Gene Study Sheds Light on Body Clock's Link to Diabetes (HealthDay)

MONDAY, Jan. 30 (HealthDay News) -- Researchers studying the link between diabetes and a hormone that affects your so-called "body clock" have identified a genetic mutation in the receptor for the hormone, melatonin, that may to boost the risk of the disease.

The finding could help improve assessment of a person's diabetes risk and could also lead to the development of personalized treatments, according to the study published in the Jan. 29 online edition of the journal Nature Genetics.

The research team from Imperial College London found that people who have rare genetic mutations in the receptor for melatonin have a greatly increased risk for type 2 diabetes.

Melatonin controls the body's sleep-wake cycle. A previous study found that people with common variations in the gene for the melatonin receptor MT2 have a slightly increased risk for type 2 diabetes.

This new study discovered that having any of four rare mutations of the MT2 is associated with a six times increased risk of developing type 2 diabetes.

Melatonin controls the release of insulin, which regulates blood sugar levels. Mutations in the MT2 gene may disrupt the connection between the body clock and insulin release, resulting in abnormal control of blood sugar, the researchers explained.

For their study, the investigators examined the MT2 gene in more than 7,000 people. They identified 40 variants associated with type 2 diabetes, four of which are very rare and make the receptor incapable of responding to melatonin. The effect of these four variants was then confirmed in an additional group of nearly 12,000 people.

"Blood sugar control is one of the many processes regulated by the body's biological clock. This study adds to our understanding of how the gene that carries the blueprint for a key component in the clock can influence people's risk of diabetes," study leader Philippe Froguel, from the School of Public Health, said in an Imperial College London news release.

"We found very rare variants of the MT2 gene that have a much larger effect than more common variants discovered before. Although each mutation is rare, they are common in the sense that everyone has a lot of very rare mutations in their DNA. Cataloging these mutations will enable us to much more accurately assess a person's risk of disease based on their genetics," Froguel added.

While the study found a link between the mutation and diabetes risk, it did not find a cause-and-effect relationship.

More information

The American Diabetes Association offers an overview of diabetes prevention.

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/science/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/hsn/20120130/hl_hsn/genestudyshedslightonbodyclockslinktodiabetes

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New DMARC email authentication aims to stop phishing (Digital Trends)

Email spam has been a problem for even longer than commercial activity has been permitted on the Internet, and thanks to botnet operators, scammers, and outright cybercriminals spam has ballooned to account for the vast majority of all email. Although antispam technologies and filters have improved considerable over the years?and there have been some notable victories, like the takedown of the Rustock botnet last year?email operators and end users are always playing catch-up to the spammers, who always seem to find new ways to get a few messages into people?s inboxes.

A new email authentication framework backed by the likes of Microsoft, Google, AOL, Yahoo, and Facebook looks to put an end to that?or, at least, some of that. The new Domain-based Message Authentication, Reporting & Conformance (DMARC) specification aims to make it easier to verify whether email messages are legitimate. The DMARC spec has been in the works for over 18 months, and now the DMARC organization has taken the wraps off it in preparation for proposing it to the IETF as an Internet standard. Members of the DMARC group include major email providers like Yahoo, Google, and Microsoft, security companies like eCert, Agari, and Cloudmark, as well as member of the financial community like PayPal, Bank of America, and Fidelity Investments.

As most Internet users know, there?s nothing secure about plain-jane email: anyone can put any address they like into the ?from? line of a message to make it appear to be from someone else. Spammers and particular phishers abuse this lack of security, crafting messages that appear to be legitimate in an effort to get users to click a link (which, more than likely leads to a malware or scareware site) or to divulge personal information like passwords, birth dates, and account numbers, which in turn will be used in forms of identity theft.

The DMARC spec builds on previous authentication mechanisms like Sender ID, SPF, and DKIM and aims to provide an easily-to-implement standard that augments SPF and DKIM. Both SPF and DKIM aim to validate whether mail from a particular domain (not a particular user) is legitimate: i.e., if a machine in the domain example.com wants to deliver a message that claims to be from yahoo.com, either SPF or DKIM could be used to determine whether Yahoo lets example.com deliver mail on its behalf. If so, great, the message will be accepted. If not, the receiving server has to make a decision about whether it wants to treat the message as legitimate.

Without a standard, major email senders and providers have had to work out individual arrangements with each other to verify messages, report problems, and attempt to block fraudulent mail before it reaches users?often with the result that legitimate (but unauthenticated) mail gets rejected. DMARC aims to improve that, creating a standard that embraces both SPF and DKIM and creates a standard feedback mechanism so site operators can more easily identify problems with email delivery or reception.

Embracing both SPF and DKIM means email operators can embrace whichever standard makes the most sense for them. SPF is the easiest to implement, and works by publishing email sender polices as part of a site?s DNS information: that?s manageable for simple setups but doesn?t always scale well for complex operators. DKIM, conversely, relies on cryptographic verification?it?s harder to set up, but easier to scale for truly massive email operators.

The proposed DMARC standard is explicitly aimed at phishing and making it much harder for scammers to get legitimate-looking email into inboxes in an effort to get people to reveal information or click links to malicious sites?and that?s one reason the financial community is interested in the technology. However, the DMARC standard doesn?t do anything to make the ?from? line in messages any more authentic: even if DMARC gets accepted as a standard, everyone will still have open season on ?from? lines?so always take them with a grain of salt.

This article was originally posted on Digital Trends

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Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/security/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/digitaltrends/20120130/tc_digitaltrends/newdmarcemailauthenticationaimstostopphishing

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Catholic Churches Distribute Letter Opposing Obama Healthcare Rule (ABC News)

Share With Friends: | | Politics - Top Stories Stories, RSS Feeds and Widgets via Feedzilla.

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Thousands of Tunisians denounce Islamist extremism (AP)

TUNIS, Tunisia ? More than 8,000 Tunisians marched Saturday through the capital denouncing violence committed by ultraconservative Islamist groups in recent months.

Since the fall of Zine El Abidine Ben Ali's secular dictatorship in a popular uprising a year ago, small groups of ultraconservative Muslims known as Salafists have risen in Tunisia calling for greater piety, attacking unveiled women and secular intellectuals and occupying universities.

Organized by two leftist opposition parties, the demonstration was one of the largest marches in the country since a moderate Islamist party swept elections last year. Not far away, several hundred Islamists held a counter-protest.

"Make a common front against fanaticism," read one of the posters carried by demonstrators in the main rally, many of whom were women. "We got rid of totalitarianism, and we don't want it back," read another banner.

