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Tin cups filled with wildflowers are now gracing the tables at Chick-fill-A at 575 Garden of the Gods Road. Employees are wearing Western bandanas. In front of the restaurant stands a partially burned welcome sign and a Model A Ford truck. There will be Indian dancers and cowhands galore, plus ranch animals.
It?s a fund-raising week for the Flying W Ranch, which burned to the ground in the Waldo Canyon fire this summer.
?We were just heartsick about the situation and want to bring the community together to support them,? said Jessica Norsky, restaurant marketing director. She met Aaron Winter,? Flying W Ranch Foundation executive director, at a luncheon recently, and they hatched the idea of ?bringing a little bit of the ranch to the community.?
Donations will be used to pay to reseed the famous working cattle ranch that since 1953 had entertained locals and tourists with chuckwagon dinners and entertainment.
?We are working to keep soil from washing into Mountain Shadows,? Winter notes. The land was incinerated three inches deep into the soil. He said that the foundation is concentrating on the land for now.
??Our hope is to someday rebuild the ranch.?
The Flying W Foundation has applied to become a non-profit organization, but the process is not complete yet.
A bag of seed to cover one acre costs $250. ?We?ve got 1,800 acres, so we are looking at $500,000 in the next couple of years,? Winter said. The foundation also hopes to purchase safety equipment such as hard hats for volunteers, as well as buckets, rakes and shovels and other equipment.
Every night this week from 5 p.m. to 8 p.m., there will be Indian dancing and other activities with a decidedly nostalgic twist.
The blacksmith shop on the ranch burned down, but the horseshoes survived. So on Tuesday, kids will have the opportunity to decorate those horseshoes and take them home.
On Wednesday, there will be another horsehoe event from 9? a.m. to 10:30 a.m. Then from 5 p.m. to 8 p.m. Wednesday, ranch hands will brand pieces of wood with the Flying W logo and give them to diners.
Thursday?s festivities will include an art event. Kids will get to color and keep pages from the ranch coloring books.
On Friday, the Flying W Wranglers will perform at 5 p.m. and 6:30 p.m.
Saturday some of the? ranch animals will be on hand ? or hoof, as the case may be. Lily the goat will be there, as will several horses.?? ?
During the week, the Flying W cookbook will be available? for cooks to copy recipes from.
Franchise operator Randy Watson is pledging 15 percent of meal receipts to the cause.
Donations from the public will also be accepted. For more information about the events visit www.cfarestaurant.com/gardenofthegods/home. ? Contact Carol McGraw: 636-0371 Twitter @mcgrawatgazette Facebook Carol McGraw
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - An informant recruited by the New York Police Department to collect information on suspected Islamic militants has quit and denounced his police handlers, according to a law enforcement source familiar with the case.
The informant, a 19-year-old American citizen of Bangladeshi descent, was recruited by the NYPD recently as part of an expansive intelligence-gathering program the department launched after the al Qaeda attacks of September 11, 2001. His assignment was to make contact with suspected Islamic extremists to try to determine if they had any inclinations to engage in violence, the source said.
On October 2, however, the informant, whom the source did not name, posted a message on his personal Facebook page exposing himself as an informant to people he had been in contact with. He declared that he had quit as a police informant.
"I was jus (sic) of pretending to be friends with ya cuz I honestly thought i was fighting terrorism, but let's be real, it's all a f...king scheme," the informant wrote, according to the source. "It was all about the money," he added.
The source said that the informant was not involved in an investigation that led to the arrest of a Bangladeshi man last week in connection with an alleged scheme to bomb the New York Federal Reserve Bank in Lower Manhattan.
New York law enforcement sources have said that the NYPD has used foreign-born confidential informants to uncover several alleged plots by militants, including one involving a possible attack on a subway station at Herald Square and another involving alleged plans to kill U.S. soldiers returning to New York from Afghanistan and Iraq.
NYPD Deputy Commissioner Paul Browne said that candidates to join the force as sworn officers must be U.S. citizens. But he said 20 percent of the department's recruit classes were foreign-born.
"We have a deep bench of foreign speakers whose first languages include Urdu, Arabic, and scores of others," Browne said. "Most CIs (confidential informants) perform invaluable, life-saving service; some don't work out," he added, while declining to comment on the specific current case of the informant who quit.
(The story corrects to show informant was U.S. citizen not Bangladeshi.)
(Reporting by Mark Hosenball Editing by Warren Strobel and Eric Walsh)
President Barack Obama arrives at a campaign fundraiser at the JW Marriott Marquis Miami, Thursday, Oct. 11, 2012, in Miami. (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster)
President Barack Obama arrives at a campaign fundraiser at the JW Marriott Marquis Miami, Thursday, Oct. 11, 2012, in Miami. (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster)
WASHINGTON (AP) ? President Barack Obama will be sitting down with Jay Leno on the set of "The Tonight Show" Wednesday, less than two weeks before Election Day.
NBC says Wednesday night's appearance will be Obama's fifth on "The Tonight Show," his third since he became president.
Obama has been making the late-night rounds as the presidential campaign has picked up steam. He was on CBS' "Late Show With David Letterman" last month, and chatted with Jon Stewart on Comedy Central's "The Daily Show" last week.
Mitt Romney has avoided the late-night talk shows since he became the Republican party's presidential nominee. But his wife, Ann, did appear on "The Tonight Show" last month.
ROTTERDAM, The Netherlands (Reuters) - The Dutch art gallery at the center of an audacious heist last week said that the electronic locks on its doors were disarmed before thieves made off with paintings by Picasso, Monet and others worth tens of millions of dollars.
The seven stolen works - which also include a Gauguin, a Lucian Freud and a Meyer de Haan - were on loan from a private collection for a special exhibition at Rotterdam's Kunsthal of impressionism, expressionism, and other modern art movements.
The theft was one of the art world's most dramatic in recent years, and one of the biggest in the Netherlands.
The apparent ease with which the thieves entered and escaped has raised questions about the Kunsthal's security system and whether an insider was involved.
The Kunsthal said in a statement on Monday that the electronic locks on its doors were in working order, but were designed to automatically unbolt shortly after the burglar alarm was set off. After that, only mechanical door locks stood between the intruders and the Kunsthal's treasures.
"The theft on Monday night suggests the intruders forced the lock after the unbolting, presumably quickly," the statement said.
The thieves forced the mechanical lock on an emergency exit at the rear of the ground floor gallery. Police arrived at the scene within five minutes, but the intruders had already gone.
Defending its security installation in the face of speculation, the gallery said an independent inspection of its security apparatus in August had found only that one motion detector was blocked off. It had been immediately repaired.
On Friday, the police released security camera footage which showed the thieves entering through the back door before disappearing from the camera's field of view. Seconds later, they come back into view carrying bulky objects, and leave the same way they entered.
The faces of the thieves cannot be seen clearly on the footage, but police are appealing to the public to come forward if they recognize their bags or clothing. Police say they have already received 60 tips relating to the robbery.
The Kunsthal, in Rotterdam's leafy museum quarter, does not have its own collection.
It had only just opened a new exhibition of works from the private Triton Foundation - collected by the Cordia family, which made its money in shipping and oil - to celebrate its 20th anniversary when the break-in took place during Monday night.
The gallery reopened on Thursday, and the empty spaces previously occupied by the stolen paintings were filled with new works from the Triton collection.
