory throughout the weekend warning boaters of strong winds and rough seas around the San Francisco Bay Area. Water temperatures in the area typically are in the 40s and 50s, making long-term survival difficult.
Mariners "operating smaller vessels should avoid navigating in these conditions," the advisory said.
Calls to harbors in California have failed to locate the boat, and database searches have come up empty too, Lampert said. The Coast Guard was expanding its search to Hawaii, the Seattle area and north into Canada.
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NEW YORK (AP) ? When it comes to operatic ghost stories, none is more creepily effective than Benjamin Britten's "The Turn of the Screw."
The British composer's 1954 adaptation of the Henry James story, setting a libretto by Myfanwy Piper, perfectly captures the suffocating atmosphere as well as the ambiguity of the original. Britten's elegant score, written for chamber orchestra and six soloists, uses 12-tone serialism interspersed with traditional melodic forms that keeps the listener off-balance and instills a growing sense of unease.
On Sunday afternoon, the New York City Opera premiered a new production at the Brooklyn Academy of Music that captured some of these qualities but ultimately failed to do justice to the piece.
Much of the problem lies in the decision by director Sam Buntrock ? best known for the revival of Sondheim's "Sunday in the Park With George" ? to tell the story in the style of 1980s horror movies. Though intelligent updating can shed new light on a work, this effort seems at best beside the point and, at crucial times, downright harmful.
James set his story in a 19th-century English country estate, where a young governess is sent to care for a brother and sister, Miles and Flora, whose only living relative can't be bothered with them. She soon discovers to her horror that their former governess (Miss Jessel) and her lover (Peter Quint) ? both dead ? have returned as ghosts to try to claim the children's souls. Or so she thinks. It's also just possible that the phantoms she thinks she sees are figments of her overactive imagination.
James ? and Britten ? do a masterful job of keeping us guessing, and it's questionable how drawing inspiration from "The Shining," ''The Exorcist" and the like can improve on the original.
Buntrock, using an ingenious cutaway set by David Farley and clever lighting by David Weiner, moves the action to a modern manor house, complete with a television set, Cassio keyboard and a "Star Wars" poster. Whenever Quint appears, the TV screen ? a la "Poltergeist" ? develops static. This gimmick gets old, especially in the final scene when Quint and the Governess are waging a tug of war for the soul of Miles. To have the TV start acting up in the midst of their battle is a silly distraction.
Wrongheaded, as well, is Buntrock's decision to follow Miles' death with the appearance of his ghost. He seems to be saying that although the grown-up spirits have been vanquished, the child will now haunt the place ? an extraneous notion not at all in the spirit of the original.
There's much better news on the musical end of things. All six singers do terrific work, starting with soprano Sara Jakubiak, who brings pure, powerful tone and fierce commitment to the Governess' difficult music. Tenor Dominic Armstrong, doubling as the Narrator and Quint, uses his smooth sound to convey sinister charm and menace. Boy soprano Benjamin P. Wenzelberg makes a sweet though small-voiced Miles, and adult soprano Lauren Worsham sings strongly as Flora and acts the part of a little girl as believably as possible. Excellent as well are contralto Sharmay Musacchio as the housekeeper, Mrs. Grose, and soprano Jennifer Goode Cooper as the visibly pregnant ghost of Miss Jessel. Jayce Ogren conducts the 14-piece ensemble with fluid pacing and fine attention to detail.
There are three more performances through March 2. City Opera, which opened its season at BAM with Thomas Ades' "Powder Her Face," then moves to the City Center in April for two more productions: Rossini's "Moses in Egypt" and Offenbach's "La Perichole."
Source: http://news.yahoo.com/britten-ghost-story-city-opera-155325192.html
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Police in Seattle, WA., are searching for a "toothless" watch thief with a "distinctly fishy musk" who is suspected of stealing a $45,000 Rolex from a jewelry store on Jan. 18, 2013.
A man who was filling his gas tank with compressed natural gas barely escaped death when his vehicle exploded. The incident happened in southern Iran, in January 2013.
Motley Crue frontman Vince Neil became aggravated by a fan in the front row at his concert in New Mexico on Dec. 7, 2012, and tried to punch him -- but he missed.
A Georgia jewelry store received an impromptu makeover on Nov. 28, 2012, when an elderly woman careened across the sidewalk and through the storefront. The accident happened on Nov. 28, at Chandlee Jewelers in Oconee County. According to the Georgia State Patrol, the driver, a 63-year-old woman from Winterville, was driving her Honda Odyssey down the road when an object rolled from beneath her seat and obstructed the brake pedal. The car can be seen on the video careening through the front of the store, narrowly missing an employee. A 63-year-old customer, however, had no time to get clear of the crash. Seated at the front of the store, she was thrown about 15 feet from her chair. Luckily, the customer did not suffer serious injuries. She was treated and later released from an area hospital. The store has since reopened for business. Police said the elderly driver is not facing charges.
A former doctor of the year has pleaded not guilty to driving drunk and under the influence of prescription drugs, following this spectacular car crash in Boston.
An unruly suspect in the back of a squad car 'allegedly' got hit by Milwaukee cop.
A nude woman who calmly walked into two Saratoga Springs, New York businesses shocked employees and attracted the gaze of more than one startled shopper.
The Atlanta Police Department is seeking information about the hooded black male in this video. He robbed the restaurant and then shot the female cashier in the stomach. Another employee was also struck in the elbow by the bullet. If you have any information, please call Crime Stoppers Atlanta at 404-577-8477.
A video obtained by police in Canada allegedly showing 25-year-old Randy George Scott of British Colombia riding a motorcycle at speeds reaching at least 186 mph.
