With the holiday season fast approaching, retail payroll teams around the world are bracing for the strain of seasonal hiring. The influx of workers means added payroll runs, and yet too few are turning to technology to ease the pressure.

Nearly two-thirds of shoppers step into a store without a specific purchase in mind, looking to be inspired by retailers who can craft the ideal ambience through digital screens and interactive kiosks. 

The peak season is renowned for Christmas cheer, retail opportunity, in store shopping, bustling shopping centres and queues. Additionally, shoppers and restaurant clientele are busy. They detest queues. Their time is precious. They have places to go and people to see.

Nikolai Patrushev, Chairman of the Russian Naval Board, said that he personally assess the combat capability of the Russian Black Sea Fleet. Responding to reports in Western media about the scale of damage that the Armed Forces of Ukraine have caused to the Russian Black Sea Fleet in the course of the special military operation, Patrushev assured that the Black Sea Fleet was as strong as before. "There is no defeat of our fleet in the Black Sea at all, even though it is NATO specialists that coordinate Kyiv's aggressive actions in this region," he said.

A car exploded on Taras Shevchenko Street in Sevastopol, Crimea. The driver, a Russian serviceman, died from his injuries. The victim is believed to be captain of the first rank of the Black Sea Fleet of the Russian Navy. The car exploded as a result of the detonation of an improvised bomb that was attached to the bottom of the vehicle.

British Business-to-Business (B2B) companies take on average 32 days to collect, collate and enrich all the necessary data for a new product launch, significantly impacting UK productivity and go-to-market times, according to research conducted by Akeneo, the Product Experience (PX) Company and leading provider of Product Information Management (PIM) solutions.

University of Wisconsin-Madison researchers targeting a group of hereditary neurodegenerative diseases have found success using a gene therapy treatment in an animal model. The approach, which uses CRISPR-Cas9 genome editing technology, offers a unique and promising strategy that could one day treat rare but debilitating motor neuron diseases in humans.

The American Association of Critical-Care Nurses awarded three AACN Impact Research Grants of up to $50,000 each, bringing its total support to more than $1.5 million in funding since 2011.

Supporting a loved one as they near the end of their life can be confronting. Palliative care is there to help but such services are not equally accessible to all Australians, particularly those in rural areas.

The Korea Research Institute of Standards and Science (KRISS) announced that they have developed an advanced disease diagnosis and treatment system based on nanomaterials.

The University of Pennsylvania Graduate School of Education (Penn GSE) has been awarded $3.5 million, part of a larger $8 million grant from Education Initiatives, to partner with the School District of Philadelphia (SDP) to launch The Academy at Penn, an innovative five-year, cohort-based college- and career-readiness model for high school students. Foundations, Inc. and the Consortium for Policy Research in Education (CPRE) were also awarded through the grant as part of the larger partnership. The close collaboration involves working together to design, implement, and evaluate the project.

Nearly three dozen Binghamton University, State University of New York researchers have been honored for their work by a Stanford University study that looks at the impact of scientists worldwide. The recently released ranking has identified 33 current faculty who were among the top 2% of all researchers in the world in their fields in 2023.

Nearly three dozen Binghamton University, State University of New York researchers have been honored for their work by a Stanford University study that looks at the impact of scientists worldwide. The recently released ranking has identified 33 current faculty who were among the top 2% of all researchers in the world in their fields in 2023.

Supporting a loved one as they near the end of their life can be confronting. Palliative care is there to help but such services are not equally accessible to all Australians, particularly those in rural areas.

The Korea Research Institute of Standards and Science (KRISS) announced that they have developed an advanced disease diagnosis and treatment system based on nanomaterials.

Digital Science's flagship product Dimensions has launched a beta of a new AI-based Natural Language to Query search technology.

What will my grocery bill be this holiday season?

[Domestic] :
Rescue workers are continuing the search for 12 missing crew members of a fishing boat that sank in waters off Jeju Island early on Friday.  The Jeju branch of the Coast Guard said it is mobilizing all available resources for the search, as the first 24 hours are considered crucial with water ...

