title: Xavier Rhodes

text: Rhodes entered training camp slated as one of the starting outside cornerbacks. Head coach Mike Zimmer officially named Rhodes the starter to begin the regular season, along with Captain Munnerlyn.


title: Xavier Rhodes

text: In Week 4, he tied a career-high with four pass deflections and made five combined tackles in the Vikings' 41–28 victory over the Atlanta Falcons. On November 16, 2014, Rhodes collected four combined tackles, broke up a pass, and made his first career interception off a pass by Jay Cutler during a 21–13 loss at the Chicago Bears in Week 11. In Week 16, Rhodes collected a season-high five solo tackles in the Vikings' 37–35 loss at the Miami Dolphins. He finished the season with 49 combined tackles (39 solo), a career-high 18 pass deflections, and an interception in 16 games and 16 starts. His 18 pass deflections led the Vikings' defense and finished fourth among all players in the league. The Minnesota Vikings finished with a 7–9 record, but were able to improve to seventh overall in pass defense after finishing 31st the previous season.


title: Xavier Rhodes

text: Rhodes was joined by Terence Newman and rookie first round pick Trae Waynes in 2015. Defensive coordinator George Edwards named Rhodes the No. 1 outside cornerback, opposite Terence Newman, to begin the regular season.


title: Xavier Rhodes

text: He started the Minnesota Vikings' season-opener at the San Francisco 49ers and collected a season-high seven solo tackles in their 20–3 loss. On January 3, 2016, Rhodes made three solo tackles, a pass deflection, and intercepted a pass by Aaron Rodgers during a 20–13 victory at the Green Bay Packers. He finished the season with a career-high 58 combined tackles (55 solo), ten pass deflections, and an interception in 16 games and 16 starts.


title: Xavier Rhodes

text: The Minnesota Vikings finished their second season under head coach Mike Zimmer with an 11–5 record and first in the NFC North. On January 10, 2016, Rhodes started in his first career playoff game and recorded four solo tackles and two pass deflections during a 10–9 loss to the Seattle Seahawks in the NFC Wildcard Game.


title: Xavier Rhodes

text: On May 2, 2016, the Vikings exercised the fifth-year, $8.02 million option on Rhodes' rookie contract. Head coach Mike Zimmer retained Xavier Rhodes and Terence Newman as the starting cornerbacks to begin the regular season.


title: Xavier Rhodes

text: While preparing to play in the season-opener against the Tennessee Titans, Rhodes sustained a knee injury while stretching on the field. His injury sidelined him for the first two games (Weeks 1–2) of the season. On October 3, 2016, Rhodes recorded two combined tackles, broke up two passes, and intercepted quarterback Eli Manning during a 24–10 victory against the New York Giants on "Monday Night Football". He was a key part of the secondary that held Odell Beckham Jr. to only five receptions for 23-yards. In Week 11, Rhodes recorded three combined tackles, two pass deflections, and intercepted two passes by quarterback Carson Palmer in the Vikings' 30–24 victory against the Arizona Cardinals. In the second quarter, he intercepted a pass intended for John Brown and returned it for a 100-yard touchdown On the game, Rhodes allowed a passer rating of 0.0 into his coverage, surrendering as many catches (two, for 16 yards) on seven targets as interceptions and earning the highest-graded game of any player in Week 11 according to Pro Football Focus (PFF) at +94.5. Rhodes performance earned him NFC Defensive Player of the Week. On December 20, 2016, Rhodes was voted to the 2017 Pro Bowl, marking the first of his career. In Week 16, Rhodes collected a season-high seven combined tackles during a 38–25 loss at the Green Bay Packers. He finished the season with 52 combined tackles (44 solo), 11 pass deflections, five interceptions, and a touchdown in 14 games and 14 starts. Pro Football Focus ranked him 29th in overall grades among the 111 qualifying cornerbacks in 2016.


title: Xavier Rhodes

text: The Minnesota Vikings were unable to qualify for the playoffs after finishing third in their division with an 8–8 record. Rhodes was ranked the 66th best player in the NFL on the NFL Top 100 Players of 2017.


title: Xavier Rhodes

text: On July 30, 2017, the Minnesota Vikings signed Rhodes to a five-year, $70.10 million extension that includes $32.80 million guaranteed and a $12 million signing bonus.


title: Xavier Rhodes

text: Head coach Mike Zimmer named Rhodes and Trae Waynes the starting cornerbacks to start the regular season. On November 23, 2017, Rhodes recorded a season-high five solo tackles, two pass deflections, and intercepted a pass by Matthew Stafford during a 30–23 victory at the Detroit Lions. The following week, he tied his season-high of five solo tackles in the Vikings' 14–9 victory at the Atlanta Falcons in Week 13. On December 19, 2017, it was announced that Rhodes was voted to the 2018 Pro Bowl. He finished the season with 56 combined tackles (44 solo), ten pass deflections, and two interceptions in 16 games and 16 starts. Pro Football Focus gave Rhodes an overall grade of 80.2, ranking him 44th among all qualified cornerbacks in 2017.


title: Xavier Rhodes

text: The Minnesota Vikings finished atop their division with a 13–3 record and received a first round bye. On January 14, 2018, Rhodes recorded two solo tackles and two pass deflections during the Vikings' 29–24 win against the New Orleans Saints in the NFC Divisional Round. The Vikings were eliminated from the playoffs the following week after losing 38–7 at the Philadelphia Eagles in the . He was ranked 55th on the NFL Top 100 Players of 2018.


title: Xavier Rhodes

text: In Week 3 against the New York Jets, Rhodes recorded his first two interceptions (including a 44 yard pick six) as a member of the Colts off of passes thrown by Sam Darnold during the 36–7 win.


title: Xavier Rhodes

text: Rhodes re-signed with the Colts on March 24, 2021. He started 13 games in 2021, recording 39 tackles, seven passes defensed and one interception.


title: Xavier Rhodes

text: Rhodes signed with the practice squad of the Buffalo Bills on September 28, 2022. He was promoted to the active roster on November 26, 2022.


title: Derrick Favors

text: Derrick Bernard Favors (born July 15, 1991) is an American professional basketball player who is currently a free agent. Favors played college basketball for the Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets for one season before being selected by the New Jersey Nets with the third overall pick of the 2010 NBA draft.


title: Derrick Favors

text: After playing a season with the Nets, Favors was traded to the Utah Jazz in 2011, where he played for eight seasons. In the 2019 offseason, he was traded to the New Orleans Pelicans. He then returned to the Jazz in the 2020–2021 season after playing a year with the Pelicans.


title: Derrick Favors

text: During his second stint with the Utah Jazz, Favors became the franchise's 10th all-time leading scorer when he passed Mehmet Okur with 7,255 points.


title: Derrick Favors

text: Favors played high school basketball at South Atlanta High School, where he was ranked as one of the best high school basketball players in the class of 2009. Scout.com rated him the #1 player in the country, #2 in the ESPNU100, and #4 by Rivals.com. On March 14, 2009, he led South Atlanta to the Georgia Class AAA state championship. He scored 38 points and had 21 rebounds in the championship game against Westover High School. He was named to the 2009 McDonald's All-American Team. He led the East to a 113–110 victory and was named the MVP of the game. He scored 19 points and had 8 rebounds. Favors was selected to participate in the 2009 Nike Hoop Summit in Portland, Oregon but pulled out due to personal reasons and he was also selected to play in the 2009 Jordan Brand Classic at Madison Square Garden where he scored a game-high 21 points and was named MVP for the black team, while Renardo Sidney was named MVP for the white team.


title: Derrick Favors

text: He finished his senior season averaging 28.1 points, 13.3 rebounds, 5.0 blocks, 3.0 steals and 2.0 assists per game and holds the career records in points (2,341), rebounds (1,511) and blocked shots (741).


title: Derrick Favors

text: Favors committed to Georgia Tech in January 2009, which he chose over Georgia and North Carolina State.


title: Derrick Favors

text: Favors played both power forward and center for Paul Hewitt's Yellow Jackets. The frontcourt consisted of a three-man rotation of Favors, Gani Lawal and Zach Peacock. In ACC games, he averaged 11.8 points and 8.7 rebounds per game and shot 62.5% from the field. He also helped lead the Yellow Jackets to the ACC tournament finals against Duke. During the tournament, he posted 17 points, 9.8 rebounds and 3 blocks per game.


title: Derrick Favors

text: On April 9, 2010, Favors announced he would forgo his final three years of college eligibility to enter the 2010 NBA draft where he was subsequently selected with the third overall pick by the New Jersey Nets. Favors was 19 years 104 days when he made his NBA debut, thus becoming the youngest player ever to set foot on court for the Nets. In just his third game with the Nets on October 31, 2010 against Miami, he recorded his first career double-double with 13 points and 13 rebounds (10 offensive) in a 101–78 loss.


title: Derrick Favors

text: On February 23, 2011, Favors was traded, along with Devin Harris, two future first-round picks, and cash considerations to the Utah Jazz in exchange for Deron Williams. He went on to score a season-high 17 points on April 9 against San Antonio.


title: Derrick Favors

text: On November 1, 2014, Favors scored a then career-high 32 points in a 118–91 win over the Phoenix Suns. On November 12, 2015, he recorded 25 points, 12 rebounds and a career-high 7 blocks in a loss to the Miami Heat. On December 5, 2015, he scored a career-high 35 points in a 122–119 overtime win over the Indiana Pacers. On January 25, 2016, Favors returned to the floor after a 16-game absence due to a back problem. He played 19 minutes off the bench and recorded 14 points and 5 rebounds in a loss to the Detroit Pistons.


title: Derrick Favors

text: On March 13, 2018, in a 110–79 win over the Detroit Pistons, Favors climbed to 10th place on Utah's all-time rebounding list with 3,602 rebounds. He passed former Utah center Mehmet Okur, who pulled down 3,599 rebounds with the Jazz. On April 11, 2018, in a 102–93 win over the Portland Trail Blazers, Favors played in his 500th game with the Jazz, becoming the 12th player in franchise history to reach the milestone. In Game 2 of the Jazz's first-round playoff series against the Oklahoma City Thunder, Favors had career playoff bests of 20 points and 16 rebounds in a 102–95 win.


title: Derrick Favors

text: On July 6, 2018, Favors re-signed with the Jazz. On January 11, 2019, he had a then season-high 13 rebounds in a 113–95 win over the Los Angeles Lakers, thus passing Greg Ostertag (3,978) for fourth place on the franchise's all-time rebounding list. On March 2, 2019, he had 23 points and tied a career best with 18 rebounds in a 115–111 win over the Milwaukee Bucks.


title: Derrick Favors

text: On July 7, 2019, Favors was traded to the New Orleans Pelicans in exchange for two second-round picks previously acquired from the Golden State Warriors.


