title: Canard (aeronautics)

text: In aeronautics, a canard is a wing configuration in which a small forewing or foreplane is placed forward of the main wing of a fixed-wing aircraft or a weapon. The term "canard" may be used to describe the aircraft itself, the wing configuration, or the foreplane. Canard wings are also extensively used in guided missiles and smart bombs.


title: Canard (aeronautics)

text: The term "canard" arose from the appearance of the Santos-Dumont 14-bis of 1906, which was said to be reminiscent of a duck ("canard" in French) with its neck stretched out in flight.


title: Canard (aeronautics)

text: Despite the use of a canard surface on the first powered aeroplane, the Wright Flyer of 1903, canard designs were not built in quantity until the appearance of the Saab Viggen jet fighter in 1967. The aerodynamics of the canard configuration are complex and require careful analysis.


title: Canard (aeronautics)

text: Rather than use the conventional tailplane configuration found on most aircraft, an aircraft designer may adopt the canard configuration to reduce the main wing loading, to better control the main wing airflow, or to increase the aircraft's maneuverability, especially at high angles of attack or during a stall. Canard foreplanes, whether used in a canard or three-surface configuration, have important consequences for the aircraft's longitudinal equilibrium, static and dynamic stability characteristics.


title: Canard (aeronautics)

text: The Wright Brothers began experimenting with the foreplane configuration around 1900. Their first kite included a front surface for pitch control and they adopted this configuration for their first Flyer. They were suspicious of the aft tail because Otto Lilienthal had been killed in a glider with one. The Wrights realised that a foreplane would tend to destabilise an aeroplane but expected it to be a better control surface, in addition to being visible to the pilot in flight. They believed it impossible to provide both control and stability in a single design, and opted for control.


title: Canard (aeronautics)

text: Many pioneers initially followed the Wrights' lead. For example, the Santos-Dumont 14-bis aeroplane of 1906 had no "tail", but a box kite-like set of control surfaces in the front, pivoting on a universal joint on the fuselage's extreme nose, making it capable of incorporating both yaw and pitch control. The Fabre Hydravion of 1910 was the first floatplane to fly and had a foreplane.


title: Canard (aeronautics)

text: But canard behaviour was not properly understood and other European pioneers—among them, Louis Blériot—were establishing the tailplane as the safer and more "conventional" design. Some, including the Wrights, experimented with both fore and aft planes on the same aircraft, now known as the three surface configuration.


title: Canard (aeronautics)

text: After 1911, few canard types would be produced for many decades. In 1914 W.E. Evans commented that "the Canard type model has practically received its death-blow so far as scientific models are concerned."


title: Canard (aeronautics)

text: In 1917 de Bruyère constructed his C 1 biplane fighter, having a canard foreplane and rear-mounted pusher propeller. The C 1 was a failure.


title: Canard (aeronautics)

text: First flown in 1927, the experimental Focke-Wulf F 19 "Ente" (duck) was more successful. Two examples were built and one of them continued flying until 1931.


title: Canard (aeronautics)

text: Immediately before and during World War II, several experimental canard fighters were flown, including the Ambrosini SS.4, Curtiss-Wright XP-55 Ascender and Kyūshū J7W1 "Shinden". These were attempts at using the canard configuration to give advantages in areas such as performance, armament disposition or pilot view. Ultimately, no production aircraft were completed. The Shinden was ordered into production "off the drawing board" but only prototypes had flown by the time the war ended.


title: Canard (aeronautics)

text: In 1945 in Europe, what may have been the first canard designed and flown in the Soviet Union appeared as a test aircraft, the experimental Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-8 "Utka" (Russian for "duck"), a lightweight propeller aircraft. It was noted for its docile slow-speed handling characteristics and flew for some years, being used as a testbed during development of the swept wing of the (conventional layout) MiG-15 jet fighter.


title: Canard (aeronautics)

text: With the arrival of the jet age and supersonic flight, American designers, notably North American Aviation, began to experiment with supersonic canard delta designs, with some such as the North American XB-70 Valkyrie and the Soviet equivalent Sukhoi T-4 flying in prototype form. But the stability and control problems encountered prevented widespread adoption.


title: Canard (aeronautics)

text: In 1963 the Swedish company Saab patented a delta-winged design which overcame the earlier problems, in what has become known as the close-coupled canard. It was built as the Saab 37 Viggen and in 1967 became the first modern canard aircraft to enter production. The success of this aircraft spurred many designers, and canard surfaces sprouted on a number of types derived from the popular Dassault Mirage delta-winged jet fighter. These included variants of the French Dassault Mirage III, Israeli IAI Kfir and South African Atlas Cheetah. The close-coupled canard delta remains a popular configuration for combat aircraft.


title: Canard (aeronautics)

text: The Viggen also inspired the American Burt Rutan to create a two-seater homebuilt canard delta design, accordingly named VariViggen and flown in 1972. Rutan then abandoned the delta wing as unsuited to such light aircraft. His next two canard designs, the VariEze and Long-EZ had longer-span swept wings. These designs were not only successful and built in large numbers but were radically different from anything seen before. Rutan's ideas soon spread to other designers. From the 1980s they found favour in the executive market with the appearance of types such as the OMAC Laser 300, Avtek 400 and Beech Starship.


title: Canard (aeronautics)

text: Static canard designs can have complex interactions in airflow between the canard and the main wing, leading to issues with stability and behaviour in the stall. This limits their applicability. The development of fly-by-wire and artificial stability towards the end of the century opened the way for computerized controls to begin turning these complex effects from stability concerns into maneuverability advantages.


title: Canard (aeronautics)

text: This approach produced a new generation of military canard designs. The Dassault Rafale multirole fighter first flew in 1986, followed by the Saab Gripen (first to enter service) in 1988, and the Eurofighter Typhoon in 1994. These three types and related design studies are sometimes referred to as the euro-canards or eurocanards. The Chinese Chengdu J-10 appeared in 1998.


title: Canard (aeronautics)

text: A canard foreplane may be used for various reasons such as lift, (in)stability, trim, flight control, or to modify airflow over the main wing. Design analysis has been divided into two main classes, for the lifting-canard and the control-canard. These classes may follow the close-coupled type or not, and a given design may provide either or both of lift and control.


title: Canard (aeronautics)

text: In the lifting-canard configuration, the weight of the aircraft is shared between the wing and the canard. It has been described as an extreme conventional configuration but with a small highly loaded wing and an enormous lifting tail which enables the centre of mass to be very far aft relative to the front surface.


title: Canard (aeronautics)

text: A lifting canard generates an upload, in contrast to a conventional aft-tail which sometimes generates negative lift that must be counteracted by extra lift on the main wing. As the canard lift adds to the overall lift capability of the aircraft, this may appear to favor the canard layout. In particular, at takeoff the wing is most heavily loaded and where a conventional tail exerts a downforce worsening the load, a canard exerts an upward force relieving the load. This allows a smaller main wing.


title: Canard (aeronautics)

text: However, the foreplane also creates a downwash which can affect the wing lift distribution unfavorably, so the differences in overall lift and induced drag are not obvious and they depend on the details of the design.


title: Canard (aeronautics)

text: A danger associated with an insufficiently loaded canard—i.e. when the center of gravity is too far aft—is that when approaching stall, the main wing may stall first. This causes the rear of the craft to drop, deepening the stall and sometimes preventing recovery. To ensure safe pitch stability in the stall, the canard must stall first, so the wing must always stay below its maximum lift capability. Hence, the wing must be larger than otherwise necessary, reducing or even reversing the reduction in size enabled by the canard lift.


title: Canard (aeronautics)

text: With a lifting-canard type, the main wing must be located further aft of the center of gravity than a conventional wing, and this increases the downward pitching moment caused by the deflection of trailing-edge flaps. Highly loaded canards do not have sufficient extra lift available to balance this moment, so lifting-canard aircraft cannot readily be designed with powerful trailing-edge flaps.


title: Canard (aeronautics)

text: Pitch control in a canard type may be achieved either by the canard surface, as on the control-canard or in the same way as a tailless aircraft, by control surfaces at the rear of the main wing, as on the Saab Viggen.


title: Canard (aeronautics)

text: In a control-canard design, most of the weight of the aircraft is carried by the wing and the canard is used primarily for pitch control during maneuvering. A pure control-canard operates only as a control surface and is nominally at zero angle of attack and carrying no load in normal flight. Modern combat aircraft of canard configuration typically have a control-canard driven by a computerized flight control system.


title: Canard (aeronautics)

text: Canards with little or no loading (i.e. control-canards) may be used to intentionally destabilize some combat aircraft in order to make them more manoeuvrable. The electronic flight control system uses the pitch control function of the canard foreplane to create artificial static and dynamic stability.


title: Canard (aeronautics)

text: A benefit obtainable from a control-canard is the correction of pitch-up during a wingtip stall. An all-moving canard capable of a significant nose-down deflection can be used to counteract the pitch-up due to the tip stall. As a result, the aspect ratio and sweep of the wing can be optimized without having to guard against pitch-up. A highly loaded lifting canard does not have sufficient spare lift capacity to provide this protection.


title: Canard (aeronautics)

text: A canard foreplane may be used as a horizontal stabiliser, whether stability is achieved statically or artificially (fly-by-wire).


title: Canard (aeronautics)

text: Being placed ahead of the center of gravity, a canard foreplane acts directly to reduce longitudinal static stability (stability in pitch). The first airplane to achieve controlled, powered flight, the Wright Flyer, was conceived as a control-canard but in effect was also an unstable lifting canard. At that time the Wright brothers did not understand the basics of pitch stability of the canard configuration, and were in any event more concerned with controllability.


title: Canard (aeronautics)

text: Nevertheless, a canard stabiliser may be added to an otherwise unstable design to obtain overall static pitch stability. To achieve this stability, the change in canard lift coefficient with angle of attack (lift coefficient slope) should be less than that for the main plane. A number of factors affect this characteristic.


title: Canard (aeronautics)

text: For most airfoils, lift slope decreases at high lift coefficients. Therefore, the most common way in which pitch stability can be achieved is to increase the lift coefficient (so the wing loading) of the canard. This tends to increase the lift-induced drag of the foreplane, which may be given a high aspect ratio in order to limit drag. Such a canard airfoil has a greater airfoil camber than the wing.


title: Canard (aeronautics)

text: Another possibility is to decrease the aspect ratio of the canard, with again more lift-induced drag and possibly a higher stall angle than the wing.


title: Canard (aeronautics)

text: A design approach used by Burt Rutan is a high aspect ratio canard with higher lift coefficient (the wing loading of the canard is between 1.6 and 2 times the wing one) and a canard airfoil whose lift coefficient slope is non-linear (nearly flat) between 14° and 24°.


