SYDNEY (Reuters) - The Australian Federal Police said on Wednesday they had arrested a man who they described as a senior member of the group that hacked websites of major corporations, including Sony Pictures, last year.
Police said the 24-year-old man, the self-styled leader of the LulzSec hacking collective, was charged on Tuesday with hacking offences.
LulzSec, an offshoot of the international hacking group Anonymous, has taken credit for hacking attacks on government and private sector websites, including 20th Century Fox and Nintendo.
Anonymous - and LulzSec in particular - became notorious in late 2010 when they launched what they called the "first cyber war" in retaliation for attempts to shut down the Wikileaks website.
This undated photo provided by Tom Smedinghoff, shows Anne Smedinghoff. Anne Smedinghoff, 25, was killed Saturday, April 6, 2013 in southern Afghanistan , the first American diplomat to die on the job since last year's attack on the U.S. diplomatic installation in Benghazi, Libya. (AP Photo/Tom Smedinghoff)
This undated photo provided by Tom Smedinghoff, shows Anne Smedinghoff. Anne Smedinghoff, 25, was killed Saturday, April 6, 2013 in southern Afghanistan , the first American diplomat to die on the job since last year's attack on the U.S. diplomatic installation in Benghazi, Libya. (AP Photo/Tom Smedinghoff)
This undated photo provided by Tom Smedinghoff, shows Anne Smedinghoff. Anne Smedinghoff, 25, was killed Saturday, April 6, 2013 in southern Afghanistan , the first American diplomat to die on the job since last year's attack on the U.S. diplomatic installation in Benghazi, Libya. (AP Photo/Tom Smedinghoff)
This image made from AP video shows Afghan National Army soldier rushing to the scene moments after a car bomb exploded in front the PRT, Provincial Reconstruction Team, in Qalat, Zabul province, southern Afghanistan, Saturday, April 6, 2013. Six American troops and civilians and an Afghan doctor were killed in attacks on Saturday in southern and eastern Afghanistan as the U.S. military's top officer began a weekend visit to the country, officials said. (AP Photo via AP video)
CHICAGO (AP) ? The family of an American diplomat who was among those killed in a terrorist attack in southern Afghanistan has taken solace in knowing she died doing what she loved.
Anne Smedinghoff, the first American diplomat to die on the job since last year's attack in Benghazi, Libya, was one of five Americans killed Saturday in a suicide car bombing while they were delivering textbooks to school children. The Taliban claimed responsibility for the attack.
The 25-year-old suburban Chicago woman was remembered as having a quiet ambition and displayed a love of global affairs from an early age. She joined the U.S. Foreign Service straight out of college and volunteered for missions in perilous locations worldwide.
"It was a great adventure for her ... She loved it," her father, Tom Smedinghoff, told The Associated Press on Sunday. "She was tailor-made for this job."
Anne Smedinghoff grew up in River Forest, Ill. ? an upscale suburb about 10 miles west of Chicago ? the daughter of an attorney and the second of four children. She attended the highly selective Fenwick High School, followed by Johns Hopkins University, where she majored in international studies and became a key organizer of the university's annual Foreign Affairs Symposium in 2008. The event draws high-profile speakers from around the world.
Those who knew Smedinghoff described her as a positive, hard-working and dependable young woman.
While a student in Baltimore, she worked part time for Sam Hopkins, an attorney near campus. He described her as ambitious "but in a wonderfully quiet, modest way."
Her first assignment for the foreign service was in Caracas, Venezuela, and she volunteered for the Afghanistan assignment after that. Her father said family members would tease her about signing up for a less dangerous location, maybe London or Paris.
"She said, 'What would I do in London or Paris? It would be so boring,'" her father recalled. In her free time, she would travel as much as possible, her father said.
Smedinghoff was an up-and-coming employee of the State Department who garnered praise from the highest ranks. She was to finish her Afghanistan assignment as a press officer in July. Already fluent in Spanish, she was gearing up to learn Arabic, first for a year in the U.S. and then in Cairo, before a two-year assignment in Algeria.