title: Derrick Favors

text: On November 25, 2020, Favors signed a three-year, $27 million contract that reunited him with the Utah Jazz in free agency. On April 8, 2021, Favors moved into 10th place on the Utah Jazz's all-time scoring list, passing Mehmet Okur with 7,257 points.


title: Derrick Favors

text: On July 30, 2021, Favors was traded, along with a future first-round pick, to the Oklahoma City Thunder in exchange for a 2027 second-round pick and cash considerations. On March 31, 2022, Favors was ruled out for the remainder of the season with lower back soreness. On September 30, 2022, Favors was traded, along with Ty Jerome, Maurice Harkless, Théo Maledon and a future second-round pick, to the Houston Rockets in exchange for David Nwaba, Sterling Brown, Trey Burke, and Marquese Chriss. On October 14, 2022, the Rockets officially waived Favors.


title: Derrick Favors

text: Favors signed a shoe deal with Adidas just before the 2010 NBA Draft. Favors has been loyal to Adidas since he was 15, when he was playing for his AAU team, the Atlanta Celtics.


title: Massacre of Novgorod

text: The Massacre of Novgorod was an attack launched by Tsar Ivan IV (The Terrible)'s "oprichniki" on the city of Novgorod, Russia in 1570. Although initially an act of vengeance against the perceived treason of the local Orthodox church, the massacre quickly became possibly the most vicious in the brutal legacy of the "oprichnina", with casualties estimated between two thousand to fifteen thousand and innumerable acts of extreme, violent cruelty. In the aftermath of the attack, Novgorod lost its status as one of Russia's leading cities, crippled by decimation of its citizenry combined with Ivan's assault on the surrounding farmlands.


title: Massacre of Novgorod

text: The late 1560s under Ivan the Terrible were rife with conspiracies and violence. Ivan's mental state was continually deteriorating and was exacerbated by his wars with Sweden, Lithuania, and Poland. Ivan's deep distrust of the boyars, a sentiment held from childhood, coupled with his paranoia and need for control, led him to create the oprichnina in 1565.


title: Massacre of Novgorod

text: The oprichniki were essentially a private army under Ivan's personal control with the power to "pronounce official disgrace upon, execute and confiscate the property of disobedient boyars without the advice of the [boyar] council." Ivan proceeded to exercise this right liberally, as he attempted to purge all those whom he deemed a threat.


title: Massacre of Novgorod

text: One year before the carnage, in 1569, the tsar evicted several thousand from Novgorod and the neighboring town of Pskov in an attempt to avoid a betrayal like the one in Izborsk. He also began to execute anyone he deemed a threat; for example, in 1568, over 150 boyar council members and noblemen (along with their households in some cases) in Moscow were killed in response to real or imagined conspiracies, as well as anyone who protested against the oprichnina.


title: Massacre of Novgorod

text: The suspicious circumstances surrounding the loss of Izborsk (despite the fact that Ivan managed to recover the town), along with growing unrest among the aristocrats in Moscow, convinced Ivan that treason was widespread and expanding, prompting him to take murderous action against those he viewed as the largest threats, his cousin, Prince Vladimir Andreyevich, and the city of Novgorod.


title: Massacre of Novgorod

text: Shortly after the executions of Prince Vladimir and most of his family, Ivan launched an attack on Novgorod, claiming treason and treachery. It is probably not a coincidence that Novgorod still housed a number of the late Vladimir's supporters and retainers.


title: Massacre of Novgorod

text: Though the reasoning behind the attack was generally kept secret, there were rumors of a conspiracy among the boyars of the city, aided by the Archbishop of Novgorod, Bishop Pimen, to surrender the city to the king of the Polish–Lithuanian commonwealth.


title: Massacre of Novgorod

text: There is much speculation about the authenticity of the evidence behind the rumors (a document of questionable origin) considering that relations between Pimen and Ivan were relatively amicable.


title: Massacre of Novgorod

text: One theory was that Peter, the man who informed Ivan of the document's existence and location, had been punished by the people of Novgorod and composed the document in revenge, forging the signatures of the archbishop and other important citizens. It is also possible that Polish agents planted the documents in an attempt to unseat or at least destabilize Ivan.


title: Massacre of Novgorod

text: There is little to no concrete evidence to suggest that Novgorod actually planned to defect to Poland–Lithuania. Novgorod's planned defection (as well as its alleged plan to convert en masse to the Roman Catholic Church) had been used as part of the justification of Ivan III of Russia for taking direct control of the city in 1478, and it seems that Ivan IV copied his paternal grandfather on this and several other occasions - fighting the same battle twice.


title: Massacre of Novgorod

text: In the summer of 1569 Ivan and the oprichnina council decided to march on Novgorod that December to exact revenge for the alleged treasonous behavior. Ivan's force started from Alexandrov Village, where he resided and ruled from December 1564 to February 1565, when he had fled Moscow before the creation of the oprichnina. They moved from Klin at the beginning of the Tver district, sweeping westward through Tver and other centers, then all the way to Novgorod, plundering and terrorizing each population, laying waste to everything in their path.


title: Massacre of Novgorod

text: On 2 January 1570, the advance regiment of the tsar's armies arrived on the outskirts of the city, four days before the tsar. They were to construct a barrier around the city, trapping the inhabitants. The regiment also attacked the monasteries surrounding the city, looting the treasuries and beating and/or imprisoning the clergy.


title: Massacre of Novgorod

text: On 6 January, the tsar arrived with his son Ivan, his court, and roughly 1,500 musketeers in tow. Ivan stopped just before entering the city, in the trading quarter of Gorodische, to set up his camp and royal court, issuing his initial orders from there. On the second day (7 January), the clergy members, the father superiors and monks, who had been arrested by the advance regiment, were to be beaten to death and their bodies returned to the monasteries to be buried.


title: Massacre of Novgorod

text: On 8 January, Ivan proceeded into Novgorod and was met on the bridge over the Volkhov River, as was customary, by the Archbishop Pimen. In line with tradition and ceremony, the archbishop attempted to bless the tsar, but Ivan refused, accusing Pimen (and with him, all of Novgorod) of treason and of conspiring to turn the city over to Poland–Lithuania. Ivan refused to approach the cross that came with the welcoming procession, stating to the archbishop:


title: Massacre of Novgorod

text: Despite his reproof of the archbishop, Ivan still demanded that he be taken to the Saint Sophia Cathedral for divine-liturgy. Ivan's piety and the fact that he was not entirely mentally sound led him to demand that the clergy say liturgy amid the general confusion and disorder caused by the entrance of the tsar and his armed retinue. Afterward, Ivan's company dined with Pimen, though that too was interrupted by chaos. Shortly after the meal began, Ivan shouted orders to his assembled guard to arrest Pimen and to plunder his residence, treasury, and court. The prelate was publicly insulted and mocked by the tsar, who paraded him around the city on a mare while facing backwards and accompanied by "skomorokhi" (Russian folk minstrels, outlawed by the Russian Orthodox Church as a hold-over from paganism). He was then arrested and imprisoned while Ivan sacked the city.


title: Massacre of Novgorod

text: Ivan's first commands from Gorodishche concerned the immediate subjugation and humiliation of the church. He ordered that his regiment confiscate the treasuries of the outlying monasteries, as well as begin the brutality of the trials at Gorodishche. Initially, around 500 father superiors and monks from the outlying churches (the same clergymen that he would order beaten to death two days later), were rounded up, taken into Novgorod and flogged. The priests and deacons of the churches inside the city were to be arrested and turned over to the bailiffs to be held in shackles and flogged from dawn until dusk unless or until they could pay a ransom of 20 rubles each.


title: Massacre of Novgorod

text: Following the arrest of the archbishop and his subsequent imprisonment, Ivan's soldiers set about stripping the cathedrals and churches of all of their valuables. They stripped the St. Sophia cathedral, making off with valuable ornaments and icons as well as the ancient Korsun gate from the altar.


title: Massacre of Novgorod

text: Though the trials held by the tsar's court at Gorodishche were drawing to a close, the assault on the city persisted. Ivan began to tour prominent monasteries in the suburbs of the city, supervising the oprichniki as they continued to loot the monastic treasuries. When Ivan began his sweeps of the surrounding churches, about two to four weeks later, his men set out to finish the job they started before the tsar's arrival.


title: Massacre of Novgorod

text: Though Ivan believed that Pimen and the church were the primary architects of the plot for Polish defection, he took out the brunt of his sadistic anger on the population of Novgorod, namely the upper and middle classes. The peasantry suffered a more generic, though equally brutal, punishment that contrasted with the targeted brutality directed at the more prominent members of society.


title: Massacre of Novgorod

text: Before his arrival in the city, Ivan's army had rounded up and detained the leading merchants, traders and officials along with their families. They were tortured for information regarding the supposed defection and liaison with the Polish king. The judges employed exceedingly cruel tortures to facilitate their inquiries, including burning with a "clever fire-making device" called a grill by the chronicler, roasting over fires, or being strung up by one's hands and having one's eyebrows singed off. An equally brutal punishment also awaited many upper and upper-middle-class families, including those implicated or questioned.


title: Massacre of Novgorod

text: Women and children of all ages were bound and thrown from a high bank into the Volkhov river where they were trapped under the ice. Soldiers patrolled the water in boats, armed with boat hooks, spears, lances and axes, pushing down anyone who managed to surface alive. Those condemned by the court, after enduring questions under torture, were often tied to sleds and dragged through town until they too were forced off the bridge into the river.


title: Massacre of Novgorod

text: The “Novgorod Chronicle’’ has been able to identify many of the people summoned to the courts for examination. They included boyars from the archbishop's court (and many serving-men), lesser boyars, merchants, and traders. The court condemned approximately 200 gentry, more than 100 servants, 45 secretaries and chancery people, and a proportionate number of families to die during their occupation of the city.


title: Massacre of Novgorod

text: In addition to the tortures visited on the upper and middle classes, the peasants and paupers also were treated with disregard and disdain, albeit of a broader nature. The oprichniki centered its attack on the townspeople around two main objectives: to increase the royal treasury and to terrorize the lower classes into submission. Ivan's fear of conspiracies and revolution in any combination, led him to try to quell disaffection and discourage revolutionary tendencies, generally through the manipulation of fear and violence.


title: Massacre of Novgorod

text: Near the end of the greater part of the Gorodische trials, Ivan ordered an attack on the trade streets of Novgorod, hoping to cripple the middle-class merchants (generally considered to be the seat of discontented revolutionary ideas) in order to suppress popular insurrection and guarantee dependency and submission. The oprichniki were to seize all profitable goods and destroy shops and storehouses, then move into the suburbs, where their instructions were to loot and destroy homes and kill all inhabitants who resisted (and, periodically, even those who complied), regardless of age or sex. Cold, hunger, and disease also killed the hundreds of families that were evicted and exiled from the city and surrounding villages.


