R. David Lankes, Ph.D.
This paper examines the domain of digital reference services for and by the primary and secondary education community. Data is provided to demonstrate the current understanding of education question types and education users in digital reference. It is believed this data will be of wide utility for digital library builders geared toward primary and secondary users (K-12) such as the International Children's Digital Library  and the National Science Digital Library .
Digital Reference and Digital Libraries for Education
Digital reference refers to Internet-based expert answering services [Lankes, 1999b]. In such a service, a user typically poses a question to a digital reference service through a web form, e-mail or a chat interface. An expert (such as a scientist or librarian) uses this input to construct an answer that is both passed back to the user as well as used in some knowledge base or enhancement to a digital library collection. There is a growing body of research and development in digital reference [Janes, 2000; Mardikian and Kesselman, 1995; Tyckoson, 2002; Lagace and McClennen, 1998; Mon, 2000; Ferguson and Bunge, 1997], and digital reference services are being implemented within the context of digital libraries such as the National Science Foundation(NSF) National Science Digital Library [National Research Council, 1998]. Much is known about use of digital reference in primary and secondary education (in this article, the term "education" will refer simply to primary and secondary education), and this knowledge has utility not only to digital reference services aimed at this population, but to the larger digital library community as well.
Specifically, the author argues that services aimed at primary and secondary users represent a revelatory case for digital reference for three reasons; digital reference services for education are:
Current State of the Art
In order to present a picture of digital reference for education, the author first presents two major types of services in the education domain. Each type is then illustrated with an exemplar service.
Types of Digital Reference Services in Education
There are two obvious, though often overlapping, categories of digital reference services in education: library-based services, and AskA services. AskA services can be further divided into general services that may be of use to the education community as part of a more general mission (such as Ask Joan of Art® , an AskA service that answers questions concerning American art for anyone who asks, but is particularly useful in art education) and services targeted squarely at the education community (such as AskERIC(sm) , though it covers all levels of education including higher and continuing education). The author will concentrate on education AskA services for this paper.
For the purposes of this discussion, "library reference" refers to digital reference services either centered in a public, academic, school or special library, or with primary reliance on library programs. With the advent of digital reference, a great number of libraries are now offering reference service to remote patrons [Janes, 2000]. These services take a variety of forms, from e-mail systems, to real-time chat systems. In the library context, digital reference is referred to as virtual reference, e-reference, networked reference, live reference, online reference and even chat reference. While some in the community make a distinction in the mode of delivery and the synchronous nature of the service offered, most agree that these are all part of a single larger concept of digital reference.
The library reference community also provides the most in-depth discussion of policy, evaluation [McClure and Lankes, 2001] and the largest set of documented digital reference services (as opposed to the body of systems and development work out of the AskA community discussed later). Much of this work is encapsulated in the proceedings of the annual Virtual Reference Desk (VRD) Conferences [Virtual Reference Desk, 2002], which have a strong library emphasis. In fact, this article and the Digital Reference Research Symposium were outgrowths of the VRD conferences and other work.
As a result of this intense interest in digital reference by the library community, several large-scale digital reference projects are available for use by the research and scholarly community. The Collaborative Digital Reference Service (CDRS) spearheaded by the Library of Congress and that has evolved into the QuestionPoint service run by OCLC in cooperation with the Library of Congress, certainly demonstrates the breadth of library-based digital reference services spanning public, academic and international libraries. The National Library of Canada's recent introduction of Virtual Reference Canada  to work with Canadian digital reference services also promises to be a major source of digital reference activity and development. Other prominent digital reference efforts in the library world include KnowItNow  from the Cleveland Public Library, the 24/7 Reference service  that acts as a statewide digital reference network for the State of California, and the recent efforts of the State Library of Washington. Also of interest to researchers in digital reference are digital reference vendors in the library domain including LSSI's Virtual Reference Service . One special case that should not be overlooked is the Internet Public Library , for while it is not based in a library setting (it is part of the School of Information at the University of Michigan), it has its roots and traditions firmly planted in the library community.
Library Reference Exemplar: KidsConnect
While many library services support the education community (of course, academic libraries serve a higher education population and public libraries answer questions of students), few target primary and secondary education exclusively. One exception is the KidsConnect service. KidsConnect is a question-answering, help and referral service to K-12 students on the Internet [KidsConnect, 2002; Bennett, 1998]. It is a project of the American Library Association's American Association of School Librarians (AASL). KidsConnect has three missions: The first is to educate school library media specialists in the use of the Internet and digital reference as part of the larger ICONnect project. The second is to promote information literacy in students through digital reference [Mancall et al., 1999]. The third is to promote local school libraries (and school library media specialists) as valuable sources of information and instruction.
The KidsConnect model uses a large number of volunteer school library media specialists (primarily in the United States). Each volunteer is trained using an in-depth mentoring process, then answers questions (ranging from one question a day to one a week). The digital reference transaction is conducted through e-mail and web forms.
Data from the KidsConnect service provides valuable insight into the types of students using digital reference services as well as the types of questions they ask. The service has been widely advertised to schools, particularly to teachers and school library media specialists. This advertising has been done through the professional association for school library media specialists (AASL), as well as through the Internet.
The data presented in Figures 1 - 5 are from 1996 - 1998; however, more recent data presented in Figures 6 - 9 are used to estimate the current validity of the earlier numbers.
Figure 1 shows the number of questions answered by KidsConnect for the years 1996-1998:
These numbers are very much in line, though on the high end, with current numbers of library-based digital reference services as reported at recent library meetings, including the 2002 American Library Association conference.
Figure 2 shows how these questions were distributed across differing student and adult populations:
These figures demonstrate a rough equivalence between primary (elementary and middle school) and secondary education (high school). The low number of users identified as "adult" is explained by both the focus of the KidsConnect service (K-12 students), but also that any questions KidsConnect received from teachers were routed (sent to) the AskERIC service.
A more interesting finding, however, was the gender distribution of the questioners as seen in Figure 3:
One interesting finding of the KidsConnect staff was the prominence of girls asking questions. While many hypotheses were put forward to explain this situation (e-mail providing a "safer" environment to ask questions than the well documented male dominated classroom, for example), no formal research was conducted to follow up on this finding.
The other interesting finding from the KidsConnect data related to the topics or subjects of the questions asked of KidsConnect. The KidsConnect team utilized a "Subject Line Analysis" technique whereby the subject lines of a random sample of questions were examined and classified inductively into a subject scheme. If the subject lines were felt to be uninformative (they did not indicate topicality but instead were words or phrases like "Hello" or "Please help") the underlying question was examined. The results of this analysis are shown in Figure 4:
It is clear from this figure that questions on the topic of science constituted the bulk of questions received. In order to provide a clearer picture of this category, the analysis was further refined by "type of science questions", as shown in Figure 5:
Data such as this should prove of great use to new digital reference services geared towards education, most notably the NSF's National SMETE Digital Library [NSDL, 2002].
As mentioned before, these statistics represent somewhat dated analysis (4 years old). In 1999, operation of the KidsConnect service moved from Syracuse University to Drexel University (the previous statistics are based on Syracuse data). Syracuse then transferred much of the staff and processes of KidsConnect into the Virtual Reference Desk Learning Center. This project had a slightly different aim; it had a broader focus and also worked in a network of AskA services with general foci. However, the main concentration of the service was still on school library media specialists answering questions from the education community.
Statistics from the VRD service show a strong correlation between older KidsConnect statistics and more recent VRD usage. For example, Figure 6 shows the user populations of the VRD service:
Note the higher "adult" population (as compared with Figure 2) reflecting the broader focus of the VRD Network members. However, with this result removed, the distribution in primary and secondary education remains roughly equivalent to the earlier data, with a greater number of "middle school" questions. Also note in Figure 7 that science questions still dominate the service:
Once again, Figure 8 provides a more fine-grained analysis of science questions:
This distributions seems to hold over the three most recent years of the VRD service (as seen in Figure 9):
From these more recent statistics, it seems difficult to argue that there has been a massive shift in the types of education users asking questions or in the types of questions they ask.
What is also clear from analyzing these two services is that the library community has many contributions to make to the digital reference research agenda specifically with respect to education as well as to digital reference research in general. It is also clear the library community contains large-scale digital reference efforts that make excellent research environments capable of being utilized in the search for generalizable knowledge.
