Online Game Helps Scientists Studying Dementia

Kanemasa Ito, 72, holds hands with his 68-year-old wife Kimiko, who was diagnosed with dementia 11 years ago, at their home in Kawasaki, south of Tokyo, Japan, April 6, 2016.Dementia affects nearly 5 million Japanese citizens and is forecast to affect 7 million by 2025.
LONDON — 
An online game following the journey of an elderly former sea explorer who has lost his memories has helped scientists lead a vast international dementia study and given important preliminary results about human orientation skills.

The game, called Sea Quest Hero and developed by Deutsche Telekom and Alzheimer’s Research UK, was launched in May and has generated enough data to help create a global benchmark for the human brain’s navigational processes and how they vary between men and women, and between the young and old.

It has been played more than 2.4 million times worldwide, giving more than 9,400 years’ worth of equivalent lab-based research, the scientists said Wednesday — and is showing the potential to be able to help diagnose dementia earlier.

Kanemasa Ito, 72, and his 68-year-old wife Kimiko, who was diagnosed with dementia 11 years ago, chat at their home in Kawasaki, south of Tokyo, Japan, April 6, 2016.
47.5 million with dementia

According to the World Health Organization, the total number of people with dementia in 2015 was estimated at 47.5 million, and that number is rising rapidly as life expectancy increases and societies age. Case numbers are projected to reach 75.6 million by 2030, and to more than triple between now and 2050.

The incurable condition is a leading cause of disability and dependency, and it is starting to overtake heart disease as a cause of death in some developed countries.

Dementia is caused by brain diseases, most commonly Alzheimer’s disease, which result in the loss of brain cells and affect memory, thinking, behavior, navigational and spatial abilities and the ability to perform everyday activities.

Hugo Spiers, a neuroscientist at Britain’s University College London who led the research team, said the Sea Hero study was unprecedented in both scale and accuracy.

“The findings the game is yielding have enormous potential to support vital developments in dementia research,” he said.

Some abilities decline early

In preliminary results, published and presented at a neuroscience conference in the United States, scientists found that spatial navigation abilities start to decline from early adulthood continue on this trajectory.

Players age 19, for example, were 74 percent likely to accurately hit a target during the game, compared with 46 percent among 75-year-old players.

Spiers said this was in stark contrast to findings of previous small studies, which suggest declines start much later.

While memory deterioration is a fairly normal part of aging, Spiers explained that becoming completely disoriented is not. It is, however, common in people developing dementia.

This means the benchmark established by the initial data from Sea Hero Quest players paves the way to finding the earliest spatial navigational changes, he said. This makes dementia potentially diagnosable long before someone displays symptoms of general memory loss. In turn, this could allow for earlier diagnosis and treatment of patients.

Since the game’s data shows changes in spatial navigation abilities — both declines and improvements — it could also be used in future drug trials to assess the effectiveness of possible treatments, the researchers said.

Astronaut About to Set Record as Oldest Woman in Space

“I love working at NASA,” U.S. astronaut Peggy Whitson told reporters last summer, “but the part that has been the most satisfying … has been working on board the space station.” Whitson leaves soon for her third trip to the International Space Station.
CAPE CANAVERAL, FLORIDA — 
NASA astronaut Peggy Whitson is on the verge of becoming the oldest woman in space, adding to her long list of barrier-breaking records.

Whitson will be 56 when she rockets off the planet Thursday. She’ll celebrate her 57th birthday in February on the International Space Station.

That’s a far cry from John Glenn’s space shuttle flight at age 77 and a few years shy of the male runners-up. But it’s enough to beat Barbara Morgan’s record as the world’s oldest spacewoman. Morgan waited so long to fulfill her role as Christa McAuliffe’s teacher-in-space backup that she was 55 when she finally flew in 2007.

This will be the third space station mission for Whitson, an Iowa-born biochemist, and her second stint as commander. She’ll launch from Kazakhstan with two younger men, Russian and French.

