title: Daisaku Ikeda

text: When he became the third Soka Gakkai president, Ikeda "continued the task begun by Soka Gakkai founder Tsunesaburo Makiguchi of fusing the ideas and principles of educational pragmatism with the elements of Buddhist doctrine." He reformed many of the organization's practices, including the aggressive conversion style known as shakubuku, for which the group had been criticized in Japan. He also worked "to improve the movement's public image." The organization "had provoked public opprobrium because of its aggressive recruitment policies and its strongly developed political base." By the latter half of the 20th century, the Soka Gakkai had "matured into a responsible member of society" under Ikeda's leadership while "its ongoing connection with reformist political activity served to keep it in the public eye"; after 1999, "the media assault on Soka Gakkai subsequently evaporated."


title: Daisaku Ikeda

text: In 1979, Ikeda resigned as president of the Soka Gakkai (in Japan), accepting responsibility for the organization's purported deviation from Nichiren Shōshū priesthood doctrine and the accompanying conflict. Hiroshi Hōjō succeeded Ikeda as Soka Gakkai president, and Ikeda was made honorary president.


title: Daisaku Ikeda

text: Ikeda continues to be revered as the Soka Gakkai's spiritual leader, according to Asian studies associate professor Daniel Métraux in 1999. Métraux in 1994 wrote that "adulation of Ikeda in the Gakkai press gives some non-member readers the impression that the Gakkai is little more than an Ikeda personality cult". Sociologist Maria Immacolata Macioti noted in 2002: "President Ikeda is very much loved – and according to a few authoritative studies, too much loved". This has aroused critics for years. One reason for the excommunication of Soka Gakkai by Nichiren Shōshū in 1991 was, according to the "Nichiren Shoshu" entry in "The Princeton Dictionary of Buddhism", "Nichiren Shōshū accusing Sōka Gakkai of forming a personality cult around their leader Ikeda" and "Soka Gakkai accusing the Nichiren Shoshu leader Abe Nikken of trying to dominate both organizations." Sociologist of religion Peter Beyer in 2006 summarizes an understanding in the context of contemporary global society: "Until the 1990s, Soka Gakkai still was related formally to the monastic organization, Nichiren Shoshu, but conflicts over authority led to their separation (Métraux 1994)."


title: Daisaku Ikeda

text: Based on textual analysis of Ikeda's self-presentations as a disciple of Josei Toda and ethnographic fieldwork on the Soka Gakkai, Clark Chilson wrote in 2014 that "Ikeda is not only a charismatic leader but, more specifically, a transformational one. On the basis of Ikeda's self presentations, Gakkai members come to learn a model of the mentor-disciple relationship that is empowering and thus one that encourages them to enter a mentor-disciple relationship with Ikeda". He concludes that: "although Ikeda as a youth was in many ways ordinary, he achieved greatness as a leader as the result of his discipleship to his mentor [Josei Toda]. This holds the promise for Gakkai members that they too can achieve greatness in the mentor-disciple relationship, which in turn helps them see the self-conception of disciple as one of strength. With the self-conception of a disciple, Gakkai members are more likely to strive to achieve goals articulated by their mentor, Ikeda, that transcend their own self interests, such as the expansion of the Gakkai's membership, and the promotion of culture, education, and world peace."


title: Daisaku Ikeda

text: By the 1970s, Ikeda's leadership had expanded the Soka Gakkai into an international lay Buddhist movement increasingly active in peace, cultural, and educational activities. On 26 January 1975, a world peace conference was held in Guam, where Soka Gakkai representatives from 51 countries created an umbrella organization for the growing network of members around the world. This became the Soka Gakkai International (SGI). Ikeda took a leading role in the global organization's development and became the founding president of the SGI. In his address to the assembly, Ikeda encouraged the representatives to dedicate themselves to altruistic action, stating "Please devote yourselves to planting seeds of peace throughout the world."


title: Daisaku Ikeda

text: Ikeda as Soka Gakkai president and his predecessors Tsunesaburō Makiguchi and Jōsei Toda "have been deeply political, each in different circumstances and distinct ways, which has no doubt contributed to the many controversies in the Soka Gakkai's history," according to religion professor Richard Seager. Makiguchi and Toda were persecuted for opposing Japan's wartime government. In the history of institutional relations between the religious movement Soka Gakkai and the political party Kōmeitō founded in 1964 by Ikeda as an outgrowth from Soka Gakkai, he has faced "unabated criticism against the alleged violation of the separation of religion and state" and been accused of "far-reaching political ambitions." Associate professor of government George Ehrhardt and co-authors write that "Sōka Gakkai's entrance into the political arena [...] permanently transformed the relationship between religion and politics in Japan by dividing those who opposed the creation of a religious political party from those who accepted it."


title: Daisaku Ikeda

text: According to Asian studies professor Daniel Métraux in 1994, Ikeda is "possibly one of the more controversial figures in Japan's modern history". Ikeda's involvement through the Kōmeitō (also known as CGP) has raised controversies in Japanese politics for several decades. There were some charges claiming that Ikeda controlled the Komeito. In 1969 and 1970, there was a freedom of speech controversy about the intent to prevent the publication of Hirotatsu Fujiwara's polemical book, "I denounce Soka Gakkai", that vehemently criticized Ikeda, Soka Gakkai and the Komeito. In his 3 May 1970 speech, addressing, among others, Soka Gakkai members, guests and news media, Ikeda responded to the controversy by: apologizing to the nation "for the trouble...the incident caused," affirming the Soka Gakkai's commitment to free speech and religious freedom, announcing a new policy of formal separation between the Soka Gakkai religious movement and Komeito, calling for both moderation in religious conversion practices and democratizing reforms in the Soka Gakkai, and envisioning a Buddhist-inspired humanism. Some authors contend that, despite the formal separation, there are still "strong links" and that the Komeito has remained to some extent the "political arm" of Soka Gakkai. In 2015, addressing the "party's understudied history," political scientist Steven Reed and his co-authors write that "the image of Kōmeitō as a mere political branch of Sōka Gakkai is clearly mistaken" and that "the separation between party and religious group announced by Ikeda Daisaku in 1970 made a real difference."


title: Daisaku Ikeda

text: In October 1982, Ikeda had to appear in court concerning three cases. In 1996, "Los Angeles Times" described Ikeda as "the most powerful man in Japan - and certainly one of the most enigmatic", "condemned and praised as a devil and an angel, [...] a despot and a democrat". In 1999, "The Economist" reported that Ikeda has been called "the most powerful man in Japanese politics." In his assessment of these criticisms and "the changing role of the Komeito in Japanese politics in the 1990s", Daniel Métraux states that: "While it is difficult to determine his exact role, an examination of his daily itinerary would reveal that he would have very little time personally for political management and that most of the aging leader's time is devoted to religious affairs, traveling, and writing. Ikeda may well have influenced the Komeito in a macrosense, but in a microsense he is clearly not involved. The Komeito and its successes have a life of their own; they are certainly not lifeless puppets ready to react to Ikeda's or to the Soka Gakkai's every whim." Ehrhardt and co-authors attribute perpetuation of negative images of Ikeda, Komeito and the Soka Gakkai, firstly, to weekly magazines and tabloids which "tend to ignore standards of substance and veracity", with reporting that is "often biased" ; secondly, to the publications of "disgruntled former administrators and leaders of the religion or party". According to Morehouse College historian and professor of religion, Reverend Dr. Lawrence Carter, in 2003: "Controversy is an inevitable partner of greatness. No one who challenges the established order is free of it. Gandhi had his detractors, as did Dr. King. Dr. Ikeda is no exception."


title: Daisaku Ikeda

text: East Asian history and studies lecturer Brian Gold, in his comparative study of religious leaders Ikeda in Japan and Cho in South Korea, writes in 2005 that "answering the question of why, if so similar, Ikeda has been so much more a controversial figure in his society than Cho, when in fact Ikeda has probably been a more moderating influence", "tells us more about modern (and post-war) Japan than about Ikeda." Gold writes that Ikeda and Soka Gakkai have received "seemingly endless vilification [...] from much of Japanese society over the last several decades" and that "being overtly opposed to the longest-running political establishment of the post-war era, namely the LDP, has made Ikeda the constant source of attacks from the governing party", with "'smear campaigns' [...] generated by tabloid media with close connections to the LDP." When "the electoral math clearly pointed toward cooperation" between the LDP and Komeito in the late-1990s, the LDP newspaper "Jiyū Shimpō" printed an official apology and the LDP's press official Yosano Kaoru "apologized for having gone too far in criticizing Ikeda and declared that the research for the articles had been 'improper' ("futekisetsu")."


title: Daisaku Ikeda

text: Ikeda and the Soka Gakkai members had been excommunicated by Nichiren Shōshū on 28 November 1991. National University of the Arts doctoral fellow Mariano Gancedo wrote that the break with the clergy marked a greater role for Ikeda as spiritual teacher. In a scholarly historical comparison to the Protestant Reformation, a key conflict between "priestly and pragmatic forms of religion" has been to "adapt or fail" in response to "great change" in society, and in this area Ikeda is credited with democratic and other structurally modernizing reforms that both appealed favorably within the SGI membership organizations and expanded its institutional programs in the areas of peace, culture and education.