Education AskA Services
The second progenitor of current digital reference systems is AskA services. AskA services take their name from expert question and answer services tending to adopt names such as "Ask A Scientist"  and "Ask A Volcanologist"  [Lankes, 1999b]. These services tended to originate without interaction with formal library systems and emphasized topical expertise (as opposed to process expertise such as a librarian's ability to search for information).
A fuller picture of AskA services can be drawn from two studies conducted by Lankes and White [Lankes, 1999b; Lankes, 1999c; and White, 1999]. Lankes presents an in-depth analysis of the structure and commonalities of "exemplary K-12 digital reference services." Specifically this study sought to:
The outcome of this study included detailed "blueprints" and a tuned framework of AskA services grounded in complexity theory, as seen in Figure 10:
White developed an analytical framework based on systems for evaluating AskA services. This framework was then applied to a variety of 11 services (including library-based services).
Unlike library digital reference services that to this point have seen modest usage, AskA services, in general, have begun with large usage and have experienced continuing dramatic increases. The most recent Virtual Reference Desk survey of AskA services done in 1999 demonstrates this. Survey results in Table 1 show an average 44% increase in use of these asynchronous services from 1997 to 1998, with an average answer rate of 77% in 1998 [Lankes and Shostack, forthcoming].
Table 1: Virtual Reference Desk Survey of AskA Service Usage
Compare these statistics to those of the libraries studied as part of McClure and Lankes Quality Study [Mcclure and Lankes, 2001], "In all cases the volume of digital reference questions is low, ranging from 3 to 33 per day" [Gross et al., 2002]. This study covered a range of libraries in terms of size and scope (academic, public, federal, state).
One result of the large volume encountered by AskA services has been an emphasis on process, software development and automation. Whereas many library services have quickly adopted real-time technologies in which one-to-one interactions require full human intervention, AskA services have looked to asynchronous technologies. (At least this has been so at their onset. See Figure 11 for the distribution of questions received by AskERIC by mode of digital reference as an example of the predominance of asynchronous means. Note that "web" and "e-mail" are both asynchronous modes.) AskA services have also looked for means of shunting users to resources. (See Lankes for a more detailed discussion of AskA services and their architectures [Lankes, 1999b].) These run the gambit from sophisticated techniques such as automated searching of previously asked questions (as in the MadSci  service), to forcing users through a list of frequently asked questions before they are able to submit a question (as in the Ask A Volcanologist service).
AskA services have also tended to develop more in terms of software and systems. Early examples include Ask Dr. Math® , the MadSci Network, and How Things Work . Though there are excellent examples of software development in the library arena [Meola and Starmont, 2002], library services have by and large adopted software from the help desk and e-commerce community, such as LSSI and 24/7 Reference's use of eGain® and the common use of LivePerson® and NetAgent. While this may be changing, AskA services still remain a hot bed of systems development.
Another common attribute with AskA services is their attention to the primary and secondary education community. In the case of some services, this attention is part of a larger view of the general Internet population, but in many cases, it is a special attention where education is foremost and the general population is welcome as well. This can be seen in Dr. Math and MadSci Networks. It can also be seen in services, such as AskERIC, which focus on education professionals.
Education AskA Service Exemplar: AskERIC
While the KidsConnect discussion sheds light on digital reference use by primary and secondary education students, AskERIC can shed light on use of digital reference by education professionals.
AskERIC is a project of the U.S. Department of Education's ERIC program. It was initiated and is still operated by the ERIC Clearinghouse on Information & Technology (though nearly all ERIC components (Clearinghouses, ACCESS ERIC, the ERIC Processing Facility and even the parent institution of ERIC, the National Library of Education) are involved in answering questions). AskERIC has two primary components: a question/answering service staffed by ERIC library and education professionals (see Figure 12 for the volume of questions), and a virtual library of lesson plans, which contains pointers to reviewed sites on the Internet and an archive of previously asked questions. A more in-depth description, though slightly dated, can be found in the author's dissertation [Lankes 1999b].
The purpose of AskERIC is to answer questions related to all areas of the education process. The emphasis on education professionals can be seen in AskERIC's mission as well, see Figure 13, by AskERIC's users.
This distribution of users, with the majority being K-12 teachers followed by graduate students (pre-service educators are traditionally heavy users of any ERIC service), is in line with AskERIC's stated mission:
AskERIC is a personalized Internet-based service providing education information to teachers, librarians, counselors, administrators, parents, and anyone interested in education throughout the United States and the world. [AskERIC, 2002]
In fact, AskERIC explicitly does not answer "homework help" questions:
Thank you for visiting the AskERIC Web site! If you are a K-12 student with a homework question, AskERIC may not have the resources to respond to your question.
AskERIC is designed to provide education information to teachers, librarians, counselors, administrators, parents, students, and others throughout the United States and the world. Our focus is not on the specific things you are learning in school; instead, we specialize in research and ideas about how students of all ages learn best. As an example, we can respond to a question such as "What is the best time of day to teach math?", but not "What is the formula to determine the radius of a circle?".
If you are looking for information in other specific subject areas or need homework help, you probably won't find AskERIC very helpful. Instead, you may want to investigate the following sites which are designed specifically for students. [AskERIC, 2002a]
All student questions received by AskERIC are forwarded to other services such as the Virtual Reference Desk.
What can one determine about AskERIC users besides their educational roles? First, one can determine the education level about which users were asking (a K-12 teacher was asking a question about high school, for example) as seen in Figure 14:
One can also analyze the nature of the questions being asked by the professional community. AskERIC user surveys provide the anticipated use of the information gained as seen in Figure 15:
Using subject line analysis once again, Figure 16 shows question types identified in AskERIC questions:
Figure 17 shows the relative stability of this question distribution over time:
In Figure 16 and Figure 17, "subjects" refers to particular topics or academic disciplines taught in the classroom. (Note: information from AskERIC responses may be used in higher and continuing education contexts as seen in Figure 18 where 18% of answers were intended for higher or adult education.)
Figure 19 shows the relative stability of these subjects over time:
Of particular interest in Figure 19 is the predominance of "language arts" as a topic for educators versus "science" for students, as seen in Figure 4 of the KidsConnect sample. One possible reason for this difference may be the abundance of science material on the Internet (particularly education-related science material) versus instructional resources in language and English instruction.
Aside from the information AskERIC provides on digital reference use by education professionals, it also provides an exemplar of reference authoring [Lankes, 2001]. Reference authoring refers to the capture of information in the reference process and the transformation of this information into resources that can be used outside the reference process as part of a larger digital library context. This authoring process can be from the simple, say the creation of frequently asked questions on a web site, to the complex, say the creation on the MadSci knowledge base.
The heart of the AskERIC website consists of a resource collection:
In response to questions we've received at AskERIC, our network information specialists have compiled over 3000 resources on a variety of educational issues. This collection includes Internet sites, educational organizations, and electronic discussion groups. [AskERIC, 2002b]
This resource collection acts not only as a set of Internet links for end-users, but for AskERIC digital reference specialists as well. As digital reference specialists constantly comb over this collection of Internet resources, ERIC citations, discussion groups and more, they are also finding new resources to add and old resources to delete. This means that it is the digital reference process itself that is used as collection development, annotation and expert review.
AskERIC is only one example of AskA services geared specifically to the education community. It does, however, serve as a revelatory case. In the AskERIC exemplar we see the predominance of asynchronous technologies, high-volume usage, and the interconnection of the reference process with systems and digital libraries.
Digital reference for primary and secondary education has a rich and well-documented tradition. It serves as a revelatory case for other digital reference research and provides valuable insight into digital libraries that serve the education community as well as other communities.
What is apparent from this small examination of digital reference in the education context is that all levels of education use digital reference services and education questions, while covering a broad range of topics, concentrate most heavily on science (in the case of students) and language arts (in the case of education professionals). Also apparent is the usefulness of education digital reference services as research environments. AskA services and library reference services alike hold large data sets of question and answer transactions. These data sets can be used to evaluate how questions are asked, what topics are of interest to the education community, and what language is used by the education community, as well as used to examine myriad other facts. Some of these data sets are publicly available on the Internet, while others are proprietary due to privacy concerns.
