title: Lamarckism

text: The identification of Lamarckism with the inheritance of acquired characteristics is regarded by evolutionary biologists including Ghiselin as a falsified artifact of the subsequent history of evolutionary thought, repeated in textbooks without analysis, and wrongly contrasted with a falsified picture of Darwin's thinking. Ghiselin notes that "Darwin accepted the inheritance of acquired characteristics, just as Lamarck did, and Darwin even thought that there was some experimental evidence to support it." Gould wrote that in the late 19th century, evolutionists "re-read Lamarck, cast aside the guts of it ... and elevated one aspect of the mechanics—inheritance of acquired characters—to a central focus it never had for Lamarck himself." He argued that "the restriction of 'Lamarckism' to this relatively small and non-distinctive corner of Lamarck's thought must be labelled as more than a misnomer, and truly a discredit to the memory of a man and his much more comprehensive system."


title: Lamarckism

text: The period of the history of evolutionary thought between Darwin's death in the 1880s, and the foundation of population genetics in the 1920s and the beginnings of the modern evolutionary synthesis in the 1930s, is called the eclipse of Darwinism by some historians of science. During that time many scientists and philosophers accepted the reality of evolution but doubted whether natural selection was the main evolutionary mechanism.


title: Lamarckism

text: Among the most popular alternatives were theories involving the inheritance of characteristics acquired during an organism's lifetime. Scientists who felt that such Lamarckian mechanisms were the key to evolution were called neo-Lamarckians. They included the British botanist George Henslow (1835–1925), who studied the effects of environmental stress on the growth of plants, in the belief that such environmentally-induced variation might explain much of plant evolution, and the American entomologist Alpheus Spring Packard, Jr., who studied blind animals living in caves and wrote a book in 1901 about Lamarck and his work. Also included were paleontologists like Edward Drinker Cope and Alpheus Hyatt, who observed that the fossil record showed orderly, almost linear, patterns of development that they felt were better explained by Lamarckian mechanisms than by natural selection. Some people, including Cope and the Darwin critic Samuel Butler, felt that inheritance of acquired characteristics would let organisms shape their own evolution, since organisms that acquired new habits would change the use patterns of their organs, which would kick-start Lamarckian evolution. They considered this philosophically superior to Darwin's mechanism of random variation acted on by selective pressures. Lamarckism also appealed to those, like the philosopher Herbert Spencer and the German anatomist Ernst Haeckel, who saw evolution as an inherently progressive process. The German zoologist Theodor Eimer combined Larmarckism with ideas about orthogenesis, the idea that evolution is directed towards a goal.


title: Lamarckism

text: With the development of the modern synthesis of the theory of evolution, and a lack of evidence for a mechanism for acquiring and passing on new characteristics, or even their heritability, Lamarckism largely fell from favour. Unlike neo-Darwinism, neo-Lamarckism is a loose grouping of largely heterodox theories and mechanisms that emerged after Lamarck's time, rather than a coherent body of theoretical work.


title: Lamarckism

text: Neo-Lamarckian versions of evolution were widespread in the late 19th century. The idea that living things could to some degree choose the characteristics that would be inherited allowed them to be in charge of their own destiny as opposed to the Darwinian view, which placed them at the mercy of the environment. Such ideas were more popular than natural selection in the late 19th century as it made it possible for biological evolution to fit into a framework of a divine or naturally willed plan, thus the neo-Lamarckian view of evolution was often advocated by proponents of orthogenesis. According to the historian of science Peter J. Bowler, writing in 2003:


title: Lamarckism

text: Scientists from the 1860s onwards conducted numerous experiments that purported to show Lamarckian inheritance. Some examples are described in the table.


title: Lamarckism

text: A century after Lamarck, scientists and philosophers continued to seek mechanisms and evidence for the inheritance of acquired characteristics. Experiments were sometimes reported as successful, but from the beginning these were either criticised on scientific grounds or shown to be fakes. For instance, in 1906, the philosopher Eugenio Rignano argued for a version that he called "centro-epigenesis", but it was rejected by most scientists. Some of the experimental approaches are described in the table.


title: Lamarckism

text: The British anthropologist Frederic Wood Jones and the South African paleontologist Robert Broom supported a neo-Lamarckian view of human evolution. The German anthropologist Hermann Klaatsch relied on a neo-Lamarckian model of evolution to try and explain the origin of bipedalism. Neo-Lamarckism remained influential in biology until the 1940s when the role of natural selection was reasserted in evolution as part of the modern evolutionary synthesis.


title: Lamarckism

text: Herbert Graham Cannon, a British zoologist, defended Lamarckism in his 1959 book "Lamarck and Modern Genetics". In the 1960s, "biochemical Lamarckism" was advocated by the embryologist Paul Wintrebert.


title: Lamarckism

text: Neo-Lamarckism was dominant in French biology for more than a century. French scientists who supported neo-Lamarckism included Edmond Perrier (1844–1921), Alfred Giard (1846–1908), Gaston Bonnier (1853–1922) and Pierre-Paul Grassé (1895–1985). They followed two traditions, one mechanistic, one vitalistic after Henri Bergson's philosophy of evolution.


title: Lamarckism

text: In 1987, Ryuichi Matsuda coined the term "pan-environmentalism" for his evolutionary theory which he saw as a fusion of Darwinism with neo-Lamarckism. He held that heterochrony is a main mechanism for evolutionary change and that novelty in evolution can be generated by genetic assimilation. His views were criticized by Arthur M. Shapiro for providing no solid evidence for his theory. Shapiro noted that "Matsuda himself accepts too much at face value and is prone to wish-fulfilling interpretation."


title: Lamarckism

text: A form of Lamarckism was revived in the Soviet Union of the 1930s when Trofim Lysenko promoted the ideologically-driven research programme, Lysenkoism; this suited the ideological opposition of Joseph Stalin to genetics. Lysenkoism influenced Soviet agricultural policy which in turn was later blamed for crop failures.


title: Lamarckism

text: George Gaylord Simpson in his book "Tempo and Mode in Evolution" (1944) claimed that experiments in heredity have failed to corroborate any Lamarckian process. Simpson noted that neo-Lamarckism "stresses a factor that Lamarck rejected: inheritance of direct effects of the environment" and neo-Lamarckism is closer to Darwin's pangenesis than Lamarck's views. Simpson wrote, "the inheritance of acquired characters, failed to meet the tests of observation and has been almost universally discarded by biologists."


title: Lamarckism

text: Botanist Conway Zirkle pointed out that Lamarck did not originate the hypothesis that acquired characteristics could be inherited, so it is incorrect to refer to it as Lamarckism:


title: Lamarckism

text: What Lamarck really did was to accept the hypothesis that acquired characters were heritable, a notion which had been held almost universally for well over two thousand years and which his contemporaries accepted as a matter of course, and to assume that the results of such inheritance were cumulative from generation to generation, thus producing, in time, new species. His individual contribution to biological theory consisted in his application to the problem of the origin of species of the view that acquired characters were inherited and in showing that evolution could be inferred logically from the accepted biological hypotheses. He would doubtless have been greatly astonished to learn that a belief in the inheritance of acquired characters is now labeled "Lamarckian," although he would almost certainly have felt flattered if evolution itself had been so designated.


title: Lamarckism

text: Peter Medawar wrote regarding Lamarckism, "very few professional biologists believe that anything of the kind occurs—or can occur—but the notion persists for a variety of nonscientific reasons." Medawar stated there is no known mechanism by which an adaptation acquired in an individual's lifetime can be imprinted on the genome and Lamarckian inheritance is not valid unless it excludes the possibility of natural selection but this has not been demonstrated in any experiment.


title: Lamarckism

text: A host of experiments have been designed to test Lamarckianism. All that have been verified have proved negative. On the other hand, tens of thousands of experiments— reported in the journals and carefully checked and rechecked by geneticists throughout the world— have established the correctness of the gene-mutation theory beyond all reasonable doubt... In spite of the rapidly increasing evidence for natural selection, Lamarck has never ceased to have loyal followers... There is indeed a strong emotional appeal in the thought that every little effort an animal puts forth is somehow transmitted to his progeny.


title: Lamarckism

text: According to Ernst Mayr, any Lamarckian theory involving the inheritance of acquired characters has been refuted as "DNA does not directly participate in the making of the phenotype and that the phenotype, in turn, does not control the composition of the DNA." Peter J. Bowler has written that although many early scientists took Lamarckism seriously, it was discredited by genetics in the early twentieth century.


title: Lamarckism

text: Studies in the field of epigenetics, genetics and somatic hypermutation have highlighted the possible inheritance of traits acquired by the previous generation. However, the characterization of these findings as Lamarckism has been disputed.


title: Lamarckism

text: Epigenetic inheritance has been argued by scientists including Eva Jablonka and Marion J. Lamb to be Lamarckian. Epigenetics is based on hereditary elements other than genes that pass into the germ cells. These include methylation patterns in DNA and chromatin marks on histone proteins, both involved in gene regulation. These marks are responsive to environmental stimuli, differentially affect gene expression, and are adaptive, with phenotypic effects that persist for some generations. The mechanism may also enable the inheritance of behavioral traits, for example in chickens, rats and human populations that have experienced starvation, DNA methylation resulting in altered gene function in both the starved population and their offspring. Methylation similarly mediates epigenetic inheritance in plants such as rice. Small RNA molecules, too, may mediate inherited resistance to infection. Handel and Romagopalan commented that "epigenetics allows the peaceful co-existence of Darwinian and Lamarckian evolution."


title: Lamarckism

text: Lamarck and his ideas were ridiculed and discredited. In a strange twist of fate, Lamarck may have the last laugh. Epigenetics, an emerging field of genetics, has shown that Lamarck may have been at least partially correct all along. It seems that reversible and heritable changes can occur without a change in DNA sequence (genotype) and that such changes may be induced spontaneously or in response to environmental factors—Lamarck's "acquired traits." Determining which observed phenotypes are genetically inherited and which are environmentally induced remains an important and ongoing part of the study of genetics, developmental biology, and medicine.


