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Thursday, March 21, 2013

Apollo Moon Rocket Engines Raised from Seafloor by Amazon CEO

Long thought to be lost forever on the ocean floor, massive engines that launched astronauts to the moon more than 40 years ago have been recovered by a private expedition led by the founder of Amazon.com.

"We found so much," said Jeff Bezos, the online retailer's CEO, in an update posted Wednesday (March 20) on the Bezos Expeditions website. "We have seen an underwater wonderland ? an incredible sculpture garden of twisted F-1 enginesthat tells the story of a fiery and violent end, one that serves testament to the Apollo program."

When NASA's mighty Saturn V rockets were launched on missions to Earth orbit and the moon in the late 1960s and early 1970s, the five F-1 engines that powered each of the boosters' first stages dropped into the Atlantic Ocean and sank to the seafloor. There they were expected to remain, discarded forever.

Then, almost exactly one year ago, Bezos announced his private ? and until then, secret ? expedition had located what they believed to be theengines from the 1969 Apollo 11 mission?that began the journey to land the first humans on the moon. [Apollo Rocket Engines Recovered by Jeff Bezos (Photos)]

"Nearly one year ago, Jeff Bezos shared with us his plans to recover F-1 engines," said NASA administrator Charles Bolden in a statement that was released Wednesday. "We share the excitement expressed by Jeff and his team in announcing the recovery of two of the powerful Saturn V first-stage engines from the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean."

Poetic echoes of lunar missions

When Bezos first revealed that his team had discovered the engines using state-of-the-art deep-sea sonar, he said he wasn't sure what condition they were in.

"They hit the ocean at high velocity and have been in salt water for more than 40 years. On the other hand, they are made of tough stuff, so we'll see," Bezos wrote in 2012.

What they saw, using Remotely Operated Vehicles (ROV), was a tangled pile of F-1 engine parts strewn across the ocean floor at a depth of more than 14,000 feet (4,270 meters).

"We photographed many beautiful objects in situ and have now recovered many prime pieces," Bezos wrote in the update Wednesday. "Each piece we bring on deck conjures for me the thousands of engineers who worked together back then to do what for all time had been thought surely impossible."

The scene also evoked the Apollo moon missions themselves.

"We on the team were often struck by poetic echoes of the lunar missions," Bezos wrote. "The buoyancy of the ROVs looks every bit like microgravity. The blackness of the horizon. The gray and colorless ocean floor. Only the occasional deep sea fish broke the illusion."

Bezos and his team are now heading back to port in Cape Canaveral, Fla., after working for three weeks at sea on the Seabed Worker, a multi-purpose support vessel.

Recovery, restoration and display

The Bezos expedition returned enough major components to rebuild two Saturn V F-1 engines ? out of the 65 that were launched between 1967 and 1973 ? for display. Despite claims last year that the engines were specifically from Apollo 11, Bezos now says the history of the engine parts he recovered may not be known.

Inspecting the raised pieces, Bezos reported that many of the parts' original serial numbers are missing or partially missing, which may make mission identification difficult.

"We might see more during restoration," Bezos wrote.

Once the engine parts are back on land, they will undergo a restoration to stabilize the hardware and prevent further corrosion from their decades-long exposure to the ocean's salt water. But Bezos hinted the restoration may not return the engines to like-new condition.

"We want the hardware to tell its true story, including its 5,000 mile per hour re-entry and subsequent impact with the ocean surface," Bezos stated. "We're excited to get this hardware on display where just maybe it will inspire something amazing."

Where the recovered F-1 engines will go on exhibit is still to be decided. Last year, Bezos expressed a desire that if two or more of the engines were successfully raised, one would go on display at The Museum of Flight in Seattle, near where Amazon and Bezos' commercial spaceflight company, Blue Origin, are headquarted.

NASA, which?retains ownership of the engines?and all of its parts, said it would likely offer one to the Smithsonian's National Air and Space Museum in Washington, DC.

"We look forward to the restoration of these engines by the Bezos team and applaud Jeff's desire to make these historic artifacts available for public display," Bolden said.

