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The Everglades and Big Cypress Swamp of South Florida are characterized by complex patterns of spatial heterogeneity and temporal variability, with water flow being the major factor controlling the trophic dynamics of the system. A key objective of modeling studies for these systems is to compare the future effects of alternative hydrologic scenarios on the biotic components of the systems. Due to the varying scales at which trophic interactions occur, and the importance of population structure and individual behavior for population prediction in higher trophic level organisms, use of a single modeling approach is not appropriate. We are developing a set of models designed to integrate three approaches for different trophic levels of the system: (1) process models for lower trophic levels (including benthic insects, periphyton and zooplankton), (2) structured population models for five functional groups of fish and macroinvertebrates, and (3) individual-based models for large consumers (wood storks, great blue herons, white ibis, American alligators, white-tailed deer, and Florida panther). These are integrated across the freshwater landscape of the Everglades and Big Cypress Swamp and coupled to GIS maps for cover type. Spatial scales of resolution for the models are as small as 100 m, with the capability to vary this based upon the scale of available input data. The system is then coupled to a hydrology model, and used to assess the effects of alternative proposed restoration scenarios on trophic structure.
Future plans for this project include: (1) continuing development of new models for particular trophics components not currently included (e.g. nutrient fluxes, bacteria/fungi, Apple Snail, Roseate Spoonbill, feral hog); (2) development of a fine-scaled landscape vegetation model that includes successional changes across the landscape, and simulates vegetation responses to major disturbances (fires, freezes, and hurricanes); (3) continued integration of all ATLSS model components to allow a unified approach to questions which cross trophic levels, and allow complete analysis of alternative flow scenarios without requiring very different model runs; and (4) aiding the development of modeling systems based upon the ATLSS approach for the remaining major areas of environmental concern within the region (e.g. the Kissimmee River basin, Lake Okeechobee, Florida Bay, Florida reef tract) and integrating these models at their boundaries.
The overall ATLSS project is coordinated by Donald DeAngelis of the U.S. Geological Survey (BRD). The model components being constructed at the Institute for Environmental Modeling of the University of Tennessee at Knoxville (UTK) are coordinated by Louis Gross (Professor of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology and Mathematics, UTK), with code development and production carried out by Ethel Jane Comiskey, Mark Palmer, Michael Peek, and Scott Sylvester. Particular models have been developed by with the assistance of several UTK graduate students including Eric Carr, Holly Gaff, Phil Nott, Rene' Salinas and Maurice Shorrosh. Post-doctoral and other staff from UTK involved in the ATLSS effort have included Jon Cline, Dr. John Curnutt, Dr. Hang-Kwang Luh, and Dr. Paul Wetzel. Other key personnel who have been involved in the modeling components of the project include: John Chick (Florida International University), Phil Darby (University of Florida), D. Martin Fleming (USGS), Paul Fishwick (University of Florida), Noble Hendrix (University of Washington), Michael Huston (ORNL), William Loftus (USGS), Jerry Lorenz (USGS), Wolf Mooij (Netherlans Institute of Ecology), Ken Rice (USGS), Joel Trexler (Florida International University), Robert Ulanowicz (Chesapeake Biological Laboratory, University of Maryland); and Wilfried Wolff (Forschungszentrum Julich, Germany). Financial support for the project is provided by several agencies, all coordinated through the USGS.