title: Lamarckism

text: The prokaryotic CRISPR system and Piwi-interacting RNA could be classified as Lamarckian, within a Darwinian framework.


title: Lamarckism

text: However, the significance of epigenetics in evolution is uncertain. Critics such as the evolutionary biologist Jerry Coyne point out that epigenetic inheritance lasts for only a few generations, so it is not a stable basis for evolutionary change.


title: Lamarckism

text: The evolutionary biologist T. Ryan Gregory contends that epigenetic inheritance should not be considered Lamarckian. According to Gregory, Lamarck did not claim that the environment directly affected living things. Instead, Lamarck "argued that the environment created needs to which organisms responded by using some features more and others less, that this resulted in those features being accentuated or attenuated, and that this difference was then inherited by offspring." Gregory has stated that Lamarckian evolution in epigenetics is more like Darwin's point of view than Lamarck's.


title: Lamarckism

text: In 2007, David Haig wrote that research into epigenetic processes does allow a Lamarckian element in evolution but the processes do not challenge the main tenets of the modern evolutionary synthesis as modern Lamarckians have claimed. Haig argued for the primacy of DNA and evolution of epigenetic switches by natural selection. Haig has written that there is a "visceral attraction" to Lamarckian evolution from the public and some scientists, as it posits the world with a meaning, in which organisms can shape their own evolutionary destiny.


title: Lamarckism

text: Thomas Dickens and Qazi Rahman (2012) have argued that epigenetic mechanisms such as DNA methylation and histone modification are genetically inherited under the control of natural selection and do not challenge the modern synthesis. They dispute the claims of Jablonka and Lamb on Lamarckian epigenetic processes.


title: Lamarckism

text: In 2015, Khursheed Iqbal and colleagues discovered that although "endocrine disruptors exert direct epigenetic effects in the exposed fetal germ cells, these are corrected by reprogramming events in the next generation." Also in 2015, Adam Weiss argued that bringing back Lamarck in the context of epigenetics is misleading, commenting, "We should remember [Lamarck] for the good he contributed to science, not for things that resemble his theory only superficially. Indeed, thinking of CRISPR and other phenomena as Lamarckian only obscures the simple and elegant way evolution really works."


title: Lamarckism

text: In the 1970s, the Australian immunologist Edward J. Steele developed a neo-Lamarckian theory of somatic hypermutation within the immune system and coupled it to the reverse transcription of RNA derived from body cells to the DNA of germline cells. This reverse transcription process supposedly enabled characteristics or bodily changes acquired during a lifetime to be written back into the DNA and passed on to subsequent generations.


title: Lamarckism

text: The mechanism was meant to explain why homologous DNA sequences from the VDJ gene regions of parent mice were found in their germ cells and seemed to persist in the offspring for a few generations. The mechanism involved the somatic selection and clonal amplification of newly acquired antibody gene sequences generated via somatic hypermutation in B-cells. The messenger RNA products of these somatically novel genes were captured by retroviruses endogenous to the B-cells and were then transported through the bloodstream where they could breach the Weismann or soma-germ barrier and reverse transcribe the newly acquired genes into the cells of the germ line, in the manner of Darwin's pangenes.


title: Lamarckism

text: The historian of biology Peter J. Bowler noted in 1989 that other scientists had been unable to reproduce his results, and described the scientific consensus at the time:


title: Lamarckism

text: Bowler commented that "[Steele's] work was bitterly criticized at the time by biologists who doubted his experimental results and rejected his hypothetical mechanism as implausible."


title: Lamarckism

text: The hologenome theory of evolution, while Darwinian, has Lamarckian aspects. An individual animal or plant lives in symbiosis with many microorganisms, and together they have a "hologenome" consisting of all their genomes. The hologenome can vary like any other genome by mutation, sexual recombination, and chromosome rearrangement, but in addition it can vary when populations of microorganisms increase or decrease (resembling Lamarckian use and disuse), and when it gains new kinds of microorganism (resembling Lamarckian inheritance of acquired characteristics). These changes are then passed on to offspring. The mechanism is largely uncontroversial, and natural selection does sometimes occur at whole system (hologenome) level, but it is not clear that this is always the case.


title: Lamarckism

text: The Baldwin effect, named after the psychologist James Mark Baldwin by George Gaylord Simpson in 1953, proposes that the ability to learn new behaviours can improve an animal's reproductive success, and hence the course of natural selection on its genetic makeup. Simpson stated that the mechanism was "not inconsistent with the modern synthesis" of evolutionary theory, though he doubted that it occurred very often, or could be proven to occur. He noted that the Baldwin effect provided a reconciliation between the neo-Darwinian and neo-Lamarckian approaches, something that the modern synthesis had seemed to render unnecessary. In particular, the effect allows animals to adapt to a new stress in the environment through behavioural changes, followed by genetic change. This somewhat resembles Lamarckism but without requiring animals to inherit characteristics acquired by their parents. The Baldwin effect is broadly accepted by Darwinists.


title: Lamarckism

text: Within the field of cultural evolution, Lamarckism has been applied as a mechanism for dual inheritance theory. Gould viewed culture as a Lamarckian process whereby older generations transmitted adaptive information to offspring via the concept of learning. In the history of technology, components of Lamarckism have been used to link cultural development to human evolution by considering technology as extensions of human anatomy.


title: Clubfoot

text: Clubfoot is a birth defect where one or both feet are rotated inward and downward. Congenital clubfoot is the most common congenital malformation of the foot with an incidence of 1 per 1000 births. In approximately 50% of cases, clubfoot affects both feet, but it can present unilaterally causing one leg or foot to be shorter than the other. Most of the time, it is not associated with other problems. Without appropriate treatment, the foot deformity will persist and lead to pain and impaired ability to walk, which can have a dramatic impact on the quality of life.


title: Clubfoot

text: The exact cause is usually not identified. Both genetic and environmental factors are believed to be involved. There are two main types of congenital clubfoot: idiopathic (80% of cases) and secondary clubfoot (20% of cases). The idiopathic congenital clubfoot is a multifactorial condition that includes environmental, vascular, positional, and genetic factors. There appears to be hereditary component for this birth defect given that the risk of developing congenital clubfoot is 25% when a first-degree relative is affected. In addition, if one identical twin is affected, there is a 33% chance the other one will be as well. The underlying mechanism involves disruption of the muscles or connective tissue of the lower leg, leading to joint contracture. Other abnormalities are associated 20% of the time, with the most common being distal arthrogryposis and myelomeningocele. The diagnosis may be made at birth by physical examination or before birth during an ultrasound exam.


title: Clubfoot

text: The most common initial treatment is the Ponseti method, which is divided into two phases: 1) correcting of foot position and 2) casting at repeated weekly intervals. If the clubfoot deformity does not improve by the end of the casting phase, an Achilles tendon tenotomy can be performed. The procedure consists of a small posterior skin incision through which the tendon cut is made. In order to maintain the correct position of the foot, it is necessary to wear an orthopedic brace until 5 years of age.


title: Clubfoot

text: Initially, the brace is worn nearly continuously and then just at night. In about 20% of cases, further surgery is required. Treatment can be carried out by a range of healthcare providers and can generally be achieved in the developing world with few resources.


title: Clubfoot

text: Clubfoot occurs in 1 to 4 of every 1,000 live births, making it one of the most common birth defects affecting the legs. About 80% of cases occur in developing countries where there is limited access to care. Clubfoot is more common in firstborn children and males. It is more common among Māori people, and less common among Chinese people.


title: Clubfoot

text: Birth prevalence of clubfoot varies between 0.51 and 2.03/1,000 live births in Low to middle income countries. It is one of the most common birth defects affecting the legs. Clubfoot is more common in firstborn children and males, who are twice as likely to be affected as females. It is more common among Māori people, and less common among Chinese people.


title: Clubfoot

text: Clubfoot disproportionally affects those in low and middle-income countries (LMICs). About 80% of those with clubfoot, or approximately 100,000 children per year as of 2018, are born in LMICs.


title: Clubfoot

text: Pharaohs Siptah and Tutankhamun had clubfeet, and the condition appears in Egyptian paintings. Indian texts () and Hippocrates () describe treatment. In 1823, Delpech presented a new procedure to treat the condition. The new method, known as tenotomy, involved the cutting of the Achilles tendon. The surgical procedure had complications such as infections.


title: Clubfoot

text: In clubfoot, feet are rotated inward and downward. The affected foot and leg may be smaller than the other, while in about half of cases, clubfoot affects both feet. Most of the time clubfoot is not associated with other problems.


title: Clubfoot

text: Clubfoot can be diagnosed by ultrasound of the fetus in more than 60% of cases. The earliest week of gestation in which the condition is diagnosed with a high degree of confidence was the 12th and the latest was the 32nd. Not all patients were diagnosed at an early stage. In 29% of fetuses the first ultrasound examination failed to detect the deformity which subsequently became obvious at a later examination. Clubfoot was diagnosed between 12 and 23 weeks of gestation in 86% of children and between 24 and 32 weeks of gestation in the remaining 14%.


title: Clubfoot

text: Without treatment the foot remains deformed and people walk on the sides or tops of their feet, which can cause calluses, foot infections, trouble fitting into shoes, pain, difficulty walking, and disability.


title: Clubfoot

text: Hypotheses about the precise cause of clubfoot vary. However, research has found that genetics, environmental factors or a combination of both are associated with this condition. Evidence suggests that the etiology of clubfoot is most likely multifactorial. A meta-analysis and systematic review found that the most clinically relevant risk factors for clubfoot were family history, paternal and maternal smoking, maternal obesity, gestational diabetes, amniocentesis, and the use of selective serotonin re-uptake inhibitors (SSRIs). Many findings agree that "it is likely there is more than one different cause and at least in some cases the phenotype may occur as a result of a threshold effect of different factors acting together." The most commonly associated conditions are distal arthrogryposis or myelomeningocele. The factors contributing to the development of clubfoot can be categorized as extrinsic and intrinsic factors.


