title: Atlantic bluefin tuna

text: The body of the Atlantic bluefin tuna is rhomboidal in profile and robust. The head is conical and the mouth rather large. The head contains a "pineal window" that allows the fish to navigate over its multiple thousands-of-miles range. Their color is dark blue above and gray below, with a gold coruscation covering the body and bright yellow caudal finlets. Bluefin tuna can be distinguished from other family members by the relatively short length of their pectoral fins. Their livers have a unique characteristic in that they are covered with blood vessels (striated). In other tunas with short pectoral fins, such vessels are either not present or present in small numbers along the edges.


title: Atlantic bluefin tuna

text: Fully mature adult specimens average long and weigh around . The largest recorded specimen taken under International Game Fish Association rules was caught off Nova Scotia, an area renowned for huge Atlantic bluefin, and weighed and was long. The longest contest between man and tuna fish occurred near Liverpool, Nova Scotia in 1934, when six men taking turns fought a tuna for 62 hours. Both the Smithsonian Institution and the U. S. National Marine Fisheries Service have accepted that this species can weigh up to , though further details are lacking. Atlantic bluefin tuna reach maturity relatively quickly. In a survey that included specimens up to in length and in weight, none was believed to be older than 15 years. However, very large specimens may be up to 50 years old.


title: Atlantic bluefin tuna

text: The bluefin possesses enormous muscular strength, which it channels through a pair of tendons to its lunate-shaped caudal fin for propulsion. In contrast to many other fish, the body stays rigid while the tail flicks back and forth, increasing stroke efficiency. It also has a very efficient circulatory system. It possesses one of the highest blood-hemoglobin concentrations among fish, which allows it to efficiently deliver oxygen to its tissues; this is combined with an exceptionally thin blood-water barrier to ensure rapid oxygen uptake.


title: Atlantic bluefin tuna

text: To keep its core muscles warm, which are used for power and steady swimming, the Atlantic bluefin uses countercurrent exchange to prevent heat from being lost to the surrounding water. Heat in the venous blood is efficiently transferred to the cool, oxygenated arterial blood entering a rete mirabile. While all members of the tuna family are warm-blooded, the ability to thermoregulate is more highly developed in bluefin tuna than in any other fish. This allows them to seek food in the rich but chilly waters of the North Atlantic.


title: Atlantic bluefin tuna

text: Bluefins dive to depths of . The Atlantic bluefin tuna typically hunts small fish such as sardines, herring, and mackerel, and invertebrates such as squid and crustaceans. They exhibit opportunistic hunting in schools of fish organised by size. Their white skeletal muscle allows for large contractions which aids burst swimming to ensure prey capture.


title: Atlantic bluefin tuna

text: The species is host to over 70 parasites although none have been yet described as causing harm to the species. The tetraphyllidean tapeworm "Pelichnibothrium speciosum" is one parasite of the species. As the tapeworm's definite host is the blue shark, which does not generally seem to feed on tuna, the Atlantic bluefin tuna likely is a dead-end host for "P. speciosum".


title: Atlantic bluefin tuna

text: Bluefin tuna are oviparous, congregating together in large groups to spawn. Over several days, a female releases large numbers of eggs into the water where they are fertilized externally by male sperm. Female bluefins have been estimated to produce a mean of 128.5 eggs per gram of body weight, or up to 40 million eggs at a time. Eggs hatch into larvae two days after fertilization and become cannibalistics quarter-inch long fish by the end of a week. About 40% of larvae survive their first week, and about 0.1% the first year. Surviving bluefin tend to group together in schools according to size.


title: Atlantic bluefin tuna

text: Atlantic bluefin tuna were traditionally known to spawn in two widely separated areas. Pop-up satellite tracking results generally confirm the belief held by many scientists and fishermen that although bluefin that were spawned in each area may forage widely across the Atlantic, the vast majority return to their natal area to spawn.


title: Atlantic bluefin tuna

text: The Eastern stock of Atlantic bluefins' spawning ground exists in the western Mediterranean, particularly in the area of the Balearic Islands. The spawning ground of the Western stock is the Gulf of Mexico. Because Atlantic bluefins group together in large concentrations to spawn, they are highly vulnerable to commercial fishing while spawning. This is particularly so in the Mediterranean, where the groups of spawning bluefins can be spotted from the air by light aircraft and purse seines directed to set around the schools.


title: Atlantic bluefin tuna

text: In 2016, researchers suggested that a third spawning area exists in the Slope Sea, an area to the north and west of the Northeastern United States Continental Shelf. Subsequent research indicates that comparable concentrations of bluefin larvae are found in the Slope Sea and in the Gulf of Mexico.


title: Atlantic bluefin tuna

text: A number of behavioral differences have been observed between the eastern and western populations, some of which may reflect environmental conditions. For example, bluefin in the Gulf of Mexico spawn between mid-April and mid-June, when the surface water temperature is between and , while bluefin in the Mediterranean spawn between June and August, when water is between and . In the Gulf of Mexico bluefin appear to correct for higher surface temperatures by diving, going deeper than when entering the Gulf and staying deeper than to spawn.


title: Atlantic bluefin tuna

text: The western and eastern populations have been thought to mature at different ages. Bluefins born in the east are thought to reach maturity a year or two earlier than those spawned in the west. It has also been suggested that these apparent differences may reflect not-well-understood complexities of migration patterns and additional spawning areas such as the Slope Sea.


title: Atlantic bluefin tuna

text: According to Longo, "by the turn of the first millennium CE, a sophisticated bluefin tuna trap fishery [had] emerged. ... This trap fishery, called tonnara in Italian, madrague in French, almadraba in Spanish, and armação in Portuguese, forms an elaborate maze of nets that capture and corral bluefin tuna during their spawning season. Active for more than a thousand years, the traditional/artisanal bluefin tuna trap fishery has experienced a collapse in the Mediterranean and has struggled where it is still practiced."


title: Atlantic bluefin tuna

text: After World War II, Japanese fishermen needed more tuna to eat and to export for European and U.S. canning industries. They expanded their fishing range and perfected industrial long-line fishing, a practice that employs thousands of baited hooks on miles-long lines. In the 1970s, Japanese manufacturers developed lightweight, high-strength polymers that were spun into drift net. Though they were banned on the high seas by the early 1990s, in the 1970s, hundreds of miles of them were often deployed in a single night. At-sea freezing technology then allowed them to bring frozen sushi-ready tuna from the farthest oceans to market after as long as a year.


title: Atlantic bluefin tuna

text: The initial target was yellowfin tuna. Japanese did not value bluefin before the 1960s. By the late 1960s, sportfishing for giant bluefin tuna was burgeoning off Nova Scotia, New England, and Long Island. North Americans, too, had little appetite for bluefins, usually discarding them after taking a picture. Bluefin sportfishing's rise, however, coincided with Japan's export boom. In the 1960s and '70s, cargo planes were returning to Japan empty. A Japanese entrepreneur realized he could buy New England and Canadian bluefins cheaply, and started filling Japan-bound holds with tuna. Exposure to beef and other fatty meats during the U.S. occupation following World War Two had prepared the Japanese palate for bluefin's fatty belly ("otoro"). The Atlantic bluefin was the biggest and the favorite. The appreciation rebounded across the Pacific when Americans started to eat raw fish in the late 1970s.


title: Atlantic bluefin tuna

text: Prior to the 1960s, Atlantic bluefin fisheries were relatively small scale, and populations remained stable. Although some local stocks, such as those in the North Sea, were damaged by unrestricted commercial fishing, other populations were not at risk. However, in the 1960s, purse seiners catching fish for the canned tuna market in United States coastal waters removed huge numbers of juvenile and young Western Atlantic bluefins, taking out several entire-year classes. Mediterranean fisheries have historically been poorly regulated and catches under-reported, with French, Spanish, and Italian fishermen competing with North African nations for a diminishing population. The fish's migratory habits complicate the task of regulating the fishery, because they spend time in the national waters of multiple countries, as well as the open ocean outside of any national jurisdiction.


title: Atlantic bluefin tuna

text: Tuna ranching began as early as the 1970s. Canadian fishermen in St Mary's Bay captured young fish and raised them in pens. In captivity, they grow to reach hundreds of kilos, eventually fetching premium prices in Japan. Ranching enables ranchers to exploit the unpredictable supply of wild-caught fish. Ranches across the Mediterranean and off South Australia grow bluefins offshore. According to OECD statistics, 35 thousand tons have been produced in 2018 with Japan accounting for about 50% of it, followed by Australia, Mexico, Spain and Turkey with smaller amounts. Large proportions of juvenile and young Mediterranean fish are taken to be grown on tuna farms. Because the tuna are taken from the wild to the pens before they are old enough to reproduce, ranching is one of the most serious threats to the species. The bluefin's slow growth and late sexual maturity compound its problems. The Atlantic population has declined by nearly 90% since the 1970s.


title: Atlantic bluefin tuna

text: In Europe and Australia, scientists have used light-manipulation technology and time-release hormone implants to bring about the first large-scale captive spawning of Atlantic and southern bluefins. The technology involves implanting gonadotropin-releasing hormone in the fish to stimulate fertile egg production and may push the fish to reach sexual maturity at younger ages.


title: Atlantic bluefin tuna

text: However, since bluefins require so much food per unit of weight gained - up to 10 times that of salmon - if bluefins were to be farmed at the same scale as 21st-century salmon farming, many of their prey species might become depleted if farmed bluefin were fed the same diet as their wild counterparts. As of 2010, 30 million tons of small forage fish were removed from the oceans yearly, the majority to feed farmed fish.


title: Atlantic bluefin tuna

text: Market entry by many North African Mediterranean countries, such as Tunisia and Libya in the 1990s, along with the increasingly widespread practice of tuna farming in the Mediterranean and other areas, such as southern Australia (for southern bluefin tuna), depressed prices. One result is that fishermen must now catch up to twice as many fish to maintain their revenues.


title: Atlantic bluefin tuna

text: Global appetite for fish is the predominant threat to Atlantic bluefin. Overfishing continues despite repeated warnings of the current precipitous decline. Bluefin aquaculture, which arose in response to declining wild stocks, has yet to achieve a sustainability, in part because it predominantly relies on harvesting and ranching juveniles rather than captive breeding.


title: Atlantic bluefin tuna

text: The 2010 Deepwater Horizon oil spill released an estimated 4.9 million barrels of crude oil into the Gulf of Mexico during the spawning season of the Atlantic bluefin tuna. The oil is estimated to have affected roughly 3.1 million square miles, including more than 5 percent of the tuna habitat in the U.S. Exclusive Economic Zone. The spill occurred at a peak time for the fertilization of eggs and the development of larval bluefin tuna. Resulting short and long-term impacts on populations of Atlantic bluefin tuna and other pelagic species are difficult to determine, in part due to limitations in monitoring ability.


