All Critics (53) | Top Critics (22) | Fresh (50) | Rotten (3)
This film is distinctly minor league. But it does provide the thumbs-up emotional lift of a bumper-sticker message on game day.
It's a credit to directors Daniel Lindsay and T.J. Daniels that the personal stories of the kids and coaches resonate more than the wins and losses.
Undefeated is undeniably inspirational stuff.
For the most part admirably chooses honest documentation over emotional manipulation.
"Undefeated" is an emotional and effective film, and I'm happy for it.
I wanted it blow my mind, to flatten me. Demanding, I know.
This is one of the best sports documentaries of the last few years and while I don't think it should have won in a VERY good year for non-fiction film, I'm really not upset at all that it did.
Finds the warmth and vulnerability that is sometimes hard for outsiders to see beneath the rough, damaged exterior of the impoverished Memphis neighborhood where much of the action takes place.
Undefeated does more to draw a straight line between the desire to win (as opposed to actually winning) and the character of a man than a thousand locker room pep talks.
This year's Oscar winner for Best Documentary Feature seems almost too good to be true...but that's what makes it so effective.
Has a huge heart. There won't be a dry eye in the crowd.
a remarkable documentary about the power of commitment and resolve
Should be required viewing of anyone who is committed to becoming a teen athlete -- or a coach of one.
If you can get through this movie dry-eyed, you are made of sterner stuff than I.
This emotional love letter from a coach to his team follows a downtrodden Memphis high school football team through a tumultuous season which tests the patience of the coach and the tenacity of the players.
A compelling documentary chronicling not just football exploits but a few bona fide cases of quality character revealed.
Forget about "Blind Side". This is the real deal, a stirring documentary about high school football that will move you to tears.
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By influencing all the natural biomechanics in your body, barefoot shoes will help you move more in the way nature has intended. This footwear provides a number of health benefits to the individual who wears them. There are some major benefits to wearing Barefoot footwear you may want to consider.
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Contact: Franny White franny.white@pnnl.gov 509-375-6904 DOE/Pacific Northwest National Laboratory
Microbes turn leaves into nutrients; knowledge could improve biofuel production
RICHLAND, Wash. Leafcutter ants, the tiny red dots known for carrying green leaves as they march through tropical forests, are also talented farmers that cultivate gardens of fungi and bacteria. Ants eat fungi from the so-called fungal gardens, but the bacteria's role has been unclear until now.
New research shows the bacteria help decompose the leaves and play a major role in turning the leaves into nutrients that may be important for both ants and fungi. The findings were published March 1 by The ISME Journal, a publication of the International Society for Microbial Ecology.
"This research provides some of the first tangible details about the fascinating symbiotic relationship between leafcutter ants, fungi and bacteria," said Kristin Burnum, a bioanalytical chemist at the Department of Energy's Pacific Northwest National Laboratory. Burnum is a co-author on the paper and led the study's protein analysis. "Understanding how bacteria turn plant matter into a source of energy in ant fungal gardens could also help improve biofuel production."
The gardens in question are initially sowed by the ants, which bring leaf pieces into their underground nests. From the leaves grow the fungus Leucoagaricus gongylophorus, traditionally thought of as the ants' food. The relationship between leafcutter ants and fungi has been known since 1874, but it wasn't until the late 1990s that scientists started to also identify bacteria in the underground gardens.
Since then, a lively debate has gone on about the bacteria's role. Because pure samples of the garden fungi grown in laboratories don't easily degrade cellulose, a molecule that gives plants structural stability, many scientists have argued the bacteria help decompose the leaves. Other researchers have proposed bacteria like the microscopic bugs in our guts help ants obtain nutrients from the leaves.
Lead author Frank Aylward of the University of Wisconsin-Madison, Burnum and their co-authors set out to help resolve the debate by doing a comprehensive survey of the various bacteria species that live in the gardens and examining the suite of proteins those bacteria produce. They traveled to a Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute site near Gamboa, Panama, and gathered samples of fungal gardens tended by two ant species, Atta colombica and Atta cephalotes.
Aylward and several others on the research team are part of the Great Lakes Bioenergy Research Center, one of three Bioenergy Research Centers established by DOE's Office of Science in 2007 to accelerate research toward the development of cost-effective advanced biofuels from nonfood plant fiber. The University of Wisconsin-Madison leads the Great Lakes center.
To produce results that more accurately reflect the large diversity of real-world gardens, the team collected large samples with bits of leaves, ants, fungi and bacteria intermixed instead of just gathering samples of the bacteria they intended to study. This allowed them to better examine the entire community of bacteria that live in the gardens and prevented them from missing some bacterial species. The team then studied the bacterial community's genes and proteins an approach known as metagenomics and metaproteomics.