The identification of differentially expressed genes (DEGs) from Affymetrix GeneChips arrays is currently done by first computing expression levels from the low-level probe intensities, then deriving significance by comparing these expression levels between conditions. The proposed PL-LM (Probe-Level Linear Model) method implements a linear model applied on the probe-level data to directly estimate the treatment effect. A finite mixture of Gaussian components is then used to identify DEGs using the coefficients estimated by the linear model. This approach can readily be applied to experimental design with or without replication.
On a wholly defined dataset, the PL-LM method was able to identify 75% of the differentially expressed genes within 10% of false positives. This accuracy was achieved both using the three replicates per conditions available in the dataset and using only one replicate per condition.
The method achieves, on this dataset, a higher accuracy than the best set of tools identified by the authors of the dataset, and does so using only one replicate per condition.
DNA microarrays are commonly used to measure, in parallel, the steady-state concentration of tens of thousands of mRNAs, providing an estimate of the level of expression of the corresponding genes. They come in two flavors: 1) spotted arrays allows for the simultaneous measurement of two samples on the same array, we'll refer to these arrays as multi-channel arrays; 2) Affymetrix GeneChips arrays with a significantly higher density but only allowing for the hybridization of one sample, we'll refer to those as High-Density Arrays, HDAs. A typical piece of information that investigators seek to extract from microarrays is the list of differentially expressed genes (DEGs) between a treatment and a control condition. This can either take the form of a defined subset or an ordering of the whole transcriptome on which some meaningful (statistically and/or practically) threshold is applied. Until recently most of the efforts to derive a statistical method to solve this problem have been focusing on a general approach applicable to both type of arrays. The strategy when analyzing HDAs is to estimate the absolute level expression of a given gene in each condition and then compute the log-ratio of the expression levels between two conditions. Methods applied to log-ratios on multi-channel arrays can readily be applied to these computed ratios.
A fundamental issue when analyzing microarrays data is the imbalance between the dimensionality of the data (tens of thousands of measures for each sample) vs. the number of samples or replicates (for most studies between 2 and 60). On the theoretical side, this imbalance gives rise to the necessity of adjusting statistical thresholds to the context of multiple testing [1, 2], seriously complicating the accurate estimation of sensitivity and specificity. Because widely used statistical methods are based on an estimate of the gene-specific variation, they technically require at least 2 replicates per conditions. In the context of multi-channel arrays, experts in the field have been recommending the use of 6 replicates . But, for practical reasons, most laboratories have been settling for 3 replicates per condition. Proof-of-principle experiments with no replication (one array per condition) are still performed routinely by several labs and typically analyzed by the simple method of identifying genes as putative DEGs if they show a ratio above 2 or below 0.5.
In the work presented here, a significant increase in the accuracy of DEGs detection from a low number of replicate arrays will be obtained by taking advantage of the design itself of HDAs. All of the Affymetrix GeneChips contain k pairs of 25-mer DNA oligonucleotides, called probe pairs, per probe-set. The probe-sets are designed to measure the expression of a single gene. Each probe pair is composed of a match (PM) and mismatch (MM) probe, the former being the exact 25 nucleotides and the later containing one single mismatch at position 13. MM probes were introduced to estimate the level of non-specific hybridization of the corresponding PM probe, but the recent trend has been to ignore the MM measures and only use PM measures seeking alternative methods to estimate non-specific hybridization. The measure of interest being the level of expression of the genes, it is necessary to transform a set of k probe pair's intensities into a single probe-set measurement. This step is referred to as the expression summary. It is still debated which expression summary method gives the best results but both MAS5.0  and RMA  have been widely used. A recent summarization approach, FARMS , have been found to compare favorably to more classical summarization approaches and will be included in the comparisons.
The publication of the Choe et al. dataset in 2005  has provided an objective benchmark to evaluate the accuracy of differential gene expression of various combinations of methods. In this work the authors have amplified 3,866 cRNAs and prepared two samples, 'control' (C) and 'spike' (S), where 1,331 cRNAs were spiked at various ratios of concentrations from 1.2 to 4. The two samples were then hybridized to three Affymetrix GeneChips and scanned using standard Affymetrix protocol. The work was done using the Affymetrix Drosophila array (DrosGenome1) where each gene is represented by a probe-set of 14 probe pairs of 25-mer DNA oligonuceotides. There are a total of 14,010 probe-sets present on the array. Two key characteristics of this dataset will be important to remember when carrying out the statistical analysis: 1) a large proportion (72%) of the probe-sets corresponds to cRNAs that were not present in the samples, leading to a bimodal intensity distribution; 2) Only concentration ratios above 1 were introduced in the spiked sample, inducing a strong asymmetry in the distribution of log-ratios. Using this validation dataset, it was shown  that a preferred set of steps can be identified to optimize the detection of DEGs in HDAs. The optimal pipeline identified corresponds to the use of MAS5.0 for the background correction, probe-level normalization, PM adjustment and the use of the medianpolish algorithm for expression summaries (borrowed from RMA), followed by a loess normalization on the probe-set level data and finally use Cyber-T  to identify DEGs.
The most successful and widely used methods to identify DEGs are currently based on variations of a regularized t-statistic where the standard deviation term is weighted , a constant added to it [9, 10] or both . Regularization terms are always, but in various ways, estimated from the dataset being analyzed to account for experiment-specific behavior of the data. Recent work from Barrera et al.  attempts to identify DEGs directly from the probe-level data using a two-way ANOVA approach. Their results suggest that this class of approaches can outperform probe-set level methods or give comparable results with less replicates, but their validation relies on the use of the Affymetrix Latin Square dataset which contains DEGs with concentration ratios of 2 and above on a small number of genes (a total of 126 spiked genes). All statistical methods tested (data not shown) perform well on this dataset and it is often difficult to quantify slight improvements in accuracy.
In this paper, I propose a method that scores better accuracy than the preferred pipeline identified by Choe et al.  and will demonstrate that this method doesn't require the three technical replicates provided by the dataset to correctly identify 75% of the DEGs within 10% of false positives. The proposed method, called PL-LM (Probe-Level Linear Model), directly models the treatment effect versus a baseline control using the probe-level data, using a linear model. The treatment effect and average intensity fitted by the linear model are then modeled by a Gaussian Mixture Model (GMM), which is used to separate the DEGs from non-DEGs. The outcome of the GMM is the probability of each probe-set to belong to the cluster of DEGs, thus the PL-LM method as a whole should be characterized as a feature selection algorithm. This second stage of the analysis borrows idea introduced by Jia and Xu , where they used a GMM to cluster genes showing similar expression responses vs. a quantitative phenotype. The average intensity and treatment effect in PL-LM are equivalent to the βk0 and βk1 in . There are a few fundamental differences between the two approaches: 1) in PL-LM, the optimization of the GMM is decoupled from the fitting of the linear model, 2) the linear model of PL-LM is based on probe-level data, and 3) the clustering step aims essentially at separating DEGs from non-DEGs.
Data from the Choe et al.  dataset was log2-transformed, quantile-normalized  and a linear model (see Methods section) was fit for each probe-set, estimating parameter T, the treatment effect in equation 2 using a standard least-square method . Figure 1 presents normalized probe-level data for three typical probe-sets: a) a probe-set that was spiked at four times the concentration of the control; b) a probe-set that wasn't spiked, and c) a probe-set corresponding to a cRNA that wasn't amplified. For each probe-set the value estimated for the treatment effect, T, is reported. A first observation that can be made is the fact that values obtained for T underestimate the ratio of concentration (T = 1 would be equivalent to a two-fold ratio). This trend has been also reported by Choe et al.  for other methods on their dataset. It seems to be either a limitation introduced by the impossibility to accurately estimate non-specific signal for each probe or a real bias introduced by the experimental methods to prepare the dataset. Another important observation is that cRNAs that were not spiked tend to have a negative value of T, suggesting that they are seen as decreasing in the spiked vs. the control sample. Examination of the raw data presented in figure 1b confirms this trend since for each probe, all three spiked replicates fall below the intensities of the three control replicates. On the other hand, for probe-set corresponding to cRNAs that were not amplified the intensities seem to be similar between the spiked and control samples (figure 1c).
Examples of probe-level data. a) For a differentially expressed gene (cRNA spiked at 4-fold from the Choe et al. dataset, probe-set: 147419_at), b) a non-differentially expressed gene (cRNA at equal concentrations, probe-set: 149358_at), and c) a non-expressed gene (not in the pool of amplified cRNAs, probe-set: 142266_at). Quantile-normalized data from the control (circle) and spiked (+) samples are shown, including replicate data. Probes are ordered by the average intensity on the control replicates. For each probe-set, the value of T obtained from the linear model is shown.
For each probe-set, the average log2 intensity is also determined by considering all probes and will be referred as I. To identify DEGs, a mixture model with three Gaussian components (with variable mean, and full variance matrices) was fitted to the two-dimensional data points defined by T and I. The number of Gaussian components to use in the mixture is dictate by the distribution of data points with respect to T and I as observed from a scatter plot. Figure 2 shows the result of this model. Upon multiple trials, starting from random assignations of data points to mixture components, the same classification was obtained (data not shown). The three mixture components are represented in figure 2 as ellipses, visually translating the mixtures parameters. Not shown in the figure, the mixing proportions of the three components are 17%, 74% and 9%, and can be respectively attributed to non-spiked probe-sets, not amplified cRNAs and DEGs. Probe-sets having a conditional probability of belonging to the third component above 0.5 are identified by larger dots and grayed out. This conditional probability will be used as the ordering statistic to compute ROC curves and allows for an objective comparison with other methods to identify DEGs. Observations made on the three typical probe-sets of figure 1 can be seen as widespread among their classes. There also seem to be a slight intensity-dependant bias over T that can be observed in all three components.
Mixture modeling of the PL-LM method on the Choe et al. dataset. The three mixture components are represented as ellipse identifying their center and variances. Data points with a conditional probability of belonging to the component modeling DEGs above 0.5 are shown as larger gray dots. The mixing proportions of the three components are 17%, 74% and 9%, respectively for the non-spiked probe-sets, not amplified cRNAs and DEGs.
To assess the accuracy of the ordering induced by the PL-LM method, ROC curves were computed for results obtained by using all six arrays from the dataset and for all combinations of two arrays (one control and one spiked sample). As a comparison, three other approaches were applied to the dataset: 1) the preferred pipeline identified by Choe et al.  using the MAS5.0 algorithm  but using the medianpolish as the summarization step, loess normalization  and Cyber-T regularized t-statistic ; 2) a simple approach combining the RMA expression summary , quantile normalization  and absolute fold-change ordering; 3) the FARMS summarization method, with the ordering obtained from either the absolute fold-change or by applying the cyber-T approach. Resulting ROC curves are shown in figure 3. In an attempt to quantify the overall accuracy of each method, the area under the curve (AUC) of the ROC curves have been computed and reported in the legend. First, both the PL-LM (on two or six arrays) and Cyber-T perform equally well up to the identification of around 800 true positives, after which the PL-LM significantly outperforms the Cyber-T method whether using all arrays or a single replicate per condition. The fold-change method applied to quantile-normalized RMA summaries, even when using three replicates per condition, performs on a much lower level than Cyber-T, highlighting a clear necessity for a proper statistical analysis when reporting HDA data, even in the absence of replication.
ROC curves comparing methods on the Choe et al. dataset. Probe-sets with a spiked to control concentration ratio above or equal to 1.2 were considered as DEGs to compute these curves, resulting in 1,326 spiked probe-sets to identify among a total of 14,010. The fold-change applied after RMA summaries and quantile normalization is shown as a baseline for comparison since it is a simple and frequently used method. Nine shaded curves, representing the results from applying the PL-LM method to all combinations of two arrays (one control vs. one spike), are falling directly under the PL-LM (on all replicates) curve (black line). For all methods, the area under the curve (AUC) is reported as a quantitative measure of both sensitivity and specificity.
To assess if a higher level of analysis on the Cyber-T regularized t-statistic could help distinguish between DEGs and non-DEGs, the distribution of this statistic vs. the average intensity I is presented in figure 4. Spiked probe-sets are shown as large and dark dots, not amplified cRNAs as large and light dots, and probe-sets that where not spiked as small black dots. An interesting feature of Cyber-T is that it was able to completely remove the intensity-dependant bias on its statistic. But, in doing so, seems to blur the boundaries between the clusters identified from the PL-LM method. It is also important to notice that the clear clustering apparent in figure 2 is revealed only by the use of the treatment coefficient T and is mostly lost using probe-set-based statistics.
Distribution of the Cyber-T statistic as a function of average intensity I. Spiked probe-sets are shown as large and dark gray dots, not amplified cRNAs as large and light gray dots, and probe-sets that where not spiked as small black dots.
By adapting and combining previously proposed approaches (probe-level linear model  and treatment effect clustering ), the PL-LM method was able to outperform by a significant margin the preferred method identified by Choe et al.  on their validation dataset: MAS5.0 background correction and PM adjustment, median polish expression summaries followed by loess normalization and Cyber-T . Moreover, by using probe-level data to assess the variability of a differential expression measure, the PL-LM method maintains its level of performance on the validation dataset even when only one array per condition (control and spike) is used, no matter which arrays are chosen. These results indicate that, within the experimental setup used for the validation study of Choe et al., no replication was necessary to correctly identify 75% of the DEGs within 10% of false positives (compared to 69% using Cyber-T and 14% using the fold-change method).
It is important to qualify the previous statement since the replicates that were performed in this study were technical replicates obtained by hybridizing the same pool of labeled cRNAs to three arrays: the PL-LM method doesn't require technical replicates to achieve high accuracy. In several contexts, it will still be recommended to perform biological replicates to account for possible variations due to limitations of the experimental protocol (small amount of material available, uncontrolled biological factors, etc.). But in general, if each biological sample provides a statistically sound sampling of the population to study, this variability should be negligible. Despite being a controversial technique [17–20], it is possible in practice to reduce this variability by increasing the amount of RNA per sample, and can readily be achieved by pooling multiple samples together. The downside of this approach is that quantification of the biological variations not due to the factor of interest is lost, but this loss might be more than compensated by the reduction in array costs. In fact, to properly quantify the biological variation and to avoid relying on a priori assumptions to regularize it, typically requires a number of arrays that falls well above the budget of a large number of studies. In the study on pooling carried out by Jolly et al.  they compare an ANOVA analysis performed on probe-set expression levels obtained from 5 vs. 3 samples with the analysis of pooled RNA done based on the observed fold-change. They concluded that the pooled strategy should only be used "where the expected response or phenotype is robust and its variation in that response is minimal". It is debatable whether their conclusions stems from the fundamentally diverging approaches used to analyze the pooled vs. individuals datasets or if it truly reflects limitations set forth by the pooling process. The PL-LM method, by being amenable to both multiple and single replicate context, could be used to remove the method bias when comparing the pooled vs. non-pooled approach.
The PL-LM method still carries a few drawbacks. The most limiting aspect is the manual nature of the mixture modeling step: deciding on the number of components and which component(s) is (are) modeling the DEGs is currently done by manual inspection of the optimized mixture parameters. In a different context, Jia et al.  have been using the Bayesian information criterion (BIC) to determine the optimal number of components. The use of a graphical representation as shown in figure 2 greatly simplifies this step but, depending on the dataset analyzed the group separation might be less obvious, and mostly, the procedure relies on the knowledge of it operator. It is also a possibility that on a dataset with an extremely low proportion of DEGs (1 to 10 for example), the mixture step will require a large number of components before dedicating one to the DEGs, complicating the visual assessment of the mixture model. In such circumstance, the mixture could be used to model non-DEGs and an outlier detection approach used to identify DEGs (see ).
In essence, the PL-LM method implements in a single step the RMA expression summary  and the linear model proposed by Kerr et al. . By quantifying directly the difference induced by the treatment without the need to estimate the expression level of a probe-set for each array, the method achieves, on a wholly defined validation dataset, better accuracy without any technical replicate. The reduction in the number of estimated parameters and possibility to consider across treatments observations increases the robustness of the approach to quantify the treatment difference.
Two normalization methods were tested as a pre-treatment to PL-LM to remove intensity-dependant bias and scaling effect: 1) Cyclic loess, introduced by Dudoit et al. , qualitatively performed the best on the Choe et al. dataset but requires 5 minutes of computation time (5 cycles were applied, all CPU time reported are from a P4 3.2GHz); 2) Quantile normalization, described in Bolstad et al. , requires 10 seconds of computation time and returns quantitatively equivalent results after applying the PL-LM and mixture model. Unless stated, all results presented in this paper were done on a log2-transformed and quantile-normalized dataset.
The process of segmenting the genes represented on an array between DEGs and non-DEGs is a highly debated subject. Feature selection can actually be broken down into two distinct steps, a first step seeks to order the genes from the most susceptible to be a DEG to the least, most often returning a transformation of the primary data into a single scalar (called the ordering statistics). As examples, the log2 fold-change, t-statistics, z-scores, relative differences and p-values used by various approaches all play this role. Then, an appropriate threshold should be determined to separate the DEGs from the non-DEGs. Typical approaches are the ad hoc choice of a threshold (the two-fold change rule), ad hoc choice of a number of genes to consider as DEGs, choice of an upper bound to the false discovery rate , or to the Bonferroni-adjusted p-value. Contrarily to common belief, the computation of the ordering statistics doesn't need to be quantitatively accurate, but only its relation to the determined threshold is of importance. The main feature sought in an ordering statistic is its power to segregate the DEGs from non-DEGs. In this paper the discussion will be strictly limited to a choice of statistics since in most practical settings the resources available for follow-up experiments is the determinant factor in adjusting the threshold. When the true segmentation between DEGs and non-DEGs is known (as is the case with the Choe et al. dataset), the use of receiver-operator characteristic (ROC) curves provides visual assessment of the trade-offs between sensitivity and specificity of the ordering induced by a statistics without the need for a specific threshold. The area under the ROC curves (AUC) have also been computed for the approaches applied, it provides a quantitative evaluation of the performance of the method.
Linear model fitting has already been explored for the identification of DEGs in DNA microarray data [12, 22, 23]. It represents a flexible framework where a linear equation can be defined as a function of hidden parameters to return the observed data. Given enough data, well known methods  exist that are able to estimate values for each parameter that minimize the discrepancies between predicted output of the function and the observed data. When analyzing microarray data, the model is designed in such a way that one (or several) of the hidden parameters represents the treatment effect. Either this estimated parameter or the p-value returned by performing hypothesis testing on its value are then used as the ordering statistic.
The machine learning literature  has always been concerned with the concept of over-fitting, which is also applicable to linear model fitting. This concept states that using a too simple model (with less hidden parameters) leads to a systematic bias in the predictions since parts of the phenomenon to model are not accounted for. On the other hand, using a too complex model can lead to instability in the predictions, values of the hidden parameters are artificially adjusted to fit observed variations that are actually due to a normal noise. This situation is called over-fitting and typically arises when the number of observations becomes small with respect to the number of hidden parameters to estimate. The main impact of over-fitting in the context of linear models is a loss of accuracy in the hidden parameter estimates, which implies local shuffling on the order induced by the estimated statistic. An appropriate method to control over-fitting is to settle for a simpler model when the data is scarce, achieving a favorable trade-off between the bias introduced by the simpler model and the variability of the more complex model.
The PL-LM method uses an extra step on top of the linear model, finite mixture model  are used to transform the output of the linear model into an ordering statistics that can flexibly account for biases introduced by the experimental design. Since it is a well-known fact that a finite mixture of Gaussian components can model any arbitrary distribution, this approach doesn't make any assumption with respect to distributional properties of the data analyzed. The EM algorithm  implementation used in this work is the MCLUST software  running under R.
where μ is the level of expression of the gene corresponding to this probe-set, P i models the effect of each probe affinity, T j represents the impact of the treatment j, PT ij is the specific effect of the treatment j on probe i and ε ijk is assumed to be normally distributed with a probe-set specific variance. In context of the Choe et al. dataset (2 treatments, triplicates each), fitting the model for a probe-set means estimating 1 + 14 + 2 + 28 = 40 parameters from 14 × 6 = 84 data points. In their work, Barrera et al.  suggest that decision should be taken by testing the hypothesis of equality between the treatments.
In the context of microarray data analysis, the appropriateness of the normally distributed error term, and thus the possibility to use least-square fitting procedure, is still under debate. The use of a mixture modeling step (see below) in PL-LM to derive the final ordering of the probe-set allows to account for biases introduced in the fitting of T, if this bias is shared by all probe-sets or if it is probe-set intensity-dependant.
This model can readily be extended to experimental designs testing multiple treatments (having more than one unconstrained T j ) and can be applied in the absence of replication. For simplicity, T will be used to refer to the unique unconstrained T j appearing in the analysis of the Choe et al. dataset.
After fitting the model on experimental observations two quantities are used to test if the probe-set corresponds to a DEG or not: T, or the p-value returned by testing if T is different from zero. In the results section, I will show that for the Choe et al. dataset there is a significant dependency between T and the average log2 probe intensity within a probe-set, I, that makes it unreasonable to use the default T = 0 as a null hypothesis for all probes.
To compensate this bias, the expected distribution of T and I over all probe-sets is estimated from the results returned by the linear model. A finite mixture of Gaussian components is known to be able to approximate any distribution and was used for this purpose. It is expected that one or several Gaussian component(s) will be affected to model probe-sets showing significant treatment effect and that this (those) component(s) should account for a proportion of the dataset corresponding to the expected fraction of DEGs. In typical microarray experiments, this fraction is usually assumed to be small (1–5% of the genes expected to change their level of expression). But in the validation dataset built by Choe et al. the fraction of DEG is known to be 9.3% (probe-sets with spiked ratios above 1). Moreover, the non-DEGs are known to fall in two distinct classes: 18.1% of cRNAs were amplified but kept in equal concentrations between the two samples and 72.4% of the cRNAs were not amplified. The segmentation of the probe-sets in three classes defined by the experimental setup warrants the use of a mixture of three Gaussians. And with this model, one Gaussian should be expected to model each class of probe-sets. DEGs can then be identified as the probe-sets with high conditional probabilities of belonging to the component of the mixture modeling DEGs, reducing this clustering step to an ordering of the probe-sets. In the case of real expression data, it is still unclear how to determine the optimal number of components to use and how to determine which component(s) are modeling the DEGs. Visual inspection of the data and mixture parameters are currently needed to make those decisions. A few observations are made in the discussion section regarding this aspect of the work.
The author would like to thank Marc S. Halfon for providing the Choe et al. dataset. This work was supported by a NSERC discovery grant to SL and the Institute for Research in Immunology and Cancer at the Université de Montréal.