title: Daisaku Ikeda

text: Ikeda's leadership "globalized the Soka Gakkai and harnessed its energy to goals that suited new generations in different cultures" and subsequently developed the SGI into a broad-based grassroots peace movement around the world. Ikeda is credited with having fostered among SGI members an ethos of social responsibility and a strong spirit of global citizenship. According to Levi McLaughlin, Associate Professor of Philosophy and Religious Studies, "Ikeda last appeared in a broadcast to members in May 2010. Thereafter, his apotheosis into unquestioned authority was confirmed by his followers."


title: Daisaku Ikeda

text: Ikeda's thoughts and work on a "Buddhist-based humanism" are situated within a broader tradition of east–west dialogue in search of humanistic ideals. In his biography of historian Arnold J. Toynbee, William McNeill describes the aim of the Toynbee-Ikeda dialogues as a "convergence of East and West," the significance of which would be realized by the "flourishing in the Western world" of the Soka Gakkai organization. Whether a "new religious movement" becomes "a legitimate 'new religion' in the global religious system" is "a question of how both those involved in it and those who observe it from the outside understand that movement," according to sociologist of religion Peter Beyer.


title: Daisaku Ikeda

text: As of 2010, more than 40 research institutes and initiatives affiliated with universities, including Shanghai Sanda University and DePaul University, formally study Ikeda's philosophy. Bilingual-bicultural education specialist Jason Goulah's research into transformative world language learning characterizes Ikeda's Buddhist-inspired refinement of Makiguchi's Soka education philosophy as an approach engendering a "world view of dialogic resistance" that responds to the limitations of a neoliberal world view of education. In their introduction to education and cosmopolitanism in Asia, editors Fazal Rizvi and Suzanne S. Choo cite Goulah's work and write that in Ikeda's Soka educational philosophy, "cosmopolitan ideals emerged in opposition to authoritarian state policies that served to entrench narrow-minded nationalism." In a study of 30 of Ikeda's philosophical dialogues, Augusta University associate professor Nai-Cheng Kuo asserts that "Ikeda's humanism has made profound global impacts on education and human lives."


title: Daisaku Ikeda

text: Ikeda's relationship with his mentor, Jōsei Toda, and influence of Tsunesaburō Makiguchi's educational philosophy, shaped his emphasis on dialogue and education as fundamental to building trust between people and peace in society. This world view is informed by his belief that Buddhism essentially offers a spiritual dimension "where faith and human dignity intersect to promote positive change in society." He interprets the Middle Way as a path between idealism and materialism, an orientation that places "public interest, practical policy, morality and ethics at the forefront so that people can find prosperity and happiness..." His emphasis on linking individual agency and empowerment with society's attainment of peace and happiness, most notably made in his multi-volume "The New Human Revolution", revolves around and gives expression to the Buddhist view of life's inherent dignity.


title: Daisaku Ikeda

text: Ikeda's use of the term "ōbutsu myōgō" in his 1964 book "Seiji shūkyō" (Politics and Religion) has been interpreted to mean "politics by people, with mercy and altruism as a Buddhist philosophy, different from the union of politics and religion ("seikyo icchi")." The term is also used by Ikeda in the Komeito's founding statement. In the 1969 edition of "Seiji shūkyō" , "he declared that "obutsu myogo" would not be an act of Soka Gakkai imposing its will on the Japanese state to install Nichiren Shoshu Buddhism as the national creed," and that "Soka Gakkai, through Komeito, would instead guide Japan to a new, democratic world order, a 'Buddhist democracy' ("buppo minshu shugi") combining the Dharma with the best of the Euro-American philosophical tradition to focus on social welfare and humanistic socialism." Another interpretation of his views at that time was that "Buddhist democracy" could be achieved by a "religious revolution" through "kōsen-rufu" on the premise of achieving "social prosperity in accordance with individual happiness" for the entire society. In 1970, after Ikeda announced the severing of official ties between the Soka Gakkai and Komeito, the use of "politically charged terms such as "obutsu myogo"" was eliminated. Since the 1970s, an understanding of the term "kōsen-rufu" took into account religious tolerance, which was made explicit in 1995 in the SGI Charter and, in the 2000s, interpreted by Ikeda to mean the movement based on the philosophy and teachings of Nichiren that conveys the principles of individual happiness and peace as accessible to all. He is credited with recasting "the idea of kosen-rufu to mean the broad dissemination of, rather than the conversion of the world to, Nichiren Buddhism."


title: Daisaku Ikeda

text: In a 2008 interview, he said : "The ideal of Mahayana Buddhism is the realization of happiness for oneself and for others. Nowhere is this more completely set out than in the "Lotus Sutra", which recognizes the Buddha-nature in all people—women and men, those with formal education and those without. It declares that all people, without regard to their class, origin, personal, cultural, or social background, can attain enlightenment. Our recitation of the title of the "Lotus Sutra" is a way of renewing our vow to live in accord with this ideal."


title: Daisaku Ikeda

text: Ikeda refers in several writings to the Nine Consciousness as an important conception for self-transformation, identifying the ninth one, "amala-vijñāna", with the Buddha-nature. According to him, the "transformation of the karma of one individual" can lead to the transformation of the entire society and humankind.


title: Daisaku Ikeda

text: Central to Ikeda's activities, whether they be on an institutional level or as a private citizen, is his belief in "Buddhist principles ... rooted in our shared humanity, ... where faith and human dignity intersect to promote positive change in society." His view of a "Buddhist-based humanism," the fostering of mutual respect and dignity, emphasizes human agency in the engagement of dialogue.


title: Daisaku Ikeda

text: Ikeda has founded a number of institutions to promote education in all its forms, cultural exchange and the exchange of ideas on peacebuilding through dialogue. They include: Soka University in Tokyo, Japan, and Soka University of America in Aliso Viejo, California; Soka kindergarten, primary and secondary schools in Japan, Korea, Hong Kong, Malaysia, Brazil and Singapore; the Victor Hugo House of Literature, in the Île-de-France region of France; the International Committee of Artists for Peace in the United States; the Min-On Concert Association in Japan; the Tokyo Fuji Art Museum in Japan; the Institute of Oriental Philosophy in Japan with offices in France, Hong Hong, India, Russia and the United Kingdom; the Toda Peace Institute in Japan and the United States; and the Ikeda Center for Peace, Learning, and Dialogue in the United States.


title: Daisaku Ikeda

text: From 1990, Ikeda partnered with Rabbi Abraham Cooper and the Simon Wiesenthal Center to address anti-Semitic stereotypes in Japan. In a 2001 interview, Rabbi Cooper recalled: "The only partners we found to help us bring our concerns to the Japanese public were people from Soka University under the leadership of Daisaku Ikeda. If you ask me who our best friend in Japan is, who 'gets it,' it is Ikeda. He was actually our first visitor to the Museum of Tolerance." Their friendship led to the joint development of a Japanese-language Holocaust exhibition "The Courage to Remember," which was seen by more than two million people in Japan between 1994 and 2007. In 2015, a new version of the exhibit opened in Tokyo focusing on the bravery of Anne Frank and Chiune Sugihara.


title: Daisaku Ikeda

text: Ikeda was an original proponent of the Earth Charter Initiative, co-founded by Mikhail Gorbachev, and Ikeda has included details of the Charter in many of his annual peace proposals since 1997. The SGI has supported the Earth Charter with production of global exhibitions including "Seeds of Change" in 2002 that traveled to 27 nations and "Seeds of Hope" in 2010, correlating with the Earth Charter-related documentary film, "A Quiet Revolution," which the SGI has donated to schools and educational programs around the world.


title: Daisaku Ikeda

text: Since 26 January 1983, Ikeda has submitted annual peace proposals to the United Nations, addressing such areas as building a culture of peace, gender equality in education, empowerment of women, youth empowerment and activism for peace, UN reform and universal human rights with a view on global civilization. In presenting a Buddhist view, he draws parallels with peace and human rights struggles throughout history and discusses the civilizational influences of international relations, political science, philosophy, literature and social theory. A recurrent argument in these proposals is that "humans achieve their best potentials not in isolation, but as relating and interacting members of society."


title: Daisaku Ikeda

text: Ikeda's proposals for nuclear disarmament and abolishing nuclear weapons submitted to the special session of the UN General Assembly in 1978, 1982 and 1988 built on his mentor Josei Toda's 1957 declaration condemning such weapons of mass destruction as "an absolute evil that threatens the people's right of existence." Calling for human security and sustainability in his 2012 peace proposal, he advocated for a transition away from nuclear-powered energy. In his 2015 peace proposal, he called on the international community for concerted multilateral action—"shared action"—for protecting human rights of displaced persons including refugees and migrants, ridding the world of nuclear weapons and constructing a global sustainable society. In his 2019 peace proposal, he advocated for multilateral support toward the entry into force of the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons(TPNW), renewed efforts based on Article 6 of the Non-Proliferation Treaty to de-escalate tensions, and an international framework to ban lethal autonomous weapons (LAWs). In his 2020 peace proposal, "Towards Our Shared Future: Constructing an Era of Human Solidarity", Ikeda urges nations to collaborate to confront issues like natural disasters and climate change. In his 2021 peace proposal, Ikeda welcomed the entry into force of the TPNW and called for the "deterrent force" not of nuclear weapons but of "joint action and solidarity ... brought to bear against" the critical impacts of climate change and the COVID-19 pandemic. In his 2022 peace proposal, he addresses climate justice, inclusive education and nuclear disarmament, and calls for a shift away from nuclear-dependent security strategies.