title: Clubfoot

text: Factors that can influence the positioning of the fetal foot in uteru include oligohydramnios, breech presentation, Müllerian anomalies, multiple gestation, amniotic band sequence, or amniocentesis at <15 weeks of gestation. In cases that impede normal growth and position for longstanding period of times, clubfoot can be accompanied with other deformations and may be associated with developmental hip dysplasia. The theory of fetal growth arrest was proposed by Von Volkmann in 1863, and has been verified by other authors since. According to this theory, intrinsic errors or environmental insults during gestation prevents the correction of an equinovarus to pronated foot. Other researchers hypothesize that clubfoot may derive from external insults during gestation. For example, a research study found an alarming high incidence of club foot and limb contractures associated with iatrogenic amniotic leakage caused by early amniocentesis between the 11th and 12th week of gestation.


title: Clubfoot

text: Clubfoot can be diagnosed prenatally as early as 13 weeks of gestation via ultrasound. According to the Society of Maternal-Fetal Medicine, a diagnostic testing for genetic causes is recommended when clubfoot is diagnoses prenatally. If prenatal screening is suspicious for aneuploidy, karyotype analysis or chromosomal microarray (CMA) may be performed. However, if patients decline diagnostic testing, Cell-Free DNA is another screening option to identify high-risk pregnancies for aneuploidy and it is not diagnostic. The incidence of chromosomal abnormalities in fetuses with prenatal diagnosis of clubfoot is relatively low. Overall, fetal ultrasound should be performed with a prenatal diagnosis of clubfoot in order to classify the condition as either complex or isolated because of the significant differences in rates of chromosomal abnormalities and outcomes between these two groups.


title: Clubfoot

text: Mutations in genes involved in muscle development are risk factors for clubfoot, specifically those encoding the muscle contractile complex ("MYH3", "TPM2", "TNNT3", "TNNI2" and "MYH8"). These can cause congenital contractures, including clubfoot, in distal arthrogryposis (DA) syndromes. Clubfoot can also be present in people with genetic conditions such as Loeys–Dietz syndrome and Ehlers-Danlos syndrome.


title: Clubfoot

text: Genetic mapping and the development of models of the disease have improved understanding of developmental processes. Its inheritance pattern is explained as a heterogenous disorder using a polygenic threshold model. The PITX1-TBX4 transcriptional pathway has become key to the study of clubfoot. PITX1 and TBX4 are uniquely expressed in the hind limb.


title: Clubfoot

text: Clubfoot is diagnosed through physical examination. Typically, babies are examined from head-to-toe shortly after they are born. There are four components of the clubfoot deformity:


title: Clubfoot

text: Factors used to assess severity include the stiffness of the deformity (how much it can be corrected by manually manipulating the foot), the presence of skin creases at the arch and heel, and poor muscle consistency.


title: Clubfoot

text: Sometimes, it is possible to detect clubfoot before birth using ultrasound. Prenatal diagnosis by ultrasound can allow parents to learn more about this condition and plan ahead for treatment after their baby is born.


title: Clubfoot

text: More testing and imaging is typically not needed, unless there is concern for other associated conditions.


title: Clubfoot

text: Treatment is usually with some combination of the Ponseti method and French method. The Ponseti method involves a combination of casting, Achilles tendon release, and bracing. It is widely used and highly effective under the age of two. The French method involves realignment, taping, and long-term home exercises and night splinting. It is also effective but outcomes vary and rely on heavy involvement of caregivers. Generally, the Ponseti method is preferred. Another technique, the Kite method, does not appear to be as effective. In about 20% of cases, additional surgery is required after initial treatment.


title: Clubfoot

text: The Ponseti method is highly effective with short-term success rates of 90%. However, anywhere from 14% to 41% of children experience a recurrence of the deformity. The most common reason for this is inadequate adherence to bracing, such as not wearing the brace properly, not keeping it on for the recommended length of time, or not using it every day. Children who do not follow proper bracing protocol have up to seven times higher recurrence rates than those who follow bracing protocol, as the muscles around the foot can pull it back into the abnormal position. Low parental education level and failure to understand the importance of bracing is a major contributor to non-adherence. Relapses are managed by repeating the casting process. Relapsed feet may also require additional, more extensive surgeries and have a reduced chance of achieving subsequent correction.


title: Clubfoot

text: Another reason for recurrence is a congenital muscle imbalance between the muscles that invert the ankle (tibialis posterior and tibialis anterior muscles) and the muscles that evert the ankle (peroneal muscles). This imbalance is present in approximately 20% of infants successfully treated with the Ponseti casting method, and makes them more prone to recurrence. This relapse is usually treated with Ponseti casting and can be done multiple times before resorting to surgery. If after all non-surgical casting and bracing options have been exhausted, and when the child is over four years of age (many doctors prefer to wait until after seven years old), this can be addressed with a surgery to transfer the tibialis anterior tendon from its medial attachment (on the navicula) to a more lateral position (on the lateral cuneiform). The surgery requires general anesthesia and subsequent casting while the tendon heals, but it is a relatively minor surgery that re-balances the muscles of the foot without disturbing any joints.


title: Clubfoot

text: The French method is a conservative, non-operative method of clubfoot treatment that involves daily physical therapy for the first two months followed by thrice-weekly physical therapy for the next four months and continued home exercises following the conclusion of formal physical therapy. During each physical therapy session the feet are manipulated, stretched, then taped to maintain any gains made to the feet's range of motion. Exercises may focus on strengthening the peroneal muscles, which is thought to contribute to long-term correction. After the two month mark, the frequency of physical therapy sessions can be weaned down to three times a week instead of daily, until the child reaches six months. After the conclusion of the physical therapy program, caregivers must continue performing exercises at home and splinting at night in order to maintain long-term correction.


title: Clubfoot

text: Compared to the Ponseti method which uses rigid casts and braces, the French method uses tape which allows for some motion in the feet. Despite its goal to avoid surgery, the success rate varies and surgery may still be necessary. The Ponseti method is generally preferred over the French method.


title: Clubfoot

text: If non-operative treatments are unsuccessful or achieve incomplete correction of the deformity, surgery is sometimes needed. Surgery was more common prior to the widespread acceptance of the Ponseti method. The extent of surgery depends on the severity of the deformity. Usually, surgery is done at 9 to 12 months of age and the goal is to correct all the components of the clubfoot deformity at the time of surgery.


title: Clubfoot

text: For feet with the typical components of deformity (cavus, forefoot adductus, hindfoot varus, and ankle equinus), the typical procedure is a Posteromedial Release (PMR) surgery. This is done through an incision across the medial side of the foot and ankle, that extends posteriorly, and sometimes around to the lateral side of the foot. In this procedure, it is typically necessary to release (cut) or lengthen the plantar fascia, several tendons, and joint capsules/ligaments. Typically, the important structures are exposed and then sequentially released until the foot can be brought to an appropriate plantigrade position. Specifically, it is important to bring the ankle to neutral, the heel into neutral, the midfoot aligned with the hindfoot (navicula aligned with the talus, and the cuboid aligned with the calcaneus). Once these joints can be aligned, thin wires are usually placed across these joints to hold them in the corrected position. These wires are temporary and left out through the skin for removal after 3–4 weeks. Once the joints are aligned, tendons (typically the Achilles, posterior tibialis, and flexor halluces longus) are repaired at an appropriate length. The incision (or incisions) are closed with dissolvable sutures. The foot is then casted in the corrected position for 6–8 weeks. It is common to do a cast change with anesthesia after 3–4 weeks, so that pins can be removed and a mold can be made to fabricate a custom AFO brace. The new cast is left in place until the AFO is available. When the cast is removed, the AFO is worn to prevent the foot from returning to the old position.


title: Clubfoot

text: For feet with partial correction of deformity with non-operative treatment, surgery may be less extensive and may involve only the posterior part of the foot and ankle. This might be called a posterior release. This is done through a smaller incision and may involve releasing only the posterior capsule of the ankle and subtalar joints, along with lengthening the Achilles tendon.


title: Clubfoot

text: Surgery leaves residual scar tissue and typically there is more stiffness and weakness than with nonsurgical treatment. As the foot grows, there is potential for asymmetric growth that can result in recurrence of foot deformity that can affect the forefoot, midfoot, or hindfoot. Many patients do fine, but some require orthotics or additional surgeries. Long-term studies of adults with post-surgical clubfeet, especially those needing multiple surgeries, show that they may not fare as well in the long term. Some people may require additional surgeries as they age, though there is some dispute as to the effectiveness of such surgeries, in light of the prevalence of scar tissue present from earlier surgeries.


title: Clubfoot

text: Despite effective treatments, children in LMICs face many barriers such as limited access to equipment (specifically casting materials and abduction braces), shortages of healthcare professionals, and low education levels and socioeconomic status amongst caregivers and families. These factors make it difficult to detect and diagnose children with clubfoot, connect them to care, and train their caregivers to follow the proper treatment and return for follow-up visits. It is estimated that only 15% of those diagnosed with clubfoot receive treatment.


title: Clubfoot

text: In an effort to reduce the burden of clubfoot in LMICs, there have been initiatives to improve early diagnosis, organize high-volume Ponseti casting centers, utilize mid-level practitioners and non-physician health workers, engage families in care, and provide local follow-up in the person's community.


title: Erosion

text: Erosion is the action of surface processes (such as water flow or wind) that removes soil, rock, or dissolved material from one location on the Earth's crust, and then transports it to another location where it is deposited. Erosion is distinct from weathering which involves no movement. Removal of rock or soil as clastic sediment is referred to as "physical" or "mechanical" erosion; this contrasts with "chemical" erosion, where soil or rock material is removed from an area by dissolution. Eroded sediment or solutes may be transported just a few millimetres, or for thousands of kilometres.


