Israel becomes lab for electric car network

Israeli entrepreneur Shai Agassi has begun rolling out the world's first nationwide electric car network. Now, will the drivers come?

After more than $400 million in outlays and months behind schedule, dozens of electric cars have hit the road in Israel, the test site Agassi chose for his Better Place venture. Four stations where the cars can get a new dose of juice when their batteries run out are operating, and the plan is to ramp that number up within months.

The concept: to wean the world from oil and eliminate the biggest hurdles to environmentally friendly electric cars ? high cost and limited range.

To do this, Better Place has jettisoned the fixed battery. Instead, drivers can swap their depleted batteries for fully charged ones at a network of stations, receiving a full, 100-mile range in five minutes. Better Place owns the batteries, bringing down the purchase price of the cars using the network.

People driving shorter distances, the vast majority of customers, can plug in their batteries each day to chargers installed at their homes, offices and public locations, which will fully recharge in six to eight hours.

He faces a wall of skepticism. A major concern is "range anxiety": Will the car conk out because its battery is drained, stranding the driver in a dicey neighborhood, en route to the hospital, or with three wailing kids in back?

Rising fuel prices worldwide still haven't sent electric car sales surging, noted U.S.-based automotive expert John McElroy. "It may not be an energy price issue," he said. "Consumers may simply decide that electric cars don't offer the range they need."

Agassi, a former top executive at software giant SAP AG, said he is ready to prove his doubters wrong. "We're driving a car that most people said would be a fantasy," he said.

The swappable battery model aims to reassure drivers about range and show they don't need to sacrifice convenience or cash to switch to electric.

So far, the four Better Place battery stations are set up in central and northern Israel. During the second half of the year, around 40 stations are due to be operating across the country. But even before that, the company says enough will be up that a motorist could make the 300-mile drive from Israel's northern tip to its southern end.

Agassi has raised $750 million from investors including General Electric Co. and HSBC Holdings PLC since founding Better Place 4 1/2 years ago.

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French automaker Renault has begun selling a sedan, the Fluence, customized to use the stations, priced in Israel at roughly $32,000, comparable to other sedans sold here. Currently, about 140 are on the road, most driven by Better Place employees.

The Fluence should start becoming available to the general public within weeks. Leasing companies, which buy about two-thirds of the more than 200,000 new cars sold annually in Israel, have ordered more than 1,800, and private customers have ordered several hundred more.

Compared to electric or hybrid cars in other markets, the sales numbers in this nation of nearly 8 million might not be as humble as they seem: In 2011, Chevrolet sold about 7,700 Volts and Nissan sold under 10,000 LEAFs in the U.S., which has a population of more than 310 million.

"It interests all fleet managers we talk to," said Shai Dahan, CEO of Eldan Transportation, a top Israeli leasing group.

Better Place, which had promised to have thousands of cars on the road last year, acknowledges the rollout is behind schedule, mostly because of bureaucratic hurdles and production issues at Renault.

Better Place has also spent years testing its integrated system designed to allow its operation center, which is connected to every car, to monitor the vehicles and correct problems remotely. For instance, its software notifies drivers when their batteries are running low and directs them to the nearest switching station.

Israel sales director Zohar Bali predicts up to 5,000 Fluences will be silently running on Israeli roads and highways within a year.

Israel was chosen for the experiment in part because of its tech-savvy population. Also, with 80 percent of the population living in a narrow, densely populated stretch along the Mediterranean coast, it provides a perfect laboratory for the charging network.

Better Place claims it can shave up to 20 percent off the annual cost of owning a car, especially if gas prices, now around $8 a gallon here, continue to rise. Drivers buy access to the switching stations and charging spots through a monthly package ranging from under $300 to over $500, depending on mileage.

Israelis are taking notice. Better Place says more than 80,000 people have trekked to its visitor's center, situated at an abandoned oil reserves depot outside Tel Aviv.

What happens in Israel could decide how broadly Better Place deploys.