title: Massacre of Novgorod

text: The famines that had plagued the area for the previous years (exacerbated by the oprichniki's razing of the farm land on their trek to Novgorod) had drawn many of the poor from the surrounding land into the city for shelter. With little regard for the lives at stake, the tsar ordered the collected paupers and beggars expelled from the city in the middle of winter, abandoning them to die of exposure or starvation.


title: Massacre of Novgorod

text: Ivan and the oprichniki continued to brutalize Novgorod until 12 February, when the troops withdrew leaving the destroyed city in the hands of the remaining population. They continued with this murderous quest to rid the kingdom of traitors, moving first to Pskov for a brief (and bizarre) interlude, then back to Moscow, where Ivan continued to arrest and interrogate anyone he considered guilty, dangerous or even a possible threat. He looked into the supposed treachery at Novgorod within his own court, examining who had contact with the archbishop and therefore may have been involved in the plot.


title: Massacre of Novgorod

text: His suspicions were especially focused on several prominent members of the boyar court, Alexis Basmanov and his son, Nikita Funikov (the treasurer), Viskovaty (the keeper of the seal), Semeon Yakovlev, Vasily Stepanov (the crown secretary), Andrei Vasiliev, and Prince Afanasy Viazemsky.


title: Massacre of Novgorod

text: While the details of the investigation have been lost, the trial results are known. Most of these men, court favourites, Basmanov and Viazemsky, included, were condemned to death along with Prince Peter Obolensky-Serebriany and a handful of others. Most others, around 180 people, were given pardon. Pimen of Novgorod was removed first to Alexandrov and finally to Tula, where he died under uncertain circumstances.


title: Massacre of Novgorod

text: Ivan's terrible ‘vengeance’ left Novgorod severely wounded. The death toll of the massacre is uncertain. According to the "Third Novgorod Chronicle", the massacre lasted for five weeks. The "First Pskov Chronicle" gives the number of victims as 60,000. These numbers are debated, however, and are not from an impartial source. Western sources from the time give figures ranging from 2,700 to 27,000 killed. Modern researchers estimate the number of victims in a range from 2,500 up to 12,000. Ruslan Skrynnikov, reconstructing the sinodiki (prayer lists) of the Kirillo-Belozersky Monastery, found only 1,505 named victims of the massacre, although these were most likely elite citizens and lesser citizens were not listed. Based on these lists, Skrynnikov considers that the number of victims was 2,000 to 3,000. As the author of "Ivan the Terrible (Ivan Grozny)", R.G. Skrynnikov stated, "the sack of Novgorod is the most repulsive episode in the brutal history of the oprichnina. The cruel, senseless slaughter of innocent people made oprichnina synonymous with lawlessness and excess."


title: Massacre of Novgorod

text: Ivan's attack, while not solely at fault, contributed heavily to the decline of the once great city of Novgorod. An attack from one's own ruler, especially one as devastating to life and property as Ivan's campaign against Novgorod, would have been psychologically crippling, even more so when considered with the previous blows dealt to the city by Ivan IV and his grandfather. After the attack, many of the inhabitants either fled the city to escape persecution from Moscow, or died from increasingly damning conditions, exacerbated by high taxes and food shortages (and the epidemics that tend to accompany poor living conditions) that followed the departure of the oprichniki.


title: Massacre of Novgorod

text: As part of his attack Ivan burned the fields, laying waste roughly 90 percent of the arable land surrounding Novgorod. Coupled with the crop failures of the years before, this would create a massive food shortage (and cause supply in the Livonian war). With the loss of the majority of its production capacity and the economy essentially in ruins, Novgorod, a city that, until Ivan III, rivaled Moscow for the seat of power in Russia, lost its political standing and the Novgorod Republic officially became a thing of the past.


title: Alligatoridae

text: The superfamily Alligatoroidea includes all crocodilians (fossil and extant) that are more closely related to the American alligator than to either the Nile crocodile or the gharial. This is a stem-based definition for alligators, and is more inclusive than the crown group Alligatoridae. As a crown group, Alligatoridae only includes the last common ancestor of all extant (living) alligators, caimans, and their descendants (living or extinct), whereas Alligatoroidea, as a stem-based group, also includes more basal extinct alligator ancestors that are more closely related to living alligators than to crocodiles or gavialids. When considering only living taxa (neontology), this makes Alligatoroidea and Alligatoridae redundant.


title: Alligatoridae

text: The simplified cladogram below shows Alligatoridae's relationships to other extant (living) crocodilians.


title: Alligatoridae

text: The below detailed cladogram shows one proposal for the internal relationships within Alligatoridae (although the exact alligatoroid phylogeny is still disputed).


title: Alligatoridae

text: The superfamily Alligatoroidea is thought to have split from the crocodile-gharial lineage in the late Cretaceous, about 87 million years ago. "Leidyosuchus" of Alberta is the earliest known genus. Fossil alligatoroids have been found throughout Eurasia as land bridges across both the North Atlantic and the Bering Strait have connected North America to Eurasia during the Cretaceous, Paleogene, and Neogene periods. Alligators and caimans split in North America during the early Tertiary or late Cretaceous (about 53 million to about 65 million years ago) and the latter reached South America by the Paleogene, before the closure of the Isthmus of Panama during the Neogene period. The Chinese alligator split from the American alligator about 33 million years ago and likely descended from a lineage that crossed the Bering land bridge during the Neogene. The modern American alligator is well represented in the fossil record of the Pleistocene. The alligator's full mitochondrial genome was sequenced in the 1990s. The full genome, published in 2014, suggests that the alligator evolved much more slowly than mammals and birds.


title: Alligatoridae

text: The lineage including alligators proper (Alligatorinae) occurs in the fluvial deposits of the age of the Upper Chalk in Europe, where they did not die out until the Pliocene age. The true alligators are today represented by two species, "A. mississippiensis" in the southeastern United States, which can grow to 15.6 ft (4.6 m) and weigh 1000 lbs(453 kg), with unverified sizes of up to 19.2 ft(5.9 m). And the small "A. sinensis" in the Yangtze River, China, which grows to an average of 5 ft (1.5 m). Their name derives from the Spanish "el lagarto", which means "the lizard".


title: Alligatoridae

text: In Central and South America, the alligator family is represented by six species of the subfamily Caimaninae, which differ from the alligator by the absence of a bony septum between the nostrils, and having ventral armour composed of overlapping bony scutes, each of which is formed of two parts united by a suture. Besides the three species in "Caiman", the smooth-fronted caimans in genus "Paleosuchus" and the black caiman in "Melanosuchus" are described. Caimans tend to be more agile and crocodile-like in their movements, and have longer, sharper teeth than alligators.


title: Alligatoridae

text: "C. crocodilus", the spectacled caiman, has the widest distribution, from southern Mexico to the northern half of Argentina, and grows to a modest size of about . The largest is the near-threatened "Melanosuchus niger", the "jacaré-açu" or large or black caiman of the Amazon River basin. Black caimans grow to , with the unverified size of up to . The black caiman and American alligator are the only members of the alligator family that pose the same danger to humans as the larger species of the crocodile family.


title: Alligatoridae

text: Although caimans have not been studied in depth, scientists have learned their mating cycles (previously thought to be spontaneous or year-round) are linked to the rainfall cycles and the river levels, which increases chances of survival for their offspring.


title: Systems design

text: Systems design interfaces, and data for an electronic control system to satisfy specified requirements. System design could be seen as the application of system theory to product development. There is some overlap with the disciplines of system analysis, system architecture and system engineering.


title: Systems design

text: If the broader topic of product development "blends the perspective of marketing, design, and manufacturing into a single approach to product development," then design is the act of taking the marketing information and creating the design of the product to be manufactured. Systems design is therefore the process of defining and developing systems to satisfy specified requirements of the user.


title: Systems design

text: The basic study of system design is the understanding of component parts and their subsequent interaction with one another.


title: Systems design

text: The physical design relates to the actual input and output processes of the system. This is explained in terms of how data is input into a system, how it is verified/authenticated, how it is processed, and how it is displayed.


title: Systems design

text: Put another way, the physical portion of system design can generally be broken down into three sub-tasks:


title: Nathan Lyon

text: Nathan Michael Lyon (born 20 November 1987) is an Australian international cricketer. He made his Test debut in 2011 and plays domestic cricket for New South Wales. Lyon is an off spin bowler and a lower-order right-handed batsman. Considered the most successful off-spin bowler for Australia, Lyon holds the record for the most Test wickets taken by an Australian off-spin bowler, passing Hugh Trumble's 141 wickets in 2015. In January 2021, Lyon played in his 100th Test match during Australia's series against India.


title: Nathan Lyon

text: Lyon was born in Young, New South Wales, to Stephen and Bronwyn Lyon. He moved from Young to Canberra as a teenager where he went on to play for ACT Cricket's under-17s and under-18s representative teams. Lyon played for Western Districts and University of Canberra Cricket Club in ACT Grade cricket and debuted for the ACT Comets in 2008 in the Cricket Australia Cup against the South Australian Second XI where he claimed a wicket on day one. During his time with Comets, Lyon was mentored by captain and later captain-coach, Mark Higgs, who helped him in his spin bowling, getting his bowling action right as well as the tactical side including what lines to bowl and fields to set. After Lyon left the Comets he continued to keep in contact with Higgs in regards to the game.


title: Nathan Lyon

text: In 2010 Nathan Lyon moved to Adelaide and worked as a member of the ground staff team at the Adelaide Oval. He played for the Prospect Cricket Club in the South Australian Grade Cricket League while continuing playing for the Comets in the Futures League. After Lyon's performance in the 2010 Futures League Twenty20 in December for the Comets in Melbourne which South Australia's Twenty20 coach Darren Berry witnessed he was selected to play for the Southern Redbacks in the KFC Twenty20 Big Bash.


title: Nathan Lyon

text: In 2010–11 KFC Twenty20 Big Bash Lyon was the leading wicket-taker where the Redbacks went on to win the competition. Lyon went on to play for South Australia in the Sheffield Shield and the Australian domestic limited-overs competition. In the same year he was selected to represent Australia A in Zimbabwe where he took 11 wickets in the tri-series to be named man of the series. Nathan Lyon has signed to play in the inaugural season of the Big Bash League for the Adelaide Strikers.


title: Nathan Lyon

text: In May 2017 it was announced that Worcestershire had signed Lyon as a replacement for compatriot John Hastings, who was competing in the ICC Champions Trophy. On 15 November 2017, during the final moments of the Sheffield Shield match against Queensland at the Allan Border Field, Lyon was involved in a bizarre incident, burning a piece of toast in the dressing room and causing the smoke alarm to go off, which brought the fire services to the ground and stopped play for 30 minutes.