[more...]

[Domestic] :
Search for 12 missing crew members of a fishing boat that sank in waters off Jeju Island continued for the second straight day on Saturday. According to the Jeju branch of the Korea Coast Guard, a remotely operated vehicle(ROV) is set to be submerged once in the morning and again in the afternoon for ...

[more...]

[Domestic] :
Another body was found in the search for missing crew members after a fishing boat sank off Jeju Island last week.  According to the Jeju branch of the Korea Coast Guard on Monday, the body was found close to the sunken boat around 4 p.m. Sunday during an underwater search using a remotely operated ...

[more...]

[Domestic] :
The search for missing crew members continued for the fourth straight day on Monday, after a fishing boat sank in waters off Jeju Island. According to the Jeju branch of the Korea Coast Guard, 47 vessels and eight aircraft were dispatched to search for the eight South Koreans and two Indonesians who remain ...

[more...]

[Politics] :
Defense Minister Kim Yong-hyun on Monday reiterated that sending an observation team to Ukraine is necessary for protecting national interest. During a National Assembly National Defense Committee session, Minister Kim said sending an observation team differs from troop deployment. He explained that a ...

[more...]

[Sports] :
The Kia Tigers have won the regular-season title in the Korea Baseball Organization(KBO), heading straight to the Korean Series. The Tigers were defeated by the SSG Landers 2-0 Tuesday but secured the regular-season title as second-place Samsung Lions lost 8-4 to the Doosan Bears. With seven games ...

[more...]

[Sports] :
South Korean forward Son Heung-min of the Tottenham Hotspur has picked up his first two assists of the season, helping his club with the second win of the season. Son set up Brennan Johnson's 28th-minute goal in a match against Brentford on Saturday at Tottenham Hotspur Stadium in London, breaking ...

[more...]

[Science] :
The Animal and Plant Quarantine Agency says it has developed, for the first time in the world, a differential diagnosis technology for lumpy skin disease(LSD), a viral disease that affects cattle. With the technology, jointly developed with Median Diagnostics, it can be determined within eight hours if a ...

[more...]

[Science] :
Seoul, Daejeon and other inland areas experienced the first frost of the fall season Wednesday. In Seoul and Suwon, Gyeonggi Province, the first frost was observed two days earlier than last year and nine days later than average. Daejeon reported its first frost 16 days later than last year and nine ...

[more...]

In the realm of online privacy, private search engines provide a shield against intrusive tracking and data collection. Let's explore five prominent options.

Explore Aquarius Season's unique energy, from innovation to social connection. Learn how this zodiac period influences creativity, relationships, and self-expression.

Deep-sea mining evidence review published  British Geological Survey

Sea floor: marine geoscience  British Geological Survey

CMIC: critical minerals research review  British Geological Survey

My role as a stable isotope research assistant  British Geological Survey

New research supports conservation of fallow deer across Europe  British Geological Survey

International geoscience research and development  British Geological Survey

New underground observatory open for research  British Geological Survey

Seabed geology data: stakeholder consultation  British Geological Survey

Preparation of biomacromolecules for structural biology studies is a complex and time-consuming process. The goal is to produce a highly concentrated, highly pure product that is often shipped to large facilities with tools to prepare the samples for crystallization trials or for measurements at synchrotrons and cryoEM centers. The aim of this article is to provide guidance and to discuss general considerations for shipping biomacromolecular samples. Details are also provided about shipping samples for specific experiment types, including solution- and cryogenic-based techniques. These guidelines are provided with the hope that the time and energy invested in sample preparation is not lost due to shipping logistics.

This review summarizes the methodological aspects of laboratory X-ray powder micro-diffraction and demonstrates the assets of the method in the research of painted artworks for evaluation of their provenance or diagnosing their degradation.