Police appeals for information are posted around the museum park, home to half a dozen museums besides the Kunsthal, which was designed by Rem Koolhaas.
The museum has not said which paintings now hang in place of the stolen works, which included Matisse's "La Liseuse en Blanc et Jaune", Monet's "Waterloo Bridge, London" and "Charing Cross Bridge, London", Gauguin's "Femme devant une fen?tre ouverte", De Haan's "Autoportrait" and Freud's "Woman with Eyes Closed".
But even the absence of Picasso's "T?te d'Arlequin", which was the exhibition's centerpiece, has not dampened interest in the exhibition, which was crowded on Sunday.
"Numbers are way up since the theft," said the cloakroom attendant with a smile. "Disaster tourists."
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BOCA RATON, Florida (Reuters) - When President Barack Obama and Mitt Romney face off on Monday in their third and final debate, it will be the Republican challenger's last best chance to recover from his botched "Libya moment" and exploit vulnerabilities in his opponent's foreign policy record.
But Romney has an uphill struggle to make his case against Obama, who will be buoyed by the advantages of incumbency as well as polls showing him with an edge - though a shrinking one - on the question of who is more trusted in global affairs.
This week's debate in Boca Raton, Florida, coming just 15 days before the election and devoted entirely to foreign policy, could be the riskiest of the three nationally televised showdowns for Romney, largely because of his inexperience and recent blunders on the world stage.
Romney's missteps in criticizing Obama's handling of a deadly September attack on the U.S. diplomatic mission in Benghazi - the focus of a vividly testy exchange in the previous debate - have complicated his broader strategy of trying to cast the president as a weak steward of American power abroad.
Deprived of one of his most potent lines of attack, expect Romney to instead focus more of his criticism on Obama's policies toward Iran, Israel, Syria, China, Afghanistan and Russia.
"Obama has a record, and Romney doesn't, so he can just cherry-pick the arguments," said Jon Alterman, a former State Department policy planner now at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington. "But that doesn't mean any of it will stick."
Romney's aides hope that chipping away at Obama's credibility on foreign policy and national security - areas the White House once saw as largely immune from Republican attack - can help put him over the top with undecided voters in the final weeks of a White House race still too close to call.
The two men go into their final head-to-head encounter in a dead heat, with an NBC/Wall Street Journal poll showing them tied at 47 percent among likely voters.
WILL VOTERS CARE?
Obama's policies have faced setbacks recently, from challenges to U.S. interests in the Middle East to a string of attacks on U.S.-led NATO forces in Afghanistan by the Afghan troops they are supposed to be training.
A report in The New York Times that the Obama administration has agreed in principle with Iran to hold one-on-one talks over Tehran's nuclear program could provide a fresh avenue for Romney to cast Obama as too willing to accommodate. The White House denied any such deal had been reached.
Republican Senator Rob Portman, Romney's sparring partner in mock debates before Monday night, warned Obama against sidelining U.S. allies in the diplomatic front against Iran.
"The other thing that gets interesting about the story, if it's accurate, it sounds like the U.S. is taking a position that we're likely to jettison our allies," he told NBC's "Meet the Press." "The last thing we would want to do is abandon our allies on this and make it a one-on-one negotiation," he said.
It remains to be seen how much traction any of this will have with voters, whose main concerns by far are the economy and jobs.
The problem for Romney is that in focusing on Obama's trouble spots, he also further exposes his own weaknesses.
As former governor of Massachusetts and an ex-businessman, he is out of his comfort zone when not focused on domestic and economic matters.
That was evident in last week's debate when he mistakenly said Obama took weeks to acknowledge that the Benghazi assault - which claimed the lives of the U.S. ambassador and three other Americans - was a terrorist attack.
Obama, who spoke of "acts of terror" in an appearance in the White House Rose Garden the day after the attack, challenged Romney to "check the transcript" and chastised him for trying to score political points from a national tragedy.
A slew of pundits dubbed it Romney's "Libya moment," and some of his own aides conceded privately that Obama got the better of him.
On top of that, Obama managed to shift the focus away from the thornier question of whether the administration had ignored requests to beef up diplomatic security in Libya.
Romney went silent on Libya after Tuesday's encounter but aides say the Republican, hunkered down in debate prep in Florida this weekend, will be ready to deal with it on Monday when it is all but certain to come up again.
What Romney hopes to do is press his point, drowned out in the last debate, that the recent wave of anti-American violence in Libya and other parts of the Middle East shows Obama's foreign policy is "unraveling before our very eyes."
At the same time, he will want to avoid giving Obama another opportunity to go on the offensive.
"I doubt the governor will end up parsing words. That's not the most productive thing to do," said Eliot Cohen, a Romney adviser who was a senior aide to former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice during the Bush administration.
Romney must also show voters he has what it takes to be a capable commander-in-chief, and he will seek to counter any attempt by Obama to "paint him as an insane warmonger," said Cohen, now a foreign policy expert at the Johns Hopkins School of International Studies in Washington.
Obama - who has touted the U.S. withdrawal from Iraq as a signature foreign policy accomplishment - has signaled he could use the debate to caution war-weary voters of the risk of a more hawkish Romney presidency.
Obama himself often mentions that he ordered the U.S. mission that killed Osama bin Laden, and the White House has also touted a deadly drone campaign against al Qaeda leaders.
At a campaign rally in New Hampshire last week, Obama suggested Romney was promoting the kind of foreign policy that "takes us into wars without a plan to get us out."
A Pew Research Center survey, conducted after the first debate but before the second, showed Obama ahead 47 percent to 43 percent on the question of who would make wiser foreign policy decisions. That was much narrower than Obama's 15 percentage-point advantage in a poll early last month.
LOOKING FOR CONTRASTS
Romney will be under pressure to sharpen contrasts with Obama when the two men sit side-by-side across the table from moderator Bob Schieffer, known for a cantankerous demeanor with guests on the Sunday morning CBS news show "Face the Nation."
The 90-minute debate will be divided into six segments: America's role in the world; the war in Afghanistan; Israel and Iran; the changing Middle East; terrorism; and China's rise.
Critics have accused Romney of relying on generalities and platitudes - he has hearkened back to Ronald Reagan's "peace through strength" doctrine - and he could be put on the spot if he resists providing specifics.
Romney has promised to tighten the screws over Iran's nuclear program. He has accused Obama of "leading from behind" as Syria's civil war expands, and of a politically timed exit from the unpopular Afghanistan war.
But in each case, critics say, he has not detailed alternatives policies.
(Additional reporting by Deborah Zabarenko, Writing by Matt Spetalnick; Editing by Warren Strobel, Mohammad Zargham and Christopher Wilson)
It was a beautiful Sunday morning over five-and-a-half years ago. My ex and I sat in a class with 10 other couples -- most of them in their late 20s and early to mid-30s. We were just babies compared to them. I stared at the girls' huge diamond engagement rings in wonder compared to my tiny one. I was feeling butterflies in my stomach. How did I get here?
A woman with dark hair stood in front of the class and smiled. "Welcome to your first premarital class," she said. "I'm your instructor, and I'm a marriage and family therapist. In the next 10 weeks, we will be exploring marriage and what you will need to make it last. This will be intense, and not all of you may last. But if you do, you will have an excellent chance of lasting for the long haul."
During our nine-month engagement, my ex and I took the the ten-week course described above and a four-week course with a rabbi. We didn't miss a session of either and did our homework dutifully. We weren't going into marriage flippantly. And yet here I am, divorced. What went wrong?