Tunisia's long-oppressed moderate Islamist party, Ennahda, won October's elections and formed a government with two secular parties. Ennahda has taken pains to calm the fears of Tunisia's secular elite that it would turn the country into an Islamic state.

The party has been repeatedly embarrassed by the actions of the Salafists, who appear to be justifying the warnings of secular parties such as the Progressive Democratic Party that radical Islamists are trying to change the country.

PDP leader Maya Jribi attended the demonstration and called for a "tolerant and pluralistic Tunisia where the citizens are respected in face of the death threats we hear these days."

Critics of the government say it is not doing enough in the face of the Salafi actions, which included occupying a university and preventing students from taking exams because of the institution's policy against the religious face veil.

"I came to denounce the violence and say that the government has to take responsibility for applying the law against those who are violent," said demonstrator Aicha Naboltane, 29.

The incident that appeared to have really galvanized people was an attack on secular intellectual Hamadi Rendissi and newspaper editor Zied Krichen by Salafis outside a courthouse Monday.

The two men were attending a civil trial against a television station owner for airing the award-winning Iranian animated film Persepolis on charges he "violated sacred values."

The three-kilometer long march passed through Avenue Bourguiba in the heart of Tunis, where demonstrators brought down the dictatorship a year earlier.

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/world/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20120128/ap_on_re_mi_ea/ml_tunisia_protests

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Arab League halts observer mission due to violence

NBC's Ayman Mohyeldin reports.

By NBC News and msnbc.com news services

Updated 12:51 p.m. ET: Syria says it regrets an Arab League decision to halt its mission monitoring a peace plan in the country, official state television?reported on Saturday.

"Syria regrets and is surprised at the Arab decision to stop the work of its monitoring mission after it asked for a one-month extension of its work,'' Syria Television reported in an urgent news flash.

Updated at 11:31 a.m. ET: The Arab League halted its observer mission to Syria on Saturday, sharply criticizing the regime of President Bashar Assad for escalating violence in recent days that has killed nearly 100 people across the country.

"Given the critical deterioration of the situation in Syria and the continued use of violence ... it has been decided to immediately stop the work of the Arab League's mission to Syria pending presentation of the issue to the league's council," Arab League Secretary-General Nabil Elaraby said in a statement.

AP

This citizen journalism image provided by the Local Coordination Committees in Syria purports to show anti-Syrian regime protesters during a demonstration in Idlib province, Syria Friday.

A delegate at the league said no date had yet been fixed for a meeting of the council on Syria.

The rising bloodshed has added urgency to new attempts by Arab and Western countries to find a resolution to the 10 months of violence that according to the United Nations has killed at least 5,400 people as Assad seeks to crush persistent protests demanding an end to his rule.

But the initiatives continue to face two major obstacles: Damascus' rejection of an Arab peace plan which it says impinges on its sovereignty, and Russia's willingness to use its U.N. Security Council veto to protect Syria from sanctions.

Syrian government forces clashed with anti-regime army defectors across the country on Saturday. At least 20 were reported killed in the clashes and other violence. The new deaths come after two days of bloody turmoil killed at least 74 people, including small children.

NBC's Ayman Mohyeldin visits Zabadani and speaks with members of the?anti-regime Free Syria Army.

The Arab League and Western countries are pushing for a U.N. Security Council resolution on Syria.

The Security Council discussed a European-Arab draft resolution on Friday aimed at halting the bloodshed.

Russia, which joined China in vetoing a previous Western draft resolution in October and which has since promoted its own draft, said the European-Arab version was unacceptable in its present form but said it was willing to "engage" on it.

Russian U.N. Ambassador Vitaly Churkin said Moscow wanted a Syrian-led political process, not "an Arab League-imposed outcome of a political process that has not yet taken place" or Libyan-style "regime change.

The Arab League said it was in talks with Russia ahead of a Security Council meeting in New York. Britain and France said they hoped to put the draft resolution to a vote next week.

Published at 7:30 a.m. ET: A Syrian opposition group claimed Saturday that 130 people had been killed across the country in just 24 hours by President Bashar al-Assad's forces.

The U.K.-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reported the death toll while speaking to NBC News in London.

Activists also told Reuters Saturday that the bodies of 17 men previously held by Syrian security forces have been found in the city of Hama.

"They were killed execution-style, mostly with one bullet to the head. Iron chains that had tied them were left on their legs as a message to the people to stop resisting," Abu al-Walid, an activist in the city, told Reuters by telephone.

Another activist said the bodies, their hands tied with plastic wire and some with their legs chained, were dumped in the streets of five Hama neighborhoods on Thursday evening.

Turkey was due to meet Gulf Arab states later Saturday to reinforce support for an Arab call for Assad to quit.

The Arab League and Western countries are pushing for a U.N. Security Council resolution on Syria, resisted by Assad's ally Russia. The U.N. Security Council discussed a new European-Arab draft resolution on Friday aimed at halting the bloodshed.??

The United Nations Children's Fund also said Friday that at least 384 children had been killed and virtually the same number had been jailed during the course of the uprising.

UN Security Council weights action on Syria

The U.N., which estimated in mid-December that more than 5,000 people had been killed, says it can no longer keep track of the total death toll. The Syrian government says insurgents have killed more than 2,000 soldiers and policemen.

'Siding with the Syrian people'
Turkey urged Syria's leadership to comply with an Arab League transition plan that calls on Assad to step down.

"We are siding with the Syrian people and their legitimate demands," Turkish President Abdullah Gul was quoted as saying by the United Arab Emirates newspaper al-Bayan.

Outside Syria capital, suburbs look like war zones

Turkish officials say the number of Syrians seeking sanctuary in Turkey has risen in the past six weeks, with 50 to 60 arriving daily, taking the total living in refugee camps to nearly 9,600 from about 7,000 previously.

More than 6,000 Syrian refugees have fled to Lebanon.

Turkey, which spent years rebuilding relations with Syria, turned against Assad after he ignored its advice to enact reforms to calm what began in March as a peaceful uprising against his rule, inspired by Arab revolts elsewhere.

Russia, which joined China in vetoing a previous Western draft U.N> resolution in October and which has since promoted its own draft, said the European-Arab version was unacceptable in its present form but added that it was willing to "engage" on it.

Russian U.N. Ambassador Vitaly Churkin criticized the draft, which endorses the Arab transition plan.

Moscow, he said, wants a Syrian-led political process, not "an Arab League-imposed outcome of a political process that has not yet taken place" or Libyan-style "regime change."