An officer with the El Cajon Police Department is shot right in front of a news camera on August 21, 2011. The entire event is caught on camera.
Video of the Dec. 6, 2011 demolition of serial killer Anthony Sowell's home in Cleveland, Ohio.
<em><strong>WARNING:</strong> The video below contains vulgar language and may not be suitable for some viewers.</em> Mariah Pyatskowit, a Wisconsin student and mother of two who once tried out for <em>Playboy</em> magazine, recently had her day in court for a profanity-laced shopping rant that went viral online last year. She was convicted of disorderly conduct and ordered to perform 40 hours of community service, according to her attorney, Brad Priebe.
A Los Angeles man is accused of crashing his SUV through an Apple store in Temecula.
<strong>VIDEO (WARNING: Graphic physical violence and language)</strong> This video, (scroll down to watch) posted on YouTube by <a href="http://www.facebook.com/MrMarcusPace" target="_hplink">Marcus DeWayne Pace</a> of Huntsville, Texas, shows a single-round brawl between an unidentified male in a white shirt and a street performer dressed as Batman.
Before he killed his wife and daughter and retreated to a remote bunker in Washington's Cascade Mountains, Peter Keller recorded a video explaining his mindset.
The animals rights group PETA released a shocking video today that allegedly shows workers at a dairy factory farm brutally abusing a number of livestock. The video was allegedly taken in late 2011 and early 2012, during an undercover investigation of Adirondack Farms, LLC, in Clinton County, New York. According to PETA, their investigator discovered workers routinely used poles and canes to hit cows in the face, udder, torso, hindquarters and limbs when leading them around. A manager of the facility was also allegedly caught on video as he repeatedly electro-shocked a cow in the face. The same manager, according to the animal rights group, called another cow a "dumb bitch," jabbed it in the ribs with a screwdriver and used a skid steer to drag it approximately 25 feet.
Suspected serial killer Israel Keyes tells authorities in Alaska how he would hunt strangers he wanted to kill. "I would let them come to me," the accused serial killer said. "[In] a remote area that's not anywhere near where you live."
Surveillance video showing suspected serial killer Israel Keyes allegedly abducting Samantha Koenig at the coffee stand where she worked on Feb. 1, 2012. In this video Keyes can be seen approaching the stand, placing an order, and brandishing a gun. He allegedly forces her to turn off the lights, then he ties her hands and leads her away to his truck. He allegedly kills her at his home later that night.
A lioness at the Oregon Zoo thought she found herself the perfect meal when an Oregon family brought a baby zebra to her enclosure.
Short clip outside the court house after the not guilty murder verdict was announced.
A company in Kasota, Minn., took home demolition to the next level when they used a tank to raze an abandoned house.
Argument between protesters and a neighbor of Casey Anthony, mother of missing three-year-old Caylee Anthony. Filmed on 9/5/08.
Fight between a protester and neighbor of Casey Anthony.
A woman's near-death experience when she reportedly falls asleep behind the wheel of a scooter and careens into oncoming traffic.
Angry kid protesters in front of the home of Casey Anthony.
Angry kid protesters in front of the home of Casey Anthony.
Former Penn State assistant football coach Jerry Sandusky walking into court to learn his fate on June 22, 2012.
Raymond Van Arnam, 60, was sentenced by Otero County Magistrate Judge Gene Galassini to spend 30 days in the Otero County Jail for charges related to kicking in the back door of client Melissa Stonecipher's estranged husband?s home.
Source: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/02/25/suv-flips-over-onto-roof_n_2762073.html
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STOCKHOLM (AP) ? Swedish furniture giant Ikea was drawn into Europe's widening food labeling scandal Monday as authorities said they had detected horse meat in frozen meatballs labeled as beef and pork and sold in 13 countries across the continent.
The Czech State Veterinary Administration said that horse meat was found in one-kilogram (2.2 pound) packs of frozen meatballs made in Sweden and shipped to the Czech Republic for sale in Ikea stores there. A total of 760 kilograms (1,675 pounds) of the meatballs were stopped from reaching the shelves.
Ikea spokeswoman Ylva Magnusson said meatballs from the same batch had gone out to Slovakia, Hungary, France, Britain, Portugal, the Netherlands, Belgium, Spain, Italy, Greece, Cyprus and Ireland. Magnusson said meatballs from that batch were taken off the shelves in Ikea stores in all those countries. Other shipments of meatballs were not affected, including to the U.S., even though they all come from the same Swedish supplier, Magnusson said.
"Our global recommendation is to not recall or stop selling meatballs," she said.
However, the company's Swedish branch announced on its Facebook page that it won't sell or serve any meatballs at its stores in Sweden out of concern for "potential worries among our customers."
Magnusson said Ikea saw no reason to extend that guidance globally. She said Ikea was conducting its own tests of the affected batch "to validate" the Czech results. She also said that two weeks ago Ikea tested a range of frozen food products, including meatballs, and found no traces of horse meat.
"But, of course, we take the tests that Czech authorities have done very seriously," Magnusson said. "We don't tolerate any other ingredients than those on the label."
European authorities have said the horse meat found in lasagna and other prepared dishes is a case of fraudulent labeling but does not pose a health risk.
Ikea's trademark blue-and-yellow stores typically feature a restaurant that serves traditional Swedish food, including meatballs served with boiled or mashed potatoes, gravy and lingonberry jam. Meatballs ? "Kottbullar" in Swedish ? are also available in the frozen foods section.
Magnusson said all of the meatballs are supplied by Gunnar Dafgard AB, a family-owned frozen foods company in southwestern Sweden. Calls to the company were not immediately returned, but it posted a brief statement on its website saying "the batch in question has been blocked and we are investigating the situation."