Safeway Jordan was founded in 1987 as a pioneer in retailing services. In 1991, Al-Masri family purchased the company. The success of the flagship store in Shmesani led to a rapid expansion throughout the country. In December 2003, Safeway Jordan operations were acquired by The Sultan Center (TSC) of Kuwait. Established in 1976 as a provider of hardware, tools, and supplies to the oil industry, TSC has expanded to become the premier retailer and leading supplier of supermarket items, perishables, and general merchandise in the Middle East.
Today, Safeway operates a total of eleven service stores, two wholesale centers, and three Safeway Express convenience stores in Jordan. We are engaged in adding some more stores to our expanding portfolio.
Still trading under the established Safeway brand name, sixteen stores are full-service operations. All stores are open seven days a week except JU Branch and offer a range of supermarket items, perishables, and general merchandise.
As of customers need we have always provided a variety of exclusive products from different parts of the world. We expanded our international assortments and improved our existing products and service. We also insured serving our customers with seasonal and exclusive products on time. Value added products were introduced along to our extended offers in fresh departments (produce and meat departments). We have also added a home delivery service to provide a very helpful and useful service to insure our customer's satisfaction. We have also remodeled and expanded our business in an effort to provide the best service to our customers.
Due to the growing industry and the need to serve more areas around the country, we opened new stores in 2014, one in the northern city near Ramtha (Al Zatari Store) to serve Syrian refugees, and the second one in Marj Al Hamam Area. In 2015 we opened up two more stores, one in Khalda and the second one in Shafa Badran. In 2016 we opened the new location near the University Of Jordan front gate. This Hub includes bookstores, restaurants, money exchange shop, and much other nice idea for students.
Offer a unique and enjoyable shopping experience and caters for sophisticated customer needs through exclusive assortment and high quality products.
Offer wide assortment of basic value products and caters to price sensitive customers with focus on promotions and bulky deals.
Offer basic and impulsive produce assortment and caters for neighborhood and passing by customers for an easy and quick shopping experience.