title: Daisaku Ikeda

text: In a public statement addressed to the 2022 NPT Review Conference, Ikeda issued an "emergency proposal" calling on the United States, Russia, the United Kingdom, France and China to shift from "existing deterrence policies" and "declare their commitment to the principle of No First Use at the earliest possible date." He cites the role of NFU policy pledges in averting an escalation in the China-India border clashes of June 2020.


title: Daisaku Ikeda

text: Ikeda's work has been described by academics as citizen diplomacy for his contributions to diplomatic as well as intercultural ties between Japan and other countries, and more broadly between peoples of the world. Ikeda's dialogues with scholars, politicians, and cultural figures have increased awareness and support of humanitarian and peace activities, have facilitated deeper international relationships, and generated support for SGI-sponsored work on global issues including the environment and nuclear disarmament.


title: Daisaku Ikeda

text: Academic researchers have suggested the body of literature chronicling Ikeda's diplomatic efforts and his more than 7,000 international dialogues provide readers with a personalized global education and model of citizen diplomacy and, from a scholarly view, represent "a new current in interculturalism and educational philosophy."


title: Daisaku Ikeda

text: First in 1967 then several times in 1970, Ikeda met with Austrian-Japanese politician and philosopher Richard von Coudenhove-Kalergi, founder of the Paneuropean Movement. Their discussions which focused on east–west relations and the future of peace work were serialized in the 'Sankei Shimbun' newspaper in 1971. Between 1971 and 1974, Ikeda conducted multiple dialogues with Arnold J. Toynbee in London and Tokyo. The major topics of their meetings were published as the book "Choose Life". In 1974, Ikeda conducted a dialogue with French novelist and Minister of Cultural Affairs Andre Malraux.


title: Daisaku Ikeda

text: In September 1974, Ikeda visited the Soviet Union and met with Premier Alexei Kosygin. During their dialogue, Kosygin agreed with Ikeda, saying "We must abandon the very idea of war. It is meaningless. If we stop preparing for war and prepare instead for peace, we can produce food instead of armaments." He then asked Ikeda, "What is your basic ideology?" Ikeda replied, "I believe in peace, culture and education – the underlying basis of which is humanism." Kosygin said, "I have a high regard for those values. We need to realize them here in the Soviet Union as well."


title: Daisaku Ikeda

text: In January 1975, Ikeda met with Henry Kissinger, then United States Secretary of State, to "urge the de-escalation of nuclear tensions between the United States and the Soviet Union." The same month Ikeda met with Secretary-General of the United Nations Kurt Waldheim. Ikeda presented Waldheim with a petition containing the signatures of 10,000,000 people calling for total nuclear abolition. The petition was organized by youth groups of the Soka Gakkai International and was inspired by Ikeda's longtime anti-nuclear efforts.


title: Daisaku Ikeda

text: Ikeda's meetings with Nelson Mandela in the 1990s led to a series of SGI-sponsored anti-apartheid lectures, a traveling exhibit, and multiple student exchange programs at the university level. Their October 1990 meeting in Tokyo led to collaboration with the African National Congress and the United Nations Apartheid Center on an anti-apartheid exhibit inaugurated in Yokohama, Japan "on the 15th anniversary of the Soweto uprisings (16 June 1976)."


title: Daisaku Ikeda

text: Dialogues between Ikeda and Gorbachev, published in 2005 as "Moral Lessons of the Twentieth Century," have been described as "perhaps the best starting point from which to examine the search for a new historicity" of the twentieth century and inform the basis of a new humanism in the twenty-first century.


title: Daisaku Ikeda

text: Ikeda's message to Ravenna on the occasion of celebrating the poet Dante Alighieri was described as an expression of spiritual resonance with the poet's life and world view, and as a contribution to intercultural dialogue that affirms the value of peaceful coexistence.


title: Daisaku Ikeda

text: Ikeda made several visits to China and met with Chinese Premier Zhou Enlai in 1974, though Sino-Japanese tensions remained over the brutalities of war waged by the Japanese militarists. The visits led to the establishment of cultural exchanges of art, dance and music between China and Japan and opened academic exchanges between Chinese educational institutions and Soka University. Chinese media describe Ikeda as an early proponent of normalizing diplomatic relations between China and Japan in the 1970s, citing his 1968 proposal that drew condemnation by some and the interest of others including Zhou Enlai. It was said that Zhou Enlai entrusted Ikeda with ensuring that "Sino-Japanese friendship would continue for generations to come."


title: Daisaku Ikeda

text: Since 1975, cultural exchanges have continued between the Min-On Concert Association, founded by Ikeda, and institutions including the Chinese People's Association for Friendship with Foreign Countries. After Ikeda's 1984 visit to China and meetings with public figures including Chinese Communist Party Leader Hu Yaobang and Deng Yingchao, observers estimated that Ikeda's 1968 proposal moved Japanese public sentiment to support closer diplomatic ties with China and his cultivation of educational and cultural ties helped strengthen state relations.


title: Daisaku Ikeda

text: During a Turin Book Fair-hosted event concluding the 2018 five-day FIRMA-Faiths in Tune festival of religion, music and art, held in 2018 for the first time in Italy, an international jury presented a FIRMA award to Daisaku Ikeda "for his lifelong commitment to interreligious dialogue." Other international awards received by Ikeda include:


title: Daisaku Ikeda

text: In 1999, the Martin Luther King Jr. Chapel at Atlanta, Georgia-based Morehouse College established the Gandhi, King, Ikeda Institute for Ethics and Reconciliation as one of its programs to foster peace, nonviolence and reconciliation. In 2001, the Institute inaugurated the traveling exhibition "Gandhi, King, Ikeda: A Legacy of Building Peace," to illustrate parallels in twentieth-century peace activism through the examples of Mahatma Gandhi, Martin Luther King Jr., and Daisaku Ikeda; and the Gandhi, King, Ikeda Community Builders Prize, to recognize individuals whose actions for peace transcend cultural, national and philosophical boundaries. In 2015, the Community Builders Prize went to Islamic scholar Fethullah Gülen.


title: Daisaku Ikeda

text: In 2000, the city of Londrina, Brazil honored Ikeda by naming a 300-acre nature reserve in his name. The Dr. Daisaku Ikeda Ecological Park is open to the public and its land, waterways, fauna and wildlife are protected by Brazil's Federal Conservation Law.


title: Daisaku Ikeda

text: In 2014, the City of Chicago named a section of Wabash Avenue in downtown Chicago "Daisaku Ikeda Way," with the Chicago City Council measure passing unanimously, 49 to 0.


title: Daisaku Ikeda

text: The United States House of Representatives and individual states including Georgia, Missouri, and Illinois have passed resolutions honoring the service and dedication of Daisaku Ikeda as one "who has dedicated his entire life to building peace and promoting human rights through education and cultural exchange with deep conviction in the shared humanity of our entire global family." The state of Missouri praised Ikeda and his value of "education and culture as the prerequisites for the creation of true peace in which the dignity and fundamental rights of all people are respected."


title: Daisaku Ikeda

text: The Club of Rome named Ikeda an honorary member, and, as of 2020, Ikeda has received more than 760 honorary citizenships from cities and municipalities around the world.


title: Daisaku Ikeda

text: At the International Day for Poets of Peace in February 2016, an initiative launched by the Mohammed bin Rashid World Peace Award, Daisaku Ikeda from Japan along with Kholoud Al Mulla from the UAE, K. Satchidanandan from India and Farouq Gouda from Egypt were named International Poets of Peace. In presenting the honors, Shaikh Nahyan bin Mubarak Al Nahyan described the initiative as reinforcing "the idea that poetry, and literature in general, are a universal language that plays an important role in spreading the message of peace in the world," echoing the sentiments of Dr Hamad Al Shaikh Al Shaibani, chair of the World Peace Award's board of trustees, who cited the role of poets in "promoting a culture of hope and solidarity."


title: Daisaku Ikeda

text: In November 2010, citing his peacebuilding efforts and promotion of cultural exchange and humanist education, the University of Massachusetts Boston bestowed an honorary doctorate upon Ikeda, marking the 300th such title conferred by higher learning institutions in more than 50 countries, which Ikeda accepted, he said, on behalf of SGI members and in recognition of their contributions to peace, culture and education. He received his first honorary doctorate in 1975 from Moscow State University and, as of August 2020, some 395 such academic honors.


title: Daisaku Ikeda

text: Ikeda lives in Tokyo with his wife, Kaneko Ikeda (née Kaneko Shiraki), whom he married on 3 May 1952. The couple had three sons, Hiromasa (vice president of Soka Gakkai), Shirohisa (died 1984), and Takahiro.


title: Daisaku Ikeda

text: Ikeda is a prolific writer, peace activist, and interpreter of Nichiren Buddhism. His interests in photography, art, philosophy, poetry and music are reflected in his published works. In his essay collections and dialogues with political, cultural, and educational figures he discusses, among other topics: the transformative value of religion, the universal sanctity of life, social responsibility, and sustainable progress and development.


title: Daisaku Ikeda

text: The 1976 publication of "Choose Life: A Dialogue" (in Japanese, "Nijusseiki e no taiga") is the published record of dialogues and correspondences that began in 1971 between Ikeda and British historian Arnold J. Toynbee about the "convergence of East and West" on contemporary as well as perennial topics ranging from the human condition to the role of religion and the future of human civilization. Toynbee's 12-volume "A Study of History" had been translated into Japanese, which along with his lecture tours and periodical articles about social, moral and religious issues gained him popularity in Japan. However, Toynbee being "paid well" for the interviews with Ikeda raised criticism, and questionning arose about an attempt to use Toynbee's reputation. To an expat's letter critical of Toynbee's association with Ikeda and Soka Gakkai, Toynbee wrote back: "I agree with Soka Gakkai on religion as the most important thing in human life, and on opposition to militarism and war." To another letter critical of Ikeda, Toynbee responded: "Mr. Ikeda's personality is strong and dynamic and such characters are often controversial. My own feeling for Mr. Ikeda is one of great respect and sympathy." As of 2012, the book had been translated and published in twenty-six languages.


