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Posts Live from Van Cliburn International Piano Competition: Plumbing – The Sublime to the Ridiculous

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Posts Live from Van Cliburn International Piano Competition
By ANN MCLAUGHLIN
 
PLUMBING: THE SUBLIME TO THE RIDICULOUS

With just five hours remaining before the Cliburn Competition final round begins, I want to turn from pianists and music to a topic of vital concern to every female concert-goer ─ bathrooms.

Fort Worth’s Bass Performance Hall is an admirable venue: lovely to look at, comfortable, with great acoustics. But even the most beautiful performing arts facility can shortchange women when it comes to bathrooms, so I faced my first trip to this necessity with the usual nagging Read More

Posts Live from Van Cliburn International Piano Competition: Finalists Announced!

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Posts Live from Van Cliburn International Piano Competition
By ANN MCLAUGHLIN

FINALISTS ANNOUNCED!

The judges have ruled and the six Cliburn Competition finalists have been announced. The result met our expectations with one curious surprise.

I have been smitten with Russian Nikita Mndoyants since hearing his performance in the preliminaries via the Cliburn’s web stream. Mndoyants, 24, has made a clear statement about his artistic intentions. He is a musical storyteller. His performances of Mussorgsky’s Pictures at an Exhibition and three Debussy Preludes were gorgeous, vivid, illuminating.

Read More

Differences, Similarities of Early Los Alamos, Soviet Scientists Focus of 70th Anniversary Lecture

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Istvan Hargittai, right, talks with Edward Teller at Stanford in 1996. Courtesy/LANL

LANL News:

  • June 12 at Bradbury Science Museum

The differences and similarities between Manhattan Project-era scientists at Los Alamos National Laboratory and scientists working at the former Soviet Union’s secret Arzamas-16 installation will be discussed by Professor Istvan Hargittai at 5:30 p.m., June 12 at the Laboratory’s Bradbury Science Museum. The talk is part of the Laboratory’s 70th anniversary lecture series.

According to Hargittai, Los Alamos’ first director, Julius Robert (J. Robert) Read More

Posts Live from Van Cliburn International Piano Competition: Different Styles Mark Cliburn Competitors

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Posts Live from Van Cliburn International Piano Competition
By ANN MCLAUGHLIN
 
DIFFERENT STYLES MARK CLIBURN COMPETITORS

Chinese pianist Fei Fei Dong closes the semifinals of the Cliburn Competition. The judges are scheduled to announce the finalists at 11:30 p.m., well past our bedtime, but for this we will stay wide awake.

That all of these pianists have formidable technical skills is a given. Pyrotechnics abound. But I have decided that the competitors fall into two broad categories.  Some choose repertoire and play in a way that says, “This is the kind of pianist I am and I’ll Read More

LANL: Metamaterial Flexible Sheets Could Transform Optics

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Members of the metamaterials team, from left: Nathaniel K. Grady, Hou-Tong Chen, Jane E. Heyes. Courtesy/LANL

(a) Photograph of an ultrathin (72 µm thick) metamaterial sample. (b) Illustration of how the metamaterial redirects an electromagnetic wave, which would not happen for a normal thin film. The structure is not drawn to scale. Courtesy/LANL

LANL News:

  • New design flattens bulky optical devices

New ultrathin, planar, lightweight, and broadband polarimetric photonic devices and optics could result from recent research by a team of Los Alamos National Laboratory scientists. The Read More

Searching for Clandestine Graves with Geophysical Tools

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Workers examine remains at a mass grave in eastern Bosnia in 2004. Photo by Polargeo

AGU News:

By Carlos M. Molina, National University of Colombia, Bogota and Orlando Hernandez, National University of Colombia, Bogota

Cancún, Mexico — It’s very hard to convict a murderer if the victim’s body can’t be found. And the best way to hide a body is to bury it.

Developing new tools to find those clandestine graves is the goal of a small community of researchers spread across several countries, some of whom are presenting their work on Tuesday, May 14, at the Meeting of the Americas in Cancún, Mexico, a scientific Read More

US, China Hold Joint Meeting to Discuss Peaceful Uses of Nuclear Technology

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Beijing, China. Courtesy photo

NNSA News:

  • Eighth U.S.-China PUNT Joint Coordinating Committee Meeting Held in Beijing

NNSA Deputy Administrator for Defense Nuclear Nonproliferation Anne Harrington

BEIJING – The National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) and the China National Energy Administration (NEA) this week held the 8th Joint Coordinating Committee meeting of the 1998 U.S.-China Peaceful Uses of Nuclear Technology (PUNT) Agreement.

NNSA Deputy Administrator for Defense Nuclear Nonproliferation Anne Harrington and Director General of the NEA Nuclear Power Department Read More

Former Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher Dies at 87

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WHITE HOUSE News:

Statement from President Obama on the death of Britain’s former Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher:

With the passing of Baroness Margaret Thatcher, the world has lost one of the great champions of freedom and liberty, and America has lost a true friend.

As a grocer’s daughter who rose to become Britain’s first female prime minister, she stands as an example to our daughters that there is no glass ceiling that can’t be shattered.

As prime minister, she helped restore the confidence and pride that has always been the hallmark of Britain at its best.

And as an unapologetic supporter Read More

U.S. Removes Last Remaining HEU from Czech Republic, Sets Nonproliferation Milestone

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Casks containing HEU being loaded into shipping containers at the Nuclear Research Institute in Rez, Czech Republic, Friday, March 22, 2013. Courtesy/NNSA

A worker checks for radiation at the Nuclear Research Institute in Rez, Czech Republic, Friday, March 22, 2013. Courtesy/NNSA

NNSA News:

WASHINGTON, D.C. – The United States’ National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) and the Czech Republic’s Nuclear Research Institute announced today the successful removal of 68 kilograms (approximately 150 pounds, or enough material for two nuclear weapons) of highly enriched uranium Read More