Iran sits on what are thought to be the world’s largest gas reserves, yet can barely supply its own domestic demand. Since the nuclear deal lifted sanctions, the country has sought foreign investment in exploration and infrastructure. But will the hawkish stance of U.S. President Donald Trump put them off? Henry Ridgwell reports from the CWC Iran Gas Conference in Frankfurt, Germany.
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From: MeNeedIt

Immigrants in the United States have had a bad rap through a divisive presidential election. Now, with a new administration in the White House, there seems to be real consequences, ranging from travel bans to deportations. But immigrants are fighting back, and on Thursday in Washington, some businesses gladly suffered the loss of a day without their workforce. Arash Arabasadi explains.
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From: MeNeedIt

Danish toymaker Lego is building a playhouse in its hometown designed to look like 21 giant versions of its bricks stacked on top of each other, the company said on Thursday.

The Lego House is due to open in September near the company’s headquarters in Billund, Denmark.

“Lego House will be the only one of its kind in the world and it will remain so, because Billund is the home of Lego and this is where we will always be,” its general manager, Jesper Vilstrup, told Reuters.

The 12,000-square-meter (130,000-square-feet) building, designed by Danish architect Bjarke Ingels, will include three restaurants, a Lego store, four play areas and a gallery displaying the history of Lego and creations made by fans.

Lego House will “display everything the Lego brick can do,” Vilstrup said.

Lego, which is vying with Barbie doll maker Mattel to become the world’s biggest toymaker, has teamed up with movie franchises such as “Star Wars” in deals that span Lego sets, video games, and smartphone applications.

The company, founded in 1932 by Ole Kirk Kristiansen and his grandchild Kjeld Kirk Kristiansen, aims to bring children back to its core product: the Lego brick, first produced in its current form in 1958.
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From: MeNeedIt

Keith Urban’s boundary-pushing album “Ripcord” has spawned several top country singles and led him to pick up seven nominations including entertainer of the year and album of the year at this year’s Academy of Country Music Awards.

Lady Antebellum announced the nominations Thursday on “CBS This Morning” for the awards show, which will be held April in Las Vegas and aired live on CBS. Urban is also nominated for male vocalist of the year, single record of the year and song of the year.

Six-time nominee Miranda Lambert could make history again as she is nominated for female vocalist of the year, which she has won a record seven years in a row. She is also nominated for album of the year for her double album, “The Weight of These Wings,” single record of the year, song of the year and video of the year.

Coming off her Grammy win for best country solo performance, Maren Morris tied Lambert with six nominations, including album of the year for “HERO.” She also is nominated as female vocalist of the year, new female vocalist of the year and single record of the year for her song, “My Church.”

With strong pop, dance and R&B influences, Urban’s album has dominated country radio over the past year, with four singles reaching the top six on Billboard’s Hot Country Songs chart.

Urban, who performed his newest single “The Fighter” at the Grammys last Sunday with Carrie Underwood, said the entertainer of the year nomination is an acknowledgement of great live performances.

“I have been a musician since I was six and playing on stage since I was like 7,” Urban told The Associated Press on Thursday. “I have always loved performing on stage, being an entertainer. So that category has always been the highest honor imaginable.”

He added that great performances are all about being “in the flow,” and mentioned Adele’s performance at the Grammys when she restarted her tribute to George Michael.

“She had this incredible courage to stop it in the middle of a live show and say, ‘Let me get this thing right,’” Urban said. “It was the most extraordinary thing I have ever seen on a live TV show.”

Competing with Urban for entertainer of the year will be last year’s winner, Jason Aldean, along with Luke Bryan, Florida Georgia Line and Underwood.

Florida Georgia Line and Tim McGraw both have five nominations each, including a shared nomination for vocal event of the year for their collaboration on the song “May We All.”

Bryan and Dierks Bentley, who has three nominations, return to host the awards for a second time together. Thomas Rhett and Chris Stapleton also each have three nominations.

 
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From: MeNeedIt

The political climate in the United States is stressing out Americans, according to a new study.

Researchers from the American Psychological Association found that 57 percent of Americans say the “current political climate is a very or somewhat significant source of stress,” according to a poll done in January.