Click through to collectSPACE.com?for more photos and video from Bezos Expeditions? recovery of two Apollo Saturn V rocket F-1 engines.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/apollo-moon-rocket-engines-raised-seafloor-amazon-ceo-190956909.html

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Sun in the way will affect Mars missions in April

Mar. 20, 2013 ? The positions of the planets next month will mean diminished communications between Earth and NASA's spacecraft at Mars.

Mars will be passing almost directly behind the sun, from Earth's perspective. The sun can easily disrupt radio transmissions between the two planets during that near-alignment. To prevent an impaired command from reaching an orbiter or rover, mission controllers at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif., are preparing to suspend sending any commands to spacecraft at Mars for weeks in April. Transmissions from Mars to Earth will also be reduced.

The travels of Earth and Mars around the sun set up this arrangement, called a Mars solar conjunction, about once every 26 months.

"This is our sixth conjunction for Odyssey," said Chris Potts of JPL, mission manager for NASA's Mars Odyssey, which has been orbiting Mars since 2001. "We have plenty of useful experience dealing with them, though each conjunction is a little different."

The Mars solar conjunctions that occur once about every 26 months are not identical to each other. They can differ in exactly how close to directly behind the sun Mars gets, and they can differ in how active the sun is. The sun's activity, in terms of sunspots and solar flares, varies on a 22-year cycle.

This year, the apparent angle between Mars and the sun (if you could see Mars against the glare of the sun--but don't try, because it's dangerous to the eyes) will slim to 0.4 degree on April 17. The sun is in a more active period of solar flares for its current cycle, compared to the 2011 conjunction, but this cycle has been relatively mild.

"The biggest difference for this 2013 conjunction is having Curiosity on Mars," Potts said. Odyssey and the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter relay almost all data coming from Curiosity and the Mars Exploration Rover Opportunity, as well as conducting the orbiters' own science observations.

Transmissions from Earth to the orbiters will be suspended while Mars and the sun are two degrees or less apart in the sky, from April 9 to 26, with restricted commanding during additional days before and after. Both orbiters will continue science observations on a reduced basis compared to usual operations. Both will receive and record data from the rovers. Odyssey will continue transmissions Earthward throughout April, although engineers anticipate some data dropouts, and the recorded data will be retransmitted later.

The Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter will go into a record-only mode on April 4. "For the entire conjunction period, we'll just be storing data on board," said Deputy Mission Manager Reid Thomas of JPL. He anticipates that the orbiter could have about 40 gigabits of data from its own science instruments and about 12 gigabits of data from Curiosity accumulated for sending to Earth around May 1.

NASA's Mars Exploration Rover Opportunity is approaching its fifth solar conjunction. Its team will send no commands between April 9 and April 26. The rover will continue science activities using a long-term set of commands to be sent beforehand.

"We are doing extra science planning work this month to develop almost three weeks of activity sequences for Opportunity to execute throughout conjunction," said Opportunity Mission Manager Alfonso Herrera of JPL. The activities during the conjunction period will not include any driving.

Curiosity, the newest asset on Mars, can also continue making science observations from the location where it will spend the conjunction period. Curiosity's controllers plan to suspend commanding from April 4 to May 1.

"We will maintain visibility of rover status two ways," said Torsten Zorn of JPL, conjunction planning leader for the mission's engineering operations team. "First, Curiosity will be sending daily beeps directly to Earth. Our second line of visibility is in the Odyssey relays."

JPL, a division of the California Institute of Technology, manages the projects operating both NASA Mars orbiters and both Mars rovers for NASA's Science Mission Directorate, Washington.

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Source: http://feeds.sciencedaily.com/~r/sciencedaily/space_time/nasa/~3/zL72aL-jUGc/130320192453.htm

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Analysis: Private equity funds rapid growth of walk-in clinics

By Atossa Araxia Abrahamian

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Walk-in clinics are popping up in shopping malls and main streets across the United States and private equity is helping fund the expansion.

At least a dozen private equity firms have in the last few years plowed millions of dollars into urgent care clinics, which have become popular with people who do not have regular doctors or who like the convenience of their extended hours of operation.

Several private equity executives told Reuters they are eager for more acquisitions in this sector because they expect profits to grow as healthcare reforms boost the number of Americans with health insurance by more than 30 million over the next decade.

