How to Recover from a Data Breach

Have You Been Hacked?

It's every modern business's worst nightmare: You discover there's been a security breach, and your sensitive business and customer data has ended up in the hands of hackers.

While business owners may have some safeguards in place, the reality is that a data breach can happen to anyone at any time, especially small businesses. In fact, according to the National Cyber Security Alliance (NCSA), 71 percent of security breaches target small businesses, and nearly half of all small businesses have been victims of cyberattacks. And unlike larger corporations, smaller companies don't always have the resources to recover. Experian reported that 60 percent of small businesses that suffer a breach go out of business after six months.

It's likely not possible to regain control of everything the hackers accessed, but you can still take action and salvage your trust and reputation with your customers and clients. Legal and technology experts shared their insights on how to best recover from a small business data breach. 

Identifying a data breach

You can't start recovering from a breach unless you know it's occurred. That's why it's critical to learn how to identify when something has gone wrong. The problem, of course, is that in many cases, there aren't any telltale signs you've been hacked.

"Often, businesses discover that they have been breached for the first time months after it happened, when they are informed by law enforcement, business partners, banks or the media — who themselves discover the businesses' data being sold on the black market," said David Zetoony, a partner with the international law firm Bryan Cave LLP. "Other businesses may have been breached months, or even years, ago and still do not know."

There are, however, a few things that may tip you off to a security problem. Francoise Gilbert, founder of IT Law Group, said that slow or lagging computer response time, pop-up windows that you can't close, client reports of spammy emails from your account, or strange programs or websites asking for your credentials could all be signs of a data breach. If malware or a virus is discovered on your system, you'll also want to investigate to see if any data was compromised.

Justin Bingham, chief technology officer for digital business solutions firm Janeiro Digital, warned companies that any noticeable issues are signs of a low-quality breach.

"If you've been compromised by someone that knows what they're doing, those signs are going to be few and far between, unless you have a sophisticated team and tools," Bingham said. "The best way to determine if you've been comprised is not to look for the attack, but what is done after it, when the hacker establishes residency within the network." 

What to do when a breach occurs

Recovering compromised information from a hacker is impossible in most cases, Zetoony said. By the time you discover a breach, the hacker has already stolen or misused the information, and has often wiped his or her trail, he said. Therefore, your first priority after discovering a breach should be to piece together what happened, how bad the breach was and which customers might have been impacted, Zetoony said.

"Companies typically call their attorney and have him or her retain [a forensic] investigator who specializes in finding, preserving and analyzing electronic equipment and data," Zetoony told Business News Daily. "Lawyers that specialize in data security breaches typically advise companies concerning any legal obligation that they have to notify consumers, the public, insurance carriers or regulators."

In terms of equipment, Gilbert advised organizations to stop using the server, computer or device where the breach occurred. This will preserve evidence, so the forensic team can look into the cause of the problem.

"If the computer is not performing a vital function, disconnect it physically from its network and the Internet immediately," she said. "Copy and securely store the access and activity logs from the affected machine, [and then] attempt to identify the type, nature and categories of information that has been affected — company trade secrets, customer lists, payment and delivery information, etc."

Informing affected parties

Once you've assessed the initial damage and potential cause, your next order of business is to break the news to your business partners, vendors, customers or any other affected stakeholders. Nicholas Gaffney, a lawyer and founder of legal media relations firm Zumado, said it's important to have a response team in place that will work quickly to preserve and enhance the reputation of your organization after a data breach. This means having a team member assigned as the point person for official responses to inquiries about the breach, and being transparent and consistent in all communications about it.

If possible, your company — rather than an outside party, such as the media — should break the news of the breach. Gaffney said this will demonstrate the organization's concern for the affected parties.

"Create a statement about the breach, and communicate it through the appropriate channels," Gaffney said. "Commit to keeping all affected parties informed of developments related to the breach, following appropriate legal guidelines. Accept responsibility for the inconvenience caused, apologize, and make it clear that you will do all you can to help victims deal with the consequences of the breach."

"Provide information promptly, even if incomplete," Gilbert added. "You want the affected party to learn about the incident from you, and in your own words. Don't be vague, or if you have to be, explain why — because you are still investigating the incident and do not have all the details."

To that end, Zetoony said that any information you provide about the incident must be accurate and verified. As Gilbert noted, this may mean telling stakeholders that you don't have any information for them, and providing updates only when you are sure of the facts yourself.

"Although waiting can be difficult, providing them with speculation, or information that may turn out later to be false, only hurts trust and reputation further," Zetoony said.

Preventing future breaches

It's a long road to recovery after your company has suffered a data breach, but once you've gotten the situation under control, you can learn from it and work to prevent another incident from occurring. Bingham said there's a laundry list of best practices that should be employed, from perimeter network security to secure access mechanisms and route audits, but there is no "silver bullet" solution. 

"Establishing security for a given organization requires constant vigilance and attention by trained and dedicated people equipped with the right tools employing industry best practices," he said.

Gilbert agreed that a highly trained and vigilant staff is the key to minimizing the risk and damages of future breaches. Your employees should take extra care when using company equipment and learn to recognize clues that could indicate compromised information. Additionally, she recommended conducting a periodic "sweep" of all personnel's equipment to catch any malware and security holes.

