Barack Obama in Kenya

Barack Obama with his grandmother in Kenya

The Stellar Accretion History of the Milky Way Through SEGUE Observations of Halo Substructure

We identify 20 (17 for the first time kinematically cold streams in the inner halo of the Milky Way. Our result is based on the observed spatial and radial velocity distribution of metal-poor main sequence turn-off (MPMSTO) stars in 117 Sloan Extension for Galactic Understanding (SEGUE) lines-of-sight. We show that the observed distribution is consistent with a smooth stellar component of the Milky Way's halo at large scales, but disagrees significantly at the radial velocities that correspond to our detections. We prove that all of our detections are significant to more than 10-sigma and that we expect only one of our detections to be a false-positive. These cold streams represent the observable stellar populations of those dark matter halos that merged to form the Milky Way, and we use our detections and estimates of our completeness to predict that approximately 3000 streams are present in the entire inner halo. We compare our detections with the very high resolution dark matter-only Via Lactea simulation to constrain the mapping of dark matter halos to their stellar content. Finally, we consider the implications of our detections in the context of the formation of Milky Way.

Kevin C. Schlaufman (Astronomy and Astrophysics Department, University of California, Santa Cruz)

Ministry confirms Safir satellite-carrier rocket launch

Ministry of Defense and Armed Forces Logistics said Friday that in presence of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Iran's `Safir' (Messenger) satellite-carrier rocket, carrying Iran's first `Omid' (Hope) Satellite, was successfully launched into the space tentatively on Sunday.

The Ministry statement, a copy of which was made available to IRNA on Sunday, said the launch thus paved the way for placing the first Iranian satellite in orbit.

It said the rocket had been built by Iranian experts and fired tentatively on the auspicious birthday anniversary of Hazrat Mahdi (May God Hasten His Reappearance).

Iran successfully fires rocket carrying its 1st satellite

Joint Chief of Staff on Sunday congratulated Supreme Leader of Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Seyed Ali Khamenei and brave Iranian nation on successful launching of the rocket carrying the country's first satellite.

In a message issued on Sunday, the Joint Chief of Staff said the rocket carrying the country's first satellite, the `Hope' Satellite, was successfully fired on the birth Anniversary of the last Imam of Shiites, Hazrat Mahdi (May God Hasten His Reappearance), thus illustrating the auspicious name of the Imam in the space.

The message said the launching marks the second instance of successful tentative firing of such rockets.

Beijing advocates safe sex during Olympics

To advocate safe sex and AIDS prevention, Beijing's health bureau distributed 400,000 free condoms to 119 contract hotels of the Olympic Games, as well as other hotels in the city, said an official with the bureau on Friday.

Jin Dapeng, the bureau's Party chief, said the condoms had been put in more than 90,000 rooms of 424 hotels rated three stars and above.

The bureau also distributed 250,000 free pamphlets on AIDS prevention and control in contract and other hotels.

He said the authorities had trained thousands of Olympic volunteers to advocate AIDS prevention during the Games.

The Chinese organizers had worked with United Nations Program on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS) and the International Olympic Committee to distribute information about AIDS to participants in this year's Games.

In the clinic at the Olympic Village, some 100,000 high-quality condoms were available for distribution along with information on HIV prevention in English, French and Chinese.

"Now 180 college students and 500 community volunteers are ready to publicize AIDS-related knowledge. We have opened 40 clinics in Beijing's 18 districts and counties to offer free HIV tests and AIDS counseling," Jin said.

Jin said the Games were a good opportunity to amplify the AIDS prevention message globally as it brought an enormous influx of visitors to Beijing.

Texas district will let teachers carry guns

A tiny Texas school district will allow teachers and staff members to carry concealed firearms to protect against school shootings, provided the gun-toting employees follow certain requirements.

The small community of Harrold in north Texas is a 30-minute drive from the Wilbarger County Sheriff's Office, leaving students and teachers without protection, said David Thweatt, superintendent of the Harrold Independent School District. The lone campus of the 110-student district sits near a heavily traveled highway, which could make it a target, he argued.

"When the federal government started making schools gun-free zones, that's when all of these shootings started. Why would you put it out there that a group of people can't defend themselves? That's like saying 'sic 'em' to a dog," Thweatt said in a story published Friday on the Fort Worth Star-Telegram's Web site.

Barbara Williams, a spokeswoman for the Texas Association of School Boards, said her organization did not know of another district with such a policy. Ken Trump, a Cleveland, Ohio-based school security expert who advises districts nationwide, said Harrold is the first district with such a policy.

Trustees approved the policy change last year, and it takes effect when classes begin this month. For employees to carry a pistol, they must have a Texas license to carry a concealed handgun, must be authorized to carry by the district, must receive training in crisis management and hostile situations and must use ammunition designed to minimize the risk of ricocheting bullets.