So far the Fluence is the only model compatible with the grid, but Renault's Middle East director, Jean-Christophe Pierson, says the company is considering a more compact model. Better Place is also in contact with other carmakers.

Denmark is set to become Better Place's second launch site this year. Australia is to become its first major market, with deployment in the capital, Canberra, also this year. Small-scale projects are in place in Hawaii and California. Amsterdam is the next European target after Denmark.

The company also has its sights set on China, where it already has opened a demonstration battery switching station.

Agassi sees the "tipping point" for electric cars coming in two to three years, propelled by dropping prices of cars and batteries. By 2017, he expects 50 percent of all new car sales in Israel to be electric.

The largest investor is The Israel Corp., whose holdings include Israel's biggest oil refinery and deep water oil drilling.

Idan Ofer, whose family controls The Israel Corp. and who serves as Better Place's chairman, said he saw no contradiction between his oil and clean-tech holdings.

Film giant Kodak "knew about digital photography. And look what happened. They still went bankrupt because they didn't do anything about it," observed Ofer. "There are many examples. I don't want to be there."

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Want to be Healthy & Fit? Chiropractic Can Help Both | HealthNOW ...

Would You Like to be Healthy AND Fit?

One can be physically fit and yet unhealthy, and one can be relatively healthy but not that physically fit.? However, if you want to be really healthy, physical fitness should be a part of your health care regimen.? We usually think of health as not being sick or not getting colds or nothing bad being found on our yearly medical exam. As a doctor of chiropractic, I know that truly being healthy requires much more than the above.

What is Health?

To be generally healthy, we should eat well (gluten-free if so indicated by testing), and not too much; we should sleep enough (about 8 hours), drink enough water (optimally ? your body weight in ounces), exercise enough (a mix of aerobic ? cardio ? and weights ? for strength), and keep the stress low (or at least to manageable levels).? Avoid the processed, fast foods, artificial sweeteners, sodas and trans-fats; and try keep a good attitude (smile more).

Good general health is all systems operating normally and optimally without drug support, with no symptoms alerting you to problems, and good energy to do what you want to do when you want to do it.

Regular chiropractic care can support our general health by minimizing interruptions or interference with nerve communication between the central nervous system (brain & spinal cord) and the rest of the body.

Is Physical Fitness Necessary?

Some people are very involved in physical fitness ? attending the gym daily, or having workout equipment at home and focusing on strength training as well as aerobic workouts (running, biking, etc.).? Marathons (26.2 mile run) and triathlons (running, biking, and swimming) are gaining in popularity around the world as well.

A few individuals push it even further entering the Ironman triathlon (a 26.2 mile run, 112 mile bike ride, 2.4 mile swim) and other extreme sports performed on land (e.g. mountain climbing), in the air (e.g. sky jumping), or in/on the water (e.g. wind or kite surfing).

Although it requires a lot of effort to perform these activities. being involved in them doesn?t necessarily ensure good? general health.? On the other hand, the healthier one is, the longer one could continue doing these activities, which is a good thing.

Chiropractic adjusting of the spine and extremities (arms and legs) helps the body to perform at its best.? To be physically fit, we need proper and effective nerve signals going to the necessary muscles to perform these feats.? We also require proper bone alignment at the joints to allow optimal movement with minimal resistance (wear & tear).

Physical stresses from falls and extreme muscular effort, whether from sports or daily living, can misalign the skeleton causing injuries at that moment or in the future (from cumulative stress over time).? Chiropractic care can help minimize the negative effects of these injuries or stresses on the body.

Health & Fitness Combined ? the Best of Both Worlds

To be truly healthy, we should incorporate physical fitness into a general healthy lifestyle.? That is often overlooked with today?s busy lifestyle, where we travel from home to car to office to car to home, and sit way too much.

Life tends to present some unexpected stresses along the way.? If we?re out of shape, and if the stress is a physical one, it can cause an injury that can take months or longer to recover from.? While fitness is an important part of true health, it can be overdone.? Our bodies have physical limitations, and if we push them to the limit, parts can break or tear or dislocate.

