TORONTO (Reuters) - BlackBerry said on Friday it would ask securities regulators in Canada and the United States to probe a report about retail return rates for its new Z10 smartphone that it called "false and misleading."
The Canadian company, which has pinned its turnaround hopes on its new BlackBerry 10 line, said return rates were at or below its forecasts and in line with industry norms.
"To suggest otherwise is either a gross misreading of the data or a willful manipulation," Chief Executive Thorsten Heins said in a statement. "Such a conclusion is absolutely without basis and BlackBerry will not leave it unchallenged."
BlackBerry said research and investment firm Detwiler Fenton had said Z10 smartphones were being returned in unusually high numbers, and had refused to share its report or its methods.
The company said it would present a formal request to the Securities and Exchange Commission and the Ontario Securities commission over the next few days.
Shares of Waterloo, Ontario-based BlackBerry fell 8.0 percent on Thursday.
(Reporting by Allison Martell; Editing by Janet Guttsman and Bernadette Baum)
The April 12 ShopAndroid.com Deal of the Day is the Amzer ShellCase w/ Holster for HTC One X. The Amzer Shellster combines the protection of a hard case and the power of a clip-stand holster. The case is impact resistant for complete protection and quickly slides in and out of the holster. Lined with a soft fabric, the holster doubles as an adjustable clip stand, perfect for displaying or media viewing.
BERLIN, April 11 (Reuters) - Bayern Munich have received more than 200,000 ticket requests for their Champions League semi-final game in Munich, thousands of which were made before they advanced against Juventus, the club said on Thursday. "We have been updating the figure constantly and at the moment it stands at 200,000 ticket requests for the semi-final home leg," a Bayern Munich official told Reuters. Bayern's stadium fits only 69,000 and that includes the 39,500 ticket holders and any fans travelling with their opponents. ...
Sprint has been teasing for weeks that its LTE network would soon launch in Los Angeles. If a fresh leak from Phone Arena proves true, we may at last be down to the final hours before the Now Network officially flicks the switch for those Angelenos -- and a good chunk of the US population, for that matter. The staff memo reportedly has LTE formally launching in 21 markets on April 12th, with LA being joined by larger cities across the US like Charlotte, Memphis, Norfolk, Virginia Beach and Newport News. Its schedule also has a number of sizable cities joining the mix across 10 states, with multi-city expansions on the way in California, Florida, Indiana, North Carolina, Tennessee, Texas and (as you likely noticed) Virginia. Although the faster 4G service still won't be ubiquitous on Sprint if the rollout goes ahead as claimed, the expansion could be a very convenient complement to the HTC One launch.
Update: Much like San Francisco, LA will be something of a soft launch: Sprint has noted that bits and pieces of the LTE network are in testing.
Have you ever seen Jupiter in daylight? This weekend, you just might get your chance.
Very few people have, but you could get an opportunity to join those elite ranks on Sunday (April 14). On that date, the moon will pass close to Jupiter, and can be used to locate the planet in the daytime sky.
Although the daytime sky looks like an unbroken blue blanket on a clear, sunny day, it is actually just as transparent in daylight as it is on a dark night. The difference is that much of the sunlight is scattered by the air molecules in our atmosphere, called Rayleigh scattering. Despite the overall blue cast this gives to the sky, stargazers can still easily see the sun and moon through it.
If you know exactly where to look ? and have something to focus your eyes on ? you can also see the brighter planets in a blue sky. Venus is easily observed, including the famous incident at Abraham Lincoln's second inauguration, when large numbers in the crowd saw?Venus over the Capitol Dome. [Amazing Night Sky Photos for April]
Although it is much larger than Venus, Jupiter is more difficult to spot in daylight because it is farther from the sun. Because of its proximity to the star, it is not as well-lit. When Jupiter is close to the moon, it is easier to spot. The moon shows you where to look, and also gives your eyes something to focus on.
While Jupiter will be visible without optical aid on Sunday, it will be easier to spot first with binoculars. First locate the moon in the south-southeastern sky. Then, look slightly above and to the left of the moon to spot the tiny speck of Jupiter. Once you have spotted Jupiter in binoculars, try the greater challenge of seeing it without optical aid.
If you have a telescope, you can locate Jupiter in the same way.
Amateur astronomers whose telescopes have setting circles or GoTo computers can locate Jupiter any time without needing the help of the moon. Using these methods, you can also observe the planet Mercury and the bright stars Sirius and Procyon in full daylight.