title: Erosion

text: Agents of erosion include rainfall; bedrock wear in rivers; coastal erosion by the sea and waves; glacial plucking, abrasion, and scour; areal flooding; wind abrasion; groundwater processes; and mass movement processes in steep landscapes like landslides and debris flows. The rates at which such processes act control how fast a surface is eroded. Typically, physical erosion proceeds the fastest on steeply sloping surfaces, and rates may also be sensitive to some climatically-controlled properties including amounts of water supplied (e.g., by rain), storminess, wind speed, wave fetch, or atmospheric temperature (especially for some ice-related processes). Feedbacks are also possible between rates of erosion and the amount of eroded material that is already carried by, for example, a river or glacier. The transport of eroded materials from their original location is followed by deposition, which is arrival and emplacement of material at a new location.


title: Erosion

text: While erosion is a natural process, human activities have increased by 10-40 times the rate at which soil erosion is occurring globally. At agriculture sites in the Appalachian Mountains, intensive farming practices have caused erosion at up to 100 times the natural rate of erosion in the region. Excessive (or accelerated) erosion causes both "on-site" and "off-site" problems. On-site impacts include decreases in agricultural productivity and (on natural landscapes) ecological collapse, both because of loss of the nutrient-rich upper soil layers. In some cases, this leads to desertification. Off-site effects include sedimentation of waterways and eutrophication of water bodies, as well as sediment-related damage to roads and houses. Water and wind erosion are the two primary causes of land degradation; combined, they are responsible for about 84% of the global extent of degraded land, making excessive erosion one of the most significant environmental problems worldwide.


title: Erosion

text: Intensive agriculture, deforestation, roads, anthropogenic climate change and urban sprawl are amongst the most significant human activities in regard to their effect on stimulating erosion. However, there are many prevention and remediation practices that can curtail or limit erosion of vulnerable soils.


title: Erosion

text: Rainfall, and the surface runoff which may result from rainfall, produces four main types of soil erosion: "splash erosion", "sheet erosion", "rill erosion", and "gully erosion". Splash erosion is generally seen as the first and least severe stage in the soil erosion process, which is followed by sheet erosion, then rill erosion and finally gully erosion (the most severe of the four).


title: Erosion

text: In "splash erosion", the impact of a falling raindrop creates a small crater in the soil, ejecting soil particles. The distance these soil particles travel can be as much as vertically and horizontally on level ground.


title: Erosion

text: If the soil is saturated, or if the rainfall rate is greater than the rate at which water can infiltrate into the soil, surface runoff occurs. If the runoff has sufficient flow energy, it will transport loosened soil particles (sediment) down the slope. "Sheet erosion" is the transport of loosened soil particles by overland flow.


title: Erosion

text: "Rill erosion" refers to the development of small, ephemeral concentrated flow paths which function as both sediment source and sediment delivery systems for erosion on hillslopes. Generally, where water erosion rates on disturbed upland areas are greatest, rills are active. Flow depths in rills are typically of the order of a few centimetres (about an inch) or less and along-channel slopes may be quite steep. This means that rills exhibit hydraulic physics very different from water flowing through the deeper, wider channels of streams and rivers.


title: Erosion

text: "Gully erosion" occurs when runoff water accumulates and rapidly flows in narrow channels during or immediately after heavy rains or melting snow, removing soil to a considerable depth. A gully is distinguished from a rill based on a critical cross-sectional area of at least one square foot, i.e. the size of a channel that can no longer be erased via normal tillage operations.


title: Erosion

text: Extreme gully erosion can progress to formation of badlands. These form under conditions of high relief on easily eroded bedrock in climates favorable to erosion. Conditions or disturbances that limit the growth of protective vegetation (rhexistasy) are a key element of badland formation.


title: Erosion

text: "Valley" or "stream erosion" occurs with continued water flow along a linear feature. The erosion is both downward, deepening the valley, and headward, extending the valley into the hillside, creating head cuts and steep banks. In the earliest stage of stream erosion, the erosive activity is dominantly vertical, the valleys have a typical V-shaped cross-section and the stream gradient is relatively steep. When some base level is reached, the erosive activity switches to lateral erosion, which widens the valley floor and creates a narrow floodplain. The stream gradient becomes nearly flat, and lateral deposition of sediments becomes important as the stream meanders across the valley floor. In all stages of stream erosion, by far the most erosion occurs during times of flood when more and faster-moving water is available to carry a larger sediment load. In such processes, it is not the water alone that erodes: suspended abrasive particles, pebbles, and boulders can also act erosively as they traverse a surface, in a process known as "traction".


title: Erosion

text: "Bank erosion" is the wearing away of the banks of a stream or river. This is distinguished from changes on the bed of the watercourse, which is referred to as "scour". Erosion and changes in the form of river banks may be measured by inserting metal rods into the bank and marking the position of the bank surface along the rods at different times.


title: Erosion

text: "Thermal erosion" is the result of melting and weakening permafrost due to moving water. It can occur both along rivers and at the coast. Rapid river channel migration observed in the Lena River of Siberia is due to thermal erosion, as these portions of the banks are composed of permafrost-cemented non-cohesive materials. Much of this erosion occurs as the weakened banks fail in large slumps. Thermal erosion also affects the Arctic coast, where wave action and near-shore temperatures combine to undercut permafrost bluffs along the shoreline and cause them to fail. Annual erosion rates along a segment of the Beaufort Sea shoreline averaged per year from 1955 to 2002.


title: Erosion

text: Most river erosion happens nearer to the mouth of a river. On a river bend, the longest least sharp side has slower moving water. Here deposits build up. On the narrowest sharpest side of the bend, there is faster moving water so this side tends to erode away mostly.


title: Erosion

text: Rapid erosion by a large river can remove enough sediments to produce a river anticline, as isostatic rebound raises rock beds unburdened by erosion of overlying beds.


title: Erosion

text: Shoreline erosion, which occurs on both exposed and sheltered coasts, primarily occurs through the action of currents and waves but sea level (tidal) change can also play a role.


title: Erosion

text: "Hydraulic action" takes place when the air in a joint is suddenly compressed by a wave closing the entrance of the joint. This then cracks it. "Wave pounding" is when the sheer energy of the wave hitting the cliff or rock breaks pieces off. "Abrasion" or "corrasion" is caused by waves launching sea load at the cliff. It is the most effective and rapid form of shoreline erosion (not to be confused with "corrosion"). "Corrosion" is the dissolving of rock by carbonic acid in sea water. Limestone cliffs are particularly vulnerable to this kind of erosion. "Attrition" is where particles/sea load carried by the waves are worn down as they hit each other and the cliffs. This then makes the material easier to wash away. The material ends up as shingle and sand. Another significant source of erosion, particularly on carbonate coastlines, is boring, scraping and grinding of organisms, a process termed "bioerosion".


title: Erosion

text: Sediment is transported along the coast in the direction of the prevailing current (longshore drift). When the upcurrent supply of sediment is less than the amount being carried away, erosion occurs. When the upcurrent amount of sediment is greater, sand or gravel banks will tend to form as a result of deposition. These banks may slowly migrate along the coast in the direction of the longshore drift, alternately protecting and exposing parts of the coastline. Where there is a bend in the coastline, quite often a buildup of eroded material occurs forming a long narrow bank (a spit). Armoured beaches and submerged offshore sandbanks may also protect parts of a coastline from erosion. Over the years, as the shoals gradually shift, the erosion may be redirected to attack different parts of the shore.


title: Erosion

text: Erosion of a coastal surface, followed by a fall in sea level, can produce a distinctive landform called a raised beach.


title: Erosion

text: Chemical erosion is the loss of matter in a landscape in the form of solutes. Chemical erosion is usually calculated from the solutes found in streams. Anders Rapp pioneered the study of chemical erosion in his work about Kärkevagge published in 1960.


title: Erosion

text: Formation of sinkholes and other features of karst topography is an example of extreme chemical erosion.


title: Erosion

text: Glaciers erode predominantly by three different processes: abrasion/scouring, plucking, and ice thrusting. In an abrasion process, debris in the basal ice scrapes along the bed, polishing and gouging the underlying rocks, similar to sandpaper on wood. Scientists have shown that, in addition to the role of temperature played in valley-deepening, other glaciological processes, such as erosion also control cross-valley variations. In a homogeneous bedrock erosion pattern, curved channel cross-section beneath the ice is created. Though the glacier continues to incise vertically, the shape of the channel beneath the ice eventually remain constant, reaching a U-shaped parabolic steady-state shape as we now see in glaciated valleys. Scientists also provide a numerical estimate of the time required for the ultimate formation of a steady-shaped U-shaped valley—approximately 100,000 years. In a weak bedrock (containing material more erodible than the surrounding rocks) erosion pattern, on the contrary, the amount of over deepening is limited because ice velocities and erosion rates are reduced.


title: Erosion

text: Glaciers can also cause pieces of bedrock to crack off in the process of plucking. In ice thrusting, the glacier freezes to its bed, then as it surges forward, it moves large sheets of frozen sediment at the base along with the glacier. This method produced some of the many thousands of lake basins that dot the edge of the Canadian Shield. Differences in the height of mountain ranges are not only being the result tectonic forces, such as rock uplift, but also local climate variations. Scientists use global analysis of topography to show that glacial erosion controls the maximum height of mountains, as the relief between mountain peaks and the snow line are generally confined to altitudes less than 1500 m. The erosion caused by glaciers worldwide erodes mountains so effectively that the term "glacial buzzsaw" has become widely used, which describes the limiting effect of glaciers on the height of mountain ranges. As mountains grow higher, they generally allow for more glacial activity (especially in the accumulation zone above the glacial equilibrium line altitude), which causes increased rates of erosion of the mountain, decreasing mass faster than isostatic rebound can add to the mountain. This provides a good example of a negative feedback loop. Ongoing research is showing that while glaciers tend to decrease mountain size, in some areas, glaciers can actually reduce the rate of erosion, acting as a "glacial armor". Ice can not only erode mountains but also protect them from erosion. Depending on glacier regime, even steep alpine lands can be preserved through time with the help of ice. Scientists have proved this theory by sampling eight summits of northwestern Svalbard using Be10 and Al26, showing that northwestern Svalbard transformed from a glacier-erosion state under relatively mild glacial maxima temperature, to a glacier-armor state occupied by cold-based, protective ice during much colder glacial maxima temperatures as the Quaternary ice age progressed.