"If you think about where healthcare is headed, urgent care is very clearly part of the solution, said Stan Blaylock, a former executive at drug store chain Walgreen Co, who left to invest in and head the urgent care chain Physicians Immediate Care.

The number of such clinics in the United States climbed almost 20 percent to 9,400 in the last four years, according to the Urgent Care Association of America. Almost 40 percent of clinics surveyed by the trade group expect to expand their facilities or add new clinics this year, up from 18 percent in 2010.

After poor management caused many walk-in health centers to close in the 1970s and 1980s, today's clinics are much improved, thanks to investor money and customer demand. They are in more convenient locations, open earlier and close later, and offer online billing. Some also sell snacks and dispense medicine to boost profits.

"We borrow a lot from the restaurant industry," said Zach Wooldridge, co-founder of Elm Creek Partners, a Dallas-based equity firm, which in 2011 bought a majority stake in Millennium Healthcare Management, an urgent care chain with clinics in Louisiana and Mississippi. "We have to be good, fast and kind to be successful.

Wooldridge declined to say how much Elm Creek paid for Millennium Healthcare. The firm - like others - plans to remain invested for several years, before selling the company or taking it public. He expected that his chain and others would generate EBITDA (earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization) margins of about 20 percent when fully operational.

Private equity firms invested $4 billion in 2012 in health and medical services, which include urgent care, up from $3.5 billion in 2011, according to Thomson Reuters data.

One of the first in the recent wave of investments was in 2010, when venture capital firm Sequoia Capital and private equity firm General Atlantic bought MedExpress, the country's No. 3 urgent care chain. They did not disclose the size of their investment.

In the same year, health insurer Humana Inc bought the largest U.S. walk-in chain, Concentra, with 330-clinics, for $805 million. And LLR Partners and health insurer WellPoint Inc invested last summer in 12th ranked Physicians Immediate Care, a chain of 20 urgent care clinics based in Chicago for an undisclosed sum.

INVESTOR INTEREST

Most urgent care chains are privately run and investing in them is not risk free. Too many clinics in close proximity can saturate a market, and low insurance reimbursements can cut into the bottom line.

Consumer advocates also say they worry investors will drive clinics to focus more on profits than on quality of care.

Private equity firms say they help clinics standardize procedures and consolidate overhead costs like billing. Scott Perricelli of LLR Partners said his firm also spends a lot of time helping clinics look for new branch locations and recruit doctors - two tasks physicians are usually too busy to tackle.

When Aaron Money, an executive at FFL, a San Francisco-based private equity firm, saw the potential in urgent care, he teamed up with physician Lee Resnick to start WellStreet, a chain of walk-in health clinics in Georgia. FFL owns 70 percent of the business.

WellStreet's clientele are mostly privately insured, said Money, who expects business to grow as health reforms under the U.S. Affordable Care Act kick in.

"We thought it would be mostly people who would otherwise go to the emergency room. But it's equal parts E.R. and primary care physician-type appointments," he said.

Health industry experts say urgent care centers should keep their services simple to maximize profitability. They are better equipped to treat a kid with an ear infection, than a diabetes patient who needs ongoing, complex care, for instance.

The clinics could lose money if they spend time with patients or take on complicated health problems because insurance companies generally reimburse at a flat rate for each visit, said Franz Ritucci, president of the industry group American Academy of Urgent Care.

Mike Williams, who heads the Abaris Group, a consulting firm that advises urgent and ambulatory care clinics, said, "It's not complex, critical-care medicine. It's a low-tech, high-touch business."

(Reporting By Atossa Araxia Abrahamian; Editing by Jilian Mincer, Tiffany Wu and Leslie Gevirtz)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/analysis-private-equity-funds-rapid-growth-walk-clinics-050751165--sector.html

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CA-NEWS Summary

Cyprus seeks Russian rescue, EU threatens cutoff

NICOSIA/MOSCOW (Reuters) - Cyprus pleaded for a new loan from Russia on Wednesday to avert a financial meltdown, after the island's parliament rejected the terms of a bailout from the EU, raising the risk of default and a bank crash. Cypriot Finance Minister Michael Sarris said he had not reached a deal at a first meeting with his Russian counterpart Anton Siluanov in Moscow, but talks there would continue.