My parents and in-laws paid for the first class as an engagement present for us. I was more than happy to attend. I went into my marriage with my eyes on forever, and I needed the tools for it.
After introductions, we were handed spiral notebooks with the coursework and were given our first lesson and homework assignment, all based around expectations. What did we expect from our marriage? Were we both in agreement about certain issues and understanding where the other was coming from in terms of the future? Were we ready?
It seemed like we were going about things the right way, but I was still concerned as we left the class. Were we really on the same page? I wasn't entirely sure where I stood, or even if I was ready to be married. My ex and I went through our first homework assignment: a list of expectations. I would read the questions, state my answers and he would follow with his. They seemed to match most of the time, so I figured it was right and wondered why I was worrying.
In the following weeks, we learned about conflict resolution and fighting fair, sex in marriage and even how to handle our finances. About three weeks before the class ended, we met with the therapist for a private session. My ex led the conversation, talking loudly about how much he loved me, how set we were to be married and how great everything was. I quietly sat there and nodded. I felt like I was invisible, and my gut was telling me there was something amiss in this whole situation.
I was dying for the therapist to ask me questions, particularly without my ex in the room. I had a hard time being honest about my doubts when he was full speed ahead. But I was always told that this was good for me, to be quiet and to not let my worries take over. So I went along with it.
As we transitioned to the religious class, we seemed to have a good grounding. The religious class provided us some extra knowledge, but nothing that we didn't already know moving forward. We seemed to be ready. On our wedding day, the officiating rabbi said that no matter how many classes we took or how prepared we seemed to be, marriage was a whole different story. And he was certainly right.
I was amazed that after we got married, all the lessons we learned seem to disappear. Rather than fighting fair, my ex became an attack dog, calling me names when our lessons clearly stated not to do so. He was not alone; when the name-calling started, I would respond by stonewalling or completely tuning him out, which is a major no-no. Regarding compromising about sex, he had agreed to schedule it before the wedding. After we were married, he put up wall after wall to prevent us from having sex and said that if we scheduled it, it would lose its spontaneity. And finances? Don't even get me started.
It didn't make sense. Weren't we great students? We prepared ourselves dutifully and should have had a terrific marriage.
It was only several years later, when my ex and I were in marriage counseling to solve our problems, did I realize the truth. He was talking about sending our non-existent kids to a local private school. I reminded him that the night after the marriage class about children, we took a walk and I talked about how I wanted to send my kids to public school. At the time he agreed.
"I figured that we wouldn't have enough money, so that's why I said it," he said. I was curious about what other expectations he had lied about, so I went back to that first assignment one night. It became clear to me that he wasn't be honest at the time; he just said what I wanted to hear.
I continued to fight for our marriage despite the dishonesty, because I am not one to give up. But when you start with a faulty foundation, the structure just won't stay standing. And no matter how good of a student you are, you don't really know success until you experience failure and know what it looks like. After all, the key to being a good pupil in life is to learn from your mistakes.
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Follow Amira Young on Twitter: www.twitter.com/LaDivorceeVita
WASHINGTON (AP) -?A new White House executive order would direct U.S. spy agencies to share the latest intelligence about cyberthreats with companies operating electric grids, water plants, railroads and other vital industries to help protect them from electronic attacks, according to a copy obtained by The Associated Press.?
The seven-page draft order, which is being finalized, takes shape as the Obama administration expresses growing concern that Iran could be the first country to use cyberterrorism against the United States. The military is ready to retaliate if the U.S. is hit by cyberweapons, Defense Secretary Leon Panetta said. But the U.S. also is poorly prepared to prevent such an attack, which could damage or knock out critical services that are part of everyday life.?
The White House declined to say when the president will sign the order.?
The draft order would put the Department of Homeland Security in charge of organizing an information-sharing network that rapidly distributes sanitized summaries of top-secret intelligence reports about known cyberthreats that identify a specific target. With these warnings, known as tear lines, the owners and operators of essential U.S. businesses would be better able to block potential attackers from gaining access to their computer systems.?
An organized, broad-based approach for sharing cyberthreat information gathered by the government is widely viewed as essential for any plan to protect U.S. computer networks from foreign nations, terrorist groups and hackers. Existing efforts to exchange information are narrowly focused on specific industries, such as the finance sector, and have had varying degrees of success.?
Yet the order has generated stiff opposition from Republicans on Capitol Hill who view it as a unilateral move that bypasses the legislative authority held by Congress.?
Administration officials said the order became necessary after Congress failed this summer to pass cybersecurity legislation, leaving critical infrastructure companies vulnerable to a serious and growing threat. Conflicting bills passed separately by the House and Senate included information-sharing provisions. But efforts to get a final measure through both chambers collapsed over the GOP's concerns that the Senate bill would expand the federal government's regulatory power and increase costs for businesses.?
The White House has acknowledged that an order from the president, while legally binding, is not enough. Legislation is needed to make other changes to improve the country's digital defenses. An executive order, for example, cannot offer a company protection from liabilities that might result from a cyberattack on its systems.?
The addition of the information-sharing provisions is the most significant change to an earlier draft of the order completed in late August. The new draft, which is not dated, retains a section that requires Homeland Security to identify the vital systems that, if hit by cyberattack, could "reasonably result in a debilitating impact" on national and economic security. Other sections establish a program to encourage companies to adopt voluntary security standards and direct federal agencies to determine whether existing cyber security regulations are adequate.?
The draft order directs the department to work with the Pentagon, the National Security Agency, the director of national intelligence and the Justice Department to quickly establish the information-sharing mechanism. Selected employees at critical infrastructure companies would receive security clearances allowing them to receive the information, according to the document. Federal agencies would be required to assess whether the order raises any privacy or civil liberties risks.?
To foster a two-way exchange of information, the government would ask businesses to tell the government about cyberthreats or cyberattacks. There would be no requirement to do so.?
The NSA has been sharing cyberthreat information on a limited basis with companies that conduct business with the Defense Department. These companies work with sensitive data about weapon systems and technologies and are frequently the targets of cyberspying.?
But the loss of valuable information has been eclipsed by fears that an enemy with the proper know-how could cause havoc by sending the computers controlling critical infrastructure systems incorrect commands or infecting them with malicious software. Potential nightmare scenarios include high-speed trains being put on collision courses, blackouts that last days or perhaps even weeks or chemical plants that inadvertently release deadly gases.?
Panetta underscored the looming dangers during a speech last week in New York by pointing to the Shamoon virus that destroyed thousands of computer systems owned by Persian Gulf oil and gas companies. Shamoon, which spreads quickly through networked computers and ultimately wipes out files by overwriting them, hit the Saudi Arabian state oil company Aramco and Qatari natural gas producer RasGas.?
Panetta did not directly connect Iran to the Aramco and RasGas attacks. But U.S. officials believe hackers based in Iran were behind them.?
Shamoon replaced files at Aramco with the image of a burning U.S. flag and rendered more than 30,000 computers useless, Panetta said. The attack on RasGas was similar, he said.?
A spokeswoman for the National Security Council, Caitlin Hayden, said the administration is consulting with members of Congress and the private sector as the order is being drafted. But she provided no information on when an order would be signed. "Given the gravity of the threats we face in cyberspace, we want to get this right in addition to getting it done swiftly," she said.
Copyright 2012 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
Today?s Golfer travel awards: The Celtic Manor Resort?tops?the best golf course and best hotel/resort category in Wales?