title: Erosion

text: These processes, combined with erosion and transport by the water network beneath the glacier, leave behind glacial landforms such as moraines, drumlins, ground moraine (till), kames, kame deltas, moulins, and glacial erratics in their wake, typically at the terminus or during glacier retreat.


title: Erosion

text: The best-developed glacial valley morphology appears to be restricted to landscapes with low rock uplift rates (less than or equal to 2mm per year) and high relief, leading to long-turnover times. Where rock uplift rates exceed 2mm per year, glacial valley morphology has generally been significantly modified in postglacial time. Interplay of glacial erosion and tectonic forcing governs the morphologic impact of glaciations on active orogens, by both influencing their height, and by altering the patterns of erosion during subsequent glacial periods via a link between rock uplift and valley cross-sectional shape.


title: Erosion

text: At extremely high flows, kolks, or vortices are formed by large volumes of rapidly rushing water. Kolks cause extreme local erosion, plucking bedrock and creating pothole-type geographical features called rock-cut basins. Examples can be seen in the flood regions result from glacial Lake Missoula, which created the channeled scablands in the Columbia Basin region of eastern Washington.


title: Erosion

text: Wind erosion is a major geomorphological force, especially in arid and semi-arid regions. It is also a major source of land degradation, evaporation, desertification, harmful airborne dust, and crop damage—especially after being increased far above natural rates by human activities such as deforestation, urbanization, and agriculture.


title: Erosion

text: Wind erosion is of two primary varieties: "deflation", where the wind picks up and carries away loose particles; and "abrasion", where surfaces are worn down as they are struck by airborne particles carried by wind. Deflation is divided into three categories: (1) "surface creep", where larger, heavier particles slide or roll along the ground; (2) "saltation", where particles are lifted a short height into the air, and bounce and saltate across the surface of the soil; and (3) "suspension", where very small and light particles are lifted into the air by the wind, and are often carried for long distances. Saltation is responsible for the majority (50-70%) of wind erosion, followed by suspension (30-40%), and then surface creep (5-25%).


title: Erosion

text: Wind erosion is much more severe in arid areas and during times of drought. For example, in the Great Plains, it is estimated that soil loss due to wind erosion can be as much as 6100 times greater in drought years than in wet years.


title: Erosion

text: "Mass wasting" or "mass movement" is the downward and outward movement of rock and sediments on a sloped surface, mainly due to the force of gravity.


title: Erosion

text: Mass wasting is an important part of the erosional process and is often the first stage in the breakdown and transport of weathered materials in mountainous areas. It moves material from higher elevations to lower elevations where other eroding agents such as streams and glaciers can then pick up the material and move it to even lower elevations. Mass-wasting processes are always occurring continuously on all slopes; some mass-wasting processes act very slowly; others occur very suddenly, often with disastrous results. Any perceptible down-slope movement of rock or sediment is often referred to in general terms as a landslide. However, landslides can be classified in a much more detailed way that reflects the mechanisms responsible for the movement and the velocity at which the movement occurs. One of the visible topographical manifestations of a very slow form of such activity is a scree slope.


title: Erosion

text: "Slumping" happens on steep hillsides, occurring along distinct fracture zones, often within materials like clay that, once released, may move quite rapidly downhill. They will often show a spoon-shaped isostatic depression, in which the material has begun to slide downhill. In some cases, the slump is caused by water beneath the slope weakening it. In many cases it is simply the result of poor engineering along highways where it is a regular occurrence.


title: Erosion

text: "Surface creep" is the slow movement of soil and rock debris by gravity which is usually not perceptible except through extended observation. However, the term can also describe the rolling of dislodged soil particles in diameter by wind along the soil surface.


title: Erosion

text: On the continental slope, erosion of the ocean floor to create channels and submarine canyons can result from the rapid downslope flow of sediment gravity flows, bodies of sediment-laden water that move rapidly downslope as turbidity currents. Where erosion by turbidity currents creates oversteepened slopes it can also trigger underwater landslides and debris flows. Turbidity currents can erode channels and canyons into substrates ranging from recently deposited unconsolidated sediments to hard crystalline bedrock. Almost all continental slopes and deep ocean basins display such channels and canyons resulting from sediment gravity flows and submarine canyons act as conduits for the transfer of sediment from the continents and shallow marine environments to the deep sea. Turbidites, which are the sedimentary deposits resulting from turbidity currents, comprise some of the thickest and largest sedimentary sequences on Earth, indicating that the associated erosional processes must also have played a prominent role in Earth's history.


title: Erosion

text: The amount and intensity of precipitation is the main climatic factor governing soil erosion by water. The relationship is particularly strong if heavy rainfall occurs at times when, or in locations where, the soil's surface is not well protected by vegetation. This might be during periods when agricultural activities leave the soil bare, or in semi-arid regions where vegetation is naturally sparse. Wind erosion requires strong winds, particularly during times of drought when vegetation is sparse and soil is dry (and so is more erodible). Other climatic factors such as average temperature and temperature range may also affect erosion, via their effects on vegetation and soil properties. In general, given similar vegetation and ecosystems, areas with more precipitation (especially high-intensity rainfall), more wind, or more storms are expected to have more erosion.


title: Erosion

text: In some areas of the world (e.g. the mid-western USA), rainfall intensity is the primary determinant of erosivity (for a definition of "erosivity" check,) with higher intensity rainfall generally resulting in more soil erosion by water. The size and velocity of rain drops is also an important factor. Larger and higher-velocity rain drops have greater kinetic energy, and thus their impact will displace soil particles by larger distances than smaller, slower-moving rain drops.


title: Erosion

text: In other regions of the world (e.g. western Europe), runoff and erosion result from relatively low intensities of stratiform rainfall falling onto the previously saturated soil. In such situations, rainfall amount rather than intensity is the main factor determining the severity of soil erosion by water. According to the climate change projections, erosivity will increase significantly in Europe and soil erosion may increase by 13-22.5% by 2050


title: Erosion

text: In Taiwan, where typhoon frequency increased significantly in the 21st century, a strong link has been drawn between the increase in storm frequency with an increase in sediment load in rivers and reservoirs, highlighting the impacts climate change can have on erosion.


title: Erosion

text: Vegetation acts as an interface between the atmosphere and the soil. It increases the permeability of the soil to rainwater, thus decreasing runoff. It shelters the soil from winds, which results in decreased wind erosion, as well as advantageous changes in microclimate. The roots of the plants bind the soil together, and interweave with other roots, forming a more solid mass that is less susceptible to both water and wind erosion. The removal of vegetation increases the rate of surface erosion.


title: Erosion

text: The topography of the land determines the velocity at which surface runoff will flow, which in turn determines the erosivity of the runoff. Longer, steeper slopes (especially those without adequate vegetative cover) are more susceptible to very high rates of erosion during heavy rains than shorter, less steep slopes. Steeper terrain is also more prone to mudslides, landslides, and other forms of gravitational erosion processes.


title: Erosion

text: Tectonic processes control rates and distributions of erosion at the Earth's surface. If the tectonic action causes part of the Earth's surface (e.g., a mountain range) to be raised or lowered relative to surrounding areas, this must necessarily change the gradient of the land surface. Because erosion rates are almost always sensitive to the local slope (see above), this will change the rates of erosion in the uplifted area. Active tectonics also brings fresh, unweathered rock towards the surface, where it is exposed to the action of erosion.


title: Erosion

text: However, erosion can also affect tectonic processes. The removal by erosion of large amounts of rock from a particular region, and its deposition elsewhere, can result in a lightening of the load on the lower crust and mantle. Because tectonic processes are driven by gradients in the stress field developed in the crust, this unloading can in turn cause tectonic or isostatic uplift in the region. In some cases, it has been hypothesised that these twin feedbacks can act to localize and enhance zones of very rapid exhumation of deep crustal rocks beneath places on the Earth's surface with extremely high erosion rates, for example, beneath the extremely steep terrain of Nanga Parbat in the western Himalayas. Such a place has been called a "tectonic aneurysm".


title: Erosion

text: Human land development, in forms including agricultural and urban development, is considered a significant factor in erosion and sediment transport, which aggravate food insecurity. In Taiwan, increases in sediment load in the northern, central, and southern regions of the island can be tracked with the timeline of development for each region throughout the 20th century. The intentional removal of soil and rock by humans is a form of erosion that has been named "lisasion".


title: Erosion

text: Mountain ranges are known to take many millions of years to erode to the degree they effectively cease to exist. Scholars Pitman and Golovchenko estimate that it takes probably more than 450 million years to erode a mountain mass similar to the Himalaya into an almost-flat peneplain if there are no major sea-level changes. Erosion of mountains massifs can create a pattern of equally high summits called summit accordance. It has been argued that extension during post-orogenic collapse is a more effective mechanism of lowering the height of orogenic mountains than erosion.


title: Erosion

text: Examples of heavily eroded mountain ranges include the Timanides of Northern Russia. Erosion of this orogen has produced sediments that are now found in the East European Platform, including the Cambrian Sablya Formation near Lake Ladoga. Studies of these sediments indicate that it is likely that the erosion of the orogen began in the Cambrian and then intensified in the Ordovician.


title: Erosion

text: If the rate of erosion is higher than the rate of soil formation the soils are being destroyed by erosion. Where soil is not destroyed by erosion, erosion can in some cases prevent the formation of soil features that form slowly. Inceptisols are common soils that form in areas of fast erosion.