From this examination of digital reference services, some methodological techniques can be added to the digital reference research discussion. First among these is the concept of subject line analysis. This technique seems to provide excellent exploratory power and may provide a rapid way to compare question types across services.
Lastly, analysis of digital reference services targeted towards the primary and secondary education community (or at least the study of these services) provides a wealth of models, theories and frameworks that can be brought to bear in future research. From The Lankes/Sutton Framework, the General Digital Reference Model (resulting from Lankes' complexity framework) to White's evaluative framework, there are rich analytic tools that can be used in the broader digital reference and digital library domain.
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(Corrected coding for navigational links to the editorial and guest editorial 8/31/05.)
Copyright © R. David Lankes


One of the Four Great Ancient Capitals of China, Beijing’s roots can be traced back over 3,000 years. Beijing is located in the north of the country, and its name in fact means ‘northern capital’. The city has played a vital role in China since Emperor Qin united China in 221 BC, and it was the capital city of the Liao, Jin, Yuan, Ming and Qing dynasties which ruled China for 1,000 years until the 20th century.
The Qing dynasty came to an end in 1911 due to the Xinhai Revolution, a movement for a Chinese Republic. In 1916 the new emperor, Yuan Shikai, died and Beijing fell under the control of regional warlords. Royal residences were ransacked and burned down, and the country degenerated into a semi-feudal society. It took more than three decades for China to recover and on 1st October 1949 the Communist Party Leader, Chairman Mao Zedong, announced the creation of the People's Republic of China.
Modern day Beijing is home to 17 million residents and is an integral part of China’s prosperity. Beijing is a great starting point to explore this vast, populous country, and the coastal metropolis of Shanghai is just 1,000 kilometres to the south.
Beijing has been described as ‘a portal between centuries’. Every successive dynasty has made its mark on the city, from the ornate buildings of Imperial China and the boxy architecture of the 1950-70s Sino-Soviet era to proliferation of 21st century skyscrapers.
Imperial China is the most eye-catching place to start, at the 15th century imperial palaces of The Forbidden City. The courtyard-after-courtyard-after-courtyard of The Forbidden City makes up the enormous centre of the ancient walled city of Beijing. It was declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1987 and is the world’s largest collection of preserved ancient wooden structures.
Just outside of Beijing’s centre is Summer Palace, another UNESCO World Heritage Site and the summer retreat for the Qing Dynasty emperors. Equally as impressive in winter, its collection of palaces, landscaped gardens, gentle hills, pavilions, temples and bridges combine to create a harmonious and breathtaking setting.
The architecture of the 1950s has been put to good use in the Dashanzi art district, also known as Factory 798. This thriving community is housed in decommissioned Bauhaus-style military factories, where art galleries, fashion designers, photographers and writers exhibit their wares to numerous visitors.
Modern Chinese architecture is best exemplified by the Beijing National Stadium which attracts up to 30,000 visitors a day. Constructed for the 2008 Beijing Olympics, it is better known as the Birds' Nest due to the myriad of steel beams which criss-cross its exterior.
The world’s largest Chinatown, Beijing is the ultimate destination to try Chinese cuisine. Street food is abundant and delicious: try little steamed ‘baozi’ buns, peking duck or cold noodles with cucumber, tofu and sesame seeds. However, only the strongest of stomach may want to sample the roasted scorpions.
Head to the famous lantern-lit road of Guijie Street to try a hot pot; this Asian fondue is a simmering stock in which guests cook their own food. Or try Peking Duck in Chao Yang Park – clichéd but delicious and an experience in itself.
Nightlife in Beijing is both lively and fun, and the bar and club scenes at San Li Tun and Hou Hai run so far into the next day that’ll you be glad of Beijing’s 24-hour food culture.
The Great Wall of China, a UNESCO World Heritage Site and one of the Seven Wonders of the World, embraces such broad dimensions that nothing else compares. It runs 10,000 miles across China from east to west, and can be seen from space. The closest place to visit it is in Badaling, just 75kms north of Beijing. However, it pays to travel an extra 45kms to the 14th century Simatai section in Gubeikou: it is less touristy and the wall is in far better condition. This section is 5.4kms long with 35 watchtowers which snake along the mountain ridges and is a truly remarkable place for sightseeing, hiking and exploration.


The VLT Active Optics System
Due to the low ratio between their thickness and their diameter, the VLT primary mirrors will be rather flexible and sensitive to various disturbances, requiring permanent control of their optical shape.
Active optics consists in applying controlled forces to the primary mirror and in moving the secondary mirror in order to cancel out the errors. The scheme was developped by ESO for the 3.5-m New Technology Telescope (NTT) and is now applied to the VLT. The system must essentially compensate for static or slowly varying deformations such as manufacturing errors, thermal effects, low frequency components of wind buffeting, telescope inclination, ... It is also used when changing between Cassegrain and Nasmyth foci.
A schematic view of the system is shown below.
(Drawing by Ed Janssen, ESO)
DescriptionThe different elements of the active optics system of the VLT are the primary mirror, with its active support system located within the M1 Cell structure, the M2 unit, the CCD Shack-Hartmann wavefront sensor (WFS) located in the sensor arm of the adapter, and the computer analysing the wavefront sensor data. There are three modes of operation, that are described below
BaselineThe active optics baseline operation is the correction of wavefront aberrations generated by the optics of the telescope and by slowly varying temperature inhomogeneities in or near the building. The corrections are based on an image analysis.
The active optics system constantly monitors the optical quality of the image using an offset reference star as it is picked up in the field by the wavefront sensor CCD in the adapter sensor arm. The same offset star is also used by the acquisition and autoguiding CCD.
The system controls the relative position and the shape of the optical elements. The primary mirror shape can be actively controlled by varying the force pattern applied by means of its support system. The latter consists of 150 computer controlled axial actuators, applying a distribution of forces at the back of the mirror.
Periodically the image analyzer calculates the deviation of the image from the best quality. The image analysis typically requires about 30 seconds (1/30 Hz) in order to integrate out the effect of atmospheric seeing. The computer decomposes the deviation into single optical contributions (defocus, astigmatism, coma etc...) and calculates the force correction which each active element has to perform to achieve the optimal quality. The set of 150 correction forces, one for each axial actuator, is computed and transmitted to the local control of the M1 Cell-M3 Tower for execution. The focus and coma terms are corrected by displacements of the secondary mirror.
Fast correctionsThe feedback scheme is the same as above but here the maximum frequency for fast corrections is 1 Hz. These shorter integration times reduce the signal to noise ratio of measurements and affect both the sky coverage (requirement of brighter guide stars in the field) and the number of aberrations which can be corrected (only the lowest spatial frequency ones).
Open loop corrections
This mode does not use feedback information from the image analyser. The open loop mode is used in the absence of any sufficiently bright guide star, or in the case of image analysis failure, or as initialization for baseline operation after a new telescope preset. For this type of operation accurately predicted forces on M1 (dependent on telescope tube inclination) and predicted positions (dependent also on temperature) are required.
More technical information on the principles of active optics can be obtained in the following publications:
R. Wilson, F. Franza, L. Noethe, Journal of Modern Optics, vol. 34/4, 1987, p. 485 L. Noethe et al., Journal of Modern Optics, vol. 35/9, 1988, p. 1427


I've heard that the "smog" in NYC actually helps plants and vegetables grow better. Is there any truth to this, or is it one of those things New Yorkers say to make themselves feel better, like "We have the best drinking water in the country"?
-Sarah from Astoria, NY
I'm sorry to burst your Big Apple bubble, but this is just wishful thinking. I'll start by blowing your mind and totally turning the question around: Do plants affect the air quality in polluted cities?
Trees planted in urban areas have actually been proven to reduce air pollution by doing what they do naturally, which is filter the air. Plants suck in carbon dioxide (along with the pollution) and release clean oxygen back into the environment. Woohoo, new clean air! But the flipside of all this is that the plant is sucking in polluted carbon dioxide. And that pollution has gotta end up somewhere...
Toxins pulled in from air, water and soil can eventually be transferred to the leaves and fruit of the plant. All plants are affected differently: Tomatoes, for example, harbor toxins in their leaves and not in their fruit, so you're safe if you're only eating the tomatoes and not the leaves like a weirdo.