title: Canard (aeronautics)

text: Another stabilisation parameter is the power effect. In case of canard pusher propeller: "the power-induced flow clean up of the wing trailing edge" increases the wing lift coefficient slope (see above). Conversely, a propeller located ahead of the canard (increasing the lift slope of the canard) has a strong destabilising effect.


title: Canard (aeronautics)

text: A highly loaded lifting canard may not have sufficient spare lifting capacity to accommodate large movements of the centre of pressure or of the centre of gravity. Trim may be accomplished in similar manner to a tailless craft, by adjustment of trailing-edge surfaces. In particular, the use of landing flaps on the main wing causes a large trim change. The Saab Viggen has flaps on the canard surface which were deployed simultaneously to cancel out the change in trim. The Beech Starship uses variable-sweep foreplanes to trim the position of the lift force.


title: Canard (aeronautics)

text: When the main wing is most loaded, at takeoff, to rotate the nose up a conventional tailplane typically pushes down while a foreplane lifts up. In order to maintain trim the main wing on a canard design must therefore be located further aft relative to the centre of gravity than on the equivalent conventional design.


title: Canard (aeronautics)

text: A close-coupled canard has been shown to benefit a supersonic delta wing design which gains lift in both transonic flight (such as for supercruise) and also in low speed flight (such as take offs and landings).


title: Canard (aeronautics)

text: In the close-coupled delta wing canard, the foreplane is located just above and forward of the wing. The vortices generated by a delta-shaped foreplane flow back past the main wing and interact with its own vortices. Because these are critical for lift, a badly-placed foreplane can cause severe problems. By bringing the foreplane close to the wing and just above it in a close-coupled arrangement, the interactions can be made beneficial, actually helping to solve other problems too. For example, at high angles of attack (and therefore typically at low speeds) the canard surface directs airflow downward over the wing, reducing turbulence which results in reduced drag and increased lift. Typically the foreplane creates a vortex which attaches to the upper surface of the wing, stabilising and re-energising the airflow over the wing and delaying or preventing the stall.


title: Canard (aeronautics)

text: The canard foreplane may be fixed as on the IAI Kfir, have landing flaps as on the Saab Viggen, or be moveable and also act as a control-canard during normal flight as on the Dassault Rafale.


title: Canard (aeronautics)

text: A free-floating canard is designed to change its angle of incidence to the fuselage without pilot input. In normal flight, the air pressure distribution maintains its angle of attack to the airflow, and therefore also the lift coefficient it generates, to a constant amount. A free-floating mechanism may increase static stability and provide safe recovery from high angle of attack evolutions. However, it negatively affects stall characteristics, since the main wing may stall before the canard. Control surfaces may be added to the free-floating canard, allowing pilot input to affect the generated lift, thus providing pitch control or trim adjustment.


title: Canard (aeronautics)

text: The Beechcraft Starship has a variable sweep canard surface. The sweep is varied in flight by swinging the foreplanes forward to increase their effectiveness and so trim out the nose-down pitching effect caused by the wing flaps when deployed.


title: Canard (aeronautics)

text: A moustache is a small, high aspect ratio foreplane which is deployed for low-speed flight in order to improve handling at high angles of attack such as during takeoff and landing. It is retracted at high speed in order to avoid the wave drag penalty of a canard design. It was first seen on the Dassault Milan and later on the Tupolev Tu-144. NASA has also investigated a one-piece slewed equivalent called the conformably stowable canard, where as the surface is stowed one side sweeps backwards and the other forwards.


title: Canard (aeronautics)

text: The Rockwell B-1 Lancer has small canard vanes or fins on either side of the forward fuselage that form part of an active damping system that reduces aerodynamic buffeting during high-speed, low altitude flight. Such buffeting would otherwise cause crew fatigue and reduce airframe life during prolonged flights.


title: Canard (aeronautics)

text: Canard aircraft can potentially have poor stealth characteristics because they present large angular surfaces that tend to reflect radar signals forwards. The Eurofighter Typhoon uses software control of its canards in order to reduce its effective radar cross section.


title: Canard (aeronautics)

text: Canards have been incorporated on stealth aircraft such as Lockheed Martin's Joint Advanced Strike Technology (JAST) program. and McDonnell Douglas / NASA's X-36 research prototype.


title: Martie Maguire

text: Martha Elenor Maguire (née Erwin, previously Seidel; October 12, 1969) is an American musician who is a founding member of both the all-female alternative country band The Chicks and country bluegrass duo Court Yard Hounds. She won awards in national fiddle championships while still a teenager. Maguire is accomplished on several other instruments, including the mandolin, viola, double bass and guitar. She has written and co-written a number of the band's songs, some of which have become chart-topping hits. She also contributes her skills in vocal harmony and backing vocals, as well as orchestrating string arrangements for the band.


title: Martie Maguire

text: Maguire learned several instruments at a young age, honing her skills with her younger sister, Emily Strayer (born Emily Erwin) and two schoolmates (a brother and sister team, Troy and Sharon Gilchrist) for over five years as a part of a touring bluegrass quartet while in high school. After graduation, the sisters forged an alliance with two other women they had met through the Dallas music scene, Laura Lynch and Robin Lynn Macy, forming a bluegrass and country music band, busking and touring the bluegrass festival circuits for six years. After the departure of Macy, and the replacement of Lynch with singer Natalie Maines, the band widened their musical repertoire and appearance. The result was a trio so commercially successful that it took the country music industry by surprise, with 19 singles hitting the Billboard Country Charts, 2 Diamond Albums, 2 Platinum albums, and 13 Grammy Awards. Maguire subsequently stood by her bandmates as they were engulfed in a 2003 controversy for criticizing George W. Bush, which led to The Chicks being blacklisted by many country radio stations.


title: Martie Maguire

text: Encouraged by her parents – educators at private schools – Maguire began playing violin at age five, and by age 12, started to learn to play "fiddle style" after receiving a birthday gift of fiddle lessons. She also was active in her school orchestra.


title: Martie Maguire

text: Her sister Emily shared her love and interest in music, and displayed early talent herself. The two sisters were provided musical instruction on several instruments, and their talent for vocal harmony continued to be nurtured. Although Maguire became famous for her harmony and mastery of the fiddle, she also plays a variety of strings that include the viola, guitar, mandolin, and double bass. Maguire composes songs and arranges the use of stringed instruments for concert and recording performances.


title: Martie Maguire

text: By 1983, Maguire was touring with her sister Emily and school friends siblings Troy and Sharon Gilchrist. The sisters showed an "almost obsessive" interest in busking at small venues and attending bluegrass festivals. The four students formed the teenage bluegrass group "Blue Night Express", playing together for five years, from 1984 to 1989, while still attending private Greenhill School. "We'd drive down to the west end of Dallas and open our cases, and that was our job," Maguire said of it in a later interview to 60 Minutes II correspondent Dan Rather. "That's how we made money in high school." Also while in high school Maguire performed at Six Flags Over Texas in Arlington, TX, in a strolling duo with Troy Gilchrist for a summer.


title: Martie Maguire

text: In 1987, Maguire was awarded second place for the fiddle in the National fiddle championships held yearly in Winfield, Kansas. Upon graduation from high school, with Emily still in high school, she spent a year attending college at Southwestern University in Georgetown, Texas, from 1988 to 1989. She performed in the school orchestra there and again competed in the national fiddle championships at the Walnut Valley Festival, in Winfield, earning third place that year.


title: Martie Maguire

text: In 1989, Maguire and Strayer joined guitarist Robin Lynn Macy and Laura Lynch on double bass in the Dixie Chicks, playing what was at the time predominantly bluegrass music and a mix of country standards. Originally listed as Martha, and then Martie Erwin, Maguire played fiddle, mandolin, viola and harmonized with Strayer on backing vocals.


title: Martie Maguire

text: Maguire had begun writing and recording songs on their debut independent album, "Thank Heavens for Dale Evans", and in 2001, one song co-written with Laura Lynch called "Pink Toenails" resurfaced. The song was featured in the film, "Don't Say A Word", with Skye McCole Bartusiak performing the song.


title: Martie Maguire

text: When their second album had a more polished sound, Maguire commented, "I hope our fans won't be disappointed [in "The Little Ol' Cowgirl"]; it's got drums on every track; it's no longer bluegrass, but we have to make a living and you can't do that playing bluegrass."


title: Martie Maguire

text: Two albums later, after Natalie Maines became the lead vocalist of The Chicks, the band's commercial success skyrocketed. Maguire said of their music, "It's very rootsy, but then Natalie comes in with a rock and blues influence. That gave Emily and I a chance to branch out, because we loved those kinds of music but felt limited by our instruments."


title: Martie Maguire

text: Maguire co-wrote the song, "Cowboy Take Me Away" on the Chicks' album "Fly" for her sister Emily. It was a tribute to Emily's courtship with country music writer/singer Charlie Robison. Maguire was singled out by BMI in 2000, and awarded Songwriter of the Year for writing and/or co-writing "Cowboy Take Me Away", "Ready To Run" and "You Were Mine". "You Were Mine" was co-written by the sisters about their parents' divorce.


title: Martie Maguire

text: In 1999, the Dixie Chicks performed two songs, recording a cover of the song, "You Can't Hurry Love" as well as Maguire's "Ready to Run" for the Julia Roberts/ Richard Gere film "Runaway Bride". In 2003, Maguire was nominated for a Tony Award for co-composing the film score to "Urban Cowboy"; the musical used her "Cowboy Take Me Away".


title: Martie Maguire

text: After the band achieved massive commercial success with its first two Sony studio albums with Maines, they struggled with their record company over artistic direction on the third. Maguire commented, "I don't think any of us ever trusted Nashville. When you're in that town you know everybody is talking about everybody else. Everybody is wishing for the other guy to fail."


title: Martie Maguire

text: Although Maguire and Strayer often appear quiet and demure compared to their animated bandmate Natalie Maines, the trio have stood united on controversial subjects since they banded together to play in 1995, even when their opinions have had the potential to serve them more harm than good. In 2006, Maguire said, "I'd rather have a smaller following of really cool people who get it, who will grow with us as we grow and are fans for life, than people that have us in their five-disc changer with Reba McEntire and Toby Keith. We don't want those kinds of fans. They limit what you can do."


title: Martie Maguire

text: With Natalie Maines taking a break from music, Maguire was working on a solo fiddle album; however, it was announced in January 2010 that she and sister Emily Strayer have formed a side project called the Court Yard Hounds, with Strayer on lead vocals. The band made their live debut in March at South by Southwest with an album released in May 2010.