The researchers sequenced their genetic samples at Lawrence Berkley National Laboratory's DOE Joint Genome Institute. With the help of an extensive library of bacterial genes developed by co-author Cameron Currie, team members at University of Wisconsin-Madison identified thousands of bacterial genetic sequences from the two ant gardens. More than two-thirds of the bacterial species found were from just a few groups. More than half of those identified belong to the family Enterobacteriaceae, whose members are known to ferment sugars and include the intestinal microbes that help animals digest food.
From the bacteria, Burnum and her PNNL colleagues in Richland examined proteins, the workhorses of the cell that perform the tasks needed to keep organisms alive and well. They used mass spectrometers at EMSL, the Department of Energy's Environmental Molecular Sciences Laboratory at PNNL, to identify proteins in an A. colombica nest.
They found proteins that were involved a surprising number of different metabolic pathways, including:
Breaking down complex sugars that make plants tough and durable, but difficult to digest
Transporting sugars, allowing broken-down sugars to be used for energy
Making amino acids, the buildings blocks of proteins
Making vitamin B5, which is needed to both break down proteins, carbohydrates and fats and to make energy from nutrients
When compared to all other bacteria in Currie's large library of bacterial genes, very few just 0.2 to 0.6 percent of the garden bacteria were involved in breaking down cellulose. Instead, most of the garden bacteria were involved in breaking down simpler sugars, indicating that perhaps fungi initially breaks down cellulose and the bacteria then turn the partially digested sugars that result into a variety of nutrients that could promote the fungi's growth or even nourish the ants themselves.
"Our results show that calling these 'fungal gardens' is pretty misleading; 'fungus-bacterial communities' would be far more accurate," Burnum said. "Bacteria are not only integral residents of these communities, but they perform essential tasks that keep the communities and the ants that help cultivate them living."
Next, the team plans to analyze the fungi, lipids and various metabolic products found in the gardens.
This study's findings and future results could advance the work of scientists who are looking at fungal enzymes to make biofuel out of plants. The enzymes, or biological catalysts, of fungi are exceptionally talented at breaking down cellulose in plants, making them a good model for large-scale biofuel production.
"It's apparent that neither fungi nor bacteria work in isolation when it comes to leafcutter ant gardens," Burnum said. "It's possible that the same goes for biomass conversion; perhaps both fungi and bacteria are needed to efficiently turn plants into biofuel."
###
REFERENCE: Frank O. Aylward, Kristin E. Burnum, Jarrod J. Scott, Garret Suen, Susannah G. Tringe, Sandra M. Adams, Kerrie W. Barry, Carrie D. Nicora, Paul D. Piehowski, Samuel O. Purvine, Gabriel J. Starrett, Lynne A. Goodwin, Richard D. Smith, Mary S. Lipton, Cameron R. Currie. Metagenomic and metaproteomic insights into bacterial communities in leaf-cutter ant fungus gardens. The ISME Journal, Online publish date March 1, 2012. DOI: 10.1038/ISMEJ.2012.10. www.nature.com/ismej/journal/vaop/ncurrent/full/ismej201210a.html.
Interdisciplinary teams at Pacific Northwest National Laboratory address many of America's most pressing issues in energy, the environment and national security through advances in basic and applied science. PNNL employs 4,700 staff, has an annual budget of nearly $1.1 billion, and has been managed for the U.S. Department of Energy by Ohio-based Battelle since the laboratory's inception in 1965. For more, visit the PNNL's News Center, or follow PNNL on Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter.
DOE'S Office of Science is the single largest supporter of basic research in the physical sciences in the United States, and is working to address some of the most pressing challenges of our time. For more information, please visit science.energy.gov. The Joint Genome Institute and EMSL are also supported by the Office of Science.
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AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.
Contact: Franny White franny.white@pnnl.gov 509-375-6904 DOE/Pacific Northwest National Laboratory
Microbes turn leaves into nutrients; knowledge could improve biofuel production
RICHLAND, Wash. Leafcutter ants, the tiny red dots known for carrying green leaves as they march through tropical forests, are also talented farmers that cultivate gardens of fungi and bacteria. Ants eat fungi from the so-called fungal gardens, but the bacteria's role has been unclear until now.
New research shows the bacteria help decompose the leaves and play a major role in turning the leaves into nutrients that may be important for both ants and fungi. The findings were published March 1 by The ISME Journal, a publication of the International Society for Microbial Ecology.
"This research provides some of the first tangible details about the fascinating symbiotic relationship between leafcutter ants, fungi and bacteria," said Kristin Burnum, a bioanalytical chemist at the Department of Energy's Pacific Northwest National Laboratory. Burnum is a co-author on the paper and led the study's protein analysis. "Understanding how bacteria turn plant matter into a source of energy in ant fungal gardens could also help improve biofuel production."