Reuters and The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Source: http://worldnews.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2012/01/28/10257534-arab-league-halts-observer-mission-due-to-violence

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How Did 30 Pounds of Drugs Get Delivered to the United Nations? [WTFriday]

Thirty pounds of cocaine was mysteriously delivered to the United Nations mailroom according to a report. There are no further details available about the incident, but it makes wonder how all of that blow got that far undetected. More »

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Jan Brewer: 'The Talk' Ladies Rip Arizona Governor's Finger-Pointing (VIDEO)

Arizona Governor Jan Brewer is making headlines after she use some aggressive body language in a heated exchange with President Obama on a tarmac in Phoenix on Wednesday. A photo of the tense conversation has gone viral, and the ladies of "The Talk" (weekdays on CBS) offered their opinions Brewer's testy body language on Thursday.

Aisha Tyler poked fun at Brewer calling the President overly sensitive. "The guy has been taking a beating for three years straight, he definitely does not have thin skin. But I'm surprised the Secret Service didn't shoot that finger right off," she joked.

Sara Gilbert thought Brewer's combative body language indicated that she was over-compensating, and argued that it was counter-productive. "When people talk to me that way, I think it comes because they feel like they're in a weak position, so they compensate with aggressive body language to make you hear them. But if anything it just shuts you down, it doesn't make you open when somebody's aggressive," she said.

Guest-host Tori Spelling empathized with Brewer's gesture, but still called her behavior childish. "As a mom, I'm used to finger pointing every single day. They're condescending ... all the same things, basically," Spelling quipped.

Sheryl Underwood, for her part, closed the discussion by demonstrating a much more friendly greeting she would've offered the President. Maybe when election season's in full swing, he'll stop by "The Talk" and "The View."

TV Replay scours the vast television landscape to find the most interesting, amusing, and, on a good day, amazing moments, and delivers them right to your browser.

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MONDAY, JANUARY 23: "Gossip Girl"

1? of ?19

"Gossip Girl" (8 p.m. EST, The CW) "Clueless" writer/director Amy Heckerling makes her first foray into TV directing since 2005 for Blair's bachelorette party, as others scheme behind Queen B's back to make it a night to remember. After discovering the truth behind Chuck and Blair's car accident, Nate joins forces with a surprising ally to gather the evidence, while Serena and Dan pretend to be dating again to protect Blair's secret. "Gossip Girl" (8 p.m. EST, The CW)
"Clueless" writer/director Amy Heckerling makes her first foray into TV directing since 2005 for Blair's bachelorette party, as others scheme behind Queen B's back to make it a night to remember. After discovering the truth behind Chuck and Blair's car accident, Nate joins forces with a surprising ally to gather the evidence, while Serena and Dan pretend to be dating again to protect Blair's secret.

MONDAY, JANUARY 23: "Gossip Girl"

"Gossip Girl" (8 p.m. EST, The CW) "Clueless" writer/director Amy Heckerling makes her first foray into TV directing since 2005 for Blair's bachelorette party, as others scheme behind Queen B's back to make it a night to remember. After discovering the truth behind Chuck and Blair's car accident, Nate joins forces with a surprising ally to gather the evidence, while Serena and Dan pretend to be dating again to protect Blair's secret. "; var coords = [-5, -72]; // display fb-bubble FloatingPrompt.embed(this, html, undefined, 'top', {fp_intersects:1, timeout_remove:2000,ignore_arrow: true, width:236, add_xy:coords, class_name: 'clear-overlay'}); });

Source: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/01/26/jan-brewer-the-talk_n_1234774.html

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More than 50 killed in 2 days of turmoil in Syria

This citizen journalism image provide by the Local Coordination Committees in Syria and released early Friday Jan. 27, 2012, purports to show a Syrian man, right, mourning over the dead body of his son, who was shot by the Syrian forces, in Idlib province, Syria, on Thursday Jan. 26, 2012. A "terrifying massacre" in the restive Syrian city of Homs has killed more than 30 people, including small children, in a barrage of mortar fire and attacks by armed forces loyal to President Bashar Assad, activists said Friday. (AP Photo/Local Coordination Committees in Syria) EDITORIAL USE ONLY, NO SALES, THE ASSOCIATED PRESS IS UNABLE TO INDEPENDENTLY VERIFY THE AUTHENTICITY, CONTENT, LOCATION OR DATE OF THIS HANDOUT PHOTO

This citizen journalism image provide by the Local Coordination Committees in Syria and released early Friday Jan. 27, 2012, purports to show a Syrian man, right, mourning over the dead body of his son, who was shot by the Syrian forces, in Idlib province, Syria, on Thursday Jan. 26, 2012. A "terrifying massacre" in the restive Syrian city of Homs has killed more than 30 people, including small children, in a barrage of mortar fire and attacks by armed forces loyal to President Bashar Assad, activists said Friday. (AP Photo/Local Coordination Committees in Syria) EDITORIAL USE ONLY, NO SALES, THE ASSOCIATED PRESS IS UNABLE TO INDEPENDENTLY VERIFY THE AUTHENTICITY, CONTENT, LOCATION OR DATE OF THIS HANDOUT PHOTO

Syrian army defectors, celebrate shortly after they defected and join the anti-Syrian rgime protesters at Khalidiya area in Homs province, central Syria, on Thursday, Jan. 26, 2012. Syrian troops stormed a flashpoint suburb of Damascus on Thursday, rounding people up in house-to-house raids and clashing with army defectors, activists said, as the 10-month-old uprising inches ever closer to the capital. (AP Photo)

A Syrian army defector, flashes victory sign as he carries on his shoulders a boy shortly after he defected and join the anti-Syrian regime protesters at Khalidiya area in Homs province, central Syria, on Thursday, Jan. 26, 2012. Syrian troops stormed a flashpoint suburb of Damascus on Thursday, rounding people up in house-to-house raids and clashing with army defectors, activists said, as the 10-month-old uprising inches ever closer to the capital. (AP Photo)

Syrian army defectors, celebrate and wave the Syrian revolution flag shortly after they defected and join the anti-Syrian regime protesters at Khalidiya area in Homs province, central Syria, on Thursday, Jan. 26, 2012. Syrian troops stormed a flashpoint suburb of Damascus on Thursday, rounding people up in house-to-house raids and clashing with army defectors, activists said, as the 10-month-old uprising inches ever closer to the capital. (AP Photo)

BEIRUT (AP) ? Two days of bloody turmoil in Syria killed more than 50 people as forces loyal to President Bashar Assad shelled residential buildings, fired on crowds and left bleeding corpses in the streets in a dramatic escalation of violence, activists said Friday.