title: Daisaku Ikeda

text: In their 1984 book "Before It Is Too Late", Ikeda and Aurelio Peccei discuss the human link in the ecological consequences of industrialization, calling for a reform in understanding human agency to effect harmonious relationships both between humans and with nature. They see a pivotal role in environmental education and a broadly curricular emphasis on developing global-scale thinking and a more humane society. On the basis of Ikeda's view of unity and Peccei's view of ecological interdependence, their dialogue attests to a convergence between European ecological, pacifist and humanitarian movements and Eastern religious thought. The book is credited as summarizing Peccei's insights into the multifaceted challenges of post-WWII global society.


title: Daisaku Ikeda

text: In "Life—An Enigma, a Precious Jewel" (1982), "Unlocking the Mysteries of Birth and Death" (1984) and the environmental education proposal "The Challenge of Global Empowerment" (2002), Ikeda's discussions of a Buddhist ontology offer an alternative to anthropocentric and biocentric approaches to wildlife conservation.


title: Daisaku Ikeda

text: Ikeda's children's stories are "widely read and acclaimed," according to "The Hindu", which reported that an anime series of 14 of the stories was to be shown on the National Geographic Channel. In the Philippines, DVD sets of 17 of the animated stories called "Animazing Tales" were donated by Anak TV to a large school, as part of a nationwide literacy effort. "Hope and perseverance in times of difficulty" describes the theme that runs through such stories as "The Cherry Tree" and "The Snow Country Prince."


title: Daisaku Ikeda

text: In 2003, Japan's largest English-language newspaper, "The Japan Times", began carrying Ikeda's contributed commentaries on global issues including peacebuilding, nuclear disarmament, and compassion. By 2015, "The Japan Times" had published 26 of them, 15 of which the newspaper also published in a bilingual Japanese-English book titled "Embracing the Future."


title: Daisaku Ikeda

text: The sixteen conversations between Lou Marinoff and Ikeda in their book "The Inner Philosopher" (2012) introduce classic Eastern and Western philosophers in making the case that philosophy can be personally accessible and broadly applicable to daily life, and that "philosophy and psychology both can provide a source of robust optimism." A reviewer of the Italian edition, "Qualunque fiore tu sia sboccerai", states that the two authors agree on a fundamental point: that the meaning and realization of oneself and one's existence are not found outside of oneself but, rather, as Marinoff points out, cultivated through dialogue, through a philosophy that becomes practical."


title: Daisaku Ikeda

text: Ikeda's most well-known publication is the novel "The Human Revolution" ("Ningen Kakumei"), which was serialized in the Soka Gakkai's daily newspaper, the "Seikyo Shimbun". Its book publication in English includes a foreword by British philosopher and historian Arnold J. Toynbee and has been translated into English, Chinese, French, German, Spanish, Portuguese, Korean and Dutch editions. In the preface to "The Human Revolution", the author describes the book as a "novelized biography of my mentor, Josei Toda." The author's official website describes the book as an "historical novel [that] portrays the development of the Soka Gakkai in Japan, from its rebirth in the post-World War II era to the last years of its second president, Josei Toda." In the preface to the 2004 edition, the author stated the narrative was edited to bring it in line with recent developments in the history of Nichiren Buddhism, and that he hoped "such revisions will help readers to better appreciate the original message of the book."


title: Daisaku Ikeda

text: Often described as a roman à clef, this autobiographical work "fosters an interpretation of Ikeda as being an exemplary disciple to his own mentor, Toda Josei," and offers "a model of the mentor-disciple relationship that is empowering" and portrays "the virtues of discipleship." This dramatic narrative helps readers "identify with him as someone not very different from themselves," presents "the mentor-disciple relationship as an attractive one that can enormously benefit the disciple," and "holds the promise for Gakkai members that they too can achieve greatness in the mentor-disciple relationship, which in turn helps them see the self-conception of disciple as one of strength." Chilson concludes that: "With the self-conception of a disciple, Gakkai members are more likely to strive to achieve goals articulated by their mentor, Ikeda, that transcend their own self interests, such as the expansion of the Gakkai's membership, and the promotion of culture, education, and world peace."


title: DNA extraction

text: The first isolation of deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) was done in 1869 by Friedrich Miescher. Currently, it is a routine procedure in molecular biology or forensic analyses. For the chemical method, many different kits are used for extraction, and selecting the correct one will save time on kit optimization and extraction procedures. PCR sensitivity detection is considered to show the variation between the commercial kits.


title: DNA extraction

text: DNA extraction is frequently a preliminary step in many diagnostic procedures used to identify environmental viruses and bacteria and diagnose illnesses and hereditary diseases. These methods consist of, but are not limited to:


title: DNA extraction

text: Fluorescence In Situ Hybridization (FISH) technique was developed in the 1980s. The basic idea is to use a nucleic acid probe to hybridize nuclear DNA from either interphase cells or metaphase chromosomes attached to a microscopic slide. It is a molecular method used, among other things, to recognize and count particular bacterial groupings.


title: DNA extraction

text: To recognize, define, and quantify the geographical and temporal patterns in marine bacterioplankton communities, researchers employ a technique called terminal restriction fragment length polymorphism (T-RFLP).


title: DNA extraction

text: Sequencing: Whole or partial genomes and other chromosomal components, ended for comparison with previously published sequences.


title: DNA extraction

text: Cellular and histone proteins bound to the DNA can be removed either by adding a protease or having precipitated the proteins with sodium or ammonium acetate or extracted them with a phenol-chloroform mixture before the DNA precipitation.


title: DNA extraction

text: After isolation, the DNA is dissolved in a slightly alkaline buffer, usually in a TE buffer, or in ultra-pure water.


title: DNA extraction

text: Some of the most common DNA extraction methods include organic extraction, Chelex extraction, and solid phase extraction. These methods consistently yield isolated DNA, but they differ in both the quality and the quantity of DNA yielded. When selecting a DNA extraction method, there are multiple factors to consider, including cost, time, safety, and risk of contamination.


title: DNA extraction

text: Organic extraction involves the addition of incubation in multiple different chemical solutions; including a lysis step, a phenol-chloroform extraction, an ethanol precipitation, and washing steps. Organic extraction is often used in laboratories because it is cheap, and itelds large quantities of pure DNA. Though it is easy, there are many steps involved, and it takes longer than other methods. It also involves the unfavorable use of the toxic chemicals phenol and chloroform, and there is an increased risk of contamination due to transferring the DNA between multiple tubes. Several protocols based on organic extraction of DNA were effectively developed decades ago, though improved and more practical versions of these protocols have also been developed and published in the last years.


title: DNA extraction

text: The chelex extraction method involves adding the Chelex resin to the sample, boiling the solution, then vortexing and centrifuging it. The cellular materials bind to the Chelex beads, while the DNA is available in the supernatant. The Chelex method is much faster and simpler than organic extraction, and it only requires one tube, which decreases the risk of DNA contamination. Unfortunately, Chelex extraction does not yield as much quantity and the DNA yielded is single-stranded, which means it can only be used for PCR-based analyses and not for RFLP.


title: DNA extraction

text: Solid phase extraction such as using a spin-column-based extraction method takes advantage of the fact that DNA binds to silica. The sample containing DNA is added to a column containing a silica gel or silica beads and chaotropic salts. The chaotropic salts disrupt the hydrogen bonding between strands and facilitate the binding of the DNA to silica by causing the nucleic acids to become hydrophobic. This exposes the phosphate residues so they are available for adsorption. The DNA binds to the silica, while the rest of the solution is washed out using ethanol to remove chaotropic salts and other unnecessary constituents. The DNA can then be rehydrated with aqueous low-salt solutions allowing for elution of the DNA from the beads.


title: DNA extraction

text: This method yields high-quality, largely double-stranded DNA which can be used for both PCR and RFLP analysis. This procedure can be automated and has a high throughput, although lower than the phenol-chloroform method. This is a one-step method i.e. the entire procedure is completed in one tube. This lowers the risk of contamination making it very useful for the forensic extraction of DNA. Multiple solid-phase extraction commercial kits are manufactured and marketed by different companies; the only problem is that they are more expensive than organic extraction or Chelex extraction.


title: DNA extraction

text: Specific techniques must be chosen for the isolation of DNA from some samples. Typical samples with complicated DNA isolation are:


title: DNA extraction

text: Extrachromosomal DNA is generally easy to isolate, especially plasmids may be easily isolated by cell lysis followed by precipitation of proteins, which traps chromosomal DNA in insoluble fraction and after centrifugation, plasmid DNA can be purified from soluble fraction.


title: DNA extraction

text: A Hirt DNA Extraction is an isolation of all extrachromosomal DNA in a mammalian cell. The Hirt extraction process gets rid of the high molecular weight nuclear DNA, leaving only low molecular weight mitochondrial DNA and any viral episomes present in the cell.