Always remember to use?extreme caution?when using binoculars or a telescope when the sun is above the horizon. Be especially careful with GoTo telescopes, as these often take quite unpredictable paths across the sky and may catch the sun in passing.
Editor's note:?If you snap an amazing photo of Jupiter in daylight or any other stargazing photo you'd like to share for a possible story or image gallery, please contact managing editor Tariq Malik at?spacephotos@space.com.
This article was provided to SPACE.com by?Starry Night Education, the leader in space science curriculum solutions. Follow Starry Night on Twitter?@StarryNightEdu. Original article on SPACE.com.
Copyright 2013 SPACE.com, a TechMediaNetwork company. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
Medion isn't the best-known PC badge outside of Europe, but it does have an occasional eye for sleek design. We'd say the Lenovo-backed company's new Akoya P2004 offers that kind of style UK crowd. The all-in-one fits a 23.6-inch, 1080p display into a minimalist design that's oddly charming for what's ultimately a budget machine. No one would call the P2004 feature-loaded when it's carrying a dual-core 3.2GHz Core i3, 4GB of RAM, a 1TB hard drive and a DVD burner, but the price is right at a frugal £500 ($770). The catch? If you like what's on offer, you're going to have to swing by ASDA, which has the UK exclusive. Still, we wouldn't object too much to picking up a fairly tasteful Windows 8 PC alongside the groceries.
Mayo Clinic: Cardiopoietic 'smart' stem cells show promise in heart failure patientsPublic release date: 10-Apr-2013 [ | E-mail | Share ]
Contact: Traci Klein newsbureau@mayo.edu 507-284-5005 Mayo Clinic
First-in-humans study introduces next generation cell therapy
ROCHESTER, Minn. -- Translating a Mayo Clinic stem-cell discovery, an international team has demonstrated that therapy with cardiopoietic (cardiogenically-instructed) or "smart" stem cells can improve heart health for people suffering from heart failure. This is the first application in patients of lineage-guided stem cells for targeted regeneration of a failing organ, paving the way to development of next generation regenerative medicine solutions. Results of the clinical trial appear online of the Journal of the American College of Cardiology.
The multi-center, randomized Cardiopoietic stem cell therapy in heart failure (C-CURE) trial involved heart failure patients from Belgium, Switzerland and Serbia. Patients in the control group received standard care for heart failure in accordance with established guidelines. Patients in the cell therapy arm received, in addition to standard care, cardiopoietic stem cells -- a first-in-class biotherapeutic. In this process, bone marrow was harvested from the top of the patient's hip, and isolated stem cells were treated with a protein cocktail to replicate natural cues of heart development. Derived cardiopoietic stem cells were then injected into the patient's heart.
"The cells underwent an innovative treatment to optimize their repair capacity," says Andre Terzic, M.D., Ph.D., study senior author and director of the Mayo Clinic Center for Regenerative Medicine. "This study helps us move beyond the science fiction notion of stem cell research, providing clinical evidence for a new approach in cardiovascular regenerative medicine."
Every patient in the stem cell treatment group improved. Heart pumping function improved in each patient within six months following cardiopoietic stem cell treatment. In addition, patients experienced improved fitness and were able to walk longer distances than before stem cell therapy. "The benefit to patients who received cardiopoietic stem cell therapy was significant," Dr. Terzic says.
In an accompanying editorial, Charles Murry, M.D., Ph.D., and colleagues at the University of Washington, Seattle, say, "Six months after treatment, the cell therapy group had a 7 percent absolute improvement in EF (ejection fraction) over baseline, versus a non-significant change in the control group. This improvement in EF is dramatic, particularly given the duration between the ischemic injury and cell therapy. It compares favorably with our most potent therapies in heart failure."
The science supporting this trial is a product of a decade-long journey in decoding principles of stem cell-based heart repair. "Discovery of rare stem cells that could inherently promote heart regeneration provided a critical clue. In following this natural blueprint, we further developed the know-how needed to convert patient-derived stem cells into cells that can reliably repair a failing heart," says Dr. Terzic, underscoring the team effort in this endeavor.
Initial discovery led to the identification of hundreds of proteins involved in cardiogenesis, or the heart development process. The research team then identified which proteins are necessary in helping a stem cell become a reparative cell type, leading to development of a protein cocktail-based procedure that orients stem cells for heart repair. Such upgraded stem cells are called cardiopoietic or heart creative.
###
Mayo Clinic partnered with Cardio3 Biosciences, a bioscience company in Mont-Saint-Guibert, Belgium, for advanced product development, manufacturing scale-up, and clinical trial execution.