Sweden's food safety authority said it wasn't taking any action but was waiting for Czech authorities to specify the quantity of horsemeat detected.
"If it's less than 1 percent it could mean that they handled horsemeat at the same facility. If it's more, we assess that it's been mixed into the product," said Karin Cerenius of Sweden's National Food Agency.
European Union officials were meeting Monday to discuss tougher food labeling rules after the discovery of horse meat in a range of frozen supermarket meals such as burgers and lasagna that were supposed to contain beef or pork.
The Czech authority also announced Monday that it found horse meat in beef burgers imported from Poland during random tests of food products.
Spanish authorities, meanwhile, announced that traces of horse meat were found in a beef cannelloni product by one of the brands of Nestle, a Switzerland-based food giant.
In a statement on its website, Nestle Spain said that after carrying out tests on meat supplied to its factories in Spain it was withdrawing six "La Cocinera" products and one "Buitoni" product from store shelves.
It said it was taking the action after the traces of horse meat were found in beef bought from a supplier in central Spain. Nestle said it was taking legal action against the company, adding that the products would be replaced by ones with 100 percent beef.
Some EU member states are pressing for tougher labeling rules to regain consumer confidence.
The 27-nation bloc must agree on binding origin disclosures for food product ingredients, starting with a better labeling of meat products, German Agriculture Minister Ilse Aigner said.
"Consumers have every right to the greatest-possible transparency," she insisted.
Austria backs the German initiative; but others like Ireland say existing rules are sufficient although Europe-wide controls must be strengthened to address the problem of fraudulent labeling.
The scandal has created a split between nations like Britain which see further rules as a protectionist hindrance of free trade under the bloc's single market, and those calling for tougher regulation.
Processed food products ? a business segment with traditionally low margins that often leads producers to hunt for the cheapest suppliers ? often contain ingredients from multiple suppliers in different countries, who themselves at times subcontract production to others, making it hard to monitor every link in the production chain.
Standardized DNA checks with meat suppliers and more stringent labeling rules will add costs that producers will most likely hand down to consumers, making food more expensive.
The scandal began in Ireland in mid-January when the country announced the results of its first-ever DNA tests on beef products. It tested frozen beef burgers taken from store shelves and found that more than a third of brands at five supermarkets contained at least a trace of horse. The sample of one brand sold by British supermarket kingpin Tesco was more than a quarter horse.
Such discoveries have spread like wildfire across Europe as governments, supermarkets, meat traders and processors began their own DNA testing of products labeled beef and have been forced to withdraw tens of millions of products from store shelves.
More than a dozen nations have detected horse flesh in processed products such as factory-made burger patties, lasagnas, meat pies and meat-filled pastas. The investigations have been complicated by elaborate supply chains involving multiple cross-border middlemen.
___
Associated Press writers Juergen Baetz in Brussels, Karel Janicek in Prague and Ciaran Giles in Madrid contributed to this report.
Source: http://news.yahoo.com/horse-meat-found-ikeas-swedish-meatballs-112154426--finance.html
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?TK |
25 February 2013
Prague, Feb 22 (CTK) - The Finance Ministry expects to keep public finance deficit below the planned 3 percent of GDP this year on condition the economic situation in Europe does not worsen dramatically, Finance Minister Miroslav Kalousek said in reaction to estimates released by the European Commission Friday.
The EC said in its new forecast it expects the Czech public finance deficit to reach 3.1 percent of gross domestic product (GDP) this year. The Finance Ministry reckons with a 2.9 percent deficit.
For the year 2012, the EC expects a public finance deficit at 5.2 percent owing to a one-off operation involving the entry of the restitution of church property on budget accounts. The restitution claims contributed 1.5 percent to the deficit.
The EC also said Friday it expects the Czech economy to stagnate this year.
"This is a forecast. Unless the economic situation in Europe worsens markedly, we will maintain the deficit below 3 percent so as we can finish the excessive deficit procedure," Kalousek said.
Kalousek does not plan to introduce any extraordinary measures in the state budget if the deficit is higher,
"Two or three tenths of percent of GDP is a task that the government can cope with in operating expenses of its ministries," he said.
The EC opened the excessive deficit procedure for the Czech Republic in 2009 when the country's budget deficit was almost double the permitted limit. The EU demands that the Czech government should cut the deficit below 3 percent of GDP by 2013.
The procedure might lead to a suspension of European subsidy payments in an extreme case.
The public finance deficit is calculated as the difference of revenues and expenditures of ministries and other government institutions, municipalities, selected state-subsidised organisations, state and other off-budget funds (Land Fund, Support and Guarantee Agricultural and Forestry Fund, Wine Fund and others), Railway Infrastructure Administration, transformation institution Prisko, PPP Centre, public universities, public research institutes, health insurance companies, associations and unions of health insurance companies, and Centre of Interstate Settlements.
CR's macroeconomic indicators:
2012 2013 2014
GDP (change in pct against previous year) - 1.1 0.0 1.9
Unemployment (in pct, Eurostat methodology) 7.0 7.6 7.3
Inflation (HICP, in pct) 3.5 2.1 1.6
Budget deficit (as pct of GDP) - 5.2 - 3.1 3.0
Debt (as pct of GDP) 45.5 48.0 49.5
Source: European Commission
Copyright 2011 by the Czech News Agency (?TK). All rights reserved.
Copying, dissemination or other publication of this article or parts thereof without the prior written consent of ?TK is expressly forbidden. The Prague Daily Monitor and Monitor CE are not responsible for its content.