So, everything in moderation and include chiropractic adjustments on a regular basis to help the all important brain and nervous system to work better.

The bottom line is that if you want to be as healthy as possible, and perform at your best level of physical fitness, while minimizing the risks of injury and healing as quickly as possible from any injury you do sustain, then think chiropractic healthcare.

And if your level of physical fitness has deteriorated over the years, you might be interested in the Fitness Program here at HealthNOW?s physical therapy department.? We can evaluate your current level of fitness and design a program for you to month by month raise your fitness to a level you?re happy with.

We?re here to help. ?Call us for a free health analysis and we?ll tell you if we think we can help get to the root of your pain; to the cause behind the symptom. We can be reached at 408-733-0400.

Please contact me if you have any questions or comments.? If you, or someone you know, suffer from pain, please allow us to offer them assistance ? we are here to help!

In health,

Koen P. Kallop, D.C.
Director of Chiropractic Services
HealthNOW Medical Center

Permission is granted to repost this article in its entirety with credit to Dr Koen Kallop & HealthNOW Medical Center and a clickable link back to this page.

?


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Myanmar welcomes easing of US economic sanctions

YANGON, Myanmar (AP) ? Officials and businessmen in Myanmar welcomed U.S. plans to ease economic sanctions, saying Friday it will benefit both countries in a market long cut off from most Western investment.

However, human rights activists are wary and some exporters in Myanmar say they may not immediately benefit.

President Barack Obama on Thursday announced he was easing an investment ban and naming the first U.S. ambassador to Myanmar in 22 years to reward it for democratic reforms.

Myanmar opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi's election to parliament last month prompted Western governments to roll back years of hard-hitting restrictions against the Asian nation also known as Burma, which is emerging from decades of authoritarian rule and diplomatic isolation.

Its former military regime was shunned for its human rights abuses and failure to hand over power to a democratically elected government ? a situation that began to change after a 2010 general election.

U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton said in Washington that the U.S. was suspending sanctions on export of American financial services and investment across all sectors of the Myanmar economy ? including in the resource-rich country's lucrative oil, gas and mining sectors. She spoke after meeting with Myanmar Foreign Minister Wunna Maung Lwin.

Other Western nations and the European Union had already taken similar moves, putting pressure on Washington to do likewise so U.S. companies would not lose out to foreign competitors in this latest frontier market.

Despite the easing of restrictions, U.S. companies would still be barred from doing business with firms associated with the country's powerful military. The White House also announced it was keeping the legal framework of hard-hitting sanctions in place for now, saying Myanmar's democratic reforms are still "nascent."

The ban on financial transactions had been a particular hurdle for doing business in Myanmar, since the dollar is the world's main trading currency. Transactions through other currencies raised costs to uncompetitive levels, Nay Zin Latt, an adviser to Thein Sein, said Friday.

"It's very beneficial if U.S. companies come and invest here. We can get technology, new markets and management skills," he said. U.S. companies will also be able to help Myanmar products reach a larger global export market, he said.

For foreign investors, Myanmar has the advantage of a being a low-cost economy, important for such mass market commodities as textiles and footwear.

However, restrictions that still remain on trade that will keep the American export market out of the reach of Myanmar producers, pointed out Myint Soe, a factory owner who is chairman of Myanmar's Garment Manufacturers Association Garment Factory Association.

Along with the provisional nature of the suspension, "Who will dare to come and invest here?" he asked, saying local businessmen won't immediately benefit.

"We haven't achieved our goal of getting made-in-Burma products into the U.S. market," he said.

Human rights groups and exiled Myanmar activists have been strongly critical of easing economic controls. They are particularly concerned about fighting in northern Myanmar between the government and members of the Kachin ethnic minority.