“I love working at NASA, but the part that has been the most satisfying on a day-to-day basis, hour-to-hour, minute-to-minute, has been working on board the space station,” Whitson told reporters over the summer.

“It doesn’t matter if I’m cleaning the filters. I feel like I’m helping personally push forward exploration. … That’s the why I want to go again.”

French astronaut Thomas Pesquet (right) Russian cosmonaut Oleg Novitsky and U.S. astronaut Peggy Whitson, members of the main crew to the International Space Station, pose after a news conference in Russian leased Baikonur cosmodrome, Kazakhstan, Nov. 16, 2016.
Strict when it comes to lifetime radiation exposure, NASA insisted Whitson remain Earth-bound for a while after her 2008 mission.

“I would have rather gone sooner, but I’ll deal with it,” she said.

A list of firsts

Whitson was the first woman to serve as commander of the space station — in 2007, nine years into its lifetime. She also was the first — and so far only — woman to head NASA’s male-dominated astronaut corps. No other woman has spent more time in space.

She’ll ride a Soyuz rocket with a Russian cosmonaut, Oleg Novitskiy, 45, and a French newcomer to space, Thomas Pesquet, who’s 38. The launch is 3:20 p.m. EST Thursday, 2:20 a.m. Friday in Kazakhstan.

A French documentary crew followed Pesquet during training, focusing on his relative youth and fresh eyes. Whitson said the interest on her, by comparison, was for being “old and experienced.”

“All right, yes, I’m old,” she said in the NASA interview. She noted in a recent series of preflight interviews that it gets easier with age, knowing what to expect on a spaceflight and how to prioritize.

Her biochemist husband, Clarence Sams, also works for NASA.

Record in space

Whitson has spent 377 days in space and performed multiple spacewalks. Her upcoming six-month mission should push her beyond 534 days in space, the U.S. record set in September by 58-year-old astronaut Jeffrey Williams.

Whitson said she’s had a lucky run with few regrets. But she noted: “In terms of goals for NASA before I die, we need to be living on Mars. And I might not live that long, so they better get with it!”

Zika No Longer a Global Health Emergency, WHO Says

The World Health Organization said Friday that the Zika virus no longer posed a world public health emergency, but it stressed the need for a long-term response to the mosquito-borne disease.

“The Zika virus remains a highly significant and long-term problem, but it is not anymore a public health emergency of international concern,” the U.N. health agency’s emergency committee said.

Brazil, which has seen the worst of the Zika crisis, said Friday that it would maintain its emergency status.

While the Zika virus causes only mild symptoms in most people, pregnant women who become infected are at risk of giving birth to babies with microcephaly, a condition characterized by an abnormally small head and possibly improper brain development.

More than 2,000 babies have been born with microcephaly since last year, most of them in Brazil.

FILE – Caio Julio Vasconcelos, who was born with microcephaly, undergoes physical therapy at the Institute for the Blind in Joao Pessoa, Brazil, Feb. 25, 2016.
The WHO originally declared the Zika epidemic a global health emergency in February 2016, and the outbreak sparked fears of infection among travelers to this summer’s Olympic Games in Brazil.

The WHO acknowledged Friday that “many aspects of this disease and its associated consequences still remain to be understood” but said “this can best be done through sustained research.”

“We are not downgrading the importance of Zika. In fact, by placing this as a longer program of work, we are sending the message that Zika is here to stay and WHO’s response is here to stay in a very robust manner,” said Dr. Peter Salama, executive director of WHO’s Health Emergencies Program.
The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said Friday that it “remains crucially important that pregnant women avoid traveling to areas with local transmission of Zika, because of the devastating complications that can occur in fetuses that become infected during pregnancy.”
The disease is mainly spread by mosquitoes, but can also be spread through sexual contact. It has spread to more than 60 countries and territories since the current outbreak began in Brazil last year.

In addition to microcephaly, the Zika virus can also cause rare adult-onset neurological problems such as Guillain-Barre Syndrome.