Mayo Clinic and Dr. Terzic have a financial interest related to technology in this research program.
Contact:
Traci Klein
507-284-2511 (evenings)
VIDEO ALERT: Audio and video resources are available on the Mayo Clinic News Network.
About Mayo Clinic
Mayo Clinic is a nonprofit worldwide leader in medical care, research and education for people from all walks of life. For more information, visit http://www.mayoclinic.org/about and http://www.mayoclinic.org/news.
Journalists can become a member of the Mayo Clinic News Network for the latest health, science and research news and access to video, audio, text and graphic elements that can be downloaded or embedded.
[ | E-mail | Share ]
?
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.
Mayo Clinic: Cardiopoietic 'smart' stem cells show promise in heart failure patientsPublic release date: 10-Apr-2013 [ | E-mail | Share ]
Contact: Traci Klein newsbureau@mayo.edu 507-284-5005 Mayo Clinic
First-in-humans study introduces next generation cell therapy
ROCHESTER, Minn. -- Translating a Mayo Clinic stem-cell discovery, an international team has demonstrated that therapy with cardiopoietic (cardiogenically-instructed) or "smart" stem cells can improve heart health for people suffering from heart failure. This is the first application in patients of lineage-guided stem cells for targeted regeneration of a failing organ, paving the way to development of next generation regenerative medicine solutions. Results of the clinical trial appear online of the Journal of the American College of Cardiology.
The multi-center, randomized Cardiopoietic stem cell therapy in heart failure (C-CURE) trial involved heart failure patients from Belgium, Switzerland and Serbia. Patients in the control group received standard care for heart failure in accordance with established guidelines. Patients in the cell therapy arm received, in addition to standard care, cardiopoietic stem cells -- a first-in-class biotherapeutic. In this process, bone marrow was harvested from the top of the patient's hip, and isolated stem cells were treated with a protein cocktail to replicate natural cues of heart development. Derived cardiopoietic stem cells were then injected into the patient's heart.
"The cells underwent an innovative treatment to optimize their repair capacity," says Andre Terzic, M.D., Ph.D., study senior author and director of the Mayo Clinic Center for Regenerative Medicine. "This study helps us move beyond the science fiction notion of stem cell research, providing clinical evidence for a new approach in cardiovascular regenerative medicine."
Every patient in the stem cell treatment group improved. Heart pumping function improved in each patient within six months following cardiopoietic stem cell treatment. In addition, patients experienced improved fitness and were able to walk longer distances than before stem cell therapy. "The benefit to patients who received cardiopoietic stem cell therapy was significant," Dr. Terzic says.
In an accompanying editorial, Charles Murry, M.D., Ph.D., and colleagues at the University of Washington, Seattle, say, "Six months after treatment, the cell therapy group had a 7 percent absolute improvement in EF (ejection fraction) over baseline, versus a non-significant change in the control group. This improvement in EF is dramatic, particularly given the duration between the ischemic injury and cell therapy. It compares favorably with our most potent therapies in heart failure."
The science supporting this trial is a product of a decade-long journey in decoding principles of stem cell-based heart repair. "Discovery of rare stem cells that could inherently promote heart regeneration provided a critical clue. In following this natural blueprint, we further developed the know-how needed to convert patient-derived stem cells into cells that can reliably repair a failing heart," says Dr. Terzic, underscoring the team effort in this endeavor.
Initial discovery led to the identification of hundreds of proteins involved in cardiogenesis, or the heart development process. The research team then identified which proteins are necessary in helping a stem cell become a reparative cell type, leading to development of a protein cocktail-based procedure that orients stem cells for heart repair. Such upgraded stem cells are called cardiopoietic or heart creative.
###
Mayo Clinic partnered with Cardio3 Biosciences, a bioscience company in Mont-Saint-Guibert, Belgium, for advanced product development, manufacturing scale-up, and clinical trial execution.
Mayo Clinic and Dr. Terzic have a financial interest related to technology in this research program.
Contact:
Traci Klein
507-284-2511 (evenings)
VIDEO ALERT: Audio and video resources are available on the Mayo Clinic News Network.
About Mayo Clinic
Mayo Clinic is a nonprofit worldwide leader in medical care, research and education for people from all walks of life. For more information, visit http://www.mayoclinic.org/about and http://www.mayoclinic.org/news.
Journalists can become a member of the Mayo Clinic News Network for the latest health, science and research news and access to video, audio, text and graphic elements that can be downloaded or embedded.
[ | E-mail | Share ]
?
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.
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Public release date: 10-Apr-2013
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