"We urge the U.S. government to be cautious in taking new directions. We urge that the easing of sanctions needs to match up with reality in Burma," said Sunai Phasuk, a researcher in Bangkok for U.S.-based Human Rights Watch, highlighting the "full-scale" armed conflict in Kachin State.

A U.S.-based group, United to End Genocide, said "President Obama's premature action to remove the investment ban on Burma is overly optimistic.

"It ignores the reality of the situation on the ground, including ongoing atrocities," the group's president, Tom Andrews, said in a prepared statement. "This is a dangerous decision that is likely to further exacerbate human rights abuses and has left the U.S. government without any leverage in the future."

The opposition party of Aung San Suu Kyi welcomed the naming of a new ambassador to Myanmar and the easing of U.S. sanctions.

Nyan Win, a spokesman for the National League for Democracy, said that easing sanctions now is timely but pressure on calls for the release of political prisoners and ending ethnic conflict in ethnic regions should continue.

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G-8 leaders put focus on European financial crisis

President Barack Obama, right, greets Canada's Prime Minister Stephen Harper on arrival for the G8 Summit Friday, May 18, 2012 at Camp David, Md. (AP Photo/Charles Dharapak)

President Barack Obama, right, greets Canada's Prime Minister Stephen Harper on arrival for the G8 Summit Friday, May 18, 2012 at Camp David, Md. (AP Photo/Charles Dharapak)

President Barack Obama, right, chats with Canada's Prime Minister Stephen Harper on arrival for the G8 Summit Friday, May 18, 2012 at Camp David, Md. (AP Photo/Charles Dharapak)

President Barack Obama waves to cameras before greeting world leaders for the G8 Summit Friday, May 18, 2012 at Camp David, Md. (AP Photo/Susan Walsh)

President Barack Obama kisses German Chancellor Angela Merkel on the cheek on arrival for the G8 Summit Friday, May 18, 2012 at Camp David, Md. (AP Photo/Charles Dharapak)

President Barack Obama greets German Chancellor Angela Merkel on arrival for the G8 Summit Friday, May 18, 2012 at Camp David, Md. (AP Photo/Charles Dharapak)

(AP) ? Drawn together in this serene mountain outpost, leaders of the major industrialized nations are prodding Germany to balance its push for European fiscal austerity with doses of stimulus spending to avoid an economic calamity that could reverberate worldwide.

With three new members in their midst, the Group of Eight leaders will take measure of themselves as they turn their attention Saturday to reconciling the need to quell European debt crises with the desire to increase demand for goods and spur job growth.

Facing economic and political pressures at home, President Barack Obama and leaders of Germany, France, Canada, Italy, Great Britain, Russia, and Japan were huddling in the casual setting of Camp David's Laurel Lodge looking to build consensus even though a decisive plan of action seemed out of reach at this point.

The G-8 session here in this secure presidential compound nestled in Maryland's Catoctin Mountains sets the stage for a far more consequential European summit next week where eurozone members hope to come together on specific steps to fight rising debt while spurring a recovery.

Obama established the tone for the G-8 Friday after meeting with just-elected French President Francois Hollande, declaring that the aim of the summit is to promote both fiscal consolidation and a "strong growth agenda."

"President Hollande and I agree that this is an issue of extraordinary importance not only to the people of Europe but also to the world economy," Obama told reporters following the meeting.

In a hint of the pressures facing the leaders, Obama greeted German Chancellor Angela Merkel to Camp David Friday at dusk, asking her how she was. Merkel, facing resistance over her austerity push, merely shrugged.

"Well, you have a few things on your mind," Obama said sympathetically.

A central economic topic, though hardly the only one confronting Europe, is the fate of Greece which is facing the most acute financial crisis of the eurozone and is set to hold elections June 17 to end political deadlock. At issue is whether Greece abandons the euro to escape austerity measures.

Hollande, speaking with Obama at his side Friday, said: "We share the same views, the fact that Greece must stay in the eurozone and that all of us must do what we can to that effect."