The gardens in question are initially sowed by the ants, which bring leaf pieces into their underground nests. From the leaves grow the fungus Leucoagaricus gongylophorus, traditionally thought of as the ants' food. The relationship between leafcutter ants and fungi has been known since 1874, but it wasn't until the late 1990s that scientists started to also identify bacteria in the underground gardens.
Since then, a lively debate has gone on about the bacteria's role. Because pure samples of the garden fungi grown in laboratories don't easily degrade cellulose, a molecule that gives plants structural stability, many scientists have argued the bacteria help decompose the leaves. Other researchers have proposed bacteria like the microscopic bugs in our guts help ants obtain nutrients from the leaves.
Lead author Frank Aylward of the University of Wisconsin-Madison, Burnum and their co-authors set out to help resolve the debate by doing a comprehensive survey of the various bacteria species that live in the gardens and examining the suite of proteins those bacteria produce. They traveled to a Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute site near Gamboa, Panama, and gathered samples of fungal gardens tended by two ant species, Atta colombica and Atta cephalotes.
Aylward and several others on the research team are part of the Great Lakes Bioenergy Research Center, one of three Bioenergy Research Centers established by DOE's Office of Science in 2007 to accelerate research toward the development of cost-effective advanced biofuels from nonfood plant fiber. The University of Wisconsin-Madison leads the Great Lakes center.
To produce results that more accurately reflect the large diversity of real-world gardens, the team collected large samples with bits of leaves, ants, fungi and bacteria intermixed instead of just gathering samples of the bacteria they intended to study. This allowed them to better examine the entire community of bacteria that live in the gardens and prevented them from missing some bacterial species. The team then studied the bacterial community's genes and proteins an approach known as metagenomics and metaproteomics.
The researchers sequenced their genetic samples at Lawrence Berkley National Laboratory's DOE Joint Genome Institute. With the help of an extensive library of bacterial genes developed by co-author Cameron Currie, team members at University of Wisconsin-Madison identified thousands of bacterial genetic sequences from the two ant gardens. More than two-thirds of the bacterial species found were from just a few groups. More than half of those identified belong to the family Enterobacteriaceae, whose members are known to ferment sugars and include the intestinal microbes that help animals digest food.
From the bacteria, Burnum and her PNNL colleagues in Richland examined proteins, the workhorses of the cell that perform the tasks needed to keep organisms alive and well. They used mass spectrometers at EMSL, the Department of Energy's Environmental Molecular Sciences Laboratory at PNNL, to identify proteins in an A. colombica nest.
They found proteins that were involved a surprising number of different metabolic pathways, including:
Breaking down complex sugars that make plants tough and durable, but difficult to digest
Transporting sugars, allowing broken-down sugars to be used for energy
Making amino acids, the buildings blocks of proteins
Making vitamin B5, which is needed to both break down proteins, carbohydrates and fats and to make energy from nutrients
When compared to all other bacteria in Currie's large library of bacterial genes, very few just 0.2 to 0.6 percent of the garden bacteria were involved in breaking down cellulose. Instead, most of the garden bacteria were involved in breaking down simpler sugars, indicating that perhaps fungi initially breaks down cellulose and the bacteria then turn the partially digested sugars that result into a variety of nutrients that could promote the fungi's growth or even nourish the ants themselves.
"Our results show that calling these 'fungal gardens' is pretty misleading; 'fungus-bacterial communities' would be far more accurate," Burnum said. "Bacteria are not only integral residents of these communities, but they perform essential tasks that keep the communities and the ants that help cultivate them living."
Next, the team plans to analyze the fungi, lipids and various metabolic products found in the gardens.
This study's findings and future results could advance the work of scientists who are looking at fungal enzymes to make biofuel out of plants. The enzymes, or biological catalysts, of fungi are exceptionally talented at breaking down cellulose in plants, making them a good model for large-scale biofuel production.
"It's apparent that neither fungi nor bacteria work in isolation when it comes to leafcutter ant gardens," Burnum said. "It's possible that the same goes for biomass conversion; perhaps both fungi and bacteria are needed to efficiently turn plants into biofuel."
###
REFERENCE: Frank O. Aylward, Kristin E. Burnum, Jarrod J. Scott, Garret Suen, Susannah G. Tringe, Sandra M. Adams, Kerrie W. Barry, Carrie D. Nicora, Paul D. Piehowski, Samuel O. Purvine, Gabriel J. Starrett, Lynne A. Goodwin, Richard D. Smith, Mary S. Lipton, Cameron R. Currie. Metagenomic and metaproteomic insights into bacterial communities in leaf-cutter ant fungus gardens. The ISME Journal, Online publish date March 1, 2012. DOI: 10.1038/ISMEJ.2012.10. www.nature.com/ismej/journal/vaop/ncurrent/full/ismej201210a.html.