Obama arrives in Israel, vows undying support

JERUSALEM (Reuters) - Making his first official visit to Israel, President Barack Obama pledged on Wednesday unwavering commitment to the security of the Jewish State where concern over a nuclear-armed Iran has clouded bilateral relations. He also stressed the need for Middle East peace at the start of a three-day trip aimed at resetting fraught relations with both the Israelis and Palestinians. But U.S. officials have said Obama had come to listen and had no new initiatives to offer.

North Korea's Kim supervises "drone attack" drill

SEOUL (Reuters) - North Korean leader Kim Jong-un supervised a drone attack on a simulated South Korean target on Wednesday, Pyongyang's KCNA news agency reported, and the armed forces shot down a target mimicking a cruise missile. North Korea has stepped up its military exercises in response to what it regards as "hostile" joint drills by South Korea and the United States after Pyongyang was sanctioned by the U.N. Security Council for a nuclear test in February.

Afghanistan, NATO agree on troops leaving key province

KABUL (Reuters) - Afghanistan and NATO-led forces have reached a deal on foreign troops leaving a key strategic district near Kabul, coalition forces said, but a controversial expulsion order against U.S. special forces from the entire province remained unclear. An Afghan defense ministry spokesman told reporters in Kabul that the elite American force would quit the whole province of Wardak within a few days, despite U.S. concerns that their departure would leave a security vacuum.

Lew's China visit ends with focus on currency, cyber security

BEIJING (Reuters) - Treasury Secretary Jack Lew wrapped up a two-day visit to China on Wednesday having reopened dialogue on pressing issues of economic reform but saying more action is needed on China's exchange rate. Lew, in his first international trip since taking office last month, also raised concerns about security issues involving cyber threats and North Korea.

Italian president seeks way out of political stalemate

ROME (Reuters) - Italian President Giorgio Napolitano began consultations with political leaders on Wednesday to try to find a way of forming a government after the deadlocked election last month which left no party with a majority in parliament. Senate speaker Pietro Grasso said after meeting Napolitano the president was determined to reach an accord, saying there was "an absolute necessity to give the country a government".

Al Qaeda claims attacks on Iraq invasion anniversary

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Al Qaeda in Iraq has claimed responsibility for a wave of bombings and suicide attacks that killed around 60 people on the 10th anniversary of the U.S.-led invasion that ousted Saddam Hussein. A decade after U.S. and Western troops swept into Iraq to remove the Sunni strongman, Iraq still struggles to overcome violence, sectarian tensions and political instability that test the fragile unity among Shi'ites, Sunnis and ethnic Kurds.

Indian government unlikely to call snap election: sources

NEW DELHI (Reuters) - The Indian government is unlikely to call a snap election despite its biggest ally abruptly quitting the ruling coalition, as it needs time to implement flagship welfare schemes and hopes the economy will improve, government sources said on Wednesday. The withdrawal of the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK) has rattled markets, which are worried that it has left Prime Minister Manmohan Singh unable to pass reforms needed to turn around the worst economic slowdown in a decade.

Five Syrian shells land in Lebanon despite warning

CHTAURA, Lebanon (Reuters) - Five shells fired from Syria landed in Lebanon on Wednesday, one day after Lebanese President Michel Suleiman warned that Syrian strikes on its neighbor were an unacceptable violation of its sovereignty. Witnesses said the shells landed in fields near al-Qasr, a village less than a mile from the border, but no one was hurt.

Pakistan to hold general elections May 11

ISLAMABAD (Reuters) - Pakistan will hold historic general elections on May 11, a presidential spokesman said on Wednesday, after the government completed its first full term in the country's troubled history. A caretaker administration will now manage the run-up to elections as the country struggles with Taliban violence, record sectarian unrest, chronic power cuts and a fragile economy.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/ca-news-summary-000945250.html

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US implies Rwanda hasn't assured warlord's passage