Google Disappointed by South Korean Refusal on Mapping Data

SEOUL, SOUTH KOREA — 
South Korea rejected a request by Google to use local mapping data in the company’s global maps service in a long-awaited ruling Friday that had divided the country for months.

The company said it was disappointed by the decision, which the land ministry said was based on concerns over national security.

“We’re disappointed by this decision. We’ve always taken security concerns very seriously and will continue to provide useful map services in compliance with Korea’s current map data export regulation,” Taj Meadows, a Google spokesperson, said in a statement.

The South Korean government said the risks outweighed benefits from exporting the country’s mapping data to Google, a unit of Alphabet Inc.

South Korea, facing the overt threat of rival North Korea, bars exporting local mapping data to foreign companies that do not operate domestic data servers.

Google, a unit of Alphabet Inc., handles its maps service at data centers outside South Korea. The restrictions have limited the usefulness of Google Maps within South Korea, since the app cannot offer driving or walking directions.

The government had proposed granting permission to Google to use local mapping data for Google Maps if the company would blur sensitive information on South Korean military facilities on its satellite map.

“Our position from the start was that if it deletes security facilities, we would allow exporting (the local mapping data),” said Kim Tong-il, an official at the land ministry. “Google’s position is that it won’t delete those. The question was whether we would allow that regardless.”

South Korea has been divided over the issue since Google filed its request in June. The government extended an August deadline to this month, highlighting disagreements between government ministries.

The long-time deliberation reflects growing support for Google within some government ministries that are trying to promote tourism and local firms’ overseas businesses. One of the biggest inconveniences that foreign tourists run into in South Korea, which has some of the fastest and cheapest internet access in the world, is the lack of an online mapping service with navigation and directions in foreign languages.

Some local businesses and consumers opposed giving Google full access to the local mapping data, saying it would be unfair to local companies that operate local data servers to support their map services. They said Google should build data centers in South Korea instead of seeking an exemption from the rules.

Google said earlier that restricting Google Maps in South Korea would be an inconvenience for foreigners visiting the host country of the PyeongChang Winter Olympics in 2018.

It also argued that restrictions on exporting the local mapping data could hinder efforts of companies to roll out global services using locations data and will deprive local consumers of cutting-edge services.

Twitter CEO Apologizes for Allowing White Supremacist Ad

FILE – Twitter’s Jack Dorsey is interviewed on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange, Nov. 19, 2015. The chief executive apologized Thursday, Nov. 17, 2016, after the service let through an ad promoting a white supremacist group.

Twitter Chief Executive Jack Dorsey apologized Thursday after the microblogging service let through an ad promoting a white supremacist group.

“We made a mistake here and we apologize. Our automated system allowed an ad promoting hate. Against our policy. We did a retro and fixed,” Dorsey tweeted.

The ad promoted an article titled “The United States Was Founded as a White People’s Republic.” It showed eight white children in a field.

It was tweeted from an account with the handle “@NEW_ORDER_1488.”

Twitter has suspended several accounts linked to the alt-right movement, USA Today reported Wednesday.

The company, which has also been under criticism for not doing enough to thwart cyberbullying, said Tuesday that it would upgrade some features to curb abusive behavior.

Twitter’s advertising policy prevents advertisers from promoting certain sensitive topics, including hate speech or discrimination against race, ethnicity, color, religion or sexual orientation.

Malawi’s ‘Hyena’ Convicted for Traditional, But Illegal, Sex Customs

NSANJE, MALAWI — 
A magistrate’s court in Malawi has convicted a 45-year-old man accused of practicing traditional sex customs — deflowering young girls and comforting bereaved widows — that were outlawed three years ago in the southern African nation.

Malawi’s president, Peter Mutharika, ordered the arrest of Eric Aniva due to concerns that he may have spread HIV infections in the course of his work as a practitioner of “kusasa fumbi,” or “removing dust,” and “fisi,” the local name for a hyena.