Secretary of State John Kerry said Sunday at a news conference in Turkey that Smedinghoff was "vivacious, smart" and "capable." Smedinghoff had assisted Kerry during a visit to Afghanistan two weeks ago.
He also described Smedinghoff as "a selfless, idealistic woman who woke up yesterday morning and set out to bring textbooks to school children, to bring them knowledge."
Her father said they knew the assignments were dangerous, though she spent most of her time at the U.S. Embassy compound. Trips outside were in heavily armored convoys ? as was Saturday's trip that killed five Americans, including Smedinghoff. The U.S. Department of Defense did not release the names of the others who died: three soldiers and one employee.
"It's like a nightmare, you think will go away and it's not," he said. "We keep saying to ourselves, we're just so proud of her, we take consolation in the fact that she was doing what she loved."
Friends remembered her Sunday for her charity work too.
Smedinghoff participated in a 2009 cross-country bike ride for The 4K for Cancer ? part of the Ulman Cancer Fund for Young Adults ? according to the group. She served on the group's board of directors after the ride from Baltimore to San Francisco.
"She was an incredible young woman. She was always optimistic," said Ryan Hanley, a founder of the group. "She always had a smile on her face and incredible devotion to serving others."
Johns Hopkins officials mourned her death in a letter on Sunday to students, faculty and alumni. Smedinghoff graduated in 2009. In the letter, University President Ronald J. Daniels praised her work on the symposium, her involvement in her sorority, Kappa Alpha Theta, and her involvement outside campus too.
"Her selfless action for others was nothing new," he wrote.
Funeral arrangements for Smedinghoff are pending.
___
Contact Sophia Tareen at https://www.twitter.com/sophiatareen .
Alongside the big Facebook Home announcement today was a short and sweet video which ran through what these new Android apps were all about. Sure, the video is mostly about invoking all the feels for social networking, but we do get to see Chat Heads, Cover Feed and notifications in action. It looks like it's working smoothly enough, anyway.
Expect Facebook Home to be landing April 12, alongside the new HTC First.
In this April 3, 2013 photo shows Butte-Silver Bow Animal Shelter supervisor Jacki Casagranda sits with "Shirley" a pygmy goat in Butte Mont. The goat was picked up at a local bar by the animal warden last weekend. Fairmont Hot Springs Resort general manager Steve Luebeck says staffers knew the goat was missing but didn't realize it had been stolen until they saw a story in The Montana Standard reporting that a goat had been taken into a Butte bar early Sunday. Shirley was returned to the resort's petting zoo. (AP Photo/The Montana Standard, Walter Hinick)
In this April 3, 2013 photo shows Butte-Silver Bow Animal Shelter supervisor Jacki Casagranda sits with "Shirley" a pygmy goat in Butte Mont. The goat was picked up at a local bar by the animal warden last weekend. Fairmont Hot Springs Resort general manager Steve Luebeck says staffers knew the goat was missing but didn't realize it had been stolen until they saw a story in The Montana Standard reporting that a goat had been taken into a Butte bar early Sunday. Shirley was returned to the resort's petting zoo. (AP Photo/The Montana Standard, Walter Hinick)
BUTTE, Mont. (AP) ? So the goat that walked into a Montana bar last weekend ... was stolen from a petting zoo.
Fairmont Hot Springs Resort general manager Steve Luebeck says staffers knew the goat was missing but didn't realize it had been stolen until they saw a story in The Montana Standard on Wednesday reporting that a goat had been taken into a Butte bar early Sunday.
The pygmy goat, named "Shirley, was returned to the resort's petting zoo.
Luebeck tells The Standard (http://bit.ly/11rcGB5 ) he has never had an animal stolen from the zoo, which has goats and miniature horses. He says zoo managers would like to know who took the animal so they can press charges.