title: Martie Maguire

text: Maguire married pharmaceutical representative Ted Seidel on June 17, 1995, and changed her last name to Seidel. She also was stepmother to his son, Carter. However, her marriage did not last, and she and Ted Seidel were divorced in November 1999.


title: Martie Maguire

text: At bandmate Natalie Maines' sister Kim's wedding, Martie met Gareth Maguire, a Roman Catholic teacher and actor from Carnlough, Northern Ireland. The couple became engaged in June 2001 and married on August 10, 2001, in a civil ceremony in Hawaii; as explained at one of their concerts, the Dixie Chicks' song "White Trash Wedding" is based on Martie's relationship with Gareth. Later they had a Catholic "blessing" ceremony in the groom's hometown, Carnlough in County Antrim, Northern Ireland, on March 9, 2002, for all the guests that were not able to attend the first wedding. Maguire said of the ceremony that the Catholic Church would not permit a wedding service due to her prior divorce. Maguire said that there were many "special" people that they had wanted to include, but that they just could not wait to marry. Another reason for the rush was Gareth's need to keep flying back and forth between the United States and Ireland because of visa considerations. After her second marriage, Maguire changed her name to that of her new husband, which is why in her musical career she has been credited by all three of her surnames: Erwin, Seidel, and Maguire.


title: Martie Maguire

text: Maguire and her second husband had three daughters together: fraternal twins Eva Ruth and Kathleen 'Katie' Emilie were born April 27, 2004. Katie was named after Gareth's late sister, Kathleen. Their third daughter, Harper Rosie Maguire was born July 25, 2008. The couple divorced in 2013. In February 2022, it was revealed Maguire is married to Clem Moore


title: Martie Maguire

text: Maguire has been frank about using in vitro fertilization to conceive their daughters. In an interview in "Conceive", she said, "All my paperwork said 'unspecified origin.' We spent three years of active trying before we went to IVF. First I went on Clomid. Then I had some dye tests and found I had a collapsed tube, so I had laparoscopic surgery; the tube wasn't blocked, just spasming." After three attempts at intrauterine insemination, she said, she and her husband didn't think it was worth continuing in that manner, and switched to IVF. In August 2007, Maguire began IVF again, resulting in their third daughter Harper. In 2008, regarding the number of children the Dixie Chicks had produced in the past seven years, (Maines had two; Strayer had four in addition to Maguire's twins and newborn) Maguire told "People" "We'll have to move over and let the little chicks take over! We've got a new band!"


title: Martie Maguire

text: Maguire and Strayer co-wrote a song, "So Hard", about their own personal experiences with infertility and their need to rely on other methods to conceive. They speak out about the difficulties they faced, but also their good fortune; both having options that for many women are financially prohibitive. Mentioning the stigma attached to IVF, Maguire said, "I think we feel a responsibility to break down some barriers. It's much more of a common problem than people realize." A final concern Maguire mentioned was the question of what to do with all the unused frozen embryos.Now that I have children, I see those embryos as possible children. So I have to think about what my options are if there are leftovers again. I could keep them in storage, and maybe they will help my children some day. Or I can try to donate them to stem cell research. I don't think I could give them to another family. I would always worry: what if it's an abusive family? What if they don't get enough love?


title: Detective Chinatown 3

text: Detective Chinatown 3 () is a 2021 Chinese comedy mystery buddy film directed and written by Chen Sicheng, starring Wang Baoqiang and Liu Haoran. It is a sequel to "Detective Chinatown 2" (2018) and is the third installment in the "Detective Chinatown" series. It was released on 12 February 2021.


title: Detective Chinatown 3

text: The film set several box office records, including the biggest opening weekend ever in a single territory. Grossing over US$699 million, becoming the highest-grossing non-American R-rated film of all time. It is also the sixth-highest-grossing film of 2021 and the sixth-highest-grossing non-English film of all time.


title: Detective Chinatown 3

text: After the events in Bangkok and New York, Tang Ren and Qin Feng are invited to Tokyo to investigate another crime that has occurred there, leading to a battle between the strongest detectives in Asia. The film starts with Tang and Qin on plane eating junk food and Tang needs to use the bathroom. Later, he was escorted to meet the suspected murder of the Don who stated not guilty. Following examination of the body, Tang found a needle prick in the victim's body, which was not reported in the autopsy report. Also, he used a visual stimulisor of the broken glasses and found the missing glass from the murdered Don´s car. Tang convinces the judge that Anna had committed the murder by showing the murder weapon and examining the CCTV footages. Anna was the daughter of the suspected murderer, who left her and her mother in their worst times. Driven by revenge of her mother's sufferings and death, Anna planned to make her father suffer, by making him suspect of the murder she had committed. The film ends with all the detectives from the investigation app united against Q, who turned out to be a group of individuals with high IQ, planning to destroy the established systems of the world.


title: Detective Chinatown 3

text: The film was initially planned for release in China for the 2020 Chinese New Year but the release was postponed due to the COVID-19 pandemic in China. The film was rescheduled and released on February 12, 2021.


title: Detective Chinatown 3

text: "Detective Chinatown 3" made RMB 673 million ($104 million) in advance tickets for its opening day and RMB 950 million ($147 million) for its first week, the highest amount ever in China beating "" ($95.5 million) and resulting in a projected opening weekend of over $200 million. The film grossed $163 million (RMB 1.05 billion) on its first day of release, the biggest opening day in world history (beating "Endgame"s $157 million in North America) and pushing weekend projections to as high as $400 million. The film ended up debuting to RMB 2.56 billion ($398 million), becoming the biggest opening weekend ever in a single territory (beating "Endgame"s $357 million in April 2019). The film grossed over US$424 million in its opening weekend, making it the ninth-highest-grossing opening for a film. By the end of its second weekend the film had a running total of RMB 4.36 billion ($673 million), making it the fifth-highest-grossing film of 2021 and the sixth-highest-grossing non-English film of all time.


title: Detective Chinatown 3

text: Peter Bradshaw of "The Guardian" gave the film 3/5 stars, calling it "more no-holds-barred slapstick action". Todd McCarthy of "Deadline Hollywood" was less favorable, writing: "Its enormous box office numbers notwithstanding, I have to rate "Detective Chinatown 3" as something of a disappointment after the raucously engaging first two entries." John Berra of "Screen International" gave the film a favorable review, writing that it "exudes a heightened zaniness which is most welcome in today's largely homogenised franchise landscape" and "is an insanely colourful, no expense spared blockbuster".


title: Detective Chinatown 3

text: Chinese audiences on Maoyan gave the film a 8.8/10, while those on Douban gave it an average score of 5.6.


title: Prehistoric Planet

text: Prehistoric Planet is a British-American five-part nature documentary streaming television series about dinosaurs that premiered on Apple TV+ beginning May 23, 2022. It is produced by the BBC Studios Natural History Unit with Jon Favreau as showrunner, visual effects by MPC, and narration by natural historian David Attenborough. The documentary follows dinosaurs and other prehistoric animals recreated with computer-generated imagery living around the globe in the Late Cretaceous period, 66 million years ago (Maastrichtian), just before the dinosaurs’ extinction. It set out to depict prehistoric life using current palaeontological research by including accurately feathered dinosaurs, and probable speculative animal behaviour.


title: Prehistoric Planet

text: Hans Zimmer, Kara Talve and Anže Rozman composed the soundtrack. It is the first major dinosaur-focused documentary series produced by the BBC since "Planet Dinosaur" in 2011, and the third overall (the first was "Walking with Dinosaurs" in 1999). "Prehistoric Planet" received critical acclaim for its visual effects, depiction of dinosaurs, and Attenborough's narration.


title: Prehistoric Planet

text: A documentary that follows dinosaurs recreated with computer-generated imagery living around the globe in the Late Cretaceous period, 66 million years ago. It set out to depict dinosaurs using current paleontological research such as feathered dinosaurs.


title: Prehistoric Planet

text: According to palaeontologist and consultant Steve Brusatte, the series had been in development "a decade" prior to its trailer release. On May 8, 2019, it was first reported by "Deadline" that Apple had ordered a new documentary series by BBC Studios titled "Prehistoric Planet", to be executively produced by Jon Favreau. An original score was composed by Kara Talve, Anže Rozman and Hans Zimmer.


title: Prehistoric Planet

text: The series uses up-to-date palaeontological research to depict its animals of the Cretaceous with scientific rigour; for example, feathered dinosaurs are featured in the series, such as juvenile "Tyrannosaurus rex." Palaeozoologist Darren Naish was the lead consultant for the depictions of prehistoric life in the series. The concept art and creature design was created by Jellyfish Pictures, while computer-generated imagery was developed by MPC and intended to be photorealistic, as with their previous productions "The Jungle Book" (2016) and "The Lion King" (2019).


title: Prehistoric Planet

text: A first sneak peek was posted to the official Apple TV+ YouTube channel on April 2, 2022, along with a trailer, with a May 23 airdate set for the first episode. A ten-second teaser was released on April 19, 2022, followed by an official trailer the following day. A second trailer was released on May 19, 2022, in the lead up to the show's premiere.


title: Prehistoric Planet

text: After its release, the series consultants other than Darren Naish were revealed to be Steve Brusatte, Alexander Farnsworth, Kiersten Formoso, Michael Habib, Scott Hartman, John R. Hutchinson, Luke Muscutt, Peter Skelton, Robert Spicer, Paul Valdes and Mark Witton. David Krentz, the director of "Dinosaur Revolution" and character designer on Disney's "Dinosaur", was also revealed to have been involved in the creature development and design.


title: Prehistoric Planet

text: The review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes reported a 100% approval rating with an average rating of 8.4/10, based on 30 reviews. The website's critics consensus reads, "Marrying state of the art visual effects with equally immersive narration by David Attenborough, "Prehistoric Planet" wondrously brings viewers back to the age of dinosaurs." On Metacritic, the series has a weighted average score of 85 out of 100, based on 8 reviews, indicating "universal acclaim".


title: Hollywoodbets

text: Hollywoodbets is a sports betting company based in South Africa. It is also known as Hollywood Sportsbook. It currently operates in South Africa, Mozambique, Ireland and the United Kingdom. The company offers betting via its website, mobisite, call centre, and USSD. It has retail branches in South Africa and Mozambique.


title: Hollywoodbets

text: Hollywoodbets offers betting on horse racing, football/soccer, cricket, rugby, tennis, motorsport and more. Hollywoodbets offers over 1775 Lucky Numbers draws a week to bet on (fixed odds betting on lotto draws). Other products offered include Betgames Africa, Ezugi, Evolution, Live Instant Win, Jika Sports, Golden Race, and Spina Zonke (slots).