Most importantly, Zetoony reminded businesses that, given enough time, a data security incident is as inevitable as any other type of crime — but learning from it will help you handle it better going forward.

"If you view each breach as a learning exercise, you won't be able to stop them necessarily," Zetoony said. "But you can learn how to respond to them more efficiently, quickly, and with less impact to your business and your customers."

Culled from businessnewsdaily.com

Green Tea

Green tea is a product made from the Camellia sinensis plant. It can be prepared as a beverage, which can have some health effects or an “extract” can be made from the leaves to use as medicine. Green tea is used to improve mental alertness and thinking. It is also used for weight loss and to treat stomach disorders, vomiting, diarrhea,headaches, bone loss (osteoporosis), and solid tumor cancers.Green tea is the one of healthiest beverage on the planet. It is loaded with antioxidants and nutrients that have powerful effects on the body. This includes improved brain function, fat loss, a lower risk of cancer and many other incredible benefits.

Some benefits include:

1. Green Tea Contains Various Bioactive Compounds That Can Improve Health

Green tea is more than just green liquid. Many of the bioactive compounds in the tea leaves do make it into the final drink, which contains large amounts of important nutrients. It is loaded with polyphenols like flavonoids and catechins, which function as powerful antioxidants.These substances can reduce the formation of free radicals in the body, protecting cells and molecules from damage. These free radicals are known to play a role in aging and all sorts of diseases. One of the more powerful compounds in green tea is the antioxidant Epigallocatechin Gallate (EGCG), which has been studied to treat various diseases and may be one of the main reasons green tea has such powerful medicinal properties. Green tea also has small amounts of minerals that are important for health.

Try to choose a higher quality brand of green tea, because some of the lower quality brands can contain excessive levels of fluoride. That being said, even if you choose a lower quality brand, the benefits still far outweigh any risk.

2. Compounds in Green Tea Can Improve Brain Function and Make You Smarter

Green tea does more than just keep you awake, it can also make you smarter.The key active ingredient is caffeine, which is a known stimulant.It doesn’t contain as much as coffee, but enough to produce a response without causing the “jittery” effects associated with too much caffeine.

What caffeine does in the brain is to block an inhibitory neurotransmitter called Adenosine. This way, it actually increases the firing of neurons and the concentration of neurotransmitters like dopamine and norepinephrine.

Caffeine has been intensively studied before and consistently leads to improvements in various aspects of brain function, including improved mood, vigilance, reaction time and memory. However… green tea contains more than just caffeine. It also has the amino acid L-theanine, which is able to cross the blood-brain barrier. L-theanine increases the activity of the inhibitory neurotransmitter GABA, which has anti-anxiety effects. It also increases dopamine and the production of alpha waves in the brain. Studies show that caffeine and L-theanine can have synergistic effects. The combination of the two is particularly potent at improving brain function. Because of the L-theanine and the smaller dose of caffeine, green tea can give you a much milder and different kind of “buzz” than coffee. Many people report having more stable energy and being much more productive when they drink green tea, compared to coffee.

3. Green Tea Increases Fat Burning and Improves Physical Performance

If you look at the ingredients list for any fat burning supplement, chances are that green tea will be on there.

This is because green tea has been shown to increase fat burning and boost the metabolic rate, in human controlled trials.  In one study in 10 healthy men, green tea increased energy expenditure by 4%. Another study showed that fat oxidation was increased by 17%, indicating that green tea may selectively increase the burning of fat.

However, I’d like to point out that some studies on green tea don’t show any increase in metabolism, so the effects may depend on the individual. Caffeine itself has also been shown to improve physical performance by mobilizing fatty acids from the fat tissues and making them available for use as energy. In two separate review studies, caffeine has been shown to increase physical performance by 11-12%, on average.

4. Antioxidants in Green Tea May Lower Your Risk of Various Types of Cancer

Cancer is caused by uncontrolled growth of cells. It is one of the world’s leading causes of death. It is well known that oxidative damage contributes to the development of cancer and that antioxidants can have a protective effect.

Green tea is an excellent source of powerful antioxidants, so it makes perfect sense that it could reduce your risk of cancer, which it appears to do:

• Breast cancer: A meta-analysis of observational studies found that women who drank the most green tea had a 22% lower risk of developing breast cancer, the most common cancer in women.
• Prostate cancer: One study found that men drinking green tea had a 48% lower risk of developing prostate cancer, which is the most common cancer in men.
• Colorectal cancer: A study of 69,710 Chinese women found that green tea drinkers had a 57% lower risk of colorectal cancer.

5. Green Tea May Lower Your Risk of Type II Diabetes

Type II diabetes is a disease that has reached epidemic proportions in the past few decades and now afflicts about 300 million people worldwide. This disease involves having elevated blood sugar levels in the context of insulin resistance or an inability to produce insulin. Studies show that green tea can improve insulin sensitivity and reduce blood sugar levels.

One study in Japanese individuals found that those who drank the most green tea had a 42% lower risk of developing type II diabetes. According to a review of 7 studies with a total of 286,701 individuals, green tea drinkers had an 18% lower risk of becoming diabetic.