Trees planted along the streets of NYC are actually chosen for their high rate of filtration. High filtering trees help clean the air better, but they also have a strong tolerance for pollution so they can survive the tough NYC air conditions. To learn more about trees planted in NYC, check out the Million Trees Initiative- you can request a tree to be planted on your block!
So, sorry Sarah... your New York City garden does not like the smog. But hey, at least you don't live in super-smoggy Los Angeles!
If anyone has a specific plant they're growing and would like to know how pollution is affecting it, comment below and I'll find the answer!
Have a question? Send it to Green Thumb Conundrums!


A Brief History
The Bureau’s first field office in Cincinnati opened in 1913 under the leadership of Special Agent in Charge Hinton G. Clabaugh. Over the next several years, as the Bureau’s responsibilities grew, the office investigated everything from interstate prostitution to potential espionage during World War I.
1920s and 1930s
In 1920, Cincinnati became one of the Bureau’s eight field divisions, overseeing much of the administrative work of several other offices. In 1926, the division was moved to Columbus, Ohio.
|Special Agent in
Charge L.C. Schilder
In November 1929, an office in Cincinnati was reopened with L.C. Schilder as special agent in charge. At that time, the division’s territory was far-ranging, encompassing all of Ohio and parts of Kentucky and Indiana. When Bureau offices were established in Indianapolis in 1934 and Cleveland in 1935, the Cincinnati Division’s territory was limited to the Southern Judicial District of Ohio. Still, the division handled a large and diverse number of cases, from helping to pursue John Dillinger to breaking up a number of significant interstate prostitution rings.
Nelson B. Klein
On August 16, 1935, the division lost its first agent in the line of duty—Special Agent Nelson B. Klein. The 37-year-old Klein and another agent were pursing a man named George Barrett for car theft and other charges when they tracked him to the northeast border of Indiana. The agents spotted Barrett and asked him to surrender, but he opened fire. Klein was mortally wounded, but his return fire struck Barrett in both legs. The criminal was captured and ultimately convicted of the murder. He was the first person to receive the death penalty under 1934 legislation that outlawed the murder of a federal agent.
World War II and the 1950s
With the advent of World War II in 1939, the focus of the division—along with the rest of the Bureau—turned to national security matters. In the coming years, the Cincinnati office searched for spies, helped strengthen the security of manufacturing plants in the area, searched for draft evaders and enemy aliens, and handled other war-time responsibilities. When a band of Nazi saboteurs landed on U.S. soil in 1942, Cincinnati agents helped track down their various contacts.
One odd case came along in 1945. A highly explosive thermite bomb was on exhibit at the Gibson Hotel in Cincinnati when a curious newspaper boy picked it up and dropped it out of the window, scaring nearby pedestrians. Cincinnati agents responded to the scene along with police and fire personnel. The bomb didn’t ignite, and no one was harmed.
As World War II came to an end, the Cincinnati Division joined the rest of the FBI in handling Cold War espionage and related national security cases. Meanwhile, agents continued to handle a variety of criminal investigations—such as pursuing two robbers who stole $160,000 from a bank in Thornville and a group of individuals who sabotaged telephone lines. In late 1947, the division’s work led to the indictment of 17 people in connection with a major prostitution ring operating in and around Ohio.
|Cincinnati agents in 1949|
Some cases were easier than others. In 1950, a fugitive named Fred Whiteacre stopped to stare at his own wanted poster in a federal building. He was quickly arrested by Cincinnati agents. The division also worked to identify surreptitious communist influence in certain unions and to halt attempts by bookies to fix games by intimidating college basketball players. In May 1959, division agents arrested the last escaped prisoner of war from World War II—a German soldier who had been captured in northern Africa but had escaped confinement in Ohio in 1945. The soldier lived and worked under an assumed identity for years, but ultimately turned himself in to the Bureau.
1960s and 1970s
The division continued to tackle a wide range of cases during the 1960s and 1970s.
|Early Cincinnati field office|
In 1963, agents investigated the fraudulent awarding of contracts at a local air force base. Two years later, the office assisted the Bureau’s disaster squad in responding to the crash of an American Airlines flight that killed 58 people near Cincinnati. In the late 1960s, agents tracked the radical activities of black nationalists like H. Rapp Brown, hoping to gain insight into the race riots taking place across the nation. In 1969, the division joined with the FBI office in New Orleans and IRS agents in building a successful case against organized crime figures Sam DiPiazza and William Demming on illegal gambling, tax violation, and other charges. Stronger laws in the coming years would help the FBI to more systematically take down larger Mafia crime families.
By 1971, a total of 117 special agents and 75 support staff in Cincinnati were handling an average workload of 2,398 criminal cases, 1,118 national security investigations, and 169 applicant and other matters. In the late 1970s, Cincinnati agents rescued a 3-year-old boy kidnapped from his home and arrested two brothers who plotted to blow up an Ohio school.
1980s and 1990s
During the next two decades, the division focused largely on cases of white-collar crime, violent crime, property crime, organized crime, and foreign espionage.
In December 1982, tragedy struck when four Chicago Division agents were killed in an airplane accident near Montgomery, Ohio. The agents—Terry Burnett Hereford, Charles L. Ellington, Robert W. Conners, and Michael James Lynch—were accompanying bank fraud suspect Carl Henry Johnson and an individual from the law firm representing him to an area where agents believed Johnson had stashed $50,000 in embezzled money. The plane—which was piloted by two of the agents and was apparently experiencing problems with its altitude readings—crashed on approach to Lunken Airport. No one aboard survived.
|Raymond Luc Levasseur|
On November 4, 1984, local police and Cincinnati agents arrested Ten Most Wanted fugitive Raymond Luc Levasseur and his wife in Deerfield, Ohio. A founding member of a left-wing terrorist group known as the United Freedom Front, Levasseur had been placed on the FBI’s Top Ten list in 1977 for his role in a series of bombings and bank robberies across the northeastern United States. He was convicted in 1986 and served in prison until 2004. On November 3, 1988, the division arrested another Top Ten fugitive, John Edward Stevens, who was sought in connection with 22 bank robberies across the country.
In the late 1980s, the office handled a number of significant cases, including the collapse of the Home State Savings Bank of Cincinnati and a wide-ranging scheme to fix harness races that led to the indictment of more than a dozen conspirators. From 1986 through 1989, the Cincinnati Division investigated the illegal gambling activities of baseball star and Cincinnati Reds manager Pete Rose, who was later banned from the game. In the late 1980s, the division also investigated a hospital attendant named Donald Harvey, who claimed to have murdered as many as 87 people while working in various medical facilities in Kentucky and Ohio. Harvey was eventually sentenced to several life terms.
In the 1980s, Cincinnati agents and IRS investigators began investigating price-fixing in the sale of industrial diamonds used for cutting and grinding tools. The case—which made use of court-authorized wiretaps and the federal witness protection program—led to indictments in March 1994.
In July 2001, division agents arrested Danny William Kincaid, the Ohio leader of the white supremacist group known as Aryan Nations, for possessing an explosive device and a trove of other weapons. He pled guilty the following year.
Following the events of 9/11, the Cincinnati Division joined with the rest of the Bureau in making the prevention of terrorist attacks its top priority. It strengthened its Joint Terrorism Task Force, which has components in both Cincinnati and Columbus, and set up a Field Intelligence Group.
The terror task force was soon involved in some key investigations. In 2003, working with agents from FBI Headquarters and various partners, the Cincinnati Division began investigating an Ohio truck driver named Iyman Faris. Faris admitted having personal contact with several individuals tied to terrorism, and agents later learned that he had been tasked by al Qaeda operatives with attacking the Brooklyn Bridge and other targets. He pled guilty to terrorism support charges and was sentenced to 20 years in prison in October 2003. Faris also led investigators to Nuradin Abdi—a Somali national living in Columbus—who had plotted with Faris to blow up a shopping mall and discussed potential missile attacks against U.S. landmarks. Abdi pled guilty to various terrorism support charges in July 2007. A third co-conspirator, Christopher Paul, pled guilty in June 2008 to plotting to use a weapon of mass destruction against targets in the United States and Europe.
Meanwhile, the division continued its work on criminal cases, investigating everything from mortgage fraud and other white-collar crimes to drug trafficking and child pornography.