title: Hollywoodbets

text: Hollywoodbets was ranked number 8 on the list of the "Top 50 Gaming Sites Worldwide" published by iGaming Business Magazine in March 2019.


title: Hollywoodbets

text: Hollywoodbets originally started in 1986 as a small South African based publishing company named Winning Form that handled the publishing and distribution of racecards for South African Horse Racing. Winning Form still publishes racecards for all South African racing.


title: Hollywoodbets

text: Hollywoodbets entered the bookmaking industry with the opening of its first betting branch in Argyle Road, Durban in 2000. This was later followed by the opening of the current flagship branch, Hollywood Park in Springfield Park, Durban.


title: Hollywoodbets

text: Hollywoodbets currently operates in four countries. South Africa, Mozambique, Ireland, and the United Kingdom.


title: Hollywoodbets

text: Hollywoodbets operates 96 shops across South Africa under a number of gaming licences issued by regulators in Gauteng, Western Cape, Eastern Cape, Free State, Limpopo, Mpumalanga, and KwaZulu-Natal.


title: Hollywoodbets

text: There are currently two Hollywoodbets branches in Maputo, Mozambique; as well as a mobile platform to bet on.


title: Hollywoodbets

text: In November 2018, Hollywoodbets went live with its website in Ireland, making its services available to Irish customers. In March 2019, the company went live with its website in the United Kingdom. Their betting licence was issued by the UK Gambling.


title: Hollywoodbets

text: The company is the current title sponsor of the Hollywoodbets Dolphins cricket team. They started as associate sponsors of the franchise in the 2015/16 season, before becoming the title sponsors in the 2016/17 season.


title: Hollywoodbets

text: Hollywoodbets sponsored the KwaZulu-Natal Coastal and KwaZulu-Natal Inland teams for the 2017 Africa T20 Cup. Hollywoodbets KZN Inland went onto win the tournament, after defeating Free State in the final. At the start of the 2018/19 domestic cricket season, Hollywoodbets committed to sponsoring both the KwaZulu-Natal Coastal and the KwaZulu-Natal Inland senior provincial teams for the duration of the season, covering the Africa T20 Cup, 3 Day Cup and 50 Over competition.


title: Hollywoodbets

text: Hollywoodbets came on board as the title sponsors of the Murray Cup in 2018. This is a rugby knock-out competition involving clubs from the KwaZulu-Natal Rugby Union.


title: Hollywoodbets

text: Hollywoodbets became the title sponsors of the Phaka rugby show on Supersport in February 2019. Hollywoodbets’ new sponsorship relationship with the show will allow the company to assist development rugby teams who desperately need the support and equipment to be able to grow their talented players.


title: Hollywoodbets

text: On Thursday, 27 June 2019, Hollywoodbets was announced as the naming rights sponsor for both Greyville and Scottsville racecourses in a 3-year deal. The racecourses will now be known as Hollywoodbets Greyville Racecourse and Hollywoodbets Scottsville Racecourse.


title: Hollywoodbets

text: On Monday, 7 October 2019, Hollywoodbets was announced as the naming rights sponsor for Kingsmead Cricket Ground in a 5-year deal, that would see the commitment run until August 2024.


title: Hollywoodbets

text: In February 2020, Hollywoodbets became the official betting partner to LaLiga in South Africa. The partnership included soccer development and community work across underprivileged parts of South Africa, with the focus on making an impact on the game at grassroots levels.


title: Hollywoodbets

text: On Sunday, 16 May 2021, Hollywoodbets was announced as the title sponsor of the SAFA National Womens Soccer League, with the tournament being renamed the Hollywoodbets Super League. The Hollywoodbets logo would be shown across the front of all the teams' jerseys for the 2021/22 season.


title: Hollywoodbets

text: On Friday, 16 July 2021, Hollywoodbets was announced as the principal partner of Brentford Football Club. The Hollywoodbets logo will be shown across the front of the club's home, away and third shirts throughout the 2021/22 English Premier League. The initial deal was signed for a period of two years.


title: Hollywoodbets

text: In December 2021, Hollywoodbets acquired the naming rights to Kings Park Rugby Stadium, the home of the Sharks in Durban. The 52 000-seater arena will be known as Hollywoodbets Kings Park from January 2021.


title: Hollywoodbets

text: In February 2022, Hollywoodbets took over from Vodacom as the title sponsor of the Durban July Handicap, becoming only the third sponsor in the last 59 years. The sponsorship included an increase in the prize purse for the main race to a record R5 million in stakes. The Hollywoodbets Durban July will take place on Saturday 2nd July 2022.


title: Hollywoodbets

text: Every Hollywoodbets branch in South Africa supports a local charity, as well as a local sports team, as part of their Social Responsibility Programme, commonly known as the Hollywoodbets MyCommunity Programme. Included are children's homes, community centers, old-age homes and schools.


title: Hollywoodbets

text: With regards to community sports teams, they include soccer teams, cricket teams, rugby and other sports.


title: Hollywoodbets

text: In September 2021, Hollywoodbets announced the launch of the Hollywood Foundation. The Hollywood Foundation will operate as a “fully-fledged non-profit organisation that plays an active role in the communities within which it operates." The Foundation works on projects focussing on welfare, education, sports, arts and culture as well as investing in SMMEs.


title: Hollywoodbets

text: The Hollywood Bunny Bar branches, under the Hollywoodbets banner, currently consists of 8 branches located in the South African provinces of Gauteng, KwaZulu-Natal, the Eastern Cape and Western Cape. These branches are famous for their authentic Durban curries, and won the award for Best Bunny Chow in 2014 after winning the Bunny Chow Barometer Challenge 2014.


title: Hollywoodbets

text: In 2016, former Orlando Pirates and Bafana Bafana soccer player Jerry Sikhosana was named as a brand ambassador for Hollywoodbets. In 2017, former Kaizer Chiefs, Mamelodi Sundowns and Bafana Bafana goalkeeper Brian Baloyi also joined as a brand ambassador for Hollywoodbets.


title: Hollywoodbets

text: In 2019, rugby twins Akona Ndungane and Odwa Ndungane joined Hollywoodbets as Brand Ambassadors. The pair are actively involved in Hollywood's partnership with the Phaka rugby programme on SuperSport, as well as initiatives through the twin's Ndungane Foundation.


title: Hollywoodbets

text: In March 2020, former South African Champion jockey Anthony Delpech joined on as a brand ambassador for Hollywoodbets. His main role is to assist in managing the Hollywood Syndicate, the horse racing ownership arm of Hollywoodbets.


title: Hollywoodbets

text: In April 2020, former South African cricketer Mike Procter joined on as a brand ambassador for Hollywoodbets. Work was done in conjunction with the Mike Procter Foundation, as well as Ottawa Primary School in Durban, where Procter runs the physical education programme.


title: Hollywoodbets

text: In 2020, South African-born actress Nomzamo Mbatha joined Hollywoodbets as a brand ambassador. Hollywoodbets works with the actress and her Lighthouse Foundation in various community development and bursary projects.


title: Hollywoodbets

text: In December 2021, radio sports talk show host Robert Marawa was introduced as a Hollywoodbets brand ambassador, and appeared in TV commercials and advertisements for the brand.


title: Hollywoodbets

text: In February 2022, sports broadcaster Carol Tshabalala, known as South Africa’s "First Lady of Sport", signed as the latest Brand Ambassador for Hollywoodbets.


title: Hollywoodbets

text: In 2018 at the Gambling Industry Awards held in South Africa, Hollywoodbets was awarded best Corporate Social Investment (CSI), Best Sports Betting Campaign for 2018, Best Employer of the Year and Best CEO of the Year (Suren Rampersadh).


title: Hollywoodbets

text: In 2021, Hollywoodbets was voted as KwaZulu-Natal's Brand of the Year at the Standard Bank KZN Top Business Awards.


title: Cape Fear (1962 film)

text: Cape Fear is a 1962 American noir psychological thriller film starring Gregory Peck, Robert Mitchum, and Polly Bergen. It was adapted by James R. Webb from the 1957 novel "The Executioners" by John D. MacDonald. The picture was directed by J. Lee Thompson from storyboards devised by original director Alfred Hitchcock and released on April 12, 1962. The film concerns an attorney whose family is stalked by a criminal he helped to send to jail. The supporting cast features Martin Balsam, Telly Savalas and Barrie Chase.


title: Cape Fear (1962 film)

text: "Cape Fear" was remade in 1991 by Martin Scorsese. Peck, Mitchum, and Balsam all appeared as different characters in the remake.


title: Cape Fear (1962 film)

text: In Southeast Georgia, Max Cady is released from prison after serving an eight-year sentence for rape. He promptly tracks down Sam Bowden, a lawyer whom he holds personally responsible for his conviction because Sam interrupted his attack and testified against him. Cady begins to stalk and subtly threaten Bowden's family. He kills the Bowden family dog, though Sam cannot prove Cady did it. A friend of Bowden, Police Chief Mark Dutton, attempts to intervene on Bowden's behalf, but he cannot prove Cady guilty of any crime.


title: Cape Fear (1962 film)

text: Bowden hires private detective Charlie Sievers. Cady brutally rapes a young woman, Diane Taylor, when he brings her home, but neither the private eye nor Bowden can persuade her to testify. Bowden hires three men to beat up Cady and coerce him to leave town, but the plan backfires when Cady gets the better of all three. Cady's lawyer vows to have Bowden disbarred.


title: Cape Fear (1962 film)

text: Afraid for his wife Peggy and 14-year-old daughter Nancy, Bowden takes them to their houseboat in the Cape Fear region of North Carolina. In an attempt to trick Cady, Bowden makes it seem as though he has gone to Atlanta. He fully expects Cady to follow his wife and daughter, and he plans on killing Cady to end the battle. On a dark night, Bowden and local deputy Kersek hide in the swamp nearby, but Cady realizes that Kersek is there and drowns him, leaving no evidence of a struggle. Eluding Bowden and setting the houseboat adrift down current, Cady first attacks Mrs. Bowden on the boat, causing Bowden to go to her rescue. Meanwhile, Cady swims back to shore to attack Nancy. Bowden realizes what has happened, and also swims ashore.


title: Cape Fear (1962 film)

text: The two men engage in a final fight on the riverbank. Bowden manages to reach his gun, which he had dropped, and shoots Cady, wounding and disabling him. Cady tells Bowden, "Finish the job", but Bowden decides to do the thing that Cady earlier told him would be unbearableput him in prison for the rest of his life, to "count the years, the months, the hours". In the morning light, the Bowden family are together on a boat, traveling with police back to port.