The Celtic Manor Resort?received the awards of being the best golf course and best hotel/resort in the Wales region, announced earlier in the inaugural Today?s Golfer travel awards.
It is the same course that hosted the 2010 edition of the Ryder Cup and was then named as Europe?s Golf Resort of the Year for 2011 and the UK?s Sport Venue of the Year.
It was awarded with all these accolades because of its state-of-the-art facilities available at the course and the resort as well.
Later on, the prestigious Reader?s Digest also recognized Celtic Manor as the best UK golf club in the Club Mirror awards.
Therefore, the award from the Today?s Golfer travel awards for best golf course and best hotel/resort was an addition to the fame that it had gained in the last two years.
?It?s always pleasing to win awards but it?s particularly satisfying that these awards have been voted for by readers,? Matthew Lewis, Celtic Manor Director of Golf and Leisure said.
?We enjoyed a record year for numbers of visiting golfers in 2011 and the fact they have chosen us for these accolades is the finest endorsement we can get, particularly when you look at the quality of the other clubs and venues in the running,? he added.
Overall, the Celtic Manor outclassed each and every golf club and resort in the region in both the categories.
There was not a single resort that could have managed to come close to it in terms of total votes casted.
According to the UK?s best selling golf magazine, the Celtic Manor received 53 per cent of the votes casted against best golf course category. It was a huge margin over the Links courses at Royal Porthcawl,?with 15 per cent votes to stand second.
In addition to that, it received a huge number of votes in the best hotel/resort category - 80 per cent. The Marriott St Pierre stood second with only 11 percent votes.
For that reason, one can say that the Celtic Manor Resort?is the most prestigious and well known golf course in South Wales and will be a hot spot for many of the international golf tournaments in the near future.
BOSTON/NEW YORK (Reuters) - Executives at the Boston-area pharmacy whose injectable steroids have been linked to a deadly U.S. meningitis outbreak have been sued in an action aimed at freezing their personal assets, while the death toll on Friday rose to 21 with more than 260 cases of infection reported.
Peter McGrath, a lawyer who is a former federal prosecutor, said he was spearheading a civil case that alleges Massachusetts-based NECC and company officers Barry and Lisa Cadden and Greg Conigliaro are responsible for the tainted drugs. The lawsuit was filed on behalf of an unnamed plaintiff in Middlesex County Superior Court in suburban Boston, court records show.
"We want to pierce the corporate veil and go after the individuals," McGrath said Friday in a telephone interview.
Fourteen new cases of fungal meningitis in patients who received the contaminated steroid injections for back pain were reported on Friday, bringing the total to 268, and the death toll rose by one to 21, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said.
There were four new cases each reported in Michigan and Florida, one each in Indiana, Ohio and Virginia, and three in Tennessee, which has been the hardest hit of the 16 states with confirmed cases. The latest death was in Michigan, its fifth.
There have also been three cases of peripheral infections from injections into joints.
Florida surgeon general John Armstrong said Friday that NECC would no longer be allowed to do business in the state.
"The company will cease to operate as a pharmacy in our state, immediately," Armstrong said. "Further, the NECC may never re-apply for a pharmacy permit in the state of Florida."
U.S. health regulators confirmed on Thursday the presence of the deadly Exserohilum fungus in vials of the NECC steroid used for the pain injections. They estimate that as many as 14,000 people may have been exposed to the contaminated medication.
Three potentially contaminated lots of the drug, methylprednisolone, were shipped to 76 facilities in 23 states. After confirming contamination in one of the three lots, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration and the CDC said they are checking the other two lots for the fungus, as well as additional injectable NECC drugs as a precautionary measure.
A Tennessee clinic that received more potentially contaminated steroid than any facility in the nation temporarily closed to cope with the fallout from the outbreak. The Nashville clinic received 2,000 vials of the NECC drug.
Federal authorities are investigating how NECC supplied hospitals, clinics and other healthcare providers with large orders of compounded drugs and whether it violated state laws regulating pharmacies.
The FDA and CDC said about 97 percent of potentially exposed patients have been contacted so far. The agencies cautioned doctors and patients to be on the lookout for potential meningitis symptoms for months after injections.
According to a paper published online Thursday in the Annals of Internal Medicine based on a 2002 outbreak of fungal meningitis linked to contaminated steroids, the incubation period from exposure could be up to six months.
Doctors also warned that early diagnosis and treatment with a powerful antifungal drug was vital to prevent meningitis from attacking the brain.
LUXURY HOMES
In the lawsuit filed in Massachusetts, the plaintiff identified as "John Doe" is seeking a court order on November 6 to freeze the assets of NECC and the named officers. Such a "prejudgment remedy" is allowed in Massachusetts state courts during pending litigation.
"My clients are in a lot of pain," said McGrath, whose New Hampshire-based firm is representing several people injured in the meningitis outbreak. NECC's public relations firm did not return a call seeking comment.
Members of the Boston-area family who own the pharmacy and related companies spent several million dollars on luxury homes in the months before U.S. authorities shut down their operations. Greg Conigliaro is a recycling entrepreneur who joined forces with his pharmacist brother-in-law, Barry Cadden, and other family members to start NECC in 1998. His sister Lisa is also a pharmacist and is married to Cadden.
The real estate transactions, disclosed in publicly available deeds filed in March and April, provide a glimpse into the Conigliaro family's fortune before authorities moved in and shut down the pharmacy operations of NECC and Ameridose LLC, a related, but larger drug manufacturer and compounder.
In March and April, Greg Conigliaro paid $2.4 million for a beach front home on Cape Cod, while his brother Doug Conigliaro paid $4.2 million for a penthouse condo on Beacon Street in Boston's tony Back Bay neighborhood, the deeds show.
About the same time, a real estate venture owned and managed by the two brothers paid $4.6 million to buy the state-of-the-art facility that Ameridose used to win new customers and rapidly expand its business, real estate records show. Ameridose previously leased the building.
Ameridose said Friday that the Massachusetts Board of Registration in Pharmacy requested an extension of its closure to allow authorities to continue and complete an inspection that has been under way since October 10.
Ameridose products have not been linked to the meningitis outbreak. "As this extension agreement states, neither the Board nor the Registrants are aware that any product compounded or produced by the Registrants is in any way unfit for use or consumption," Ameridose said in a statement.
Doug Conigliaro, who is president of Medical Sales Management, the sales arm for NECC and Ameridose, is not named in the lawsuit filed in Middlesex County.
The Caddens, Greg Conigliaro and Doug Conigliaro did not immediately respond to messages seeking comment.
(Additional reporting by Aaron Pressman, Toni Clarke, David Bailey and Michael Peltier; Editing by Gerald E. McCormick, Lisa Von Ahn, Andre Grenon and Leslie Adler)
Painting by Rembrandt Peale/New York Historical Society/Wikimedia Commons.
Almost 20 years have passed since the publication of Jeffersonian Legacies, a collection of essays published on the occasion of the Founding Father?s 250th birthday that ushered in a new era of Jefferson scholarship. What were modern Americans to make, the book asked, of the 18th-century slaveholding patriarch who could not envision a multiracial America but who nonetheless authored America's creed?a vision that has inspired people the world over? At the very least, one had to be, the book suggested, conflicted about the man.