___
Information from: The Montana Standard, http://www.mtstandard.com
Holy freaking smokes, almost getting hit by a train doesn't get closer than this. A young woman in Sao Paulo, Brazil had apparently dropped her phone onto the metro tracks and foolishly jumped down to retrieve it. Couple of problems with this situation: she couldn't get back on the platform, the train was coming into the station fast AND SHE PROBABLY WOULD"VE DIED. Miraculously, two guys managed to pull her out right before she would've gotten hit. It's terrifyingly close. More »
Fatty acid metabolite shows promise against cancer in micePublic release date: 2-Apr-2013 [ | E-mail | Share ]
Contact: Dorsey Griffith dorsey.griffith@ucdmc.ucdavis.edu 916-734-9118 University of California - Davis Health System
UC Davis discovery demonstrates mechanism in dietary omega-3 fatty acids (fish oils)
(SACRAMENTO, Calif.) A team of UC Davis scientists has found that a product resulting from a metabolized omega-3 fatty acid helps combat cancer by cutting off the supply of oxygen and nutrients that fuel tumor growth and spread of the disease.
The scientists report their discovery in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS). The groundbreaking study was a collaboration among multiple UC Davis laboratories and Harvard University.
The metabolite is epoxy docosapentaenoic acid (EDP), an endogenous compound produced by the human body from the omega-3 fatty acid named docosahexaenoic acid (DHA), which is found in fish oil and breast milk. In animal studies, the UC Davis scientists found that EDP inhibits angiogenesis, the formation of new blood vessels in the body.
Tumors grow and spread by hijacking the normal biological process of angiogenesis, which plays a role in wound repair as well in growth and development. The UC Davis researchers determined that by inhibiting angiogenesis, EDP reduces the growth and spread (metastasis) of tumors in mice. The research provides the first scientific evidence about EDP's potent anti-cancer, anti-metastatic effects.
EDP works by a different mechanism than many current anti-cancer drugs that block angiogenesis.
"Our investigation opens up a new understanding of the pathways by which omega-3 fatty acids exert their biologic effects," said Guodong Zhang, the lead author of the article and a postdoctoral researcher in the laboratory of Bruce Hammock in the Department of Entomology and the UC Davis Comprehensive Cancer Center.
The researchers said that future studies hopefully will determine that stabilized EDP can be safely and effectively combined with other current anti-angiogenesis drugs in the treatment of cancer.
"As far as we know, EDPs are the first signaling lipids that have been discovered to have such potent anti-cancer effects. Researchers may be able to use EDPs as structural targets to develop stable analogs that mimic their anti-cancer agents," Zhang said.
"The study by Zhang and colleagues has uncovered a previously unrecognized anti-cancer effect of omega-3 fatty acids, which are an important lipid component of diets that have been developed to prevent heart disease and cancer," said Jonathan R. Lindner, professor of medicine at Oregon Health & Sciences University.
"The authors have demonstrated that metabolites of these lipids can act to suppress the growth of new blood vessels that are necessary to feed tumor growth," added Lindner, who was not involved in the study. "By shutting off a tumor's blood supply, these compounds can act to dramatically slow tumor growth and prevent spread. The results from this study suggest that new drug strategies for fighting cancer could emerge from knowledge of how the body uses nutrition to promote health."
The EDPs are broken down in the body by inhibiting the enzyme soluble epoxide hydrolase (sHI). In previous research, Hammock's lab showed that inhibitors of the sEHI enzyme help to normalize physiological activity. In the current study, UC Davis researchers determined that the addition of sEHI stabilized EDP in circulating blood thereby producing EDPs' anti-tumor effects. The anti-cancer drugs sorafenib and regorafenib are FDA-approved sEHIs.
"It may be possible to improve the efficacy of these anti-cancer drugs by combining them with a diet high in omega-3 and low in omega-6 fatty acids," Hammock said.