FILE - In this Jan. 16, 2009 file photo, Bosco Ntaganda, seated center, holds a press conference with Congo Interior Minister Celestine Mboyo, right, in Goma, Congo, as rebel leader Ntaganda agreed to work with the Congolese government. The government of Rwanda said Monday, March 18, 2013, that Ntaganda, who had been on the run in neighboring Congo, had turned himself in to the United States Embassy in Kigali, the capital of Rwanda. Ntaganda has become one of Africa's symbols of impunity. Despite an outstanding warrant from the International Criminal Court, which indicted him on war crimes in 2006, he became a general in the Congolese army, living in an upscale villa and playing tennis in his spare time.(AP Photo/T.J. Kirkpatrick, File)

FILE- In this June 30, 2010 file photo, Bosco Ntaganda, a former warlord then integrated into Congo's national army, attends the 50th anniversary celebration of Congo's independence in Goma, eastern Congo. The government of Rwanda said Monday, March 18, 2013, that Ntaganda, who had been on the run in neighboring Congo, had turned himself in to the United States Embassy in Kigali, the capital of Rwanda. Ntaganda has become one of Africa's symbols of impunity. Despite an outstanding warrant from the International Criminal Court, which indicted him on war crimes in 2006, he became a general in the Congolese army, living in an upscale villa and playing tennis in his spare time.(AP Photo/Alain Wandimoyi, File)

NAIROBI, Kenya (AP) ? The United States government appears to be worried that Rwanda won't allow a warlord from Congo now camped out in the U.S. Embassy safe passage to the airport to be flown to the International Criminal Court for prosecution.

The U.S. hopes Rwanda will help facilitate the transfer of Congolese rebel leader Bosco Ntaganda from the U.S. Embassy in Kigali to the airport for a flight to the ICC in the Netherlands, the top U.S. State Department official on Africa, Johnnie Carson, said Wednesday.

"We hope that the Rwandan government will do its part," Carson said in a telephone press conference from Washington. "It is a small but significant part to ensure that Bosco Ntaganda is able to move freely from the American embassy compound to the airport where he will board a plane and go to The Hague."

Carson said it's important that Ntaganda's movement from the embassy to the airport "in no way be inhibited."

Carson also indicated that Rwanda hasn't yet assured cooperation with ICC officials en route to Rwanda. He noted that Rwanda, like the United States, is not a signatory to the Rome Statue that created the ICC and is not bound by international obligations to hand Ntaganda to the ICC.

Rwanda's foreign minister, Louise Mushikiwabo, implicitly criticized the ICC on Twitter on Sunday that "Rwanda believes in justice, not judicial colonialism," in response to a question from the head of Human Rights Watch on whether Rwanda would commit to sending Ntaganda to the court's headquarters in The Hague.

A spokesman for the ICC, Fadi El Abdallah, said the ICC is "contacting authorities in Rwanda and the Americans in order to check how we can get him as soon as possible." He wouldn't elaborate on the nature of the contacts.

Ntaganda's reputation for ruthless methods in the battlefield acquired him the nickname "The Terminator," and his ICC arrest warrant describes how Ntaganda would not hesitate to shell villages with heavy artillery before launching an attack in which his men would kill people with machetes, knifes and rifles.

Those who recently fought alongside him say Ntaganda fled Congo over the weekend after his men lost a key battle against fighters who split off last month from his M23 rebel movement.

"Ntaganda's self-surrender at the U.S. Embassy in Kigali was a surprising end to a saga of conflict, human rights abuses, and blatant disregard for his ICC arrest warrant by (Congolese) officials for many years. It is very significant in terms of a victory for individual rights," said Laura Seay, a Congo expert at Morehouse University in Atlanta.

Having Ntaganda on the stand, though, could pose problems for Rwandan President Paul Kagame, Seay said. Kagame won't want Ntaganda, who was born in Rwanda, to reveal the details of security arrangements and illicit mineral extraction deals between Congo and Rwanda, she said.

Congo has been wracked by warfare for years, and Carson noted that some experts indicate 5 million people have died in violence. Women suffer from mass rapes and children are forced to become soldiers.

But even with Ntaganda out of the picture, peace in eastern Congo remains a long way off. The victorious M23 faction of Gen. Sultani Makenga has lost little strength in the fighting with Ntaganda's faction, and troop morale is high after defeating one of the most feared warlords in Africa. Makenga himself does not have an international arrest warrant against him, but is under United Nations sanctions and has a track record of similar crimes to those committed by Ntaganda.