Henry Wiencek is not at all conflicted. He loathes Thomas Jefferson. In Master of the Mountain: Thomas Jefferson and His Slaves, his attempted takedown of the man, the third president appears as a demonic figure warped one summer day by a sudden discovery that being a slaveholder could pay. I?ll detail how Wiencek arrives at his bizarre proof of a Jefferson who suddenly becomes Simon Legree, but I should say up front that this book fails as a work of scholarship. This is surprising. I favorably reviewed Wiencek's book about George Washington, Imperfect God, and I admire The Hairstons: An American Family in Black and White. What happened with Master of the Mountain?
The book's tone and presentation betray a journalistic obsession with ?the scoop.? Getting the scoop can be the life?s blood of journalism. It does not work so well for writing history, which is not always (or almost ever, really) about discovering things previously unknown. This sensibility leads Weincek astray in a number of ways. To begin with, it compels him to write as if he had discovered, and was writing about, things that had not been discovered and written about before. In truth, all of the important stories in this book have been told by others.
There is nothing inherently wrong with recycling stories. All historians do, and that is to be expected. But Wiencek rarely adds insights to these recycled stories, and when he offers interpretations, they are usually wrong-headed. It often seems that he is ignoring all the things that have been written about Jefferson and slavery over the past 30 years, consigning it to a claim that ?scholarly consensus? is that ?Jefferson managed his plantations with a lenient hand.?. In fact, scholars have known, and written, for years about whipping at Monticello.
Wiencek?s primary scoop?upon which his thesis depends and his publisher is marketing this new history?is that he has discovered why Jefferson went from opposing slavery to enthusiastically supporting the institution. It happened, Wiencek says, in the summer of 1792:
As Jefferson was counting up the agricultural profits and losses of his plantation in a letter to President Washington in 1792, it occurred to him that there was a phenomenon he had perceived at Monticello but never actually measured. He proceeded to calculate it in a barely legible, scribbled note in the middle of a page, enclosed in brackets. What Jefferson set out clearly for the first time was that he was making a 4 percent profit every year on the birth of black children.
Of course, Weincek could not possibly know what ?occurred to? Jefferson as he did his calculations. And note the reference to the ?barely legible, scribbled note,? as if he had ferreted out a detail that only the most diligent of researchers would have found. He then quotes Jefferson: ?I allow nothing for losses by death, but, on the contrary, shall presently take credit four per cent. per annum, for their increase over and above keeping up their own numbers.?
The problem with what Wiencek calls the ?4 percent theorem? or ?formula? is that Jefferson was not speaking about his slaves at Monticello?he was speaking about farms in Virginia generally. The quoted ?four per cent? line is from his ?Notes on Arthur Young?s Letter to George Washington,? written, while Jefferson was serving in Washington?s Cabinet, in response to a request for a comparison of free labor to enslaved labor. Jefferson, who could never resist an opportunity to count and compute, joined in to ?calculate, in the Virginia way, the employment? of slave labor. When he speaks of allowing ?nothing for losses by death,? he is explaining what variables are going into his calculations about how to determine the value of enslaved labor?not opining on any policy he had at Monticello. In a later letter to Washington, Jefferson noted that ?being at such a distance from the country of which I wrote,? he utilized his own time-weakened memories of life in Virginia. ?I therefore hazarded the calculation rather as an essay of the mode of calculating the profits of a Virginia estate, than as an operation which was to be ultimately relied on.?
Jefferson had no ?4 percent theorem? or ?formula.? This lawyer and lifelong slaveholder had no epiphany in 1792, approaching age 50, that the babies of enslaved women increased his capital. Jefferson?s thoughts about slavery cannot be treated in such a reductive manner.
We can come down from Wiencek?s version of high theory to see in another context how he reasons and solves problems. He suggests that Jefferson purchased collars?iron spiked vises?for slaves. Follow Wiencek?s logic and note the incredible inferential leaps required to link these disparate occurrences into a chain: Jefferson?s father, Peter, advertised for a runaway slave (in 1751)who was wearing an iron collar; Jefferson must have seen enslaved people being collared when he was growing up; while in France in the 1780s, Jefferson wrote to Nicholas Lewis, the manager of his farms, telling him to use ?extraordinary exertions?; and then??the manager?s expense accounts in 1791 include a line item for the purchase of ?collars.?? Wiencek?s endnote explains that he had ?at first? thought the reference was to ?horse collars.? That view changed after Wiencek noticed that Jefferson wrote ?leather collars? or ?horse collars? and ?Lewis would have been similarly specific.? Therefore, enslaved people at Monticello must have been put in iron collars.
Promotional products and business gifts are both time-tested ways of getting your name out there in front of the crowd. Nearly every major company spends time and resources on producing and distributing these items at tradeshows, product showcases, etc.
But, have you thought of the concept through? Is the ?gimme? the end of your campaign or is it the beginning? By that I mean, what role does the promotional gift play in your overall strategy, and more specifically what action does it compel the recipient to take? Any marketing effort should not exist in a silo, it should be a part of a larger, more organized campaign, with specific ?call-to-action? for the recipient.
It may be true that your coffee mug or key chain or pen is actually a valuable giveaway, and recipients will find use with them, but if you?re spending money on these items, they need to justify ?extra value? in your overall marketing plan. If recipients don?t know why your coffee cup is special, they will use it to hold the pens they got from your competitor.
For example, let?s say you?re giving away an item at a trade show. The item should have at least one additional use during the trade show to produce that ?extra value.? Perhaps the coffee mug has a paper inside that the recipient can bring back later in the show for a discount or a free drawing.
If you?re at the trade show and giving away items, use a numbering system or some other means to invite the recipient to participate in a focus group. You?ll need someplace to host the focus group?maybe a hospitality suite?but the information you receive from live customer focus groups is invaluable, and can?t be replicated exactly in any other way. If you?re doing well, the focus group will validate your success, and if not, you need to know where you?re falling short.
At this stage of the game, every imprinted item should send the recipient to your Website or social media site. There, you?ll need a promotion that references the trade show or item and will keep them coming back. Here?s the problem: many industries have a trade show or conference that?s once a year. That means you?re not going to engage with your trade show crowd for an entire year after the event? This is where the importance of a strong ?nurturing campaign? is demonstrated. A nurturing campaign is a comprehensive marketing effort that moves prospects along the buying process. Therefore, giving someone a pen is not as valuable as giving them a pen, then inviting them to that focus group, then following up with an additional thank-you item.
The item should have some ?beyond the booth? appeal. If it?s a pen, the pitch might be ?write your own ticket.? Mini soccer balls or footballs could contain an offer to ?score.?
Build in a QR code that recipients can scan with their cell phones that take them to additional content like a video or your website.
Make no mistake, people will always smile at you when they receive something for nothing. Promotional items should be viewed as the start of the conversation rather than the end. Promotional items need to be part of a larger plan of customer engagement, not an end unto themselves. Use the promotional item to blend in with your product, your sales pitch, and the personality of your company.
Author:
Eric Thomas is Brand Manager at BrandMe.com.au, Australia?s leading provider of promotional products.