The researchers also found that a metabolite of arachidonic acid (ARA), an omega-6 fatty acid, has the opposite effect of EDP. The ARA metabolite, epoxyeicosatrienoic acids (EETs), slightly increases angiogenesis and tumor progression in mice.
"There is no free lunch," said Katherine W. Ferrara, professor in the UC Davis Department of Biomedical Engineering. "The EETs encourage wound healing, while the EDPs block the growth and metastasis of solid tumors.
"Our results designate EDPs and EETs as unique mediators of an angiogenic switch to regulate tumorigenesis," Ferrara said. "They also implicate a novel mechanistic linkage between omega-3 and omega-6 fatty acids and cancers."
UC Davis scientists determined that EDP starves tumors by inhibiting vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) and fibroblast growth factor-2 (FGF-2)-induced angiogenesis in mice. In laboratory cultures, EDP also suppresses the endothelial cell migration needed for new blood vessels.
Thus, EDP-based angiogenesis inhibitors offer an advantage over angiogenesis inhibitors that target the VEGF-VEGFR2 pathway. The drugs that target the VEGF-VEFGFR2 pathway increase patients' risk for high blood pressure.
Because EDPs widen the blood vessels, a medication based on the UC Davis researchers' discovery should not increase the patient's risk for high blood pressure.
Harvard researchers Mark Kieran and Dipak Panigrahy conducted the metastasis studies. The in vivo imaging work that allowed the scientists to monitor tumors in living mice was done in Ferrara's UC Davis laboratory.
###
UC Davis Comprehensive Cancer Center is the only National Cancer Institute-designated center serving the Central Valley and inland Northern California, a region of more than 6 million people. Its specialists provide compassionate, comprehensive care for more than 9,000 adults and children every year, and access to more than 150 clinical trials at any given time. Its innovative research program engages more than 280 scientists at UC Davis, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory and Jackson Laboratory (JAX West), whose scientific partnerships advance discovery of new tools to diagnose and treat cancer. Through the Cancer Care Network, UC Davis collaborates with a number of hospitals and clinical centers throughout the Central Valley and Northern California regions to offer the latest cancer care. Its community-based outreach and education programs address disparities in cancer outcomes across diverse populations. For more information, visit http://cancer.ucdavis.edu.
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AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.
Fatty acid metabolite shows promise against cancer in micePublic release date: 2-Apr-2013 [ | E-mail | Share ]
Contact: Dorsey Griffith dorsey.griffith@ucdmc.ucdavis.edu 916-734-9118 University of California - Davis Health System
UC Davis discovery demonstrates mechanism in dietary omega-3 fatty acids (fish oils)
(SACRAMENTO, Calif.) A team of UC Davis scientists has found that a product resulting from a metabolized omega-3 fatty acid helps combat cancer by cutting off the supply of oxygen and nutrients that fuel tumor growth and spread of the disease.
The scientists report their discovery in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS). The groundbreaking study was a collaboration among multiple UC Davis laboratories and Harvard University.
The metabolite is epoxy docosapentaenoic acid (EDP), an endogenous compound produced by the human body from the omega-3 fatty acid named docosahexaenoic acid (DHA), which is found in fish oil and breast milk. In animal studies, the UC Davis scientists found that EDP inhibits angiogenesis, the formation of new blood vessels in the body.
Tumors grow and spread by hijacking the normal biological process of angiogenesis, which plays a role in wound repair as well in growth and development. The UC Davis researchers determined that by inhibiting angiogenesis, EDP reduces the growth and spread (metastasis) of tumors in mice. The research provides the first scientific evidence about EDP's potent anti-cancer, anti-metastatic effects.
EDP works by a different mechanism than many current anti-cancer drugs that block angiogenesis.
"Our investigation opens up a new understanding of the pathways by which omega-3 fatty acids exert their biologic effects," said Guodong Zhang, the lead author of the article and a postdoctoral researcher in the laboratory of Bruce Hammock in the Department of Entomology and the UC Davis Comprehensive Cancer Center.