title: Atlantic bluefin tuna

text: Nonetheless, a number of lethal and sublethal impacts have been documented, including pericardial edema, defective cardiac function and cardiac abnormalities.


title: Atlantic bluefin tuna

text: In 2007, researchers from the International Commission for the Conservation of Atlantic Tunas (ICCAT) — the regulators of Atlantic bluefin fishing—recommended a global quota of 15,000 tonnes to maintain current stocks or 10,000 tonnes to allow the fisheries recovery. ICCAT then chose a quota of 36,000 tonnes, but surveys indicated that up to 60,000 tonnes were actually being taken (a third of the total remaining stocks) and the limit was reduced to 22,500 tonnes. Their scientists now say that 7500 tonnes are the sustainable limit. In November 2009, ICCAT set the 2010 quota at 13,500 tonnes and said that if stocks were not rebuilt by 2022, it would consider closing some areas.


title: Atlantic bluefin tuna

text: On 18 March 2010, the United Nations rejected a U.S.-backed effort to impose a total ban on Atlantic bluefin tuna fishing and trading. The Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES) vote was 68 to 20 with 30 European abstentions. The leading opponent, Japan, claimed that ICCAT was the proper regulatory body.


title: Atlantic bluefin tuna

text: In 2011, the USA's National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) decided not to list the Atlantic bluefin tuna as an endangered species. NOAA officials said that the more stringent international fishing rules created in November 2010 would be enough for the Atlantic bluefin tuna to recover. NOAA agreed to reconsider the species' endangered status in 2013. It was made a National Marine Fisheries Service species of concern, one of those species about which the U.S. government has some concerns regarding status and threats, but for which insufficient information is available to indicate a need to list the species under the U.S. Endangered Species Act.


title: Atlantic bluefin tuna

text: In November 2012, 48 countries meeting in Morocco for the International Commission for the Conservation of Atlantic Tunas voted to keep strict fishing limits, saying the species' population is still fragile. The quota will rise only slightly, from 12,900 metric tons a year to 13,500. The decision was reviewed in November 2014, resulting in higher allowances listed below.


title: Atlantic bluefin tuna

text: The latest stock assessment for Atlantic bluefin tuna reflected an improvement in the status for both western and eastern Atlantic/Mediterranean stocks. The Commission adopted new management measures that are within the range of scientific advice, are consistent with the respective rebuilding plans, and allow for continued stock growth. For the western stock, the TAC of 2,000 mt annually for 2015 and 2016 will provide for continued growth in spawning stock biomass and allow the strong 2003 year-class to continue to enhance the productivity of the stock. The TAC for the eastern Atlantic/Mediterranean stock was set at 16,142 t for 2015; 19,296 t for 2016; and 23,155 t for 2017.


title: Atlantic bluefin tuna

text: In 2020, the UK government recognised the increasing incidence of bluefin tuna in UK waters in recent years and is funding ongoing research to understand the ecology of the species and devise an approach to its management.


title: Atlantic bluefin tuna

text: In 2010, Greenpeace International added the northern bluefin tuna to its seafood red list. As of January 2022, the bluefin tuna remains on the list.


title: Atlantic bluefin tuna

text: In the summer of 2011, the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society led a campaign against supposedly illegal bluefin tuna fishing off the coast of Libya, which was under Muammar Gaddafi's regime at the time. The fishermen retaliated against Sea Shepherd's intervention by throwing various, small metal pieces at the crew. Nobody was injured due to the other side's actions during the conflict.


title: Atlantic bluefin tuna

text: In November 2011, food critic Eric Asimov of "The New York Times" criticized the top-ranked New York City restaurant Sushi Yasuda for offering bluefin tuna on their menu, arguing that drawing from such a threatened fishery constituted an unjustifiable risk to bluefins, and to the future of culinary traditions that depend on the species.


title: Atlantic bluefin tuna

text: The bluefin species are listed by the Monterey Bay Aquarium on its Seafood Watch list and pocket guides as fish to avoid due to overfishing.


title: Atlantic bluefin tuna

text: Atlantic bluefin tuna is one of the most highly prized fish used in Japanese raw fish dishes. About 80% of the caught Atlantic and Pacific bluefin tunas are consumed in Japan. Bluefin tuna sashimi is a particular delicacy in Japan. For example, an Atlantic bluefin caught off eastern United States sold for US$247,000 at the Tsukiji fish market in Tokyo in 2008. This high price is considerably less than the highest prices paid for Pacific bluefin. Prices were highest in the late 1970s and 1980s.


title: Atlantic bluefin tuna

text: Japanese began eating tuna sushi in the 1840s, when a large catch came into Edo [old Tokyo] one season. A chef marinated a few pieces in soy sauce and served it as "nigiri sushi". At that time, these fish were nicknamed" shibi" — "four days" — because chefs would bury them for four days to mellow their bloody taste.


title: Quicksand

text: Quicksand is a colloid consisting of fine granular material (such as sand, silt or clay) and water. It forms in saturated loose sand when the sand is suddenly agitated. When water in the sand cannot escape, it creates a liquefied soil that loses strength and cannot support weight. Quicksand can form in standing water or in upward flowing water (as from an artesian spring). In the case of upward flowing water, forces oppose the force of gravity and suspend the soil particles.


title: Quicksand

text: The saturated sediment may appear quite solid until a sudden change in pressure or shock initiates liquefaction. This causes the sand to form a suspension and lose strength. The cushioning of water gives quicksand, and other liquefied sediments, a spongy, fluid-like texture. Objects in liquefied sand sink to the level at which the weight of the object is equal to the weight of the displaced soil/water mix and the submerged object floats due to its buoyancy.


title: Quicksand

text: Soil liquefaction may occur in partially saturated soil when it is shaken by an earthquake or similar forces. The movement combined with an increase in pore pressure (of groundwater) leads to the loss of particle cohesion, causing buildings or other objects on that surface to sink.


title: Quicksand

text: Quicksand is a shear thinning non-Newtonian fluid: when undisturbed, it often appears to be solid ("gel" form), but a less than 1% change in the stress on the quicksand will cause a sudden decrease in its viscosity ("sol" form). After an initial disturbance—such as a person attempting to walk on it—the water and sand in the quicksand separate and dense regions of sand sediment form; it is because of the formation of these high volume fraction regions that the viscosity of the quicksand seems to decrease suddenly. Someone stepping on it will start to sink. To move within the quicksand, a person or object must apply sufficient pressure on the compacted sand to re-introduce enough water to liquefy it. The forces required to do this are quite large: to remove a foot from quicksand at a speed of 1 cm/s would require the same amount of force as that needed to lift a car.


title: Quicksand

text: It is impossible for a human to sink entirely into quicksand, due to the higher density of the fluid. Quicksand has a density of about 2 grams per cubic centimeter, whereas the density of the human body is only about 1 gram per cubic centimeter. At that level of density, sinking beyond about waist height in quicksand is impossible. Even objects with a higher density than quicksand will float on it if stationary. Aluminium, for example, has a density of about 2.7 grams per cubic centimeter, but a piece of aluminium will float on top of quicksand until motion causes the sand to liquefy.


title: Quicksand

text: Continued or panicked movement, however, may cause a person to sink further in the quicksand. Since this increasingly impairs movement, it can lead to a situation where other factors such as weather exposure (i.e. sun stroke), dehydration, hypothermia, drowning in a rising tide or predatory animals may harm a trapped person.


title: Quicksand

text: Quicksand may be escaped by slow movement of the legs in order to increase viscosity of the fluid, and rotation of the body so as to float in the supine position (lying horizontally with the face and torso facing up).


title: David Eigenberg

text: David Eigenberg (born May 17, 1964) is an American actor. He is known for his roles as Steve Brady on the HBO series "Sex and the City" and its revival series "And Just Like That..." and as Lieutenant Christopher Herrmann on NBC's "Chicago Fire".


title: David Eigenberg

text: Eigenberg was born in Manhasset, New York, on Long Island, and grew up in Naperville, Illinois, the only boy in a family of six children. He has an older sister named Helen and a younger sister named Betsy. His mother, Beverly, owned pre-schools, and his father, Harry, was a certified public accountant. Eigenberg's father was Jewish and his mother was Episcopalian; he was raised in his mother's faith.


title: David Eigenberg

text: After graduating from high school in 1982, Eigenberg enlisted in the United States Marine Corps Reserve, serving for three years (1982–1986), and was honorably discharged at the rank of Lance Corporal.


title: David Eigenberg

text: Eigenberg's first recurring role was on "", where he portrayed a copycat sniper, before acting in "The Practice". He voiced the role of Nermal in "". He made an appearance on an episode of "ER" during the show's final season, and made an appearance in the movie "Daybreak". He appeared in the American TV show "The King of Queens", in the episode entitled "Flash Photography", where he portrayed the groom of Carrie's annoying friend.


title: David Eigenberg

text: In 2002, Eigenberg starred as the short-lived character Officer Ross in the Season 3 episode of "Third Watch", entitled "Superheroes: Part 1". In July 2004, he appeared in the sci-fi series "The 4400". He appeared as Carl Morrissey in part two of the pilot, entitled "The New and Improved Carl Morrissey". Eigenberg appeared as a suspect in the sixth episode of the TV series "Raines", entitled "Inner Child", which first aired on April 20, 2007.


title: David Eigenberg

text: He appeared in an episode of "Ghost Whisperer", alongside Jennifer Love Hewitt, and in CBS's "NCIS" as Ted Bankston, a former NSA analyst who was suspected of mishandling classified information, which was eventually proven to be true. His character had kidnapped Michelle Lee's (Liza Lapira) daughter/sister, Amanda, and had forced her to work for him; he was killed off during a stand-off between himself, Lee, and Leroy Jethro Gibbs (Mark Harmon) in the Season 6 episode, "Dagger". Eigenberg had a recurring role in the HBO series "Sex and the City" as Steve Brady, Miranda Hobbes' on-and-off-again boyfriend and eventual husband, a role he later reprised in the revival series "And Just Like That…". In 2009 he appeared in Season 6 episode 13 of "Cold Case" titled "Breaking News". He played the 1988 version of Nathan Kravet.