"It is an interesting development for peace in eastern Congo," said Marc-Andr? Lagrange, senior analyst at the International Crisis Group. "A warlord is leaving, but it doesn't mean that he won't be replaced. Makenga has exactly the same connections in minerals trafficking and so on. A warlord is merely being replaced by another."

Carson said the next 48 hours are critical for Ntaganda's situation. Carson said Ntaganda moved across the border from eastern Congo to Rwanda late on March 14 or early on March 15 with 500 to 700 of his fighters.

"We then found Mr. Ntaganda coming to our embassy. We did not encourage him, we did not know his whereabouts," Carson said. "I suspect he may have come because he knows we are a symbol of fairness and justice and integrity in these kinds of processes but I can't tell you because I don't know and can't read his mind."

Carson said the situation with Ntaganda is an opportunity for progress to be made in the battle against impunity for atrocities and crimes against humanity.

___

Associated Press writer Melanie Gouby reported from Goma, Congo. Mike Corder contributed from The Hague, Netherlands.

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/apdefault/cae69a7523db45408eeb2b3a98c0c9c5/Article_2013-03-20-AF-Rwanda-Ntaganda/id-c3583d90b94844c5b288eb5c9b0f51fb

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Grand Old Party, the Republicans, turns 159, maybe

On March 20, 1854, disgruntled voters met in Wisconsin to start a new political party to contest the Democrats and a third long-forgotten party, the Whigs. But the Republican Party?s birth is somewhat hazy in its early days.

William Seward.

For a brief time in the decade before the Civil War, the Democratic Party of Andrew Jackson and his descendants enjoyed a period of one-party rule.

The Democrats had battled the Whigs for power since 1836 and lost the presidency in 1848 to Zachary Taylor. But the Whig Party dramatically collapsed in the few short years after Taylor died in office in 1850.

By 1854, the battle between pro-slavery and anti-slavery forces ended the Whig party as a force in American politics. The Kansas-Nebraska Act was passed, allowing new territories and states to decide on their own if they would allow slavery. The act was a fatal blow to unity within the Whig Party.

There are at least three dates recognized for the birth of the Republican Party in 1854. The first is February 24, 1854, when a small group met in Ripon, Wisconsin, to discuss its opposition to the Kansas-Nebraska Act. The group called themselves Republicans in a reference to Thomas Jefferson?s Republican faction in the American republic?s early days.

The second meeting was larger, on March 20, 1854, in Ripon, to formally recognize and popularize the movement in Wisconsin. A third meeting in Jackson, Michigan, on June 6, 1854, was attended by about 10,000 people.

Horace Greeley, the newspaper publisher, had officially christened the group as Republicans in an editorial.

?We should not care much whether those thus united [against slavery] were designated ?Whig,? ?Free Democrat? or something else; though we think some simple name like ?Republican? would more fitly designate those who had united to restore the Union to its true mission of champion and promulgator of Liberty rather than propagandist of slavery,? he wrote.

The Republicans made quick inroads with their anti-slavery platform in the 1854 elections as a regional party, with its candidate becoming Michigan?s governor.

But the Republicans had rivals in other northern states popularly called the Know Nothings (or the Native American or American party). That rival party was loosely organized and campaigned on an anti-immigrant platform; it faded away after 1856, also divided over slavery.

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The Whig party also had a minimal presence in 1856. Former president and former Whig Millard Fillmore ran for president with the Know Nothing Party. But he finished third, and Democratic candidate James Buchanan became president.

In two short years, the Republicans had become a force in the North, and their 1856 candidate, John Fremont, won 114 electoral votes and finished second to Buchanan, despite the lack of any Republican presence in the South.

The Democrats? popular vote total fell from 50 percent in 1852 to 45 percent in 1856.

Among the early leaders of the national Republican Party was William Seward, a former Whig and staunch enemy of slavery. Another former Whig, Abraham Lincoln, sought the party?s vice presidential nomination in 1856, but came in second at the party?s first convention in Philadelphia.