The researchers said that future studies hopefully will determine that stabilized EDP can be safely and effectively combined with other current anti-angiogenesis drugs in the treatment of cancer.
"As far as we know, EDPs are the first signaling lipids that have been discovered to have such potent anti-cancer effects. Researchers may be able to use EDPs as structural targets to develop stable analogs that mimic their anti-cancer agents," Zhang said.
"The study by Zhang and colleagues has uncovered a previously unrecognized anti-cancer effect of omega-3 fatty acids, which are an important lipid component of diets that have been developed to prevent heart disease and cancer," said Jonathan R. Lindner, professor of medicine at Oregon Health & Sciences University.
"The authors have demonstrated that metabolites of these lipids can act to suppress the growth of new blood vessels that are necessary to feed tumor growth," added Lindner, who was not involved in the study. "By shutting off a tumor's blood supply, these compounds can act to dramatically slow tumor growth and prevent spread. The results from this study suggest that new drug strategies for fighting cancer could emerge from knowledge of how the body uses nutrition to promote health."
The EDPs are broken down in the body by inhibiting the enzyme soluble epoxide hydrolase (sHI). In previous research, Hammock's lab showed that inhibitors of the sEHI enzyme help to normalize physiological activity. In the current study, UC Davis researchers determined that the addition of sEHI stabilized EDP in circulating blood thereby producing EDPs' anti-tumor effects. The anti-cancer drugs sorafenib and regorafenib are FDA-approved sEHIs.
"It may be possible to improve the efficacy of these anti-cancer drugs by combining them with a diet high in omega-3 and low in omega-6 fatty acids," Hammock said.
The researchers also found that a metabolite of arachidonic acid (ARA), an omega-6 fatty acid, has the opposite effect of EDP. The ARA metabolite, epoxyeicosatrienoic acids (EETs), slightly increases angiogenesis and tumor progression in mice.
"There is no free lunch," said Katherine W. Ferrara, professor in the UC Davis Department of Biomedical Engineering. "The EETs encourage wound healing, while the EDPs block the growth and metastasis of solid tumors.
"Our results designate EDPs and EETs as unique mediators of an angiogenic switch to regulate tumorigenesis," Ferrara said. "They also implicate a novel mechanistic linkage between omega-3 and omega-6 fatty acids and cancers."
UC Davis scientists determined that EDP starves tumors by inhibiting vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) and fibroblast growth factor-2 (FGF-2)-induced angiogenesis in mice. In laboratory cultures, EDP also suppresses the endothelial cell migration needed for new blood vessels.
Thus, EDP-based angiogenesis inhibitors offer an advantage over angiogenesis inhibitors that target the VEGF-VEGFR2 pathway. The drugs that target the VEGF-VEFGFR2 pathway increase patients' risk for high blood pressure.
Because EDPs widen the blood vessels, a medication based on the UC Davis researchers' discovery should not increase the patient's risk for high blood pressure.
Harvard researchers Mark Kieran and Dipak Panigrahy conducted the metastasis studies. The in vivo imaging work that allowed the scientists to monitor tumors in living mice was done in Ferrara's UC Davis laboratory.
###
UC Davis Comprehensive Cancer Center is the only National Cancer Institute-designated center serving the Central Valley and inland Northern California, a region of more than 6 million people. Its specialists provide compassionate, comprehensive care for more than 9,000 adults and children every year, and access to more than 150 clinical trials at any given time. Its innovative research program engages more than 280 scientists at UC Davis, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory and Jackson Laboratory (JAX West), whose scientific partnerships advance discovery of new tools to diagnose and treat cancer. Through the Cancer Care Network, UC Davis collaborates with a number of hospitals and clinical centers throughout the Central Valley and Northern California regions to offer the latest cancer care. Its community-based outreach and education programs address disparities in cancer outcomes across diverse populations. For more information, visit http://cancer.ucdavis.edu.
[ | E-mail | Share ]
?
AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.
Flurry, an app analytics firm with a presence on some now 1 billion mobile devices, has taken another deep dive into its large data set to examine the increasingly fragmented selection of hardware form factors on the market today, in an effort to better understand consumer preferences. The report concludes that people most prefer and use apps on medium-sized smartphones, like those in the Samsung Galaxy line, and full-sized tablets like the iPad. "Phablets," meanwhile, Flurry dubs a "fad," saying that they don't show significant, or even disproportionally significant, app usage.
LONDON (AP) ? Stock markets mostly rose on Tuesday on hopes that improvements in the U.S. economy will make up for the continued gloom in the eurozone, where the unemployment rate hit a new record high.
Traders will keep an eye on data for U.S. factory orders later Tuesday in the run-up to Friday's release of the monthly jobs figures, a key measure of the health of the world's largest economy.
The steady recovery in the U.S. has been supporting markets in the face of financial trouble in the 17-country eurozone, where the economy continues to wilt under the pressure of government budget cuts. Unemployment in the single currency bloc hit a record high in January and February, at 12 percent. Governments are trimming costs and companies are discouraged from hiring due to uncertainty in markets.
Cyprus was the focus of such financial uncertainty this month as it chaotically negotiated a bailout. Deep cuts to its banking sector are expected to cause a huge slump in the economy ? to ease the pain the country was granted more time to reach its budget targets.
By late morning in Europe, Britain's FTSE 100 was up 0.8 percent to 6,465.73 while Germany's DAX rose 0.7 percent to 7,849.30. France's CAC-40 rose 0.6 percent to 3,754.26.
Wall Street also appeared headed for gains, with Dow Jones industrial futures rising 0.3 percent to 14,525. The broader S&P 500 futures gained 0.3 percent to 1,560.70.
Earlier, Japan's Nikkei 225 tumbled 1.1 percent to close at 12,003.43 as the yen's recent weakness reversed course. A stronger currency makes products sold abroad more expensive, a hardship for Japan's export-dependent economy.
Analysts said, however, that the new government in Japan, with its new plan of attack to right the country's economy, has lifted business optimism. A survey released by the Bank of Japan on Monday showed an improvement in business sentiment, although it was smaller than expected.
"The economy is improving, albeit slowly, and the mood has been lifted by the assertive and coordinated economic plan of the new government," Moody's Analytics said in a market commentary.
Hong Kong's Hang Seng closed 0.3 percent higher at 22,367.82.
Australia's S&P/ASX 200 advanced 0.4 percent to 4,985.50. South Korea's Kospi opened higher but then gave up its gains by midday. It was 0.5 percent down at 1,986.15. Benchmarks in mainland China, the Philippines and New Zealand also fell.
In commodity markets, the benchmark oil contract for May delivery was up 8 cents to $97.15 per barrel in electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange. The contract fell 16 cents on Monday.
In currencies, the euro rose to $1.2838 from $1.2804 late Monday in New York. The dollar fell to 93.31 yen from 94.22 yen.
___
Pamela Sampson in Bangkok contributed to this report.
TORRES VEDRAS, Portugal (Reuters) - For Portugal to succeed in ambitions to reindustrialize its shrinking, debt-laden economy, it will not be down to the revival of mass manufacturing but to the sprouting of high-tech start-ups such as UAVision.
As the name Unmanned Aerial Vehicles suggests, drones mounted with cameras are a mainstay for the small engineering firm. Clients include big farmers who want to monitor conditions in their fields. One drone has been adapted to film camel racing in Dubai.
Nuno Simoes, one of UAVision's partners, is as excited as a schoolboy as a small battery-driven drones lifts off outside his workshops some 55 km (35 miles) north of Lisbon.
He says Portugal needs to play to its strengths in design and engineering rather than making eyes at footloose multinationals.
"Don't think big. We are a small country with small companies," Simoes said. "They think they can turn Portugal into a new European China. They can't. China can produce at a fraction of our cost."