Lowering expectations for the G-8, U.S. National Security Adviser Tom Donilon said: "The leaders I think will focus on specifics and specific concepts and ideas for growth and jobs. But I would also point out that the ultimate decisions on that would be decisions taken in the eurozone."

Also on the agenda is energy as the world looks to the oil markets in advance of scheduled sanctions on Iranian oil exports. While oil prices have been falling, major oil importing countries, including the U.S., are keeping a wary eye on prices and keeping open the possibility of tapping their own oil reserves.

For Obama, Europe's fate is critical to his own political survival. An economic recession that spreads to the U.S. could damage an already slow recovery and boost the argument by his Republican challenger, Mitt Romney, that the United States economy needs new leadership.

There is a get-acquainted aspect to the session as well. The Camp David gathering, the largest collection of foreign leaders ever at the presidential retreat, is the first G-8 meeting for Hollande, for Italian Prime Minister Mario Monti and for Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda. In what has been widely viewed as a snub, Russian President Vladimir Putin is skipping the G-8, sending Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev in his place.

The meeting comes at a turning point in Europe, marked by elections in France and Greece that signaled defiance toward the fiscal austerity measures that Merkel has pushed for the most indebted eurozone countries. European countries are straining under high borrowing rates. The drastic cuts in spending and government layoffs were designed to address massive national debts but they have also caused short-term economic distress and joblessness.

On Friday, Spain's central bank announced that the level of bad loans on the books of Spanish banks was at an 18-year high, fueling concerns about the financial sector in the eurozone's fourth-largest economy.

The emphasis on economic growth has been welcomed by Obama, who has long argued that the stimulative steps he took in 2009 put the U.S. on the road to recovery.

"Europe is still in a difficult state," Obama told donors in Seattle last week, "partly because they didn't take some of the decisive steps that we took early on in this recession."

To what degree the Europeans, and Merkel in particular, agree remains to be seen.

"With Hollande coming into play here, there is going to be a lot of pressure on Germany, not just from Hollande and Obama, but also some of the other countries ? Italy and UK ? some pressure for Germany to push more toward growth within Europe because they have to get them on board," said Jeffrey Bergstrand, a former federal reserve economist and now an expert on international finance at the University of Notre Dame.

U.S. officials have been encouraged by recent discussions in Europe to ease up some belt-tightening so that spending cuts aren't as deep or as swift and to increase spending on public works projects like roads and schools in weaker parts of Europe. They also point to Germany's recent decision to negotiate higher public sector wages, a move they say could have a positive ripple effect on demand.

Merkel herself has made conciliatory gestures, saying in a television interview this week that she was open to helping stimulate the Greek economy provided Greece honored pledges to shrink its debt.

Associated Press

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UK surveillance could yield window into lives

LONDON (AP) ? British officials have given their word: "We won't read your emails."

But experts say that its proposed new surveillance program, unveiled last week as part of the government's annual legislative program, will gather so much data that spooks won't have to read your messages to guess what you're up to.

The U.K. Home Office stresses that it is not seeking to read the content of every Britons' communications, saying the data it was seeking "is NOT the content of any communication." It is, however, seeking information on who's sending the message, whom it's sent to, where it's sent from, and potentially other details including a message's length and its format.

The government's proposal is just a draft bill, so it could be modified or scrapped. But if passed in its current form, it would put a huge amount of personal data at the government's disposal, which it could potentially use to deduce a startling amount about Britons' private life ? from sleep patterns to driving habits or even infidelity.

"We're really entering a whole new phase of analysis based on the data that we can collect," said Gerald Kane, an information systems expert at Boston College. "There is quite a lot you can learn."

The ocean of information is hard to fathom. Britons generate 4 billion hours of voice calls and 130 billion text messages annually, according to industry figures. In 2008 the BBC put the annual number of U.K.-linked emails at around 1 trillion. Then there are instant messaging services run by companies such as BlackBerry, Internet telephony services such as Skype, chat rooms, and in-game services liked those used by World of Warcraft.