Each Month the University honors a Mason employee with the Employee of the Month Award. The candidates are nominated by a supervisor or co-worker and the winners are selected by a committee. The award program is coordinated through Human Resources and Payroll's Reward and Recognition Department, however, a Staff Senator sits of the selection committee and the Senate honors each winner with a gift.
Do you have an employee in your department who deserves to be nominated for Employee of the Month? Do you know how to submit a nomination? Details can be found on the HR webpage.


The planet has always been changing: current patterns of biodiversity are the result of past environmental conditions and ecological and evolutionary constraints. However, current rates and sources of change pose scientists and people in general with new challenges. We must incorporate change into the way we view biodiversity, and learn to distinguish between necessary change and change we should aim to avoid or at the very least mitigate. Extinction per se is an inevitable (and perhaps necessary) process in the balance of the biological diversity contained in the world. It is the mass extinction currently underway, caused by overexploitation of natural resources, that needs to worry us. Similarly, environmental change has always been prevalent, and has helped shape biodiversity patterns of today. In contrast, never before has a single species driven such profound changes to the habitats, composition and climate of the planet. To deal with the challenges raised by these large-scale and intense modifications of the planet, we need to develop quantitative tools to quantify and understand change; we must document change at multiple scales of space, time and organizational levels; and we must develop management tools that take change into account.
Climate Progress goes on talking about the seriousness of the situation--which frankly it's nigh impossible to overstate--but the crucial question is one raised by a commenter there. Paraphrased, how do we get people to care? Richard Brenne suggests more provocative headlines and the one on this post is mostly Brenne's. Thanks.
But does grabbing attention for a few seconds mean people will change? After all, if everything is sensationalized then you start ignoring things that are truly sensational.
I frankly just don't have an answer to the grand and crucial problem of getting each and every one of us to deeply understand the deep and profound, both literal and metaphorical, interconnectedness of existence; to firmly establish the notion that without the very things the rise of our species is destroying--as in all the other species of this planet, we ourselves will die out.
Why is this simple, seemingly self-evident concept so difficult to grasp? Let alone act upon?


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Q: How to create multiple group input type in single form in angular js I am using angula js and php in project
I want to create a form there is multiple input type that is group wise in single form like

name email phone
name email phone
name email phone
name email phone
name email phone

there is not a certain group it can be 10 to 50 so i want to create it in loop
1: How to create in loop
2: How to upload on server
Please help me Thank you

A: you can use 'ng-repeat' on $scope :
<input  ng-model="numberOfInputs" type="text"/>
<button ng-click="myFunc()"> set number of inputs! </button>

<div ng-repeat="item in items">
    <input ng-model="item.name" type="text" />
    <input ng-model="item.phone" type="text" />
</div>

in your controller:
suppose we can set number of inputs and we store it
in $scope.numberOfInputs :
$scope.items = [];

$scope.myFunc = function(){

    for (i = 0; i < $scope.numberOfInputs.length; i++) {

         $scope.items.push({id:i,name:'', email:''});
    }

}

then $scope.items could be send with angular $http service to php!
 and then for converting it to array use json-decode() . after that use php's
foreach loop to iterate trough this array and save each one separatly!

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaStackExchange


One of my favorite office looks is by far the high waisted skirt, whether it's a pencil or a bit shorter one, paired to a tucked in blouse. In this case, I mixed it with a plaid blouse, that looks like a men's shirt. And it's time for a style confession: I LOVE men's shirts, as they always use cool sophisticated prints, vibrant colors and refined details.
To that, I like adding pumps and a little statement necklace (the preferred accessory color to match with blue is silver as they are both cold tones). A little cuff also adds a little something.
I love this outfit for its feminity, power statement and great balance of accessories and of shades of blue.


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Daily Ratings & News for Johnson Controls International
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Johnson Controls International PLC (JCI) Shares Bought by Toronto Dominion Bank
Toronto Dominion Bank increased its holdings in shares of Johnson Controls International PLC (NYSE:JCI) by 15.5% in the first quarter, HoldingsChannel reports. The firm owned 628,201 shares of the company's stock after acquiring an additional 84,493 shares during the period. Toronto Dominion Bank's holdings in Johnson Controls International were worth $23,200,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.
Other institutional investors and hedge funds have also bought and sold shares of the company. Horan Capital Advisors LLC. acquired a new stake in Johnson Controls International in the first quarter valued at approximately $25,000. Creative Financial Designs Inc. ADV grew its position in Johnson Controls International by 155.6% in the first quarter. Creative Financial Designs Inc. ADV now owns 667 shares of the company's stock valued at $25,000 after acquiring an additional 406 shares in the last quarter. Ellis Investment Partners LLC acquired a new stake in Johnson Controls International in the first quarter valued at approximately $30,000. Paragon Capital Management LLC acquired a new stake in Johnson Controls International in the first quarter valued at approximately $31,000. Finally, Financial Gravity Companies Inc. acquired a new stake in Johnson Controls International in the fourth quarter valued at approximately $32,000. 91.94% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.
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In other news, insider Rodney M. Rushing sold 29,728 shares of the firm's stock in a transaction that occurred on Wednesday, May 1st. The shares were sold at an average price of $39.03, for a total transaction of $1,160,283.84. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at this hyperlink. Also, VP Brian J. Stief sold 126,158 shares of the firm's stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, May 7th. The stock was sold at an average price of $39.09, for a total transaction of $4,931,516.22. Following the sale, the vice president now directly owns 154,860 shares of the company's stock, valued at approximately $6,053,477.40. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold 175,384 shares of company stock valued at $6,861,650 in the last three months. Corporate insiders own 0.50% of the company's stock.
Shares of JCI stock traded up $0.18 during mid-day trading on Thursday, reaching $39.23. 175,190 shares of the company were exchanged, compared to its average volume of 4,764,744. Johnson Controls International PLC has a fifty-two week low of $28.30 and a fifty-two week high of $40.33. The company has a current ratio of 0.95, a quick ratio of 0.80 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.40. The company has a market capitalization of $35.08 billion, a P/E ratio of 13.87, a PEG ratio of 2.10 and a beta of 1.06.
Johnson Controls International (NYSE:JCI) last released its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, May 1st. The company reported $0.32 earnings per share for the quarter, topping analysts' consensus estimates of $0.30 by $0.02. Johnson Controls International had a net margin of 8.52% and a return on equity of 9.85%. The business had revenue of $5.78 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $5.79 billion. During the same quarter last year, the company earned $0.54 earnings per share. The business's quarterly revenue was up 2.6% compared to the same quarter last year. On average, research analysts predict that Johnson Controls International PLC will post 1.93 EPS for the current year.
Johnson Controls International announced that its board has authorized a share repurchase program on Thursday, March 7th that authorizes the company to buyback $8.50 billion in shares. This buyback authorization authorizes the company to buy up to 26% of its shares through open market purchases. Shares buyback programs are usually a sign that the company's management believes its shares are undervalued.
Several analysts have issued reports on the stock. Credit Suisse Group assumed coverage on shares of Johnson Controls International in a research report on Monday. They issued a "neutral" rating and a $42.00 price objective for the company. TheStreet raised shares of Johnson Controls International from a "c+" rating to a "b-" rating in a research report on Thursday, May 9th. Zacks Investment Research downgraded shares of Johnson Controls International from a "buy" rating to a "hold" rating in a research report on Tuesday. Wells Fargo & Co raised shares of Johnson Controls International from a "market perform" rating to an "outperform" rating and set a $42.00 price objective for the company in a research report on Monday, March 18th. Finally, Cowen reaffirmed a "hold" rating and issued a $32.00 price objective (down previously from $38.00) on shares of Johnson Controls International in a research report on Friday, February 15th. Two research analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, eight have given a hold rating and five have given a buy rating to the company. Johnson Controls International currently has a consensus rating of "Hold" and an average target price of $39.45.
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Johnson Controls International Company Profile
Johnson Controls International plc operates as a diversified technology and multi industrial company worldwide. The company operates through Building Technologies & Solutions and Power Solutions segments. The company designs, sells, installs, and services heating, ventilating, and air conditioning systems, controls systems, integrated electronic security systems, and integrated fire detection and suppression systems for commercial, industrial, retail, small business, institutional, and governmental customers; and energy efficiency solutions and technical services, including inspection, scheduled maintenance, and repair and replacement of mechanical and control systems, to non-residential building and industrial applications.
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Dicerna Pharmaceuticals (DRNA) Cut to Sell at Zacks Investment Research
7,319 Shares in Franklin Resources, Inc. (BEN) Purchased by Wrapmanager Inc.