Officials researched the policy and considered other options for about a year before approving the policy change, Thweatt said. The district also has other measures in place to prevent a school shooting, he said.

"The naysayers think [a shooting] won't happen here. If something were to happen here, I'd much rather be calling a parent to tell them that their child is OK because we were able to protect them," Thweatt said.

Texas law outlaws firearms at schools unless specific institutions allow them.

It isn't clear how many of the 50 or so teachers and staff members will be armed this fall, because Thweatt did not disclose that information, to keep it from students or potential attackers.

Military wants to study mind-reading

Here's a mind-bending idea: The U.S. military is paying scientists to study ways to read people's thoughts.

The hope is that the research could someday lead to a gadget capable of translating the thoughts of soldiers who suffered brain injuries in combat or even stroke patients in hospitals. But the research also raises concerns that such mind-reading technology could be used to interrogate the enemy.

Armed with a $4 million grant from the Army, scientists are studying brain signals to try to decipher what a person is thinking and to whom the person wants to direct the message.

The project is a collaboration among researchers at the University of California, Irvine; Carnegie Mellon University; and the University of Maryland.

The scientists use brain wave-reading technology known as electroencephalography, or EEG, which measures the brain's electrical activity through electrodes placed on the scalp.

It works like this: Volunteers wear an electrode cap and are asked to think of a word chosen by the researchers, who then analyze the brain activity.

In the future, scientists hope to develop thought-recognition software that would allow a computer to speak or type out a person's thought.

"To have a person think in a free manner and then figure out what that is, we're years away from that," said lead researcher Michael D'Zmura, who heads UC Irvine's cognitive sciences department.

D'Zmura said such a system would require extensive training by people trying to send a message and dismisses the notion that thoughts can be forced out.

"This will never be used in a way without somebody's real, active cooperation," he said.

John Pike, director of GlobalSecurity.org, a Virginia-based defense research firm, said the technology is still too nascent to be of practical use for the military.

"They're still in the proof of principle stage," Pike said.

A message left with the Army was not immediately returned Friday.

Peter Pan, Snow White arrested at Disneyland

ANAHEIM, Calif. - Cinderella, Snow White, Tinkerbell and other fictional fixtures of modern-day childhood were handcuffed, frisked and loaded into police vans Thursday at the culmination of a labor protest that brought a touch of reality to the Happiest Place on Earth.

The arrest of the 32 protesters, many of whom wore costumes representing famous Disney characters, came at the end of an hour-long march to Disneyland's gates from one of three Disney-owned hotels at the center of a labor dispute.

Those who were arrested sat in a circle on a busy intersection outside the park holding hands until they were placed in plastic handcuffs and led to two police vans while hundreds of hotel workers cheered and chanted.

Obama adviser compares Putin to Hitler

The former US national security adviser, Zbigniew Brzezinski, has called on the world community to isolate Russia in protest over its campaign in the Caucasus, likening its tactics to those of "Hitler or Stalin".

Brzezinski, who was the national security adviser under President Jimmy Carter from 1977 to 1981, and is now an occasional adviser to the Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama, said the Russian prime minister, Vladimir Putin, was "following a course that is horrifyingly similar to that taken by Stalin and Hitler in the 1930s".

He said that Putin's "justification" for splitting up Georgia - because of the Russian citizens living in South Ossetia - could be compared to when Hitler used the alleged suffering of ethnic Germans in the Sudetenland as a pretext for annexing Czechoslovakia in 1938.

In an interview with the conservative German daily Die Welt, he said even more striking were the parallels between Putin's strategy against Georgia and Stalin's invasion of Finland in 1939, describing both as "the undermining of the sovereignty of a small, democratic neighbouring state through the use of violence". He added: "Georgia is to an extent the Finland of today, both morally and strategically."

Polish-born Brezinski, 80, who earned a reputation as a hardliner due to his anti-Soviet politics, said the world was now being confronted with the question as to how it should react to Russia and what he saw as its efforts to "reincorporate old Soviet areas into the Kremlin's sphere of control". He said at the heart of the issue was access to oil and specifically who controlled the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan pipeline which runs through Georgia.

"If Georgia no longer has its sovereignty it means not only that the west is cut off from the Caspian Sea and Central Asia, but we can also assume that Putin will exercise a similar strategy against Ukraine if he faces resistance. He's already publicly voiced threats against Ukraine."

"If Russia continues on this path it has to be isolated by the international community," he said, including economic sanctions on which all alliances from the European Union to Nato would have to take a joint stand.

He added that Russia's invasion of Georgia was proof of the failure of the White House during George Bush's eight year tenure, to recognise the "Putin regime" for what it really was.