title: David Eigenberg

text: In 2010, he appeared as Agent Russell Goldman in the Season 5 episode of "Criminal Minds", entitled "Parasite". In March 2011, he appeared in Season 3 of "Castle", in the episode "One Life to Lose", as Peter Connelly. He appeared in the May 16, 2012 episode of "", entitled "Strange Beauty". In the fall of 2012, Eigenberg joined the cast of NBC's "Chicago Fire" as Senior Firefighter/Lieutenant Christopher Herrmann.


title: David Eigenberg

text: Eigenberg first appeared on Broadway in the original production of John Guare's Six Degrees of Separation as the "Hustler" from 1990 to 1992. He returned from 2003 to 2004 as "Toddy Koovitz" in the original Broadway production of Richard Greenberg's Tony award winning play Take Me Out.


title: David Eigenberg

text: Eigenberg and his wife Chrysti (née Kotik) have a son, Louie Steven (born January 19, 2009) and a daughter, Myrna Belle (born January 31, 2014). In 2021, it was reported that Eigenberg had been diagnosed with hearing loss.


title: Zero Two

text: ', also called ' and is a fictional character in the Japanese anime television series "Darling in the Franxx" by A-1 Pictures, Trigger, and CloverWorks. She was designed as the most prominent character and icon of the series. Zero Two is an artificially-created life form who aspires to become fully human, and an elite pilot with an infamous reputation as the "Partner Killer". She is well known for addressing Hiro, the protagonist, by the eponymous term "darling".


title: Zero Two

text: Zero Two is the most popular character of "Darling in the Franxx" and her personality has been well received by both fans and critics, with the latter typically citing her as one of the best aspects of the series.


title: Zero Two

text: Zero Two had the most labor-intensive design process and was designed to be an iconic character to act as a flagship for "Darling in the Franxx". The series' creative staff came to the consensus she should be the most eye-catching character. The inspiration for Zero Two's anime design came from character designer Masayoshi Tanaka and director Atsushi Nishigori. Tanaka explained that the design team was more concentrated on "what sort of existence Zero Two had", rather than her appearance, beginning with a vague image of a "badass transfer student". The initial design concepts of Zero Two were substantially subdued in comparison to her final appearance, appearing as a small, quiet, dark-haired character, before the design team decided that the design did not work with the intended personality. Her originally dark hair was exchanged for pink to assist in marketing her as the series' icon. Tanaka adapted the original design for the queen of the Klaxosaurs. The creative team considered their goal to make Zero Two an iconic character as a success, citing the abundance of cosplay and fanart. When asked by fans, Nishigori stated that Zero Two was his favorite character in the series but expressed that he was more "attracted to her charismatic personality" rather than her romantic appeal.


title: Zero Two

text: Zero Two is an elite pilot originally belonging to the special forces unit with an infamous reputation as the "Partner Killer" due to none of her previous co-pilots having survived past three rides. As an artificially-created hybrid between humans and "Klaxo sapiens" (a cybernetic dinosaur-like species which inhabited the Earth millions of years ago), she possesses superhuman abilities such as increased strength and rapid regeneration. Commonly viewed by others as a monster, Zero Two possesses bestial physical characteristics such as two small red horns and fangs. She began to pursue her ambition to become fully human after meeting the protagonist Hiro in her youth, and frequently questions the meaning of humanity. Zero Two has a confident and assertive personality, as well as being consistently rebellious towards the collectivist, quasi-theocratic world government depicted in the series.


title: Zero Two

text: As a child, she was significantly more bestial in nature with red skin, blue blood, longer horns, sharper teeth, and described as having eyes "filled with hatred for the world". Growing up, Zero Two took on a significantly more humanoid-like appearance, with red blood and light skin.


title: Zero Two

text: An elite pilot belonging to APE's special forces, Zero Two is a mysterious and rebellious girl often referred to as a monster due to her red horns and klaxosaur blood. She is also known as the "partner killer" as all partners who pilot Strelizia with her always die after riding three times with her at most, with Hiro being the only exception. She always calls Hiro as her "darling". Her true age is unknown but is clearly around Hiro's age, but her ultimate wish is to become fully human so she can reunite with an important person from her past, which turned out to be Hiro. Since she was a child, she was inspired by a book called “The Beast and the Prince”, which she notes is similar to the circumstances of her and Hiro. She begins creating her own version of the story but intentionally left the last page blank because of the likelihood she may have to part ways with Hiro.


title: Zero Two

text: She later finds out she is a clone of the Klaxosaur Princess created by Dr. Franxx. When Hiro is forced to link with the princess, Zero Two is able to mentally connect with Strelizia to save him and stop VIRM from destroying the planet but this left her body catatonic. Mentally, she continued fighting VIRM in a galactic battle in space. She and Hiro reconnect, allowing Zero Two to merge with Strelizia, becoming the Strelizia True Apus, and overpower the VIRM. She and Hiro then part ways with their friends but promise to return. In the final episode, Zero Two and Hiro are nearly defeated but they sacrifice themselves to destroy the VIRM home planet and free the souls trapped by VIRM. At some point in the future, they are reincarnated into two children.


title: Zero Two

text: Several pieces of merchandising action figures based on Zero Two have been announced. A Nendoroid, a brand of figures manufactured by Good Smile Company that typically feature exchangeable faces and body parts, was released in December 2018. Other figures from Kotobukiya and S.H. Figuarts were released by the end of 2018.


title: Zero Two

text: At "Newtype" Anime Awards 2017–2018, Zero Two won first for Best Female Character. Eric Van Allen of "Kotaku" describes Zero Two as "much a protagonist as Hiro" and considers her character arc as "one of the show’s best parts". Kyle Rogacion of "Goomba Stomp" expresses that she is "easily one of the best aspects of "Franxx"". Skyler Allen notes that Zero Two's energetic nature "lets her steal pretty much every scene she’s in". "Tokyo Otaku Mode News" ranked Zero Two twice as the best Winter 2018 character in both male and female polls.


title: Zero Two

text: On March 5, 2018, Kim Kardashian posted a picture of Zero Two on her Instagram profile, stating that the character was the inspiration for her hairstyle.


title: Zero Two

text: Zero Two became the subject of many internet memes. One scene of an emotional conversation between Zero Two and Hiro became a meme when fans realized that the animation made their mouth movements easy to manipulate and dub over with nonsensical audio. Popular edits involved audio such as dial-up modem connection sounds or popular music. The meme began when a Tumblr user posted an edit with barking noises over the two characters. The scene originates from episode 15 of "Darling in the Franxx". In November 2020, a video edit of Zero Two dancing to a remix of "2 Phút Hơn" became viral. The dance itself was taken from "ME!ME!ME!" The trend originated in China when TikTokers began mimicking the dance. The song and the associated clip of Zero Two appeared in popular memes.


title: Debra Marshall

text: Debra Gale Marshall (formerly McMichael and Williams; born March 2, 1960) is an American former professional wrestling valet, occasional professional wrestler, and actress. She is best known for her appearances with World Championship Wrestling (WCW) between 1995 and 1998 as Queen Debra and with the World Wrestling Federation (WWF) between 1998 and 2002 as simply Debra.


title: Debra Marshall

text: Marshall began her career in professional wrestling in 1995, accompanying her husband Steve "Mongo" McMichael to the ring in WCW. She joined the WWF in 1998, where she managed the tag team of Jeff Jarrett and Owen Hart until Hart's in-ring death in May 1999. Later that year, she won the WWF Women's Championship from Sable in an evening gown match. She later appeared on-screen with her second husband Stone Cold Steve Austin until 2002, when the duo left the company.


title: Debra Marshall

text: Raised in Tuscaloosa, Alabama, Marshall became a track-runner, cheerleader, and Homecoming Queen in high school before attending the Lee Strasberg Theatre Institute in New York City. She then became a flight attendant. Before her involvement in wrestling, she competed and won the title of 1987 Mrs. Illinois America in Elgin, Illinois and went on to compete in the Mrs. America pageant that same year in Las Vegas, Nevada. She later competed and won in the 1992 Mrs. Texas USA pageant held in Houston, Texas and went on to compete in the National Mrs. USA pageant. Marshall also attended the University of Alabama.


title: Debra Marshall

text: Marshall first appeared in WCW in late-1995 and early-1996, making occasional unnamed appearances as an audience plant, and as part of a group of valets for the team of Hulk Hogan and "Macho Man" Randy Savage. In April 1996, she began appearing regularly as a valet for her husband, Steve "Mongo" McMichael as he transitioned from commentator to wrestler. Based on her real-life participation in beauty pageants, Debra took on the role of a beauty-pageant queen character, giving herself the nickname "The Queen of WCW" and often making remarks about other wrestlers and valets in kayfabe interviews.


title: Debra Marshall

text: At The Great American Bash 1996, Steve McMichael and his partner Kevin Greene competed against two of the Four Horsemen (Ric Flair and Arn Anderson). Flair won the match after Mongo and Debra turned on Greene by hitting him with a steel briefcase, joining the 4 Horsemen. She managed the stable with Miss Elizabeth and Woman. The briefcase later became one of Debra's signature objects. At Bash at the Beach in July 1997, Debra turned on Mongo during his WCW United States Heavyweight Championship match against Jeff Jarrett by handing Jarrett the steel briefcase, which he then used to knock Mongo out and thus to win the match. Next, Debra briefly managed Goldberg and Alex Wright. On the November 24, 1997 edition of "Nitro", Wright fired Debra after she accidentally distracted him, causing a loss to Prince Iaukea. After her divorce from McMichael, Debra left WCW.


title: Debra Marshall

text: In October 1998, Marshall rejoined Jarrett in the WWF. At the beginning of her WWF career, known as Debra McMichael and later simply as Debra, she played the part of a shrewd businesswoman, wearing business suits. She also played the part of Jarrett's girlfriend. In late 1998, Jarrett began a feud with Goldust that culminated in December at in a "Striptease match". During the match, Debra hit Goldust over the head with Jarrett's trademark guitar, enabling Jarrett to win. WWF Commissioner Shawn Michaels, however, disqualified Jarrett, and Debra had to strip due to the match's stipulations. As she stripped, The Blue Blazer (Owen Hart) and Jarrett covered her up. Debra, however, began utilizing a new strategy during matches, distracting Jarrett's opponents by unbuttoning her blouse. She would willingly take off her blouse to show the crowd her "puppies", a nickname originally bestowed upon her chest by wrestler Road Dogg and later utilized by commentator Jerry Lawler.