Communications service providers, who would log the details of all that back-and-forth, believe that the government's program would force them to process petabytes (1 quadrillion bytes) of information every day. It's a mind-bogglingly large amount of data on the scale of every book, every movie, and every piece of music ever released.

So even without opening emails, how much can British spooks learn about who's sending them?

THEY'LL SEE THE RED FLAGS

Do you know how fast you were going?

Your phone does.

If you sent a first text from London before stepping behind the wheel, and a second one from a service station outside Manchester only three hours later, authorities could infer that you broke the speed limit to cover the roughly 200 miles which separate the two.

Crunching location data and communications patterns gives a remarkable rich view of a person's lives ? and their misadventures.

Ken Altshuler, of the American Academy of Matrimonial Lawyers, raves about the benefits which smartphones and social media have brought to savvy divorce attorneys. Lawyers don't need sophisticated data mining software to spot evidence of infidelity or hints of hidden wealth when they review phone records or text traffic, he said.

"One name, one phone number that's not on our client's radar, and our curiosity is piqued," he said. The more the communication ? a late-night text sent to a work colleague, an unexplained international phone call ? is out of character, "the more of a red flag we see."

THEY'LL KNOW HOW YOU'RE SLEEPING

The ebb and flow of electronic communication ?that call to your mother just before bed, that early-morning email to your boss saying you'll be late ? frames our waking lives.

"You can figure somebody's sleep patterns, their weekly pattern of work," said Tony Jebara, a Columbia University machine learning expert. In 2006, he helped found New York-based Sense Networks, which crunches phone data to do just that.

Jebara said that calls made from the same location between 9 and 5 are a good indication of where a person works; the frequency of email traffic to or from a person's work account is a good hint of his or her work ethic; dramatic changes to a person's electronic routine might suggest a promotion ? or a redundancy.

"You can quickly figure out when somebody lost their job," Jebara said, adding: "Credit card companies have been interested in that for a while."

THEY'LL KNOW WHO'S THE BOSS

Drill down, and communication can reveal remarkably rich information. For example, does office worker A answer office worker B's missives within minutes of the message being sent? Does B often leave colleagues' emails unanswered for hours on end? If so, B probably stands for "boss."

That's an example of what Jebara's Columbia colleagues described as "automated social hierarchy detection," a technique which can infer who gives the orders, who's respected, and who's ignored based purely on whose emails get answered and how quickly. In 2007 four of them analyzed traffic taken from the Enron Corporation's email archive to correctly guess the seniority of several top-level managers.

Intelligence agencies may not need such tools to untangle corporate flowcharts, but identifying ringleaders becomes more important when tracking a suspected terrorist cell.

"If you piece together the chain of influence, then you can find the central authority," he said. "You can figure that out without looking at the content."

THEY'LL KNOW WHO YOU'RE TALKING TO

Seeing how networks of people communicate isn't just about finding your boss, it's about figuring out who are your friends.

Programs already exist to determine the density of communications ? something that can identify close groups of friends or family without even knowing who's who. If one user is identified as suspicious, then the users closest to him or her might get a second look as well.

"Let's say we find out somebody in the U.K. is a terrorist," said Kane. "You know exactly who he talks to on almost every channel, so BOOM you know his 10 closest contacts. Knowing that information not only allows you to go to his house, but allows you to go to their houses as well."

A SNOOPER'S CHARTER?

Detective work at the stroke of a key is clearly attractive to spy agencies. British officialdom has been pushing for the mass surveillance program for years, but civil libertarians are perturbed, branding the proposal a "snooper's charter."

Kane said that the surveillance regime had to be seen in the context of social networks such as Facebook and LinkedIn, where hundreds of millions of people were constantly volunteering information about themselves, their friends, their family and their colleagues.

"There's no sense in getting all Big Brother-ish that there are legitimate safeguards in place," he said. "The bottom line is that we're all leaving digital trails, everywhere, all the time. The whole concept of privacy is shifting daily."