6. Green Tea Can Help You Lose Weight and Lower Your Risk of Becoming Obese

Given that green tea can boost the metabolic rate in the short term, it makes sense that it could help you lose weight. Several studies show that green tea leads to decreases in body fat, especially in the abdominal area. One of these studies was a randomized controlled trial in 240 men and women that went on for 12 weeks. In this study, the green tea group had significant decreases in body fat percentage, body weight, waist circumference and abdominal fat.

However, some studies don’t show a statistically significant increases in weight loss with green tea, so this needs to be taken with a grain of salt.

7. Green Tea May Reduce Your Risk of Cardiovascular Disease

Cardiovascular diseases, including heart disease and stroke, are the biggest causes of death in the world. Studies show that green tea can improve some of the main risk factors for these diseases. This includes total cholesterol, LDL cholesterol and triglycerides.

Green tea also dramatically increases the antioxidant capability of the blood, which protects the LDL cholesterol particles from oxidation, which is one part of the pathway towards heart disease.

Given the beneficial effects on risk factors, it is not surprising to see that green tea drinkers have up to a 31% lower risk of cardiovascular disease.

8. Green Tea Can Kill Bacteria, Which Improves Dental Health and Lowers Your Risk of Infection

The catechins in green tea have other biological effects as well. Some studies show that they can kill bacteria and inhibit viruses like the influenza virus, potentially lowering your risk of infections.

Streptococcus mutans is the primary harmful bacteria in the mouth. It causes plaque formation and is a leading contributor to cavities and tooth decay. Studies show that the catechins in green tea can inhibit the growth of streptococcus mutans. Green tea consumption is associated with improved dental health and a lower risk of caries.

Another awesome benefit of green tea… multiple studies show that it can reduce bad breath.

9. Green Tea May Protect Your Brain in Old Age, Lowering Your Risk of Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s

Not only can green tea improve brain function in the short term, it may also protect your brain in old age. Alzheimer’s disease is the most common neurodegenerative disease in humans and a leading cause of dementia.

Parkinson’s disease is the second most common neurodegenerative disease and involves the death of dopamine producing neurons in the brain.

Multiple studies show that the catechin compounds in green tea can have various protective effects on neurons in test tubes and animal models, potentally lowering the risk of Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s.

Precautions and risks

There are little to no known side effects or contraindications to drinking green tea for adults. Those with severe caffeine sensitivities could experience insomnia, anxiety, irritability, nausea or upset stomach.

Those taking anticoagulant drugs such as Coumadin/warfarin should drink green tea with caution due to its vitamin K content. If taken with stimulant drugs, green tea could possibly increase blood pressure and heart rate. 

Green tea supplements however, contain high levels of active substances that can trigger side effects and interact with other herbs, supplements, or medications. Green tea supplements are unregulated by the FDA and may also contain other substances unsafe for health or with unproven health benefits. Always check with a physician before starting any herb or supplement regimen.

In particular, pregnant or breastfeeding women, those with heart problems or high blood pressure, kidney or liver problems, stomach ulcers, or anxiety disorders should not take green tea supplements or extracts.

Culled from authoritynutrition,medicalnewstoday and webmd

New device allows brain to bypass spinal cord, move paralyzed limbs

For the first time ever, a paralyzed man can move his fingers and hand with his own thoughts thanks to an innovative partnership between The Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center and Battelle.

Ian Burkhart, a 23-year-old quadriplegic from Dublin, Ohio, is the first patient to use Neurobridge, an electronic neural bypass for spinal cord injuries that reconnects the brain directly to muscles, allowing voluntary and functional control of a paralyzed limb. Burkhart is the first of a potential five participants in a clinical study.

"It's much like a heart bypass, but instead of bypassing blood, we're actually bypassing electrical signals," said Chad Bouton, research leader at Battelle. "We're taking those signals from the brain, going around the injury, and actually going directly to the muscles."

The Neurobridge technology combines algorithms that learn and decode the user's brain activity and a high-definition muscle stimulation sleeve that translates neural impulses from the brain and transmits new signals to the paralyzed limb. In this case, Ian's brain signals bypass his injured spinal cord and move his hand, hence the name Neurobridge.

Burkhart, who was paralyzed four years ago during a diving accident, viewed the opportunity to participate in the six-month, FDA-approved clinical trial at Ohio State's Wexner Medical Center as a chance to help others with spinal cord injuries.

"Initially, it piqued my interested because I like science, and it's pretty interesting," Burkhart said. "I've realized, 'You know what? This is the way it is. You're going to have to make the best out of it.' You can sit and complain about it, but that's not going to help you at all. So, you might as well work hard, do what you can and keep going on with life."

This technology has been a long time in the making. Working on the internally-funded project for nearly a decade to develop the algorithms, software and stimulation sleeve, Battelle scientists first recorded neural impulses from an electrode array implanted in a paralyzed person's brain. They used that data to illustrate the device's effect on the patient and prove the concept.

Two years ago, Bouton and his team began collaborating with Ohio State neuroscience researchers and clinicians Dr. Ali Rezai and Dr. Jerry Mysiwto design the clinical trials and validate the feasibility of using the Neurobridge technology in patients.