title: Nathan Lyon

text: On 5 November 2019, Lyon signed for Hampshire as their overseas player for the 2020 season in Championship cricket in England. However, this deal was later cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic. In February 2021, during the 2020–21 Sheffield Shield season, Lyon took his 600th first-class wicket.


title: Nathan Lyon

text: On 26 July 2011, Lyon was selected in the Australian Test squad for the tour to Sri Lanka in 2011. He took two wickets for Australia against the Sri Lanka Board XI in the three-day warm-up match at the Paikiasothy Saravanamuttu Stadium. Lyon made his Test debut against Sri Lanka at Galle on 31 August 2011. Nathan Lyon took his first wicket off his first ball in Test cricket on 1 September 2011, his victim was Kumar Sangakkara. With this feat he became the third Australian (and seventeenth international player) to take his first wicket off his first ball in Test cricket, and the first Australian since Arthur Coningham, in 1894. He finished with 5/34 in his first innings, becoming the 131st player to take five wickets on debut in a Test match.


title: Nathan Lyon

text: In November 2011, Lyon became just the seventh number 11 batsman to have the top score in his team's innings, when he scored 14 in Australia's second-innings total of 47 in the 1st Test against South Africa. Nathan Lyon played his first Test in Australia at the Gabba starting on 1 December 2011 against New Zealand in the first Test match of the series. Lyon took 4/69 in the first innings and 3/19 in his second innings, culminating in match figures of 7/88, the best Test match bowling figures by an Australian off-spinner at the venue. He played in three of the four Tests of the subsequent home series against India—being left out of the team for the third Test on the pace-friendly WACA Ground—taking seven wickets at an average of 41.57. Former Australian off-spinner Ashley Mallett criticised Lyon's delivery method during the series, saying he had been bowling too wide on the crease.


title: Nathan Lyon

text: On 24 April 2013, Lyon was named as the only spinner in the upcoming 2013 Ashes series for the Australian squad. It held true until hours before the first match when he was dropped from out of the lineup in favour of shock debutant Ashton Agar, who then went on to score 98 on his Test debut, which was also a world record for a no. 11 batsman. However, Lyon was recalled to the team for the third Ashes Test, and in the fourth Ashes Test at Chester-le-Street, he took figures of 4/42 on the first day to help restrict England to 238 in their first innings. On 28 December 2013, during the Boxing Day Test match at the Melbourne Cricket Ground, Lyon took his 100th Test wicket and also his first five wicket haul in Australia. He became just the sixth Australian off-spinner to take 100 Test wickets.


title: Nathan Lyon

text: On 5 January 2014, Lyon became only the second cricketer ever to not be dismissed in any innings during a five-Test series. Lyon made 60 runs during his six innings, with a strike rate of 52.63. On 13 December 2014, Lyon was named man of the match in the first Test of the Border–Gavaskar Trophy series against India at the Adelaide Oval after taking a personal best haul for the match of 5 for 134 in the first innings and 7 for 152 in the second. This was the first match the Australian team had played after the death of Phillip Hughes just two weeks earlier. After taking the final wicket of the match to secure the victory for Australia, Lyon knelt down and patted Hughes's Test number 408 that had been painted on the field for the match.


title: Nathan Lyon

text: In 2015, Lyon was not named in Australia's final squad of 15 for the 2015 Cricket World Cup. Xavier Doherty was picked in his place as a specialist spin bowler. In June 2015, Lyon took his 142nd Test wicket, passing Hugh Trumble to become the most prolific wicket-taker of all Australian off-spinners.


title: Nathan Lyon

text: Lyon made his Twenty20 International debut for Australia against India on 29 January 2016. On 28 July 2016, Lyon became the first Australian off-spinner to take 200 Test wickets. He achieved this feat during the first Test against Sri Lanka at the Pallekele Cricket Stadium by dismissing Dhananjaya de Silva. During the 2016 Test series between Australia and South Africa, the phrase "Nice, Garry!" became affectionately associated with Lyon after wicketkeeper Matthew Wade repeatedly yelled it after every ball bowled by the spinner (a joking reference to the Melbourne FC footballer Garry Lyon). This phrase was adopted by cricket fans throughout Australia, elevating Lyon to cult-hero status. A Facebook campaign was started up for fans at the 2016 Boxing Day Test against Pakistan to yell "Nice, Garry!" in unison after Lyon's third ball bowled; however, their attempts were replaced by cheering, as he took the wicket of Sami Aslam with his third delivery.


title: Nathan Lyon

text: On 4 March 2017, in the second Test between Australia and India in Bangalore as part of the 2017 Australian tour of India, Lyon took figures of 8/50 and finished with the best figures ever recorded in India by a visiting bowler. On 27 August 2017, Lyon became the 8th Australian bowler and the second Australian spinner after Shane Warne to take 250 Test wickets. He achieved this feat during the first Test against Bangladesh at the Sher-e-Bangla National Cricket Stadium by dismissing Mehedi Hasan Miraz. In September 2017, in the second Test between Australia and Bangladesh in Chittagong as part of the 2017 Australian tour of Bangladesh, Lyon took match figures of 13/154 and finished with the best figures ever recorded in Asia by an Australian bowler. He also took the most wickets in a two-Test series by an Australian bowler (22).


title: Nathan Lyon

text: Having missed out on the Champions Trophy squad, Lyon replaced John Hastings to play for Worcestershire. In 2017, Lyon became an Australian Apprenticeships Ambassador for the Australian Government. He would finish the year by taking more Test wickets than anyone else (63).


title: Nathan Lyon

text: On 6 March 2018, Lyon was fined 15 per cent of his match fee for a breach of the ICC Code of Conduct during the first Test against South Africa in Durban.


title: Nathan Lyon

text: Lyon took his 300th Test wicket during the 3rd Test in Cape Town by dismissing Kagiso Rabada out stumped. In April 2018, he was awarded a national contract by Cricket Australia for the 2018–19 season. Lyon finished the India–Australia Test series with 21 wickets and as the highest wicket taker, along with Jasprit Bumrah.


title: Nathan Lyon

text: Lyon awarded the Men's Test Player of the Year at the Allan Border Medal ceremony by the CA in 2019. In April 2019, he was named in Australia's squad for the 2019 Cricket World Cup. In July 2019, he was named in Australia's squad for the 2019 Ashes series in England. In the first Test of the 2019 Ashes, his figures of 3/112 in the first innings 6/49 in the second innings helped Australia to win a Test at Edgbaston for the first time in 19 years. Australia went on to retain The Ashes for the first time in 18 years. In November 2019, Lyon took seven wickets in two Tests against Pakistan, including a five-wicket haul in Adelaide. In the following series against New Zealand, Lyon was the leading wicket taker between both sides, finishing the series with 20 wickets as Australia won the series 3–0. This was capped off with match figures of 10/118 in the New Year's Test in Sydney, taking five wickets in each innings.


title: Nathan Lyon

text: On 16 July 2020, Lyon was named in a 26-man preliminary squad of players to begin training ahead of a possible tour to England following the COVID-19 pandemic. On 14 August 2020, Cricket Australia confirmed that the fixtures would be taking place, with Lyon included in the touring party. On 11 December 2021, during the first match of the 2021–22 Ashes series, Lyon took his 400th Test wicket by dismissing Dawid Malan.


title: Hermine Braunsteiner

text: Hermine Braunsteiner Ryan (July 16, 1919 – April 19, 1999) was a German SS "Helferin" and female camp guard at Ravensbrück and Majdanek concentration camps, and the first Nazi war criminal to be extradited from the United States to face trial in the then West Germany. Braunsteiner was known to prisoners of Majdanek concentration camp as the "Stomping Mare" and was said to have beaten prisoners to death, thrown children by their hair onto trucks that took them to be murdered in gas chambers, hanged young prisoners and stomped an old prisoner to death with her jackboots.


title: Hermine Braunsteiner

text: She was convicted for numerous murders and sentenced to life imprisonment by the District Court of Düsseldorf on April 30, 1981 but released on health grounds in 1996 before her death three years later.


title: Hermine Braunsteiner

text: Braunsteiner was born in Vienna, the youngest child in a strictly observant Roman Catholic working class family. Her father, Friedrich Braunsteiner, was a chauffeur for a brewery and/or a butcher. Hermine lacked the means to fulfill her aspiration to become a nurse, and worked as a maid. From 1937 to 1938, she worked in England for an American engineer's household.


title: Hermine Braunsteiner

text: In 1938, Braunsteiner became a German citizen after the "Anschluss". She returned to Vienna from England and the same year relocated to Germany for a job at the Heinkel aircraft works in Berlin.


title: Hermine Braunsteiner

text: At the urging of her landlord, a German policeman, Braunsteiner applied for a better paying job supervising prisoners, quadrupling her income in time. She began her training on August 15, 1939, as an Aufseherin under Maria Mandel at Ravensbrück concentration camp. She remained there after the start of World War II, and the influx of new prisoners from occupied countries. After three years, a disagreement with Mandel led Braunsteiner to request a transfer in October 1942.


title: Hermine Braunsteiner

text: On October 16, 1942, Braunsteiner assumed her duties in the forced-labor apparel factory near the Majdanek concentration camp, established near Lublin, Poland, a year earlier. It was both a labour camp (Arbeitslager) and an extermination camp (Vernichtungslager) with gas chambers and crematoria. She was promoted to assistant wardress in January 1943, under "Oberaufseherin" Elsa Ehrich along with five other camp guards. By then most of the Aufseherinnen had been moved into Majdanek from the Alter Flughafen labor camp.


title: Hermine Braunsteiner

text: Braunsteiner had a number of roles in the camp. She involved herself in "selections" of women and children to be sent to the gas chambers and whipped several women to death. Working alongside other female guards such as Elsa Ehrich, Hildegard Lächert, Marta Ulrich, Alice Orlowski, Charlotte Karla Mayer-Woellert, Erna Wallisch and Elisabeth Knoblich, Braunsteiner became known for her wild rages and tantrums. According to one witness at her later trial in Düsseldorf, she "seized children by their hair and threw them on trucks heading to the gas chambers". Other survivors testified how she killed women by stomping on them with her steel-studded jackboots, earning her the nickname "The Stomping Mare" (In Polish "Kobyła", in German "Stute von Majdanek"). For her work, she received the War Merit Cross, 2nd class, in 1943.