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Below are listed the popular routes from airports in Chile to airports in Morocco. Only the cheapest flights found are shown. To find the best deal on your airline ticket Chile to Morocco, use the form below.
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With the self-managed superannuation funds (SMSF) reforms which came into effect on 1 July 2014 and the end of the financial year upon us, now is as good a time as any to make sure your SMSF is on track.
Think a Self-Managed Superannuation Fund (SMSF) is right for you? Before you start, we think you should ask yourself these 3 questions.


There is nothing worse than discovering that you have a leak in your roof. However, if that leak is left unresolved, it can result in much bigger problems like problems for your interior, your belongings and even extensive mold. You might end up needing Metal Roof.
It could be quite challenging to find and hire a good contractor in Loris. Great homes in Loris aren't worth anything without a good roof, but you can't get that without looking into the type of repairs or hiring a professional roofing contractor.
Above The Rest Roofing understands that solving a roof problem immediately is essential to you and your investment. We provide free assessments of your roof and can often be there in the same day. A roof inspection is a method that should be carried out at least once per year to make sure that the roof of your home in Loris is in excellent condition.
At Above the Rest Roofing, we know getting the job done right is the only method to do it. We hope when the time comes for you to replace your roofing system, you will call us for a complimentary roof assessment of your roof needs complete with a written quote. Above the Rest Roofing follows these roof replacement procedures based upon numerous years of roofing experience. Call us if you need Metal Roof.
Above The Rest Roofing provides free roof inspections to homes in Loris to find out what needs to be done. You can depend on us to be fair and reliable.We are dedicated to providing you with good and reliable Metal Roof to consumers in Loris.


Protected Long-stick for Esgrima Lusitana – Jogo do Pau training.
Training sticks with foam protection and rigid core, ideal for the specific training without protections in which occasional touches can occur in the body, or for training of young people in a class scenario with greater safety.
In case of real / competitive combat training or training directed at parts of the body that may suffer damage from impact even with the padded surface the use of personal protective equipment is still required.
This original article from the Esgrima Lusitana Cascais group is presented in a black twill cover.
(Other sizes and colors are possible on request).


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Stretton Institute
Ideas for Australian Cities
Cultural Policy
Food and Water Futures
Democracy, Security, Trust and Integrity
Security in the Pacific Islands
Pacific Partners? The Australia-New Zealand alliance in the Pacific Islands
Regional Perspectives Project
Security Cooperation in the Pacific Islands
Statecraftiness
Stretton Health Equity
Decolonising practice in Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Primary Health Care
Punching Above Their Weight Network
Stretton Health Equity Policy Lab
Hugo Population and Migration Studies Program
Hugh Stretton Oration
Professor Hugh Stretton AC.
Current: Professor Rachel Ankeny elected Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science
Professor Rachel Ankeny elected Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science
Posted on Nov 26 2020 by Lin Siah
Congratulations Professor Rachel Ankeny, Director our Agrifood Policy Program and Deputy Dean, Research at the Faculty of Arts for her election as Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science.
Elected Fellows are awarded for distinguished contributions to STEM-related disciplines, including pioneering research, leadership in a given field, teaching and mentoring, fostering collaborations, and advancing public understanding of science.
Rachel was elected for her contributions to our understanding of the foundational roles that organisms play in biological research and her leadership in history and philosophy of science.
Tagged in agrifood policy
strettoninstitute@adelaide.edu.au
Authorised by: Director, Stretton Institute
Maintained by: Website Maintainer, Stretton Institute
Last updated: 27 Nov 2020