During a three-hour surgery on April 22, Rezai implanted a chip smaller than a pea onto the motor cortex of Burkhart's brain. The tiny chip interprets brain signals and sends them to a computer, which recodes and sends them to the high-definition electrode stimulation sleeve that stimulates the proper muscles to execute his desired movements. Within a tenth of a second, Burkhart's thoughts are translated into action.

"The surgery required the precise implantation of the micro-chip sensor in the area of Ian's brain that controls his arm and hand movements," Rezai said.

He said this technology may one day help patients affected by various brain and spinal cord injuries such as strokes and traumatic brain injury.

Battelle also developed a non-invasive neurostimulation technology in the form of a wearable sleeve that allows for precise activation of small muscle segments in the arm to enable individual finger movement, along with software that forms a 'virtual spinal cord' to allow for coordination of dynamic hand and wrist movements.

The Ohio State and Battelle teams worked together to figure out the correct sequence of electrodes to stimulate to allow Burkhart to move his fingers and hand functionally. For example, Burkhart uses different brain signals and muscles to rotate his hand, make a fist or pinch his fingers together to grasp an object, Mysiw said. As part of the study, Burkhart worked for months using the electrode sleeve to stimulate his forearm to rebuild his atrophied muscles so they would be more responsive to the electric stimulation.

"I've been doing rehabilitation for a lot of years, and this is a tremendous stride forward in what we can offer these people," said Mysiw, chair of the Department of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation at Ohio State. "Now we're examining human-machine interfaces and interactions, and how that type of technology can help."

Burkhart is hopeful for his future.

"It's definitely great for me to be as young as I am when I was injured because the advancements in science and technology are growing rapidly and they're only going to continue to increase."

Video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fEbioFpdK5E

Culled from Ohio State University, Wexner Medical Center 2014

World's oldest stone tools challenge ideas about first toolmakers

Scientists working in the desert badlands of northwestern Kenya have found stone tools dating back 3.3 million years, long before the advent of modern humans, and by far the oldest such artifacts yet discovered. The tools, whose makers may or may not have been some sort of human ancestor, push the known date of such tools back by 700,000 years; they also may challenge the notion that our own most direct ancestors were the first to bang two rocks together to create a new technology.

The discovery is the first evidence that an even earlier group of proto-humans may have had the thinking abilities needed to figure out how to make sharp-edged tools. The stone tools mark "a new beginning to the known archaeological record," say the authors of a new paper about the discovery, published today in the leading scientific journal Nature.

"The whole site's surprising, it just rewrites the book on a lot of things that we thought were true," said geologist Chris Lepre of the Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory and Rutgers University, a co-author of the paper who precisely dated the artifacts.

The tools "shed light on an unexpected and previously unknown period of hominin behavior and can tell us a lot about cognitive development in our ancestors that we can't understand from fossils alone," said lead author Sonia Harmand, of the Turkana Basin Institute at Stony Brook University and the Universite Paris Ouest Nanterre.

Hominins are a group of species that includes modern humans, Homo sapiens, and our closest evolutionary ancestors. Anthropologists long thought that our relatives in the genus Homo -- the line leading directly to Homo sapiens -- were the first to craft such stone tools. But researchers have been uncovering tantalizing clues that some other, earlier species of hominin, distant cousins, if you will, might have figured it out.

The researchers do not know who made these oldest of tools. But earlier finds suggest a possible answer: The skull of a 3.3-million-year-old hominin,Kenyanthropus platytops, was found in 1999 about a kilometer from the tool site. A K. platyops tooth and a bone from a skull were discovered a few hundred meters away, and an as-yet unidentified tooth has been found about 100 meters away.

The precise family tree of modern humans is contentious, and so far, no one knows exactly how K. platyops relates to other hominin species.Kenyanthropus predates the earliest known Homo species by a half a million years. This species could have made the tools; or, the toolmaker could have been some other species from the same era, such as Australopithecus afarensis, or an as-yet undiscovered early type of Homo.

Lepre said a layer of volcanic ash below the tool site set a "floor" on the site's age: It matched ash elsewhere that had been dated to about 3.3 million years ago, based on the ratio of argon isotopes in the material. To more sharply define the time period of the tools, Lepre and co-author and Lamont-Doherty colleague Dennis Kent examined magnetic minerals beneath, around and above the spots where the tools were found.

The Earth's magnetic field periodically reverses itself, and the chronology of those changes is well documented going back millions of years. "We essentially have a magnetic tape recorder that records the magnetic field ... the music of the outer core," Kent said. By tracing the variations in the polarity of the samples, they dated the site to 3.33 million to 3.11 million years.

Lepre's wife and another co-author, Rhoda Quinn of Rutgers, studied carbon isotopes in the soil, which along with animal fossils at the site allowed researchers to reconstruct the area's vegetation. This led to another surprise: The area was at that time a partially wooded, shrubby environment. Conventional thinking has been that sophisticated tool-making came in response to a change in climate that led to the spread of broad savannah grasslands, and the consequent evolution of large groups of animals that could serve as a source of food for human ancestors.

One line of thinking is that hominins started knapping -- banging one rock against another to make sharp-edged stones -- so they could cut meat off of animal carcasses, said paper co-author Jason Lewis of the Turkana Basin Institute and Rutgers. But the size and markings of the newly discovered tools "suggest they were doing something different as well, especially if they were in a more wooded environment with access to various plant resources," Lewis said. The researchers think the tools could have been used for breaking open nuts or tubers, bashing open dead logs to get at insects inside, or maybe something not yet thought of.