With new intelligence capabilities, new and deepened cooperation with a variety of law enforcement and intelligence partners, and new post-9/11 legal authorities and resources, the Cincinnati Division is committed to continuing its work to protect local communities and the country from a range of national security and criminal threats.


On This Day - 15 April 1918
Theatre definitions: Western Front comprises the Franco-German-Belgian front and any military action in Great Britain, Switzerland, Scandinavia and Holland. Eastern Front comprises the German-Russian, Austro-Russian and Austro-Romanian fronts. Southern Front comprises the Austro-Italian and Balkan (including Bulgaro-Romanian) fronts, and Dardanelles. Asiatic and Egyptian Theatres comprises Egypt, Tripoli, the Sudan, Asia Minor (including Transcaucasia), Arabia, Mesopotamia, Syria, Persia, Afghanistan, Turkestan, China, India, etc. Naval and Overseas Operations comprises operations on the seas (except where carried out in combination with troops on land) and in Colonial and Overseas theatres, America, etc. Political, etc. comprises political and internal events in all countries, including Notes, speeches, diplomatic, financial, economic and domestic matters. Source: Chronology of the War (1914-18, London; copyright expired)
Fighting continues on Bailleul-Wulverghem line, and Germans capture both places.
Very violent artillery action in Luce Valley (Somme).
Finland: Germans report occupation of Helsingfors.
Macedonia: Greek troops cross Struma river and occupy villages in Seres district.
British troops take two villages south-west of Demirhissar.
Naval and Overseas Operations
British Naval forces sink ten German armed trawlers in Kattegat.
Austria: Count Czernin's resignation announced.


Who Invented Fireworks Article
Fourth of July for Kids
There are many different ways that the Fourth of July can be celebrated. Each year, families everywhere participate in some sort of activity to celebrate the Fourth of July. This year, if you are searching for a way to celebrate the Fourth of July, you should consider simply doing things that surround the enjoyment of your child. Here, you will find many suggestions that you can use to create a Fourth of July for kids. You can implement one of these suggestions this Fourth of July, or all of them!
One of the first ways that you can create a Fourth of July for kids is to encourage children to dress in the American colors. You may even allow children to purchase an outfit that reflects the American spirit. You can allow children to create an American hat, or other accessories that they can wear. You may choose to purchase small flags that they can wave as they walk around throughout the day. You may want to teach them what the different symbols and colors on the American flag represent and encourage them to teach others throughout the day of the Fourth of July.
A Fourth of July for kids can include teaching many patriotic songs like “Yankee Doodle”, and teaching the history of the song and why the lyrics are what they are. It is also a great idea to check out books from the library that tell the story of the Fourth of July. These books should be the appropriate grade level for the child that you are sharing it with. There are numerous books, for example, that teach about the Fourth of July for very small children so that they have a basic understanding of the events of the day and why we celebrate it.
If you want to celebrate a Fourth of July for kids, you should consider creating many arts and crafts that surround the holiday. You may want to create a firework display from paper, and American flag from fabric or poster board, and similar other things. There are many things that you can create using various items around the house that can teach children about the Fourth of July. This type of tactile learning allows many children to comprehend lessons more easily.
If you are going to host a Fourth of July party, you should allow your child to decorate for the event using the lessons that they have learned regarding this holiday. This can prove to be a lot of fun for the child and the people who attend the event will enjoy the creativity of the child. You may also want to allow the child to create small flags or a variety of other items to give to the guests as a thank you for coming to the Fourth of July party.


Folic Acid and Birth Defects
For at least three decades researchers have suggested that low folic acid intake during pregnancy is related to birth defects such as spina bifida and anencephaly. Two more recent studies, one in Hungary and another in England, are even more convincing that supplementing a pregnant woman's diet with this B vitamin dramatically decreases her baby's chance of birth defects.
Hungarian researchers worked with almost 5000 pregnant women. Every day half of the women received a multi vitamin and mineral tablet containing 800 micrograms of folic acid. The rest took a tablet with a minimum of nutrients and no folic acid. All the women took their tablets one month before conception and continued through their first trimester. The folic acid group had 40 percent less birth defects than the women given none of this vitamin and none of their babies with neural tube problems. There were six cases of neural tube defects among the newborns whose mothers who didn't take folic acid (13).
When English investigators gave four milligrams of folic acid each day to women who had given birth to a child with a neural tube defect in the past, the results were even more pronounced. Almost three-quarters of these supplemented women delivered children free
from this birth defect (14). As of last September, health officials at the Centers for Disease Control recommended that all women of childbearing age should take folic acid as a preventive measure (15).
- Needleman HL, Gatsonis CA. Low-level lead exposure and the IQ of children. Journal of the American Medical Association 1990;263(5): 673-78.
- Anon. Fatal pediatric poisoning from leaded paint--Wisconsin, 1990. Journal of the American Medical Association 1991;265(16): 2050-51.
- Jaroff L. Controlling a childhood menace. Time 1991, February 25: 68-69.
- Sibbison JB. USA: lead in soil. The Lancet 1992;339: 921-22.
- Anon. Is aluminum a dementing ion? The Lancet 1992;339: 713-14.
- Sherrard DJ. Aluminum--much ado about something. The New England Journal of Medicine 1991;324(8): 558-9.
- Farrar G et al. Defective gallium-transferrin binding in Alzheimer disease and Down syndrome: possible mechanism for accumulation of aluminum in brain. The Lancet 1990;335: 747-50.
- Rosenberg IH, Miller JW. Nutritional factors in physical and cognitive functions of elderly people. American Journal of Clinical Nutrition 1992;55: 1237S-43S.
- Jenner FA. Vitamins in schizophrenia. The Lancet 1973, October 6: 787-88.
- Foster HD. The geography of schizophrenia: possible links with selenium and calcium deficiencies, inadequate exposure to sunlight and industrialization. Journal of Orthomolecular Medicine 1988;3(3): 135-40.
- Nielsen FH. Nutritional requirements for boron, silicon, vanadium, nickel, and arsenic: currently knowledge and speculation. Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology 1991;5: 2661-2667.
- McBride J. The making of an essential element? Agricultural Research 1989, April: 12-13.
- Czeizel AE, Dudas I. Prevention of the first occurrence of neural-tube defects by periconceptional vitamin supplementation. The New England Journal of Medicine 1992;327(26): 1832-35.
- MRC Vitamin Study Research Group. Prevention of neural tube defects: results of the Medical Research Council Vitamin Study 1991;338(8760): 131-37.
- Cimons M. US advises folic acid use to reduce birth defects. Los Angeles Times 1992, September 15: A1 & A17.


The Curandera's Garden
It is not uncommon for a Mexican to consult a curandera for spiritual healing while under a medical doctor's care.
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In the 15th century Florentine Codex of Aztec physicians, the healer is "well versed in herbs, who knows, through experience the roots, the trees, the stones. She keeps her secrets and traditions." The healer is clearly female. But where the Codex covers Aztec physicians, the text indicates this role applies to the male gender.
Today the role of healer or "curandera" still exists in Hispanic culture. It is not uncommon for a Mexican to consult a curandera for spiritual healing while under a medical doctor's care. For the very poor with no access to modern medicine, the curandera serves both roles, blending the art of healing the mind with the administration of botanical medicines.
In the Mexican neighborhoods of most Southwestern cities you'll find botanicas, which are herb stores that carry dried traditional plant cures of the curandera's trade. If she is fortunate enough to have a plot of land, the curandera would tend a garden of useful plants for her own fresh harvest.
Some of these plants are quite toxic poisons, but in her training she learned the proper dosage and preparation. Many, such as morning glory and peyote, would be divination plants handed down to her from the Aztec Nahuatl traditions. The most common of these potent medicines is called 'tlapatl' in Nahuatl or 'toloache' in Spanish. It is the wild datura of the desert and Mexico. This nightshade contains serious medicine and may be the single most powerful plant in this garden.
The curandera's garden would also contain New World natives and some European herbs introduced by the Spanish early on. Maguey agave is perhaps the most ubiquitous plant in Mexico because of its use in the fermentation of an alcoholic beverage known as "pulque." Its fiber is utilized for everything from scrub brushes to weaving cloth. The agave leaf was scraped and boiled to treat assorted venereal diseases
The many benefits of "nopal" or prickly pear, Opuntia ficus indica, are just now coming to light in the alternative medicine community. Flat paddle-shaped stems of this plant are chopped and simmered down to a potent brew. It is the main component of treating maladies of the heart such as angina and edema. The mix is drunk on a daily basis as a preventative.