title: Cape Fear (1962 film)

text: In addition, Edward Platt, the future "Chief" on the television series "Get Smart", and November 1958 "Playboy" Playmate centerfold Joan Staley make brief appearances as a judge and a waitress, respectively.


title: Cape Fear (1962 film)

text: Cornel Wilde acquired the rights to John D. MacDonald's novel "The Executioners" for $30,000 in 1958. Gregory Peck had his own production company, Melville Productions, in partnership with Sy Bartlett, which had made "The Big Country" and "Pork Chop Hill" and they later purchased the rights. They planned to make it after "The Guns of Navarone". Peck was impressed by J. Lee Thompson's work on that film and hired him for "Cape Fear". Peck said his goal was to make "first class professional entertainment intelligently done."


title: Cape Fear (1962 film)

text: Telly Savalas was screen tested for the role, but later played private eye Charlie Sievers. Robert Mitchum refused to play Max Cady when he was first offered the part, but eventually accepted it after Peck and Thompson delivered him flowers and a case of bourbon.


title: Cape Fear (1962 film)

text: Thompson wanted Hayley Mills, whom he had cast in "Tiger Bay", to play the daughter, but Mills was unavailable.


title: Cape Fear (1962 film)

text: Principal photography of "Cape Fear" began on April 6 and ended in June 1961. Thompson envisioned the film in black and white, believing that shooting the film in color would lessen the atmosphere. As an Alfred Hitchcock fan, he wanted to have Hitchcockian elements in the film, such as unusual lighting angles, an eerie musical score, closeups, and subtle hints rather than graphic depictions of the violence Cady has in mind for the family. Hitchcock collaborators Robert F. Boyle and George Tomasini served as production designer and editor.


title: Cape Fear (1962 film)

text: The outdoor scenes were filmed on location in Savannah, Georgia; Stockton, California; and the Universal Studios backlot at Universal City, California. The indoor scenes were done at Universal Studios Soundstage. Mitchum had a real-life aversion to Savannah, where as a teenager, he had been charged with vagrancy and put on a chain gang. This resulted in a number of the outdoor scenes being shot at Ladd's Marina in Stockton, including the culminating conflict on the houseboat at the end of the movie.


title: Cape Fear (1962 film)

text: The scene in which Mitchum attacks Polly Bergen's character on the houseboat was almost completely improvised. Before the scene was filmed, Thompson suddenly told a crew member: "Bring me a dish of eggs!" Mitchum's rubbing the eggs on Bergen was not scripted and Bergen's reactions were real. She also suffered back injuries from being knocked around so much. She felt the impact of the "attack" for days. While filming the scene, Mitchum cut open his hand, leading Bergen to recall: "his hand was covered in blood, my back was covered in blood. We just kept going, caught up in the scene. They came over and physically stopped us."


title: Cape Fear (1962 film)

text: In the source novel "The Executioners", by John D. MacDonald, Cady was a soldier court-martialed and convicted on then Lieutenant Bowden's testimony for the brutal rape of a 14-year-old girl. The censors stepped in, banned the use of the word "rape", and stated that depicting Cady as a soldier reflected adversely on U.S. military personnel.


title: Cape Fear (1962 film)

text: Bernard Herrmann, as often in his scores, uses a reduced version of the symphony orchestra. Here, other than a 46-piece string section (slightly larger than usual for film scores), he adds four flutes (doubling on two piccolos, two alto flutes in G, and two bass flutes in C) and eight French horns. No use is made of further wind instruments or percussion.


title: Cape Fear (1962 film)

text: In his 2002 book "A Heart at Fire's Center: The Life and Music of Bernard Herrmann", Stephen C. Smith writes:


title: Cape Fear (1962 film)

text: Although the word "rape" was entirely removed from the script before shooting, the film still enraged the censors, who worried that "there was a continuous threat of sexual assault on a child." To accept the film, British censors required extensive editing and deleting of specific scenes.


title: Cape Fear (1962 film)

text: After making around 6 minutes of cuts, the film still nearly garnered a British X rating (meaning at the time, "Suitable for those aged 18 and older", not necessarily meaning there was sexually explicit or violent content). Thompson said he had to make 161 cuts; the censor argued it was fifteen main cuts but admitted they took 5 minutes. The censor said this was primarily because the film involved threat of sexual assault against a child.


title: Cape Fear (1962 film)

text: "Cape Fear" was first made available on VHS on March 1, 1992. On May 14, 1992 it was released on laserdisc. It was later re-released on VHS, as well as DVD, on September 18, 2001. The film was released onto Blu-ray on January 8, 2013. It contains production photos and a "making-of" featurette.


title: Cape Fear (1962 film)

text: Upon its release, the film received positive but cautious feedback from critics due to the film's content.


title: Cape Fear (1962 film)

text: Bosley Crowther of "The New York Times" praised the "tough, tight script", as well as the film's "steady and starkly sinister style." He went on to conclude his review by saying, "this is really one of those shockers that provokes disgust and regret." The entertainment-trade magazine "Variety" reviewed the film as "competent and visually polished", while commenting on Mitchum's performance as a "menacing omnipresence."


title: Cape Fear (1962 film)

text: Although it makes no acknowledgement of "Cape Fear", the episode "The Force of Evil" from the 1977 NBC television series "Quinn Martin's Tales of the Unexpected" uses virtually the same plot, merely introducing an additional supernatural element to the released prisoner.


title: Cape Fear (1962 film)

text: The film and its remake serve as the basis for the 1993 "The Simpsons" episode "Cape Feare" in which Sideshow Bob, recently released from prison, stalks the Simpson family in an attempt to kill Bart.


title: Cape Fear (1962 film)

text: In April 2007, "Newsweek" selected Cady as one of the 10 best villains in cinema history. Specifically, the scene where Cady attacks Sam's family was ranked number 36 on Bravo's "100 Scariest Movie Moments" in 2004.


title: Cape Fear (1962 film)

text: A consumer poll on the Internet Movie Database rates "Cape Fear" as the 65th-best trial film, although the trial scenes are merely incidental to the plot.


title: Colombian Liberal Party

text: The Colombian Liberal Party (; PLC) is a centre to centre-left political party in Colombia. It was founded as a classical liberal party but later developed a more social-democratic tradition, joining the Socialist International in 1999.


title: Colombian Liberal Party

text: The Liberal Party was the dominant force in Colombian politics alongside the Colombian Conservative Party until 2002, when the election victory of independent candidate Álvaro Uribe put an end to dominance of two party politics in Colombia.


title: Colombian Liberal Party

text: Currently, the Liberal Party is the largest party in Congress, and has formed a coalition with the Social Party of National Unity, the major independent party in Colombia under the presidency of Ivan Duque.


title: Colombian Liberal Party

text: The party was founded in 1848 and, in opposition to the Colombian Conservative Party, became one of the two main political forces in the country for over a century. The two parties frequently engaged in armed conflict with one another, precipitating several civil wars.


title: Colombian Liberal Party

text: In the 1940s, the liberal party turned towards socialism under the influence of the charismatic lawyer Jorge Eliécer Gaitán, despite the antipathy it provoked among party members and liberal leaders. In the rural area, Gaitanism faced a bloody repression to which its scrupulous respect for legality did not prepare it: 15,000 militants were murdered between 1945 and 1948 by death squads supposedly close to the conservatives. Gaitán himself, who was a likely winner of the next presidential election, was assassinated in 1948.


title: Colombian Liberal Party

text: After the period known as La Violencia the Liberals and the Conservative Party reached an agreement to share power from 1958 to 1974 in the so-called National Front agreement that followed the fall of General Gustavo Rojas Pinilla. Nowadays there are many critics of the 16-year agreement but it greatly reduced the intensity of the violent political warfare that preceded it.


title: Colombian Liberal Party

text: Following the end of the National Front agreement in 1974, the Liberal Party dominated Colombian politics until 2002; Liberal candidates won five of the seven Presidential elections and the party was the largest in both the Chamber of Representatives and Senate throughout the entire period.


title: Colombian Liberal Party

text: In the 1994 election the Liberal Party's Ernesto Samper was narrowly elected president. Immediately afterwards he was accused of accepting millions from the Cali Cartel to fund his campaign. While Samper had immunity to prosecution as president, a number of his close associates were convicted of involvement in the so-called Proceso 8000 scandal, including Defence Minister Fernando Botero Zea. Partly due to the scandal the Liberal Party lost seats in the 1998 parliamentary election, although it remained easily the largest party. More seriously, the Liberals were defeated in the presidential election held the same year.


title: Colombian Liberal Party

text: The Liberal Party suffered a major split in the lead-up to the 2002 elections. Horacio Serpa Uribe, the party's unsuccessful 1998 presidential candidate was nominated to run again. However Álvaro Uribe, a former senator and governor from the party launched an independent presidential campaign, backed by the Conservatives and dissident Liberals. Whereas Serpa supported the ongoing idea of negotiations with FARC, Uribe advocated confronting the guerrillas. Uribe was victorious in the elections, securing a majority in the first round. In the aftermath, the "Government endorsed" leadership of the party continued to oppose Uribe's administration, but many senators and representatives supported the government, becoming known as the "Uribist" faction. As a compromise, former president César Gaviria Trujillo was elected party leader in 2005.


title: Colombian Liberal Party

text: At the 2006 legislative election, the Liberals lost around half their seats. While they remained the largest party in the Chamber of Representatives, they finished third in the Senate. Horacio Serpa was again nominated as the Liberal candidate for the subsequent presidential elections of 28 May 2006 and won 11.84% of the popular vote, placing him third, the worst ever result for a Liberal candidate.


title: Colombian Liberal Party

text: During the parliamentary elections of 14 March 2010, the Liberal Party obtained 17 senators and 37 representatives, placing third in both the Chamber of Representatives and Senate. At the 2010 presidential election Liberal candidate Rafael Pardo finished sixth with 4.38% of the vote, worse than Horacio Serpa's 2006 vote. The Liberal Party went on to join the governing coalition of President Juan Manuel Santos.


title: Aquatic ecosystem

text: An aquatic ecosystem is an ecosystem formed by surrounding a body of water, in contrast to land-based terrestrial ecosystems. Aquatic ecosystems contain communities of organisms that are dependent on each other and on their environment. The two main types of aquatic ecosystems are marine ecosystems and freshwater ecosystems. Freshwater ecosystems may be lentic (slow moving water, including pools, ponds, and lakes); lotic (faster moving water, for example streams and rivers); and wetlands (areas where the soil is saturated or inundated for at least part of the time).


title: Aquatic ecosystem

text: Aquatic ecosystems perform many important environmental functions. For example, they recycle nutrients, purify water, attenuate floods, recharge ground water and provide habitats for wildlife. Aquatic ecosystems are also used for human recreation, and are very important to the tourism industry, especially in coastal regions.