title: DNA extraction

text: A diphenylamine (DPA) indicator will confirm the presence of DNA. This procedure involves chemical hydrolysis of DNA: when heated (e.g. ≥95 °C) in acid, the reaction requires a deoxyribose sugar and therefore is specific for DNA. Under these conditions, the 2-deoxyribose is converted to w-hydroxylevulinyl aldehyde, which reacts with the compound, diphenylamine, to produce a blue-colored compound. DNA concentration can be determined by measuring the intensity of absorbance of the solution at the 600 nm with a spectrophotometer and comparing to a standard curve of known DNA concentrations.


title: DNA extraction

text: Measuring the intensity of absorbance of the DNA solution at wavelengths 260 nm and 280 nm is used as a measure of DNA purity. DNA can be quantified by cutting the DNA with a restriction enzyme, running it on an agarose gel, staining with ethidium bromide (EtBr) or a different stain and comparing the intensity of the DNA with a DNA marker of known concentration.


title: DNA extraction

text: Using the Southern blot technique, this quantified DNA can be isolated and examined further using PCR and RFLP analysis. These procedures allow differentiation of the repeated sequences within the genome. It is these techniques which forensic scientists use for comparison, identification, and analysis.


title: DNA extraction

text: In this method, plant nuclei are isolated by physically grinding tissues and reconstituting the intact nuclei in a unique Nuclear Isolation Buffer (NIB). The plastid DNAs are released from organelles and eliminated with an osmotic buffer by washing and centrifugation. The purified nuclei are then lysed and further cleaned by organic extraction, and the genomic DNA is precipitated with a high concentration of CTAB. The highly pure, high molecular weight gDNA is extracted from the nuclei, dissolved in a high pH buffer, allowing for stable long-term storage.


title: David Tattersall

text: David Tattersall, (born 14 November 1960) is a British cinematographer. He has worked on many big-budget films and was nominated for an Emmy Award for his cinematography on "The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles" television series. Three of his most noted collaborations include having worked with film directors George Lucas, Frank Darabont and Martin Campbell.


title: David Tattersall

text: Tattersall studied at Barrow-in-Furness Grammar School for Boys before moving on to Goldsmiths College in London, receiving a first class BA in Fine Arts. He went on to study at Britain's National Film and Television School at Beaconsfield in Buckinghamshire.


title: Hootsuite

text: Hootsuite is a social media management platform, created by Ryan Holmes in 2008. The system's user interface takes the form of a dashboard, and supports social network integrations for Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, Pinterest, YouTube and TikTok.


title: Hootsuite

text: Based in Vancouver, Hootsuite has close to 1,000 staff members in 13 locations, including Toronto, London, Paris, Sydney, Bucharest, Milan, Rome and Mexico City. The company has more than 16 million users in over 175 countries.


title: Hootsuite

text: In 2008, Holmes needed a tool to manage multiple social media networks at his digital services agency, Invoke Media. Finding that there was no product in the market offering all the features he sought, Holmes, along with Dario Meli, David Tedman, and the Invoke team, chose instead to develop a platform of their own that would be able to organize their many social media accounts and networks. The first iteration of this social media management system launched on November 28, 2008 in the form of a Twitter dashboard called BrightKit.


title: Hootsuite

text: Recognizing that many other individuals and organizations across the world were facing similar problems with managing multiple social accounts, Holmes decided that BrightKit could be the solution for other businesses also looking to organize their own social networks. The launch of BrightKit had a very positive reception, thanks to its clean interface and publishing capabilities.


title: Hootsuite

text: In February 2009, Holmes offered a $500 prize for renaming the platform, and used crowdsourced suggestions from the dashboard's 100,000+ users as contest submissions. The winning idea was Hootsuite, a moniker submitted by a user named Matt Nathan and based upon "Owly", the dashboard's owl logo, as a word play on the French expression "tout de suite", meaning "right now".


title: Hootsuite

text: In November 2009, the Hootsuite dashboard expanded its offering to support Facebook and LinkedIn, and the capability to use Twitter Lists.


title: Hootsuite

text: In December 2009, Hootsuite spun off from Invoke Media and launched officially as an independent company, Hootsuite Media, Inc. That same month, Hootsuite received $1.9 million in funding from Hearst Interactive Media, Blumberg Capital, and prominent angel investors Leo Group LLC and Geoff Entress.


title: Hootsuite

text: In March 2012, OMERS Ventures, the venture capital investment arm of the Ontario Municipal Employees Retirement System, invested $20 million, valuing the company at US$200 million. OMERS did not buy its stake directly in the company, but rather bought private shares in a secondary transaction from a handful of employees and early investors, said Holmes.


title: Hootsuite

text: In September 2012, Hootsuite acquired Seesmic, a customer relationship management system and competitor.


title: Hootsuite

text: On August 1, 2013, the company announced that it had raised US$165 million in Series B funding from Insight Venture Partners, followed by Accel Partners and OMERS—all three will now have a seat on Hootsuite's board. Holmes also said the company was looking to make at least two unnamed acquisitions, in addition to employing 100 overseas employees.


title: Hootsuite

text: In 2016 AdEspresso grew to $4.8 million in revenue, up 60% from $3 million in 2015. As of 2016 AdEspresso has 35 employees and 4,000 customers.


title: Hootsuite

text: In February 2017, Hootsuite announced its acquisition of AdEspresso, a digital advertisement manager, and LiftMetrix, a leading social media analytics company.


title: Hootsuite

text: In January 2021, Hootsuite acquired Sparkcentral, a messaging customer engagement tool and competitor for an undisclosed price.


title: Hootsuite

text: The service is commonly used to manage online brands and to submit messages to a variety of social media services, including Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn and TikTok. Companies and organizations known to use Hootsuite include Facebook, the Obama administration, HBO, Martha Stewart Media, Virgin Group, SXSW, Panasonic, Zappos, The Gap and LHC. Hootsuite provides a browser-based dashboard that allows users to keep updated on their Twitter account.


title: Hootsuite

text: The company behind the service is based in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. Its business strategy allows users free basic service with payment for additional features.


title: Hootsuite

text: In January 2010, the Hootsuite company was spun out of Invoke Media after venture capital firms Blumberg Capital and Hearst Interactive Media raised $2 million in financing for the company. Localized versions of Hootsuite are available in Japanese, Spanish, Portuguese, and German, and 50 more languages are planned to be added. Hootsuite's team continues to contact media organizations to help them manage their online brands, by meeting with groups such as Time Inc. and its subsidiary magazines, including "People", "InStyle", and "This Old House".


title: Hootsuite

text: As of June 2010, the service managed over one million social media accounts for 400,000 unique users.


title: Hootsuite

text: The Hootsuite software has won awards from Mashable at their Open Web Awards 2009, and the Canadian New Media Award. the Shorty Awards,


title: Hootsuite

text: In September 2020, Hootsuite came under widespread criticism over its agreement with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, made mere weeks after allegations of forced hysterectomies at ICE detention centres surfaced. Following public pressure, the company backed out of the deal, and posted a lengthy statement from CEO Tom Keiser to their official Twitter account that expressed regret over the internal divisions that the contract had created within the company. Despite this public distancing from its earlier decision, the company terminated an employee who had acted as whistleblower in bringing the contract's existence to light.


title: Hootsuite

text: In October, it was claimed that the contract had been transferred to rival company NUVI, leading to uncertainty about the actual fate of the contract.


title: Upper Mesopotamia

text: Upper Mesopotamia is the name used for the uplands and great outwash plain of northwestern Iraq, northeastern Syria and southeastern Turkey, in the northern Middle East. Since the early Muslim conquests of the mid-7th century, the region has been known by the traditional Arabic name of al-Jazira ( "the island", also transliterated "Djazirah", "Djezirah", "Jazirah") and the Syriac variant "Gāzartā" or "Gozarto" (). The Euphrates and Tigris rivers transform Mesopotamia into almost an island, as they are joined together at the Shatt al-Arab in the Basra Governorate of Iraq, and their sources in eastern Turkey are in close proximity.


title: Upper Mesopotamia

text: The region extends south from the mountains of Anatolia, east from the hills on the left bank of the Euphrates river, west from the mountains on the right bank of the Tigris river and includes the Sinjar plain. It extends down the Tigris to Samarra and down the Euphrates to Hit, Iraq. The Khabur runs for over across the plain, from Turkey in the north, feeding into the Euphrates.


title: Upper Mesopotamia

text: The major settlements are Mosul, Deir ez-Zor, Raqqa, al-Hasakah, Diyarbakır and Qamishli. The western, Syrian part, is essentially contiguous with the Syrian al-Hasakah Governorate and is described as "Syria's breadbasket". The eastern, Iraqi part, includes and extends slightly beyond the Iraqi Nineveh Governorate. In the north it includes the Turkish provinces of Şanlıurfa, Mardin, and parts of Diyarbakır Province.


title: Upper Mesopotamia

text: The name "al-Jazira" has been used since the 7th century AD by Islamic sources to refer to the northern section of Mesopotamia, while the Lower Mesopotamia, also known as Sawād, is the southern part of Mesopotamia. The name means "island", and at one time referred to the land between the two rivers, which in Syriac is "Beth Nahrain (ܒܝܬ ܢܗܪ̈ܝܢ)". Historically, the name could be restricted to the Sinjar plain coming down from the Sinjar Mountains, or expanded to embrace the entire plateau east of the coastal ranges. In pre-Abbasid times the western and eastern boundaries seem to have fluctuated, sometimes including what is now northern Syria to the west and Adiabene in the east.