title: Erosion

text: While erosion of soils is a natural process, human activities have increased by 10-40 times the rate at which erosion is occurring globally. Excessive (or accelerated) erosion causes both "on-site" and "off-site" problems. On-site impacts include decreases in agricultural productivity and (on natural landscapes) ecological collapse, both because of loss of the nutrient-rich upper soil layers. In some cases, the eventual result is desertification. Off-site effects include sedimentation of waterways and eutrophication of water bodies, as well as sediment-related damage to roads and houses. Water and wind erosion are the two primary causes of land degradation; combined, they are responsible for about 84% of the global extent of degraded land, making excessive erosion one of the most significant environmental problems.


title: Erosion

text: In the United States, farmers cultivating highly erodible land must comply with a conservation plan to be eligible for certain forms of agricultural assistance.


title: Soil contamination

text: Soil contamination, soil pollution, or land pollution as a part of land degradation is caused by the presence of xenobiotic (human-made) chemicals or other alteration in the natural soil environment. It is typically caused by industrial activity, agricultural chemicals or improper disposal of waste. The most common chemicals involved are petroleum hydrocarbons, polynuclear aromatic hydrocarbons (such as naphthalene and benzo(a)pyrene), solvents, pesticides, lead, and other heavy metals. Contamination is correlated with the degree of industrialization and intensity of chemical substance. The concern over soil contamination stems primarily from health risks, from direct contact with the contaminated soil, vapour from the contaminants, or from secondary contamination of water supplies within and underlying the soil. Mapping of contaminated soil sites and the resulting cleanups are time-consuming and expensive tasks, and require expertise in geology, hydrology, chemistry, computer modeling, and GIS in Environmental Contamination, as well as an appreciation of the history of industrial chemistry.


title: Soil contamination

text: In North America and Western Europe the extent of contaminated land is best known, with many of countries in these areas having a legal framework to identify and deal with this environmental problem. Developing countries tend to be less tightly regulated despite some of them having undergone significant industrialization.


title: Soil contamination

text: The most common chemicals involved are petroleum hydrocarbons, solvents, pesticides, lead, and other heavy metals.


title: Soil contamination

text: Any activity that leads to other forms of soil degradation (erosion, compaction, etc.) may indirectly worsen the contamination effects in that soil remediation becomes more tedious.


title: Soil contamination

text: Historical deposition of coal ash used for residential, commercial, and industrial heating, as well as for industrial processes such as ore smelting, were a common source of contamination in areas that were industrialized before about 1960. Coal naturally concentrates lead and zinc during its formation, as well as other heavy metals to a lesser degree. When the coal is burned, most of these metals become concentrated in the ash (the principal exception being mercury). Coal ash and slag may contain sufficient lead to qualify as a "characteristic hazardous waste", defined in the US as containing more than 5 mg/L of extractable lead using the TCLP procedure. In addition to lead, coal ash typically contains variable but significant concentrations of polynuclear aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs; e.g., benzo(a)anthracene, benzo(b)fluoranthene, benzo(k)fluoranthene, benzo(a)pyrene, indeno(cd)pyrene, phenanthrene, anthracene, and others). These PAHs are known human carcinogens and the acceptable concentrations of them in soil are typically around 1 mg/kg. Coal ash and slag can be recognised by the presence of off-white grains in soil, gray heterogeneous soil, or (coal slag) bubbly, vesicular pebble-sized grains.


title: Soil contamination

text: Treated sewage sludge, known in the industry as biosolids, has become controversial as a "fertilizer". As it is the byproduct of sewage treatment, it generally contains more contaminants such as organisms, pesticides, and heavy metals than other soil.


title: Soil contamination

text: In the European Union, the Urban Waste Water Treatment Directive allows sewage sludge to be sprayed onto land. The volume is expected to double to 185,000 tons of dry solids in 2005. This has good agricultural properties due to the high nitrogen and phosphate content. In 1990/1991, 13% wet weight was sprayed onto 0.13% of the land; however, this is expected to rise 15 fold by 2005. Advocates say there is a need to control this so that pathogenic microorganisms do not get into water courses and to ensure that there is no accumulation of heavy metals in the top soil.


title: Soil contamination

text: A pesticide is a substance used to kill a pest. A pesticide may be a chemical substance, biological agent (such as a virus or bacteria), antimicrobial, disinfectant or device used against any pest. Pests include insects, plant pathogens, weeds, mollusks, birds, mammals, fish, nematodes (roundworms) and microbes that compete with humans for food, destroy property, spread or are a vector for disease or cause a nuisance. Although there are benefits to the use of pesticides, there are also drawbacks, such as potential toxicity to humans and other organisms.


title: Soil contamination

text: Herbicides are used to kill weeds, especially on pavements and railways. They are similar to auxins and most are biodegradable by soil bacteria. However, one group derived from trinitrotoluene (2:4 D and 2:4:5 T) have the impurity dioxin, which is very toxic and causes fatality even in low concentrations. Another herbicide is Paraquat. It is highly toxic but it rapidly degrades in soil due to the action of bacteria and does not kill soil fauna.


title: Soil contamination

text: Insecticides are used to rid farms of pests which damage crops. The insects damage not only standing crops but also stored ones and in the tropics it is reckoned that one third of the total production is lost during food storage. As with fungicides, the first insecticides used in the nineteenth century were inorganic e.g. Paris Green and other compounds of arsenic. Nicotine has also been used since 1690.


title: Soil contamination

text: 1. Organochlorines include DDT, Aldrin, Dieldrin and BHC. They are cheap to produce, potent and persistent. DDT was used on a massive scale from the 1930s, with a peak of 72,000 tonnes used 1970. Then usage fell as the harmful environmental effects were realized. It was found worldwide in fish and birds and was even discovered in the snow in the Antarctic. It is only slightly soluble in water but is very soluble in the bloodstream. It affects the nervous and endocrine systems and causes the eggshells of birds to lack calcium causing them to be easily breakable. It is thought to be responsible for the decline of the numbers of birds of prey like ospreys and peregrine falcons in the 1950s – they are now recovering. As well as increased concentration via the food chain, it is known to enter via permeable membranes, so fish get it through their gills. As it has low water solubility, it tends to stay at the water surface, so organisms that live there are most affected. DDT found in fish that formed part of the human food chain caused concern, but the levels found in the liver, kidney and brain tissues was less than 1 ppm and in fat was 10 ppm, which was below the level likely to cause harm. However, DDT was banned in the UK and the United States to stop the further buildup of it in the food chain. U.S. manufacturers continued to sell DDT to developing countries, who could not afford the expensive replacement chemicals and who did not have such stringent regulations governing the use of pesticides.


title: Soil contamination

text: 2. Organophosphates, e.g. parathion, methyl parathion and about 40 other insecticides are available nationally. Parathion is highly toxic, methyl-parathion is less so and Malathion is generally considered safe as it has low toxicity and is rapidly broken down in the mammalian liver. This group works by preventing normal nerve transmission as cholinesterase is prevented from breaking down the transmitter substance acetylcholine, resulting in uncontrolled muscle movements.


title: Soil contamination

text: The disposal of munitions, and a lack of care in manufacture of munitions caused by the urgency of production, can contaminate soil for extended periods. There is little published evidence on this type of contamination largely because of restrictions placed by governments of many countries on the publication of material related to war effort. However, mustard gas stored during World War II has contaminated some sites for up to 50 years and the testing of Anthrax as a potential biological weapon contaminated the whole island of Gruinard.


title: Soil contamination

text: Contaminated or polluted soil directly affects human health through direct contact with soil or via inhalation of soil contaminants that have vaporized; potentially greater threats are posed by the infiltration of soil contamination into groundwater aquifers used for human consumption, sometimes in areas apparently far removed from any apparent source of above-ground contamination. Toxic metals can also make their way up the food chain through plants that reside in soils containing high concentrations of heavy metals. This tends to result in the development of pollution-related diseases.


title: Soil contamination

text: Health consequences from exposure to soil contamination vary greatly depending on pollutant type, the pathway of attack, and the vulnerability of the exposed population. Researchers suggest that pesticides and heavy metals in soil may harm cardiovascular health, including inflammation and change in the body's internal clock.


title: Soil contamination

text: Chronic exposure to chromium, lead , and other metals, petroleum, solvents, and many pesticide and herbicide formulations can be carcinogenic, can cause congenital disorders, or can cause other chronic health conditions. Industrial or man-made concentrations of naturally occurring substances, such as nitrate and ammonia associated with livestock manure from agricultural operations, have also been identified as health hazards in soil and groundwater.


title: Soil contamination

text: Chronic exposure to benzene at sufficient concentrations is known to be associated with a higher incidence of leukemia. Mercury and cyclodienes are known to induce higher incidences of kidney damage and some irreversible diseases. PCBs and cyclodienes are linked to liver toxicity. Organophosphates and carbonates can cause a chain of responses leading to neuromuscular blockage. Many chlorinated solvents induce liver changes, kidney changes, and depression of the central nervous system. There is an entire spectrum of further health effects such as headache, nausea, fatigue, eye irritation and skin rash for the above cited and other chemicals. At sufficient dosages a large number of soil contaminants can cause death by exposure via direct contact, inhalation or ingestion of contaminants in groundwater contaminated through soil.


title: Soil contamination

text: The Scottish Government has commissioned the Institute of Occupational Medicine to undertake a review of methods to assess risk to human health from contaminated land. The overall aim of the project is to work up guidance that should be useful to Scottish Local Authorities in assessing whether sites represent a significant possibility of significant harm (SPOSH) to human health. It is envisaged that the output of the project will be a short document providing high level guidance on health risk assessment with reference to existing published guidance and methodologies that have been identified as being particularly relevant and helpful. The project will examine how policy guidelines have been developed for determining the acceptability of risks to human health and propose an approach for assessing what constitutes unacceptable risk in line with the criteria for SPOSH as defined in the legislation and the Scottish Statutory Guidance.