title: Aquatic ecosystem

text: The biotic characteristics are mainly determined by the organisms that occur. For example, wetland plants may produce dense canopies that cover large areas of sediment—or snails or geese may graze the vegetation leaving large mud flats. Aquatic environments have relatively low oxygen levels, forcing adaptation by the organisms found there. For example, many wetland plants must produce aerenchyma to carry oxygen to roots. Other biotic characteristics are more subtle and difficult to measure, such as the relative importance of competition, mutualism or predation. There are a growing number of cases where predation by coastal herbivores including snails, geese and mammals appears to be a dominant biotic factor.


title: Aquatic ecosystem

text: Autotrophic organisms are producers that generate organic compounds from inorganic material. Algae use solar energy to generate biomass from carbon dioxide and are possibly the most important autotrophic organisms in aquatic environments. The more shallow the water, the greater the biomass contribution from rooted and floating vascular plants. These two sources combine to produce the extraordinary production of estuaries and wetlands, as this autotrophic biomass is converted into fish, birds, amphibians and other aquatic species.


title: Aquatic ecosystem

text: Chemosynthetic bacteria are found in benthic marine ecosystems. These organisms are able to feed on hydrogen sulfide in water that comes from volcanic vents. Great concentrations of animals that feed on these bacteria are found around volcanic vents. For example, there are giant tube worms ("Riftia pachyptila") 1.5 m in length and clams ("Calyptogena magnifica") 30 cm long.


title: Aquatic ecosystem

text: Heterotrophic organisms consume autotrophic organisms and use the organic compounds in their bodies as energy sources and as raw materials to create their own biomass.


title: Aquatic ecosystem

text: Euryhaline organisms are salt tolerant and can survive in marine ecosystems, while stenohaline or salt intolerant species can only live in freshwater environments.


title: Aquatic ecosystem

text: An ecosystem is composed of biotic communities that are structured by biological interactions and abiotic environmental factors. Some of the important abiotic environmental factors of aquatic ecosystems include substrate type, water depth, nutrient levels, temperature, salinity, and flow. It is often difficult to determine the relative importance of these factors without rather large experiments. There may be complicated feedback loops. For example, sediment may determine the presence of aquatic plants, but aquatic plants may also trap sediment, and add to the sediment through peat.


title: Aquatic ecosystem

text: The amount of dissolved oxygen in a water body is frequently the key substance in determining the extent and kinds of organic life in the water body. Fish need dissolved oxygen to survive, although their tolerance to low oxygen varies among species; in extreme cases of low oxygen, some fish even resort to air gulping. Plants often have to produce aerenchyma, while the shape and size of leaves may also be altered. Conversely, oxygen is fatal to many kinds of anaerobic bacteria.


title: Aquatic ecosystem

text: Nutrient levels are important in controlling the abundance of many species of algae. The relative abundance of nitrogen and phosphorus can in effect determine which species of algae come to dominate. Algae are a very important source of food for aquatic life, but at the same time, if they become over-abundant, they can cause declines in fish when they decay. Similar over-abundance of algae in coastal environments such as the Gulf of Mexico produces, upon decay, a hypoxic region of water known as a dead zone.


title: Aquatic ecosystem

text: The salinity of the water body is also a determining factor in the kinds of species found in the water body. Organisms in marine ecosystems tolerate salinity, while many freshwater organisms are intolerant of salt. The degree of salinity in an estuary or delta is an important control upon the type of wetland (fresh, intermediate, or brackish), and the associated animal species. Dams built upstream may reduce spring flooding, and reduce sediment accretion, and may therefore lead to saltwater intrusion in coastal wetlands.


title: Aquatic ecosystem

text: Freshwater used for irrigation purposes often absorbs levels of salt that are harmful to freshwater organisms.


title: Aquatic ecosystem

text: The health of an aquatic ecosystem is degraded when the ecosystem's ability to absorb a stress has been exceeded. A stress on an aquatic ecosystem can be a result of physical, chemical or biological alterations to the environment. Physical alterations include changes in water temperature, water flow and light availability. Chemical alterations include changes in the loading rates of biostimulatory nutrients, oxygen-consuming materials, and toxins. Biological alterations include over-harvesting of commercial species and the introduction of exotic species. Human populations can impose excessive stresses on aquatic ecosystems.


title: Aquatic ecosystem

text: There are many examples of excessive stresses with negative consequences. The environmental history of the Great Lakes of North America illustrates this problem, particularly how multiple stresses, such as water pollution, over-harvesting and invasive species can combine. The Norfolk Broadlands in England illustrate similar decline with pollution and invasive species. Lake Pontchartrain along the Gulf of Mexico illustrates the negative effects of different stresses including levee construction, logging of swamps, invasive species and salt water intrusion.


title: Berlin Crisis of 1961

text: The Berlin Crisis of 1961 () occurred between 4 June – 9 November 1961, and was the last major European politico-military incident of the Cold War about the occupational status of the German capital city, Berlin, and of post–World War II Germany. The Berlin Crisis started when the USSR issued an ultimatum demanding the withdrawal of all armed forces from Berlin, including the Western armed forces in West Berlin. The crisis culminated in the city's "de facto" partition with the East German erection of the Berlin Wall.


title: Berlin Crisis of 1961

text: The 22nd Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union—the last to be attended by the Chinese Communist Party—was held in Moscow during the crisis.


title: Berlin Crisis of 1961

text: At the Vienna summit on 4 June 1961, tensions rose. Meeting with US President John F. Kennedy, Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev reissued the Soviet ultimatum to sign a separate peace treaty with East Germany and thus end the existing four-power agreements guaranteeing American, British, and French rights to access West Berlin and the occupation of East Berlin by Soviet forces. However, this time he did so by issuing a deadline of 31 December 1961. The three powers responded that any unilateral treaty could not affect their responsibilities and rights in West Berlin.


title: Berlin Crisis of 1961

text: In the growing confrontation over the status of Berlin, Kennedy undercut his own bargaining position during his Vienna summit negotiations with Khrushchev in June 1961. Kennedy essentially conveyed US acquiescence to the permanent division of Berlin. This made his later, more assertive public statements less credible to the Soviets. Kennedy decided on a flexible policy proposed by his younger advisors, with only a few concessions to the hardliners around Dean Acheson. The United States now defined three vital interests in its policy for Berlin, and linked all of them only to the western part of the city: the presence of Western troops in West Berlin; the security and viability of the western sectors; and Western access to them.


title: Berlin Crisis of 1961

text: As the confrontation over Berlin escalated, Kennedy delivered on July 25 a television speech in Washington on CBS, and broadcast nationwide in the US. He reiterated that the United States was not looking for a fight and that he recognized the "Soviet Union's historical concerns about their security in central and eastern Europe." He said he was willing to renew talks, but he also announced that he would ask Congress for an additional $3.25 billion for military spending, mostly on conventional weapons. He wanted six new divisions for the Army and two for the Marines, and he announced plans to triple the draft and to call up the reserves. Kennedy proclaimed: "We seek peace, but we shall not surrender."


title: Berlin Crisis of 1961

text: Vacationing in the Black Sea resort of Sochi, Khrushchev was reported to be angered by Kennedy's speech. John Jay McCloy, Kennedy's disarmament adviser, who happened to be in the Soviet Union, was invited to join Khrushchev. It is reported that Khrushchev explained to McCloy that Kennedy's military build-up threatened war.


title: Berlin Crisis of 1961

text: In early 1961, the East German government sought a way to stop its population leaving for the West. Walter Ulbricht, First Secretary of the Socialist Unity Party (SED) and Staatsrat chairman and thus East Germany's chief decision-maker, convinced the Soviet Union that force was necessary to stop this movement, although Berlin's four-power status required the allowance of free travel between zones and forbade the presence of German troops in Berlin.


title: Berlin Crisis of 1961

text: The East German government began stockpiling building materials for the erection of the Berlin Wall; this activity was widely known, but only a small circle of Soviet and East German planners believed that East Germans were aware of the purpose. This material included enough barbed wire to enclose the 156 km (97 mi) circumference of West Berlin. The regime managed to avoid suspicion by spreading out the purchases of barbed wire among several East German companies, which in turn spread their orders out among a range of firms in West Germany and the United Kingdom.


title: Berlin Crisis of 1961

text: On 15 June 1961, two months before the construction of the Berlin Wall started, Walter Ulbricht stated in an international press conference: ""Niemand hat die Absicht, eine Mauer zu errichten!"" ("No one has the intention to erect a wall"). It was the first time the term "Mauer" (wall) had been used in this context.


title: Berlin Crisis of 1961

text: On 4–7 August 1961, the foreign ministers of the US, UK, France and West Germany secretly met in Paris to discuss how to respond to the Soviet actions in West Berlin. They expressed a lack of willingness to engage in warfare. Within weeks, the KGB provided Khrushchev with descriptions of the Paris talks. These showed that US Secretary of State Dean Rusk, unlike the West Germans, supported talks with the Soviet Union, though the KGB and the GRU warned that the US was being pressured by other members of the alliance to consider economic sanctions against East Germany and other socialist countries and to move faster on plans for conventional and nuclear armament of their allies in Western Europe, such as the West German Bundeswehr.


title: Berlin Crisis of 1961

text: The West had advance intelligence about the construction of the Wall. On 6 August, a human intelligence source, a functionary in the SED, provided the 513th Military Intelligence Group (Berlin) with the correct date of the start of construction. At a weekly meeting of the Berlin Watch Committee on 9 August 1961, the Chief of the US Military Liaison Mission to the Commander Group of Soviet Forces Germany predicted the construction of a wall. An intercept of SED communications on the same day informed the West that there were plans to begin blocking all foot traffic between East and West Berlin. The interagency intelligence Watch Committee assessment said that this intercept "might be the first step in a plan to close the border", which turned out to be correct.


title: Berlin Crisis of 1961

text: On Saturday 12 August 1961, the leaders of East Germany attended a garden party at a government guesthouse in Döllnsee, in a wooded area to the north of East Berlin, and Walter Ulbricht signed the order to close the border and erect a Wall around West Berlin.


title: Berlin Crisis of 1961

text: At midnight, East Germany's border police, the East German army and units of the Soviet Army began to close the border; by morning on Sunday 13 August 1961, the border to West Berlin had been shut. East German troops and workers had begun to tear up streets running alongside the barrier to make them impassable to most vehicles, and to install barbed wire entanglements and fences along the around the three western sectors and the which actually divided West and East Berlin. Approximately 32,000 troops were employed for the building of the Wall, after which the Border Police became responsible for manning and improving it. To discourage Western interference and perhaps control potential riots, the Soviet Army was present.