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Tag Archives: digital
Recent Opinion Pieces for TES on education.
August 8, 2015 jimpknightCPD, digital, education, growth mindset, pupil voice, teaching, TES Leave a comment
I've recently been writing opinion pieces for tes.co.uk. Here they are:
11th June: On the need for a government focus on teaching rather than schools.
19th June: About the trendy issue of the Growth Mindset in education.
26th June: the potential of pupil voice – if we listen
3rd July: the power of CPD to change – teacher led
11th July: on education innovation
17th July: a proposal for digital education
27th July: are personal devices in school too distracting?
6th August: we need a learning pattern to match the new working pattern
This is for Dot Everyone
March 30, 2015 jimpknightdigital, martha lane fox 3 Comments
This evening I was lucky enough to be invited to the Science Museum to hear Martha Lane Fox's Dimbleby Lecture. It was engaging, interesting and beautifully delivered, as I would expect. More significantly Martha used the occasion to launch the vision for a new national institution she has christened Dot Everyone.
Martha and I share a passion for digital inclusion. We regularly meet to ensure the organisations we each chair – Go On UK and the Tinder Foundation – are complementing each other in our shared aim of ending the digital divide in Britain. I am also a huge admirer of the work she did as the UK Digital Champion, and subsequently, in influencing long overdue change in the way government embraces digital technology.
It is therefore no surprise that she has used the honour of delivering the Dimbleby Lecture to re-focus on the next challenge so that:
Britain can "leapfrog every nation in the world and become the most digital, most connected, most skilled, most informed on the planet."
Martha's analysis starts with the proposition that the power of the Internet is defined by the balance between private companies and public bodies. The dynamism and dazzling pace comes from the private sector but they must operated in an environment regulated for the public good.
And she is right to say that the civic side of the equation needs a boost.
The digital revolution could and should be "for everyone" as Sir Tim Berners-Lee defined it in the opening ceremony of London 2012. But the dominance of Apple, Google, Amazon and Facebook over the net, risks civic society becoming powerless as a very few in California get richer and richer. Governments are then left as bystanders whose role is only to cheer when those that run them are generous enough to turn to philanthropy.
I want a digital society that is defined by the cultures of sharing and co-creation, not increasing control through decreasing privacy.
In her lecture Martha wants her new institution to initially focus on three things:
First, how we improve our understanding of the internet at all levels of our society
Secondly, how we get more women involved in technology, and
Thirdly, how we tackle the genuinely new and thorny ethical and moral issues the internet has created
The first and third go hand in glove.
There are huge security issues around the asymmetric threats caused by cyber terrorism. There are opportunities to impose surveillance on our online activity, for example to guard against grooming by both paedophiles and terrorist groups. But few senior civil servants, ministers or Parliamentarians have sufficient understanding of the infrastructure of the net to know how best to do this.
And few also see the downsides of invading our online privacy.
These are really difficult judgements and need an informed Parliamentary debate that is informed by the public. Right now it is hard to see much public debate. This is a huge failing by politicians and their friends in the media.
Dot Everyone is a bold idea to keep that debate at the forefront.
And should we worry about the paucity of women in tech? Of course we should – if we want the internet to be more collaborative, more inclusive and to grow the culture of sharing online.
I work with some brilliant women in technology – Helen Milner at Tinder Foundation, Rachel Neaman at Go On UK, Louise Rogers at TES Global, Annika Small at the Nominet Trust, Debbie Forster and Iris Lapinski at Apps For Good and Emma Mulqueeny at Young Rewired State. But I also see how imbalanced the sector is as a whole and know that Martha is right to want this fixed as a priority.
There are plenty more questions to ask about Dot Everyone. Are these the only priorities? What about inclusion? Should it be global or national? How should we find it and safeguard its independence?
But by finding myself asking these questions I know I have already accepted the need for it to exist. Which leads to the question I hope many of us will be asking:
Well done Martha – now how can I help?
PS. Visit Martha's Doteveryone site doteveryone.org.uk and sign up to her change.org perition
Change the political paradigm
October 2, 2014 jimpknightdigital, elections 2 Comments
Six months ago I stood down from the Labour frontbench after nine years, to take up an exciting full time job in education. I still attend the Lords to vote and speak, but I have enjoyed having some distance to reflect on politics in this country.
Outside of Westminster and the media, most people say the same thing: "I'm not really interested in politics…they're all the same." I've heard that on doorsteps for over twenty years, accompanied by declining turnouts at elections, but I've rarely stopped to really drill into what people are saying.
That changed last month when 85% of voters in Scotland showed they were deeply interested in politics. When politics became relevant to them. Whilst the Yes campaign lost, there was a strong sense that voters on both sides wanted politics to change significantly. I don't believe Scottish voters are unusual.
At one level "they're all the same" could be about people in politics. Too many private school and Oxbridge educated white males – like me. Too many who've never achieved anything outside politics, and too much over-promotion of intellect and under-promotion of empathy.
But reflect longer and there are perhaps two other aspects where it may look like "they're all the same".
they're all the same
First, is the appearance that they care more about winning power than using it. I know the vast majority of politicians are in it for the right reasons but the entire political culture is geared around Westminster elections and the positioning needed to win them.
The middle ground is where elections are won and so parties disproportionately focus on how to win votes and craft policies to appeal to the same few electors – leaving everyone else feeling irrelevant. It exposes politicians as being inauthentic; because what they feel is hidden behind what the middle ground tells them they want to hear.
To the disengaged this looks like a game. A game where negative campaigning wins. That dwells on image. That does so because political parties can't risk setting out a vision that describes doing anything profoundly different, in case it loses the election.
This is the second problem. The way politics is done hasn't changed much since the Empire. The debates for decades have been about the role of the state, and the balance of tax and spend. Now the main UK parties seem to agree on cuts and balancing the budget, but with a heated debate about which benefits to cut and how much tax to give away. But it all sounds very similar.
The old ways of doing things are now as useful as Stone Age tools in the Bronze Age
An ageing population, climate change, globalisation, technological change, indebtedness – all the great challenges facing us mean the current paradigm must change. The old ways of doing things are now as useful as Stone Age tools in the Bronze Age.
The case for wholesale change in the way representation, executive decision-making and law making is done has never been stronger. By happy coincidence the public are desperate for a new way of doing things too. Many politicians are starting to see it too but like music industry bosses waking up to Napster and iTunes a decade ago, they don't know what to do. Meanwhile the destructive populism of UKIP is allowed to thrive in the vacuum.
There are no easy prescriptions to the sickness sweeping our politics. But I would start with looking at what is going on in the new economy.
In their 2010 book Macrowikinomics, Dan Tapscott and Anthony Williams offer some clues.
They start with the story of how Ushahidi was used in the 2010 Haiti earthquake to massively improve the effectiveness of disaster response. This crisis mapping site was developed over a weekend by a Kenyan lawyer in 2008, following disputed elections. When the Haiti earthquake struck it took an hour for the same platform to start recruiting the global Haitian diaspora, from a basement in Boston, to translate, categorise and geo-locate thousands of text messages in real time. They used Skype to then relay information to search and rescue teams in Port-au-Prince and respond to requests from the World Food Program and the US military. This bottom up technology proved way more effective than observation on the ground.
This is a social application of the disruptive technology that is the heart of the sharing economy.
The Linux free open source software, that is now in everything from BMW cars to Android phones, has spawned a $50,000,000,000 Linux economy. There are many other examples where co-production of services by consumers is creating massive value and disrupting whole industries, most recently Airbnb. Many of these "prosumer" products are highly resource efficient, empowering of the public and are growing really fast.
What if these forces were embraced by government? What if the sharing economy was accompanied by a sharing society? Could we design public services to cut out the middle layer, the agents, the managers, the bureaucrats, and directly connect consumers and professionals?
There are signs that some are starting to do this.
Fix my Street, here in the UK, is a long standing example of changing the relationship between local people and local government.
I met a group from China last week who told me about their system of national care credits, where the care you give can be exchanged in the future for care you receive.
The US Patent Office has moved to using the public to check patent applications – the volumes became unmanageable and so they had to crowd source it to keep up with innovation (if patents can be effectively regulated by the public, why not replace the House of Lords with mechanisms for the public to improve legislation instead?).
TES Global operates a platform for teachers to share their teaching resources. The network has over 6.5 million members downloading over ten items per second.
digital mutualism
Truly designing digital mutualism for public services ought to be a no-brainer for progressive politicians. It is putting power wealth and opportunity in the hands of the many not the few. It is the co-operative movement re-born in a post-industrial age. But is does mean those with power and influence choosing to give it up – including at the top of the Labour movement.
Embracing a new political paradigm is a big ask. Are we ready for strong government but less active government? For public sector innovation, ending the cult of the policy expert, and being open, transparent and collaborative?
The prize is better services, more personal and at less cost. It depends on rebuilding trust out of the trust we have to share our homes on Airbnb, rather than out of the ashes of the expenses scandal.
This sharing socialism may not be the new paradigm. But I am convinced that the old paradigm is over. If we don't find a new one fast we will be left behind, and people will find a new politics.
Jim Knight is a member of the House of Lords and Managing Director of Online Learning at TES Global.
Data, digital, Politics, Security
Your Privacy at Risk – Your Security Enhanced?
July 16, 2014 jimpknightcivil liberties, digital, Lords, online, security Leave a comment
This is the text of my speech today in the Lords on the controversial Data Retention & Investigatory Powers Bill
My Lords, I have to start—like the noble Lord, Lord Butler, who made such an excellent contribution—by saying that the Government's handling of this Bill has been a disgrace. I cannot repeat any better why it is a disgrace, and it would be ridiculous of me to try to compete with the noble Lord's analysis. To have given Parliament three days when they have had three months to consider their response is a disgrace. Although my ministerial experience, at just five years, is much more limited than that of the previous speaker, whom I equally respect, particularly his experience as Home Secretary, I know that when there was the threat of a case in the European Court, Ministers would receive a risk analysis. I find it difficult to believe that no one in the Home Office had a plan B. If they were to lose that case, the thinking was not going on within government as to how they were going to handle losing the case and the uncertainty with which they would then have to deal with the RIPA powers. So I am afraid that that is my starting point.
I would also strongly agree with my noble friend Lady Smith of Basildon and others when they say that there is a need for Parliament to be seen to address the very real public concerns over the balance of privacy and security and the desire for personalisation of digital services. Some of us use digital services very heavily and are only just becoming aware of how much our desire for all those personal services that come through on our phones and tablets generate metadata that are now the subject of this legislation. Given the need for Parliament to be seen to address and debate, and lead a debate in the wider public, on those concerns, it is an affront to see the legislation railroaded using the fast-track mechanism. The basis of my comments is to analyse whether some of that is justified.
Yesterday, as is my wont, I gave some friends and some of their family who are over from Canada a tour of the Palace of Westminster. Highlights of that tour are always things such as the Magna Carta; there is a copy in the Content Lobby, and we will enjoy celebrating its 800-year anniversary next year. Then there is the statue of Lord Falkland, where the sword was cut to allow a suffragette called Marjory Hume to be taken off to prison in 1909, and the plaque commemorating Nelson Mandela speaking in Westminster Hall. Best of all is the broom cupboard in the Crypt, where Emily Wilding Davison hid on the night of the 1911 census, and the phrase at the end that Tony Benn put there:
"By such means was democracy won for the people of Britain".
That tour contains in its highlights all those moments where we recognise hard-won civil liberties for us as individuals, both here and around the world. It is incumbent on us as a Parliament and those who serve at any given time in this Parliament to protect those liberties as strongly as we protect the safety and security of the people in this country.
We also need to remember that we have a different tolerance of our own privacy, because we agree to become public figures when we agree to come here, than do most people who live in our country. The information in Who's Who would probably allow anyone who wanted to steal some of my information to do so, because it has my mother's maiden name as well as my date of birth, which are the sort of questions that you get asked online. We understand that when we fill out the entry in Who's Who and we are aware of the risks that we take when we do so. I hope when we make up our security information online that we are also aware of it and are accordingly cautious.
We also need to be aware of the issue of metadata. When I sat in the audience in the Donmar Warehouse theatre a month or so ago, as a guest of my noble friend Lord Mitchell, watching the play "Privacy", we heard gasps from the audience when they found out how the default settings on an iPhone mean that Apple knows exactly where we are and exactly when at any given time, unless we change those settings. They were some of the greatest moments of theatre that I have seen in some years—it was my first profession— when I heard the gasps of the audience who saw the pictures of their houses flashed up on the back of the screen, because the researcher had researched them using metadata to show where they all lived. That is metadata, the subject of the Bill—and that is something that we have to be cautious about.
There has been a breakdown of trust in recent years between the people of this country and the state, particularly those pursuing criminal investigations. This is because of Hillsborough and Savile; because of phone hacking, and plebgate. We must have an active debate on a regular basis because of PRISM and because of the powers that the private sector and, through it, the state and GCHQ have to access our data. As a Parliament we have been remiss in not debating Snowden as actively as we should have and as actively as they have done in the US. If we do not, I think we are failing the public
I am persuaded by the arguments that Clauses 1 to 3 are necessary. I believe that security and the ability to continue criminal investigations mean that we have no choice but to pass Clauses 1 to 3 of this Bill. This was well put by the noble Lord, Lord Paddick. We need the status quo for criminal investigations.
I welcome the concessions that my right honourable friend the Shadow Home Secretary, Yvette Cooper, has won in getting the RIPA review and six-monthly reporting into the legislation. I worry that the thinking behind these reviews is through the prism—if that is not the wrong word—of security and law enforcement as the starting point, rather than the data privacy of individuals. I should also like to see a review of the operation of the Information Commissioner's Office. According to its website, it is:
"The UK's independent authority set up to uphold information rights in the public interest, promoting openness by public bodies and data privacy for individuals".
That office needs to be the guardian of members of the public on these issues. I hope the Minister will be able to give an assurance from the Dispatch Box that the Information Commissioner's Office will be included in some of that review work.
Clause 4 concerns what I will call the new powers overseas because I cannot pronounce extraterritoriality very well. I struggle to see the emergency for this to be included in a fast-track Bill. In the report of the Constitution Committee, published today, paragraph 11 says:
"It is not clear why these provisions need to be fast-tracked".
It may not be fashionable to quote Liberty but it says that Clause 5 of DRIP, read together with Clause 4 (8), gives the Government "new, express powers" to go to foreign webmail providers and demand that they hand over or obtain communications data. The objectives of the snoopers' charter are therefore met via another route. That is their charge. If the Minister were able to respond to that, I think that supporters of Liberty would be pleased to hear it.
As I am sure your Lordships will all have done, I have received a letter from a list of highly credible legal experts on internet law. These are professors from a whole range of our best universities. They say that this clause,
"introduces powers that are not only completely novel in the United Kingdom, they are some of the first of their kind globally"
The letter continues,
"the proposed Bill arguably breaches EU law to the extent that it falls within the scope of EU law, since such mass surveillance would still fall foul of the criteria set out by the Court of Justice of the EU in the Digital Rights and Seitlinger judgment".
They would say that the reassurance which the Minister gave, following my intervention, is not true. I am sure that everything the Minister is saying is on good advice and in good faith. I know him to be a completely honourable and truthful man and I do not question what he is saying. However, I would value it if he were able to publish or circulate to Members of your Lordships' House the advice he has received that this legislation, particularly Clause 4, is not in further breach of EU law, and that it will not extend the legal rights—not the practice but the legal rights—of government in respect of these matters.
On balance, very reluctantly, I support the Second Reading of this Bill, but I question whether Clause 4 should continue to be in the Bill.