title: Soil contamination

text: Not unexpectedly, soil contaminants can have significant deleterious consequences for ecosystems. There are radical soil chemistry changes which can arise from the presence of many hazardous chemicals even at low concentration of the contaminant species. These changes can manifest in the alteration of metabolism of endemic microorganisms and arthropods resident in a given soil environment. The result can be virtual eradication of some of the primary food chain, which in turn could have major consequences for predator or consumer species. Even if the chemical effect on lower life forms is small, the lower pyramid levels of the food chain may ingest alien chemicals, which normally become more concentrated for each consuming rung of the food chain. Many of these effects are now well known, such as the concentration of persistent DDT materials for avian consumers, leading to weakening of egg shells, increased chick mortality and potential extinction of species.


title: Soil contamination

text: Effects occur to agricultural lands which have certain types of soil contamination. Contaminants typically alter plant metabolism, often causing a reduction in crop yields. This has a secondary effect upon soil conservation, since the languishing crops cannot shield the Earth's soil from erosion. Some of these chemical contaminants have long half-lives and in other cases derivative chemicals are formed from decay of primary soil contaminants.


title: Soil contamination

text: Heavy metals and other soil contaminants can adversely affect the activity, species composition and abundance of soil microorganisms, thereby threatening soil functions such as biochemical cycling of carbon and nitrogen. However, soil contaminants can also become less bioavailable by time, and microorganisms and ecosystems can adapt to altered conditions. Soil properties such as pH, organic matter content and texture are very important and modify mobility, bioavailability and toxicity of pollutants in contaminated soils. The same amount of contaminant can be toxic in one soil but totally harmless in another soil. This stresses the need for soil-specific risks assessment and measures.


title: Soil contamination

text: Cleanup or environmental remediation is analyzed by environmental scientists who utilize field measurement of soil chemicals and also apply computer models (GIS in Environmental Contamination) for analyzing transport and fate of soil chemicals. Various technologies have been developed for remediation of oil-contaminated soil and sediments There are several principal strategies for remediation:


title: Soil contamination

text: Various national standards for concentrations of particular contaminants include the United States EPA Region 9 Preliminary Remediation Goals (U.S. PRGs), the U.S. EPA Region 3 Risk Based Concentrations (U.S. EPA RBCs) and National Environment Protection Council of Australia Guideline on Investigation Levels in Soil and Groundwater.


title: Soil contamination

text: The immense and sustained growth of the People's Republic of China since the 1970s has exacted a price from the land in increased soil pollution. The Ministry of Ecology and Environment believes it to be a threat to the environment, to food safety and to sustainable agriculture. According to a scientific sampling, 150 million mu (100,000 square kilometres) of China's cultivated land have been polluted, with contaminated water being used to irrigate a further 32.5 million mu (21,670 square kilometres) and another 2 million mu (1,300 square kilometres) covered or destroyed by solid waste. In total, the area accounts for one-tenth of China's cultivatable land, and is mostly in economically developed areas. An estimated 12 million tonnes of grain are contaminated by heavy metals every year, causing direct losses of 20 billion yuan ($2.57 billion USD). Recent survey shows that 19% of the agricultural soils are contaminated which contains heavy metals and metalloids. And the rate of these heavy metals in the soil has been increased dramatically.


title: Soil contamination

text: According to the received data from Member states, in the European Union the number of estimated potential contaminated sites is more than 2.5 million and the identified contaminated sites around 342 thousand. Municipal and industrial wastes contribute most to soil contamination (38%), followed by the industrial/commercial sector (34%). Mineral oil and heavy metals are the main contaminants contributing around 60% to soil contamination. In terms of budget, the management of contaminated sites is estimated to cost around 6 billion Euros (€) annually.


title: Soil contamination

text: Generic guidance commonly used in the United Kingdom are the Soil Guideline Values published by the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA) and the Environment Agency. These are screening values that demonstrate the minimal acceptable level of a substance. Above this there can be no assurances in terms of significant risk of harm to human health. These have been derived using the Contaminated Land Exposure Assessment Model (CLEA UK). Certain input parameters such as Health Criteria Values, age and land use are fed into CLEA UK to obtain a probabilistic output.


title: Soil contamination

text: Guidance by the Inter Departmental Committee for the Redevelopment of Contaminated Land (ICRCL) has been formally withdrawn by DEFRA, for use as a prescriptive document to determine the potential need for remediation or further assessment.


title: Soil contamination

text: The CLEA model published by DEFRA and the Environment Agency (EA) in March 2002 sets a framework for the appropriate assessment of risks to human health from contaminated land, as required by Part IIA of the Environmental Protection Act 1990. As part of this framework, generic Soil Guideline Values (SGVs) have currently been derived for ten contaminants to be used as "intervention values". These values should not be considered as remedial targets but values above which further detailed assessment should be considered; see Dutch standards.


title: Soil contamination

text: It is intended that the SGVs replace the former ICRCL values. The CLEA SGVs relate to assessing chronic (long term) risks to human health and do not apply to the protection of ground workers during construction, or other potential receptors such as groundwater, buildings, plants or other ecosystems. The CLEA SGVs are not directly applicable to a site completely covered in hardstanding, as there is no direct exposure route to contaminated soils.


title: Soil contamination

text: To date, the first ten of fifty-five contaminant SGVs have been published, for the following: arsenic, cadmium, chromium, lead, inorganic mercury, nickel, selenium ethyl benzene, phenol and toluene. Draft SGVs for benzene, naphthalene and xylene have been produced but their publication is on hold. Toxicological data (Tox) has been published for each of these contaminants as well as for benzo[a]pyrene, benzene, dioxins, furans and dioxin-like PCBs, naphthalene, vinyl chloride, 1,1,2,2 tetrachloroethane and 1,1,1,2 tetrachloroethane, 1,1,1 trichloroethane, tetrachloroethene, carbon tetrachloride, 1,2-dichloroethane, trichloroethene and xylene. The SGVs for ethyl benzene, phenol and toluene are dependent on the soil organic matter (SOM) content (which can be calculated from the total organic carbon (TOC) content). As an initial screen the SGVs for 1% SOM are considered to be appropriate.


title: Soil contamination

text: As of February 2021, there are a total of 2,500 plus contaminated sites in Canada. One infamous contaminated sited is located near a nickel-copper smelting site in Sudbury, Ontario. A study investigating the heavy metal pollution in the vicinity of the smelter reveals that elevated levels of nickel and copper were found in the soil; values going as high as 5,104ppm Ni, and 2,892 ppm Cu within a 1.1 km range of the smelter location. Other metals were also found in the soil; such metals include iron, cobalt, and silver. Furthermore, upon examining the different vegetation surrounding the smelter it was evident that they too had been affected; the results show that the plants contained nickel, copper and aluminium as a result of soil contamination.


title: Soil contamination

text: In March 2009, the issue of Uranium poisoning in Punjab attracted press coverage. It was alleged to be caused by fly ash ponds of thermal power stations, which reportedly lead to severe birth defects in children in the Faridkot and Bhatinda districts of Punjab. The news reports claimed the uranium levels were more than 60 times the maximum safe limit. In 2012, the Government of India confirmed that the ground water in Malwa belt of Punjab has uranium metal that is 50% above the trace limits set by the United Nations' World Health Organization (WHO). Scientific studies, based on over 1000 samples from various sampling points, could not trace the source to fly ash and any sources from thermal power plants or industry as originally alleged. The study also revealed that the uranium concentration in ground water of Malwa district is not 60 times the WHO limits, but only 50% above the WHO limit in 3 locations. This highest concentration found in samples was less than those found naturally in ground waters currently used for human purposes elsewhere, such as Finland. Research is underway to identify natural or other sources for the uranium.


title: Military career of Elvis Presley

text: American singer and actor Elvis Presley served in the United States Army from 1958 to 1960. At the time of his enlistment, he was widely regarded as the most well-known name in the world of entertainment.


title: Military career of Elvis Presley

text: Before entering the Army, Presley had caused national outrage with his rock and roll music. Many parents, religious leaders, and teachers groups welcomed his draft into the military. Despite being offered the chance to enlist in Special Services to entertain the troops and live in priority housing, Presley was persuaded by his manager to serve as a regular soldier. This earned him the respect of many of his fellow soldiers and people back in the United States who previously viewed him in a negative light.


title: Military career of Elvis Presley

text: During his service, Presley's life was affected in many ways. Not long before he was transferred to Germany, his mother, Gladys Presley died of a heart attack brought on by acute hepatitis and cirrhosis at the age of 46. While he was living in Bad Nauheim, he met his future wife, Priscilla Beaulieu. He also became reliant on barbiturates and stimulants. Due to this unhealthy addiction, Presley and Beaulieu divorced in 1973. This same addiction caused his death at the age of 42 in 1977.


title: Military career of Elvis Presley

text: After his release from the service, Presley found a new fan base among an older age group, thanks in part to his army career and releases of ballads compared to his earlier rock and roll songs.


title: Military career of Elvis Presley

text: On January 8, 1956, Presley turned twenty-one years old, and like most American men of that age, was now eligible to be drafted. Colonel Tom Parker, Presley's manager, was well aware of his client's draft status and how it could affect his career. In the summer of 1956, Parker wrote to the Pentagon requesting that Presley be considered for Special Services, which would allow Presley to do only six weeks basic training and then resume life as normal, performing several times a year for the armed forces. However, Parker had no intention of allowing Presley to sign up for Special Services, which would require Presley to perform for free, with each performance being recorded and filmed for sale to television stations worldwide. Only the armed forces would profit from these recordings, and Parker was unwilling to allow anyone to enjoy Presley's talents for free. Over the course of the next twelve months, Parker led Presley to believe that it was still possible to avoid the draft completely, while secretly planning to allow it. In his eyes, after a year of negative publicity, this was the perfect opportunity to change the view that older Americans had of him. Parker explained to Presley that this was a situation neither of them could refuse. When Presley was told that he would have to serve as a regular soldier, he was furious that Parker failed to get him out of the draft. Parker promised Presley that if he worked hard and served as a regular GI for two years, he would return "a bigger star" than when he left.