title: Berlin Crisis of 1961

text: Kennedy did not give in to angry demands for immediate action raised by West Berliners and their mayor, Willy Brandt. Instead, he sent vice president Lyndon B. Johnson together with Lucius D. Clay, the hero of the Berlin Airlift of 1948‒49, to West Berlin on August 19. They managed to calm the population and demonstrate symbolically the United States' solidarity with the city. On August 20, 1,500 additional American soldiers arrived in West Berlin.


title: Berlin Crisis of 1961

text: On 30 August 1961, in response to moves by the Soviet Union to cut off access to Berlin, President Kennedy ordered 148,000 Guardsmen and Reservists to active duty. In October and November, more Air National Guard units were mobilised, and 216 aircraft from the tactical fighter units flew to Europe in operation "Stair Step", the largest jet deployment in the history of the Air Guard. Most of the mobilised Air Guardsmen remained in the US, while some others had been trained for delivery of tactical nuclear weapons and had to be retrained in Europe for conventional operations. The Air National Guard's ageing F-84s and F-86s required spare parts that the United States Air Forces in Europe lacked.


title: Berlin Crisis of 1961

text: Richard Bach wrote his book "Stranger to the Ground" centred around his experience as an Air National Guard pilot on this deployment.


title: Berlin Crisis of 1961

text: The four powers governing Berlin (Soviet Union, United States, United Kingdom, and France) had agreed at the 1945 Potsdam Conference that Allied personnel could move freely in any sector of Berlin. But on 22 October 1961, just two months after the construction of the Wall, the US Chief of Mission in West Berlin, E. Allan Lightner, was stopped in his car (which had occupation forces license plates) while crossing at Checkpoint Charlie to go to a theatre in East Berlin. President John F. Kennedy worked closely with retired Army General Lucius D. Clay, who had been in charge of the Berlin Airlift of 1948–1949. They decided to demonstrate American resolve. The American command in the West Berlin garrison considered a plan to pull down the wire and barricades with bulldozers. This, however, was overruled by the troop commander, Brigadier General Frederick O. Hartel. General Clay went to Berlin for 10 months.


title: Berlin Crisis of 1961

text: US Commandant General Watson was outraged by the East Berlin police's attempt to control the passage of American military forces. He communicated to the Department of State on 25 October 1961 that Soviet Commandant Colonel Solovyev and his men were not doing their part to avoid disturbing actions during a time of peace negotiations, and demanded that the Soviet authorities take immediate steps to remedy the situation. Solovyev replied by describing American attempts to send armed soldiers across the checkpoint and keeping American tanks at sector boundary as an "open provocation" and a direct violation of GDR regulations. He insisted that properly identified American military could cross the sector border without impediments, and were only stopped when their nationality was not immediately clear to guards. Solovyev contended that requesting identifying paperwork from those crossing the border was not unreasonable control; Watson disagreed. In regard to the American military presence on the border, Solovyev warned:I am authorized to state that it is necessary to avoid actions of this kind. Such actions can provoke corresponding actions from our side. We have tanks too. We hate the idea of carrying out such actions, and are sure that you will re-examine your course.Perhaps this contributed to Hemsing's decision to make the attempt again: on 27 October 1961, Hemsing again approached the zonal boundary in a diplomatic vehicle. But General Clay did not know how the Soviets would respond, and sent tanks with an infantry battalion to the nearby Tempelhof airfield. No conflict took place, and the military police and tanks were recalled without incident.


title: Berlin Crisis of 1961

text: Immediately afterwards, 33 Soviet tanks drove to the Brandenburg Gate. Curiously, Soviet premier Nikita Khrushchev claimed in his memoirs that as he understood it, the American tanks had seen the Soviet tanks coming and retreated. Col. Jim Atwood, then Commander of the US Military Mission in West Berlin, disagreed in later statements. As one of the first to spot the tanks when they arrived, Lieutenant Vern Pike was ordered to verify whether they were indeed Soviet tanks. He and tank driver Sam McCart drove over to East Berlin, where Pike took advantage of a temporary absence of any soldiers near the tanks to climb into one of them. He came out with definitive evidence that the tanks were Soviet, including a Red Army newspaper.


title: Berlin Crisis of 1961

text: Ten of these tanks continued to Friedrichstraße, and stopped just 50 to 100 metres from the checkpoint on the Soviet side of the sector boundary. The US tanks turned back towards the checkpoint, stopping an equal distance from it on the American side of the boundary. From 27 October 1961 at 17:00 until 28 October 1961 at about 11:00, the respective troops faced each other. As per standing orders, both groups of tanks were loaded with live munitions. The alert levels of the US Garrison in West Berlin, then NATO, and finally the US Strategic Air Command (SAC) were raised.


title: Berlin Crisis of 1961

text: It was at this point that US Secretary of State Dean Rusk conveyed to General Lucius Clay, the US commanding officer in Berlin, that "We had long since decided that Berlin is not a vital interest which would warrant determined recourse to force to protect and sustain." Clay was convinced that having US tanks use bulldozer mounts to knock down parts of the Wall would have ended the crisis to the greater advantage of the US and its allies without eliciting a Soviet military response. Frederick Kempe argues that Rusk's views support a more unfavorable assessment of Kennedy's decisions during the crisis and his willingness to accept the Wall as the best solution.


title: Berlin Crisis of 1961

text: The United States deployed the Davy Crockett tactical nuclear recoilless gun during the Berlin crisis of 1961, according to Brigadier General Alvin Cowan, Assistant Division Commander of the United States 3rd Armored Division, at the Tactical Nuclear Weapons Symposium of 1969. According to Cowan, the device was [eventually] retired, in part, because "it was essentially a platoon weapon," and there was apparently "great fear that some sergeant would start a nuclear war." President Kennedy had voiced concern, to include when he inspected the Crockett during his June 1963 visit to Fleigerhorst Kaserne, Hanau, about US infantrymen having frontline nuclear weapons, reassurances that the D/C squads did not include Mental Cat 4 GIs notwithstanding. Also, SEC DEF MacNamara wanted to rush 171 Crocketts to USAREUR in December, 1971 [from page 224 of Marc Trachtenberg's book, HISTORY & STRATEGY (Princeton University Press, 1991)].


title: Berlin Crisis of 1961

text: With GRU spy Georgi Bolshakov serving as the primary channel of communication, Khrushchev and Kennedy agreed to reduce tensions by withdrawing the tanks. The Soviet checkpoint had direct communications to General Anatoly Gribkov at the Soviet Army High Command, who in turn was on the phone to Khrushchev. The US checkpoint contained a Military Police officer on the telephone to the HQ of the US Military Mission in Berlin, which in turn was in communication with the White House. Kennedy offered to go easy over Berlin in the future in return for the Soviets removing their tanks first. The Soviets agreed. Kennedy stated concerning the Wall: "It's not a very nice solution, but a wall is a hell of a lot better than a war."


title: Berlin Crisis of 1961

text: A Soviet tank moved about 5 metres backwards first; then an American tank followed suit. One by one the tanks withdrew. But General Bruce C. Clarke, then the Commander-in-Chief (CINC) of US Army Europe (USAREUR), was said to have been concerned about General Clay's conduct and Clay returned to the United States in May 1962. Gen. Clarke's assessment may have been incomplete, however: Clay's firmness had a great effect on the German population, led by West Berlin Mayor Willy Brandt and West German Chancellor Konrad Adenauer.


title: Scandium

text: Scandium is a chemical element with the symbol Sc and atomic number 21. It is a silvery-white metallic d-block element. Historically, it has been classified as a rare-earth element, together with yttrium and the Lanthanides. It was discovered in 1879 by spectral analysis of the minerals euxenite and gadolinite from Scandinavia.


title: Scandium

text: Scandium is present in most of the deposits of rare-earth and uranium compounds, but it is extracted from these ores in only a few mines worldwide. Because of the low availability and difficulties in the preparation of metallic scandium, which was first done in 1937, applications for scandium were not developed until the 1970s, when the positive effects of scandium on aluminium alloys were discovered, and its use in such alloys remains its only major application. The global trade of scandium oxide is 15–20 tonnes per year.


title: Scandium

text: The properties of scandium compounds are intermediate between those of aluminium and yttrium. A diagonal relationship exists between the behavior of magnesium and scandium, just as there is between beryllium and aluminium. In the chemical compounds of the elements in group 3, the predominant oxidation state is +3.


title: Scandium

text: Scandium is a soft metal with a silvery appearance. It develops a slightly yellowish or pinkish cast when oxidized by air. It is susceptible to weathering and dissolves slowly in most dilute acids. It does not react with a 1:1 mixture of nitric acid () and 48.0% hydrofluoric acid (), possibly due to the formation of an impermeable passive layer. Scandium turnings ignite in the air with a brilliant yellow flame to form scandium oxide.


title: Scandium

text: In nature, scandium is found exclusively as the isotope Sc, which has a nuclear spin of 7/2; this is its only stable isotope. Twenty-five radioisotopes have been characterized with the most stable being Sc, which has a half-life of 83.8 days; Sc, 3.35 days; the positron emitter Sc, 4 hours; and Sc, 43.7 hours. All of the remaining radioactive isotopes have half-lives less than 4 hours, and the majority of these have half-lives less than 2 minutes. This element also has five nuclear isomers, with the most stable being Sc ("t" = 58.6 h).


title: Scandium

text: The known isotopes of scandium range from Sc to Sc. The primary decay mode at masses lower than the only stable isotope, Sc, is electron capture, and the primary mode at masses above it is beta emission. The primary decay products at atomic weights below Sc are calcium isotopes and the primary products from higher atomic weights are titanium isotopes.


title: Scandium

text: In Earth's crust, scandium is not rare. Estimates vary from 18 to 25 ppm, which is comparable to the abundance of cobalt (20–30 ppm). Scandium is only the 50th most common element on Earth (35th most abundant in the crust), but it is the 23rd most common element in the Sun. However, scandium is distributed sparsely and occurs in trace amounts in many minerals. Rare minerals from Scandinavia and Madagascar such as thortveitite, euxenite, and gadolinite are the only known concentrated sources of this element. Thortveitite can contain up to 45% of scandium in the form of scandium oxide.


title: Scandium

text: The stable form of scandium is created in supernovas via the r-process. Also, scandium is created by cosmic ray spallation of the more abundant iron nuclei.


title: Scandium

text: The world production of scandium is in the order of 15–20 tonnes per year, in the form of scandium oxide. The demand is about 50% higher, and both the production and demand keep increasing. In 2003, only three mines produced scandium: the uranium and iron mines in Zhovti Vody in Ukraine, the rare-earth mines in Bayan Obo, China, and the apatite mines in the Kola peninsula, Russia; since then many other countries have built scandium-producing facilities, including 5 tonnes/year (7.5 tonnes/year ) by Nickel Asia Corporation and Sumitomo Metal Mining in the Philippines.