Painted artworks represent a significant group of cultural heritage artifacts, which are primarily admired because of their aesthetic quality. Nevertheless, the value of each particular painting depends also on what is known about it. Material investigation of paintings is one of the most reliable sources of information. Materials in painted artworks (i.e. panel, easel and miniature paintings, wall paintings, polychromed sculptures etc.) represent an extensive set of inorganic and organic phases, which are often present in complicated mixtures and exhibit characteristics reflecting their geological genesis (mineral pigments), manufacturing technology (artificial pigments), diverse biological nature (binders or dyes) or secondary changes (degradation or intentional later interventions). The analyses of paintings are often made challenging by the heterogeneous nature and minute size of micro-samples or, in some cases, even by the impossibility of sampling due to the preciousness, fragility or small dimensions of the artwork. This review demonstrates the successful implementation of laboratory X-ray powder micro-diffraction for material investigation of paintings, illustrating its efficiency for mineralogical analysis of (i) earth-based materials indicating the provenance of paintings, (ii) copper-based pigments pointing to their origin, and (iii) products of both salt corrosion and saponification enabling one to reveal the deterioration and probable original appearance of artworks.

To date, computed tomography experiments, carried-out at synchrotron radiation facilities worldwide, pose a tremendous challenge in terms of the breadth and complexity of the experimental datasets produced. Furthermore, near real-time three-dimensional reconstruction capabilities are becoming a crucial requirement in order to perform high-quality and result-informed synchrotron imaging experiments, where a large amount of data is collected and processed within a short time window. To address these challenges, we have developed and deployed a synchrotron computed tomography framework designed to automatically process online the experimental data from the synchrotron imaging beamlines, while leveraging the high-performance computing cluster capabilities to accelerate the real-time feedback to the users on their experimental results. We have, further, integrated it within a modern unified national authentication and data management framework, which we have developed and deployed, spanning the entire data lifecycle of a large-scale scientific facility. In this study, the overall architecture, functional modules and workflow design of our synchrotron computed tomography framework are presented in detail. Moreover, the successful integration of the imaging beamlines at the Shanghai Synchrotron Radiation Facility into our scientific computing framework is also detailed, which, ultimately, resulted in accelerating and fully automating their entire data processing pipelines. In fact, when compared with the original three-dimensional tomography reconstruction approaches, the implementation of our synchrotron computed tomography framework led to an acceleration in the experimental data processing capabilities, while maintaining a high level of integration with all the beamline processing software and systems.

The Protein Data Bank (PDB) was established as the first open-access digital data resource in biology and medicine in 1971 with seven X-ray crystal structures of proteins. Today, the PDB houses >210 000 experimentally determined, atomic level, 3D structures of proteins and nucleic acids as well as their complexes with one another and small molecules (e.g. approved drugs, enzyme cofactors). These data provide insights into fundamental biology, biomedicine, bioenergy and biotechnology. They proved particularly important for understanding the SARS-CoV-2 global pandemic. The US-funded Research Collaboratory for Structural Bioinformatics Protein Data Bank (RCSB PDB) and other members of the Worldwide Protein Data Bank (wwPDB) partnership jointly manage the PDB archive and support >60 000 `data depositors' (structural biologists) around the world. wwPDB ensures the quality and integrity of the data in the ever-expanding PDB archive and supports global open access without limitations on data usage. The RCSB PDB research-focused web portal at https://www.rcsb.org/ (RCSB.org) supports millions of users worldwide, representing a broad range of expertise and interests. In addition to retrieving 3D structure data, PDB `data consumers' access comparative data and external annotations, such as information about disease-causing point mutations and genetic variations. RCSB.org also provides access to >1 000 000 computed structure models (CSMs) generated using artificial intelligence/machine-learning methods. To avoid doubt, the provenance and reliability of experimentally determined PDB structures and CSMs are identified. Related training materials are available to support users in their RCSB.org explorations.

An exhaustive search for missing symmetry was performed for 223 076 entries in the ICSD (2023-2 release). Approximately 0.65% of them can be described with higher symmetry than reported. Out of the identified noncentrosymmetric entries, ∼74% can be described by centrosymmetric space groups; this has implications for compatible physical properties. It is proposed that the information on the correct space group is included in the ICSD.