title: Upper Mesopotamia

text: Al-Jazira is characterised as an outwash or alluvial plain, quite distinct from the Syrian Desert and lower-lying central Mesopotamia; however, the area includes eroded hills and incised streams. The region has several parts to it. In the northwest is one of the largest salt flats in the world, Sabkhat al-Jabbul. Further south, extending from Mosul to near Basra is a sandy desert not unlike the Empty Quarter. In the late 20th and early 21st centuries the region has been plagued by drought.


title: Upper Mesopotamia

text: Al-Jazirah is extremely important archeologically. This is the area where the earliest signs of agriculture and domestication of animals have been found, and thus the starting point leading to civilization and the modern world. Al-Jazirah includes the mountain Karaca Dağ in southern Turkey, where the closest relative to modern wheat still grows wild. At several sites (e.g. Hallan Çemi, Abu Hureyra, Mureybet) we can see a continuous occupation from a hunter-gathering lifestyle (based on hunting, and gathering and grinding of wild grains) to an economy based mainly on growing (still wild varieties of) wheat, barley and legumes from around 9000 BC (see PPNA). Domestication of goats and sheep followed within a few generations, but didn't become widespread for more than a millennium (see PPNB). Weaving and pottery followed about two thousand years later.


title: Upper Mesopotamia

text: From Al-Jazirah the idea of farming along with the domesticated seeds spread first to the rest of the Levant and then to North-Africa, Europe and eastwards through Mesopotamia all the way to present-day Pakistan (see Mehrgarh).


title: Upper Mesopotamia

text: Earlier archeologists worked on the assumption that agriculture was a prerequisite to a sedentary lifestyle, but excavations in Israel and Lebanon surprised science by showing that a sedentary lifestyle actually came before agriculture (see the Natufian culture). Further surprises followed in the 1990s with the spectacular finds of the megalithic structures at Göbekli Tepe in south-eastern Turkey. The earliest of these apparently ritual buildings are from before 9000 BC—over five thousand years older than Stonehenge—and thus the absolute oldest known megalithic structures anywhere. As far as we know today no well-established farming societies existed at the time. Farming seemed to be still experimental and only a smallish supplement to continued hunting and gathering. So either were (semi)sedentary hunter-gatherers rich enough and many enough to organize and execute such large communal building projects, or well-established agricultural societies existed much further back than hitherto known. After all, Göbekli Tepe lies just 32 km from Karaca Dağ.


title: Upper Mesopotamia

text: The questions raised by Göbekli Tepe have led to intense and creative discussions among archeologists of the Middle East. Excavations at Göbekli Tepe continues, only about 5 percent has been revealed so far. Sumerians are theorized to have evolved from the Samarra culture of northern Mesopotamia.


title: Upper Mesopotamia

text: The Uruk period (c. 4000 to 3100 BC) existed from the protohistoric Chalcolithic to Early Bronze Age period in Mesopotamia, including a section of the upper region.


title: Upper Mesopotamia

text: Upper Mesopotamia is also the heartland of ancient Assyria, founded circa the 25th century BC. From the late 24th Century BC it was part of the Akkadian Empire, then is separated into three eras: Old Assyrian Empire (circa 2050–1750 BC), Middle Assyrian Empire (1365–1020 BC), Median Empire (678-549 BC) and Neo Assyrian Empire (911–605 BC).


title: Upper Mesopotamia

text: The region fell to the Assyrians' southern brethren, the Babylonians in 605 BC, and from 539 BC it became part of the Achaemenid Empire; Achaemenid Assyria was known as "Athura". From 323 BC, it was ruled by the Greek Seleucid Empire, the Greeks corrupting the name to Syria, which they also applied to Aram.


title: Upper Mesopotamia

text: It then fell to the Parthians and Romans and was renamed Assyria by both. The area was still known as Asōristān under the Sasanian Empire until the Muslim conquest of Persia, when it was renamed al-Jazira.


title: Upper Mesopotamia

text: Since pre-Arab and pre-Islamic times, al-Jazira has been an economically prosperous region with various agricultural (fruit and cereal) products, as well as a prolific manufacturing (food processing and cloth weaving) system. The region's position at the border of the Sasanian and Byzantine territories also made it an important commercial center, and advantage that the region continued to enjoy, even after the Muslim conquest of Persia and Byzantine possessions in the Levant.


title: Upper Mesopotamia

text: Al-Jazira included the Roman/Byzantine provinces of Osroene and Mesopotamia, as well as the Parthian/Persian provinces of Asōristān, Arbayestan, Nisibis, and Mosul.


title: Upper Mesopotamia

text: The conquest of the region took place under the early Caliphate that left the general administration of the region intact, with the exception of levying the "jizya" tax on the population. At the time of Mu‘awiyah, governor of Syria and the later of the Umayyad Caliphate), the administration of al-Jazira was included in the administration of Syria. During the early Umayyad Caliphate, the administration of al-Jazira was often shared with that of Arminiya, a vast province encompassing most of Transcaucasia, Eastern Anatolia and what is now Iranian Azerbaijan.


title: Upper Mesopotamia

text: The prosperity of the region and its high agricultural and manufacturing output made it an object of contest between the leaders of the early conquering Arab armies. Various conquerors tried, in vain, to bind various cities of the former Sassanian provinces, as well as the newly conquered Byzantine provinces of Mesopotamia, into a coherent unit under their own rule.


title: Upper Mesopotamia

text: The control of the region, however, was essential to any power centered in Baghdad. Consequently, the establishment of the Abbasid Caliphate brought al-Jazira under the direct rule of the government in Baghdad. At this time, al-Jazira was one of the highest tax-yielding provinces of the Abbasid Empire.


title: Upper Mesopotamia

text: During the early history of Islam, al-Jazira became a center for the Kharijite movement and had to be constantly subdued by various caliphs. In the 920s, the local Hamdanid dynasty established an autonomous state with two branches in al-Jazira (under Nasir al-Dawla) and Northern Syria (under Sayf al-Dawla). The demise of the Hamdanid power put the region back under the nominal rule of the Caliphs of Baghdad, while actual control was in the hands of the Buyid brothers who had conquered Baghdad itself. At the turn of the 11th century, the area came under the rule of a number of local dynasties, the Numayrids, the Mirdasids, and the Uqaylids, who persisted until the conquest by the Seljuq Empire.


title: Upper Mesopotamia

text: With the arrival of the First Crusade, the western part came into Crusader hands as the County of Edessa, while the rest was ruled by a succession of semi-independent Turkish rulers until taken over by the Zengids, and eventually the Kurdish Ayyubids. Thereafter the northern and eastern portions were ruled initially by the Artuqids, laterly by the Kara Koyunlu and Akkoyunlu Turcomans and finally by the Safavids; while the western parts came under the Mamluk Sultanate of Egypt until the Ottoman–Mamluk War (1516–17), when it was taken by the Ottoman Empire. Remainder of this region was in Ottoman hands after Battle of Chaldiran and Ottoman–Safavid War (1532–1555).


title: Upper Mesopotamia

text: Although the region is ethnically diverse, it is considered to be the traditional Assyrian homeland in addition to Aramaic-speaking Christian descendants of the ancient Mesopotamians. Demographics saw huge shifts during the first half of the 20th century. Thousands of Assyrian refugees entered into Syrian Jazira province from Turkey following the Assyrian genocide of World War I. Additionally, in 1933 a further 24,000 Assyrian Christians fled into the area, following the Simele massacre in the Mosul region of northern Iraq.


title: Upper Mesopotamia

text: Violence against Christians changed the demographics of Upper Mesopotamia. Some Kurdish and Persian tribes cooperated with Ottoman authorities in the Armenian and Assyrian genocides. In the middle of the 19th century, and due to the wars between the Kurdish Buhti amirs and the Turks, many Christians in the Siirt area were killed by the Kurds.


title: Upper Mesopotamia

text: In Syria's Jazira province, the French official reports show the existence of 45 Kurdish villages in Jazira prior to 1927. After the failed Kurdish rebellions in Kemalist Turkey in the mid 1920s, there was a large influx of Kurds to Syrian Jazira province, that fell under the occupation of French Mandate authorities to escape the subsequent Turkish onslaught. It is estimated that 25,000 Kurds fled at this time to northern Syria, under French Mandate authorities, who encouraged their immigration, and granted them Syrian citizenship. A new wave of refugees arrived in 1929. The mandatory authorities continued to encourage Kurdish immigration into Syria, and by 1939, the villages numbered between 700 and 800. Sperl's estimation also contradicts the estimates of the French geographers Fevret and Gibert, who estimated that in 1953 out of the total 146,000 inhabitants of Jazira, agriculturalist Kurds made up 60,000 (41%), nomad Arabs 50,000 (34%), and a quarter of the population were Christians. Another account by Sir John Hope Simpson estimated the number of Kurds in Jazira province at 20,000 out of 100,000 people at the end of 1930.


title: Upper Mesopotamia

text: Under the French Mandate of Syria, newly-arriving Kurds were granted citizenship by French Mandate authorities and enjoyed considerable rights as the French Mandate authority encouraged minority autonomy as part of a divide and rule strategy and recruited heavily from the Kurds and other minority groups, such as Alawite and Druze, for its local armed forces.