title: Military career of Elvis Presley

text: On January 4, 1957, Presley attended Kennedy Veterans Hospital in Memphis for a pre-induction army medical. On January 8, Presley's twenty-second birthday, he was declared 1-A by the Memphis Draft Board; physically fit and likely to be drafted some time in the next eight months. On December 16, it was officially announced that Presley would be receiving his draft notice. While fans around the country were upset by the news, parents and teachers groups were ecstatic; they viewed Presley as a menace to society.


title: Military career of Elvis Presley

text: The Navy offered to create a special "Elvis Presley Company" made up of men from Memphis and Presley's closest friends, and offered him the chance to perform in Las Vegas, and have his own private quarters. The Army offered Presley the chance to tour the world and visit army bases to boost morale among soldiers and encourage other young men to enlist. Presley politely told both parties that he would consider their offers. The Pentagon, too, had been in touch to offer Presley the opportunity to join Special Services, entertaining the troops without having to train as a regular soldier; this was known by many soldiers and veterans as "the celebrity wimp-out". After discussing each offer with Parker, Presley decided to join as a regular soldier. In Parker's words, "Taking any of these deals will make millions of Americans angry".


title: Military career of Elvis Presley

text: Presley was originally scheduled to be inducted on January 20, 1958. However, due to commitments at Paramount and the filming schedule of his latest film, "King Creole", Presley had to personally write to the Memphis Draft Board to request a deferment. He explained to them that Paramount had already spent up to $350,000 on pre-production of the film, and that many jobs were dependent on his ability to complete filming, which was due to begin on January 13. They granted him an extension until the middle of March. When news of the extension broke, angry letters were sent to the Memphis Draft Board complaining about the "special treatment" that Presley was receiving. According to Milton Bowers, head of the draft board and angered by the public outcry, Presley "would have automatically gotten the extension [anyway] if he hadn't been Elvis Presley the superstar".


title: Military career of Elvis Presley

text: Worried that rock and roll was a passing fad, Presley wanted to make "King Creole" the best role he had ever acted. He knew that two years out of the limelight would mean hard work when he returned, and so he gave his all in that film to show the world that he had the potential to return as a serious, dramatic actor. Author Alanna Nash described it as "the performance that would forever define his potential".


title: Military career of Elvis Presley

text: Two weeks after finishing "King Creole", Presley reported for his induction on March 24, 1958, a day dubbed "Black Monday" for his fans by the press. Presley was given a physical and assigned army serial number 53310761, before being sworn in and made leader of his group. Parker, with the permission of the army, had arranged for news crews from around the world to be on hand to report Presley's entry into the army. After his final goodbyes to family and friends, Presley and his fellow U.S. Army recruits were taken by bus to Fort Chaffee, Arkansas.


title: Military career of Elvis Presley

text: Presley spent four days at Fort Chaffee before being transferred to Fort Hood, Texas. After being assigned to Company A, 2d Medium Tank Battalion, 37th Armor, Presley completed basic training by June. He had become a pistol sharpshooter, and expressed his enjoyment at the "rough and tumble" of the tanks obstacle course. To friends back home, however, he was less upbeat. In letters to friend Alan Fortas, Presley described his homesickness and insisted that he hated the training. Eddie Fadal, another of Presley's friends, remembers that Presley would worry about his career, fearing it was all over. One of Presley's instructors, Bill Norwood, who let Presley use his phone to call home on many occasions, recalls Presley breaking down in tears during many of these phone calls.


title: Military career of Elvis Presley

text: After a short break to record new material for RCA Victor in June, Presley returned to Fort Hood to finish his tank training. He was now living off post, in his own house, with his mother, father, grandmother, and friend Lamar Fike; soldiers who had dependents living off post were allowed to live with them. Having his family close by cheered him up immensely, although he still spoke to friends about his fears for his career. Parker, who was often a visitor to Presley's home, would attempt to reassure his client. Parker had arranged for enough material and merchandise to be available to keep Presley's name in the public arena during his two years in the service. Although Presley nodded along in agreement with his manager, he was not really convinced that he could return to what he had known previously.


title: Military career of Elvis Presley

text: In early August, while in Texas with her son, Gladys Presley took ill. She had recently increased her alcohol intake to cope with her son's fame and army commitments, and she had also begun using diet pills to attempt to lose weight. This, coupled with a bad diet, had led to the deterioration of her liver. One afternoon, after a heated argument with her husband Vernon, Gladys collapsed from exhaustion. Presley arranged for her and Vernon to return to Memphis on August 8. The next day Gladys' condition worsened so rapidly that she was rushed to a hospital. On August 11, after calls from her doctor, Presley requested emergency leave to visit with his mother. After initially being turned down and threatening to go AWOL, Presley was eventually given permission to leave on August 12. The officer who initially denied Presley his emergency leave was later disciplined for his actions.


title: Military career of Elvis Presley

text: On August 14, Gladys died from cirrhosis. The official cause of death was listed as heart attack, but the Presleys refused an autopsy to verify it. Elvis and Vernon were both devastated by her death. Her funeral was held on August 15, and Presley collapsed several times before, during, and after the service. His mother had always been the most important person in his life, and now he felt as though everything he had worked for had been for nothing. Presley's leave was extended by five days on August 18, and when he finally left to return to Fort Hood he left instructions that nothing in his mother's room was to be altered.


title: Military career of Elvis Presley

text: After training at Fort Hood Presley was assigned to the 1st Medium Tank Battalion, 32d Armor, 3d Armored Division, at Ray Barracks, Germany, where he served as an armor intelligence specialist. He left Fort Hood on September 19, headed for Brooklyn Army Terminal in New York where he would ship out to Germany on September 22. After a short press conference arranged by Parker, which also involved Presley walking up and down the plank of the eight times for cameras, the ship set sail and Presley would spend the rest of his service overseas.


title: Military career of Elvis Presley

text: During the crossing Presley became a friend of a fellow soldier named Charlie Hodge. Hodge, who had enjoyed some success as an entertainer himself before being drafted, encouraged Presley to help him put together a show for the troops. Presley accepted his request, but only agreed to play piano in the background; Parker had drilled into him that there would be no public performances of any kind during his service. Hodge would become a close friend to Presley during their time in the army, and he was invited to work for him when they were both discharged.


title: Military career of Elvis Presley

text: On October 1 the USS "General George M. Randall" arrived in Germany and Presley was once again offered the chance to join Special Services. Again he politely refused, and was instead given the task of driving the commanding officer of Company D, Captain Russell. Russell, however, did not take to the attention surrounding Presley, and he was transferred to driving duties for Reconnaissance Platoon Sergeant Ira Jones of Company C.


title: Military career of Elvis Presley

text: Shortly after arriving in Germany, Presley was allowed to live off post. He and his family moved into Hilberts Parkhotel in Bad Homburg then to the Hotel Villa Grunewald in Bad Nauheim, a town even closer to Friedberg, where Ray Barracks was located. In the meantime, Parker wrote from the United States on a nearly daily basis to Presley about how things were going back home. He had acquired deals with RCA and 20th Century Fox to make sure Presley's return to public life would go as smoothly as possible. RCA agreed to release an album of Presley's press conference the day he left for Germany; titled "Elvis Sails", the album would pay Presley $0.22 per sale in royalties, guaranteed up to at least 100,000 copies. 20th Century Fox had agreed upon a $200,000 fee for one Presley film, with options on a second for $250,000 and a 50/50 split on profits. Paramount, too, had signed deals to produce a number of new Presley films after his release; what would eventually become "G.I. Blues" was agreed upon for $175,000 and a three-picture option was also included. Parker also reassured his client about the press coverage he was receiving while overseas. News outlets were reporting regularly on stories, mostly released by Parker himself, about plans for Presley's return to entertainment. Stories of wild parties in Presley's hotel room were also making it into the papers regularly, and Parker was forced to hold a press conference to dispel these rumors. For Presley, however, being away in Germany was not all happy times. He would often write home to friends and family about how homesick he was, how desperately he missed his mother, and of how his fears about his career still clouded his mind.


title: Military career of Elvis Presley

text: Although Presley's manager had forbidden him from performing while in the army, pressure from RCA for him to record new material led to Parker sending a microphone and a tape recorder to Germany. Presley had recorded a handful of songs before he left for overseas to cover his time away, but RCA was worried that they would run out of material before March 1960. In a letter to his client, Parker explained that recordings of Presley with just a piano for accompaniment, singing gospel songs would be good enough; his fans would just want to hear him sing anything. Presley used the recorder to mess around with friends and family, singing mainly gospel and current hits, but none of these recordings was sent back for release by RCA. Decades later these recordings would be released officially on titles such as "Private Presley" and "Home Recordings". In June, with 15 days' leave to enjoy, Presley and his friends traveled to Munich and Paris. Two days in Munich were followed by over a week of partying in Paris where, on several occasions, Presley would invite the whole chorus line of girls from "The 4 O'Clock" club back to his hotel.


title: Military career of Elvis Presley

text: Media reports echoed Presley's concerns about his career, but RCA producer Steve Sholes and Freddy Bienstock of Hill and Range had carefully prepared for his two-year hiatus. Armed with a substantial amount of unreleased material, they kept up a regular stream of successful releases. Between his induction and discharge, Presley had ten top 40 hits, including "Wear My Ring Around Your Neck", the best-selling "Hard Headed Woman", and "One Night" in 1958, and "(Now and Then There's) A Fool Such as I" and the number one "A Big Hunk o' Love" in 1959. RCA also managed to generate four albums compiling old material during this period, most successfully "Elvis' Golden Records" (1958), which hit number three on the LP chart.


title: Military career of Elvis Presley

text: Introduced to amphetamines by a sergeant while on maneuvers, he became "practically evangelical about their benefits"—not only for energy, but for "strength" and weight loss, as well—and many of his friends in the outfit joined him in indulging. The army also introduced Presley to karate, which he studied seriously, later including it in his live performances. Fellow soldiers have attested to Presley's wish to be seen as an able, ordinary soldier, despite his fame, and to his generosity while in the service. He donated his army pay to charity, purchased TV sets for the post, and bought an extra set of fatigues for everyone in his outfit.