title: Hermine Braunsteiner

text: In January 1944, Braunsteiner was ordered back to Ravensbrück as Majdanek began evacuations due to the approaching front line. She was promoted to supervising wardress at the Genthin subcamp of Ravensbrück, located outside Berlin. Witnesses say that she abused many of the prisoners with a horsewhip she carried, killing at least two women with it. A French physician, who was interned at Genthin recalled the sadism of Braunsteiner while she ruled the camp: "I watched her administer twenty-five lashes with a riding crop to a young Russian girl suspected of having tried sabotage. Her back was full of lashes, but I was not allowed to treat her immediately."


title: Hermine Braunsteiner

text: On May 7, 1945, Braunsteiner fled the camp ahead of the Soviet Red Army. She then returned to Vienna, but soon left, complaining that there was insufficient food. On May 6, 1946, Austrian police arrested Braunsteiner and turned her over to the British military occupation authorities. She was held in various internment camps until April 18, 1947. Braunsteiner was re-arrested by Austrian officials on April 7, 1948.


title: Hermine Braunsteiner

text: On November 22, 1949, the Austrian People's Court in Graz convicted Braunsteiner of crimes against human dignity for non-fatal abuse in Ravensbrück, but acquitted of her crimes in Majdanek, including murder, due to a lack of witnesses. Braunsteiner was sentenced to three years in prison and had her property confiscated. With credit for time served, she was released from prison in April 1950. Braunsteiner was told that she would not face further prosecution, and was later granted partial amnesty in 1957. She worked at low-level jobs in hotels and restaurants until emigrating.


title: Hermine Braunsteiner

text: Russell Ryan, an American, met her on his vacation in Austria. They married in October 1958, after they had emigrated to Nova Scotia, Canada. She entered the United States in April 1959, becoming a United States citizen on January 19, 1963. They lived in Maspeth, Queens, New York City, where she was known as a fastidious housewife with a friendly manner, married to a construction worker.


title: Hermine Braunsteiner

text: Nazi hunter Simon Wiesenthal picked up on her trail by chance on a visit to Tel Aviv. He was at a restaurant there when he received a call from his friend that he could not make it to their luncheon. The maître d'hôtel announced the "phone call for Mr. Wiesenthal" and this led to his recognition by the other patrons, who stood up to applaud him. When he returned to his table, there were several Majdanek survivors waiting who told him about Braunsteiner and what she had done. Based on this information he followed her trail from Vienna to Halifax, Nova Scotia, and then, via Toronto, to Queens. In 1964, Wiesenthal alerted "The New York Times" that Braunsteiner might have married a man named Ryan and might live in the Maspeth area of the Borough of Queens in New York City. They assigned Joseph Lelyveld, then a young reporter, to find "Mrs. Ryan." They first lived at 54–44 82nd Street in western Elmhurst and moved to 52–11 72nd Street in Maspeth. He found her at the second doorbell he rang and later wrote that she greeted him at her front doorstep and said: "My God, I knew this would happen. You've come."


title: Hermine Braunsteiner

text: Braunsteiner stated that she had been at Majdanek only a year, eight months of that time in the camp infirmary. "My wife, sir, wouldn't hurt a fly" said Ryan. "There's no more decent person on this earth. She told me this was a duty she had to perform. It was a conscriptive service." On August 22, 1968, United States authorities sought to revoke her citizenship, because she had failed to disclose her convictions for war crimes; she was denaturalized in 1971 after entering into a consent judgment to avoid deportation.


title: Hermine Braunsteiner

text: A prosecutor in Düsseldorf began investigating her wartime behavior, and in 1973 the West German government requested her extradition, accusing her of joint responsibility in the death of 200,000 people.


title: Hermine Braunsteiner

text: The United States court denied procedural claims that her denaturalization had been invalid (U.S. citizens could not be extradited to West Germany), and that the charges alleged political offenses committed by a non-German outside West Germany. Later it rejected claims of lack of probable cause and double jeopardy. During the next year, she sat with her husband in United States district court in Queens, hearing survivors' testimony against the former "Schutzstaffel" (SS) guard. They described whippings and fatal beatings. Rachel Berger, alone among the witnesses, testified she would celebrate retribution against the former vice-commandant of the women's camp at Majdanek.


title: Hermine Braunsteiner

text: The judge certified her extradition to the Secretary of State on May 1, 1973, and on August 7, 1973, Hermine Braunsteiner Ryan became the first Nazi war criminal extradited from the United States to West Germany.


title: Hermine Braunsteiner

text: Ryan was remanded into custody in Düsseldorf on August 7, 1973, until her husband posted bail on April 7, 1976. However, she returned to custody on December 8, 1977, after attempting to intimidate witnesses, and remained there until January 9, 1978. The West German court rejected Ryan's arguments that it lacked jurisdiction, because she was not a German national but Austrian, and that the alleged offences had occurred outside Germany. It ruled she had been a German citizen at the time and more importantly had been a German government official acting in the name of the German Reich.


title: Hermine Braunsteiner

text: She stood trial in West Germany with 15 other former SS men and women from Majdanek. One of the witnesses against Hermine testified that she "seized children by their hair and threw them on trucks heading to the gas chambers." Others spoke of vicious beatings. One witness told of Hermine and the steel-studded jackboots with which she dealt blows to inmates.


title: Hermine Braunsteiner

text: The third Majdanek trial ( in German) was held in Düsseldorf. Beginning on November 26, 1975, and lasting 474 sessions, it was the longest and most expensive trial in West Germany. The defendants included Ryan, former SS guard Hermann Hackmann and camp doctor Heinrich Schmidt. The court found insufficient evidence on six counts of the indictment and convicted her on three counts: the murder of 80 people, abetting the murder of 102 children, and collaborating in the murder of 1,000 people. On June 30, 1981, the court imposed a life sentence, a more severe punishment than those meted out to her co-defendants.


title: Hermine Braunsteiner

text: Complications of diabetes, including a leg amputation, led to her release from Mülheimer women's prison in 1996. Hermine Braunsteiner Ryan died on April 19, 1999, aged 79, in Bochum, Germany.


title: Hermine Braunsteiner

text: After the publicity surrounding Ryan's extradition, the United States government established in 1979 a U.S. DOJ Office of Special Investigations to seek out war criminals to denaturalize or deport. It took jurisdiction previously held by the Immigration and Naturalization Service.


title: Lithium–sulfur battery

text: The lithium–sulfur battery (Li–S battery) is a type of rechargeable battery. It is notable for its high specific energy. The low atomic weight of lithium and moderate atomic weight of sulfur means that Li–S batteries are relatively light (about the density of water). They were used on the longest and highest-altitude unmanned solar-powered aeroplane flight (at the time) by Zephyr 6 in August 2008.


title: Lithium–sulfur battery

text: Lithium–sulfur batteries may displace lithium-ion cells because of their higher energy density and reduced cost. This is due to the use of sulfur instead of cobalt, a common element in lithium-ion batteries. Li–S batteries offer specific energies on the order of 550Wh/kg, while lithium-ion batteries are in the range of 150260Wh/kg.


title: Lithium–sulfur battery

text: Li–S batteries with up to 1,500 charge and discharge cycles were demonstrated in 2017, but cycle life tests at commercial scale and with lean electrolyte have not been completed. As of early 2021, none were commercially available.


title: Lithium–sulfur battery

text: Issues that have slowed acceptance include the polysulfide "shuttle" effect that is responsible for the progressive leakage of active material from the cathode, resulting in too-few recharge cycles. Also, sulfur cathodes have low conductivity, requiring extra mass for a conducting agent in order to exploit the contribution of active mass to the capacity. Volume expansion of the sulfur cathode during S to LiS conversion and the large amount of electrolyte needed are also issues.


title: Lithium–sulfur battery

text: LiS batteries were invented in the 1960s, when Herbert and Ulam patented a primary battery employing lithium or lithium alloys as anodic material, sulfur as cathodic material and an electrolyte composed of aliphatic saturated amines. A few years later the technology was improved by the introduction of organic solvents as PC, DMSO and DMF yielding a 2.35-2.5 V battery. By the end of the 1980s a rechargeable LiS battery was demonstrated employing ethers, in particular DOL, as the electrolyte solvent.


title: Lithium–sulfur battery

text: In 2020 Manthiram identified the critical parameters needed for achieving commercial acceptance. Specifically, Li-S batteries need to achieve a sulfur loading of >5 mg cm, a carbon content of <5%, electrolyte-to-sulfur ratio of <5 μL mg, electrolyte-to-capacity ratio of <5 μL (mA h), and negative-to-positive capacity ratio of <5 in pouch-type cells.


title: Lithium–sulfur battery

text: In 2021, researchers announced the use of a sugar-based anode additive that prevented the release of polysulfide chains from the cathodes that pollute the anode. A prototype cell demonstrated 1,000 charge cycles with a capacity of 700 mAh/g.


title: Lithium–sulfur battery

text: In 2022, an interlayer was introduced that claimed to reduce polysulfide movement (protecting the anode) and facilitate lithium ion transfer to reduce charge/discharge times. Also that year, researchers employed aramid nanofibers (nanoscale Kevlar fibers), fashioned into cell membrane-like networks. This prevented dendrite formation. It addressed polysulfide shuttle by using ion selectivity, by integrating tiny channels into the network and adding an electrical charge.


title: Lithium–sulfur battery

text: Also in 2022, Researchers at Drexel University produced a prototype lithium-sulfur battery that did not degrade over 4000 charge cycles. Analysis has shown that the battery contained monoclinic gamma-phase sulfur, which has been thought to be unstable below 95 degrees Celsius, and only a few studies have shown this type of sulfur to be stable longer than 20 to 30 minutes.


title: Lithium–sulfur battery

text: Chemical processes in the Li–S cell include lithium dissolution from the anode surface (and incorporation into alkali metal polysulfide salts) during discharge, and reverse lithium plating to the anode while charging.


title: Lithium–sulfur battery

text: At the anodic surface, dissolution of the metallic lithium occurs, with the production of electrons and lithium ions during the discharge and electrodeposition during the charge. The half-reaction is expressed as:


title: Lithium–sulfur battery

text: In analogy with lithium batteries, the dissolution / electrodeposition reaction causes over time problems of unstable growth of the solid-electrolyte interface (SEI), generating active sites for the nucleation and dendritic growth of lithium. Dendritic growth is responsible for the internal short circuit in lithium batteries and leads to the death of the battery itself.