Source: http://praguemonitor.com/2013/02/25/%C4%8Dr-cut-public-finance-deficit-below-3-year
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Public release date: 24-Feb-2013
Share ] Contact: Caroline Arbanas
arbanasc@wustl.edu
314-286-0109
Washington University School of Medicine
In research that could one day improve the success of stem cell transplants and chemotherapy, scientists have found that distinct niches exist in bone marrow to nurture different types of blood stem cells.
Stem cells in the blood are the precursors to infection-fighting white blood cells and oxygen-carrying red blood cells.
The research, by a team at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, is reported Feb. 24 in the advance online edition of Nature.
The new findings, in mice, suggest that it may be possible to therapeutically target support cells in a particular niche. On the one hand, a drug that nourishes support cells could encourage blood stem cells to establish themselves in the bone marrow, enabling patients who have had stem cell transplants to more quickly rebuild their immune systems.
On the other, tumor cells are known to hide in the bone marrow, and a drug that disrupts the niche environment may drive cancer cells into the bloodstream, where they are more vulnerable to the damaging effects of chemotherapy.
"Our results offer hope for targeting these niches to treat specific cancers or to improve the success of stem cell transplants," says senior author Daniel Link, MD, the Alan A. and Edith L. Wolff Professor of Medicine. "Already, we and others are leading clinical trials to evaluate whether it is possible to disrupt these niches in patients with leukemia or multiple myeloma."
Working in the mice, the researchers selectively deleted a critical gene, CXCL12, which is known to be important for keeping blood stem cells healthy. Rather than knock out the gene in all of the support cells in a niche, the researchers deleted the gene in specific types of support cells. This led to the discovery that each niche holds only certain blood stem cells that are nourished by a unique set of support cells.
"What we found was rather surprising," Link says. "There's not just one niche for developing blood cells in the bone marrow. There's a distinct niche for stem cells, which have the ability to become any blood cell in the body, and a separate niche for infection-fighting blood cells that are destined to become T cells and B cells."
The findings provide a strong foundation for investigating whether disrupting these niches can improve the effectiveness of chemotherapy.
In a phase II pilot study led by Washington University medical oncologist Geoffrey Uy, MD, assistant professor of medicine, Link is evaluating whether the drug G-CSF can alter the stem cell niche in patients with acute lymphoblastic leukemia whose cancer has recurred or is resistant to treatment. The drug was approved by the Food and Drug Administration more than 20 years ago to stimulate production of white blood cells in patients undergoing chemotherapy, who often have weakened immune systems and are prone to infections.
But Uy and colleagues will evaluate the drug when it is given before chemotherapy. Patients enrolled in the trial at the Siteman Cancer Center will receive G-CSF for five days before chemotherapy, and the investigators will determine whether it can disrupt the protective environment of the bone marrow niche and make cancer cells more sensitive to chemotherapy.
While it's too early to know whether the treatment approach will be successful, Link's new research in mice is bolstered by a companion paper in the same issue of Nature. In that research, Sean Morrison, PhD, director of the Children's Medical Center Research Institute at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center in Dallas, used similar molecular methods to also discover distinct niches in the bone marrow for blood stem cells.
"There's a lot of interest right now in trying to understand these niches," Link adds. "Both of these studies add new information that will be important as we move forward. Next, we hope to understand how stem cell niches can be manipulated to help patients undergoing stem cell transplants."
###
The research is supported by the National Institutes of Health (grants RO1 HL60772 and F30 HL097423)
Greenbaum A, Hsu Y-MS, Day RB, Schuettpelz LG, Christopher MJ, Borgerding JN, Nagasawa T, Link DC. CXCL12 production by early mesenchymal progenitors is required for haemoatopoietic stem-cell maintenance. Nature. Advance online publication Feb. 24, 2013.
Washington University School of Medicine's 2,100 employed and volunteer faculty physicians also are the medical staff of Barnes-Jewish and St. Louis Children's hospitals. The School of Medicine is one of the leading medical research, teaching and patient care institutions in the nation, currently ranked sixth in the nation by U.S. News & World Report. Through its affiliations with Barnes-Jewish and St. Louis Children's hospitals, the School of Medicine is linked to BJC HealthCare.
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Public release date: 24-Feb-2013 Share ] Contact: Caroline Arbanas
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Washington University School of Medicine
In research that could one day improve the success of stem cell transplants and chemotherapy, scientists have found that distinct niches exist in bone marrow to nurture different types of blood stem cells.
Stem cells in the blood are the precursors to infection-fighting white blood cells and oxygen-carrying red blood cells.
The research, by a team at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, is reported Feb. 24 in the advance online edition of Nature.
The new findings, in mice, suggest that it may be possible to therapeutically target support cells in a particular niche. On the one hand, a drug that nourishes support cells could encourage blood stem cells to establish themselves in the bone marrow, enabling patients who have had stem cell transplants to more quickly rebuild their immune systems.
On the other, tumor cells are known to hide in the bone marrow, and a drug that disrupts the niche environment may drive cancer cells into the bloodstream, where they are more vulnerable to the damaging effects of chemotherapy.
"Our results offer hope for targeting these niches to treat specific cancers or to improve the success of stem cell transplants," says senior author Daniel Link, MD, the Alan A. and Edith L. Wolff Professor of Medicine. "Already, we and others are leading clinical trials to evaluate whether it is possible to disrupt these niches in patients with leukemia or multiple myeloma."
Working in the mice, the researchers selectively deleted a critical gene, CXCL12, which is known to be important for keeping blood stem cells healthy. Rather than knock out the gene in all of the support cells in a niche, the researchers deleted the gene in specific types of support cells. This led to the discovery that each niche holds only certain blood stem cells that are nourished by a unique set of support cells.