The many forms of sagebrush, genus Artemisia, are known as 'ajenjo.' They include both native and European species, all of which are strongly bitter and potentially toxic. The herbs have been used in the Old World and the New to treat intestinal parasites. They also can make up a powerful antibacterial for treating infected wounds.
Some very long-lived woody shrubs also fall into this curandera garden pharmacoepia. Bushy apache plume, Fallugia paradoxa, is a desert shrub known as 'ponil.' Aspirin-like qualities are found in its inner bark, much like that of aspen and willow. A strong tea of the root and bark is also used for hair-loss treatment. Bright red Ocotillo blossoms from the woody 'oqueria splendens' are boiled, and the tea used to treat sore throat and tonsillitis. The leaves of a bright yellow trumpet flowered shrubby vine, Tecoma stans, known as "tronadora," are used to treat adult diabetes.
It is important to remember that these uses of plants are not medical advice or recommendations. The way each is gathered, prepared and administered can range considerably. This is folk medicine handed down verbally from curandera to apprentice, and all are combined with a strong dose of love and personal attention.
The curandera's garden is beautiful because it reflects how people have helped one another for centuries. And no one can deny that when the ocotillo turns to fire and datura perfumes the night air, the Aztec gods are pleased that Nahuatl ways live on in the 21st Century.
Find an excellent compendium of plants and their uses in:
Los Remedios, by Michael Moore
Traditional Herbal Remedies of the Southwest
Red Crane Books
Maureen Gilmer is a horticulturist and host of Weekend Gardening on DIY-Do It Yourself Network. For more information, visit www.moplants.com or DIYNetwork.com. Distributed by Scripps Howard News Service.
On Hawaii's Haleakala volcano you'll find all things lavender -- crafts, soaps and recipes.
Garden designer Matt James helps a busy California executive transform her backyard eyesore into a personal refuge.(4 photos)
Fitness guru Wes Cole offers valuable advice on how to keep gardening from becoming a pain in the neck -- and back and knees.


History of Western Political Tradition A brief overview of the development of political philosohpy from Socrates to Marx by John A. Sterling
Biblical origins of American Political philosophy by John A. Sterling. A look at the biblical and philosophical origins of self-government.
Christianity as an Influence on the Founders A look at some of the best-known founding fathers and what they said about Christianity and the Bible. Also, what their contemporaries said about them and their faith. By John A. Sterling
Scroll down the page for Documents and quotes that demonstrate the ideological basis of American Self-Government
1. Magna Carta
2. The Mayflower Compact
3.Declaration of the Causes and Necessity of Taking up Arms.
4. The Declaration of Independence
5. The U.S. Constitution and Bill of Rights
6. The Federalist Papers This hyperlink takes you to the THOMAS information site maintained by the U.S. Government. To return to the Law & Liberty Foundation, use the BACK button on your browser.
7. Davy Crockett's speech on the Floor of Congress 1830
8. Madison Veto of Public Works Law March 3, 1817
9. Sermon by Samuel West on the right to rebel against governors, 1789
10. Offenses Against God by Sir William Blackstone11. Discourse on Civil Liberty by Nathaniel Niles, legislator, judge, & preacher, (1741-1821)
12. Civil Disobedience: A duty to disobey by Jonathan Mayhew, (1720-1766)
Sites on the Web where you can find many more historical documentsLINKS The Constitution Society
Articles on Religion and America's Founding


Born at Belbrook House, Mountrath, Queen's County, Ireland, 1810; died at Manchester, N.H., 17 September, 1884. Left motherless in infancy, she was confined to the care of a maternal grant-aunt who undertook the formation of her religious character according to the method of Fénelon. Naturally of a gay disposition, she was carried away by the frivolities of fashionable life until her scruples led her to confide in her director. She followed his advice in offering her services to the foundress of the Congregation of the Sisters of Mercy, whom she assisted in instructing the little inmates of the House for Homeless Children recently erected. Assuming the plain black habit of the institution in 1828, she conducted the affairs of the home while Mother McAuley and two foundress companions were making their novitiate in the Presentation Convent of George's Hill preparatory to the founding of the new congregation. After their return as professed Sisters of Mercy she and six companions assumed the garb of the congregation.
In 1837 Sister Mary Francis Xavier was appointed superior of the convent at Carlow, which had been built under her supervision and was the first house of the congregation outside of Dublin. In 1839 she founded the convent of Naas and in 1840 that of Weyford, to which soon after its establishment the public orphan asylum was affiliated. From Wexford foundations have been sent out as far as Australia. The convent of Sligo is perhaps the most noteworthy of her Irish foundations on account of its flourishing training-school for teachers. In 1843 Bishop O'Connor of Pittsburgh applied to Carlow for a foundation for his diocese, and Mother Warde with a band of six left for America. At Pittsburgh the sisters took charge of the cathedral Sunday school and the instruction of adults. Mother Warde's power of language and sympathy allied to ardent zeal won many to the Church. Parochial schools and academies, visitation of the sick poor in their houses and in the poor house, visitation of the penitentiary, and the opening of the first hospital in Pittsburgh followed each other in rapid succession. In 1846 a foundation was made in Chicago in compliance with Mother Warde's promise to Bishop Quarter. In 1848 she opened a second branch house in the Alleghanies on land given by the Reverend Demetrius Gallitzin within the limits of his Catholic settlement of Loretto. In 1850, though the "Knownothings" had recently burned the convent of the Ursulines near Boston, Mother Warde accepted the invitation of Bishop O'Reilly of Hartford to open a house in Providence. After the sisters' installation a mob surrounded the convent, threatening them with death if they would not immediately vacate the premises. Mother Warde exacted a promise from each of their Catholic defenders that no shot would be fired except in self defence, and the sisters held possession of the convent. One of the rioters had remarked to his companions:
We made our plans without reckoning the odds we shall have to contend with in the strong controlling force the presence of that nun commands. The only honourable course for us is to retreat from this ill-conceived fray. I, for one, shall not lift a hand to harm these ladies.
In 1852 Mother Warde opened houses in Hartford and New Haven to which free schools were attached; later on academies were opened and the works of mercy inaugurated. In 1854 Mrs. Goodloe Harper, daughter of Charles Carroll of Carrollton, donated to the congregation a house and some ground at Newport, R.I., for a convent and schools. Her daughter, Miss Emily Harper, was also a generous benefactor. In 1857 free and select schools were opened at Rochester, and later at Buffalo, by desire of Bishop Timon. On 16 July, 1858, Mother Warde and a band of missionaries left Providence for Manchester, by invitation of Bishop Bacon of Portland, and there established night schools for factory children. St. Mary's Academy was opened the same year. In 1861, at the request of Bishop Wood, Mother Warde opened a convent at Philadelphia, where free schools and the works of mercy were instituted. In 1864 a foundation was sent to Omaha; in 1865 a branch house and schools were opened at Bangor, Maine; in 1871 a colony of sisters was sent to Yreka, California, and North Whitefield Mission, Maine, was undertaken by Mother Warde, who likewise sent foundations to Jersey City, Bordentown, and Princeton, N.J. In 1857 Bishop Bacon requested her to open an orphanage in Portland, but a disastrous fire delayed the work until 1872, when the Burlington foundation had been begun. The Kavanagh School was given to the sisters by Miss Winifred Kavanagh; an academy was also opened at Portland. On the feast of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross, 1878, Mother Warde sent the sisters to labour among the Indians of Maine at Old Town, Pleasant Point, and Dana's Point. The Government builds the schools houses and pays the sisters salaries for teaching the Indian children. Mother Warde's last works were the opening of an Old Ladies' Home and a Young Ladies' Academy at Deering, Maine. At the time of her golden jubilee in 1883 Mother Warde was the oldest Sister of Mercy living. Her salient characteristics were great purity of heart, earnestness of purpose, sincerity, and large-mindedness. She was exceedingly reserved, but sympathizing and compassionate towards others. Endowed with rare common-sense, she was an optimist in all things. In appearance she was of medium height, erect, and of commanding presence; her forehead was high, and her blue eyes deeply set.