Much of the violence was focused in Homs, where heavy gunfire hammered the city Friday in a second day of chaos. A day earlier, the city saw a flare-up of sectarian kidnappings and killings between its Sunni and Alawite communities, and pro-regime forces blasted residential buildings with mortars and gunfire, according to activists who said an entire family was killed.

Video posted online by activists showed the bodies of five small children, five women of varying ages and a man, all bloodied and piled on beds in what appeared to be an apartment after a building was hit in the Karm el-Zaytoun neighborhood of the city. A narrator said an entire family had been "slaughtered."

The video could not be independently verified.

Activists said at least 30 people were killed in Homs on Thursday and another 21 people were killed across the country Friday.

In an attempt to stop the bloodshed in Syria, the U.N. Security Council was to hold a closed-door meeting Friday to discuss the crisis, a step toward a possible resolution against the Damascus regime, diplomats said.

The Syrian uprising, which began nearly 11 months ago with mostly peaceful protests, has become increasingly violent in recent months as army defectors clash with government forces and some protesters take up arms to protect themselves. The violence has enflamed the potentially explosive sectarian divide in the country, where the Alawite minority dominates the regime despite a Sunni Muslim majority. The U.N. estimates that more than 5,400 people have been killed since March.

The head of Arab League observers in Syria said in a statement that violence in the country has spiked over the past few days. Sudanese Gen. Mohammed Ahmed al-Dabi said the cities of Homs, Hama and Idlib have all witnessed a "very high escalation" in violence since Tuesday.

A "fierce military campaign" was also under way in the Hamadiyeh district of Hama since the early hours of Friday, according to the British-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights and other activists. They said the sound of heavy machine-gun fire and loud explosions reverberated across the area.

Some activists reported seeing uncollected bodies in the streets of Hama.

Elsewhere, a car bomb exploded Friday at a checkpoint outside the northern city of Idlib, the Observatory said, citing witnesses on the ground. The number of casualties was not immediately clear.

Details of Thursday's wave of killings in Homs were emerging from an array of residents and activists on Friday, though they said they were having difficulty because of continuing gunfire.

"There has been a terrifying massacre," Rami Abdul-Rahman, director of the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, told the AP on Friday, calling for an independent investigation.

Thursday started with a spate of sectarian kidnappings and killings between the city's population of Sunnis and Alawites, a Shiite sect to which Assad belongs as well as most of his security and military leadership, said Mohammad Saleh, a centrist opposition figure and resident of Homs.

There was also a string of attacks by gunmen on army checkpoints, Saleh said. Checkpoints are a frequent target of dissident troops who have joined the opposition.

The violence culminated with the evening killing of the family, Saleh said, adding that the full details of what happened were not yet clear.

The Observatory said at least 11 people, including eight children, died when a building came under heavy mortar and machine gun fire. Some residents spoke of another massacre that took place when shabiha ? armed regime loyalists ? stormed the district, slaughtering residents in an apartment, including children.

"It's racial cleansing," said one Sunni resident of Karm el-Zaytoun, speaking on condition of anonymity for fear of reprisal. "They are killing people because of their sect," he said.

Some residents said kidnappers were holding Alawites in the building hit by mortars and gunfire, but the reports could not be confirmed.

Thursday's death toll in Homs was at least 35, said the Observatory and the Local Coordination Committees, an umbrella group of activists. Both groups cite a network of activists on the ground in Syria for their death tolls. The reports could not be independently confirmed.

Syria tightly controls access to trouble spots and generally allows journalists to report only on escorted trips, which slows the flow of information.

The Syrian uprising began last March with largely peaceful anti-government protests, but it has grown increasingly violent in recent months.

Also Friday, Iran's official IRNA news agency said gunmen in Syria have kidnapped 11 Iranian pilgrims traveling by road from Turkey to Damascus.

Iranian pilgrims routinely visit Syria ? Iran's closest ally in the Arab world ? to pay homage to Shiite holy shrines. Last month, 7 Iranian engineers building a power plant in central Syria were kidnapped. They have not yet been released.

The Free Syrian Army ? a group of army defectors ? released a video on its Facebook page claiming responsibility for the kidnapping and saying the Iranians were taking part in the suppression of the Syrian people. The leader of the group could not be reached for comment.

Bassma Kodmani, a spokeswoman for the opposition Syrian National Council, said the group is working to help the army defectors to link them up and supply them with everything from communications equipment to clothes. Speaking in Paris, she said defectors are increasingly swelling the ranks of the Free Syrian Army and it is becoming a critical force in the uprising.

In Cairo, around 200 opposition Syrians protested outside the Syrian Embassy, trying to break into the building. They threw stones and bricks at the building, but were kept back by a line of police and soldiers.

Assad's regime claims terrorists acting out a foreign conspiracy are behind the uprising, not protesters seeking change, and that thousands of security forces have been killed.

International pressure on Damascus to end the bloodshed so far has produced few results.

The Arab League has sent observers to the country, but the mission has been widely criticized for failing to stop the violence. Gulf states led by Saudi Arabia pulled out of the mission Tuesday, asking the Security Council to intervene because the Syrian government has not halted its crackdown.

The U.N. Security Council has been unable to agree on a resolution since violence began in March because of strong opposition from Russia and China.

Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Gennady Gatilov said Friday that Moscow will oppose a new draft U.N. resolution on Syria worked out by the West and some Arab states because it does not exclude the possibility of outside military interference.

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/cae69a7523db45408eeb2b3a98c0c9c5/Article_2012-01-27-Syria/id-297dd5fd2b7a48fb9dcc31cbbcaebd94

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Report: Man spends 2 years in solitary after DWI arrest

A man in New Mexico has been awarded $22 million after being tossed in solitary confinement for 2 years following a DWI arrest. KOB-TV's Marissa Torres reports.

?

By Elizabeth Chuck, msnbc.com

A New Mexico man who?said he was?forced to pull his own tooth while in solitary confinement because he was denied access to a dentist has been awarded $22 million due to inhumane treatment by New Mexico's Dona Ana County Jail.

Stephen Slevin was arrested in August of 2005 for driving while intoxicated, then thrown in jail for two years, reported NBC station KOB.com Tuesday night. He was in solitary at Dona Ana County Jail for his entire sentence and basically forgotten about and never given a trial, he told?KOB.com.

"'[Prison officials were] walking by me every day, watching me deteriorate," he said. "Day after day after day, they did nothing, nothing?at all,?to get me any help."