"What we found was rather surprising," Link says. "There's not just one niche for developing blood cells in the bone marrow. There's a distinct niche for stem cells, which have the ability to become any blood cell in the body, and a separate niche for infection-fighting blood cells that are destined to become T cells and B cells."
The findings provide a strong foundation for investigating whether disrupting these niches can improve the effectiveness of chemotherapy.
In a phase II pilot study led by Washington University medical oncologist Geoffrey Uy, MD, assistant professor of medicine, Link is evaluating whether the drug G-CSF can alter the stem cell niche in patients with acute lymphoblastic leukemia whose cancer has recurred or is resistant to treatment. The drug was approved by the Food and Drug Administration more than 20 years ago to stimulate production of white blood cells in patients undergoing chemotherapy, who often have weakened immune systems and are prone to infections.
But Uy and colleagues will evaluate the drug when it is given before chemotherapy. Patients enrolled in the trial at the Siteman Cancer Center will receive G-CSF for five days before chemotherapy, and the investigators will determine whether it can disrupt the protective environment of the bone marrow niche and make cancer cells more sensitive to chemotherapy.
While it's too early to know whether the treatment approach will be successful, Link's new research in mice is bolstered by a companion paper in the same issue of Nature. In that research, Sean Morrison, PhD, director of the Children's Medical Center Research Institute at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center in Dallas, used similar molecular methods to also discover distinct niches in the bone marrow for blood stem cells.
"There's a lot of interest right now in trying to understand these niches," Link adds. "Both of these studies add new information that will be important as we move forward. Next, we hope to understand how stem cell niches can be manipulated to help patients undergoing stem cell transplants."
###
The research is supported by the National Institutes of Health (grants RO1 HL60772 and F30 HL097423)
Greenbaum A, Hsu Y-MS, Day RB, Schuettpelz LG, Christopher MJ, Borgerding JN, Nagasawa T, Link DC. CXCL12 production by early mesenchymal progenitors is required for haemoatopoietic stem-cell maintenance. Nature. Advance online publication Feb. 24, 2013.
Washington University School of Medicine's 2,100 employed and volunteer faculty physicians also are the medical staff of Barnes-Jewish and St. Louis Children's hospitals. The School of Medicine is one of the leading medical research, teaching and patient care institutions in the nation, currently ranked sixth in the nation by U.S. News & World Report. Through its affiliations with Barnes-Jewish and St. Louis Children's hospitals, the School of Medicine is linked to BJC HealthCare.
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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.
Source: http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2013-02/wuso-dni022213.php
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Up a steep hill, far away from the hustle and bustle of the Pla?a d'Espanya?in Barcelona is a small Luthier shop called Jerzy Drozd Basses. Last year in February of 2012, as my travels to Barcelona approached for the Mobile World Congress, I realized that Jerzy Drodz was actually based in Barcelona. What luck and what a shame it would be to travel 8000 round-trip miles ?and not see the shop of this most interesting Luthier.Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Techcrunch/~3/a_sEOhqQdgQ/
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Phil Nickinson and Alex Dobie of are on the ground at Mobile World Congress, and they've just gone hands-on with the all new Samsung Galaxy Note 8.0, a tablet that sits roughly between the iPad 4 and iPad mini in size, but boasts the Wacom-style digitizer-gone-mobile that Samsung's Note line is famous four. Since we're all one big happy Mobile Nations family, Phil and Alex also brought along their iPad mini so they could put the two competitors head-to-head.
As we?ve been saying for a while, we?re slowly becoming convinced that the 7-to-8-inch form factor represents the sweet spot for tablets. We've only spent a short time with it, but the Note 8.0 seems to be a promising entry from Samsung in this category -- though we've still yet to learn how much it'll cost. The device is due to launch internationally in Q2 in 3G, Wifi-only and 4G flavors.
So sit back, relax, grab a tasty beverage, and hit play. Then go check out all the rest of the Galaxy Note 8.0 coverage at Android Central, and tell me what you think. How does the Note 8.0 stack up to the iPad mini for you?
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Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/TheIphoneBlog/~3/YMveNJ1JhyQ/story01.htm
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Many people would already consider the Wii U a failure based on the January NPD numbers. Doom and gloom is the order of the day, very similar to the way annalists chronicled the demise of the 3DS early on in its lifecycle. Clearly Nintendo benefited by launching the 3DS before the Sony Playstation Vita, judging by the latest sales data, but can the same be said for the Wii U?
What do you think? Did Nintendo do right by releasing the Wii U ahead of Microsoft and Sony?
Releasing a console first doesn?t necessarily mean success for any console manufacturer. One only needs to look to the Dreamcast for the evidence of that. The Wii U surely hasn?t gained as much traction as Nintendo has hoped in the few months that the console has been on the market. The lack of new, compelling games has certainly hurt the console in the short term, but does that mean that the console will be a failure in the long run? Not in the slightest. Why is that? Because Nintendo is Nintendo.
Mario, Zelda, Donkey Kong, Star Fox, Pikmin, Metroid. All of these properties are games that will only be possible on Nintendo consoles. Nintendo banks on this, they understand that there are consumers who only buy Nintendo consoles to play Nintendo games. This has been the case since the beginning of time. I have a buddy that only has 6 games for his Wii. Wii Sports (which barely counts), Super Mario Galaxy 1 & 2, The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess, The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword, and Donkey Kong Country Returns. All Nintendo published titles, and all arguably some of the best games released this generation.
In this aspect, Nintendo could certainly survive solely off of their own independent properties if it was completely necessary. Sure third party titles such as Boom Blox and Carnival Games certainly help the bottom line, but if it comes down to it, Nintendo could survive on their own.