Each summer, the Atlantic Life Community hosts a Faith and Resistance retreat in Washington, DC. It is held during the anniversaries of the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki on August 6th and 9th, 1945. We use this time to remember the dead and to raise our voices and say, "Never Again". I went along with my dad this year.
After holding demonstrations against war and nuclearism at the Pentagon, the Department of Energy and the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of the Military, our final stop was the White House on the afternoon of August 9th.. I was arrested there after participating in a die-in along with two men, Steve Miller and Start Loving. We laid out in hundred degree weather on hot concrete, bearing signs with pictures of atomic bomb victims. Steve, Start, and the protesters not risking arrest were at my side and giving me encouragement. Mary Grace came to give us water and my dad stood behind us with a sign to shade our faces from the sun until the police had given us the second warning. (The law requires the police to warn us three times to leave the area before they can arrest us for tresspassing.) An hour and three warnings later, the three of us were arrested and taken to the main processing center, Anacostia.
I was frisked, relieved of my shoelaces (so that I wouldn't commit suicide, I guess!), and put in a cell at Anacostia. My cell had a metal chair not quite big enough to lie down on, a metal toilet and a camera in the corner. With very little to work with, I had ample time to reflect on the previous few hours and honestly, I began to doubt myself.
What example could I possibly be setting if I was locked up in a cell where no one could see me? Was it worth it? I spent an hour out on the concrete where I could've sworn I had gotten third degree burns and now I had to wait around until they let me out? Who in their right mind would do this? My dad is crazy to have done this so many times before. He once stayed in jail for eleven months, while I couldn't even last three hours.
A very slim, balding woman came to talk to me and had me call my mom. This was the first instance where I actually felt like a prisoner. She talked down to me more than any other adult had before, seemingly trying to intimidate me. She asked if my dad made me risk arrest, and after having no luck getting through to anyone at home, she sent me back to my cell while she tried some more. She returned later confirming that my dad hadn't abducted me and forced me to refuse the three warnings I was given. I wished I'd had someone to laugh with. I couldn't believe she could possibly be serious, but apparently, she was.
The next time she came they took me out of my cell and put me back in handcuffs as she told me what was going to happen to me; walking through every step with wide eyes and a stern tone. I would be taken to a juvenile processing center where I would have to wait until I was fully put in the system She even threatened me with having to stay in for three weeks! However, the fact that other teenagers have been arrested for similar actions comforted me. I was sure I'd be out of there that night.
The policewoman transporting me from Anacostia to the juvenile center had an obvious dislike for my actions. During the entire ride, she talked about me to someone on the phone and at that point, I wasn't afraid, I was angry. How could she be so disrespectful? How could she even disagree with what I had done? I should not be treated like a prisoner for going against the norm of the citizens in this country and trying to put and end to killing. Who do these people think they are? I was patted down again and fingerprinted twice before being left for thirteen hours in what may be the most insanity-provoking room imaginable. With its whitewashed walls and unbearably cold temperature, I began to feel like a mental patient more than a prisoner. There were two large windows which made it easy for them to see anything I did—not that there was much to do. I could hear them talking about me, asking each other what I was there for. After all, I was the only girl and for that matter, the only white girl in the whole facillity.
Would I? After all I had been through in those thirteen hours, hating it as much as I did, would I go through with it again?
The next morning, I met up with some friends of ours and headed off to court. They kept congratulating me and telling me how brave it was to have done that. They passed on messages to me from other people and asked me so many questions about the night before. Within an hour, my mind had changed about the entire experience. My action had the potential to influence someone else, just as my own dad's actions have influenced me. If what I'd done could move just a few people to participate next time, they could get others to as well. Just think, all we need is a chain reaction to get going and before you know it, the whole country could be demanding peace! I might have made a difference in someone's life that day, whether we were out there on that pavement for an hour or three days.
Would I do it again? Absolutely. Now, there is no doubt in my mind that I'd be willing to risk arrest again. Just the fact that I followed what my conscience said and attempted to make people aware of injustices in the world made the whole trip worth while. Not only that, but it made an amazing story, and after relaying it to friends at school, I felt like I had finally done something that I was meant to do. I used this story for my college essay and I hope to be studying journalism this time next year. Perhaps by writing about the movement I can make a difference as well. I encourage everyone to join with the effort to raise issues and promote peace. By giving yourself to this, you can make it possible to end war and to attain social justice and equality everywhere.
I am deeply mioved by your action and your essay.
Friend Keeley: Good on you. How wonderful to see how your conscience has developed. I never expected anything less from you as I watched you as a child. My love and respect to you, Kevin Wyer. P.S. I'd like a plain one, lightly toasted with extra cream cheese.
Great story, you got a lot of guts, and i too am moved to do more!
Wow, that's quite something. I had the chance to participate in something similar, but apparently wasn't as brave as you. It must feel great to know you made a difference after going through all that.


text:
Q: How to share/post a video on Facebook in iOS I want to share/post video file to facebook via my application.
How to share it?
Tried this one but not working.
NSURL *videourl = [NSURL URLWithString:@"https://graph.facebook.com/me/videos"];

NSString *filePath = [[NSBundle mainBundle] pathForResource:@"me" ofType:@"mov"];
NSURL *pathURL = [[NSURL alloc]initFileURLWithPath:filePath isDirectory:NO];
NSData *videoData = [NSData dataWithContentsOfFile:filePath];

NSDictionary *params = @{
                        @"title": @"Me being silly",
                        @"description": @"Me testing the video upload to Facebook with the new system."
                        };

SLRequest *uploadRequest = [SLRequest requestForServiceType:SLServiceTypeFacebook
                                              requestMethod:SLRequestMethodPOST
                                                        URL:videourl
                                                 parameters:params];
[uploadRequest addMultipartData:videoData
                       withName:@"source"
                           type:@"video/quicktime"
                       filename:[pathURL absoluteString]];

uploadRequest.account = self.facebookAccount;

[uploadRequest performRequestWithHandler:^(NSData *responseData, NSHTTPURLResponse *urlResponse, NSError *error) {
    NSString *responseString = [[NSString alloc] initWithData:responseData encoding:NSUTF8StringEncoding];
    if(error){
        NSLog(@"Error %@", error.localizedDescription);
    }else
        NSLog(@"%@", responseString);
}];