title: Scandium

text: In the United States, NioCorp Development hopes to raise $1 billion toward opening a niobium mine at its Elk Creek site in southeast Nebraska which may be able to produce as much as 95 tonnes of scandium oxide annually. In each case, scandium is a byproduct of the extraction of other elements and is sold as scandium oxide.


title: Scandium

text: To produce metallic scandium, the oxide is converted to scandium fluoride and then reduced with metallic calcium.


title: Scandium

text: Madagascar and the Iveland-Evje region in Norway have the only deposits of minerals with high scandium content, thortveitite ) but these are not being exploited. The mineral kolbeckite has a very high scandium content but is not available in any larger deposits.


title: Scandium

text: The absence of reliable, secure, stable, long-term production has limited the commercial applications of scandium. Despite this low level of use, scandium offers significant benefits. Particularly promising is the strengthening of aluminium alloys with as little as 0.5% scandium. Scandium-stabilized zirconia enjoys a growing market demand for use as a high-efficiency electrolyte in solid oxide fuel cells.


title: Scandium

text: The USGS reports that, from 2015 to 2019 in the US, the price of small quantities of scandium ingot has been $107 to $134 per gram, and that of scandium oxide $4 to $5 per gram.


title: Scandium

text: Scandium chemistry is almost completely dominated by the trivalent ion, Sc. The radii of M ions in the table below indicate that the chemical properties of scandium ions have more in common with yttrium ions than with aluminium ions. In part because of this similarity, scandium is often classified as a lanthanide-like element.


title: Scandium

text: α- and γ-ScOOH are isostructural with their aluminium hydroxide oxide counterparts. Solutions of in water are acidic due to hydrolysis.


title: Scandium

text: The halides , where X= Cl, Br, or I, are very soluble in water, but is insoluble. In all four halides, the scandium is 6-coordinated. The halides are Lewis acids; for example, dissolves in a solution containing excess fluoride ion to form . The coordination number 6 is typical for Sc(III). In the larger Y and La ions, coordination numbers of 8 and 9 are common. Scandium triflate is sometimes used as a Lewis acid catalyst in organic chemistry.


title: Scandium

text: Scandium forms a series of organometallic compounds with cyclopentadienyl ligands (Cp), similar to the behavior of the lanthanides. One example is the chlorine-bridged dimer, and related derivatives of pentamethylcyclopentadienyl ligands.


title: Scandium

text: Compounds that feature scandium in oxidation states other than +3 are rare but well characterized. The blue-black compound is one of the simplest. This material adopts a sheet-like structure that exhibits extensive bonding between the scandium(II) centers. Scandium hydride is not well understood, although it appears not to be a saline hydride of Sc(II). As is observed for most elements, a diatomic scandium hydride has been observed spectroscopically at high temperatures in the gas phase. Scandium borides and carbides are non-stoichiometric, as is typical for neighboring elements.


title: Scandium

text: Dmitri Mendeleev, who is referred to as the father of the periodic table, predicted the existence of an element "ekaboron", with an atomic mass between 40 and 48 in 1869. Lars Fredrik Nilson and his team detected this element in the minerals euxenite and gadolinite in 1879. Nilson prepared 2 grams of scandium oxide of high purity. He named the element scandium, from the Latin "Scandia" meaning "Scandinavia". Nilson was apparently unaware of Mendeleev's prediction, but Per Teodor Cleve recognized the correspondence and notified Mendeleev.


title: Scandium

text: Metallic scandium was produced for the first time in 1937 by electrolysis of a eutectic mixture of potassium, lithium, and scandium chlorides, at 700–800 °C. The first pound of 99% pure scandium metal was produced in 1960. Production of aluminium alloys began in 1971, following a US patent. Aluminium-scandium alloys were also developed in the USSR.


title: Scandium

text: Laser crystals of gadolinium-scandium-gallium garnet (GSGG) were used in strategic defense applications developed for the Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI) in the 1980s and 1990s.


title: Scandium

text: In early 2018, evidence was gathered from spectrometer data of significant scandium, vanadium, and yttrium abundances in red giant stars in the Nuclear Star Cluster (NSC) in the Galactic Center. Further research showed that this was an illusion caused by the relatively low temperature (below 3,500 K) of these stars masking the abundance signals, and that this phenomenon was observable in other red giants.


title: Scandium

text: The addition of scandium to aluminium limits the grain growth in the heat zone of welded aluminium components. This has two beneficial effects: the precipitated forms smaller crystals than in other aluminium alloys, and the volume of precipitate-free zones at the grain boundaries of age-hardening aluminium alloys is reduced. The precipitate is a coherent precipitate that strengthens the aluminum matrix by applying elastic strain fields that inhibit dislocation movement (i.e., plastic deformation). has an equilibrium L1 superlattice structure exclusive to this system. A fine dispersion of nano scale precipitate can be achieved via heat treatment that can also strengthen the alloys through order hardening. Recent developments include the additions of transition metals such as Zr and rare earth metals like Er produce shells surrounding the spherical precipitate that reduce coarsening. These shells are dictated by the diffusivity of the alloying element and lower the cost of the alloy due to less Sc being substituted in part by Zr while maintaining stability and less Sc being needed to form the precipitate. These have made somewhat competitive with titanium alloys along with a wide array of applications. However, titanium alloys, which are similar in lightness and strength, are cheaper and much more widely used.


title: Scandium

text: The main application of scandium by weight is in aluminium-scandium alloys for minor aerospace industry components. These alloys contain between 0.1% and 0.5% of scandium. They were used in Russian military aircraft, specifically the Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-21 and MiG-29.


title: Scandium

text: Some items of sports equipment, which rely on lightweight high-performance materials, have been made with scandium-aluminium alloys, including baseball bats, tent poles and bicycle frames and components. Lacrosse sticks are also made with scandium. The American firearm manufacturing company Smith & Wesson produces semi-automatic pistols and revolvers with frames of scandium alloy and cylinders of titanium or carbon steel.


title: Scandium

text: Dentists use erbium-chromium-doped yttrium-scandium-gallium garnet () lasers for cavity preparation and in endodontics.


title: Scandium

text: The first scandium-based metal-halide lamps were patented by General Electric and made in North America, although they are now produced in all major industrialized countries. Approximately 20 kg of scandium (as ) is used annually in the United States for high-intensity discharge lamps. One type of metal-halide lamp, similar to the mercury-vapor lamp, is made from scandium triiodide and sodium iodide. This lamp is a white-light source with high color rendering index that sufficiently resembles sunlight to allow good color-reproduction with TV cameras. About 80 kg of scandium is used in metal-halide lamps/light bulbs globally per year.


title: Scandium

text: The radioactive isotope Sc is used in oil refineries as a tracing agent. Scandium triflate is a catalytic Lewis acid used in organic chemistry.


title: Scandium

text: Elemental scandium is considered non-toxic, though extensive animal testing of scandium compounds has not been done. The median lethal dose (LD) levels for scandium chloride for rats have been determined as 755 mg/kg for intraperitoneal and 4 g/kg for oral administration. In the light of these results, compounds of scandium should be handled as compounds of moderate toxicity. Scandium appears to be handled by the body in a manner similar to gallium, with similar hazards involving its poorly soluble hydroxide.


title: Anri Okita

text: Anri Okita (Japanese: 沖田杏梨) is an English-born Japanese actress, singer, songwriter, and former pornographic actress.


title: Anri Okita

text: Between 2011 and 2016 Okita was active as a popular AV idol before retiring in May 2016 to focus on a career in mainstream media. From 2016 to 2017, Okita was a member of the idol group Ebisu Muscats. In 2017, Okita debuted as a solo music artist and released the album "GORILLA." Okita has also acted in numerous mainstream Japanese language films, such as "Naked Ambition 2" (2014), "Assassination Classroom" (2015), "Scoop!" (2016), and "Diamond Dogs" (2017).


title: Anri Okita

text: Okita was born in Birmingham, England, United Kingdom. At the age of eight, Okita and her family moved back to Japan. Okita first began watching adult videos (AV) during her teenage years with her favorite performer being Japanese-German AV idol Saori Hara. Okita was an art student in England during her college years but she also started to take modelling jobs and became a gravure idol before her AV debut.


title: Anri Okita

text: Okita entered the AV industry in 2011 at the age of 24. Her first adult film titled "1,000,000 Yen Body Best of All – Anri Okita" was released on 7 February 2011 at the famed AV studio, S1 No. 1 Style. For the next two years Okita remained as an exclusive performer at S1 and was featured in twenty adult films with the studio, thus becoming a major player in the AV landscape as a newcomer. With her exotic looks and voluptuous figure Okita's popularity increased rapidly from mid-2011 onward in Japan as well as other Southeast Asian markets. In late 2012, Okita began to arise as a popular Japanese adult film star in Western markets like Australia and Europe and even in the US after dozens of her scenes were uploaded to adult websites like XVideos, XNXX, and Pornhub. In 2013, Okita's popularity exploded in the United States and Canada as well as Europe; she became the third watched Asian porn star after Hitomi Tanaka and Yui Hatano. In 2011, Okita was named the Number 1 Newcomer from the Asian market by Internet Adult Film Database.


title: Anri Okita

text: In October 2012, Okita decided to transfer from S1 to Soft On Demand under the stage name of "Akane Mizuki", but by early 2013 she decided to become a freelance actress ("kikatan joyū)" working with numerous other AV studios like Wanz Factory, Moodyz or Fitch. During her AV career Okita was part of several high-profile projects. One was "J & L – Two Pairs Of Huge Tits Take Real Creampies" (released by Moodyz in June 2015) in which she co-starred with fellow AV actress and close friend Hitomi Tanaka. She was also part of Moodyz 15th anniversary work, "Crimson Dream," an extravagant live action adaptation of a hentai manga with a runtime of six hours and a cast of other highly popular Japanese adult film actresses like Ai Uehara, Kaho Kasumi, Kurea Hasumi, Yui Hatano, Hibiki Otsuki, and Shoko Akiyama.


title: Anri Okita

text: Okita also made appearances at the AVN Adult Entertainment Expo in 2015 and 2016, as well as the 33rd AVN Awards. In 2016 Okita announced her retirement from the adult industry and her last adult film "Porn Retirement x Crimson – Anri Okita Captured by an Erotic Artist", directed by Kitorune Kawaguchi was released on 8 May 2016. Over her career Okita has been featured in nearly 300 films (including original works and numerous compilations).