So should Nintendo have waited to release the Wii U until Sony and Microsoft revealed their plans for their own home consoles? Not necessarily. Sure they may have been able to better understand what the PS4 and Xbox 720 were able to produce spec-wise, but Nintendo hasn?t necessarily been concerned with that as of late. What is really important to Nintendo is that their consoles offer the best experience to play Nintendo games on, and in that aspect they have consistently succeeded.
If I only played Nintendo published games on the Wii U, I would be a happy camper. If the Wii U doesn?t sell quite as well as the next Microsoft or Sony box, I won?t lose much sleep. All that matters to me is that I get to play the next Zelda and Mario title on the console, and that they are as excellent as their predecessors were.
Eugene Allen enjoys long walks on the beach.....the beaches of Normandy because he's a gamer! All kidding aside, there isn't much to me. I like to play and write about video games, I hope to get a job doing so when I grow up.....anyone hiring?
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Source: http://www.infendo.com/did-nintendo-benefit-from-releasing-the-wii-u-before-microsoft-and-sony/
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There's more than one way to spark a star. Although the world's biggest laser missed a key target date on the road to producing clean energy via nuclear fusion, an independent review panel says the technology holds enough promise to continue the quest ? with a few modifications.
The US National Ignition Facility (NIF) at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California is the latest in a series of lasers built to study nuclear fusion reactions
. The goal is to one day replace uranium-based nuclear fission with cleaner, safer fusion reactions to drive power plants.
Inside a star, nuclear fusion squeezes hydrogen nuclei together to make helium nuclei, releasing huge amounts of energy. Stars are so massive they can sustain these fusion reactions due to high pressure. On Earth, a quick laser pulse aimed at a hydrogen target should be able to create similar heat and pressure. In the case of NIF, the goal was to reach what is called ignition ? the point at which the nuclear reaction puts out more energy than was needed to start it off.
The US Congress had set a deadline of 30 September 2012 to achieve ignition, one that NIF failed to meet. Now a review panel convened by the US National Research Council has come up with several recommendations for fusion developers, including looking at new types of targets, a different laser design and even replacing the laser with beams of heavy ions.
NIF's approach was to fire a 192-beam laser at a metal shell the size of a pencil eraser, holding a ball of frozen hydrogen. This produces a burst of X-rays that heats and compresses the hydrogen, fusing the nuclei in a brief implosion.
When NIF was being built in the 1990s, computer models predicted that short laser pulses delivering 1.8 megajoules of energy would create the pressures needed for ignition. The giant laser surpassed this energy level last year but still wasn't achieving enough pressure.
Until we know why NIF fell short, the panel recommends trying out other options, such as shifting to a different type of laser. For instance, firing an electron beam through a mixture of krypton and fluorine produces bright laser pulses at a shorter wavelength. This technology is less mature, but if it works it could implode the targets more uniformly than NIF's lasers.
Developers might also try changing the target. NIF was designed to fire its lasers at a metal cylinder because this was thought to be the best way to spread compression energy evenly over the hydrogen ball. But new optical techniques have fired laser pulses directly at the hydrogen and still seen uniform compression. The panel wants to test this technique at NIF's energy levels.
Another suggestion is to get rid of the lasers entirely and fire heavy ions from a particle accelerator, akin to the ones used to recreate the conditions of the big bang at facilities like the Large Hadron Collider near Geneva, Switzerland. Ion beams can transfer energy to targets just as efficiently as lasers, although for now the beam energies we can achieve are far short of what's needed for fusion.
Mike Dunne, programme director for laser fusion energy at Livermore, praised the new report for continuing to support inertial confinement techniques ? the idea of heating and compressing a target. But that isn't the only avenue being explored. Teams at the Joint European Torus in Culham, UK and the ITER test reactor, under construction in Cadarache, France, are continuing to chase magnetic confinement, which uses magnetic fields to hold hot hydrogen for a few seconds. Only time will tell which, if any, method will be the first to build a star on Earth.
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In reef-building corals variations within genes involved in immunity and response to stress correlate to water temperature and clarity, finds a study published in BioMed Central's open access journal BMC Genetics. This information could be used to conserve or rebuild reefs in areas affected by climate change, by changes in extreme weather patterns, increasing sedimentation or altered land use.
A research team led by the Australian Institute of Marine Science, and in collaboration with Penn State University and the Aix-Marseille University, studied DNA variations (Single Nucleotide Polymorphisms, SNPs) across populations of reef corals found at a range of temperatures and water clarity along the Great Barrier Reef.
SNPs which correlated to water clarity and water temperature preferred by cauliflower coral were found in genes involved in providing immune response, and regulating stress-induced cell-death. This means that coral with a specific version of these genes tended to grow at higher temperatures (or water clarity) and another variant at lower. A similar story was found for staghorn coral - SNP in genes involved in detoxification, immune response, and defense against reactive oxygen damage, were found to be associated with temperature or to water clarity.
Dr Petra Lundgren, from The Australian Institute of Marine Science, explained, "Corals are particularly vulnerable to climate change. Not only is the temperature of the water they live in affected but extreme weather and higher rainfall leads to increased levels of sediment, agricultural runoff, and fresh water on the reef. This work opens up possibilities for us to enhance reef resilience and recovery from impacts of climate change and pollution. For example, if in the future we need to restore coral populations, we can make sure that we use the most robust strains of corals to do so."
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BioMed Central: http://www.biomedcentral.com
Thanks to BioMed Central for this article.
