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Monday, April 14, 2008

Theoretical physicist John Archibald Wheeler died of pneumonia at his residence in Hightstown, New Jersey yesterday. Wheeler is most known in the popular culture for popularizing the term “black hole” to describe stars which had become so dense that nothing, not even light, could escape their gravitational pull. Although Wheeler initially objected to the idea, he later accepted the idea and coined the term “black hole” to describe such objects.

Wheeler was also known for his work along with Richard Feynman and others in the Manhattan Project, which produced the first nuclear fission bomb. He was later involved in the work to build the first fusion bomb. As much as he was known for his research, Wheeler was known for his skill and accomplishment in teaching.

Wheeler was born July 9, 1911, in Jacksonville, Florida and went on to earn his doctorate in physics at the early age of 21. He then went on to work in Copenhagen with Niels Bohr and later returned to the United States to become part of the Manhattan Project during World War II.

Wheeler continued to work in physics after the war and was involved in the United States Matterhorn project to build a hydrogen bomb before the Soviet Union. His politics were more militaristic than many of his fellow scientists at the time, in that he supported the Vietnam War and the building of the hydrogen bomb.

For a long time Wheeler was at Princeton University as the doctoral adviser for many prominent physicists including Kip Thorne and Nobel Prize winner Richard Feynman. Wheeler went on to the University of Texas at Austin in 1976 when Princeton’s mandatory retirement age neared.

Wheeler continued to work until near his death. Physicists both young and old have paid tribute to Wheeler; cosmologist Max Tegmark told the New York Times that Wheeler had been “the only physics superhero still standing”.

He is survived by three children, along with grandchildren and great-grandchildren.

Monday, February 9, 2009

A van packed with explosives blew up at a trade fair center in the Spanish capital, Madrid shortly after 9:00 a.m. Monday. The blast was preceded by a phoned in warning from the assailants, which allowed police and fire crews to evacuate the area. Authorities believe the ETA (Euskadi Ta Askatasuna), a Basque separatist group which is on the United States list of foreign terrorist organizations, is responsible.

The attack comes three weeks before Basque regional elections and a day after the Spanish Supreme Court banned two nationalist party members from running for office in the upcoming election.

The van exploded around 9:00 a.m. local time (3:00 a.m.EST) outside the HQ of the building company Ferrovial Agroman, at the Campo de las Naciones. A warning about the pending attack was phoned into the city’s local chapter of the Red Cross about 90 minutes before the explosion. The caller said the bomb would explode at 9:00 a.m. local time. No one was injured or killed, but the blast shattered windows in buildings and destroyed about 30 vehicles surrounding the blast zone. A nearby railway line and a bridge were also damaged.

Ferrovial is involved in building a high-speed train line in the Basque region, a project criticized by leftist Basque nationalists and ecologists and targeted by ETA in previous attacks. In December 2008, Ignacio Uria, a businessman linked to this project, was shot and killed. The ETA claimed responsibility for the attack. Ferrovial has not commented on the incident.

Sunday, May 20, 2012

U.S. Democratic Party presidential candidate John Wolfe, Jr. of Tennessee took some time to answer a few questions from Wikinews reporter William S. Saturn.

Wolfe, an attorney based out of Chattanooga, announced his intentions last year to challenge President Barack Obama in the Democratic Party presidential primaries. So far, he has appeared on the primary ballots in New Hampshire, Missouri, and Louisiana. In Louisiana, he had his strongest showing, winning 12 percent overall with over 15 percent in some congressional districts, qualifying him for Democratic National Convention delegates. However, because certain paperwork had not been filed, the party stripped Wolfe of the delegates. Wolfe says he will sue the party to receive them.

Wolfe will compete for additional delegates at the May 22 Arkansas primary and the May 29 Texas primary. He is the only challenger to Obama in Arkansas, where a May 10 Hendrix College poll of Democrats shows him with 38 percent support, just short of the 45 percent for Obama. Such an outing would top the margin of Texas prison inmate Keith Russell Judd, who finished 18 percent behind Obama with 41 percent in the West Virginia Democratic primary; the strongest showing yet against the incumbent president. Despite these prospects, the Democratic Party of Arkansas has already announced that if Wolfe wins any delegates in their primary, again, due to paperwork, the delegates will not be awarded. Wolfe will appear on the Texas ballot alongside Obama, activist Bob Ely, and historian Darcy Richardson, who ended his campaign last month.

Wolfe has previously run for U.S. Congress as the Democratic Party’s nominee. On his campaign website, he cites the influence “of the Pentagon, Wall Street, and corporations” on the Obama administration as a reason for his challenge, believing these negatively affect “loyal Americans, taxpayers and small businesses.” Wolfe calls for the usage of anti-trust laws to break up large banks, higher taxes on Wall Street, the creation of an “alternative federal reserve” to assist community banks, and the implementation of a single-payer health care system.

With Wikinews, Wolfe discusses his campaign, the presidency of Barack Obama, corporations, energy, the federal budget, immigration, and the nuclear situation in Iran among other issues.

A compilation of brief news reports for Monday, July 8, 2013.

Thursday, December 1, 2005

Surgeons in France have performed a face transplant operation on a French woman who had lost her nose, lips and chin after being savaged by a dog. According to Iain Hutchison, an oral-facial surgeon at Barts and the London Hospital, the transplant is the first one to use skin from another person.

Doctors say the woman’s new face will be a “hybrid” between her donor’s face and her own face before the attack. In the five hour long operation, the donor’s tissues, muscles, arteries and veins were attached to the patient’s lower face. It is more favourable to use skin from another person’s face instead of skin from another part of the patient’s body, as the texture and colour of the skin are more likely to match.

A statement released by the hospital in Amiens said that the 38-year-old patient, who wishes to remain anonymous, has not been able to eat or speak properly since the attack in May this year. The woman was reportedly in “excellent general health” and her graft looked normal.

Ethical concerns, psychological impact, concerns relating to immunosuppression and consequences of technical failure have prevented teams from performing face transplant operations in the past, even though it has been technically possible to carry out such procedures for years.

Mr Hutchison warned of several problems with face transplants, such as blood vessels in the donated tissue clotting and immunosuppressants failing or increasing the patient’s risk of cancer. He also pointed out ethical issues with the fact that the procedure requires a “beating heart donor”. The transplant is carried out while the donor is brain dead, but still alive by use of a ventilator.

According to Stephen Wigmore, chair of British Transplantation Society’s ethics committee, it is unknown to what extent facial expressions will function in the long term. He said that it is not certain whether a patient could be left worse off in the case of a face transplant failing.

Mr Michael Earley, a member of the Royal College of Surgeon’s facial transplantation working party, commented that if successful, the transplant would be “a major breakthrough in facial reconstruction” and “a major step forward for the facially disfigured.”

Tuesday, July 17, 2007

Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania — Local caterers get ready for big business, as almost three thousand fans converge on the David L. Lawrence Convention Center over the Independence Day weekend for the world’s largest ever furry convention, Anthrocon 2007.

Many hope to renew acquaintances, or meet new friends. Others look to buy from dealers and artists, or show off new artwork or costumes. Some attend to make money, or even learn a thing or two. But one thing unites them: They’re all there to have fun.