Life of Mother M. Xavier Warde (Manchester); Annals of Sisters of Mercy, III-IV.
APA citation. (1912). Mary Francis Xavier Warde. In The Catholic Encyclopedia. New York: Robert Appleton Company. http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/15553a.htm
MLA citation. "Mary Francis Xavier Warde." The Catholic Encyclopedia. Vol. 15. New York: Robert Appleton Company, 1912. <http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/15553a.htm>.
Transcription. This article was transcribed for New Advent by Thomas M. Barrett. Dedicated to my grandmother, Mary Loretta Ashley Barrett.
Ecclesiastical approbation. Nihil Obstat. October 1, 1912. Remy Lafort, S.T.D., Censor. Imprimatur. +John Cardinal Farley, Archbishop of New York.
Contact information. The editor of New Advent is Kevin Knight. My email address is feedback732 at newadvent.org. (To help fight spam, this address might change occasionally.) Regrettably, I can't reply to every letter, but I greatly appreciate your feedback — especially notifications about typographical errors and inappropriate ads.


EVEN a material 10 billion times as strong as steel has a breaking point. It seems neutron stars may shatter under extreme forces, explaining puzzling X-ray flares.
Neutron stars are dense remnants of stars gone supernova, packing the mass of the sun into a sphere the size of a city. Their cores may be fluid, but their outer surfaces are solid and extremely tough - making graphene, the strongest material on Earth, look like tissue paper by comparison.
These shells may shatter, though, in the final few seconds before a pair of neutron stars merges to form a black hole - a union thought to generate explosions known as short gamma-ray bursts.
David Tsang of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena and colleagues have calculated how the mutual gravitational pull of such stars will distort their shape, creating moving tidal bulges. As the stars spiral towards each other, orbiting ever faster, they squeeze and stretch each other ever faster too.
A few seconds before the stars merge, the frequency of this squeezing and stretching matches the frequency at which one of the stars vibrates most easily. This creates a resonance that boosts the vibrations dramatically, causing the star's crust to crack in many places - just as a wine glass may shatter when a certain note is sung, the team says (Physical Review Letters, DOI: 10.1103/physrevlett.108.011102).
The star's gravity is too powerful to let the pieces fly away, but the sudden movement can disturb its magnetic field, accelerating electrons and leading to a powerful X-ray flare. That could explain observations by NASA's Swift satellite in which a blast of X-rays preceded some short gamma-ray bursts by a few seconds.
Combining observations of X-ray flares with those of gravitational waves emitted by the stars as they spiral together could fix the exact frequency at which the shattering occurs, which would reveal more about the stars' mysterious interiors, says Tsang.
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The world economy is being reshaped by new technologies, services, and trading relationships. Much of this dynamism is fuelled by ambitious developing-world nation-states like Brazil, India and South Africa. As governments, businesses and regional blocs in the global south expand their horizons, they increasingly bypass rich northern states. But is this south-south cooperation any more progressive or less selfish than the more familiar and hegemonic north-south relationship?
The idea of south-south cooperation started to influence the field of development studies in the late 1990s. It was fuelled by a growing realisation that poor nations might find appropriate, low-cost and sustainable solutions to their problems in other developing countries rather than in the rich north. It drew on clear examples of existing waste and alternative opportunity; for example, if African farmers need boreholes to access water, it surely makes more sense to access Indias huge pool of expertise than to send expensive European water engineers.
The concept quickly spread from the seminar room to the policy chamber. By 1997, Britains new department for international development (DfID) explicitly aimed under its first minister, Clare Short to withdraw from its aid programmes any requirement to use British service providers. The intention was to encourage recipient governments to spend the aid more effectively especially on solutions sourced from other developing nations.
By the early 2000s, some forward-thinking developing nations themselves were incorporating this altruistic principle into their foreign policies. Luís Ignácio Lula da Silvas Brazil is just beginning to make Africa part of its wider effort to build the countrys global profile; recently it granted fellow-Lusophone Mozambique a project to install and staff its own factory producing anti-retroviral HIV drugs, thus reducing its reliance on expensive imports.
China and Africa
An even more potent example of south-south cooperation is the Peoples Republic of China. Chinas presence in Africa goes back centuries: archaeologists digging in the ruins of Africas great medieval trading states at Timbuktu and Great Zimbabwe have found fine porcelain and other evidence of a trading network that spanned half the world. After the PRC was founded in 1949, the new state based its relations with the developing world on a defined doctrine, the five principles of peaceful coexistence; it also used its own legacy of colonial aggression and experience of liberation to forge links with the African nation-states emerging from colonial rule. China in the 1960s lacked the resources of the cold-war superpowers, but still invested significant energies in support of independent Africa. The PRC, driven by perceived ideological, anti-imperialist affinities, dispatched Chinese technicians to nominally leftist states to provide military training, modest economic aid and infrastructural monuments to socialist solidarity. The era of liberation wars in the 1970s saw China choose sides and patronise its favoured forces, as in Angola. This interest receded in the 1980s as Chinese development efforts were diverted inwards. But the post-Tiananmen period gave earlier ideological bonds a fresh twist: the hostility of many African leaders to democratic pressures and (especially) western, hegemonic conceptions of human rights chimed with Chinas own preconceptions. Throughout the 1990s, China increased its aid to African governments and resumed its earlier rhetoric of mutual respect and concern for diversity a discourse that resounded strongly in a continent highly attuned to the perceived neo-colonial reflexes of the former ruling powers. In return, Beijing received recognition of its sovereignty over Taiwan, indifference to its human-rights abuses, and support in international organisations. In 2000, a new China-Africa cooperation forum agreed a joint economic and social programme, one that lent a developmental and commercial slant to the five principles. China has subsequently been well in advance of the G8 by cancelling $10 billion of the debt it is owed by African states; at the second Sino-Africa business conference in December 2003, China offered further debt relief to thirty-one African countries, as well as opening the prospect of zero-tariff trade.
The tensions in what might be called Chinas developmental evangelism in Africa are evident. The ideological underpinnings retain some potency and the principle of non-interference in domestic politics persists. But as Chinese commercial interests dominate the relationship, the strain of avoiding entanglement in ethically and politically complex questions increases. For China, insensitivity to human-rights abuses can be finessed as respecting cultural diversity, but this gets harder in a more open, regulated trading environment.
Rapid economic growth in China in the last decade, coupled with oil exploration and economic diversification in west-central Africa, has created new links. More than 60% of African timber exports are now destined for east Asia; 25% of Chinas oil supplies are now sourced in the gulf of Guinea region.
China-Zimbabwe: a special relationship
But China is moving beyond merely securing essential inputs to acquiring stakes in potentially productive African enterprises. Zimbabwe is a prime example of the kind of place where China likes to do business. In return for bailing out Robert Mugabes regime with injections of cash, machinery, equipment and military supplies, Chinese state-owned enterprises have assembled a portfolio of shares in some of Zimbabwes prize assets.
In buying a 70% stake in the Zimbabwes only electricity generation facilities at Hwange and Kariba, and stakes in the national railway, the Chinese have stepped in where other developing nations (even Libya) have feared to tread. And on a micro-level, Chinese entrepreneurs are quickly supplanting small-scale retailers and local manufactures on Harares streets.
Zimbabwes deteriorating political situation and asset-hungry officials may deter most private investors, but the Chinese government can instruct managers of state enterprises to take the risk, rely on good intergovernmental relations to guarantee investment flow, and depend on state coffers to absorb any loss in the last resort.
Chinas lack of domestic political criticism, meanwhile, frees its government and companies from reputational risks and pressures that can leave western-based companies exposed. Informed, responsible shareholders might be cautious about backing state-led projects in Sudan or Mauritania which rely on a brutally-enforced stability; such issues have little visibility to the Chinese public.
Chinas new hard-nosed Africa policy gives it a strong incentive to circumvent the kind of multilateral aid and investment agendas promoted by Britains Tony Blair and Gordon Brown at the G8 summit, with their inconvenient governance concerns and transparency provisions. As China moves towards becoming the third-largest investor in Africa, its unilateralism will impact on the internal continental map.