title: Debra Marshall

text: The strategy helped Jarrett and partner Hart defeat The Big Boss Man and Ken Shamrock to become World Tag Team Champions in January 1999. In February, Debra feuded with female professional wrestler Ivory, making her in-ring debut in a mixed tag match on "Monday Night Raw", which ended in a no contest. Immediately after the bell rang, she attacked Ivory and hit her with Jarrett's guitar. The same month, Jarrett and Hart retained the tag title in a tag match against Ivory's associates Mark Henry and D'Lo Brown at with Debra's assistance. In March, the team lost their tag title to the team of Kane and X-Pac. She also competed in her first singles match, against Ivory but lost via disqualification after Jacqueline and Terri Runnels attacked Ivory during the match. As Debra continued to manage Jarrett and Hart, a potential storyline developed where Hart and Debra would have an affair, but the creative team vetoed the idea before it played out on-screen. A team name was also in the works—Debra favoring "Talent and Attitude" (T&A)—but Hart died in May 1999 at Over the Edge. Later in the event, Debra and Jarrett lost a mixed tag team match against Nicole Bass and Val Venis. Debra and Jarrett were interviewed moments after Hart's fall from the rafters at Kemper Arena, where Debra was noticeably shaken and fighting back tears of concern for her friend and was unable to stay in her persona.


title: Debra Marshall

text: On May 2, 1999, Debra was scheduled to take on Sable in a 'Nightgown' match, but was made to compete against Nicole Bass, against whom she lost. On May 10, 1999, Debra won the WWF Women's Championship from Sable in an evening gown match. Usually, in an Evening Gown match, the woman who forcibly removes her opponent's dress wins. Because Sable removed Debra's dress, she therefore should have been the winner. Commissioner Shawn Michaels, however, ruled that he considered the woman who had "lost" her dress the winner, crowning Debra the new Women's Champion. She held the Women's title for a month and eventually lost it to Ivory on June 14, due to interference from Nicole Bass.


title: Debra Marshall

text: At SummerSlam in 1999 Jarrett faced D'Lo Brown. During the match, Debra and Brown's former tag-team partner Mark Henry interfered on Jarrett's behalf, allowing him to win both the European Championship and the Intercontinental Championship. The following night, Jarrett awarded Henry the European title and gave Debra an assistant, Miss Kitty. Following an attack by Jarrett after losing a mixed tag match against Stephanie McMahon and Test, on September 26, Debra turned on Jarrett at Unforgiven and hit him over the head with a guitar in the middle of his match against Chyna for the Intercontinental Championship. Chyna pinned Jarrett, but referee Tom Prichard overturned the decision due to Debra's involvement. On the following episode of "RAW", Debra participated in an intergender tag match with Chyna against the team of Jarrett and Prichard, in a winning effort.


title: Debra Marshall

text: In November 1999, Debra participated in an eight-women Sudden Death match at Survivor Series where she teamed with The Fabulous Moolah, Mae Young, and Tori in a winning effort against Ivory, Jacqueline, Luna Vachon and Terri Runnels which also served as her last appearance as an in-ring performer, despite being trained at the time to compete. Debra subsequently stayed off television while her husband Stone Cold Steve Austin recovered from neck surgery. She reappeared in April 2000, acting as a guest ring announcer at Backlash for the opening match. In the fall of that year she played the role of Lieutenant Commissioner, the assistant of Commissioner Mick Foley.


title: Debra Marshall

text: Debra resigned as Lieutenant Commissioner on the March 5, 2001 episode of "Raw" to pursue managing again, while it was revealed on-screen that she was the wife of Stone Cold. Mr. McMahon subsequently gave her the duty of managing The Rock, who at the time was feuding with Stone Cold. During the feud, she appeared on an episode of RAW and slapped Vince McMahon Although she was advertised to be involved in a high-profile Wrestlemania 17 match between the two, she was later pulled due to both competitors lobbying not to have her out at ringside. After Wrestlemania, she returned on an episode of RAW, questioning Vince McMahon for his role in Stone Cold's villainous persona, and subsequently slapping him after he insulted her. During an episode of Smackdown, she appeared in a backstage segment and slapped The Undertaker, who was feuding with Austin at the time.


title: Debra Marshall

text: By the second half of 2001, Debra accompanied Austin, as he defected to the Alliance, with a running gag about her famous chocolate chip cookies being repulsive (although Debra herself remained oblivious to this). Following a miscommunication, during a prank on Kurt Angle, Stacy Keibler and Shawn Stasiak accidentally dropped a bucket of milk on Debra. The following week, Debra beat up Keibler with a tray of cookies in a backstage segment, following a failed peace offering.


title: Debra Marshall

text: In August, during an episode of "Smackdown!", Debra also clocked Stone Cold in frustration with a cookie tray in the middle of the ring. The next week on "RAW", she accompanied her husband to the ring for a match against Matt Hardy, and was involved in a physical altercation with Lita during the match.


title: Debra Marshall

text: In 2002, Debra was involved in a major backstage brawl with Stephanie McMahon after arguing over their respective husbands. Debra appeared sporadically thereafter in backstage segments, leaving the company in June 2002 after her last RAW appearance with Austin, fanning the flames of their well-publicized marital fallout.


title: Debra Marshall

text: Following domestic abuse charges against Austin and arrest, Austin eventually returned to WWE in 2003. Debra, however, was never invited back. References of Debra were subsequently dropped from WWE programming and media altogether, although, in 2021, she was acknowledged by WWE.com in a list of female performers who made an impact outside the ring.


title: Debra Marshall

text: Before becoming involved in wrestling, Marshall studied acting in Texas. Her first acting jobs involved commercials and two music videos for country musician George Strait. She also had a small role in the 1994 film "" as a police officer. The producers originally offered her the lead in the film, but when the director's first choice changed her mind and accepted the role, Marshall was given the small role instead.


title: Debra Marshall

text: On March 10, 2002, Marshall appeared on an episode of "The Weakest Link" alongside several other members of the WWE roster. In addition, she has a role in the 2010 film "".


title: Debra Marshall

text: Marshall's marriage to National Football League alumnus and professional wrestler Steve McMichael lasted thirteen years. McMichael's mother, whom Marshall met on an airplane, set up their first meeting as a blind date. They divorced on October 12, 1998.


title: Debra Marshall

text: Debra met Steven Williams, known on-screen as Stone Cold Steve Austin, in 1998; they moved in together in 2000. On September 13 of that year, they married at The Little White Wedding Chapel in Las Vegas, and she changed her name to Debra Williams. On June 15, 2002, police responded to a call to the couple's residence in San Antonio, Texas, and found Debra with bruises and a bloody nose. On August 14, the authorities arrested Austin and charged him with misdemeanor assault. He pleaded no contest on November 25 and received a year's probation, a $1,000 fine, and an order to carry out eighty hours of community service. Austin filed for divorce from Marshall on July 22, 2002, and the divorce was finalized on February 5, 2003. Marshall later auctioned her wedding ring off on eBay for $27,100 and donated a portion of the proceeds to "Safe Place", an organization which assists the victims of domestic abuse.


title: Debra Marshall

text: In June and July 2007, Marshall made several appearances to discuss the Chris Benoit double-murder and suicide. She described steroids and drugs as the cause of Austin hitting her in June 2002 and suggested links between such substances and the death of Benoit and his family. She also alleged that Austin beat her three times. She however maintains a cordial relationship with Austin following the divorce.


title: Debra Marshall

text: Marshall graduated cum laude from the University of Alabama with an undergraduate interdisciplinary degree in 2013. In December 2017, she was awarded a Master of Science degree in criminal justice from the University of Alabama. While working on her master's of science degree, Marshall was awarded the University of Alabama College of Arts and Science's Mary Avis Todd Award for "outstanding work in community studies".


title: Alicia Nash

text: Alicia Esther Nash (née Lardé Lopez-Harrison; January 1, 1933 – May 23, 2015) was a Salvadoran-American physicist. The wife of mathematician John Forbes Nash Jr., she was a mental-health care advocate, who gave up her professional aspirations to support her husband and son, who were both diagnosed with schizophrenia.


title: Alicia Nash

text: Her life with Nash was chronicled in the 1998 book, "A Beautiful Mind" by Sylvia Nasar, as well as in the 2001 film of the same title directed by Ron Howard, in which she was portrayed by Jennifer Connelly.


title: Alicia Nash

text: Alicia Lardé Lopez-Harrison was born on January 1, 1933, in El Salvador, the daughter of Alicia (née Lopez-Harrison) and Carlos Lardé, a doctor. The Lardé family also included two boys, Carlos and Rolando Lardé. Both of her parents came from socially prominent, well-travelled families who spoke several languages. Her aunt was the poet Alice Lardé de Venturino; her paternal grandfather was Jorge Lardé, a chemical engineer.


title: Alicia Nash

text: When Lardé was a child, her father traveled to the United States a few times before deciding to move the family there permanently in 1944. After first settling in Biloxi, Mississippi, the family later moved to New York City. Lardé was accepted to the Marymount School with the help of a letter of recommendation from El Salvador's Ambassador to the United States. Following graduation from Marymount, Lardé was accepted into Massachusetts Institute of Technology, to study physics. She was one of very few women studying at MIT in the 1950s. There she met her future husband, John Forbes Nash, Jr.


title: Alicia Nash

text: Despite signs of Nash's mental illness which had emerged in the early 1950s, the couple married in 1957. She became pregnant with their son John Charles Martin Nash, who was to develop schizophrenia, in 1958; shortly before the birth in 1959, Nash was committed to McLean Hospital to receive psychiatric treatment for his illness. After spending 50 days in hospital, he was released, but was re-committed three times over the next few years against his will, by his sister. The couple divorced in 1963, but when John's mother died in 1968, he pressed Alicia to allow him to return to live with her. In 1970, he moved in, and she continued to help take care of her by then ex-husband; the couple remarried in 2001.


title: Alicia Nash

text: In 2002, the couple visited her native country, El Salvador, where she was honored by the president, Francisco Flores Pérez, with a tribute to her life.


title: Alicia Nash

text: After graduation from MIT, Nash went to work for the Brookhaven Nuclear Development Corporation as a lab physicist. In the early 1960s, she worked for RCA as an aerospace engineer, but was laid off. She then worked for years at Con Edison as a system programmer and later for the New Jersey Transit system as a computer programmer and data analyst. She was a member of numerous women's engineering societies. When the film "A Beautiful Mind" was released, Alicia Nash was serving as president of MIT's Alumni Association Board.


title: Alicia Nash

text: Nash became a spokesperson for schizophrenia and mental illness. In 2005 she was given the Luminary Award from the Brain & Behavior Research Foundation. She travelled around the country to discuss rights for those with mental illness, and in 2009 she met with New Jersey state lawmakers to discuss how to improve that state's mental health care system. In 2012, she was honored at the University of Texas at Austin's John and Alicia Nash Conference for her support of those with mental illness, where she delivered the keynote address.