title: Upper Mesopotamia

text: Assyrian Christians began to emigrate from Syria after the Amuda massacre of August 9, 1937. This massacre, carried out by the Kurd Saeed Agha, emptied the city of its Assyrian population. In 1941, the Assyrian community of al-Malikiyah were subjected to a vicious assault. Even though the assault failed, the Assyrians were terrorized and left in large numbers, and the immigration of Kurds from Turkey to the area have converted al-Malikiya, al-Darbasiyah and Amuda to completely Kurdish cities. The historically-important Christian city of Nusaybin had a similar fate after its Christian population left when it was annexed to Turkey. The Christian population of the city crossed the border into Syria and settled in Qamishli, which was separated by the railway (new border) from Nusaybin. Nusaybin became Kurdish and Qamishli became an Assyrian city. Things soon changed, however, with the immigration of Kurds beginning in 1926 following the failure of the rebellion of Saeed Ali Naqshbandi against the Turkish authorities.


title: Upper Mesopotamia

text: Djezirah is one of the four dioceses of the Syriac Orthodox Church. The others are in Aleppo, Homs–Hama and Damascus.


title: Acetylcholine receptor

text: An acetylcholine receptor (abbreviated AChR) is an integral membrane protein that responds to the binding of acetylcholine, a neurotransmitter.


title: Acetylcholine receptor

text: Like other transmembrane receptors, acetylcholine receptors are classified according to their "pharmacology," or according to their relative affinities and sensitivities to different molecules. Although all acetylcholine receptors, by definition, respond to acetylcholine, they respond to other molecules as well.


title: Acetylcholine receptor

text: Molecular biology has shown that the nicotinic and muscarinic receptors belong to distinct protein superfamilies. Nicotinic receptors are of two types: Nm and Nn. Nm is located in the neuromuscular junction which causes the contraction of skeletal muscles by way of end-plate potential (EPPs). Nn causes depolarization in autonomic ganglia resulting in post ganglionic impulse. Nicotinic receptors cause the release of catecholamine from the adrenal medulla, and also site specific excitation or inhibition in brain. Both Nm and Nn are Na and Ca channel linked but Nn is also linked with an extra K channel.


title: Acetylcholine receptor

text: The nAChRs are ligand-gated ion channels, and, like other members of the "cys-loop" ligand-gated ion channel superfamily, are composed of five protein subunits symmetrically arranged like staves around a barrel. The subunit composition is highly variable across different tissues. Each subunit contains four regions which span the membrane and consist of approximately 20 amino acids. Region II which sits closest to the pore lumen, forms the pore lining.


title: Acetylcholine receptor

text: Binding of acetylcholine to the N termini of each of the two alpha subunits results in the 15° rotation of all M2 helices. The cytoplasm side of the nAChR receptor has rings of high negative charge that determine the specific cation specificity of the receptor and remove the hydration shell often formed by ions in aqueous solution. In the intermediate region of the receptor, within the pore lumen, valine and leucine residues (Val 255 and Leu 251) define a hydrophobic region through which the dehydrated ion must pass.


title: Acetylcholine receptor

text: The nAChR is found at the edges of junctional folds at the neuromuscular junction on the postsynaptic side; it is activated by acetylcholine release across the synapse. The diffusion of Na and K across the receptor causes depolarization, the end-plate potential, that opens voltage-gated sodium channels, which allows for firing of the action potential and potentially muscular contraction.


title: Acetylcholine receptor

text: In contrast, the mAChRs are not ion channels, but belong instead to the superfamily of G-protein-coupled receptors that activate other ionic channels via a second messenger cascade.


title: Acetylcholine receptor

text: The muscarine cholinergic receptor activates a G-protein when bound to extracellular ACh. The alpha subunit of the G-protein activates guanylate cyclase (inhibiting the effects of intracellular cAMP) while the beta-gamma subunit activates the K-channels and therefore hyperpolarize the cell. This causes a decrease in cardiac activity.


title: Acetylcholine receptor

text: ACh receptors are related to GABA, glycine, and 5-HT3 receptors and their similar protein sequence and gene structure strongly suggest that they evolved from a common ancestral receptor. In fact, relatively minor mutations, such as a change in 3 amino acids in many of these receptors can convert a cation-selective channel to an anion-selective channel gated by acetylcholine, showing that even fundamental properties can relatively easily change in evolution.


title: Acetylcholine receptor

text: Nicotinic acetylcholine receptors can be blocked by curare, hexamethonium and toxins present in the venoms of snakes and shellfishes, like α-bungarotoxin. Drugs such as the neuromuscular blocking agents bind reversibly to the nicotinic receptors in the neuromuscular junction and are used routinely in anaesthesia. Nicotinic receptors are the primary mediator of the effects of nicotine. In myasthenia gravis, the receptor at the neuromuscular junction is targeted by antibodies, leading to muscle weakness.


title: Acetylcholine receptor

text: Congenital myasthenic syndrome (CMS) is an inherited neuromuscular disorder caused by defects of several types at the neuromuscular junction. Postsynaptic defects are the most frequent cause of CMS and often result in abnormalities in nicotinic acetylcholine receptors. The majority of mutations causing CMS are found in the AChR subunits genes.


title: Acetylcholine receptor

text: Out of all mutations associated with CMS, more than half are mutations in one of the four genes encoding the adult acetylcholine receptor subunits. Mutations of the AChR often result in endplate deficiency. Most of the mutations of the AChR are mutations of the CHRNE gene with mutations encoding for the Alpha5 Nicotinic Acetylcholine Receptor cause increased susceptibility to addiction. The CHRNE gene codes for the epsilon subunit of the AChR. Most mutations are autosomal recessive loss-of-function mutations and as a result there is endplate AChR deficiency. CHRNE is associated with changing the kinetic properties of the AChR. One type of mutation of the epsilon subunit of the AChR introduces an Arg into the binding site at the α/ε subunit interface of the receptor. The addition of a cationic Arg into the anionic environment of the AChR binding site greatly reduces the kinetic properties of the receptor. The result of the newly introduced ARG is a 30-fold reduction of agonist affinity, 75-fold reduction of gating efficiency, and an extremely weakened channel opening probability. This type of mutation results in an extremely fatal form of CMS.


title: American Music Awards of 2021

text: The 49th Annual American Music Awards were held on November 21, 2021, at the Microsoft Theater in Los Angeles, recognizing the most popular artists, singles and albums of 2021. Cardi B hosted the ceremony, following Queen Latifah (1995) as the only female rappers in history to do so. Cardi B became the first artist to win Favorite Rap/Hip Hop Song three times. BTS, Doja Cat, and Megan Thee Stallion won three awards each.


title: American Music Awards of 2021

text: The ceremony was notable as the first produced under the banner of MRC Live & Alternative, which was formerly known as Dick Clark Productions after use of that name was phased out the month before. However, this would turn out to be the only year produced under this banner, as the Dick Clark Productions name was restored in August 2022.


title: American Music Awards of 2021

text: The nominations were announced on ABC's "Good Morning America", Spotify's morning show "The Get Up", and also via the American Music Awards Twitter account on October 28, 2021. Olivia Rodrigo received the most nominations with seven, followed by the Weeknd with six, and Bad Bunny, Doja Cat and Giveon with five each. BTS became the first Asian artist to receive Artist of the Year at the American Music Awards. Three new categories were introduced in 2021: Favorite Trending Song, Favorite Latin Duo or Group, and Favorite Gospel Artist.


title: American Music Awards of 2021

text: Additionally, it was announced towards the end of October that though country singer Morgan Wallen had two nominations, due to his personal conduct in 2020 and 2021 which saw his music removed from further publicity and the suspension of his recording contract, he was not allowed to attend the ceremony or accept any awards won remotely. The show's production company plans to evaluate his future conduct in including him in future ceremonies.


The Innocent Man: Murder and Injustice in a Small Town is a 2006 true crime book by John Grisham, his only nonfiction title . The book tells the story of Ronald 'Ron' Keith Williamson of Ada, Oklahoma, a former minor league baseball player who was wrongly convicted in 1988 of the rape and murder of Debra Sue Carter in Ada and was sentenced to death. After serving 11 years on death row, he was exonerated by DNA evidence and other material introduced by the Innocence Project and was released in 1999.


title: The Innocent Man: Murder and Injustice in a Small Town

text: Netflix released "The Innocent Man", a six-part documentary series based on the book, in December 2018.


text: Ron Williamson has returned to his hometown of Ada, Oklahoma, after multiple failed attempts to play for various minor league baseball teams, including the Chicago Cubs and two affiliate teams owned by the Chicago White Sox. A shoulder injury inhibited his chances to progress. His dreams were not enough to overcome the odds of making it to a big league game. His failures led to, or aggravated, his depression and problem drinking.


text: Early in the morning of December 8, 1982, the body of Debra Sue Carter, a 21-year-old cocktail waitress, was found in the bedroom of her garage apartment in Ada. She had been beaten, raped, and suffocated. After five years of false starts and shoddy police work by the Ada police department, Williamson, along with his "drinking buddy", Dennis Fritz, were charged, tried, and convicted of the rape and murder charges in 1988. Williamson was sentenced to death. Fritz was given a life sentence. Fritz's wife had been murdered seven years earlier and he was raising their only daughter when he was arrested.


text: Grisham's book describes the aggressive and misguided mission of the Ada police department and Pontotoc County District Attorney Bill Peterson to solve the mystery of Carter's murder. The police and prosecutor used forced "dream" confessions, unreliable witnesses, and flimsy evidence to convict Williamson and Fritz. Since a death penalty conviction automatically sets in motion a series of appeals, the Innocence Project aided Williamson's attorney, Mark Barrett, in exposing several glaring holes in the prosecution's case and the credibility of the prosecution's witnesses. Frank H. Seay, a U.S. District Court judge, ordered a retrial.