title: Lithium–sulfur battery

text: In Li-S batteries, energy is stored in the sulfur cathode (S). During discharge, the lithium ions in the electrolyte migrate to the cathode where the sulfur is reduced to lithium sulphide (LiS). The sulfur is reoxidized to S during the recharge phase. The semi-reaction is therefore expressed as:


title: Lithium–sulfur battery

text: Actually the sulfur reduction reaction to lithium sulphide is much more complex and involves the formation of lithium polysulphides (LiS, 2 ≤ "x" ≤ 8) at decreasing chain length according to the order:


title: Lithium–sulfur battery

text: The final product is actually a mixture of LiS and LiS rather than pure LiS, due to the slow reduction kinetics at LiS. This contrasts with conventional lithium-ion cells, where the lithium ions are intercalated in the anode and cathodes. Each sulfur atom can host two lithium ions. Typically, lithium-ion batteries accommodate only 0.5–0.7 lithium ions per host atom. Consequently, LiS allows for a much higher lithium storage density. Polysulfides are reduced on the cathode surface in sequence while the cell is discharging:


title: Lithium–sulfur battery

text: The main challenges of LiS batteries is the low conductivity of sulfur and its considerable volume change upon discharging and finding a suitable cathode is the first step for commercialization of LiS batteries. Therefore, most researchers use a carbon/sulfur cathode and a lithium anode. Sulfur is very cheap, but has practically no electroconductivity, 5S⋅cm at 25°C. A carbon coating provides the missing electroconductivity. Carbon nanofibers provide an effective electron conduction path and structural integrity, at the disadvantage of higher cost.


title: Lithium–sulfur battery

text: One problem with the lithium–sulfur design is that when the sulfur in the cathode absorbs lithium, volume expansion of the LiS compositions occurs, and predicted volume expansion of LiS is nearly 80% of the volume of the original sulfur. This causes large mechanical stresses on the cathode, which is a major cause of rapid degradation. This process reduces the contact between the carbon and the sulfur, and prevents the flow of lithium ions to the carbon surface.


title: Lithium–sulfur battery

text: Mechanical properties of the lithiated sulfur compounds are strongly contingent on the lithium content, and with increasing lithium content, the strength of lithiated sulfur compounds improves, although this increment is not linear with lithiation.


title: Lithium–sulfur battery

text: One of the primary shortfalls of most Li–S cells is unwanted reactions with the electrolytes. While S and are relatively insoluble in most electrolytes, many intermediate polysulfides are not. Dissolving into electrolytes causes irreversible loss of active sulfur. Use of highly reactive lithium as a negative electrode causes dissociation of most of the commonly used other type electrolytes. Use of a protective layer in the anode surface has been studied to improve cell safety, i.e., using Teflon coating showed improvement in the electrolyte stability, LIPON, LiN also exhibited promising performance.


title: Lithium–sulfur battery

text: Historically, the "shuttle" effect is the main cause of degradation in a LiS battery. The lithium polysulfide LiS (6≤x≤8) is highly soluble in the common electrolytes used for LiS batteries.


title: Lithium–sulfur battery

text: They are formed and leaked from the cathode and they diffuse to the anode, where they are reduced to short-chain polysulfides and diffuse back to the cathode where long-chain polysulfides are formed again. This process results in the continuous leakage of active material from the cathode, lithium corrosion, low coulombic efficiency and low battery life.


title: Lithium–sulfur battery

text: Moreover, the "shuttle" effect is responsible for the characteristic self-discharge of LiS batteries, because of slow dissolution of polysulfide, which occurs also in rest state. The "shuttle" effect in a LiS battery can be quantified by a factor f (0<f<1), evaluated by the extension of the charge voltage plateau. The factor "f" is given by the expression:


title: Lithium–sulfur battery

text: where "k, q, [S]" and "I" are respectively the kinetic constant, specific capacity contributing to the anodic plateau, the total sulfur concentration and charge current.


title: Lithium–sulfur battery

text: In 2022, researchers reported the use of a cathode made from carbon nanofibers. Elemental sulfur was deposited onto the carbon substrate (cf. physical vapor deposition), which formed the rare and usually metastable monoclinic γ-Sulfur allotrope. This allotrope reversibly reacts to without the formation of intermediate polysulfides . Therefore, carbonate electrolytes, which commonly react with those polysulfides, can be used instead of the rather dangerous ether based electrolytes (low flash and boiling points).


title: Lithium–sulfur battery

text: Its initial capacity was 800 Ah/kg (classical LiCoO2/graphite batteries have a cell capacity of 100 Ah/kg). It decayed only very slowly, on average 0.04% each cycle, and retained 658 Ah/kg after 4000 cycles (82%).


title: Lithium–sulfur battery

text: Conventionally, LiS batteries employ a liquid organic electrolyte, contained in the pores of PP separator. The electrolyte plays a key role in LiS batteries, acting both on "shuttle" effect by the polysulfide dissolution and the SEI stabilization at anode surface. It has been demonstrated that the electrolytes based on organic carbonates commonly employed in Li-ion batteries (i.e. PC, EC, DEC and mixtures of them) are not compatible with the chemistry of LiS batteries. Long-chain polysulfides undergo nucleophilic attack on electrophilic sites of carbonates, resulting in the irreversible formation of by-products as ethanol, methanol, ethylene glycol and thiocarbonates. In LiS batteries are conventionally employed cyclic ethers (as DOL) or short-chain ethers (as DME) as well as the family of glycol ethers, including DEGDME and TEGDME. One common electrolyte is 1M LiTFSI in DOL:DME 1:1 vol. with1%w/w di LiNO as additive for lithium surface passivation.


title: Lithium–sulfur battery

text: Because of the high potential energy density and the nonlinear discharge and charging response of the cell, a microcontroller and other safety circuitry is sometimes used along with voltage regulators to manage cell operation and prevent rapid discharge.


title: Lithium–sulfur battery

text: As of 2021 few companies had been able to commercialize the technology on an industrial scale. Companies such as Sion Power have partnered with Airbus Defence and Space to test their lithium sulfur battery technology. Airbus Defense and Space successfully launched their prototype High Altitude Pseudo-Satellite (HAPS) aircraft powered by solar energy during the day and by lithium sulfur batteries at night in real life conditions during an 11-day flight. The batteries used in the test flight utilized Sion Power's LiS cells that provide 350 W⋅h/kg. Sion originally claimed to be in the process of volume manufacturing with availability by end of 2017; however more recently it can be seen that they have dropped work on their lithium sulfur battery in favor of a lithium-metal battery.


title: Lithium–sulfur battery

text: British firm OXIS Energy developed prototype lithium sulfur batteries. Together with Imperial College London and Cranfield University, they published equivalent-circuit-network models for its cells. With Lithium Balance of Denmark they built a prototype scooter battery system primarily for the Chinese market, which had a capacity of 1.2kWh using 10Ah Long Life cells, and weighed 60% less than lead acid batteries with a significant increase in range. They also built a 3U, 3,000W⋅h Rack-Mounted Battery that weighed only 25kg and was said to be fully scalable. They claimed their Lithium-Sulfur batteries would cost about $200/kWh in mass production. However, the firm entered bankruptcy (insolvency) status in May 2021.


title: Lithium–sulfur battery

text: Sony, which also commercialized the first lithium-ion battery, planned to introduce lithium–sulfur batteries to the market in 2020, but has provided no updates since the initial announcement in 2015.


title: Lithium–sulfur battery

text: Monash University's Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering in Melbourne, Australia developed an ultra-high capacity Li-S battery that has been manufactured by partners at the Fraunhofer Institute for Material and Beam Technology in Germany. It is claimed the battery can provide power to a smartphone for five days.


title: Lithium–sulfur battery

text: In 2022, the German company Theion claimed to introduce lithium–sulfur batteries for mobile devices in 2023 and for vehicles by 2024.


title: What I've Done

text: "What I've Done" is a song by American rock band Linkin Park. It was released as the first single from their third studio album, "Minutes to Midnight" (2007), and is the sixth track. The song was released as a radio single on April 1, 2007, as a digital download on April 2, and as a CD single on April 30. The live version of "What I've Done" from "" was nominated for Best Hard Rock Performance at the 52nd Grammy Awards, but did not win. It serves as the end credits track of the 2007 science fiction film "Transformers" and also appears on "" (2007). Being certified six times platinum by the RIAA, it is the band's most commercially successful single in terms of pure sales, and reached number 7 on the "Billboard" Hot 100.


title: What I've Done

text: "What I've Done" was featured in the video game "Guitar Hero World Tour". In January 2011, it was released in a Linkin Park DLC pack for "Rock Band 3". The song is also a B-side to the UK single of "Iridescent". An instrumental version of the song is currently used by Sky UK as background music for their interactive services.


title: What I've Done

text: The single and video appeared in the iTunes Store shortly after midnight EST on April 2, 2007. It became available the day after on iTunes in the UK and Australia. On April 2, the song was featured streaming on the front page of their official website, with the video being added to the site shortly thereafter.


title: What I've Done

text: The song is composed in the key of G minor. It starts out with a short 3-second guitar part and then a piano motif, before adding a hip hop-inspired drum line, and then introducing a raw-sounding guitar riff. When the song is played live at Linkin Park's concerts, Mike Shinoda plays the piano intro and the guitar after that. This song differs from most of Linkin Park's songs from previous albums in that it features almost no lead vocals from vocalist Shinoda, with the exception of a brief "na na na" refrain at the end. "What I've Done" was the last song written for "Minutes to Midnight". The song also has a downbeat exactly once every second, consistent throughout its entirety.


title: What I've Done

text: Shinoda created a remix of the song, which is called "What I've Done (Distorted Remix)", which is included as a b-side to "Bleed It Out". The remix was then included in the international tour edition of "Minutes to Midnight", as well as a track in the Linkin Park Underground-exclusive CD "Underground X: Demos".


title: What I've Done

text: The music video for "What I've Done" was filmed in the California desert and was directed by Linkin Park turntablist Joe Hahn. It features footage of the band performing in an area outside of the city, interspersed with footage showing many political movements and humanitarian issues including pollution, racism, Nazism, the Ku Klux Klan, abortion, terrorism, Holocaust, deforestation, poverty, drug addiction, obesity, destruction, rising gasoline prices and crimes committed by humanity. Some cutscenes, such as the traffic scene and the napalm exploding, were also featured on the Rise Against music video for "Ready to Fall". The video premiered on April 2, 2007, on MTV and Fuse. It premiered on MTV Asia, MTV Germany, TMF Netherlands and Canada's MuchMusic on April 3, 2007.


title: What I've Done

text: The video clip was featured and won on MTV's "Battle of the Videos" against videos by Evanescence ("Sweet Sacrifice") and Lil' Mama ("Lip Gloss"). The video also marks the first appearance of a Linkin Park video in the #1 spot on MTV's TRL, hitting #1 six times so far. AOL currently has a live performance of "What I've Done" on their website. MTV's James Montgomery called "What I've Done" the "biggest, baddest and best Linkin Park video of all time," praising the visuals as well as the numerous political figures and events occurring within the video. He summarized the video's message: "Hahn was smart — or brave — enough to inject a message here: the destructive power of man versus the unyielding beauty of nature, and where it all will undoubtedly end ()."