The South African alternative
Amidst the dynamism of the east Asian economies, it is tempting to forget that the continent itself is generating an economic powerhouse. South Africa, freed of its apartheid-era isolationist shackles, has become an interested and aggressive explorer of the rest of the continent. The South African model is mixed: private companies led the charge into the new mobile telecommunications sphere, household names like Shoprite followed across the continent, while para-statals (state-owned enterprises) are also active.
Thabo Mbekis economically liberal instincts have been contained by the job-loss fears of his leftist coalition partners, and he has commercialised rather than fully privatised key state enterprises such as the power utility Eskom. This entity has reinforced Mbekis peace plan for the Democratic Republic of Congo by committing its own $500-million investment to the Inga dam, the 3,500-megawatt hydroelectric facility on the Congo river. This project would undoubtedly light up the DRCs cities but Eskoms greatest benefit is probably tying the potentially huge electricity resource into a regional grid which would feed much-needed power supplies to South Africas industrial zones.
This project aptly sums up the dual nature of developing-world investment in Africa. Is such investment, as Mbeki would have it, good for all involved or is it simply a new wave of economic colonisation which will leave most of Africa with as few benefits as in the past? As the developing nations themselves come to rival the investment presence of the G8 and former colonial powers in Africa, it is salutary to recall that south-south cooperation may be more efficient and less wasteful than the wests grand gestures but it is no less self-interested.


The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has issued action plans to address the potential health risks of two chemicals used in making polyurethane polymers, adhesives, sealants and coatings.
Both plans focus on “the potential health effects that may result from exposures to the consumer or self-employed worker while using products containing uncured (unreacted) diisocyanates (e.g., spray-applied foam sealants, adhesives, and coatings)” and from incidental exposures to the general population.
The plans identify a range of actions the agency is considering under the authority of the Toxic Substances Control Act.
“There has been an increase in recent years in promoting the use of foams and sealants by do-it-yourself energy-conscious homeowners, and many people may now be unknowingly exposed to risks from these chemicals,” said Steve Owens, assistant administrator for EPA’s Office of Chemical Safety and Pollution Prevention.
|OSHA regulates workplace exposure to diisocyanate compounds.|
The two new plans are the latest in EPA’s program of Chemical Action Plans
launched in 2009. EPA is also currently crafting an Action Plan for siloxanes.
Uncured Compounds at Issue
Diisocyanates are used to make polyurethane polymers. Most polyurethane products, such as foam mattresses or bowling balls, are fully reacted (cured) and not of concern. Adhesives, coatings, spray foam and other products, however, continue to react while in use and may contain "uncured" diisocyanates to which people may be exposed, according to EPA.
Diisocyanates are known to cause severe skin and breathing responses in workers who have been repeatedly exposed to them. The chemicals have been documented as a leading cause of work-related asthma, and in severe cases, fatal reactions have occurred, EPA says.
The Occupational Safety and Health Administration currently regulates workplace exposures through Permissible Exposure Limits. EPA plans to consider the potential risks from consumer exposure to these chemicals.
The spray foam industry notes that “persons developing sensitivity to isocyanates may have dangerous systemic reactions to extremely small exposures, including respiratory failure.” In a report on respiratory protection, it notes: “MDI should be not be heated or sprayed except with strict engineering controls and personal protective equipment.”
Possible actions to address concerns associated with TDI, MDI and related compounds include:
- Issuing rules to gather data on significant adverse effects;
- Obtaining unpublished health and safety data from industry sources;
- Requiring exposure monitoring studies for consumer products; and
- Banning or restricting consumer products containing uncured MDI or TDI.
EPA said it would work “with other federal agencies, the polyurethanes industry, and others to ensure improved labeling and provide comprehensive product safety information for polyurethane products containing uncured compounds, especially in consumer products.”


Right now, the accelerator is stopped for the annual maintenance shutdown. This is the opportunity to fix all problems that occurred during the past year both on the accelerator and the experiments. The detectors are opened and all accessible malfunctioning equipment is being repaired or replaced.
In the 27-km long LHC tunnel, surveyors are busy getting everything realigned to a high precision, while various repairs and maintenance operations are on their way. By early March, all magnets will have been cooled down again and prepared for operation.
The experimentalists are not only working on their detectors but also improving all aspects of their software: the detector simulations, event reconstruction algorithms, particle identification schemes and analysis techniques are all being revised.
By late March, the LHC will resume colliding protons with the goal of delivering about 16 inverse femtobarns of data, compared to 5 inverse femtobarns in 2011. This will enable the experiments to improve the precision of all measurements achieved so far, push all searches for new phenomena slightly further and explore areas not yet tackled. The hope is to discover particles associated with new physics revealing the existence of new phenomena. The CMS and ATLAS physicists are looking for dozens of hypothetical particles, the Higgs boson being the most publicized but only one of many.
When protons collide in the LHC accelerator, the energy released materializes in the form of massive but unstable particles. This is a consequence of the well-known equation E=mc2, which simply states that energy (represented by E) and mass (m) are equivalent, each one can change into the other. The symbol c2 represents the speed of light squared and acts like a conversion factor. This is why in particle physics we measure particle masses in units of energy like GeV (giga electronvolt) or TeV (tera electronvolt). One electronvolt is the energy acquired by an electron through a potential difference of one volt.
It is therefore easier to create lighter particles since less energy is required. Over the past few decades, we have already observed the lighter particles countless times in various experiments. So we know fairly well how many events containing them we should observe. We can tell when new particles are created when we see more events of a certain topology than what we expect from those well-known phenomena, which we refer to as the background.
We can claim that something additional and new is also occurring when we see an excess of events. Of course, the bigger the excess, the easier it is to claim something new is happening. This is the reason why we accumulate so many events, each one being a snap-shots of the debris coming out of a proton-proton collisions. We want to be sure the excess cannot be due to some random fluctuation.
Some of the particles we are looking for are expected to have a mass in the order of a few hundred GeV. This is the case for the Higgs boson and we already saw possible signs of its presence last year. If the observed excess continues to grow as we collect more data in 2012, it will be enough to claim the Higgs boson discovery beyond any doubt in 2012 or rule it out forever.
Other hypothetical particles may have masses as large as a few thousand GeV or equivalently, a few TeV. In 2011, the accelerator provided 7 TeV of energy at the collision point. The more energy the accelerator has, the higher the reach in masses, just like one cannot buy a 7000 CHF car with 5000 CHF. So to create a pair of particles with a mass of 3.5 TeV (or 3500 GeV), one needs to provide at least 7 TeV to produce them. But since some of the energy is shared among many particles, the effective limit is lower than the accelerator energy.
There are ongoing discussions right now to decide if the LHC will be operating at 8 TeV this year instead of 7 TeV as in 2011. The decision will be made in early February.
If CERN decides to operate at 8 TeV, the chances of finding very heavy particles will slightly increase, thanks to the extra energy available. This will be the case for searches for particles like the W’ or Z’, a heavier version of the well-known W and Z bosons. For these, collecting more data in 2012 will probably not be enough to push the current limits much farther. We will need to wait until the LHC reaches full energy at 13 or 14 TeV in 2015 to push these searches higher than in 2011 where limits have already been placed around 1 TeV.
For LHCb and ALICE, the main goal is not to find new particles. LHCb aims at making extremely precise measurements to see if there are any weak points in the current theoretical model, the Standard Model of particle physics. For this, more data will make a whole difference. Already in 2011, they saw the first signs of CP-violation involving charm quarks and hope to confirm this observation. This measurement could shed light on why matter overtook antimatter as the universe expanded after the Big Bang when matter and antimatter must have been created in equal amounts. They will also investigate new techniques and new channels.
Meanwhile, ALICE has just started analyzing the 2011 data taken in November with lead ion collisions. The hope is to better understand how the quark-gluon plasma formed right after the Big Bang. This year, a special run involving collisions of protons and lead ions should bring a new twist in this investigation.
Exploring new corners, testing new ideas, improving the errors on all measurements and most likely the final answer on the Higgs, that is what we are in with the LHC for in 2012. Let’s hope that in 2012 the oriental dragon, symbol of perseverance and success, will see our efforts bear fruit.
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Author: Carolyn Wilhelm
Children find favorite words, phrases, and sentences from familiar stories. Working together, they combine their words and phrases to create a poem. The poem is then shared as performance poetry.
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