Ground down by deep public spending cuts and shrinking domestic demand under an austerity program imposed by international lenders, the Portuguese economy contracted 3.2 percent in 2012 and is expected to shrink by a further 2.3 percent this year.
It grates with Economy Minister Alvaro Pereira that Portugal has lost too many jobs and industries to the likes of China and eastern Europe.
Manufacturing accounts for about 13.5 percent of national output. That is more than in Britain and the Netherlands, but Pereira would like to get the share back to 20 percent, where it stood in 1989, by 2020.
"One of the problems that we've had in Europe in the last few years was to think that investing in industry was not sexy," Pereira said in London recently. "We don't need to bring back all our industry, but we definitely need to have a stronger industrial base in Europe."
He rejects old-style industrial policies and focuses instead on improving conditions for manufacturing, such as by expanding vocational training.
The odds are against Pereira. Too many older workers lack skills, which weighs on competitiveness. Businessmen complain that the government ties them up in red tape. And credit is hard to come by.
"The banks give you an umbrella when the sun's shining and take it away when it's raining," grumbles Joao Carlos Costa, general manager of Arpial, a small metal-working firm in Lisbon.
But Joachim Fels, chief international economist with Morgan Stanley in London, said there are signs that production is returning to countries such as Portugal as labor costs in emerging markets rise.
"The interesting thing is that globalization is not a one-way street," he said.
HIGH-TECH, DESIGNER-DRIVEN
An illustration of that phenomenon is Brazilian plane maker Embraer, which has built a components factory in the walled Roman town of Evora to tap Portugal's underused aeronautical engineering skills.
Successful collaboration with Embraer not only will demonstrate that Portugal is capable of high-tech innovation but also will help change the nation's mindset, said Jacinto Moniz de Bettencourt, chairman of EEA, a group of 35 suppliers to the Brazilian company.
"We are capable now of making some products that 10 or 20 years ago we wouldn't have believed we could do," he said.
Just one example: the trunks worn at the London Olympics by Michael Phelps and other star swimmers were designed and made in Portugal.
The textile industry is not the only traditional sector striving to reinvent itself. Renova, Portugal's leading producer of paper goods, makes a black lavatory tissue that is much coveted. Portuguese shoe makers insist their wares are now as prized as Italy's.
"Portugal has to rebuild its image. If you go to Germany and try to sell a product or a service and say it's from Portugal, it's associated with low technology and low quality," said Antonio de Melo Pires, the head of Volkswagen AutoEuropa, the country's second-biggest exporter.
Pires, too, sees no comparative advantage in trying to lure mass manufacturing. Instead, Portugal should boost its shipping and logistics industries to capitalize on its relative proximity to Africa and the Americas, he said.
A cut in the 25 percent corporate tax rate would also encourage more firms to set up shop in Portugal, Pires added.
"We have to attract middle-sized companies because they are more flexible, they require less investment and so they distort the regional economy less," he said.
Of course, competition for foreign direct investment is stiff.
Steiff, the German maker of expensive teddy bears, recently closed a factory in the central town of Oleiros with the loss of 100 jobs. It shifted production to Sidi Bouzid, Tunisia, the birthplace of the Arab Spring uprising in late 2010.
"Salaries in Tunisia are less than half those in Portugal, so that was the key problem," Jose Marques, the mayor of Oleiros said. "This was pure greed. I see no other reason."
Sara Ladeira, a seamstress for 12 years at the Oleiros plant, earned Portugal's minimum wage of 485 euros ($620) a month. Ladeira, 33, with two children, worries how she and her husband will pay the mortgage now that she is out of a job.
"It was a surprise to us all, because we had a lot of work to do at the factory," she said.
Armenio Carlos, the head of the CGTP union, Portugal's largest, says the ambition to revive industry is realistic. But he is critical of the government for acting too late, lacking a strategic vision and failing to finance its plans.