Choosing the Right Legal Form of Business: The Complete Guide to Becoming a Sole Proprietor, Partnership,? LLC, or Corporation
List Price: $24.95
List Price: $24.95
Your Price: $12.47-
According the United States Small Business Administration s most recently released date, there are more than 9 million small businesses in the United States and almost 250,000 new ones started every year. Of those new businesses, half will fail in the first 12 months and part of that failure is due to the lack of information about how to start and develop that business. Without the right legal form of business, you may end up paying too much in taxes, failing to comply with certain laws, or miss out on certain breaks that you deserve. This book provides you with a complete guide, discussing all four major forms of business, which one is right for you, and how your decision may affect you in the future. The first thing you will read about is the list of non-legal issues you need to deal with before you start the business creation process. In addition, you will learn which form of business is ideal for your particular situation with a short overview of each type, a comparison of what each offers, and how the legal implications of each might apply to you. You will learn specifically how to choose between an LLC and a corporation in instances where it might not be immediately clear which is best for you. You will also learn which special business structures are best suited to your needs if you do not fit into any of the four primary categories. The process of structuring a partnership is outlined, along with how to create a written agreement and how to change a partnership after the business has been created. You will also learn how to create a corporation, including the structure you will use, how to establish financing, the compensation you will provide yourself, whether you need a lawyer, the 13 step process of starting and filing your corporation, and what you need to do immediately afterwards. The number of members needed to create an LLC is provided as well, along with how to structure management and determine financing and compensation. Hours of careful interviews were conducted with successful small business owners and legal experts to help create a comprehensive collection of materials that will guide you through the processes above, as well as how to handle transition of ownership and the extended process of naming your business including the legal implications of this process, what you need to know about trademarks and service marks, how to protect your own trademarks, and where to do name searches. The licensing and permit processes, as well as the tax structures for each business type, are included for federal, state, and local laws, while additional information is provided on how to build your home-based business as opposed to one in a physical location. If you are looking to create a new business and do not know which format is best for your needs, this book will walk you through each step of the selection process, making sure your new business meets all applicable laws and regulations.
By:
Roanoke County news release | WSLS-TV 10
Published: October 17, 2012
Updated: October 17, 2012 - 9:18 PM
ROANOKE COUNTY, VA --
Roanoke County Administrator Clay Goodman this week announced important information for residents with property located in flood hazard zones. The County has maintained a Class 8 designation in the Community Rating system (CRS), which means all National Flood Insurance program policies issued or renewed on property in flood hazard zones in Roanoke County, will receive a 10% discount on flood insurance premiums. Properties not deemed to be in a flood hazard zone but whose owners want flood insurance coverage will be offered a preferred risk policy.
As of August 31, 2012, there were 445 flood insurance policies in Roanoke County. Property coverage amounted to $89,685,400 with an annual written premium cost of $401,106. The total savings for citizens with flood insurance as a result of the County?s participation in CRS will be in excess of $40,000 per year.
The Community Rating System is a program initiated in 1990 by the Federal Insurance Administration to encourage and reward community mitigation activities that are beyond the basic requirements of the National Flood Insurance program. The goal is to reduce future flood losses, avoid economic disruption and human suffering, and promote awareness of the need for flood insurance.
There are 285 communities that participate in the national Flood Insurance program in Virginia. Of those, 22 communities have voluntarily committed to the Community Rating System program.
Modern Family 4?4, Modern Family Episode 4, Modern Family s04e4, Modern Family Season 4 Episode 4, Modern Family Season 4 Episode 4 online, Modern Family The Butler?s Escape,Modern Family Season 4 Episode 4 streaming, Modern Family Season 4 Episode 4 zshare,Modern Family Season 4 Episode 4 Megavideo,Modern Family Season 4 Episode 4 videobb
Summary: A Dutch filmmaker records the lives of three families, including one he stayed with as an exchange student. In one household, the dad works and the mom stays at home with their kids; in another, a gay couple experiences first-time fatherhood with the Vietnamese child they just adopted; and in the third home a 60-year old man becomes an instant father when he marries a thirtysomething Latina mother. Shot documentary-style. Modern Family won six Emmy Awards, including the one for Outstanding Comedy Series. It also brought home a Peabody Award, Writers Guild Award, Directors Guilds Award and Television Critics Award. Modern Family Season 4 Episode 4 Summary: Luke wants to quit magic and Phil just can?t seem to accept it. Meanwhile, one of Gloria?s new pregnancy symptoms is snoring and she?s keeping the whole house awake, forcing Jay to take desperate measures; and Mitch and Cam?s household dynamic is put to the test when they decide to swap duties ? Mitch staying at home with Lily while Cam goes off to work at his new job as the music teacher at Luke and Manny?s school.
Schooled? is the first, and funniest, of the two episodes tonight, as Lily (Aubrey Anderson-Emmons) gets her hair pulled by a boy on her first day of kindergarten, and Cam (Eric Stonestreet) overreacts by picking up the boy, pressing him up against the swing set, and giving him a very stern warning about touching his daughter. This leads to the boy?s parents, a lesbian couple, being called in to meet with Cam and Mitchell (Jesse Tyler Ferguson). In the episode?s best sight gag, Cam and Mitchell explain (to the camera) why gay men and gay women don?t get along, by making a Venn diagram with their arms. It?s a better bit than I can do justice by describing, but it works.
The pre-school story continued hysterically Cam and Mitch explaining why gay men don?t mix with gay women. The child who harmed Lily?s parents turned out to be lesbians. The scene in the house was pretty hysterical as the two couple did their best to get along. As the kids went missing, Cam hilariously stated how the two couples learned to get along with the half of the lesbian couple he wasn?t getting along with.
Lily?s first day in kindergarten is marred by a hair-pulling boy. Cam gets mama-bear syndrome and picks the boy up to verbally reprimand him. To the principal?s office they go ? to meet the boy?s lesbian parents. The two sets of parents don?t get along ? it?s physics: gay men and gay women don?t get along (Mitchell and Cam provided a demonstration to illustrate the reasons). The principal demands the two sets of parents agree to a playdate.
The plot thread even had an emotional beat towards the end when Haley calls her parents during their drive home upon realizing just how little she fits in on the first day, and the scene really punctuated the madcap nature of the scenes that preceded it. Learning to let go is a universal theme, even if saying goodbye at college move-in day isn?t a universal experience.
This episode was a hoot! I truly loved the touching moments with laughs along the way. My farewell sendoff to college did not contain any tears ? did yours? Did you enjoy Haley?s goodbye to Luke and Alex? Did this episode make you feel old? Was Jay/Gloria a little obnoxious in class? Are you going to preorder ?Phil?s-osopy?? ?Modern Family? does what they do best when they have their characters acknowledge flaws and embrace them in their own individual ways, and those moments read more realistic than having a character make a big, bold choice or have some huge revelation every week. The show takes baby-steps, and that pun was intentional.
Watch Modern Family Season 4 Episode 4 | Watch Modern Family Season 4 Episode 4
California Congressman Henry Waxman, a Democrat serving as Ranking Member on the Energy and Commerce Committee, on Tuesday announced he?s introducing legislation that would improve the data that the U.S. Food and Drug Administration collects on antibiotics used in animal agriculture, a practice that is increasingly under the microscope.
Waxman announced his bill ? the ?Delivering Antibiotic Transparency in Animals (DATA) Act? ? in Santa Monica with a handful of chefs, Dr. Brad Spelberg of Harbor-UCLA Medical Center and Jean Halloran of Consumers Union.
?We need reliable information about the use of antibiotics in agricultural operations,? said Rep. Waxman. ?The more we learn, the graver the threat becomes from overuse of antibiotics by industrial-scale farms.? We need this information so scientists and Congress can stop the spread of drug-resistant infections from farm animals to humans.?