"The capabilities of our ancestors and the environmental forces leading to early stone technology are a great scientific mystery," said Richard Potts, director of the Human Origins Program at the Smithsonian's National Museum of Natural History, who was not involved in the research. The newly dated tools "begin to lift the veil on that mystery, at an earlier time than expected," he said.

Potts said he had examined the stone tools during a visit to Kenya in February.

"Researchers have thought there must be some way of flaking stone that preceded the simplest tools known until now," he said. "Harmand's team shows us just what this even simpler altering of rocks looked like before technology became a fundamental part of early human behavior."

Ancient stone artifacts from East Africa were first uncovered at Olduvai Gorge in Tanzania in the mid-20th century, and those tools were later associated with fossil discoveries in the 1960s of the early human ancestor Homo habilis. That species has been dated to 2.1 million to 1.5 million years ago.

Subsequent finds have pushed back the dates of humans' evolutionary ancestors, and of stone tools, raising questions about who first made that cognitive leap. The discovery of a partial lower jaw in the Afar region of Ethiopia, announced on March 4, pushes the fossil record for the genus Homo to 2.8 million years ago. Evidence from recent papers, the authors note, suggests that there is anatomical evidence that Homo had evolved into several distinct lines by 2 million years ago.

There is some evidence of more primitive tool use going back even before the new find. In 2009, researchers at Dikika, Ethiopia, dug up 3.39 million-year-old animal bones marked with slashes and other cut marks, evidence that someone used stones to trim flesh from bone and perhaps crush bones to get at the marrow inside. That is the earliest evidence of meat and marrow consumption by hominins. No tools were found at the site, so it's unclear whether the marks were made with crafted tools or simply sharp-edged stones. The only hominin fossil remains in the area dating to that time are from Australopithecus afarensis.

The new find came about almost by accident: Harmand and Lewis said that on the morning of July 9, 2011, they had wandered off on the wrong path, and climbed a hill to scout a fresh route back to their intended track. They wrote that they "could feel that something was special about this particular place." They fanned out and surveyed a nearby patch of craggy outcrops. "By teatime," they wrote, "local Turkana tribesman Sammy Lokorodi had helped [us] spot what [we] had come searching for."

By the end of the 2012 field season, excavations at the site, named Lomekwi 3, had uncovered 149 stone artifacts tied to tool-making, from stone cores and flakes to rocks used for hammering and others possibly used as anvils to strike on.

The researchers tried knapping stones themselves to better understand how the tools they found might have been made. They concluded that the techniques used "could represent a technological stage between a hypothetical pounding-oriented stone tool use by an earlier hominin and the flaking-oriented knapping behavior of [later] toolmakers." Chimpanzees and other primates are known to use a stone to hammer open nuts atop another stone. But using a stone for multiple purposes, and using one to crack apart another into a sharper tool, is more advanced behavior.

The find also has implications for understanding the evolution of the human brain. The toolmaking required a level of hand motor control that suggests that changes in the brain and spinal tract needed for such activity could have occurred before 3.3 million years ago, the authors said.

"This is a momentous and well-researched discovery," said paleoanthropologist Bernard Wood of George Washington University, who was not involved in the study. "I have seen some of these artifacts in the flesh, and I am convinced they were fashioned deliberately." Wood said he found it intriguing to see how different the tools are from so-called Oldowan stone tools, which up to now have been considered the oldest and most primitive.

Lepre, who has been conducting fieldwork in eastern Africa for about 15 years, said he arrived at the dig site about a week after the discovery. The site is several hours' drive on rough roads from the nearest town, located in a hot, dry landscape he said is reminiscent of Arizona and New Mexico. Lepre collected chunks of sediment from a series of depths and brought them back to Lamont-Doherty for analysis. He and Kent used a bandsaw to trim the samples into sugar cube-size blocks and inserted them into a magnetometer, which measured the polarity of tiny grains of the minerals hematite and magnetite contained in the sediment.

"The magnetics pretty much clinches that the age is something like 3.3 million years old," said Kent, who also is a professor at Rutgers.

Earlier dating work by Lepre and Kent helped lead to another landmark paper in 2011: a study that suggested Homo erectus, another precursor to modern humans, was using more advanced tool-making methods 1.8 million years ago, at least 300,000 years earlier than previously thought.

"I realized when you [figure out] these things, you don't solve anything, you just open up new questions," said Lepre. "I get excited, then realize there's a lot more work to do."

Culled from The Earth Institute at Columbia University

Infant antibiotic use linked to adult diseases

A new study led by researchers at the University of Minnesota has found a three-way link among antibiotic use in infants, changes in the gut bacteria, and disease later in life. The imbalances in gut microbes, called dysbiosis, have been tied to infectious diseases, allergies and other autoimmune disorders, and even obesity, later in life.

The study, led by Biomedical Informatics and Computational Biology program graduate student fellow Pajau Vangay, also developed a predictive model with potential clinical importance for measuring healthy development of bacteria in the gut of young children. The findings were published today in the scientific journal Cell Host & Microbe.