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Source: http://www.labspaces.net/126981/Conserving_corals_by_understanding_their_genes
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On Wednesday's?Hardball, Chris Matthews, who previously ranted about too much "hate" in politics, sneeringly compared the House GOP to Hamas. Talking to Jonathan Allen of?Politico, Matthews?snarled at?Barack Obama's congressional opponents: "Who is the President talking to? Is it just a clique of a bunch of right-wingers who don't want to talk to anybody? Are they Hamas?" [See video below. MP3 audio?here.]
It was left to Allen, no conservative, to talk Matthews down: "They are not Hamas." It's clear that the cable anchor doesn't listen to himself when he talks.?On January 21,?he whined about too much partisanship and over-the-top language: "Why can't politics be a matter of belief and honest disagreement, not hatred?" If only the January 21 Matthews could ask the February 20 Matthews this.
However, considering that the anchor has also compared?Republicans to Nazis, he obviously isn't worried about too much hate? at least if it's his.
On Sunday's?Meet the Press, Matthews raailed against House conservatives for making Congress "undemocratic."
A transcript of Wednesday's exchange is below:
02/20/13
5:20
CHRIS MATTHEWS: It is the hard right. Every time the President? You talk to people at the White House. They say, this president, whatever you think of the politics, doesn't know who to talk to on the hill. There is no Boehner, he's just a front man. Eric Cantor has his got wet finger in the air trying to figure out which way the wind is blowing. Who is the President talking to? Is it just a clique of ?a bunch of right-winger who don't want to talk to anybody? Then??Are they Hamas? Who are they out there?
JONATHAN ALLEN:?They are not Hamas.?But, look, there's nobody that speaks with one voice for the House Republicans. When there is a deal cut, it's always Mitch McConnell and Joe Biden.
...
MATTHEWS: Do you think the right wing people know when they're sitting in their chairs voting no, no, no, bringing one manufactured crisis to bear after another that they're just happy when they pick up the paper and say public confidence going down. That's good for our party.
-- Scott Whitlock is the senior news analyst for the Media Research Center. Click?here?to follow him on Twitter.
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A new study explores close relationships between straight women and gay men and finds that the glue that cements these unique relationships is honest, unbiased relationship advice.
The study by University of Texas at Austin researchers, published online in the February issue of Evolutionary Psychology, is the first to provide empirical evidence that the emotional closeness shared by straight women and gay men is rooted in the absence of deceptive mating motivations.
?Friendships between straight women and gay men are free of hidden mating agendas,? said Eric Russell, lead author of the study. ?They may be able to develop a deeper level of honesty because their relationship isn?t complicated by sexual attraction or mating competition.?
As part of the study, Russell and colleagues presented 88 heterosexual women, and 58 homosexual men with the Facebook profile of a person named Jordan.
The profiles were identical, except for Jordan?s gender and sexual orientation. During the time of the study, the respondents believed the researchers were examining how online profiles influence friendships.
Participants were told to imagine they were at a party with Jordan, and he/she gave them romance-related advice. They then assessed the degree to which they would trust this advice.
According to the results, straight women perceived advice offered by a gay man to be more trustworthy than advice offered by a heterosexual man or woman. Similarly, the gay male participants perceived a straight woman?s love advice to be more trustworthy than the same advice offered by a homosexual man or woman.
Investigators theorize that women may have conflicts of interests with other women and straight men.
For example, other women may be seen as potential competitors, and straight men may discourage relationships with other men and steer women toward themselves.
Gay men, however, don?t have these conflicts with straight women, so they may be uniquely positioned to provide mating-relevant advice and support that is not tainted with ulterior motives from sexual rivalry or sexual attraction.
Source: University of Texas at Austin
Man and woman enjoying each others company photo by shutterstock.
APA Reference
Nauert PhD, R. (2013). Gay Men, Straight Women Bond With Honest Relationship Talk. Psych Central. Retrieved on February 22, 2013, from http://psychcentral.com/news/2013/02/21/gay-men-straight-women-bond-with-honest-relationship-talk/51814.html
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This undated photo made available by West Midlands Police shows, left to right, Irfan Khalid, Irfan Naseer and Ashik Ali, all from Birmingham, England, who were today found guilty at Woolwich Crown Court of being "central figures" in a terrorist bomb plot, Thursday, Feb. 21, 2013. The three young British Muslims were convicted Thursday of plotting terrorist bombings that prosecutors said were intended to be bigger than the 2005 London transit attacks. A London jury found Irfan Naseer, 31, and Irfan Khalid and Ashik Ali, both 27, guilty of being central figures in the foiled plot to explode knapsack bombs in crowded areas ? attacks potentially deadlier than the July 7, 2005 explosions on subway trains and a bus which killed 52 commuters. Judge Richard Henriques told the men ? who had been arrested in September 2011 ? they will all face life in prison when sentences are imposed in April or May for plotting a major terrorist attack in Birmingham, a city of roughly 1 million people located 120 miles (nearly 200 kilometers) northwest of London. (AP Photo/West Midlands Police)
This undated photo made available by West Midlands Police shows, left to right, Irfan Khalid, Irfan Naseer and Ashik Ali, all from Birmingham, England, who were today found guilty at Woolwich Crown Court of being "central figures" in a terrorist bomb plot, Thursday, Feb. 21, 2013. The three young British Muslims were convicted Thursday of plotting terrorist bombings that prosecutors said were intended to be bigger than the 2005 London transit attacks. A London jury found Irfan Naseer, 31, and Irfan Khalid and Ashik Ali, both 27, guilty of being central figures in the foiled plot to explode knapsack bombs in crowded areas ? attacks potentially deadlier than the July 7, 2005 explosions on subway trains and a bus which killed 52 commuters. Judge Richard Henriques told the men ? who had been arrested in September 2011 ? they will all face life in prison when sentences are imposed in April or May for plotting a major terrorist attack in Birmingham, a city of roughly 1 million people located 120 miles (nearly 200 kilometers) northwest of London. (AP Photo/West Midlands Police)
This undated photo made available by West Midlands Police shows a clock purchased as a timing device found in the safe house in White Street, Birmingham, England. Three young British Muslims were convicted Thursday, Feb. 21, 2013, of plotting terrorist bombings that prosecutors said were intended to be bigger than the 2005 London transit attacks. A London jury found Irfan Naseer, 31, and Irfan Khalid and Ashik Ali, both 27, guilty of being central figures in the foiled plot to explode knapsack bombs in crowded areas ? attacks potentially deadlier than the July 7, 2005 explosions on subway trains and a bus which killed 52 commuters. Judge Richard Henriques told the men ? who had been arrested in September 2011 ? they will all face life in prison when sentences are imposed in April or May for plotting a major terrorist attack in Birmingham, a city of roughly 1 million people located 120 miles (nearly 200 kilometers) northwest of London. (AP Photo/West Midlands Police)
LONDON (AP) ? They were very ordinary would-be terrorists, with big plans but bad luck.