Waxman?s proposal would require drug makers to report more comprehensive information to FDA regarding how their drugs are used on farms. Recent estimates have indicated that the vast majority of antibiotics sold in the United States are given to food animals. Many of those antibiotics are important to human medicine and there is broad scientific consensus that overusing these drugs promotes antibiotic resistance, which is a growing public health threat.
Currently, drug makers only report their total sales, but don?t have to distinguish which species the drugs are intended for or indicate what portion were used exclusively for food animals. The legislation would for the first time require feed mills, where many farmers are able to buy antimicrobial drugs in bulk, to report data to FDA. According to Waxman?s office, ?The bill will require feed mills to submit data to FDA on the types, purposes, and quantities of antibiotics being given to animals through feed.?
According to a breakdown of the legislation provided by Consumers Union, which is strongly supporting the proposal, the bill would only require reporting for drugs given to food-producing animals ? excluding pets and horses ? and would only apply to antibiotics that are considered important for human medicine. Perhaps most importantly, the law would require feed mills to report on what the antibiotics are used for, whether it be growth promotion or disease prevention, control or treatment.
Over the summer, FDA said it was considering adding similar reporting to the requirements under the Animal Drug User Fee Amendments of 2008. In a Federal Register notice, the agency noted that ?collecting data on antimicrobial drugs used in food-producing animals will assist FDA in tracking antimicrobial use trends and examining how such trends may relate to antimicrobial resistance.?
The congressman?s effort follows his colleague Rep. Louise Slaughter (D-NY), who has repeatedly introduced the Preservation of Antibiotics for Medical Treatment Act (PAMTA), a bill that has more than 100 cosponsors in the House, but has not gained the traction needed to advance in Congress. The legislation would phase in a ban on the use of medically important antibiotics on healthy food-producing animals, while containing to allow their use on the treatment of sick animals.
Meanwhile, antibiotic resistant pathogens remain a problem for the meat and poultry products that Americans consume every day. For the most recent report from the federal government on antibiotic resistant pathogens on food products, see: New Data on Antimicrobial Resistance a Mixed Bag.
Proof at last: Moon was created in giant smashupPublic release date: 17-Oct-2012 [ | E-mail | Share ]
Contact: Diana Lutz dlutz@wustl.edu 314-935-5272 Washington University in St. Louis
Wholesale vaporization of impactor left signature in tiny excess of heavier form of zinc
It's a big claim, but Washington University in St. Louis planetary scientist Frdric Moynier says his group has discovered evidence that the Moon was born in a flaming blaze of glory when a body the size of Mars collided with the early Earth.
The evidence might not seem all that impressive to a nonscientist: a tiny excess of a heavier variant of the element zinc in Moon rocks. But the enrichment probably arose because heavier zinc atoms condensed out of the roiling cloud of vaporized rock created by a catastrophic collision faster than lighter zinc atoms, and the remaining vapor escaped before it could condense.
Scientists have been looking for this kind of sorting by mass, called isotopic fractionation, since the Apollo missions first brought Moon rocks to Earth in the 1970s, and Moynier, PhD, assistant professor of Earth and Planetary Sciences in Arts & Sciences together with PhD student, Randal Paniello, and colleague James Day of the Scripps Institution of Oceanography are the first to find it.
The Moon rocks, geochemists discovered, while otherwise chemically similar to Earth rocks, were woefully short on volatiles (easily evaporated elements). A giant impact explained this depletion, whereas alternative theories for the Moon's origin did not.
But a creation event that allowed volatiles to slip away should also have produced isotopic fractionation. Scientists looked for fractionation but were unable to find it, leaving the impact theory of origin in limbo neither proved nor disproved for more than 30 years.
"The magnitude of the fractionation we measured in lunar rocks is 10 times larger than what we see in terrestrial and martian rocks," Moynier says, "so it's an important difference."
The data, published in the Oct. 18, 2012 issue of Nature, provide the first physical evidence for wholesale vaporization event since the discovery of volatile depletion in Moon rocks, Moynier says.
The Giant Impact Theory
According to the Giant Impact Theory, proposed in its modern form at a conference in 1975, Earth's moon was created in a apocalyptic collision between a planetary body called Theia (in Greek mythology the mother of the moon Selene) and the early Earth.
This collision was so powerful it is hard for mere mortals to imagine, but the asteroid that killed the dinosaurs is thought to have been the size of Manhattan, whereas Theia is thought to have been the size of the planet Mars.
The smashup released so much energy it melted and vaporized Theia and much of the proto-Earth's mantle. The Moon then condensed out of the cloud of rock vapor, some of which also re-accreted to the Earth.
This seemingly outlandish idea gained traction because computer simulations showed a giant collision could have created a Earth-Moon system with the right orbital dynamics and because it explained a key characteristic of the Moon rocks.
Once geochemists got Moon rocks into the lab, they quickly realized that the rocks are depleted in what geochemists call "moderately volatile" elements. They are very poor in sodium, potassium, zinc, and lead, says Moynier.
"But if the rocks were depleted in volatiles because they had been vaporized during a giant impact, we should also have seen isotopic fractionation," he says. (Isotopes are variants of an element that have slightly different masses.)
"When a rock is melted and then evaporated, the light isotopes enter the vapor phase faster than the heavy isotopes, so you end up with a vapor enriched in the light isotopes and a solid residue enriched in the heavier isotopes. If you lose the vapor, the residue will be enriched in the heavy isotopes compared to the starting material," explains Moynier.
The trouble was that scientists who looked for isotopic fractionation couldn't find it.
Extraordinary claims require extraordinary data
Asked how he felt when he saw the first results, Moynier says, "When you find something that is new and that has important ramifications, you want to be sure you haven't gotten anything wrong."
" I half expected results like those previously obtained for moderately volatile elements, so when we got something so different, we reproduced everything from scratch to make sure there were no mistakes because some of the procedures in the lab could conceivably fractionate the isotopes."
He also worried that fractionation could have occurred through localized processes on the moon, such as fire fountaining.
To make sure the effect was global, the team analyzed 20 samples of lunar rocks, including ones from the Apollo 11, Apollo 12, Apollo 15, and Apollo 17 missions all of which went to different locations on the Moon and one lunar meteorite.
To obtain the samples, which are stored in Houston at the Johnson Space Center, Moynier had to convince committee that controls access to them of the scientific merit of his project.
"'What we wanted were the basalts," Moynier says, "because they're the ones that came from inside the Moon and would be more representative of the Moon's composition."
But lunar basalts have different chemical compositions, Moynier says, including a wide range of titanium concentrations. Isotopes can also be fractionating during during the solidification of minerals from a melt. "The effect should be very, very tiny," he says, "but to make sure this wasn't what we were seeing, we analyzed both titanium-rich and titanium-poor basalts, which are at the two extremes of the range of chemical composition on the Moon."
The low and high titanium basalts had the same zinc isotopic ratios.
For comparison, they also analyzed 10 Martian meteorits. A few had been found in Antarctica but the others were from the collections at the Field Museum, the Smithsonian Institution and the Vatican.
Mars, like the Earth, is very rich in volatile elements, Moynier says. "Because there is a decent amount of zinc inside the rocks, we only needed a tiny bit to test for fractionation, and so these samples were easier to get."
What it means
Compared to terrestrial or martian rocks, the lunar rocks Moynier and his team analyzed have much lower concentrations of zinc but are enriched in the heavy isotopes of zinc.