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Japan launches rocket with first foreign satellite

AAA??May. 18, 2012?12:37 AM ET
Japan launches rocket with first foreign satellite
AP

A H-2A rocket lifts off from the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency's Tanegashima Space Center on Tanegashima Island in Kagoshima Prefecture, southwestern Japan, early Friday, May 18, 2012. JAXA and Mitsubishi Heavy Industries Ltd. successfully launched a South Korean satellite into space aboard the rocket, local media said. (AP Photo/Kyodo News) JAPAN OUT, MANDATORY CREDIT, NO LICENSING IN CHINA, HONG KONG, JAPAN, SOUTH KOREA AND FRANCE

A H-2A rocket lifts off from the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency's Tanegashima Space Center on Tanegashima Island in Kagoshima Prefecture, southwestern Japan, early Friday, May 18, 2012. JAXA and Mitsubishi Heavy Industries Ltd. successfully launched a South Korean satellite into space aboard the rocket, local media said. (AP Photo/Kyodo News) JAPAN OUT, MANDATORY CREDIT, NO LICENSING IN CHINA, HONG KONG, JAPAN, SOUTH KOREA AND FRANCE

A H-2A rocket lifts off from the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency's Tanegashima Space Center on Tanegashima Island in Kagoshima Prefecture, southwestern Japan, early Friday, May 18, 2012. JAXA and Mitsubishi Heavy Industries Ltd. successfully launched a South Korean satellite into space aboard the rocket, local media said. (AP Photo/Kyodo News) JAPAN OUT, MANDATORY CREDIT, NO LICENSING IN CHINA, HONG KONG, JAPAN, SOUTH KOREA AND FRANCE

(AP) ? A rocket has lifted off in Japan in the country's first commercial launch of a foreign satellite ? one from South Korea designed to monitor the environment.

The HII-A rocket lifted off from a remote southwestern Japan island carrying the South Korean satellite and three Japanese satellites.

Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, a private company in charge of HII-A rocket production since 2007, is hoping to compete with the U.S., Russia and Europe as a launch-vehicle provider.

The Korean satellite, KOMPSAT-3, was developed by the Korea Aerospace Research Institute to monitor the environment. The rocket also carried Japan's Shizuku satellite to monitor climate change and two smaller Japanese satellites.

Associated Press
News Topics: Satellite manufacturing, Unmanned spacecraft, Telecommunications equipment manufacturing, Telecommunications, Industries, Business, Military communications equipment, Defense electronics and systems manufacturing, Aerospace and defense, Industrial products and services, Spacecraft, Space technology, Aerospace technology, Industrial technology, Technology

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$999950 :: 1644 Lake Front RD, Lake Oswego OR, 97034 ? Lake ...

Property Photo

Mls Icon

4 beds, 4 full baths
Home size: 3,840 sq ft
Lot Size: 10,454 sq ft
Property Type: DETACHD
MLS Number: 12431800

REDUCED $ 55K! Prime location. Most rooms & all 3 decks w/great lake views ? perfect to watch lake activity. Unsurpassed quality and details. Hi-ceilings, finely crafted cabinetry, hdwd, granite counters, travertine entry. Kit is center of home ? optimum for entertaining. Walk to lake/boat easement/shops/restaurants/park. Media room equipment/sound system/DR chandelier ex.

Listed with Hasson Company Realtors


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Documents shed new light on Trayvon Martin killing

ORLANDO, Fla. (AP) ? Trayvon Martin's autopsy shows he had marijuana in his system the night he was killed by neighborhood watch volunteer George Zimmerman, and a gunshot to his chest came from close range, according to nearly 200 pages of previously undisclosed documents released Thursday.

At least one investigator wanted to charge Zimmerman with manslaughter but was overruled, according to the documents, which are shedding new light on a case that has raised questions about racial profiling and "stand your ground" laws. The investigator, who was on the scene after the shooting, wrote on March 13 that the confrontation should have been avoided. That report came nearly a month before Zimmerman was arrested.