On Thursday, a jury convicted three young British men ? including an unemployed pharmacy graduate nicknamed Chubbs ? of being ringleaders of an al-Qaida-inspired plot to explode knapsack bombs in crowded parts of Birmingham, England's second-largest city.
The men had pleaded not guilty, but were recorded discussing plans for attacks that one said would be "another 9/11."
A jury at Woolwich Crown Court in London found 27-year-old Ashik Ali; Irfan Khalid, also 27; and 31-year-old Irfan Naseer ? nicknamed Big Irfan, or Chubbs ? guilty of multiple counts of preparing for terrorism.
Judge Richard Henriques told the men they face life in prison when sentences are imposed in April or May.
"It's clear that you were planning a terrorist outrage in Birmingham," the judge said.
The jury agreed with prosecutors that the trio were the senior members of a home-grown terror cell inspired by the anti-Western sermons of U.S.-born Muslim cleric Anwar al-Awlaki, who was killed in Yemen in a U.S. drone strike in September 2011.
Prosecutors said the men hoped to detonate up to eight knapsack bombs ? either on timers or in suicide attacks ? in a bid to cause carnage on a scale larger than the July 7, 2005, London transit bombings, which killed 52 commuters.
Police said the terrorist conspiracy was the most significant uncovered in Britain since a plot to blow up airliners in mid-air was foiled in 2006. However, no targets had been chosen and no bombs built when the men were arrested in a police swoop in September 2011 in Birmingham, central England. Twelve suspects were arrested in all, several of whom have pleaded guilty to terrorism offenses.
The senior investigating officer, Detective Inspector Adam Gough, said the men were "the real deal" and, if successful, would have perpetrated "another 9/11 or another 7/7 in the U.K."
But they did not succeed ? through a mix of misfortune and their own mistakes.
Prosecutors said Naseer and Khalid traveled to Pakistan for terror training, where they learned details of poisons, bomb-making and weaponry and made "martyrdom videos" justifying their planned attacks.
On their return to England in July 2011, they began to recruit others to the plot and to raise money by posing as street collectors for Muslim charities.
They also began experimenting with chemicals, the prosecutor said, aided by Naseer's university degree in pharmacy.
But many of the group's plans soon went awry. Four other young men dispatched by the plotters to Pakistan for terrorist training were sent home within days when the family of one man found out. The four have pleaded guilty to terrorism-related offenses.
Rahin Ahmed, an alleged co-conspirator described in court as the cell's "chief financier," tried to increase the group's budget by trading the money it had made from bogus charity fundraising on the financial markets.
He lost the bulk of the terror cell's money through his "unwise and incompetent" trading, prosecutor Brian Altman said.
Among evidence found by investigators was a partially burned note written by Naseer detailing how to make what an expert witness said would have been a viable bomb.
But no evidence of a successful bomb was recovered. Among the pieces of evidence at the four-month trial was a sports injury cool pack, which prosecutors said Naseer had mistakenly believed would contain ammonium nitrate, a key bomb-making ingredient.
Fatally for the plot, by mid-2011 the men were under surveillance by police and the intelligence services. Their car was followed and their safe house bugged.
The men were recorded criticizing the London transit attackers for not packing their bombs with nails. They also discussed tying sharp blades to the front of a truck and driving it into a crowd.
Naseer was heard talking about the possibility of mixing poison into creams such as Vaseline or Nivea and smearing them on car handles to cause mass deaths.
But their main plan was for knapsack bombs ? "Seven or eight of them in different places with timers on," Naseer was recorded saying. "Probably to go boom, boom, boom everywhere."
Khalid said the attack would be "revenge for everything, what we're doing is another 9/11,"
On the recordings, the trio spoke of themselves as martyrs and jihadi warriors ? but also, tellingly, compared themselves to the hapless would-be bombers of British comedy film "Four Lions."
Ali was recorded saying to his ex-wife: "Oh, you think this is a flipping 'Four Lions.' We're one man short."
Raffaello Pantucci, a terrorism expert at the Royal United Services Institute think tank, said the foiled plot bore the hallmarks of a decentralized al-Qaida, in which local cells operate independently, often after receiving rudimentary training.
He said that "the time spent training foreign fighters by al-Qaida or affiliated networks is now being constrained because there is the threat of drone strikes" on the Pakistan-Afghan border.
"The command and control element is drawing back," he said. "It has a negative impact on their capacity to launch attacks because people aren't being trained as well. There is sometimes a clownish element to it."
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