"Two episodes illustrate this better than any others," he said. "First, when Bush met Putin for the first time and said he had looked into his soul and could trust him. Secondly, when Condi Rice, not so long ago, said that the American-Russian relations had never been better than they are today." He said the White House had deceived itself.

Asked why it was that he only spoke of Putin and not of the Russian president, Dmitri Medvedev, Brzezinski said: "He [Medvedev] has about as much influence over the current situation as the official head of state in the Soviet Union of the 1950s had over the Soviet Union. Nobody can even remember his name."

LHC synchronization test successful

The synchronization of the LHC's clockwise beam transfer system and the rest of CERN's accelerator chain was successfully achieved last weekend. Tests began on Friday 8 August when a single bunch of a few particles was taken down the transfer line from the SPS accelerator to the LHC.

After a period of optimization, one bunch was kicked up from the transfer line into the LHC beam pipe and steered about 3 kilometres around the LHC itself on the first attempt. On Saturday, the test was repeated several times to optimize the transfer before the operations group handed the machine back for hardware commissioning to resume on Sunday.
The anti-clockwise synchronization systems will be tested over the weekend of 22 August.

Lennon's killer denied parole again

John Lennon's killer, Mark David Chapman, was denied parole for the fifth time Tuesday.

The New York State Division of Parole issued a release saying Chapman's request was denied "due to concern for the public safety and welfare."

Chapman, 53, is serving a sentence of 20 years to life in prison for shooting to death the former Beatle outside his New York City apartment on December 8, 1980.

The killer has served 24 years of his sentence at the maximum-security Attica Correctional Facility and was previously turned down by the New York State division of parole in 2000, 2002, 2004 and 2006.

Chapman is held in a building with other prisoners who are not considered to pose a threat to him, according to officials with the state Department of Correctional Services. He has his own prison cell but spends most of his day outside the cell working on housekeeping and in the library.

For the past 16 years he has received conjugal visits with his wife, Gloria. The visits are part of a state program called "family reunion" that allows inmates to spend up to 44 hours at a time with family members in a special setting.

Inmates must meet certain criteria to receive the privilege. Chapman has not had an infraction since 1994, said Erik Kriss, spokesman for the Department of Corrections.

Yoko Ono, Lennon's widow, in previous years has submitted a letter requesting that Chapman be denied parole. Calls Tuesday to Ono's legal representative have not been returned.

Fifty letters and a petition signed by almost 1,100 people were submitted objecting to releasing Chapman, said Division of Parole spokeswoman Heather Groll. Only three letters were submitted appealing for Chapman's release.

The next time Chapman can apply for parole is in August 2010.

Obama to announce VP via SMS

Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama is planning to announce his choice of vice presidential running mate not at a press conference nor on nationwide TV. Instead he’s making this key declaration via text message.

In a text message and e-mail campaign Sunday night, Obama organizers alerted anyone who would listen that the candidate would announce his VP choice between now and the Democratic National Convention Aug. 25 through a text message to his supporters. To get on the distribution list, one only has to text the message “VP” to the Obama SMS short code number, 62262. The campaign is also allowing people to sign up for an email alert on its Website as well as receive notice through the microblogging site Twitter.

Obama is certainly no stranger to using new communications platforms to benefit his campaign. Though not the first to use the Internet as a fund-raising and organizing tool, he’s used it most effectively in the current presidential campaign, generating millions in small online donations. The VP SMS program isn’t even Obama’s first venture into the world of wireless. Much more than his rival, presumptive Republican nominee John McCain, Obama has been tapping into the power of the mobile phone, not just to distribute his message but to generate buzz for his candidacy.

On Obama’s campaign Website is a section called Obama Mobile, where would-be supporters can download ringtones and wallpaper featuring the candidate’s voice and mug. Wireless users can also receive regular text updates on different policy positions such as healthcare or the war in Iraq. And for those that want it all, just send the word “hope” to Obama’s short code and become part of the campaign distribution network.

The VP announcement, however, goes far beyond any of Obama’s previous dabbling in the mobile medium. By making a major news announcement—or creating the illusion thereof--via SMS and e-mail, Obama not only controls the message he sends but distributes it directly to the presumably hundreds of thousands if not millions of people who opt in to the SMS campaign. In the case of the text alert, Obama also can get that message to supporters instantaneously before it has been filtered through the news stories and commentaries of the national media. He gets to bypass the middleman.

But there are other advantages for the Obama campaign. For each of the mobile or email lists users sign on to, the campaign collects critical phone numbers, email addresses and even postal address information on potential supporters. The importance of the Democratic VP choice will likely attract into the Obama network a great a deal of people who previously had no interest in receiving Obama’s more mundane campaign messages—all of whom can be hit up for contributions or volunteer requests later.