The documents, photos and video were turned over by prosecutors to defense attorneys earlier this week before they were released to the media. Included in the many witness interviews were accounts by an acquaintance of Zimmerman's who said he's racist and a co-worker who said Zimmerman bullied him and mocked him with an exaggerated Middle Eastern accent.

The autopsy says medical examiners found THC, the psychoactive ingredient in marijuana, when they tested Martin's blood and urine. A police report shows the 17-year-old had been shot once in the chest and had been pronounced dead at the scene. The autopsy says the fatal shot was fired from no more than 18 inches away.

Also in the package is a photo showing Zimmerman with a bloody nose on the night of the fight. A paramedic report says Zimmerman had a 1-inch laceration on his head and forehead abrasion.

"Bleeding tenderness to his nose, and a small laceration to the back of his head. All injuries have minor bleeding," paramedic Michael Brandy wrote about Zimmerman's injuries in the report.

Whether Zimmerman was injured in the Feb. 26 altercation with Martin has been a key question. The 28-year-old Zimmerman has claimed self-defense and said he only fired because the unarmed teenager attacked him.

Zimmerman was not arrested for weeks because he invoked the Florida's law that does not require a person to retreat in the face of a serious threat. He was released on bail and is in hiding while he awaits trial on a second-degree murder charge. He has pleaded not guilty.

The investigator who called for Zimmerman's arrest, Christopher Serino, told prosecutors in March that the fight could have been avoided if Zimmerman had remained in his vehicle and awaited the arrival of law enforcement. He said Zimmerman, after leaving his vehicle, could have identified himself to Martin as a concerned citizen and talked to him instead of confronting him.

He said there is no evidence Martin was involved in any criminal activity.

The lawyer for Martin's parents seized on the investigator's recommendation.

"The police concluded that none of this would have happened if George Zimmerman hadn't gotten out of his car," said attorney Ben Crump. "If George Zimmerman hadn't gotten out of his car, they say it was completely avoidable. That is the headline."

A separate report written by Serino at the crime scene says Martin had $40.15, Skittles candy, a red lighter, headphones and a photo pin in his pocket. A single 9mm shell casing was found near Martin's body.

New witness accounts also emerged Thursday. A witness, whose name is redacted, told investigators he saw "a black male, wearing a dark colored hoodie," on top of a white or Hispanic male who was yelling for help.

The witness, who was looking out the sliding glass door at his home about 30 feet away, said he saw the black male throwing punches "MMA (mixed martial arts) style."

He said he told the fighters he was calling the police. He said that as he was making the call, he heard a shot. He looked outside and saw the person who had been on top laid out on the grass as if he had been shot. He said the other fighter was standing on the sidewalk, talking to another person with a flashlight.

The case has become a national racial flashpoint because the Martin family and supporters contend Zimmerman singled Martin out because he was black.

Two acquaintances paint an unflattering picture of Zimmerman in police interviews.

A distraught woman tells an investigator that she stays away from Zimmerman because he's racist and because of things he's done to her in the past, but she didn't elaborate on what happened between them.

"I don't at all know who this kid was or anything else. But I know George, and I know that he does not like black people. He would start something. He's very confrontational. It's in his blood. We'll just say that," the unidentified woman says in an audio recording.

A man whose name was deleted from the audio told investigators that he worked with Zimmerman in 2008 for a few months. It wasn't clear which company it was.

The man, who described his heritage as "Middle Eastern," said that when he first started many employees didn't like him. Zimmerman seized on this, the employee said, and bullied him.

Zimmerman wanted to "get in" with the clique at work so he exaggerated a Middle Eastern accent when talking about the employee, the man said. The employee told investigators that Zimmerman made reference to terrorists and bombings when talking about him.

"It was so immature," said the employee, who ended up writing a letter to management about Zimmerman.

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