Earth and Mars have isotopic compositions like those of chondritic meteorites, which are thought to represent the original composition of the cloud of gas and dust from which the solar system formed.
The simplest explanation for these differences is that conditions during or after the formation of the Moon led to more extensive volatile loss and isotopic fractionation than was experienced by Earth or Mars.
The isotopic homogeneity of the lunar materials, in turn, suggests that isotopic fractionation resulted from a large-scale process rather than one that operated only locally.
Given these lines of evidence, the most likely large-scale event is wholesale melting during the formation of the Moon. The zinc isotopic data therefore supports the theory that a giant impact gave rise to the Earth-Moon system.
"The work also has implications for the origin of the Earth," Moynier points out, "because the origin of the Moon was a big part of the origin of the Earth."
Without the stabilizing influence of the Moon, the Earth would probably be a very different sort of place. Planetary sciences think the Earth would spin more rapidly, days would be shorter, weather more violent, and climate more chaotic and extreme. In fact it might have been such a harsh world, it would have been unfit for the evolution of our favorite species: us.
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Proof at last: Moon was created in giant smashupPublic release date: 17-Oct-2012 [ | E-mail | Share ]
Contact: Diana Lutz dlutz@wustl.edu 314-935-5272 Washington University in St. Louis
Wholesale vaporization of impactor left signature in tiny excess of heavier form of zinc
It's a big claim, but Washington University in St. Louis planetary scientist Frdric Moynier says his group has discovered evidence that the Moon was born in a flaming blaze of glory when a body the size of Mars collided with the early Earth.
The evidence might not seem all that impressive to a nonscientist: a tiny excess of a heavier variant of the element zinc in Moon rocks. But the enrichment probably arose because heavier zinc atoms condensed out of the roiling cloud of vaporized rock created by a catastrophic collision faster than lighter zinc atoms, and the remaining vapor escaped before it could condense.
Scientists have been looking for this kind of sorting by mass, called isotopic fractionation, since the Apollo missions first brought Moon rocks to Earth in the 1970s, and Moynier, PhD, assistant professor of Earth and Planetary Sciences in Arts & Sciences together with PhD student, Randal Paniello, and colleague James Day of the Scripps Institution of Oceanography are the first to find it.
The Moon rocks, geochemists discovered, while otherwise chemically similar to Earth rocks, were woefully short on volatiles (easily evaporated elements). A giant impact explained this depletion, whereas alternative theories for the Moon's origin did not.
But a creation event that allowed volatiles to slip away should also have produced isotopic fractionation. Scientists looked for fractionation but were unable to find it, leaving the impact theory of origin in limbo neither proved nor disproved for more than 30 years.
"The magnitude of the fractionation we measured in lunar rocks is 10 times larger than what we see in terrestrial and martian rocks," Moynier says, "so it's an important difference."
The data, published in the Oct. 18, 2012 issue of Nature, provide the first physical evidence for wholesale vaporization event since the discovery of volatile depletion in Moon rocks, Moynier says.
The Giant Impact Theory
According to the Giant Impact Theory, proposed in its modern form at a conference in 1975, Earth's moon was created in a apocalyptic collision between a planetary body called Theia (in Greek mythology the mother of the moon Selene) and the early Earth.
This collision was so powerful it is hard for mere mortals to imagine, but the asteroid that killed the dinosaurs is thought to have been the size of Manhattan, whereas Theia is thought to have been the size of the planet Mars.
The smashup released so much energy it melted and vaporized Theia and much of the proto-Earth's mantle. The Moon then condensed out of the cloud of rock vapor, some of which also re-accreted to the Earth.
This seemingly outlandish idea gained traction because computer simulations showed a giant collision could have created a Earth-Moon system with the right orbital dynamics and because it explained a key characteristic of the Moon rocks.
Once geochemists got Moon rocks into the lab, they quickly realized that the rocks are depleted in what geochemists call "moderately volatile" elements. They are very poor in sodium, potassium, zinc, and lead, says Moynier.
"But if the rocks were depleted in volatiles because they had been vaporized during a giant impact, we should also have seen isotopic fractionation," he says. (Isotopes are variants of an element that have slightly different masses.)
"When a rock is melted and then evaporated, the light isotopes enter the vapor phase faster than the heavy isotopes, so you end up with a vapor enriched in the light isotopes and a solid residue enriched in the heavier isotopes. If you lose the vapor, the residue will be enriched in the heavy isotopes compared to the starting material," explains Moynier.
The trouble was that scientists who looked for isotopic fractionation couldn't find it.
Extraordinary claims require extraordinary data
Asked how he felt when he saw the first results, Moynier says, "When you find something that is new and that has important ramifications, you want to be sure you haven't gotten anything wrong."
" I half expected results like those previously obtained for moderately volatile elements, so when we got something so different, we reproduced everything from scratch to make sure there were no mistakes because some of the procedures in the lab could conceivably fractionate the isotopes."
He also worried that fractionation could have occurred through localized processes on the moon, such as fire fountaining.
To make sure the effect was global, the team analyzed 20 samples of lunar rocks, including ones from the Apollo 11, Apollo 12, Apollo 15, and Apollo 17 missions all of which went to different locations on the Moon and one lunar meteorite.
To obtain the samples, which are stored in Houston at the Johnson Space Center, Moynier had to convince committee that controls access to them of the scientific merit of his project.
"'What we wanted were the basalts," Moynier says, "because they're the ones that came from inside the Moon and would be more representative of the Moon's composition."
But lunar basalts have different chemical compositions, Moynier says, including a wide range of titanium concentrations. Isotopes can also be fractionating during during the solidification of minerals from a melt. "The effect should be very, very tiny," he says, "but to make sure this wasn't what we were seeing, we analyzed both titanium-rich and titanium-poor basalts, which are at the two extremes of the range of chemical composition on the Moon."
The low and high titanium basalts had the same zinc isotopic ratios.
For comparison, they also analyzed 10 Martian meteorits. A few had been found in Antarctica but the others were from the collections at the Field Museum, the Smithsonian Institution and the Vatican.
Mars, like the Earth, is very rich in volatile elements, Moynier says. "Because there is a decent amount of zinc inside the rocks, we only needed a tiny bit to test for fractionation, and so these samples were easier to get."
What it means
Compared to terrestrial or martian rocks, the lunar rocks Moynier and his team analyzed have much lower concentrations of zinc but are enriched in the heavy isotopes of zinc.
Earth and Mars have isotopic compositions like those of chondritic meteorites, which are thought to represent the original composition of the cloud of gas and dust from which the solar system formed.
The simplest explanation for these differences is that conditions during or after the formation of the Moon led to more extensive volatile loss and isotopic fractionation than was experienced by Earth or Mars.
The isotopic homogeneity of the lunar materials, in turn, suggests that isotopic fractionation resulted from a large-scale process rather than one that operated only locally.
Given these lines of evidence, the most likely large-scale event is wholesale melting during the formation of the Moon. The zinc isotopic data therefore supports the theory that a giant impact gave rise to the Earth-Moon system.
"The work also has implications for the origin of the Earth," Moynier points out, "because the origin of the Moon was a big part of the origin of the Earth."
Without the stabilizing influence of the Moon, the Earth would probably be a very different sort of place. Planetary sciences think the Earth would spin more rapidly, days would be shorter, weather more violent, and climate more chaotic and extreme. In fact it might have been such a harsh world, it would have been unfit for the evolution of our favorite species: us.
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Public release date: 17-Oct-2012
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