Slevin's toenails started curling around his foot because they were so long, he told KOB.com. He said he made countless requests from day?one to see a doctor to get medication for his depression, but wasn't allowed to see one until only a few weeks before his release. He had numerous health problems, including his dental issues, he said.

He said he never saw a judge during his time in confinement. His lawsuit, he said, "has never been about the money. I've always wanted this to make a statement."

The $22 million settlement, awarded by a federal jury on Tuesday, is one of the largest prisoner civil rights settlements in?U.S. history,?according to KOB.com.

"I wanted people to know that there are?people at The Dona Ana County Jail that?are doing things like this to people and getting away with it," Slevin, who now suffers from PTSD and believes he will have to take medication for life as a result, said. "Why they did what they did, I have no idea."

Neither the county nor Slevin's attorney returned phone calls from msnbc.com, but Slevin's attorney, Matt Coyte, told KOB.com, "I have never been with or seen a braver man who stood up to these guys for what they did to him ... [This case] It affects everybody and it's not good for this country. It's not good for Mr. Slevin for sure and it's not good for this country. It has to stop."

More content from msnbc.com and NBC News

Source: http://usnews.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2012/01/25/10233835-report-man-spends-2-years-in-solitary-after-dwi-arrest

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Study of freakish mystery illness finds no cause

FILE - In this Aug. 1, 2006 file photo, Verna Gallagher, who claims to be suffering from a rare infliction called, Morgellons, points to a sore on her skin that she believes bugs related to the condition emerged from, at her Roseville, Calif., home. Like others with the condition, Gallagher, 48, said she has a crawling sensation on her skin, that is caused by bugs that emerge from the skin but do not act like they are alive. Results of Centers for Disease Control study released Wednesday, Jan. 25, 2012 conclude that Morgellons exists only in the patients' minds. (AP Photo/Rich Pedroncelli, File)

FILE - In this Aug. 1, 2006 file photo, Verna Gallagher, who claims to be suffering from a rare infliction called, Morgellons, points to a sore on her skin that she believes bugs related to the condition emerged from, at her Roseville, Calif., home. Like others with the condition, Gallagher, 48, said she has a crawling sensation on her skin, that is caused by bugs that emerge from the skin but do not act like they are alive. Results of Centers for Disease Control study released Wednesday, Jan. 25, 2012 conclude that Morgellons exists only in the patients' minds. (AP Photo/Rich Pedroncelli, File)

ATLANTA (AP) ? Imagine having the feeling that tiny bugs are crawling on your body, that you have oozing sores and mysterious fibers sprouting from your skin. Sound like a horror movie? Well, at one point several years ago, government doctors were getting up to 20 calls a day from people saying they had such symptoms.

Many of these people were in California and one of that state's U.S. senators, Dianne Feinstein, asked for a scientific study. In 2008, federal health officials began to study people saying they were affected by this freakish condition called Morgellons.

The study cost nearly $600,000. Its long-awaited results, released Wednesday, conclude that Morgellons exists only in the patients' minds.

"We found no infectious cause," said Mark Eberhard, a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention official who was part of the 15-member study team.

The study appears in PLoS One, one of the Public Library of Science journals.

Sufferers of Morgellons (mor-GELL-uns) describe a variety of symptoms, including fatigue, erupting sores, crawling sensations on their skin and ? perhaps worst of all ? mysterious red, blue or black fibers that sprout from their skin. Some say they've suffered for decades, but the syndrome wasn't named until 2002, when "Morgellons" was chosen from a 1674 medical paper describing similar symptoms.

Afflicted patients have documented their suffering on websites and many have vainly searched for a doctor who believed them. Some doctors believe the condition is a form of delusional parasitosis, a psychosis in which people believe they are infected with parasites.

Last May, Mayo Clinic researchers published a study of 108 Morgellons patients and found none of them suffered from any unusual physical ailment. The study concluded that the sores on many of them were caused by their own scratching and picking at their skin.

The CDC study was meant to be broader, starting with a large population and then went looking for cases within the group. The intent was to give scientists a better idea of how common Morgellons actually is.

They focused on more than 3 million people who lived in 13 counties in Northern California, a location chosen in part because all had health insurance through Kaiser Permanente of Northern California, which had a research arm that could assist in the project. Also, many of the anecdotal reports of Morgellons came from the area.

Culling through Kaiser patient records from July 2006 through June 2008, the team found ? and was able to reach ? 115 who had what sounded like Morgellons. Most were middle-aged white women. They were not clustered in any one spot.

That led to the finding that Morgellons occurred in roughly 4 out of every 100,000 Kaiser enrollees. "So it's rare," Eberhard said.

Roughly 100 agreed to at least answer survey questions, and about 40 consented to a battery of physical and psychological tests that stretched over several days.

Blood and urine tests and skin biopsies checked for dozens of infectious diseases, including fungus and bacteria that could cause some of the symptoms. The researchers found none that would explain the cases.

There was no sign of an environmental cause, either, although researchers did not go to each person's house to look around.

They took fibers from 12 people, which were tested at the Armed Forces Institute of Pathology. Nothing unusual there, either. Cotton and nylon, mainly ? not some kind of organism wriggling out of a patient's body.

Skin lesions were common, but researchers concluded most of them were from scratching.

What stood out was how the patients did on the psychological exams. Though normal in most respects, they had more depression than the general public and were more obsessive about physical ailments, the study found.

However, they did not have an unusual history of psychiatric problems, according to their medical records. And the testing gave no clear indication of a delusional disorder.

So what do they have? The researchers don't know. They don't even know what to call it, opting for the label "unexplained dermopathy" in their paper.

But clearly, something made them miserable. "The absence of evidence is not evidence of absence," said Felicia Goldstein, an Emory University neurology professor and study co-author.

She said perhaps the patients could be helped by cognitive behavioral therapy that might help them deal with possible contributing psychological issues.

The study is not expected to be the last word on the subject.

Among those with additional questions is Randy Wymore, an Oklahoma State University pharmacologist who for years was the most reputable scientist to look into it and who has concluded Morgellons is not a psychiatric disorder.

On Wednesday, Wymore said he had not seen the CDC paper and was unable to comment on it. But when the study began, he questioned whether Kaiser patients with Morgellons would participate, especially if they were unhappy with how they were previously handled by their Kaiser doctors.

"There is always the question: How many of the study participants actually have Morgellons Disease?" he said, in an email.

The CDC is not planning additional study, however. The agency's expertise is in infectious diseases and environmental health problems, and the researchers saw no evidence of that.

"We're not mental health experts," one CDC spokeswoman said.