Nearly half of Americans, 49 percent, say the outcome of the 2016 presidential election was also a source of stress, but there were differences depending on which party those polled belonged to.

For Democrats, 72 percent said the outcome was stressful, while 26 percent of Republicans said the same. When asked about the future of the country, 59 percent of Republicans said they were stressed, with 76 percent of Democrats reporting the same.

“The stress we’re seeing around political issues is deeply concerning, because it’s hard for Americans to get away from it,” said Katherine Nordal, APA’s executive director for professional practice. “We’re surrounded by conversations, news and social media that constantly remind us of the issues that are stressing us the most.”

The new poll was done after the APA found last year that the election was causing stress for 52 percent of Americans.

The January survey found that the percentage of Americans reporting that acts of terrorism were a source of stress rose from 51 to 59 percent from a few months earlier. The survey also found increases in the percentage of Americans who were stressed by police violence and personal safety.

Education also plays a role in how stressed Americans are, according to the APA. For example, 53 percent of those with more than a high school education reported stress caused by the election outcome. That compares to 38 percent for those with a high school education or less.

Geographic location also appears to have played a role, with 62 percent of those in urban areas reporting stress, compared to 45 percent in the suburbs and 33 percent in rural areas.

The increased stress may be causing health problems, the APA says, citing those who reported a stress-related health symptom rose from 71 percent to 80 percent. Those issues include headaches, anxiety and depression.

“While these common health symptoms might seem minor, they can lead to negative effects on daily life and overall physical health when they continue over a long period,” said Nordal.

The APA recommends those experiencing stress related to the election and the political climate should perhaps take a break from the news and do something else.

“Read enough to stay informed but then plan activities that give you a regular break from the issues and the stress they might cause. And remember to take care of yourself and pay attention to other areas of your life,” Nordal said.
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From: MeNeedIt

WATCH: People in America: Meet Tuhin Das — Poet, Activist and Writer in Exile
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From: MeNeedIt

Organizers in cities across the U.S. are telling immigrants to miss class, miss work and not shop Thursday as a way to show the country how important they are to America’s economy and way of life.

“A Day Without Immigrants” actions are planned in cities including Philadelphia, Washington, Boston and Austin, Texas.

The protest comes in response to President Donald Trump and his 1-month-old administration. The Republican president has pledged to increase deportation of immigrants living in the country illegally, build a wall along the Mexican border, and ban people from certain majority-Muslim countries from coming into the U.S. He also has blamed high unemployment on immigration.

Employers in solidarity

Employers and institutions in some cities were expressing solidarity Wednesday with immigrant workers. Washington restaurateur John Andrade said he would close his businesses Thursday, and David Suro, owner of Tequilas Restaurant in Philadelphia and himself a Mexican immigrant, said he also planned to participate.

The Davis Museum at Wellesley College in Massachusetts said it would remove or shroud all artwork created or given by immigrants to the museum through February 21.

In New Mexico, the state with the largest percentage of Hispanic residents in the nation, school officials worried that hundreds of students may stay home Thursday.

“We respectfully ask all parents to acknowledge that students need to be in class every day to benefit from the education they are guaranteed and to avoid falling behind in school and life,” principals with the Albuquerque Public Schools wrote in a letter to parents.

Students who take part in the protest will receive an unexcused absence, Albuquerque school officials said.

Organizers in Philadelphia said they expect hundreds of workers and families to participate.

What would US look like?

“Our goal is to highlight the need for Philadelphia to expand policies that stop criminalizing communities of color,’’ said Erika Almiron, executive director of Juntos, a nonprofit group that works with the Latino immigrant community. “What would happen if massive raids did happen? What would the city look like?”

Almiron said that while community groups have not seen an uptick in immigration raids in the city, residents are concerned about the possibility.

Philadelphia Mayor Jim Kenney is among leaders in several cities nationwide who have vowed to maintain their “sanctuary city’’ status and decline to help federal law enforcement with deportation efforts.

Many people who make the choice to skip work Thursday will not be paid in their absence, but social media posts encouraging participation stressed that the cause is worth the sacrifice.
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From: MeNeedIt

Fossils including sharks, sea reptiles and squid-like creatures dug up in Idaho reveal a marine ecosystem thriving relatively soon after Earth’s worst mass extinction, contradicting the long-held notion life was slow to recover from the calamity.