JUAMI, the joint undertaking for an African materials institute, is a project to build collaborations and materials research capabilities between PhD researchers in Africa, the United States, and the world. Focusing on research-active universities in the East African countries of Kenya, Ethiopia, Tanzania and Uganda, the effort has run a series of schools focused on materials for sustainable energy and materials for sustainable development. These bring together early-career researchers from Africa, the US, and beyond, for two weeks in a close-knit environment. The program includes lectures on cutting-edge research from internationally renowned speakers, highly interactive tutorial lectures on the science behind the research, also from internationally known researchers, and hands-on practicals and team-building exercises that culminate in group proposals from self-formed student teams. The schools have benefited more than 300 early-career students and led to proposals that have received funding and have led to research collaborations and educational non-profits. JUAMI continues and has an ongoing community of alumni who share resources and expertise, and is open to like-minded people who want to join and develop contacts and collaborations internationally.

The workshop titled `X-ray-based technologies in emerging fuel cell research', organized by Vivian Stojanoff from Brookhaven National Laboratory (BNL) and Narayanasami Sukumar from Cornell University/Advanced Photon Source-Northeastern Collaborative Access Team, was a notable segment of the National Synchrotron Light Source II and Center for Functional Nanomaterials Users' Meeting held 13–17 May 2024. This one-day event, on 13 May 2024, at BNL in New York, aimed to bring together researchers, beamline scientists, management and developers to propel fuel cell technology forward using model systems inspired by natural photosynthesis and redox enzymes. This summary encapsulates the key discussions, advancements and future implications of the workshop.

PayComplete has unveiled a report that...

 ‘The Road Ahead: Towards Seamless Payments Interoperability’, an eBook from Thunes, Visa, and The Paypers, explores how payments interoperability is reshaping the future of cross-border transactions.

TORONTO, ON - SEPTEMBER 07: Actor Simon Pegg attends the "Hector and the Search for Happiness" premiere during the 2014 Toronto International Film Festival at Winter Garden Theatre on September 7, 2014 in Toronto, Canada. (Photo by Tommaso Boddi/Getty Images); Credit: Tommaso Boddi/Getty Images

British actor Simon Pegg has had the chance to take on some pretty fun roles. He’s battled zombies in Shaun of the Dead. He’s taken on the role of Scotty in the J.J. Abrams reboot of "Star Trek." And he plays an Impossible Missions Force technician alongside Tom Cruise in the Mission Impossible film series.

In his latest film release, Pegg plays Hector, a psychiatrist who decides his life is just too “beige,” so he sets out into the world to find out what makes people truly happy.

Pegg joins Take Two to talk about what Hector’s journey brings him in “Hector and the Search for Happiness.”

“Hector and the Search for Happiness” opens in the U.S. September 19th.

Interview Highlights:

On prepping to play the psychiatrist, Hector:

“Rosamund Pike and I…had dinner with a psychiatrist prior to starting shooting just to see, sort of, how he felt about dealing with people who have problems which aren’t necessarily, real problems, you know; which are what people call first world problems on Twitter.”

Why Hector sets out on his journey:

"I think Hector, at the beginning of the film, has a life that is very satisfactory; and to that degree, he’s unhappy…And, you know, what he learns is, you need more than that emotionally in your life to truly be happy. You know, if everything’s kind of just beige, you’re never going to be happy. You need to know misery, you need to know fear, and you need to know abandonment."

A little perspective:

"It was a very interesting thing to be shooting in Johannesburg, and to get out into…the townships…and see societies which contend with just abject poverty, and hardship everyday; but seeing so many smiles, and so many people genuinely joyful. And then get into the interior of Johannesburg, where there’s a lot of white people living in, sort of, gated communities, terrified...And see less smiles. It’s a very odd thing. And very, in keeping with the message of the film, which is, avoiding unhappiness is not the root to happiness.”

On his favorite emotion to convey as an actor – happiness, sadness, or anger:

“It’s a weird thing, I think, acting, sometimes. I sometimes almost resent it because you go through this sort of Pavlovian trauma sometimes because you have to recreate certain things that are sometimes a bit stressful.”