title: Alicia Nash

text: Alicia and her husband were killed in a car crash on the New Jersey Turnpike on May 23, 2015, in Monroe Township, New Jersey. They were on their way home after a visit to Norway, where her husband had been awarded the Abel Prize. The driver of the taxicab they were riding in from Newark Airport lost control of the cab and struck a guardrail. Both passengers were ejected and killed.


title: Alicia Nash

text: Nash was portrayed by Jennifer Connelly in the 2001 film "A Beautiful Mind". For her performance, Connelly won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress, mentioning Nash during her acceptance speech. Writing in the "Los Angeles Times", Lisa Navarrette criticized Connelly's casting as an example of whitewashing.


title: St. Louis City SC

text: St. Louis City SC (stylized as St. Louis CITY SC) is a Major League Soccer expansion franchise that is expected to begin play in 2023. The club will be based in St. Louis, with home matches at the Citypark.


title: St. Louis City SC

text: Soccer has an established history at both the professional and amateur levels in Greater St. Louis for more than a century. In 2007, St. Louis was considered a possible destination for Real Salt Lake after the club founder announced he would sell the club if a new stadium was not built. From 2008 to 2009, St. Louis lawyer Jeff Cooper led a group of would-be owners who attempted to bring an MLS expansion team to Greater St. Louis, only to have the bids turned down in favor of other cities. Despite approved plans to build the $600 million Collinsville Soccer Complex, MLS was unimpressed with the bid's financial backing and suggested Cooper expand his group of investors. Cooper instead launched a second division men's club and a Women's Professional Soccer franchise. AC St. Louis played only one season in Division 2 before folding in 2011; the Saint Louis Athletica folded midway through its second season in 2010.


title: St. Louis City SC

text: In late 2014, the city announced plans for a new stadium to host both American football and soccer. MLS Commissioner Don Garber said in January 2015, "St. Louis has got a lot of activity going on with a stadium that they’re trying to get done for the NFL's Rams. There's a big soccer community out there and we'd love to see a soccer stadium downtown like they're thinking about a football stadium." In May 2015, Garber visited St. Louis to talk about a possible new multi-purpose stadium that could host soccer games. Garber cautioned that any possible expansion to St. Louis would occur after 2020. On January 12, 2016, the Rams moved to Los Angeles after playing in St. Louis for 21 seasons. The Rams' move initially accelerated the talks of an MLS expansion team.


title: St. Louis City SC

text: In 2017, MLS began to consider adding a team in St. Louis, beginning in 2020. The proposed ownership group sought public funds to help build a $200 million soccer-specific stadium next to Union Station in downtown St. Louis. On January 26, 2017, a funding plan was approved by the city's Aldermanic Ways and Means Committee, and later by the entire Board of Aldermen, that would have directed $60 million in city tax revenue to the new stadium. Voters rejected the plan in an April 4, 2017, referendum, leaving the city's MLS future in doubt.


title: St. Louis City SC

text: In September 2018, the "St. Louis Post-Dispatch" reported on a meeting between officials with the Missouri Department of Economic Development and MLS representatives regarding a stadium proposal; St. Louis Mayor Lyda Krewson later confirmed that a new group was trying to bring a team to St. Louis. St. Louis's MLS bid was effectively re-launched on October 9 of that year, with Carolyn Kindle Betz and other heirs to the Enterprise Rent-A-Car fortune as the primary investors. The stadium location remained the same as in the original 2016 location, near Union Station. This bid did not seek public funding through taxes or from the city, so the public did not get to vote on the stadium. On November 28, 2018, the Board of Aldermen's Housing, Urban Development, and Zoning Committee voted 8–0 to approve the stadium plan.


title: St. Louis City SC

text: On April 18, 2019, the MLS announced plans to expand to 30 teams, up from the previous plan of 28. The league, currently at 27 teams, advised the Commissioner's office to advance the discussions with the Sacramento Republic and St. Louis bids. Both bids were asked to make presentations to the MLS Expansion Committee to "address each bid's final stadium plan, corporate commitments, the composition of the respective ownership groups, detailed economics on funding, strategic plans for fan development, commitments on player development and details on community programs."


title: St. Louis City SC

text: On April 20, 2019, two days after MLS announced it would advance discussions with the Sacramento and St. Louis bids, the St. Louis group released renderings and more information about their proposed stadium. The 22,500-seat stadium's design was produced by a collaboration between HOK and Snow Kreilich Architects. The group also promised that every seat would be within 120 feet of the field and that a canopy would cover the stadium.


title: St. Louis City SC

text: On August 20, 2019, MLS announced it had approved St. Louis as the league's 28th franchise, with play expected to begin in the 2022 season. The ownership group consists of Enterprise Holdings Foundation president Carolyn Kindle Betz and female members of the Taylor family, and is the first female majority-owned team in MLS. In the announcement, Don Garber said, "St. Louis is a city with a rich soccer tradition, and it is a market we have considered since the league's inception. Our league becomes stronger today with the addition of the city's deeply dedicated soccer fans, and the committed and innovative local ownership group led by Carolyn Kindle Betz, the Taylor family, and Jim Kavanaugh."


title: St. Louis City SC

text: On October 19, 2019, the ownership group released new plans for the planned soccer-specific stadium. The area was extended to encompass a plan and would likely exceed the original $200 million cost estimate. The ownership group agreed to purchase and own the land along with the stadium and will not seek tax revenue or public financing.


title: St. Louis City SC

text: On December 17, 2019, the state of Missouri informed the ownership group that the $30 million previously promised by the state will no longer be provided. However, on March 18, 2020, the Missouri Development Finance Board unanimously approved a package of incentives worth $5.7 million in tax credits to help with construction of the $458 million stadium and surrounding area.


title: St. Louis City SC

text: On March 25, 2020, the ownership group released a statement regarding the COVID-19 pandemic. Site preparation for the stadium will continue as planned but will adhere to all health advice from public health officials and the local, state, and national government. Site preparation includes clearing all land where the stadium will sit and demolishing the old on and off ramps located on the site.


title: St. Louis City SC

text: On March 31, 2021, Purina, a pet food maker founded and based in St. Louis, became the club's first jersey sponsor and founding partner.


title: St. Louis City SC

text: On July 14, 2021, Together Credit Union, a local credit union, became the club's second founding partner and the official banking partner.


title: St. Louis City SC

text: Former South African International and New York Red Bulls assistant coach Bradley Carnell was named as the teams first head coach on January 5, 2022.


title: St. Louis City SC

text: The crest features the iconic Gateway Arch and the two lines symbolize the confluence of the region's two rivers (Mississippi River and Missouri River). The team's colors are red, navy blue, and yellow.


title: St. Louis City SC

text: The team will play in Citypark in downtown St. Louis that is expected to be the anchor of a development area that will include team offices, training facilities, and commercial districts. The stadium is intended to field 17 to 23 soccer games a year and serve as a venue for concerts, high school sports, and more. The design of the stadium is intended to connect the surrounding area and the downtown area together while blending with the neighborhood.


title: St. Louis City SC

text: The St. Louis City SC ownership group consists of Enterprise Holdings Foundation president Carolyn Kindle and female members of the Taylor family (Enterprise Holdings), and is the first female majority-owned team in MLS. The group also includes CEO of World Wide Technology, Jim Kavanaugh and members of the Kavanaugh family.


title: St. Louis City SC

text: The most prominent soccer supporters' group in the St Louis area is the St. Louligans. Their name references football hooliganism, the disruptive and disorderly behavior of soccer fans, though this type of phenomenon is not generally found among soccer fans in North America. The St. Louligans were founded in 2010 when several local soccer fan groups joined forces at AC St. Louis home games. They have provided strong support for a number of St. Louis area soccer teams, including AC St. Louis, Saint Louis Athletica, St. Louis Lions, and Illinois Piasa.


title: St. Louis City SC

text: St. Louligans was the official supporters group for Saint Louis FC, a USL Championship side founded in 2014. Saint Louis FC worked closely with the St. Louligans to encourage their support. Notable contributions of the group include awarding a new fan each week with a ticket, and coordinating with the Coopers, supporters for Louisville City FC, to create the Kings' Cup rivalry competition between the two teams. Saint Louis FC folded in 2020.


title: St. Louis City SC

text: The St. Louis chapter of The American Outlaws, the largest supporters' group for the United States men's and women's national soccer team, is one of the most active in the country with over 1,000 members, leading the nation in funds raised for the group's charitable arm, AO Impact.


title: St. Louis City SC

text: Many new independent supporters' groups were organized in anticipation of the MLS squad's arrival, supporting City 2 throughout their 2022 campaign. These groups include Saint Louis CITY Punks, sporting denim vests and Punk rock vibes, as well as the No Nap City Ultras, a supporters' group of parents and their young children. 2022 also saw the arrival of a new drum corps and supporters' group, the Fleur de Noise, who will take up the role of drumming and leading chants for the supporters.


title: St. Louis City SC

text: The new stadium will contain a supporters' section with space for more than 3,000 standing spectators, three capo stands, a long integrated tifo rigging system, a drum riser for drum corps during matches, and a dedicated supporters bar.


title: St. Louis City SC

text: On December 6, 2021, the club announced it would be fielding a reserve team in the new MLS Next Pro league, in the third tier of US Soccer. St. Louis City 2 began play in the 2022 season, despite the MLS side not beginning play until 2023.


title: Danish Superliga

text: The Danish Superliga (, ) is the current Danish football championship tournament, and administered by the Danish Football Association. It is the highest football league in Denmark and is currently contested by 12 teams each year, with two teams relegated.


title: Danish Superliga

text: Founded in 1991, the Danish Superliga replaced the Danish 1st Division as the highest league of football in Denmark. From the start in 1991, 10 teams were participating. The opening Superliga season was played during the spring of 1991, with the ten teams playing each other twice for the championship title. From the summer of 1991, the tournament structure would stretch over two calendar years. The 10 teams would play each other twice in the first half of the tournament. In the following spring, the bottom two teams would be cut off, the points of the teams would be cut in half, and the remaining eight teams would once more play each other twice, for a total of 32 games in a season.