Scientists on Wednesday described the surprising fossil discovery showing creatures flourishing in the aftermath of the worldwide die-off at the end of the Permian Period about 252 million years ago that erased roughly 90 percent of species.

Even the asteroid-induced mass extinction 66 million years ago that doomed the dinosaurs did not push life to the brink of annihilation like the Permian one.

The fossils of about 30 different species unearthed in Bear Lake County near the Idaho city of Paris showed a quick and dynamic rebound in a marine ecosystem, illustrating the remarkable resiliency of life.

“Our discovery was totally unexpected,” said paleontologist Arnaud Brayard of the University of Burgundy-Franche-Comte in France, with a highly diversified and complex assemblage of animals.

The ecosystem from this pivotal time included predators such as sharks up to about 7 feet long (2 meters), marine reptiles and bony fish, squid-like creatures including some with long conical shells and others with coiled shells, a scavenging crustacean with large eyes and strangely thin claws, starfish relatives, sponges and other animals.

The Permian die-off occurred 251.9 million years ago. The Idaho ecosystem flourished 1.3 million years later, “quite rapid on a geological scale,” according to Brayard. The mass extinction’s cause is a matter of debate.

But many scientists attribute it to colossal volcanic eruptions in northern Siberia that unleashed large amounts of greenhouse and toxic gases, triggering severe global warming and big fluctuations in oceanic chemistry including acidification and oxygen deficiency.

The Idaho ecosystem, in the earliest stages of the Triassic Period that later produced the first dinosaurs, included some unexpected creatures. There was a type of sponge previously believed to have gone extinct 200 million years earlier, and a squid-like group previously thought not to have originated until 50 million years later.

The researchers found bones from what could be the earliest-known ichthyosaur, a dolphin-like marine reptile group that prospered for 160 million years, or a direct ancestor.

“The Early Triassic is a complex and highly disturbed epoch, but certainly not a devastated one as commonly assumed, and this epoch has not yet yielded up all its secrets,” Brayard said.

The research was published in the journal Science Advances.
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From: MeNeedIt

Children with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder have several brain regions that are slightly smaller than usual, more evidence that the disorder should be considered a neurological condition, a new study says.

The study, the largest review of ADHD patients’ brain scans ever conducted, might also provide clues for developing new treatments.

“If you know what region of the brain is involved in ADHD, you could possibly target that part with medication,” said Martine Hoogman of Radboud University in the Netherlands, the study’s lead author.

ADHD causes inattention, hyperactivity and impulsivity, although a given person may not show all those traits.

Hoogman and colleagues analyzed MRI scans for more than 3,200 people in nine countries aged 4 to 63, of whom 1,713 had ADHD. They found that the brains of children with the condition were slightly smaller in five regions, including those that control emotions, voluntary movement and understanding.

The scientists reviewed one scan per person and found no effect from ADHD medications.

Hoogman said the findings support previous theories that the brains of people with ADHD may develop more slowly but that those differences are mostly wiped out by the time children grow up. “By the time they become adults, the differences in their brains are not significant anymore,” she said.

The study was paid for by the National Institutes of Health and was published online Wednesday in the journal Lancet Psychiatry.

What do differences mean?

Other experts described the findings as interesting but said there wasn’t enough information to link the brain differences to behavioral problems seen in people with ADHD.

“The study confirms that there are structural differences in the brains of people with ADHD, but it doesn’t tell us what they mean,” said Graham Murray, a lecturer in psychiatry at Cambridge University, who was not part of the research.

“Having less brain in several regions sounds bad, but it’s not as simple as that,” he said, pointing out that decreased brain matter can sometimes be beneficial — like in teenagers, when the outer cortex of their developing brains becomes thinner as their intellectual capacity grows.

“The brain is very good at adapting,” Murray said. “Just because you have less brain volume doesn’t condemn the child to not being able to function well.”

Jonathan Posner, an associate professor of psychiatry at Columbia University Medical Center in New York, also said the research should help families with children diagnosed with ADHD.