___

Online:

PLoS One: http://www.plosone.org/home.action

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/386c25518f464186bf7a2ac026580ce7/Article_2012-01-25-US-MED-CDC-Morgellons-Study/id-a58d3f316879443898b6e4b265389007

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Dior shrugs off rumors at Paris Haute Couture show (Reuters)

PARIS (Reuters) ? Christian Dior shrugged off talk about who might succeed John Galliano as the fallen star designer's stand-in enjoyed a well-received Spring/Summer Haute Couture show on Monday and seen roaring sales in spite of the global economic malaise.

It was nearly a year ago that Galliano was toppled from his seat at the top of Dior's creative operations, setting off an industry-wide search for a replacement that has produced many promising names but no heir to the crown.

The latest to set fashionistas abuzz was Belgian designer Raf Simons who, according to Women's Wear Daily, had begun talks to become Dior's new creative director after Marc Jacobs ruled himself out of the running in December.

Chief Executive Sydney Toledano refused to be drawn on the search when reporters cornered him after Dior's Haute Couture show, preferring to highlight the brand's healthy Christmas sales as proof it was holding up well despite the uncertainty over succession.

"Things are going well, we are building, the house is once again finding its comfort zone," he said. "Christmas sales went very well, better than the previous year."

His remark hinted that business had held up strongly through the final quarter of 2011, after Dior posted sales of 705 million euros ($919.81 million) in the first three quarter of the year, up 21 percent over the same period in 2010.

Around the catwalk at Dior's office in Paris, the mood was equally upbeat.

The fashion elite, squeezed into narrow rows of chairs on the building's third floor, applauded loudly after a display of 40 designs largely inspired by the tone and light variations of black-and-white photography.

The chatter among fashionistas was more conciliatory toward designer Bill Gaytten, who has led Dior's creative operations since Galliano's ouster last March and weathered criticism that his shows were too formulaic.

In his second try for Dior Haute Couture, Gaytten toyed more liberally with the brand's archives, rolling out a series of bouffant silk skirts which he paired with short, cinched jackets made from embroidered silk or black crocodile.

Fine layers of translucent silk, richly piled to create a cloud-like impression, bounced loosely as the models toured the catwalk, while two evening dresses festooned with huge bows drew furious scribbling from the fashionistas in the crowd.

Also remarkable were a succession of vast ball gowns, in bright red and black.

"This is really an X-ray, which lets you see what is under the clothing," Gaytten told journalists after the show. "There is really a lot of construction, but very light."

($1 = 0.7665 euros)

(Reporting By Nicholas Vinocur and Mathilde Gardin, editing by Paul Casciato)

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/fashion/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20120124/lf_nm_life/us_france_dior

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Wasp found in upstate New York shows up in Southern California

ScienceDaily (Jan. 24, 2012) ? In August 2010, an entomologist at the University of California, Riverside discovered a tiny fairyfly wasp in upstate New York that had never been seen in the United States until then. Nearly exactly a year later, he discovered the wasp in Irvine, Calif., strongly suggesting that the wasp is well established in the country.

Called Gonatocerus ater, the wasp is about 1 millimeter long and arrived in North America from Europe. It lays its eggs inside the eggs of leafhoppers.

Leafhopper females lay their eggs inside plant tissue. Gonatocerus ater females find these eggs and lay their own eggs inside them. When the wasp eggs hatch, the larvae eat the leafhopper eggs.

"This wasp was accidentally introduced in North America," said Serguei Triapitsyn, the principal museum scientist in the Department of Entomology and the director of the Entomology Research Museum, who made the discovery. "It most likely got here in parasitized eggs of the leafhoppers in twigs of Lombardy poplar seedlings coming from Europe, perhaps long ago."

Triapitsyn explained that the wasp had been reported in Italy where the leafhopper Rhytidodus decimaquartus was determined to be its host.

"In California, we do not know if the wasp's host is this leafhopper, but I found it on the same Lombardy poplar trees that had the wasp, so an association is very likely," he said.

Triapitsyn found the wasp on August 7, 2011, when he was doing field work along a trail. He caught the insects in a net that he had swept over Lombardy poplar leaves. He preserved the sample of insects in ethanol and brought it to his lab at UC Riverside for analysis and identification, which can take long. He got a positive identification of the potential leafhopper host only two weeks ago.

"I identified the wasp as Gonatocerus ater by comparing it to wasps from upstate New York and also Europe," he said. "It would not surprise me if this wasp is found wherever Lombardy poplars are located because its likely leafhopper host prefers these trees for feeding."

According to Triapitsyn, the wasp poses no known risk -- besides killing leafhopper eggs.

"It actually helps naturally control leafhopper numbers," he said. "In its absence, leafhopper populations could have skyrocketed. This illustrates how plant pests are sometimes accompanied by their natural enemies across very long distances without our knowledge."

In August 2010, Triapitsyn discovered another species of Gonatocerus on a large willow tree in the middle of a lawn on the campus of the New York State Agricultural Experiment Station in Geneva, NY.

"This wasp, which has yet to be described, is native to the United States," he said. "The fact that I found it in a relatively well visited and studied area shows just how little we know about these minute insects."

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Marine faces 3 months in brig for Iraqi deaths (AP)

CAMP PENDLETON, California ? Military prosecutors worked for more than six years to bring Marine Staff Sgt. Frank Wuterich to trial on manslaughter charges that could have sent him away to prison for life.

But only weeks after the long-awaited trial started, they offered Wuterich a deal that stopped the proceedings and could mean little to no jail time for the squad leader who ordered his men to "shoot first, ask questions later," resulting in one of the Iraq War's worst attacks on civilians by U.S. troops.

The 31-year-old Marine, who was originally accused of unpremeditated murder, pleaded guilty Monday to negligent dereliction of duty for leading the squad that killed 24 unarmed Iraqi civilians in the town of Haditha in 2005 during raids after a roadside bomb exploded, killing a fellow Marine and wounding two others.

Wuterich, who was indicted in 19 of the 24 deaths, now faces no more than three months in confinement.

It was a stunning outcome for the last defendant in the case once compared with the My Lai massacre in Vietnam. The seven other Marines initially charged were exonerated or had their cases dropped.

"I was expecting that the American judiciary would sentence this person to life in prison and that he would appear and confess in front of the whole world that he committed this crime, so that America could show itself as democratic and fair," one of the survivors, Awis Fahmi Hussein, told The Associated Press in Haditha.

Military judge Lt. Col. David Jones will hear arguments from both sides Tuesday at Camp Pendleton, Calif., before sentencing Wuterich.