By 1858, Lincoln became a national figure after a series of debates with the architect of the Kansas-Nebraska Act, Senator Stephen Douglas. Lincoln lost the Senate race in Illinois to Douglas, but the debates made slavery and the Dred Scott decision a cause in the North.

In 1860, Lincoln gained an upset nomination over Seward at the Republican Convention and was able to win the presidency over a divided Democratic Party.

Lincoln?s win capped a startling six-year rise for the Republicans from obscurity to controlling the White House. And with the exception of a pair of terms served by a Democrat, Grover Cleveland, the Republicans controlled the White House from 1860 until 1912.

Tuesday, March 19, 2013

Scientists confirm Higgs boson discovery

The particle detected last July by CERN's Large Hadron Collider is indeed the elusive Higgs boson, say researchers. The discovery completes the Standard Model of particle physics and could help predict the ultimate fate of the universe.

By Jeanna Bryner,?LiveScience Managing Editor / March 14, 2013

The mass of the Higgs boson particle, possibly uncovered at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) in Geneva, may mean doom for our universe. Here, proton-proton collisions at the LHC showing events consistent with the Higgs.

CERN/CMS/Taylor, L; McCauley, T

Enlarge

A newfound particle discovered at the world's largest atom smasher last year is, indeed, the Higgs boson, the particle thought to give other matter its mass, scientists reported today (March 14) at the annual Rencontres de Moriond conference in Italy.

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Physicists announced on July 4, 2012, that, with more than 99 percent certainty, they had found a new elementary particle weighing about 126 times the mass of the proton that was likely the long-sought?Higgs boson. The Higgs is sometimes referred to as the "God particle," to the?chagrin of many scientists, who prefer its official name.

But the two experiments, CMS and ATLAS, hadn't collected enough data to say the particle was, for sure, the Higgs boson, the last undiscovered piece of the puzzle predicted by?the Standard Model, the reigning theory of particle physics.

Now, after collecting two and a half times more data inside the?Large Hadron Collider?(LHC) ? where protons zip at near light-speed around the 17-mile-long (27 kilometer) underground ring beneath Switzerland and France ? physicists say the particle is the Higgs. [In Photos: Searching for the Higgs Boson]

"The preliminary results with the full 2012 data set are magnificent and to me it is clear that we are dealing with a Higgs boson though we still have a long way to go to know what kind of Higgs boson it is," said CMS spokesperson Joe Incandela in a statement.

Dave Charlton, ATLAS spokesperson agreed, the new results "point to the new particle having the spin-parity of a Higgs boson as in the Standard Model," referring to a quantum property of elementary particles.

To confirm the particle as the Higgs boson, physicists needed to collect tons of data that would reveal its quantum properties as well as how it interacted with other particles. For instance, a Higgs particle should have no spin and its parity, or the measure of how its mirror image behaves, should be positive, both of which were supported by data from the ATLAS and CMS experiments.

Even so, the scientists are not sure whether this Higgs boson is the one predicted by the Standard Model or perhaps the lightest of several bosons predicted to exist by other theories.

Seeing how this particle decays into other particles could let physicists know whether this Higgs is the "plain vanilla" Standard Model Higgs. Detecting a Higgs boson is rare, with just one observed for every 1 trillion proton-proton collisions. As such, the LHC physicists say they need much more data to understand all of the ways in which the Higgs decays.

From what is known about the particle now, physicists have said the?Higgs boson may spell the universe's doom?in the very far future. That's because the mass of the Higgs boson is a critical part of a calculation that portends the?future of space and time. Its mass of 126 times the mass of the proton is just about what would be needed to create a fundamentally unstable universe that would lead to a cataclysm billions of years from now.

"This calculation tells you that many tens of billions of years from now there'll be a catastrophe," Joseph Lykken, a theoretical physicist at the Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory in Batavia, Ill., said last month at the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science.

"It may be the universe we live in is inherently unstable, and at some point billions of years from now it's all going to get wiped out," added Lykken, a collaborator on the CMS experiment.

Follow LiveScience on Twitter?@livescience,?Facebook?or?Google+. Original article on?LiveScience.com.

Source: http://rss.csmonitor.com/~r/feeds/science/~3/qI_xPdZ1dEY/Scientists-confirm-Higgs-boson-discovery

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