“To have a solid understanding that ADHD really does originate from brain systems and that it causes alterations in the way the brain is structured and functions is important information for reducing stigma,” said Posner, who co-authored an accompanying commentary. “It will hopefully create more empathy for children who have ADHD.”
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From: MeNeedIt

Training young farmers to turn agriculture into a business is key to eradicating poverty and curbing economic migration, the new president of the U.N. agricultural development agency said Wednesday.

Three-quarters of the world’s poorest people live in rural areas, predominantly in Asia and sub-Saharan Africa, and many rely on farming to survive, according to the United Nations.

Countries need to provide them with better equipment and infrastructure to carry out world leaders’ ambitious plan to end poverty and hunger by 2030, according to Gilbert Houngbo, head of the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD).

“To unleash the business spirit in smallholder women and men [farmers] is critical,” he told the Thomson Reuters Foundation.

Greater government investment needs to go hand in hand with educational schemes and private-sector partnerships aimed at broadening young people’s skills and prospects, he said.

He suggested, for example, that training schemes could help tomato growers become producers of tomato sauce.

Drawing on his experience

Although Houngbo has previously held senior roles at big international bodies, he said it was growing up in a small village in a rural area of Togo, one of the world’s poorest countries, that best prepared him for his new job.

“I know how it feels, not being able to increase the yield, as at the end of the season, when you have your crop, you cannot bring it to the market because you there is no rural road,” he said.

Houngbo said that helping young people from villages like his own fulfill their potential at home would make them less inclined to migrate to rich countries.

“I believe that a carefully thought out youth employment program in the rural activities is part of the solution when it comes to economic migration,” he said.

Houngbo, who was prime minister of Togo from 2008 to 2012, was appointed president of IFAD on Tuesday evening.

He beat seven other candidates to take the helm of the Rome-based agency, which provides investments supporting rural people in developing countries.
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From: MeNeedIt

Republican lawmakers on Wednesday criticized Federal Reserve Chair Janet Yellen’s stewardship of the U.S. economy and urged her to halt work on financial regulation until President Donald Trump names new policymakers to the central bank.

In a tense hearing before the House of Representatives’ Financial Services Committee, Republicans made clear they will keep pressing the Fed to trim its large holdings of bonds and set interest rates based on established mathematical rules.

“We must be vigilant to ensure that our central bankers do not one day become our central planners,” said Jeb Hensarling, a Texas Republican and the committee’s chairman. “There is zero evidence that zero interest rates and a bloated Fed balance sheet lead to a healthy economy.”

Critics say the Fed’s push to cut and then keep rates near zero and buy huge amounts of bonds and mortgage-backed securities in response to the 2007-2009 financial crisis led to the slowest U.S. economic recovery since World War II ended.

Yellen offering warning

Hensarling is planning regulatory reforms that include congressional audits of interest rate policy when the Fed disregards policy rules, a measure Yellen said she opposes as an intrusion on the central bank’s independence.

“It would result in poor economic performance,” Yellen said during the hearing.

Trump, a Republican who criticized the Fed during last year’s presidential campaign, will be able to name three new members to its seven-member Board of Governors. It currently has two empty seats, with a third due to become vacant when Fed Governor Daniel Tarullo steps down around early April.

Hensarling and other Republicans said the Fed’s banking regulations were too intrusive and its holdings of U.S. Treasuries and mortgage-backed securities — currently around $4.2 trillion — could be fueling asset bubbles.

“Maybe we shouldn’t be expecting so much from unconventional policies,” said Kentucky Republican Andy Barr.

No new rules

North Carolina Republican Patrick McHenry urged Yellen to avoid making new rules based on talks with international banking regulators until Trump names an official to serve as the Fed’s top financial supervisor.

Yellen said Trump’s future pick for the role, which is one of the vacant seats on the Fed’s board, would likely be able to review new regulations before they come into effect.

“Nothing going on in these international discussions binds us to carry out things in our rule making process,” she said.

Yellen’s four-year term as chair ends in January 2018.
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From: MeNeedIt

Southern Africa is beginning to come to grips with an invasive species that is wreaking havoc with its corn crops. It’s a South American insect called a fall armyworm and in Zambia alone, it may be on the way to destroying about 40 percent of that nation’s maize harvest. VOA’s Kevin Enochs reports.
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From: MeNeedIt