title: Danish Superliga

text: This practice was abandoned before the 1995–96 season, when the number of teams competing was increased to 12, playing each other thrice for 33 games per Superliga season. For the first season of this new structure, Coca-Cola became the name sponsor of the league, which was then named "Coca-Cola Ligaen". After a single season under that name, Faxe Brewery became sponsors and the league changed its name to "Faxe Kondi Ligaen". Before the 2001–02 season, Scandinavian Airlines System (SAS) became the head sponsor, and the name of the tournament changed to "SAS Ligaen". From January 2015 the Danish Superliga is known as "Alka Superliga", as the Danish insurance company Alka became name sponsor.


title: Danish Superliga

text: From 1996 through 2016, the league included 12 clubs which played each other three times. The two teams with the fewest points at the end of the season were relegated to the Danish 1st Division and replaced by the top two teams of that division. During this era, each team played every other team at least once at home and once away plus once more either at home or away. The top six teams of the previous season played 17 matches at home and 16 away while the teams in 7th to 10th place plus the two newly promoted teams played 16 matches at home and 17 away.


title: Danish Superliga

text: Following the 2015–16 season, the league was expanded to 14 teams, accomplished by relegating only the last-place finisher in that season and promoting the top three teams from the 1st division. The 2016–17 season was the first for the new league structure. It began with the teams playing a full home-and-away schedule, resulting in 26 matches for each team. At that time, the league split into a six-team championship playoff and an eight-team qualifying playoff. All teams' table points and goals carry over fully into the playoffs.


title: Danish Superliga

text: In the championship playoff, each team plays the others home and away again. The top team at the end of the playoff is Superliga champion and enters the Champions League in the second qualifying round. The second-place team enters the Europa League in the first qualifying round. The third-place team advances to a one-off playoff match for another Europa League place. If the winner of the Danish Cup finishes in the top three, the match will instead involve the fourth-place team.


title: Danish Superliga

text: The qualifying playoff is split into two groups, with the teams that finished the regular season in 7th, 10th, 11th, and 14th in one group and those finishing 8th, 9th, 12th, and 13th in the other. Each group plays home-and-away within its group. The top two teams from each group then enter a knockout tournament, with each match over two legs. If the Danish Cup winner is among the top two finishers in either playoff group, it is withdrawn from the knockout playoff and its opponent automatically advances to the tournament final. The winner of that tournament faces the third-place (or fourth-place) team from the championship playoff in a one-off match, with the winner entering the Europa League in the first qualifying round.


title: Danish Superliga

text: The bottom two teams from each group then contest a relegation playoff with several steps, centered on a separate four-team knockout playoff, also consisting totally of two-legged matches:


title: Danish Superliga

text: Following the 2019–20 season, The number of teams was reduced from 14 to 12 teams. It began with all 12 teams playing a full home-and-away schedule, resulting in 22 matches for each team. At that time, the league split into a six-team championship playoff and a six-team qualifying playoff. All teams' table points and goals carry over fully into the playoffs. In both playoff groups 6 Teams will playing a full home-and-away schedule, resulting in 10 matches (32 for the full season). The 2 bottom teams in the qualifying playoff, will be relegated to 1st Division, while the team who finishing 7th will be playing against the lowest placed team from The Championship playoff, who failed to qualifying directly to European Football, a single match, to decide the final European spot from Denmark.


title: Tim Roth filmography

text: Tim Roth is an English actor. He was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for his role in "Rob Roy".


title: VGA connector

text: The Video Graphics Array (VGA) connector is a standard connector used for computer video output. Originating with the 1987 IBM PS/2 and its VGA graphics system, the 15-pin connector went on to become ubiquitous on PCs, as well as many monitors, projectors and high-definition television sets.


title: VGA connector

text: Other connectors have been used to carry VGA-compatible signals, such as mini-VGA or BNC, but ""VGA connector"" typically refers to this design.


title: VGA connector

text: Devices continue to be manufactured with VGA connectors, although newer digital interfaces such as DVI, HDMI and DisplayPort are increasingly displacing VGA, and many modern computers and other devices do not include it.


title: VGA connector

text: The VGA connector is a three-row, 15-pin D-subminiature connector referred to variously as DE-15, HD-15 or DB-15. DE-15 is the most accurate common nomenclature under the D-sub specifications: an "E" size D-sub connector, with 15 pins in three rows.


title: VGA connector

text: All VGA connectors carry analog RGBHV (red, green, blue, horizontal sync, vertical sync) video signals. Modern connectors also include VESA DDC pins, for identifying attached display devices.


title: VGA connector

text: In both its modern and original variants, VGA utilizes multiple scan rates, so attached devices such as monitors are multisync by necessity.


title: VGA connector

text: The VGA interface includes no affordances for hot swapping, the ability to connect or disconnect the output device during operation, although in practice this can be done and usually does not cause damage to the hardware or other problems. The VESA DDC specification does however include a standard for hot-swapping.


title: VGA connector

text: In the original IBM VGA implementation, refresh rates were limited to two vertical (60 and 70 Hz) and three horizontal frequencies, all of which were communicated to the monitor using combinations of different polarity H and V sync signals.<ref name="IBM PS/2"></ref>


title: VGA connector

text: Some pins on the connector were also different: pin 9 was keyed by plugging the female connector hole, and four pins carried the monitor ID.


title: VGA connector

text: With the implementation of the VESA DDC specification, several of the monitor ID pins were reassigned for use by DDC signaling, and the key pin was replaced with a +5 V DC output per the DDC spec. Devices that comply with the DDC host system standard provide , from 50mA to 1A.


title: VGA connector

text: The IBM PS/55 Display Adapter redefined pin 9 as "+12V", which signals the monitor to turn on when the system unit is powered on.


title: VGA connector

text: In order to advertise display capabilities VESA has introduced a scheme to redefining VGA connector pins 9, 12, and 15 as a serial bus for a Display Data Channel (DDC).


title: VGA connector

text: The same VGA cable can be used with a variety of supported VGA resolutions, ranging from 320×400px @70 Hz, or 320×480px @60 Hz (12.6 MHz of signal bandwidth) to 1280×1024px (SXGA) @85 Hz (160 MHz) and up to 2048×1536px (QXGA) @85 Hz (388 MHz).


title: VGA connector

text: There are no standards defining the quality required for each resolution, but higher-quality cables typically contain coaxial wiring and insulation that make them thicker.


title: VGA connector

text: While shorter VGA cables are less likely to introduce significant signal degradation, good-quality cable should not suffer from signal crosstalk (whereby signals in one wire induce unwanted currents in adjacent wires) even at greater lengths.


title: VGA connector

text: Ghosting occurs when impedance mismatches cause signals to be reflected. A correctly impedance matched cable (75ohm) should prevent this, however, ghosting with long cables may be caused by equipment with incorrect signal termination or by passive cable splitters rather than the cables themselves.


title: VGA connector

text: Someone high-end monitors and video cards use multiple BNC connectors instead of a single standard VGA connector, providing a higher quality connection with less crosstalk by utilizing five separate 75ohm coaxial cables.


title: VGA connector

text: Within a 15-pin connector, the red, green, and blue signals (pins 1, 2, 3) cannot be shielded from each other, so crosstalk is possible within the 15-pin interconnect. BNC prevents crosstalk by maintaining full coaxial shielding through the circular connectors, but the connectors are very large and bulky. The requirement to press and turn the plug shell to disconnect requires access space around each connector to allow grasping of each BNC plug shell. Supplementary signals such as DDC are typically not supported with BNC.


title: VGA connector

text: Some laptops and other portable devices use a two-row mini-VGA connector that is much smaller than the three-row DE-15 connector, as well as five separate BNC connectors.


title: VGA connector

text: Various adapters can be purchased to convert VGA to other connector types. One common variety is a DVI to VGA adapter, which is possible because many DVI interfaces also carry VGA-compatible analog signals. Adapting from HDMI to VGA directly is not possible because HDMI includes no analog signal.


title: VGA connector

text: For conversions to and from digital formats like HDMI or DVI-D, a scan converter is required. VGA outputs to interfaces with different signaling, more complex converters may be used. Most of them need an external power source to operate and are inherently lossy. However, many modern displays are still made with multiple inputs including VGA, in which case adapters are not necessary.


title: VGA connector

text: VGA can also be adapted to SCART in some cases, because the signals are electrically compatible if the correct sync rates are set by the host PC. Many modern graphics adapters can modify their signal in software, including refresh rate, sync length, polarity and number of blank lines. Particular issues include interlace support and the use of the resolution 720×576 in PAL countries. Under these restrictive conditions, a simple circuit to combine the VGA separate synchronization signals into SCART composite sync may suffice.


title: VGA connector

text: A VGA extender is an electronic device that increases the signal strength from a VGA port, most often from a computer. They are often used in schools, businesses, and homes when multiple monitors are being run off one VGA port, or if the cable between the monitor and the computer will be excessively long (often pictures appear blurry or have minor artifacts if the cable runs too far without an extender). VGA extenders are sometimes called VGA boosters.


title: Antelope Canyon

text: Navajo Upper Antelope Canyon is a slot canyon in the American Southwest, on Navajo land east of Lechee, Arizona. It includes five separate, scenic slot canyon sections on the Navajo Reservation, referred to as Upper Antelope Canyon (or The Crack), Rattle Snake Canyon, Owl Canyon, Mountain Sheep Canyon and Lower Antelope Canyon (or The Corkscrew). It is the primary attraction of Lake Powell Navajo Tribal Park, along with a hiking trail to Rainbow Bridge National Monument.


title: Antelope Canyon

text: The Navajo name for Upper Antelope Canyon is , which means 'the place where water runs through the (Slot Canyon) rocks'. Lower Antelope Canyon is (called "Hasdestwazi" by the Navajo Parks and Recreation Department), or 'spiral rock arches'. Both are in the LeChee Chapter of the Navajo Nation. They are accessible by Navajo guided tour only.


title: Antelope Canyon

text: Antelope Canyon was formed by the erosion of Navajo Sandstone due to flash flooding and other sub-aerial processes. Rainwater, especially during monsoon season, runs into the extensive basin above the slot canyon sections, picking up speed and sand as it rushes into the narrow passageways. Over time the passageways eroded away, deepening the corridors and smoothing hard edges to form characteristic "flowing" shapes.


title: Antelope Canyon

text: Antelope Canyon is a popular location for sightseers, and a source of tourism business for the Navajo Nation. It has been accessible by tour since 1983 by Pearl Begay Family and 1997, when the Navajo Tribe made it a Navajo Tribal Park. Besides the Upper and Lower areas, there are other slots in the canyon that can be visited, such as the Rattle Snake Canyon, Owl Canyon, Mountain Sheep Canyon which is also part of the same drainage as Antelope Canyon.