“Happiness is always a nice one because it’s fun to laugh on screen or to recreate moments of joy or euphoria, cause you do get a buzz from it, you know, you get this…vicarious, sort of, happiness in yourself. But that works as well for having to replicate sadness, or fear, or anger, or love even. “

“Your body thinks, ‘Oh, are we doing this now? Are we in love with someone here? Are we scared of something [laughs]?’ And you have to constantly intellectualize and remind your hormones that you’re actually – ‘No. This is fake, okay. You’re actually not about to die.’”

The back cover photo splash from Ruth Batchelor's album "Songs for Women's Liberation: Reviving a Dream"; Credit:

I’ve been a member of the LA Film Critics Association since 1999. LAFCA is a good group - collegial and filled with real movie lovers. But it has a problem.

It's a professional organization, meaning a baseline for membership is you have to have a job, and film criticism is overwhelmingly white and male. 78 percent of the top critics listed on RottenTomatoes are male, and women write only 18 percent of the major reviews. So LAFCA is like the profession itself: overwhelmingly a platform for white men.

It's trying to diversify. It has been for years. But how do you do that when the pool you draw from has a huge institutional bias? According to film critic Claudia Puig, "Criticism has been a white male dominated field for very long. And it continues to be. And not just white males, but middle aged."

Claudia is the current LAFCA president - and a legendary critic, who wrote lead reviews for 14 years at USA Today, and now appears regularly on KPCC’s Film Week.

"Very few movies pass the Bechdel Test. Women are often just girlfriends, wives, mothers. They don't get to have a story arc of their own. But if you had more women reviewing these movies, they would point out certain things that people might not notice as potentially offensive. Because we have been harassed, or we have experienced any number of things. It's something I've grappled with through my entire career." - Claudia Puig

I'm on a committee with Claudia for the LA Film Critics. The concept is to mentor young writers - to generate diversity, from the ground up. One idea is to have a scholarship for aspiring female film critics. We thought it would be good to name it after a prominent woman from the group's past.

So I went to Myron Meisel, who joined LAFCA in 1979, just four years after it formed, and I asked him, "Is there a woman you can think of who played an especially prominent role in the history of the LA Film Critics Association?" "Oh!," Myron said. "Ruth Batchelor was the founder and driving force..." "Wait, what?" I asked. "LAFCA was founded by a woman?"

"We weren't shocked. You had Ruth, who was very much concerned with creating a Los Angeles equivalent to the New York Film Critics Association. Which she largely pulled together by force of will. While Ruth was the moving force, you really can't discount her ability to martial the enthusiastic support of Charles Champlin as a co-founder, and the imprimatur of the Los Angeles Times behind him. Ruth had an enviable ability to make everything she undertook seem inevitable." - Myron Meisel

It's poignant, isn't it? And a little creepy. A prestigious group commits to gender diversity, and somehow, it doesn't have the institutional memory to know that the pivotal figure in its history was a woman.

How could we forget Ruth? Batchelor was nothing if not memorable. Before she became a pundit, she was a successful pop songwriter in the style of Neil Sedaka, or Goffin and King. She wrote dozens of songs, recorded by everybody from Phil Spector to the Partridge Family. She wrote Elvis Presley numbers, including "Cotton Candy Land," which might be the most hated track in the Presley catalogue.

But Batchelor also wrote "Where Do You Come From?", which is beautiful.

Elvis Presley performing Ruth Batchelor's "Where do you come from?"

Where do you come from, Ruth?

It wasn't easy to find out.

Batchelor's New York Times obituary was full of false leads. It said she was a critic for National Public Radio. She wasn't, but when NPR searched their archives, they unearthed a lead: a Film Comment article from 1982, where Batchelor is described as "Ruth Batchelor of National Public Radio's 'As it Happens.'" "As It Happens" airs on Canada's CBC.

So I placed a call. And I waited.

Meanwhile, I found a blog post about Batchelor as a songwriter on an excellent site called "Zero to 180 - 3 Minute Magic." The title of the post was riveting: "First 'Women's Liberation LP.'"