Fisi is a traditional custom in southern Malawi: a man is hired and paid to have sex with widows to exorcise evil spirits that may bring death to the bereaved family.

“Kusasa fumbi” is another custom practiced in the area: hiring a man to sleep with young girls who have reached puberty, in order to prepare them for married life.

Six testified against Aniva

Both of these have been around for centuries, but of course they do not fit in with modern laws and social systems.

Magistrate Innocent Nebi told a jam-packed court Friday that it was proven beyond reasonable doubt that Aniva had engaged in harmful and illegal practices.

One of the six witnesses who testified against the 45-year-old defendant was a woman who said Aniva asked to sleep with her soon after the death of her husband.

Aniva and his fellow practitioners of “fisi” – sleeping with widows — are known as hyenas, which is what “fisi” means in Chichewa, the most widely spoken language in Malawi. He pleaded not guilty to the charges against him, and told VOA after Friday’s court proceedings that he believes he is still innocent.

“No one complained to the court that I slept with her. And the other thing you should know is that I was doing this before the passing of the law (that outlaws such harmful cultural practices),” Aniva said. “When this law was put into effect, I was given the responsibility of asking my fellow hyenas to stop this practice.”

Harsh sentence requested

Malawi prohibited “fisi” and similar practices in 2013. Aniva says he stopped comforting bereaved widows in 2012.

State prosecutor Chiyembekezo Banda asked the court to give Aniva a harsh sentence, “to serve as lesson to others” who are violating the law.

But Aniva’s lawyer,Michael Goba Chipeta, said Aniva should receive only a suspended prison sentence.

“Here we are dealing with a cultural practice that has been here for hundreds of years, against a law that is three years old,” said Chipeta. “Culture is a psychological collective element which you cannot just do away with like a switch. I mean, the court should be humane enough when giving punishments against such offenses.”

Appeal is expected

Chipeta said he will likely appeal if the judge disregards his plea.

“We can’t talk much on the details (of an appeal) but most definitely there are issues that we feel are worth appealing against the details which we can discuss after the sentence is done,” said Chipeta.

Aniva faces a maximum term of five years in prison when he is sentenced on Tuesday, November 22.

UNDER THE KNIFE Tragic student, 23, dies on operating table as surgeons prepare lip enlargement surgery

Maria Delyukina had booked into the private clinic for a lip enlargement and to have her chin re-profiled.
A TRAGIC medical student died on a cosmetic surgeon’s operating table while she was being prepared for surgery to have her lips enlarged.

Maria Delyukina – who was already a qualified dentist but had returned to medical school – had booked into the private clinic in Volgograd, southern Russia, for lip enlargement and to have her chin re-profiled.

Maria Delyukina died on the operating table as a surgeon prepared her for lip enlargement surgeryx

Maria Delyukina – who was already a qualified dentist but had returned to medical school – had booked into the private clinic in Volgograd, southern Russia

The surgeon who was preparing to carry out the procedure said Maria died from an anapylaxis reaction

Tragic Maria was declared dead before she arrived at hospital
But as the 23-year-old was being anaesthetised for the procedure, she suddenly went into massive anaphylactic shock and began fitting uncontrollably.

Maria’s death was put down as an allergic reaction.

The cosmetic surgery team managed to stabilise her while they called paramedics but Maria was declared dead before she arrived at hospital.

Teacher who had sex with a 13-years old arrested..

STUDENT SEX CASE Teacher who had sex with 13-year-old pupil on an “almost daily basis” before getting pregnant faces 30 years behind bars
Alexandria Vera, 24, entered a guilty plea to a charge of aggravated sexual assault after becoming impregnated by the young teen
A TEACHER who became pregnant by her 13-year-old student after they had sex on an “almost daily basis” is facing up to 30 years behind bars.

Alexandria Vera, 24, from Texas, entered a guilty plea to a charge of aggravated sexual assault after becoming impregnated by the young teen.