Interdisciplinary teams at Pacific Northwest National Laboratory address many of America's most pressing issues in energy, the environment and national security through advances in basic and applied science. PNNL employs 4,700 staff, has an annual budget of nearly $1.1 billion, and has been managed for the U.S. Department of Energy by Ohio-based Battelle since the laboratory's inception in 1965. For more, visit the PNNL's News Center, or follow PNNL on Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter.
DOE'S Office of Science is the single largest supporter of basic research in the physical sciences in the United States, and is working to address some of the most pressing challenges of our time. For more information, please visit science.energy.gov. The Joint Genome Institute and EMSL are also supported by the Office of Science.
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AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.
When in high school the students are asked to write many different types of essays. A persuasive essay is where the writer makes an attempt to get the reader to agree with their viewpoint or do what they are asking. There are several topics to choose from for this essay. AboutTopics.com is a great source for many engaging persuasive essay topics.
A good topic for high school students is the driving age. When writing on the topic the writer has to pick a side of the argument and give supporting facts for their standpoint. Many feel sixteen is too inexperienced and need to rise the age to eighteen. The student can give info on why sixteen is fine for driving backed by facts. They can also give crash stats if they feel it is too inexperienced.
An analogous topic is the drinking age. Some feel that since a 18 years old can go to war they ought to be able to legally drink. Others feel this is far too young. The writer can pick a side and give information to support their point of view. While discussing the world war the writer can write about the conflict in Iraq. They can supply information to support why the United States was just in invading Iraq or why the United States shouldn?t be involved.
There are many other topics for high school students to write about. They can write a report about why they should have their curfew extended. This can be a completely unique paper to present in class. They can also write an essay on reasons why somebody should hope their favourite sports team should win the following game. These topics are less controversial and might be better to present depending on the maturity of the classmate.
When writing on persuasive essay topics pick a side of the discussion and stay with it. Don?t go back and forth between variants. This can defeat the point of persuasion. It?s critical to back that debate up with facts on the subject. Statistics will be helpful as well. This information can be found on many state websites or maybe by performing a Google research. Read the paper to some other person before handing it in. If they agree with the viewpoint or see the reasoning behind it then the paper is a success.
You may also find a lot of tips and advice on the way to pick essay topics in the informative article and it can be also helpful for you. There are lots of good persuasive topics and useful tips in the article about persuasive essay topics also.
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Even though you're only shooting with the crappy camera built into your smartphone, Photoshop CS6's new Blur Gallery will easily make it look like your shots came from an expensive DSLR. More »
The Costa Allegra is being towed toward Mahe in the Seychelles following an engine-room fire Monday that left the ship adrift. None of the 636 passengers and 413 crew members were injured, according to Costa. Food and communications gear are being sent to the ship via helicopter; the vessel is expected to reach land early Thursday.
?Guests onboard are continuously being informed and assisted by the captain and the staff,? Costa said in an emailed statement.
Passengers were sent to their muster stations as a precaution when the fire broke out, according to the company. The ship currently has no air conditioning and lighting is limited, but passengers were served a cold breakfast Tuesday, according to Costa. The seas has been struck in the past by Somalian pirates, but Costa officials have said? they have armed security on board.
This is the second incident this year for a Costa ship. In January, the now-infamous Costa Concordia?a sister ship to the Allegra?was grounded off Italy; at least 25 people died. In that case, the ship's captain has been blamed for the accident.
At this point, the Allegra situation appears to have handled smoothly, much in the way that previous incidents have been managed aboard ships owned by major lines?a reminder that overall, the industry has an enviable safety record.
At the moment, it does seem that cruise ships are sailing under an unlucky star. Just over a week ago, 22 cruise passengers were robbed by bandits on their way to a nature hike near Puerta Vallarta, Mexico. The cruise line, Carnival, has now removed Puerta Vallarta from its itineraries. Both lines are owned by Carnival Corp.
These incidents can't be pleasant for passengers. But despite our longing for risk-free, trouble-free experiences, perfection simply isn't a realistic expectation on vacation any more than it is at home.
What we should expect is professional, caring attention when things do go awry. The mark of a great hotel, cruise line or tour operator is how its staff handles problems. It's too early yet to know whether Costa will appropriately fill that role in this latest incident, but indications so far are good.
Jane Wooldridge is Travel + Leisure's cruise correspondent.
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Public release date: 1-Mar-2012
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