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Volvo's 90 branded range of vehicles have truly enhanced the brand's image in the Indian market and their remarkable design and new age technologies have set a benchmark for the cars expected from this Swedish carmaker. Volvo is now focusing on their 60 branded range of vehicles - the first of which, is the XC60. It's a crossover that is much loved around the globe and the new one it appears will fit into the lineage just fine.
It speaks the design language of its elders and though I'm not a big fan of the same-sausage-different-size philosophy, the elegance of Volvo's new design is something that I would openly welcome on various body styles. Like the 90 branded range of Volvo's, the XC60 too is built on the Scalable Product Architecture - a modular platform that allows Volvo's engineers and designers to customize the dimensions of the car to suit various body-styles. The distance between the front axle and the dashboard remains unchanged on all SPA cars though and this works in the XC60's favour by giving it proportions appropriate for a premium crossover. Compared to its highly successful predecessor, the new XC60 is 44mm longer, 11mm wider and 14mm shorter and the result is a crossover that has an athletic stance and looks very proportionate.
The Volvo XC60 does resemble the XC90 in many ways, but its smaller dimensions are evident even when it's standing by itself. Another quick way of distinguishing the XC60 from the XC90 is the front face, where the Thor's Hammer daytime running lights poke their way out to reach the grille. The headlight assembly is studded with adaptive LED headlamps and the rear is typical Volvo with the familiar design of the taillights.
The side profile looks quite interesting too with the 19-inch wheels beefing up the stance. I particularly like the large doors which now extend all the way down to the floor and integrate the side skirting within the exterior door panel. This prevents your trousers from picking up stains during ingress or egress after an off-road session or a wet weather drive. Quite practical and thoughtful.
Despite the lower height of the roof, getting in and out of the cabin is pretty easy. The steering and the vertical infotainment screen establish the resemblance with the XC90 yet again. It is actually a good thing since the buyer gets Volvo's top drawer equipment and materials even in the carmaker's medium-level car. A seamless panel of grey coloured open pore wood snakes across the length of the dashboard and its natural texture feels nice when you touch it. You will also notice a flag of Sweden embossed in the chrome lining on the dash. Its coloured counterpart, as always, is situated on the side of the driver's seat.
The perforated Nappa leather upholstery on the seats looks best in tan (which is getting increasingly popular with customers, says Volvo) and I like the soft texture of the leather used too. As in most new Volvo vehicles, the seats in the XC60 also have a slim profile and an orthopedic certified design. On the launch edition that you see here, these come with ventilation and massage functions for the front pair of seats. The rear is quite roomy and the seats seem comfortable for long distance journeys. Despite the narrow glasshouse, there is an airy feel to the cabin, thanks to the panoramic sunroof.
Luxury car makers normally take audio sound quality very seriously and the XC60 has summoned the expertise of Bowers & Wilkins for its audio setup. It is made up of 15 speakers including a set of tweeters that are designed to play without any reverb; and an air-ventilated subwoofer that is the only one of its kind found in a standard fit automotive audio system. All this ensures the audio is great no matter what your choice of music or equalizer preset setting is.
Should you choose to not play any audio at all, the cabin turns into a place so quiet, that it is pleasantly surprising for a diesel burning vehicle. Volvo has worked hard on insolating the road, tyre, wind and drivetrain noises and the result is clearly evident. Our drive was largely limited to the smooth tarmac of Chennai's East Coast Road where we hardly experienced any road or tyre noise. The engine refinement is also impressive with the XC60 building pace deceptively.
The engine in question is the same 2.0l four-cylinder motor that's available in the D5 variants of Volvo's 90 branded range of vehicles. It manages to churn out a commendable 235PS and 480Nm of torque, which are figures that are usually in V6 territory. Given the overall lightweight (~1860kg) of the Volvo XC60, the engine feels eager and enthusiastic.
The eagerness of the engine is complemented by a fairly quick eight-speed transmission sourced from Aisin and a Haldex all-wheel-drive system. We have sampled this setup in the past and know that the XC60 is predominantly front wheel drive until there is loss of traction which transfers power to the rear wheels. I'm pretty sure in our test car the majority of the drive was with the power going to the front wheels only, since the straight roads and grippy tarmac were hardly a challenge for traction.
At launch, the Volvo XC60 will also be offered with air suspension on all four corners that enables the car to alter damping and ride height if needed. Our test car let us choose between Eco, Comfort, Off-road and Dynamic modes to alter the nature of the suspension and drivetrain. Surprisingly, the Individual mode to set suspension and drivetrain parameters separately, wasn't available. That said, the preset settings work just fine. The XC60 is an easy driver when you want it to be and seems like it will deliver equally well when given the beans.
If the list of safety features isn't the juiciest part of the brochure, the car wouldn't qualify as a Volvo. Appreciably, the carmaker hasn't shied away from bringing in some of its best safety tech to the India-spec XC60 either. For a mid-level offering, the list is commendable and the most notable features and assistance systems are front, side and curtain airbags, collision mitigation support at the front and rear, emergency steering assist, lane keeping assist and emergency braking assist. The City Safety package, which uses most of these systems in its application, had debuted in India on the previous generation XC60. The new one takes its further by being active at city as well as highway speeds, making the new Volvo XC60 a safer package overall.
The previous generation XC60 was clearly the best seller for Volvo, contributing to 30 per cent of the carmaker's overall sales. In fact I had even termed it one of the best buys from Sweden for its practicality. The new XC60 only seems to make the deal sweeter. It is still as sensible as you would expect a Volvo to be, but the added enthusiasm and youthfulness should give it an even wider appeal.


text:
Opus Appoints CEO
Home/Opus Appoints CEO
Leading SaaS compliance platform appoints Emanuele Conti as Chief Executive Officer
September 6, 2016, New York & London: Opus Global ("Opus"), the leading provider of SaaS-based compliance solutions, announced today the appointment of Emanuele "Manny" Conti as Chief Executive Officer. Conti brings more than 20 years of leadership experience in the risk management and data analytics industries, with a proven track record of building global growth-oriented businesses. He was most recently CEO of Kroll Inc. and before that, President of the North America and International divisions of Dun & Bradstreet.
Opus was co-founded by GTCR, a leading Chicago-based private equity firm and Doug Bergeron, former CEO of VeriFone, who will now serve as Executive Chairman. Since 2014 Opus has more than quadrupled in size and now includes a fast-growing and impressive number of the world's largest corporations as customers.
Conti said, "I am proud to join a company whose mission is anchored in helping its clients solve important and complex compliance risks such as AML, KYC, ABAC (anti-bribery and anti-corruption) and third party management. I look forward to continuing to drive innovation at the company and helping our clients address their ever-changing regulatory requirements."
Opus has rapidly built its SaaS-based compliance platform through the successful acquisitions of Hiperos and Alacra (acquired in June 2014 and September 2015, respectively). The company has already created an unmatched combination of reference data, third party management software and know-your-customer workflow solutions. Opus's vision is to build the preeminent regulatory technology, risk and compliance business and has a $500 million commitment to fund the strategy.
Bergeron said, "We are excited to have Manny join Opus at this important stage of growth for our company. I believe his extensive experience in the risk and compliance space will help accelerate the innovation efforts required to meet the dynamic compliance needs of our clients. He is a strong leader with a proven track record of results that I believe will help us achieve our full potential."
Photos are available on request
Opus is a compliance platform provider headquartered in Palo Alto, California, created through a $500 million partnership between GTCR, one of the world's leading private equity firms, and Doug Bergeron, former CEO of VeriFone. Through direct investments and targeted acquisitions, Opus's mission is to build the world's leading compliance platform by integrating leading technology solutions addressing the increasingly complex compliance requirements and risks faced by companies across all industries. Currently, these include our Alacra KYC/AML and Reference Data business information solutions for large financial services customers, and our Hiperos 3PM solutions for large corporate clients across several large end market verticals including energy, financial services, manufacturing, real estate, life sciences, and technology. For more information about Opus, please visit www.opusglobal.com. For more information on our KYC/AML and Reference Data solutions, please visit www.alacra.com, and for more information on our 3PM solutions, please visit www.hiperos.com.
Marketing Contacts:
Sharon Marcone
W: +1-908-981-1090
Email: smarcone@hiperos.com
Email: carolann.thomas@alacra.com
By Carol Ann Thomas|2019-01-17T13:14:02-04:00September 6th, 2016|Alacra, AML and Compliance, Hiperos, Information Industry, News, Opus Global, Reference Data, Third Party Management|
About the Author: Carol Ann Thomas
Carol Ann Thomas is Alacra's long time Marketing Manager and responsible for all traditional marketing, branding, events and social media. One of the firm's first ten employees, she has been with Alacra since early 1997. Carol Ann began her career in sales and marketing at Knight-Ridder Financial Information, specializing in account management and training for technical analysis and trading applications. She has more than 25 years experience in the Business Information space.


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text:
Arts Creative Handpicked Peoples
This Czech Artist Entrances Viewers With His Amazing Colorful Geometric Forms
By Deepak Mehla on Sunday, May 12, 2019
His art consists of nothing but fat colorful blobs and other shaded shapes and forms. But one look at them and you're totally swept off your feet. Meet Jan Kaláb, a Czech born in 1978, who became a graffiti artist when graffiti was literally unknown in his country. He became a pioneer in this field and helped spread his form of art in Eastern European countries in the 90s when they opened to western influences.
Kaláb founded the DSK and became famous throughout Europe, where he was lovingly called 'Cakes'. This fame was not enough for him and in order to broaden his horizon, he moved to New York, where he started calling himself 'Point'. Here his acumen for street art came to fore and he started creating huge sculpted abstract letters on the walls and the streets.
Kaláb's graffiti differs from the usual graffiti in that he never uses a spray can. He chooses to render his graffiti by making it by hand with acrylic paints and brushes. These creations were what led him towards the path of total abstraction. He also perfected 3D graffiti.
In order to further refine his art, Kaláb got enrolled in the Academy of Fine Arts of Prague and graduated as Magister of Art in 2006. Incidentally, he was the first Czech to do so from this academy. This motivated him to hold his first solo exhibition in 2008 in Prague that was well received. He also held solo exhibitions in other countries, such as Argentina, Germania and the US.
Kaláb's inspiration is František Kupka, also known as Frank Kupka or François Kupka, a Czech painter and graphic artist, who was the co-founder of the abstract art movement and Orphic Cubism. Under his influence, Kaláb's works evolved increasingly towards geometric forms. His colorful use of squares and circles display depth, time and motion. Little wonder, his works are so captivating.
Kaláb is a recipient of 2010 Art Prague Young Award and Prize of UniCredit Bank at Art Prague art fair. He enjoys a fan following of over 32,000 on Instagram.
Image Via: Jan Kaláb
Website | Instagram | Facebook
3D graffiti Art Prague. art fair Czech Artist Fine Arts graffiti graffiti artist Jan Kaláb sculpted abstract letters street art


Adorable invitation for the little man on the way!. Each invitation measures 4.75 x 6.75 and is printed on Tiffany Blue metallic (shiny) card stock (weight of 285 grams).
Adorable invitation for the little man on the way!. Each invitation measures 4.75 x 6.75 and is printed on Tiffany Blue metallic (shiny) card stock (weight of 285 grams). All wording is customized for you. Please include all wording in the "Provide Your Wording" field above. Ensure to include: * Guest of Honor's Name * Date and Time of Event * Location Name and Address * RSVP telephone number and/or email address A proof will be emailed to you for review and approval within 24 hours of purchase. It will be sent to the email account used to make the Paypal payment, unless advised otherwise. Once approval is received, the order will be processed and shipped within 2-3 days.