Legal experts said the case was fraught with errors made by investigators and the prosecution that let it drag on for years. The prosecution was also hampered by squad mates who acknowledged they had lied to investigators initially and later testified in exchange for having their cases dropped, bringing into question their credibility.

In addition, Wuterich was seen as taking the fall for senior leaders and more seasoned combat veterans, analysts said. It was his first time in combat when he led the squad on Nov. 19, 2005.

Brian Rooney, an attorney for another former defendant, said cases like Haditha are difficult to prosecute because a military jury is unlikely to question decisions made in combat unless wrongdoing is clear-cut and egregious, like rape.

"If it's a gray area, fog-of-war, you can't put yourself in a Marine's situation where he's legitimately trying to do the best he can," said Rooney, who represented Lt. Col. Jeffrey Chessani, the highest-ranking Marine charged in the case. "When you're in a town like Haditha or Fallujah, you've got bad guys trying to kill you and trying to do it in very surreptitious ways. Marines understand it's a crazy environment. You've got to do the best you can with what you've got."

Marine Corps spokesman Lt. Col. Joseph Kloppel said the deal was not a reflection or in any way connected to how the prosecution felt its case was going in the trial.

The Haditha attack is considered among the war's defining moments, further tainting America's reputation when it was already at a low point after the release of photos of prisoner abuse by U.S. soldiers at Abu Ghraib prison.

It still fuels anger in Iraq today.

"We wonder about such a sentence issued against the defendant. We called upon US to be fair in passing sentences. Regrettably, we are disappointed about the issuance of such sentences," said Khalid Salman Rasif, a member of the Provincial Council in Haditha, adding he would contact the lawyer for victims' families for an explanation.

Kamil al-Dulaimi, a Sunni lawmaker from the Anbar provincial capital of Ramadi, called the plea agreement proof that "Americans still deal with Iraqis without any respect."

"It's just another barbaric act of Americans against Iraqis," al-Dulaimi told The Associated Press. "They spill the blood of Iraqis and get this worthless sentence for the savage crime against innocent civilians."

Wuterich, the father of three children, had faced the possibility of life behind bars when he was charged with nine counts of manslaughter, which will be dropped. Besides now facing a maximum of three months in confinement, he could also lose two-thirds of his pay and see his rank demoted to private when he's sentenced.

.Wuterich, his family and his attorneys declined to comment Monday after he entered the plea. Prosecutors also declined to comment on the plea deal.

During the trial before a jury of combat Marines who served in Iraq, prosecutors argued he lost control after seeing the body of his friend blown apart by the bomb and led his men on a rampage in which they stormed two nearby homes, blasting their way in with gunfire and grenades. Among the dead was a man in a wheelchair.

In the deal, Wuterich acknowledged that his orders misled his men to believe they could shoot without hesitation and not follow the rules of engagement that required troops to positively identify their targets before they raided the homes.

He told the judge that caused "tragic events."

"I think we all understood what we were doing so I probably just should have said nothing," Wuterich told the judge.

He said his orders were based on the guidance of his platoon commander at the time, and that the squad did not take any gunfire during the 45-minute raid.

Many of his squad mates testified that they do not believe to this day that they did anything wrong because they feared insurgents were inside hiding.

Haditha prompted commanders to demand troops be more careful in distinguishing between civilians and combatants.

Former Navy officer David Glazier said the case shows such rules are essential to helping the United States prevail in an armed conflict.

"The reality is that this incident has had significant consequences for the U.S. in Iraq," said Glazier, a professor at Loyola Law School in Los Angeles. "It probably fueled the resistance and so it probably ended up costing additional soldiers and Marines their lives later on."

___

Associated Press writers Barbara Surk and Mazin Yahya in Baghdad, Elliot Spagat in San Diego and Raquel Dillon in Los Angeles contributed to this report.

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/topstories/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20120124/ap_on_re_us/us_marines_haditha

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Fresh Android Apps for Jan. 24: Apartments.com, Cut?n?Roll, The Serpent of Isis (Appolicious)

If we learned anything over the past few years, it?s that home ownership isn?t for everyone. If you want to rent, check out the fresh app from Apartments.com.

In games, help a turtle roll home in Cut?n?Roll and solve an old art heist in The Serpent of Isis.

Apartment hunting stresses everyone out, so why not let your Android do most of the work? Some real estate apps provide listings for both home sales and rentals, but this app focuses specifically on condo and apartment rentals. Search for listings within a particular radius of your current location or search a different location using the name. Filter your search by the number of bedrooms, price, number of bathrooms and more, then, save your search for later retrieval. Individual listings provide photos and even video walkthroughs to get the sense of a place.

Worried you aren?t getting all the details? The app even describes a listing?s pet policy.

If you?ve conquered Cut the Rope, this might be your next slice of fun. Here a turtle ? not an alien ? needs to get to his home, but there?s an entire obstacle course between him and his house.

Use the slashing power of your finger to cut a path for the turtle. The app is really a physics puzzle game that requires you to think before you snip. You only have a limited number of cuts, so each move must be just right. When your precision work is complete, the turtle will roll through the course in time for bed.

Calling all Agatha Christie fans! From the makers of Azada, comes a new mystery puzzle game whose setting is an exotic train called the Mont Palu Express. A legendary piece of art was stolen back in the early 1900s from the Museum of Cairo. You?ve been hunting it all your life and now you think it?s onboard.

Use your hunter/gatherer skills to locate and collect important objects that will help you solve the puzzles. The train takes you to Bucharest, Vienna, London and Paris through 10 chapters and 20 mini-games. Enjoy the ride.

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/tech/*http%3A//us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/external/appolicious_rss/rss_appolicious_tc/http___www_androidapps_com_articles10849_fresh_android_apps_for_jan_24_apartments_com_cutnroll_the_serpent_of_isis/44284389/SIG=13qrktc9e/*http%3A//www.androidapps.com/tech/articles/10849-fresh-android-apps-for-jan-24-apartments-com-cutnroll-the-serpent-of-isis

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Improv Electronics Boogie Board Rip

Make no mistake: The Boogie Board Rip is neither a traditional tablet, like the iPad 2?($499, 4.5 stars), nor is it a drawing tablet, like the Wacom Bamboo Capture?($99, 3.5 stars). It is more of an electronic paper-replacement tool, like a clipboard and marker with unlimited paper and unlimited ink. Unlike previous writing tablets from Improv Electronics, the Boogie Board Rip is the first from the company with the ability to easily save your work and upload it to a computer.?The Rip is a simple and environmentally friendly solution for jotting down quick notes or momentary sparks of inspiration. But at $129.99, ditching the pen and pad and going green will cost you a lot of green.