"One of the big problems we have is that after we joined the EU we allowed industry to crumble. We were relegated almost completely to being a country of services," Carlos, a former electrician, said in an interview.
One of the entrepreneurs trying to reverse that trend echoes the union leader. "We cannot just live off sun and olive oil," said Antonio Reis, technical director with Optimal Structural Solutions, a design and engineering start-up.
"Is our economy sustainable only on tourism? I don't think it is, so we have to grow industrially."
As per usual, Google put out various, elaborate April Fools Day jokes, which only reminded everyone how much time and money the tech company has to spend on projects that aren't core products like, ahem, Google Reader.?For those too busy to follow along, The Next Web has a running list of the myriad pranks. And while some of the antics, like the pirate treasure map,?are harmless and cute, others hit too close to home.
Apr. 1, 2013 ? A new study by Los Alamos National Laboratory and University of Pennsylvania scientists defines previously unknown properties of transmitted HIV-1, the virus that causes AIDS. The viruses that successfully pass from a chronically infected person to a new individual are both remarkably resistant to a powerful initial human immune-response mechanism, and they are blanketed in a greater amount of envelope protein that helps them access and enter host cells.
These findings will help inform vaccine design and interpretation of vaccine trials, and provide new insights into the basic biology of viral/host dynamics of infection.
During the course of each AIDS infection, the HIV-1 virus evolves within the infected person to escape the host's natural immune response and adapt to the local environment within the infected individual. Because HIV evolves so rapidly and so extensively, each person acquires and harbors a complex, very diverse set of viruses that develops over the years of their infection. Yet when HIV is transmitted to a new person from their partner, typically only a single virus from the diverse set in the partner is transmitted to establish the new infection.
The key discoveries here are the specific features that distinguish those specific viruses which successfully move to the new host, compared with the myriad forms in the viral population present in a chronically infected individual.
"The viruses that make it through transmission barriers to infect a new person are particularly infectious and resilient," said Los Alamos National Laboratory scientist Bette Korber. "Through this study we now better understand the biology that defines that resilience."
The team set out to determine whether the viruses that were successfully transmitted to a new patient might share distinct biological properties relative to those typically isolated from people with long-term, chronic infection. To do this, the group at U Penn cloned a set of intact viruses from acute infection, and a set of viruses from chronically infected people, and characterized them by measuring quantities that might be related to the virus's ability to successfully establish a new infection. They discovered several clear correlations. For example, transmitted viruses were both more infectious and contained more protective "envelope" per virus; envelope is the protein the virus uses to enter host cells.
The team identified an additional interesting property that could be a general characteristic of new viral infections: the transmitted HIV was capable of replicating and growing well in the presence of alpha interferon. Alpha interferon production is part of our innate human immune response to a new infection. As soon as a new viral infection is initiated in our bodies, local immune cells at the site of infection start secreting molecules called cytokines that have general antiviral activity and can inhibit the production of the newly infected virus. Alpha interferon is one of these potent cytokines.
In the early days of an HIV infection, this innate immune response increases to an intense level, called a "cytokine storm," which gradually recedes during infection. For a newly transmitted HIV to successfully establish infection, it must grow and expand in the new host while facing this cytokine storm. Although typical chronic viruses are sensitive to and inhibited by alpha interferon, transmitted HIV-1 viruses grew well in the presence of interferon.
Los Alamos scientists Elena Giorgi, James Theiler and Bette Korber were part of the analysis team working closely with investigators at the University of Pennsylvania, Nick Parrish and Beatrice Hahn. The paper, "Phenotypic properties of transmitted founder HIV-1" is in this week's issue of Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
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The world's fastest supercomputer isn't the world's fastest super computer anymore, so it's getting turned off today. At Los Alamos National Laboratory, IBM's Roadrunner is being replaced by a faster, cheaper and more energy efficient computer, Cielo. More »
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Flurry, an app analytics firm with a presence on some now 1 billion mobile devices, 