title: Antelope Canyon

text: Photography within the canyons is difficult due to the wide exposure range (often 10 EV or more) made by light reflecting off the canyon walls.


title: Antelope Canyon

text: Upper Antelope Canyon is called , 'the place where water runs through rocks' by the Navajo People in that specific area. It is the most frequently visited by tourists because its entrance and entire length are at ground level, requiring no climbing; and because beams of direct sunlight radiating down from openings at the top of the canyon are much more common all year round that make the inside canyon very colorful. Beams occur most often in summer, as they require the sun to be high in the sky of mid day. Light beams start to peek into the canyon March 20 and disappear by October 20.


title: Antelope Canyon

text: Lower Antelope Canyon, called , or 'spiral rock arches' by the Navajo, is located several miles from Upper Antelope Canyon. Prior to the installation of metal stairways, visiting the canyon required climbing pre-installed ladders in certain areas.


title: Antelope Canyon

text: Even following the installation of stairways, it is a more difficult hike than Upper Antelope. It is longer, narrower in places, and even footing is not available in all areas. Five flights of stairs of varying widths are currently available to aid in descent and ascent. At the end, the climb out requires flights of stairs. Additionally, sand continually falls from the crack above and can make the stairs slippery.


title: Antelope Canyon

text: Despite these limitations, Lower Antelope Canyon draws a considerable number of photographers, though casual sightseers are much less common than in the Upper canyon. Photography-only tours are available around midday when light is at its peak. Photographers cannot bring a tripod.


title: Antelope Canyon

text: The lower canyon is in the shape of a "V" and shallower than the Upper Antelope. Lighting is better in the early hours and late morning.


title: Antelope Canyon

text: Antelope Canyon is visited exclusively through guided tours, in part because rains during monsoon season can quickly flood it. Rain does not have to fall on or near the Antelope Canyon slots for flash floods to whip through; rain falling dozens of miles away can funnel into them with little notice.


title: Antelope Canyon

text: On August 12, 1997, eleven tourists, including seven from France, one from the United Kingdom, one from Sweden and two from the United States, were killed in Lower Antelope Canyon by a flash flood. Very little rain fell at the site that day, but an earlier thunderstorm dumped a large amount of water into the canyon basin upstream. The lone survivor was tour guide Francisco "Pancho" Quintana, who had prior swift-water training. At the time, the ladder system consisted of amateur-built wood ladders that were swept away by the flood. Today, ladder systems have been bolted in place, and deployable cargo nets are installed at the top of the canyon. A NOAA Weather Radio from the National Weather Service and an alarm horn are on hand at the fee booth.


title: Antelope Canyon

text: Despite improved warning and safety systems, the risks of injury from flash floods still exists. On July 30, 2010, several tourists were stranded on a ledge when two flash floods occurred at Upper Antelope Canyon. Some of them were rescued and some had to wait for the flood waters to recede. There were reports that a woman and her nine-year-old son were injured as they were washed away downstream, but no fatalities were reported.


title: Fisher King

text: The Fisher King is a figure in Arthurian legend, the last in a long line of British kings tasked with guarding the Holy Grail. The Fisher King is both the protector and physical embodiment of his lands, but a wound renders him incapable and his kingdom barren. Unable to walk or ride a horse, he is sometimes depicted as spending his time fishing as he awaits a "chosen one" who can heal him. Versions of the story vary widely, but the Fisher King is typically depicted as being wounded in the groin, legs or thigh, rendering him infertile. The healing of these wounds always depends upon the completion of a hero-knight's task.


title: Fisher King

text: Most versions of the story contain the Holy Grail and the Lance of Longinus as plot elements. In some versions, a third character is introduced. This individual, unlike the hero-knight archetype, is ignorant of the King's power, but has the ability to save the king and land, or to doom it. Variations of this third party give us divergent legends.


title: Fisher King

text: As a literary character, the Fisher King originates in Chrétien de Troyes' unfinished writings of the adventures of Perceval. Many authors have endeavoured to complete and extend the work, resulting in various continuations. Major sources of the legend include Chrétien's "Li" "Contes del Graal; Perceval, ou Le Conte du Graal" (c. 1160-1180), Wauchier de Denain's "First Continuation" (c. 1180-1200), Robert de Boron's "Didot-Perceval" (c. 1191-1202), "Peredur son of Efrawg" (c. 1200), "Perlesvaus" (c. 1200), Wolfram von Eschenbach's "Parzival" (c. 1217), and Thomas Malory's "Morte D'Arthur" (c. 1400).


title: Fisher King

text: The Fisher King first appears in Chrétien de Troyes' "Perceval, the Story of the Grail" in the late 12th century, but the character's roots may lie in Celtic mythology. He may be derived more or less directly from the figure of Brân the Blessed in the "Mabinogion". In the Second Branch, Bran has a cauldron that can resurrect the dead (albeit imperfectly; those thus revived cannot speak) which he gives to the king of Ireland as a wedding gift for him and Bran's sister Branwen. Later, Bran wages war on the Irish and is wounded in the foot or leg, and the cauldron is destroyed. He asks his followers to sever his head and take it back to Britain, and his head continues talking and keeps them company on their trip. The group lands on the island of Gwales, where they spend 80 years in a castle of joy and abundance, but finally, they leave and bury Bran's head in London. This story has analogues in two other important Welsh texts: the "Mabinogion" tale "Culhwch and Olwen", in which King Arthur's men must travel to Ireland to retrieve a magical cauldron, and the poem "The Spoils of Annwn", which speaks of a similar mystical cauldron sought by Arthur in the otherworldly land of Annwn.


title: Fisher King

text: The Welsh Romance "Peredur son of Efrawg" is based on Chrétien or derived from a common original, but it contains several prominent deviations and lacks a Grail. The character of the Fisher King appears (though he is not called such) and presents Peredur with a severed head on a platter. Peredur later learns that he was related to that king, and that the severed head was that of his cousin, whose death he must avenge by defeating the Nine Witches.


title: Fisher King

text: The Fisher King is a character in Chrétien's "Perceval" (1180) which is the first of a series of stories and texts on the subject of Perceval and the Grail.


title: Fisher King

text: "Parzival" was written in 1210 by Wolfram von Eschenbach, thirty years after "Perceval". Although a different work, it is strikingly similar to "Perceval". The story revolves around the Grail Quest and once again the main character is Percival or Parzival. Similar to "Perceval", Eschenbach kept the storyline of Parzival not asking the healing question, which results in him Questing for years. Eschenbach's "Parzival" differs from Chrétien's "Perceval" in three major ways. Firstly, the Fisher King is no longer nameless and is called Anfortas. Secondly, Eschenbach thoroughly describes the nature of the wound. The wound is a punishment for wooing a woman who is not meant for him (every Grail keeper is to marry the woman the Grail determines for him), causing the King immense pain. Then lastly, Parzival comes back to cure the Fisher King. "Parzival", unlike its predecessor "Perceval", has a definitive ending.


title: Fisher King

text: The Fisher King's next development occurred around the end of the 13th century in Robert de Boron's "Joseph d'Arimathie", the first work to connect the Grail with Jesus. Here, the “Rich Fisher” is called Bron, a name similar enough to Bran to suggest a relationship, and said to be the brother-in-law of Joseph of Arimathea, who had used the Grail to catch Christ's blood before laying him in the sepulchre. Joseph founds a religious community that travels eventually to Britain and entrusts the Grail to Bron (who is called the “Rich Fisher” because he catches a fish eaten at the Grail table). Bron founds the line of Grail keepers that eventually includes Perceval.


title: Fisher King

text: The Lancelot-Grail (Vulgate) prose cycle includes a more elaborate history of the Fisher King. Many in his line are wounded for their failings, and the only two that survived to Arthur's day are the Wounded King, named Pellehan (Pellam of Listeneise in Malory), and the Fisher King, Pelles. Pelles engineers the birth of Galahad by tricking Lancelot into bed with his daughter Elaine, and it is prophesied that Galahad will achieve the Grail and heal the Wasteland. Galahad, the knight prophesied to achieve the Holy Grail and heal the Maimed King, is conceived when Elaine gets Dame Brisen to use magic to trick Lancelot into thinking that he is coming to visit Guinevere. So Lancelot sleeps with Elaine, thinking her Guinevere, but flees when he realizes what he has done. Galahad is raised by his aunt in a convent, and when he is eighteen, comes to King Arthur's court and begins the Grail Quest. Only he, Percival, and Bors are virtuous enough to achieve the Grail and restore Pelles.


title: Fisher King

text: In the Post-Vulgate cycle and Thomas Malory's "Le Morte d'Arthur", the Fisher King's wound was given to him by Sir Balin in the "Dolorous Strok”, when Balin grabs a spear and stabs Pellam in self-defense. However, the spear is the Spear of Longinus, the lance that pierced Christ's side, and Pellam and his land must suffer for its misuse until the coming of Galahad. The Dolorous Stroke is typically represented as divine vengeance for a sin on the part of its recipient. The nature of Pellam's sin is not stated explicitly, though he at least tolerates his murderous brother Garlon, who slays knights while under cover of invisibility, apparently at random.


title: Fisher King

text: King Pelles is the Maimed King, one of a line of Grail keepers established by Joseph of Arimathea, and the father of Eliazer and Elaine (the mother of Galahad). He resides in the castle of Corbinec in Listenois. Pelles and his relative Pellehan appear in both the Vulgate and Post-Vulgate cycles and in later works, such as Malory's "Le Morte d'Arthur" (in which Pellehan is called Pellam). In the Vulgate, Pelles is the son of Pellehan, but the Post-Vulgate is less clear about their relationship. It is even murkier in Malory's work: one passage explicitly identifies them (book XIII, chapter 5), though this is contradicted elsewhere.


title: Fisher King

text: In all, there are four characters (some of whom can probably be identified with each other) who fill the role of Fisher King or Wounded King in Malory's "Le Morte d'Arthur".


title: Fisher King

text: In addition, there is King Pellinore, who is Percival's father. (In other versions of the legend, Percival is related to the Pelles family). It appears that Malory intended to have one Maimed King who was wounded by Balin and suffered until healed by his grandson Galahad, but he never successfully reconciled his sources.


title: Fisher King

text: The injury is a common theme in the telling of the Grail Quest. While the details and location of the injury vary, the injury ultimately represents the inability of the Fisher King to produce an heir. Although some iterations have two kings present, one or both are injured, most commonly in the thigh. The wound is sometimes presented as a punishment, usually for philandering. In "Parzival", specifically, the king is injured by the bleeding lance as punishment for taking a wife, which was against the code of the “Grail Guardians”. In some early storylines Percival asks the Fisher King the healing question, which cures the wound. The nature of the question differs between "Perceval" and "Parzival", but the central theme is that the Fisher King can be healed only if Percival asks, “the question”.