title: What I've Done

text: As mentioned in episode 89 of "MTV Cribs", Chester's jacket was lent to him by Yellowcard frontman Ryan Key.


title: What I've Done

text: A second video, made exclusively for Australia, features a considerably different scenario from the first; instead of clips of human sin and the grass sinking clip, the video tells the story of a woman (played by Emma Mullings) working at a government-run pharmaceutical company learning of a plan to develop a deadly new virus for "social control", and – with the help of several people dressed in black hooded sweatshirts with Linkin Park's logo on them – smuggles out several blood samples of a human test subject of the virus to expose the conspiracy. The video can be seen on YouTube and Linkin Park's Australian website.


title: What I've Done

text: Despite Minutes To Midnight having mixed responses, the song made big debuts on the US charts during the chart week of April 21, 2007. The song debuted in the top 10 of the US Hot 100 on April 10, 2007, at #7. It is the band's second highest debut to date on the chart (this title was previously held by "Somewhere I Belong" which opened at #47), earning "Hot Shot" debut of the week, and subsequently becoming the third highest position for a Linkin Park single to date on the Hot 100. The song was their highest debut until they released "New Divide" in May 2009. At the time of its debut it was only the eleventh song since 2000 to debut at #7 or higher on the Hot 100, and only the third song to do so by an artist not from "American Idol". The song was partly fueled by digital sales, debuting at #4 on the digital chart. The song was certified 6× Platinum by the RIAA on May 12, 2022. It reached 3 million downloads by early 2011, making it their most successful digital song in the US. As of January 2015, the song has sold 3,700,000 copies in the US.


title: What I've Done

text: In addition the song became only the third song ever to open at #1 on the Modern Rock chart, also becoming the band's seventh number one on the chart. It held the #1 spot on Alternative Songs for 15 consecutive weeks, at the time tying it with Marcy Playground's "Sex and Candy" The song also reached #1 on the Mainstream Rock chart, where it stayed for 8 consecutive weeks. In the iTunes music store, the song had reached number two. It was kept out of the top spot by "Give It to Me" by Timbaland. The music video is the first to reach the number 1 spot on TRL for Linkin Park video history. It has also become a moderate hit on the Adult Top 40, and Pop 100 Airplay charts, peaking at number 21 and 17 respectively on those charts.


title: What I've Done

text: The song hit #6 in the UK once the physical format was released, making it Linkin Park's highest-charting UK single.


title: What I've Done

text: In August 2022, an internet meme was born using "What I've Done" as a template for various films "but it came out in 2007." It was inspired by the usage of the song in the first "Transformers" film to showcase how well the song fits with other closing scenes in other media.


title: Mainstream media

text: In journalism, mainstream media (MSM) is a term and abbreviation used to refer collectively to the various large mass news media that influence many people and both reflect and shape prevailing currents of thought. The term is used to contrast with alternative media.


title: Mainstream media

text: The term is often used for large news conglomerates, including newspapers and broadcast media, that underwent successive mergers in many countries. The concentration of media ownership has raised concerns of a homogenization of viewpoints presented to news consumers. Consequently, the term "mainstream media" has been used in conversation and the blogosphere, sometimes in oppositional, pejorative or dismissive senses, in discussion of the mass media and media bias.


title: Mainstream media

text: In the United States, movie production is known to have been dominated by major studios since the early 20th century; before that, there was a period in which Edison's Trust monopolized the industry. In the early 21st century, the music and television industries was subject to media consolidation, with Sony Music Entertainment's parent company merging their music division with Bertelsmann AG's BMG to form Sony BMG, and Warner Bros. Entertainment's The WB and CBS Corp.'s UPN merging to form The CW. In the case of Sony BMG there existed a "Big Five", later "Big Four", of major record companies, while The CW's creation was an attempt to consolidate ratings and stand up to the "Big Four" of American network (terrestrial) television (although the CW was actually partially owned by one of the Big Four in CBS). In television, the vast majority of broadcast and basic cable networks, over a hundred in all, are controlled by eight corporations: Fox Corporation, The Walt Disney Company (which includes the ABC, ESPN, FX and Disney brands), National Amusements (which owns Paramount Global), Comcast (which owns NBCUniversal), Warner Bros. Discovery, E. W. Scripps Company, Altice USA, or some combination thereof.


title: Mainstream media

text: Over time the rate of media mergers has increased, while the number of media outlets has also increased. This has resulted in a higher concentration of media ownership, with fewer companies owning more media outlets.


title: Mainstream media

text: Some critics, such as Ben Bagdikian, assailed concentration of ownership, arguing that large media acquisitions limit the information accessible to the public. Other commentators, such as Ben Compaine and Jack Shafer, find Bagdikian's critique overblown. Shafer noted that U.S. media consumers have a wide variety of news sources, including independent national and local sources. Compaine argues that, based on economic metrics such as the Herfindahl-Hirschman Index, the media industry is not very highly concentrated and did not become more concentrated during the 1990s and 2000s. Compaine also points out that most media mergers are not purely acquisitions, but also include divestitures.


title: Mainstream media

text: Trust in the media declined in the 1970s, and then again in the 2000s. Since the 2000s, distrust in the media has been polarized, as Republicans have grown substantially more distrustful of the media than Democrats.


title: Mainstream media

text: In the UK, during 1922, after the closure of many radio stations, the British Broadcasting Corporation started its first daily radio transmission and started to grow an audience. Later that year John Reith, a Scottish engineer, would be appointed the first General Manager for the BBC. Later on January 1, 1927 the BBC was fully established by Royal Charter and renamed the British Broadcasting Corporation with Reith as the first Director-General. During November 1936 the BBC began to expand into television broadcasting and was the first broadcaster to start the trend of a regularly scheduled TV service.


title: Mainstream media

text: Today the BBC is one of two chartered public broadcasting companies in the United Kingdom. The second is ITV, Independent Television, which was established in 1955 as the first public commercial television company after the Television act of 1954 in an effort to break up the monopoly the BBC had on television broadcasting, gaining fifteen regional broadcasting licenses in less than twenty years.<ref name="ABout ITV/History"></ref> Today the BBC and ITV are the two free to air digital services offered to everyone in the United Kingdom and each other's biggest competitors. The BBC has nine national television channels, BBC three, the first channel to switch from television to online, an interactive channel, ten national and forty local radio stations, BBC Online, and BBC Worldwide. ITV currently holds thirteen of the fifteen regional broadcasting licenses in the United Kingdom that carries their multiple channels including ITV, ITVhub, ITV2, ITVBe, ITV 3, ITV4, CITV, ITV Encore,


title: Mainstream media

text: Britbox, a video-on-demand service in collaboration with the BBC to bring British television content to the United States and Canada, and Cirkus, their own video-on-demand service.<ref name="About ITV/ What we do"></ref>


title: Wound Badge

text: The Wound Badge () was a German military decoration first promulgated by Wilhelm II, German Emperor on 3 March 1918, which was first awarded to soldiers of the German Army who were wounded during World War I. Between the world wars, it was awarded to members of the German armed forces who fought on the Nationalist side of the Spanish Civil War, 1938–39, and received combat related wounds. It was awarded to members in the "Reichswehr", the Wehrmacht, SS and the auxiliary service organizations during World War II. After March 1943, due to the increasing number of Allied bombings, it was also awarded to civilians wounded in air raids. It was awarded when the wound was the result of enemy hostile action. In 1957, the West German government authorized a denazified (Swastika removed) version of the basic (black, silver, & gold) badges for wear on the Bundeswehr uniform, among other certain Nazi-era wartime awards.


title: Wound Badge

text: The "progression" could be waived in the event of loss of a limb or eyesight; when such a severe wound occurred, the silver badge was awarded.


title: Wound Badge

text: Badges were made of pressed steel, brass and zinc. All versions of the Wound Badge were worn on the lower left breast of the uniform or tunic. The badge was worn below all other awards on the left. It ranked lower than combat badges. There were 24 approved manufacturers of the Wound Badge. At first, the Wound Badge in Black was stamped from sheet brass, painted semi-matte black with a hollow reverse pin back attachment or of solid construction. From 1942, steel was used to make the badges. The Wound Badge in silver was made (before 1942) from silver-plated brass, and (after 1942) from lacquered zinc, and had a solid reverse with either a needle pin or a broad flat pin bar. The Wound Badge in Gold was a gilded version of the Wound Badge in Silver. In 1957, a revised version of the Wound Badge was authorised for wear; however, the previous type could still be worn if the swastika were removed (for example by grinding).


title: Wound Badge

text: The 20 July 1944 Wound Badge was only issued to those injured during the failed attempt on Adolf Hitler's life at the Wolf's Lair headquarters in Rastenburg, East Prussia. Twenty-four men were present when the bomb detonated; one officer was killed and three succumbed to their wounds a short time later. Thereafter, Hitler ordered a special wound badge be awarded commemorating the event, as he believed "fate had intervened" for him.


title: Wound Badge

text: The 20 July Wound Badge is based on the common Wound Badge, but the helmet is slightly higher and larger; it also bears the date "20 Juli 1944" and a facsimile of Hitler's signature below the helmet and date. The 20 July Wound Badges were also awarded at three grades; black, silver, and gold. Recipients who held regulation Wound Badges were awarded the 20 July Wound Badge in a higher grade.


title: Wound Badge

text: Unlike the Wound Badge in Black, the 20 July Wound Badge in Black was not all black. Only the helmet and wreath were black; the background was in silver so that the date and facsimile signature could be seen. The 20 July Wound Badge in silver has black highlights on the helmet swastika, the date, and the facsimile signature. The 20 July Wound Badge in gold had a silver background with the helmet and wreath colored gold. Unlike the standard Wound Badges, these were of two-piece construction.


title: Wound Badge

text: Hitler presented the survivors with the special wound badge as well as a unique award document. The first were awarded in a ceremony on 20 August 1944. The four posthumous awards were sent to the recipients' wives. Although Hitler had been injured in the bombing, he did not give one of these badges to himself. Hitler had earned his own Wound Badge (in black) in World War I on 18 May 1918.


title: Wound Badge

text: The badge replaced the basic 1939 Wound Badge on those persons who were presented the 20 July Badge. It is important to note that this badge was more a personal gift from Hitler to those involved, and was intended to be a one-off souvenir of the event. Recipients of the 20 July wound badge could have their 20 July wound badges upgraded if they earned higher grades of the Wound Badge. "Konteradmiral" Hans-Erich Voss eventually had the 20 July Wound Badge in all three grades, earning it in black on 20 July 1944, and having it upgraded twice for subsequent wounds.