Teacher who got pregnant by 13-year-old had sex on ‘daily basis’ found guilty
The charge can result in a life sentence, however a plea deal struck between the teacher’s legal team and prosecutors ensures her sentencing will be capped at 30 years.

Their relationship took place over a period of nine months, police said.
Vera went to his house, picked him up and they drove around, which is when they first kissed, according to court documents.
The following day she went back to his home and the pair had sex for the first time, while his parents were out.

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Vera claimed her and the boy were in love

Alexandria Vera, 24, from Texas, is now facing a sentence of 30 years
Vera told Aldine Independent School District Police she had sex with the teen “on almost a daily basis at her home.”

The student allegedly slept at her house, after which she drove him back home in the morning so he could catch the bus to school.
It was in January this year she fell pregnant, and according to documents the teen’s parents were supportive and excited about her having a baby with their son.
However she had an abortion when the Texas Child Protective Services officials showed up at the school where she worked in February to ask her about the relationship.
She will avoid a life sentence after arranging a plea deal with prosecutors

She had an abortion when Texas Child Protective Services visited the school where she worked
Initially Vera denied she had done anything wrong – but cops discovered evidence of their relationship on her phone.

She will be sentenced in January.

BRUTAL KILLING Sick husband murders wife with a hammer while she slept so he could go on Thailand sex holiday

A HUSBAND who killed his wife before slicing her body into eight pieces so he could go on a Thailand sex holiday has been jailed.

German Horst Koenig, 53, was sentenced to life imprisonment at a district court in Augsburg, in the German state of Bavaria.

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Koenig with his wife Grace, who was murdered while she slept
He was found to have murdered his 37-year-old Filipino wife Grace.

Judge Christoph Wiesner said: “Such a motive is shocking for the court.”

The court heard how Koenig meticulously planned the murder for a month, eventually killing her with a hammer while she slept.
Koenig then dissected the body in order to hide it, and “give him enough time to spend happy hours in Thailand.”

After killing her, Koenig then cleared the bank accounts of Grace, who he married ten years ago in the Philippines.

He then booked a flight to Thailand for a sex holiday and rented a locker in a warehouse to dispose of the body parts.

The husband then spent five weeks splashing their cash on Thai prostitutes before his money ran out.

The 53-year-old was told he may be eligible for early release when he is 74 under German law
Upon returning to Germany, he was arrested.

A judge told him: “You can decide for yourself, whether you make true the words you spoke during the trial and accept the blame for which you have been charged.”

The sisters of the victim reacted with relief at the verdict.

Their lawyer Mandana Mauss said: “They did not want revenge. They wanted justice for their sister.

“Now they can put the ordeal behind them.”

Koenig, a computer expert, was told he may be eligible for early release when he is 74 years old.

Koenig told the court: “I had check lists made, I worked it all out”

One most important thing during sex

Most Men think that when it comes to sex, big penis and body size are important. But truth is women want a man that can rock their boat long enough to get orgasm. But the painful thing about this is that most men cannot last long enough to get their woman to orgasm. But the good news is that there is a proven solution to this problem and can be found.
When women are in the mood for sex, they always set their mind and prepare their body to be properly rocked in bed. But statistics shows that most women never get their desired kind of sex because the man involved is a ONE minutes man.

According to the study, there are a number of factors that women find important for sex to become ‘good’ sex. Women reported that their most satisfying sexual encounters were when there was an emotional connection (53.2 per cent), foreplay (23.6 per cent), communication (10.4 per cent) etc.

The most important factor included Long Lasting and frequent sexual activity while novelty and/or variation is also important. That Statistics show that over 70 percent of men cannot last long. If you are suffering from premature ejaculation, weak erection etc., you are not alone.

Interestingly, the survey also found that over 50 per cent of women want more sex in their lives with a further 72.6 per cent revealing that they never get orgasm during sexual encounter with their. If you want to drive your woman to orgasm tonight , take a step