Antibiotics are by far the most common prescription drugs given to children. They account for about one-fourth of all medications prescribed to children, with a third of these prescriptions considered unnecessary. Other studies have shown profound short- and long-term effects of antibiotics on the diversity and composition of the bacteria in our bodies, called our microbiome.

"Diseases related to metabolism and the immune system are increasing dramatically, and in many cases we don't know why," said the study's senior author Dan Knights, a computational biologist and assistant professor in the University of Minnesota's Department of Computer Science and Engineering and Biotechnology Institute. "Previous studies showed links between antibiotic use and unbalanced gut bacteria, and others showed links between unbalanced gut bacteria and adult disease. Over the past year we synthesized hundreds of studies and found evidence of strong correlations between antibiotic use, changes in gut bacteria, and disease in adulthood."

Knights and his colleagues developed a framework to map how antibiotics may be acting in the gut to cause disease later in life. In the case of allergies, for example, the use of antibiotics may eradicate key gut bacteria that help immune cells mature. These cells would have been essential for keeping the immune system at bay when confronted with allergens. Even if these bacteria return, the immune system remains impaired. Related to obesity, antibiotic-induced changes in the gut microbiota resulted in increased levels of short-chain fatty acids that affect metabolism.

The study also examined the development of bacteria in the gut. Researchers demonstrated that an infant's age could be predicted within 1.3 months based on the maturity of their gut bacteria. This finding could lead to a clinical test and interventions for children whose microbiome is developmentally delayed due to antibiotics or other factors.

"We think these findings help develop a roadmap for future research to determine the health consequences of antibiotic use and for recommendations for prescribing them," Knights said. "The clinical test we demonstrated would also allow us to think about interventions at an early age."

In addition to Knights and Vangay, researchers involved in the study include Tonya Ward, a postdoctoral researcher in the University of Minnesota Biotechnology Institute and Jeffery Gerber, a researcher with the Division of Infectious Diseases at the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia.

Culled from University of Minnesota, Academic Health Center

Got a Diploma? Employers Would Rather See These Skills

With college graduation season underway, the class of 2015 is eagerly awaiting that all-important piece of paper that officially releases them into the working world. New grads often believe that a diploma is their ticket to employment, and in some cases, they're right — but overall, employers are more focused on workplace skills than degrees.

A recent study by ZipRecruiter found that just 21 percent of the jobs posted on its website specifically ask that candidates have a college degree. This is about on par with the Bureau of Labor Statistics' estimation that 33 percent of U.S. jobs require a college degree. While ZipRecruiter posited that the possession of a degree may be assumed for higher-level jobs, it seems that across the board, experience in the field and pertinent skills and training trumped a diploma or a good GPA.

Even graduates themselves have found that skills are more valuable to their careers than their degrees. In a 2014 Glassdoor survey, nearly three-quarters of employees said their employers value work experience and related skills more than education when evaluating job candidates, with 53 percent saying a graduate degree is no longer necessary to secure a high-paying job. 

There's no question that higher education still factors into career success, as 82 percent of Glassdoor respondents said their college diplomas have helped them in the workplace. But job seekers need to realize that there's more to landing a job and advancing their careers than holding a degree.

"For any employee looking to earn a bigger salary or move up the corporate ladder, they should do their research on how their industry is evolving, including identifying specific skill sets that are in demand," Rusty Rueff, Glassdoor career and workplace expert, said in a statement. "Going back to school may be one way to learn and improve, but there are also nontraditional ways, such as certificate programs, boot camps, webinars, online non-degree courses, conferences and more."

So which specific skills do today's employers want to see in job candidates? According to ZipRecruiter's analysis of 250,000 of its job ads, the following six qualifications appeared most frequently:

• Communication (51 percent) 
• Time management (21 percent) 
• Ability to work well within a team (19 percent) 
• Independent motivation (12 percent)
• Specific experience in Microsoft Office (11 percent)
• Ability to work in fast-paced environment (7 percent)

Since communication skills are so high on the priority list for many employers, it makes sense that the whole process of landing a job revolves being able to communicate well, said Allan Jones, chief marketing officer of ZipRecruiter.

"When you're writing your résumé, make sure that it doesn't have grammatical errors, that it only has the most relevant information and that it tells your story as a job seeker in a way that highlights your positive aspects in an honest way," Jones told Business News Daily. 

Additionally, Jones advised having a prepared plan for what you can do on day one of your new job to help the company, and explaining that during the interview. 

"That's a great way to showcase your communication skills, and it shows you're serious about the job and the company," Jones said.

Source: businessnewsdaily.com

Online voting a step closer thanks to breakthrough in security technology

A technique to allow people to cast their election vote online -- even if their home computers are suspected of being infected with viruses -- has been developed by researchers. Taking inspiration from the security devices issued by some banks, the system allows people to vote by employing independent hardware devices in conjunction with their PCs.

Researchers at the University of Birmingham have developed a technique to allow people to cast their election vote online -- even if their home computers are suspected of being infected with viruses.

Taking inspiration from the security devices issued by some banks, the security and privacy research group at Birmingham, led by Professor Mark Ryan, has developed a system that allows people to vote by employing independent hardware devices in conjunction with their PCs.