title: Bloody Roar

text: The series began in 1997 under the name "Beastorizer". The game's theme incorporated anthropomorphism, where the player has the ability to transform into a half-human, half-animal creature known as a "Zoanthrope" (the name came from the clinical term, 'zoanthropy', which is similar to that of lycanthropy). The game would appear under the name ""Bloody Roar"" when ported to the PlayStation in 1998, which would become the permanent title thereafter.


title: Bloody Roar

text: "Bloody Roar" has kept somewhat the same controls over the series. A button each for both punch and kick, the beast (transform/attack) button and a fourth button that has been either a throw button, a block button, an evade button (introduced for some characters in "Bloody Roar 4") and a rave button (an early version of the Hyper Beast in the original "Bloody Roar" only).


title: Bloody Roar

text: The "Bloody Roar" series is a 3D fighting game in the same vein as "Tekken", "Dead or Alive", "Soulcalibur" and "Virtua Fighter". Although some of the characters have remained almost identical through all four games, others have changed completely. For example, Yugo has a completely different move set in the fourth title compared to his original in the first and Bakuryu has stayed almost the same apart from a few extras which are relevant to the games' evolution over time and generations.


title: Bloody Roar

text: "Bloody Roar" was adapted into a manga drawn by Maruyama Tomowo. It was originally published in Monthly Shōnen Jump. A few themes were used from the games but the scenarios and characters in Maruyama's version were completely new, though a few of his characters looked a lot like the original game characters. The main stars of the manga were a loner wolf zoanthrope, Fang, and a rabbit girl named Mashiro. Their adventures had them fighting out-of-control beast men and trying to stop an evil creature being released by the gathering of talismans. The manga was released in two volumes during 2001.


title: Bloody Roar

text: In the first three games, artwork by artist Naochika Morishita, also known as CARAMEL MAMA, was used for concept artwork and in game cut scenes.


title: Bloody Roar

text: For their 2000 single "My Console", the Italian eurodance group Eiffel 65 include Bloody Roar along with several other popular PlayStation titles in the song's lyrics.


title: Bloody Roar

text: Yūgo appears as a playable character in the 2003 crossover fighting game "DreamMix TV World Fighters".


title: Amused to Death

text: Amused to Death is the third studio album by English musician Roger Waters, released 7 September 1992 on Columbia. Produced by Waters and Patrick Leonard, it is mixed in QSound to enhance its spatial feel. The album features Jeff Beck on lead guitar on several tracks. The album's title was inspired by Neil Postman's 1985 book "Amusing Ourselves to Death."


title: Amused to Death

text: In 2015, the album was remastered and re-released with new artwork and in different formats, including a new 5.1 surround sound mix by original engineer James Guthrie, assisted by Joel Plante.


title: Amused to Death

text: Roger Waters started working on "Amused to Death" in 1987 when he first wrote "Perfect Sense." It was several years before the album was released.


title: Amused to Death

text: "Amused to Death" was produced by Patrick Leonard, Waters, and was co-produced with Nick Griffiths in London at The Billiard Room, Olympic Studios, CTS Studios, Angel Recording Studios and Abbey Road Studios. The album was engineered by Hayden Bendall, Jerry Jordan, and Stephen McLaughlan and mixed by James Guthrie. The album is mixed in QSound to enhance the spatial feel of the audio, and the many sound effects on the album – rifle range ambience, sleigh-bells, cars, planes, distant horses, chirping crickets, and dogs – all make use of the 3-D facility.


title: Amused to Death

text: Amused to Death is the only studio album by Waters to not have a tour supporting it, though some songs were performed during the In The Flesh and Us + Them tours. "The Bravery of Being Out of Range" was also performed on his current This Is Not A Drill Tour.


title: Amused to Death

text: The album is loosely organized around the idea of an ape randomly switching channels on a television, but explores numerous political and social themes, including critiques of the First Gulf War in "The Bravery of Being Out of Range" and "Perfect Sense".


title: Amused to Death

text: The first track, "The Ballad of Bill Hubbard", features the voice of World War I veteran . A member of the Royal Fusiliers, he describes finding fellow soldier William "Bill" Hubbard – to whom the album is dedicated – severely wounded on the battlefield. After failed attempts to take him to safety, Razzell is forced to abandon him in no-man's land. The tale is continued at the end of the title track, at the very end of the album, providing a coda to the tragic story, with Razzell describing how he finally found peace. The excerpts are from BBC television's 1991 "Everyman" documentary, "A Game of Ghosts", marking the 75th anniversary of the start of the Battle of the Somme. "I found it very moving," Waters remarked. "That original programme confronted the horrors of war and told the real story. It was an example of television taking its responsibilities seriously." The opening track also features the sound of several animals.


title: Amused to Death

text: The second song, "What God Wants, Part I", follows and contrasts the moving words of Razzell by opening with the TV being tuned instead into an excerpt of a child who says, "I don't mind about the war. That's one of the things I like to watch – if it's a war going on. 'Cos then I know if, um, our side's winning, if our side's losing..." he is then interrupted by the channel being changed and a burst of ape-chatter.


title: Amused to Death

text: "Perfect Sense" is a two-part song about a world where live transmissions of wars are the main form of entertainment. The first part begins with a loud, unintelligible rant, then a backwards message from Waters: "Julia, however, in the light and visions of the issues of Stanley, we changed our minds. We have decided to include a backward message. Stanley, for you, and for all the other book burners." The message climaxes with Waters yelling in the aggressive Scottish voice he used to depict the teacher in "The Wall". In the second part, sportscaster Marv Albert narrates a war as if it were a basketball game. "My main inspiration behind the song 'Perfect Sense'," Waters explained, "came from thinking about the days of the Roman Empire, when they would flood the Colosseum and have fights between rival galleys. I've always been intrigued by this notion of war as an entertainment to mollify the folks back home, and the Gulf conflict fuelled that idea."


title: Amused to Death

text: "The Bravery of Being Out of Range" includes a reference to a song written by Waters on Pink Floyd's 1977 album "Animals", "Sheep", and to "Swing Low, Sweet Chariot". In "Sheep" Waters sings, "I've looked over Jordan and I have seen, things are not what they seem"; in "The Bravery of Being Out of Range" he sings "I looked over Jordan and what did I see? I saw a U.S. Marine in a pile of debris."


title: Amused to Death

text: "Late Home Tonight, Part I", which opens with the song of a Eurasian skylark, recalls the 1986 US air strike against Libya from the perspective of two "ordinary wives" and a young American F-111 pilot. The lyrics about "when you take the jeans from the refrigerator" reference a 1985 Levi's 501 commercial.


title: Amused to Death

text: At the beginning of "What God Wants, Part II" Charles Fleischer (better known as the voice of Roger Rabbit) performs the greedy teleevangelist's sermon. The lyrics about God wanting silver, gold and "his secret never to be told" reference the nursery rhyme, "One for Sorrow". "What God Wants, Part III" musically references the Pink Floyd songs "Shine On You Crazy Diamond (Part I)", "Echoes" and "Breathe (In the Air)". It ends with an audio clip of Tom Bromley, an elderly WWI veteran, singing "Wait 'Till the Sun Shines, Nellie" "a capella". The clip is also from "A Game of Ghosts".


title: Amused to Death

text: "Too Much Rope" includes the line, "Each man has his price, Bob, and yours was pretty low." "I would sometimes rehearse vocal takes by impersonating Bob Dylan," Waters explained. "That line originally read, 'Each man has his price, my friends…' – so make of that what you will. As a joke, I sang 'Bob' instead, and Pat "(Leonard, producer)" insisted that we leave it in. So, although it was unintentional, I'm happy that it's there for "(Pink Floyd producer)" Bob Ezrin. I hope he appreciates it."


title: Amused to Death

text: The song "Watching TV" (a duet with Don Henley) explores the influence of mass media on the Chinese protests for democracy in Tiananmen Square.


title: Amused to Death

text: In "It's a Miracle" Waters makes a scathing reference to Andrew Lloyd Webber (whom he would accuse elsewhere of having plagiarised music from Pink Floyd's "Echoes" for sections of the musical "The Phantom of the Opera"): The same song features a sample from the 1977 low-budget zombie film "Shock Waves" in which the film's characters wrestle over a flashlight. The title track begins with the lyric, "Doctor, Doctor". "Take Up Thy Stethoscope and Walk" on "The Piper at the Gates of Dawn", the first song written by Waters, opens with the same line.


title: Amused to Death

text: Waters stated in a "Rockline" interview on February 8, 1993, that he had wanted to use dialogue samples from "" on the album, specifically HAL 9000's 'dying' monologue. Stanley Kubrick, the film's director, turned him down on the basis that it would open the door to many other people using the sound sample. Others think that Kubrick refused because Pink Floyd had not allowed him to use music from "Atom Heart Mother" in his film "A Clockwork Orange". Waters did use the samples of HAL describing his mind being taken away when performing live – specifically at the beginning of "Perfect Sense, Part I" during his In the Flesh tour, after Kubrick's death, and it was finally incorporated into the "Amused to Death" album for the 2015 remaster / remix release.


title: Amused to Death

text: The album's title was inspired by Neil Postman's book "Amusing Ourselves to Death." In Postman's later book "The End of Education", he remarks on the album:


title: Amused to Death

text: The album's original artwork features a chimpanzee watching television in reference to Kubrick's film "". The image on the TV is a gigantic eyeball staring at the viewer. According to Waters, the ape was "a symbol for anyone who's been sitting with his mouth open in front of the network and cable news for the last 10 years."


title: Amused to Death

text: AllMusic described the album as "a masterpiece in the sense that it brings together all of his obsessions in one grand, but not unwieldy, package". "Record Collector" wrote that the album shows Waters "at his most bleakly inspired since the cautionary parable of "The Wall"". However, the "Los Angeles Times" was less favorable, writing "The result is blurred structure (partly improved by the moving old-soldier's tale Waters uses as a framing device), too much repetition and a certain distance and overintellectualization. [...] overall there's a dearth of the good old pop-rock appeal that always lifted the better Pink Floyd records." A negative review came from "Chicago Tribune", writing "self-importance doesn't equal profundity, and the world's most mind-blowing engineering couldn't cover up the deterioration of Waters' singing and melodic sense since his days with Floyd." "Ultimate Classic Rock" included "Amused to Death" on their list "Top 100 90's Rock Albums".


title: Amused to Death

text: Waters told "Classic Rock": "My view is that I've been involved in two absolutely classic albums – "The Dark Side of the Moon" and "The Wall" [...] And if you haven't got "Amused to Death", you haven't got the full set. So this album – the live one, which pulls together songs from all three albums – hopefully redresses the balance." On 19 September 2013, Waters told BBC HardTalk that "Amused to Death" has been completely underrated.