Design and Use
The Boogie Board Rip measures 11.1 by 7 by 0.5 inches (HWD), with a fairly spacious 9.5-inch LCD writing surface. Above the writing surface are an Erase and Save/Wake button and a status indicator. The left side has a lock switch, while the right houses a microUSB port and a charge indicator. The included plastic stylus slides nicely into a slot on top of the Rip. The design is very minimal, with a dark-gray, plastic construction. The Rip is lightweight at only 11.5 ounces, making it easy to hold and also easy to carry in a backpack?it's definitely more portable than some of the monstrous 5-subject notebooks I lugged around in my youth. It comes with 8MB of internal storage, which is good for about 200 saved pages. The Rip charges via USB and, according to Improv Electronics, will last more than a week during typical use.

The stylus leaves a green trail on the surface as you draw, varying in width depending on how hard you press. You can see everything you draw, as you draw it, right on the LCD. To begin, you must first make sure the Rip is not locked, press Erase to start on a clean slate, and finally press the Save/Wake button before you start sketching and after you finish. The last part is most important, as the first few times I would forget and end up losing whatever I had sketched before pressing the button. The best way to ensure your input is being recorded is to check the status indicator, which will light up green to assure you the strokes are registering.

Though the Rip is pressure sensitive, it doesn't always record lighter strokes properly. This made it difficult to draw finer lines, as pressing down hard would make fat, marker-like strokes. The Rip saves files as PDFs, which you can manipulate later in a program like Adobe Illustrator. Pen strokes are recorded as black lines on a white background, and look sharper in digital form than they do on the actual LCD surface.?

Conclusions
The Boogie Board Rip is a great way to take quick notes and sketch out ideas, but the $130 price tag is steep. I had some friends visit over a weekend and use the Rip, which turned out to be a great source of entertainment. It reminded us of a disposable camera; we took turns sketching things throughout the day, and then at the end we uploaded all the files and saw what everyone had been drawing. If you can stomach the price, I could see the Rip being a great table activity for weddings or other parties. The Rip would also be a great tool for any situation where quick and easy visual communication is key, such as in a classroom, a business meeting room, or even for those who can't speak.

The Rip doesn't properly record every pen stroke, which is a problem if you are writing a lot of notes. It also doesn't double as an input device for computers; for that, you'll need something like the Wacom Bamboo Capture, which works as a drawing tablet and multi-touch input surface, although it doesn't display anything on its own. The Rip won't replace your standard notebook, but if you stick to drawing, it's a fun and simple way to record your sketches.

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/ziffdavis/pcmag/~3/wsEbSGxe3GU/0,2817,2398470,00.asp

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Buffett sings in video for China's New Year gala

BEIJING (AP) ? A hugely popular Chinese Lunar New Year variety show has a special guest star playing the ukulele: American billionaire Warren Buffett.

Buffett is shown wearing a dark sweat shirt and singing the folk song "I've Been Working On The Railroad" in the video posted on state broadcaster CCTV's "Spring Festival Gala" website Sunday.

There are no details on the website about where the 45-second clip was shot, but Buffett appears to be sitting in a small room with an elaborate model railroad set up in the background.

The video's simplicity contrasts with other performances posted on the website of the gala, which is usually a flashy extravaganza that draws 800 million viewers.

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/f70471f764144b2fab526d39972d37b3/Article_2012-01-22-AS-China-Buffett/id-4334704b2f2444c0a10d9d1c4276b13c

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Customizable Chocolates Come in More Flavors Than Willy Wonka's Lickable Wallpaper [Video]

Why is it so impossible to make a tasty chocolate confection? I swear, every other one I eat is either coconut creme, lemon asshole, or some other flavor that has no business in my mouth. These new modular chocolates however will taste exactly how I want them to—delicious. More »

Source: http://feeds.gawker.com/~r/gizmodo/full/~3/pxkhRkhO0h0/customizable-chocolates-come-in-more-flavors-than-wonkas-lickable-wallpaper

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Nevada brush fire burns homes, forces thousands to flee (Reuters)

RENO, Nevada (Reuters) ? A wind-driven fire raged through parched brush near Reno, Nevada, on Thursday, engulfing a number of homes, and prompting residents and livestock to flee by the thousands as belching smoke from the blaze forced the closure of a major highway.

The fire also cut short a visit to Reno by Vice President Joe Biden, officials said.

The blaze erupted at about 1 p.m. in the Pleasant Valley area south of Reno and by 5 p.m. had scorched more than 3,000 acres, prompting the evacuation of seven residential neighborhoods and two schools as it burned north toward the city, authorities told reporters at a news conference.

The evacuation orders affected an estimated 4,000 people and were expected to be expanded as the blaze bore down on the southern edge of Reno, propelled by high winds through tinder-dry brush.

No injuries were reported, fire officials said, but the swiftly-moving flames claimed an unknown number of buildings south of Reno.

"We know we have lost some structures (but) we don't have a count at this time," Reno Fire Chief Michael Hernandez said.

Local television news footage from the blaze showed at least three homes engulfed in flames.

In their haste to move farm animals out of harm's way, authorities opened gates of livestock pens to release horses and cattle onto nearby roads so they could roam away from advancing flames on their own.

Trooper Mike Edgell told Reuters earlier that an 8-mile portion of U.S. Highway 395, the main north-south route connecting Reno to Nevada's capital, Carson City, was closed in both directions due to reduced visibility from smoke.

Pleasant Valley Elementary School was evacuated in the afternoon, and Galena High School on the southern outskirts of Reno was abandoned a short time after public safety officials held a 5 p.m. news conference there as the blaze drew near.

"Firefighters are in the heat of battle right now, and they will probably continue fighting throughout the night," Hernandez said.

Washoe County Manager Nevada Katy Simon declared a state of emergency allowing local authorities to seek reimbursement of firefighting costs and additional resources to battle the blaze. Governor Brian Sandoval also declared an emergency.

U.S. Vice President Joe Biden had visited Reno on Thursday, stopping at Galena High School to speak to students and their families about college affordability, but cut his remarks short due to the approaching fire.

A White House official said Biden abbreviated his visit "to ensure students could leave the school safely."

Federal government personnel accompanying the vice president provided local authorities with assistance in nearby evacuation efforts, a Reno police spokesman said.

(Additional reporting and writing by Steve Gorman; editing by Cynthia Johnston and Dan Burns)

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/us/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20120120/us_nm/us_fire_nevada

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