The new technique offers a fresh contribution to the debate surrounding e-voting and could be ready for use in time for the 2020 or 2025 General Election.

Professor Ryan said: 'This system works by employing a credit card-sized device similar to those used in online banking. It is called Du-Vote, and we have been developing it over the past two years. From the voter's perspective, it's straightforward: you receive a code on the device and type it back into the computer.

'The main advantage of this system is that it splits the security between the independent security device and a voter's computer or mobile device. A computer is a hugely powerful, all-purpose machine running billions of lines of code that no one really understands, whereas the independent security device has a much, much smaller code base and is not susceptible to viruses.'

Online voting carries a strong security requirement because of the possibility of undetectable interference in an election by foreign governments, criminal gangs, or petty fraudsters. Malware affects an estimated 20% to 40% of PCs globally, and specific election-targeting malware could be developed to attempt to alter votes cast or compromise ballot secrecy.

Gurchetan Grewal, who is part of the project team and recently completed a PhD in online voting at Birmingham, said: 'This is currently the only piece of work that addresses a core problem of e-voting -- namely, that someone may have viruses or other malware on their computer. For example, the system in Estonia, where they have already introduced online voting, does not deal with this potentially undetectable source of vote manipulation or breach of voter privacy.'

The system being developed at Birmingham aims to bypass and detect malware by using a separate security device. But the system achieves even greater security than those used by banks by allowing for the possibility that the security devices themselves have been manufactured under the influence of a hostile adversary.

Paradoxically, the researchers succeed in proving that even if a hostile adversary controls the entire computing infrastructure, voters and election officials can still detect electoral fraud.

The research paper, titled 'Du-Vote: Remote Electronic Voting with Untrusted Computers', will be presented at the 28th IEEE Computer Security Foundations Symposium in Verona, Italy, in July.

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Story Source: University of Birmingham.

Artificial intelligence system created to provide therapy for people who have suffered a cerebral stroke

Artificial intelligence, virtual worlds and interaction with video games, are the elements of a new therapy designed by several Mexican institutions to help people who have had a stroke and children with cerebral palsy to recover mobility of their upper extremities quickly.

The purpose of developing the computational system called Gesture Therapy (Terapia de Gestos) is to offer a low cost and more effective alternative than traditional methods, said the research leader, Luis Enrique Sucar Succar, researcher at the National Institute of Astrophysics, Optics and Electronics (INAOE) in Mexico.

The technology has been proven clinically successful at the National Institute of Neurology and Neurosurgery (INNN) and Pediatrics (INP), it encompasses a computer with a webcam and a special handle with a color sphere and force sensors, which detects the exercises performed by the patient.

The idea is that a virtual agent instructs the patient to perform tasks through different games designed to exercise important parts of the arm for rehabilitation, such as the shoulder, elbow, wrist, fingers and using different types of movement as flexion, extension and pressing. This allows the patient to perform their rehabilitation at home, without the need for a therapist to be present at all time.

On the other hand, the virtual environments in which the person does the therapy simulate daily activities to give present a normal lifestyle . For example, some of these tasks are cleaning a window, painting a room, cooking an egg, grocery shopping, added Enrique Sucar, PhD in Computer Science from the Imperial College in Britain.

An important part of the system is based on artificial intelligence, since it is responsible for monitoring and evaluating user's performance, while he or she exercises as indicated by the virtual agent. With these results the difficulty level of the game is set, based on the movements recorded by the camera and pressure sensors of the handle, it increases or decreases the level of hardness.

The INAOE researcher, who is also an active member of the Mexico Academy of Engineering, said another utility of artificial intelligence is detection of "compensation" for the patient, which happens when he or she moves the whole body instead of just the affected arm.

While the visual tracking software analyzes images obtained from the camera, tracking the position of the hand in three space dimensions is performed. For this, a color ball at the side of the handle is used, its position estimated using computer vision techniques that combine color and texture information of the object.

The system maps the coordinates of the patient's hand in "real" space, and transfers them to the virtual space, where it interacts with an imaginary world, which is observed through the computer screen, Sucar Succar added.

The researcher, who is currently on a sabbatical stay in Italy, said that to achieve the development of Therapy Gestures collaboration of researchers and physicians at the from several institutes and universities were required.

The evaluation was carried out at the Rehabilitation Unit of the INNN where the results showed an improvement in the movement of the affected limb, increasing motivation and adherence to treatment.

Now, the next step is to simultaneously begin a series of clinical trials with about a hundred patients from various hospitals like INNN, the National Institute of Rehabilitation, the University Hospital of Puebla and CRIT (Children Rehabilitation Center) of the same federal entity; to provide the Therapy of Gestures as a commercial product.

Finally, the teacher in electrical engineering by Stanford University, added that he already has a patent in Mexico for the concept called "3D therapy system with monocular visual tracking for the rehabilitation of the upper limb in humans." (Agencia ID)

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Story Source: Investigación y Desarrollo

#HACKGIRLSRIGHTS WINNER: NÃO ME CALO (I WILL NOT SHUT UP)

Everyone experiences and navigates the world differently, but women are at higher risk of being harassed and assaulted. Every woman knows that there are certain venues, bars, and restaurants that they avoid in the city in which they live. Não Me Calo (I Will Not Shut Up) is an app and social networking tool that lets women review and rank public venues based on the level of safety they provide for women and girls. Não Me Calo also encourages women to fight for change by using these rankings to pressure business owners and governments to improve security in locations that have received unfavorable reviews.