It turns out in 1971, Ruth Batchelor self-produced and financed a concept album called "Songs for Women's Liberation: Reviving a Dream." 

Myron Meisel told me about Ruth's earthy sense of humor, and it's right there in the first write-up's, where her working title is "A Quarter for the Ladies Room." A Billboard article from August 1971 quotes Batchelor about the album: "Right now I have an album of dirty Women's Liberation poems recorded, and I'm trying to sell the master." Then she laughs. "The last record company I recorded for folded."

Batchelor shopped her record. There were no takers.

But Batchelor proved unstoppable. She created her own record company and called it Femme Records. Then she put out what the leftist journal Broadside called "the first feminist record album," all by herself. "Reviving a Dream" is forgotten, bordering on lost. It's never been available for streaming, or released on CD.

Batchelor's record is a pastiche of radio styles from her era. There's Joan Baez folk, two drawling country laments, even some call and response stuff Batchelor probably learned from Phil Spector and his girl groups.

Are Batchelor's songs any good? They're amazing. Amazing just because they exist.

She fits into the churning sea of anonymous faces so seamlessly it takes awhile to realize: She's Ruth Batchelor. The woman who founded the LA Film Critics. A group currently struggling with gender diversity.

LAFCA prez Claudia Puig agreed to an interview knowing it had to do with LAFCA, but not what it was about. I played her Batchelor's song "Drop the Mop." Batchelor intended it as an anthem, scored to a tempo of marching feet.

The listen was awkward - like force feeding a roommate your iTunes playlist. Claudia took notes the whole time, to occupy her critical mind, but I could see when it ended that she was moved.

 "Yeah, it's a really interesting song," Claudia said. "My reaction is sort of...ummm..."

Claudia hesitated, looking for words.

"And this was the origin of the group. Yeah. It really kind of... It is really interesting. I'd never heard of her. She was right there, fighting that fight." 

"And here, we were looking for an avatar," I said.

"Right. Right. It means something. This is a really important discovery that you made."

A piece of the portrait was missing - an essential one. It came courtesy of Kevin Robertson, a producer for "As It Happens" at the CBC. Batchelor had been the show's "Hollywood Correspondent" in the early 1980s. There was audio in the archives. Kevin provided me with five MP3s.

Batchelor's CBC brand was gender traditional. She was the tinseltown gadfly, a niche created by Hedda Hopper and Louella Parsons in the 1930s. There was gossip about Burt Reynolds and Loni Anderson. Richard Burton's widow. Marvin Hamlisch. TV's "Gomer Pyle."

It was kitsch heaven, so I wasn't disappointed. Not exactly. But it was still a bit like listening to Wonder Woman try to be ordinary, because hey, we all gotta eat.

Ruth Batchelor's "Mr. Principal"

The LA Film Critics get a cameo in Batchelor's Oscar season broadcast, when she mentions her LAFCA Awards vote. For awhile, I thought that would be the only audio connecting the "As It Happens" Ruth Batchelor to the feminist fireball she wanted to be.

Then Batchelor starts riffing on "Partners," a buddy cop farce about a straight cop who goes undercover as a gay man. The film had sparked protests from the gay community. Batchelor is unsympathetic, which is surprising in a civil rights pioneer. Her reasoning is devastating.

"You know if women got angry every time there was a movie against women," Batchelor says, "there wouldn't be any movies."

Batchelor died of cancer early - she was just 58. 25 years later, men still direct most mainstream movies - 93 percent as of 2015. They have 70 percent of the speaking parts, and play 88 percent of the leads.

While women get to be naked twice as often in American movies.

Men review almost all movies too. Maybe that's why Ruth Batchelor founded the LA Film Critics. Because she lived in that world. She covered it. Spoke to it. Fought hard against it.

And then left behind a hidden legacy.

"She is our avatar," Claudia says, as our interview time runs out. "It sort of makes me want to redouble our efforts to honor her spirit."

This content is from Southern California Public Radio. View the original story at SCPR.org.