title: Fisher King

text: The location of the wound is significant to the legend. In most medieval stories, the mention of a wound in the groin or more commonly the “thigh” (such as the wounding of the ineffective suitor in "Lanval" from the "Lais of Marie de France") is a euphemism for the physical loss of or grave injury to one's genitalia. In medieval times, acknowledging the actual type of wound was considered to rob a man of his dignity, thus the use of the substitute terms “groin” or “thigh”, although any informed medieval listener or reader would have known exactly the real nature of the wound. Such a wound was considered worse than actual death because it signaled the end of a man's ability to function in his primary purpose: to propagate his line. In the instance of the Fisher King, the wound negates his ability to honor his sacred charge.


title: Fisher King

text: Most of the Grail romances do not differ much from "Parzival" and "Perceval". That being said, there are two interesting exceptions to this case. The two pieces that hold particularly stronger Christian themed deviations than prior works are the "Quested del Saint Graal" and the "Sone de Nausay". The "Queste del Saint Graal" is heavily Christianized not only in terms of the tone but also the characters and significant objects. The Grail maidens become angels, there is a constant relationship between the knights and religious symbolism; most importantly, the Fisher King is replicated as a priest-like figure. In the case of "Sone de Nausay", Bron (the Fisher King) is part of a tale in which the story makes a constant correlation between the Gospel narrative and the history of the Grail.


title: Fisher King

text: The bleeding lance has taken numerous forms throughout the Arthurian literature chronology. In the earlier appearances of the lance, it is not represented as a Christian symbol, but morphs into one over time. In "Perceval" and "Parzival", the lance is described as having “barbaric properties” which are difficult to associate with Christian influence. Chretien describes his lance with “marvelous destructive powers", which holds a closer connection to the malignant weapons of Celtic origin. In Chretien's "Perceval", the lance takes on a dark and almost evil persona and also seems to overshadow the Grail, which if this was a Christian story would be rather odd. Wolfram's tale also treated the lance in a similar dark manner. In "Parzival", the lance is “poisonous” which contrasts sharply with the general trend of healing Christian themes. This lance is plunged into the Fisher King's wound at different times to continue his pain, for having sought forbidden love. This lance is considered significant because it is most often associated directly with the wound of the Fisher King, which is demonstrated both in Chretien's and Eschenbach's versions of the tale.


title: Fisher King

text: The more recent writings have the lance presented in the Fisher King's castle with Christian theology. More specifically, it is supposed to be the lance that pierced Jesus Christ while on the cross. This is seen in Malory's "Le Morte d'Arthur". In Malory's version, the Fisher King is healed with the blood from the lance, signifying it as a good, holy, Christian object. In "Corbenic" we see the procession at the Fisher King's feast, featuring heavily on the Holy Grail, which is a strong Christian artifact. It can be extrapolated that in the same procession, the accompanying lance is the lance that pierced Jesus Christ.


title: Fisher King

text: The sword is commonly thought to be a gift from the Fisher King to Perceval. This is then followed by Perceval's cousin's prophecy that the sword will break at a crucial moment. In two cases, the writers tell us that Perceval broke the sword: in Eschenbach, it fails him in his battle against his half-brother at the end of "Parzival"; and Gerbert de Montreuil describes how he shatters it on the gates of the “Earthly Paradise”. The adventure of the broken sword is a theme originally introduced by Chretien, who intended it as a symbol of Perceval's imperfections as a knight. The major example for his imperfection is that Perceval refused to ask about the Grail. This concept of punishment is also seen in Eschenbach's tale where Perceval is told: "your uncle gave you a sword, too, by which you have been granted since your eloquent mouth unfortunately voiced no question there.” The sword remains as a plot device to both remind Perceval of how he failed to ask the healing question and as a physical reminder of the existence of "Munsalvaesche" (Eschenbach's name for Corbenic).


title: Ravi Shankar (spiritual leader)

text: Ravi Shankar (born 13 May 1956) is an Indian yoga guru, a spiritual leader. He is frequently referred to as Sri Sri (honorific), Guru ji, or Gurudev. From around the mid 1970s, he worked as an apprentice under Mahesh Yogi, the founder of Transcendental Meditation. In 1981, he split from the Transcendental Meditation (TM) and founded the Art of Living foundation.


title: Ravi Shankar (spiritual leader)

text: Ravi Shankar was born in Papanasam, Tamil Nadu, to Vishalakshi and R.S.Venkat Ratnam. He is the brother of Bhanumathi Narasimhan. He was named "Ravi" (a common Indian name which means "sun") because his birth was on a Sunday, and "Shankar" after the eighth-century Hindu saint, Adi Shankara, whose birthday was the same day as Ravi Shankar. Ravi Shankar's first teacher was Sudhakar Chaturvedi, an Indian Vedic Scholar and a close associate of Mahatma Gandhi. He holds a Bachelor of Science degree from the St. Joseph's College of Bengaluru University. After graduation, Shankar travelled with his second teacher, Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, giving talks and arranging conferences on Vedic science, and setting up Transcendental Meditation and Ayurveda centers.


title: Ravi Shankar (spiritual leader)

text: In the 1980s, Shankar initiated a series of practical and experiential courses in spirituality around the globe. He says that his rhythmic breathing practice, Sudarshan Kriya, came to him in 1982, "like a poem, an inspiration", after a ten-day period of silence on the banks of the Bhadra River in Shivamogga, in the state of Karnataka, adding, "I learned it and started teaching it".


title: Ravi Shankar (spiritual leader)

text: In 1983, Shankar held the first Art of Living course in Switzerland. In 1986, he travelled to Apple Valley, California, in the US to conduct the first course to be held in North America.


title: Ravi Shankar (spiritual leader)

text: Shankar believes spirituality is that which enhances human values such as love, compassion and enthusiasm. It is not limited to any one religion or culture. Hence it is open to all people. He feels the spiritual bond we share as part of the human family is more prominent than nationality, gender, religion, profession, or other identities that separate us.


title: Ravi Shankar (spiritual leader)

text: According to him, science and spirituality are linked and compatible, both springing from the urge to know. The question, "Who am I?" leads to spirituality; the question, "What is this?" leads to science. Emphasizing that joy is only available in the present moment, his stated vision is to create a world free of stress and violence. His programs are said to offer practical tools to help accomplish this. He sees breath as the link between body and mind, and a tool to relax the mind, emphasising the importance of both meditation/spiritual practice and service to others. In his view, "Truth is spherical rather than linear; so it has to be contradictory."


title: Ravi Shankar (spiritual leader)

text: He visited Pakistan in 2004 on a goodwill mission and again in 2012 when he inaugurated Art of Living centers in Islamabad and Karachi. The Islamabad center was burned down by armed men in March 2014.


title: Ravi Shankar (spiritual leader)

text: During his visits to Iraq, at the invitation of Prime Minister Nouri al Maliki, in 2007 and again in 2008, he met with political and religious leaders to promote global peace. In November 2014, Ravi Shankar visited the relief camps in Erbil, Iraq. He also hosted a conference to address the dire condition of Yazidis and other non-Muslims in the region.


title: Ravi Shankar (spiritual leader)

text: In June 2015, Ravi Shankar met with the delegations of Colombian government and the FARC who were negotiating the resolution to Colombian conflict in Havana. He urged FARC leaders to follow the Gandhian principle of non-violence to attain their political objectives and social justice. For his efforts, Colombia's House of Representatives awarded him the , Knight Cross grade.


title: Ravi Shankar (spiritual leader)

text: In 2019, Ravi Shankar met with Venezuelan leaders from both sides to encourage dialogue, end the political conflict and restore peace and stability in the country.


title: Ravi Shankar (spiritual leader)

text: The South Asian Forum for Peace was launched in November 2016 at a conference titled "Kashmir Back to Paradise" in Jammu. According to Ravi Shankar, 90% of people in Kashmir want peace but are neglected. He added, "The solution to the Kashmir problem can only come from the Kashmiris". This forum is intended to bring together eight South Asian countries to cooperate in areas such as entrepreneurship, skill development, cultural exchange, educational partnerships and women's empowerment.


title: Ravi Shankar (spiritual leader)

text: 68 militants from 11 militant outfits surrendered to the government in Manipur on the eve of India's 71st Independence Day in August 2017. The Chief Minister of Manipur, N. Biren Singh, lauded Ravi Shankar for his efforts in making this happen and "bringing peace in troubled areas". Ravi Shankar's organization has been working in Manipur for the last 15 years.


title: Ravi Shankar (spiritual leader)

text: In September 2017, at the "Strength in Diversity - North East Indigenous People's Conference", Ravi Shankar claimed that another 500 militants were waiting to "lay down weapons and join the peace process". The conference was attended by representatives from 67 rebel outfits from the Northeast. Expressing his willingness to facilitate the peaceful transition of any rebel group wanting to join the mainstream, Ravi Shankar claimed that his organization has been working for this for the last 10–12 years and "will continue to work until the last gun is laid down". Former ULFA General Secretary, Anup Chetia, who was also the convenor of the conference, appreciated Ravi Shankar's interest and efforts for peace in the region.


title: Ravi Shankar (spiritual leader)

text: Ravi Shankar's efforts at mediation in the Ayodhya dispute in 2017 received a mixed response from both Hindu and Muslim leaders. Based on Supreme Court of India's suggestion for an out-of-court settlement, he proposed a mutual compromise where both communities "gift" neighbouring pieces of land to each other. This proposal was met with a lot of skepticism and resistance.


title: Ravi Shankar (spiritual leader)

text: In March 2019, he was appointed by the Supreme Court of India to a 3-member mediation committee tasked with finding a resolution for the case in 8 weeks. In its final verdict, the Supreme Court of India assigned the disputed land to a trust for building a temple and an alternate piece of land nearby to build a mosque.


title: Ravi Shankar (spiritual leader)

text: Ravi Shankar is involved in interfaith dialogue and currently sits on the Board of World Religious Leaders for the Elijah Interfaith Institute. Through interfaith summits in 2008 and 2010, he has been engaging faith-based leaders for collective action against HIV. In July 2013 at a meeting in UNAIDS headquarters in Geneva, issues including HIV prevention, gender based violence, stigma and discrimination were discussed.


title: Ravi Shankar (spiritual leader)

text: In 1992, he started a prison programme to rehabilitate prison inmates and help them reintegrate into society.