In April 2015, a jury selected Não Me Calo as the winner of the #hackgirlsrights International Girls' Hackathon

Source: http://ignite.globalfundforwomen.org/gallery/naomecalo

Virtual Whiteboard Deekit

Although seriously long in the tooth and being disrupted by a plethora of startups, for many years Skype has existed as an almost ubiquitous app in any remote team’s toolkit.

So it seems apt that a new startup founded by a team of ex-Skype employees is set to tackle another aspect of online collaboration. Deekit, which exits private beta today, is a virtual and collaborative whiteboard to help remote teams work smarter.

“Working with remote teams has been a challenge in many ways – cultural differences, language differences, all the time people talk about the same things in different ways, sharing information across all locations,” she recalls.The Tallinn, Estonia-based startup is headed up by founder and CEO, Kaili Kleemeier, who was previously a Head of Operations at Skype. She and three colleagues quit the Internet calling giant in 2012 and spent a year researching ideas in the remote team space. They ended up focusing on creating a new virtual whiteboard, born out of Kleemeier’s experience collaborating with technical teams remotely, specifically helping Skype deal with incident management.

“But at the time of an incident, you need to put everything on steroids – explain things faster, solve things faster, be extremely transparent and so on. This experience literally lead me and the team to research in depth how can you collaborate really effectively.”

Part of the solution is to bring back the humble whiteboard, but one that is accessible via any HTML5 web browser, with dedicated mobile and tablet apps to follow. “Deek” is a Romani word for looking. As in “deek and you shall see”. The idea being that showing is often quicker than telling.

“Simple conversations are not effective when it comes to complex problem solving, sharing knowledge or brainstorming around creative ideas,” says Kleemeier. “For example, when developers are discussing an architecture change, a whiteboard is the most natural thing to jump to. With simple boxes and arrows you make a point within just a couple of minutes. It also applies in design, sales, working with team processes, product planning and much more.”

The Deekit app offers all of the whiteboard features you’d expect, such as drawing tools and the ability to add text. In addition, you can pin notes on the side, and the whole app is collaborative: anybody can contribute no matter where they are and in realtime. Boards can also be shared and archived for future reference.

Another feature Kleemeier and her team have focused on is offering templates. These aren’t just simple design templates but also provide extensive instructions, such as how to run a business plan whiteboard session, or brainstorming a product roadmap.

But, of course, virtual whiteboards aren’t new by any measure. Competitors in the space include Realtimeboard, Stormboard and Murally. Or even enterprise collaboration apps like Confluence and Sharepoint.

“Most enterprise software is overwhelming,” argues Kleemeier when asked about competitors. “Piles of tools and buttons that make you focus on choosing the tools and how to use them. When designing Deekit, we decided to take that all away. Deekit is designed to be simple and clean. To know what you want, before you want it. To provide the right tools when needed and keep them out of the way when not. So that you can focus on the task at hand — discussing your idea.”

Culled from Techcrunch.com

Childhood bullying: Worse long-term mental health than maltreatment by adult

Bullying adversely affects children in later life more than being maltreated, according to new research. A new study shows that children who have been bullied by peers suffer worse in the longer term than those who have been maltreated by adults according to new research from the University of Warwick.

A new study published in The Lancet Psychiatry shows that children who have been bullied by peers suffer worse in the longer term than those who have been maltreated by adults.

The research is led by Professor Dieter Wolke from Warwick's Department of Psychology and Warwick Medical School. 

There is already an established link between maltreatment by adults and the mental health consequences for children. Professor Wolke and his team wanted to examine whether long-term mental health issues among victims of bullying were related to having been maltreated by adults as well.

They looked at data from 4,026 participants in the UK ALSPAC study (Avon Longtitudinal Study of Parents and Children) and 1,273 participants from the US Great Smoky Mountain Study.

For ALSPAC they looked at reports of maltreatment between the ages of 8 weeks and 8.6 years; bullying at ages 8, 10 and 13; and mental health outcomes at age 18. Data from the Great Smoky Mountain Study had reports of maltreatment and bullying between the ages of 9 and 16, and mental health outcomes from 19-25 years old.

Professor Wolke said: "The mental health outcomes we were looking for included anxiety, depression or suicidal tendencies. Our results showed those who were bullied were more likely to suffer from mental health problems than those who were maltreated. Being both bullied and maltreated also increased the risk of overall mental health problems, anxiety and depression in both groups."

In the ALSPAC study 8.5% of children reported maltreatment only, 29.7% reported bullying only and 7% reported both maltreatment and bullying. In the Great Smoky Mountain Study, 15% reported maltreatment, 16.3% reported bullying and 9.8% reported maltreatment and bullying.

Professor Wolke added: "Being bullied is not a harmless rite of passage or an inevitable part of growing up; it has serious long-term consequences. It is important for schools, health services and other agencies to work together to reduce bullying and the adverse effects related to it."

The research is being presented at the Pediatric Academic Societies (PAS) annual meeting in San Diego.

Culled from University of Warwick