text: After eleven years on death row, Williamson and Fritz were exonerated by DNA evidence and released on April 15, 1999. Williamson was the 78th inmate released from death row since 1973.


text: Williamson suffered deep and irreversible psychological damage during his incarceration and lengthy stay on death row. For example, on September 22, 1994, he was five days away from being executed when his execution was stayed following the filing of a "habeas corpus" petition.


text: He was intermittently treated for manic depression, personality disorders, alcoholism, and mild schizophrenia. It was later proven that he was mentally ill and therefore was unfit to have been tried or sentenced to death in the first place. The State of Oklahoma, the city of Ada, and Pontotoc County officials never admitted any errors and threatened to re-arrest him.


text: Another man from Ada, Glen Gore, was eventually convicted of the crime on June 24, 2003. He was sentenced to death, but his sentence was overturned in August 2005. He was convicted at a second trial on June 21, 2006, and sentenced to life in prison without parole. This was required by law due to a jury deadlock on sentencing.


text: Williamson and Fritz sued and won a settlement of $500,000 in 2003 for wrongful conviction from the City of Ada, and an out-of-court settlement with the State of Oklahoma for an undisclosed amount. By 2004, Williamson was diagnosed with cirrhosis of the liver. He died on December 4, 2004, in a Broken Arrow, Oklahoma, nursing home. Fritz returned to Kansas City, where he lives with his daughter, Elizabeth . In 2006, Fritz published his own account of being wrongly convicted in his book titled "Journey Toward Justice".


text: The book includes accounts (as subplots) of the false conviction, trial and sentencing of Tommy Ward and Karl Fontenot in the abduction, rape, and purported murder of Denice Haraway, as well as the false conviction of Greg Wilhoit in the rape and murder of his estranged wife, Kathy. At one time, all the men were incarcerated on the same death row. About two decades before Grisham's book, Ward and Fontenot's wrongful convictions were detailed in the book "The Dreams of Ada" (1987) by Robert Mayer.


title: Wake of the Flood

text: Wake of the Flood is the sixth studio album by rock band the Grateful Dead. Released October 15, 1973, it was the first album on the band's own Grateful Dead Records label. Their first studio album in nearly three years, it was also the first without founding member Ron "Pigpen" McKernan, who had recently died. His absence and keyboardist Keith Godchaux's penchants for bebop and modal jazz (rather than McKernan's tendencies toward the blues and rhythm and blues) contributed to the band's musical evolution. Godchaux's wife, backing vocalist Donna Jean Godchaux, also joined the group and appears on the album.


title: Wake of the Flood

text: The release fared better on the pop charts than their previous studio album (1970's "American Beauty"), reaching  18. An expanded version was released in 2004.


title: Wake of the Flood

text: After three (official) live albums in a row, the Grateful Dead wanted to record studio versions of songs written since Keith Godchaux had joined the band. At the time of recording, five of the songs on the album (and part of a 6th) had been in live rotation for up to a year and a half, as arrangements were road-tested and finalized. Referring to this period, bassist Phil Lesh explained, "We'd learned to break in the material at shows (under fire, as it were), rather than try to work it out at rehearsals, or in the studio at tremendous expense."


title: Wake of the Flood

text: The new compositions drew on many of the band's influences, blending genres from country folk and R&B to ragtime and jazz rock, the latter being more prominent than previously. As had become routine, Robert Hunter and Jerry Garcia wrote the majority of the songs, with Bob Weir's contribution being the epic "Weather Report Suite". The "Prelude" section of this piece had been developed onstage, but the "Part 1" and "Part 2 (Let it Grow)" debuted after the album's recording. "Let Me Sing Your Blues Away" is the band's only singing-songwriting contribution from Keith Godchaux. It was performed live just six times, in September 1973, between the recording and release of the album.


title: Wake of the Flood

text: Describing Godchaux's influence, drummer Bill Kreutzmann characterized the album as "Keith's coming out party." Remarking on the evolution in style, he remembered:


title: Wake of the Flood

text: The band chose to record at the recently built Record Plant between August 4–15, 1973. It was in Sausalito, near their San Rafael home base, and had been used by cohorts New Riders of the Purple Sage for their successful album "The Adventures of Panama Red" (which featured input from Hunter and Donna Godchaux). Staff engineer Tom Flye, assistant engineer Tom Anderson, and Dead soundman Dan Healy recorded and mixed on 24-track, bringing the mixdown to Lacquer Channel in Sausalito for mastering. The initial vinyl runs were pressed by Monarch Record Mfg., in Los Angeles.


title: Wake of the Flood

text: Wake of the flood, laughing water, '49Get out the pans, don't just stand there dreaming, get out the way,


title: Wake of the Flood

text: a poetic reference to the historic flood in Vanport, Oregon (a site where the Dead would play in 1995). Though lyrically the songs continued Hunter's Americana themes, a thread of Earth, seasons and life cycles connects the material, particularly with Weir and Barlow's culminating suite. This is represented in the album cover artwork, designed by San Francisco counterculture artist and band associate Rick Griffin. It has an Earth tone and simple graphics including a woodcut-derived figure of a harvest-reaping man with a wheat bundle and scythe, and a field crow. Reflecting the cycles of nature is an image, hidden in a cloud, of a hooded skull. Griffin said that the artwork was inspired by a quote from Revelation – "And the sea gave up the dead that were in it and death and Hell gave up the dead that were in them, and they were judged, every man according to their works." () He added that the image was designed "to show an alternative to that. I wanted to juxtapose that Scripture with a loving image, an image of loving harvest." (The list of song titles on the back cover is missing from some early pressings.)


title: Wake of the Flood

text: After completing their extended contract and extracting themselves from Warner Bros., the Dead were left without a record label for production and distribution of their albums. The decision was made to start an independent label, in order to retain complete control of their recordings and allow for side-projects. Lesh explained, "We already owned our own sound system. Booking and travel were in-house. It seemed as if being our own record company would be worth a try. No one could see a downside." Though pressing their own records was foreseeable, setting up a distribution network to compete with existing channels was formidable and ultimately short-lived. Lesh continued, "How would we distribute the records? [Manager Ron] Rakow's original scam was to sell the records from ice-cream trucks...seriously impractical. In the end, we settled on a more traditional model: the Dead would finance and produce the recordings, and United Artists Records would manufacture and distribute."


title: Wake of the Flood

text: Two singles were released: "Let Me Sing Your Blues Away (b/w "Here Comes Sunshine"), followed by single edits of "Eyes of the World" (b/w "Weather Report Part I"). Neither charted. The Dead's ex-label responded to the loss of the band by compiling "best-of" and archive albums, beginning with "", just months after the release of "Wake of the Flood".


title: Wake of the Flood

text: All of the songs but "Let Me Sing Your Blues Away" and the first parts of "Weather Report Suite" remained in setlists throughout the existence of the band (though "Here Comes Sunshine" was absent from 2/23/74 to December 1992). Weir had played the finger-picked "Prelude" for months before attaching it to "Weather Report Suite", ultimately dropping all but the "Let it Grow" section after 1974. Though the album's version is concise, "Eyes of the World" in particular had already become an extended-jam set piece and would remain so.


title: Wake of the Flood

text: With the collapse of the band's label in 1976, "Wake of the Flood" was in and out of print for many years. Exercising an active contract, United Artists made a one-off pressing on their Liberty label in 1979. The album went back into publication when it was released on CD in 1988, again on the Grateful Dead Records imprint. It was remastered and expanded for inclusion in the "Beyond Description" box set in October 2004. The expanded version was released separately in 2006.


title: John DiFronzo

text: John DiFronzo (December 13, 1928 – May 27, 2018), nicknamed "No Nose", was an American mobster and the reputed former boss of the Chicago Outfit.


title: John DiFronzo

text: DiFronzo, a former enforcer and caporegime, first appeared with a criminal record in 1949. He got the nickname "No Nose" because he sliced off part of his nose while jumping through a window during a 1949 clothing store burglary. Reportedly, the police gave him back the missing part which was almost perfectly restored. In 1950, DiFronzo served two years in prison for burglary.


title: John DiFronzo

text: DiFronzo was a suspect in the unsolved 1952 murder of Charles Gross, a West Side politician with suspected ties to organized crime. He was a member of the Three Minute Gang, and identified as a member of a loansharking operation along with former Chicago police officers Albert Sarno and Chris Cardi in 1964. Imprisoned syndicate leader Joseph Aiuppa chose DiFronzo to head criminal operations in Chicago's western suburbs over acting syndicate boss Joseph Ferriola. Eventually, he became one of several de facto leaders running The Outfit in Chicago.


title: John DiFronzo

text: In 1993, DiFronzo was convicted along with Chicago boss Samuel "Black Sam" Carlisi, his gambling capo Donald "The Wizard of Odds" Angelini, and four other men of federal racketeering charges for attempting to subterfuge gambling operations at the Rincon Reservation near San Diego. The 1993 conviction was reversed on appeal, however, and DiFronzo was released from prison in 1994.


title: John DiFronzo

text: In 2009, DiFronzo, Rudy Fratto and several others were named in a civil lawsuit by Joseph Fosco, the son of late Teamsters treasurer Armando Fosco, alleged to have tried to extort $400,000 from Fosco.


title: Liu Chuanzhi

text: Liu Chuanzhi (; born 29 April 1944) is a Chinese entrepreneur. Liu is the founder of Lenovo, the world's largest personal computer vendor by unit sales. He remains one of the leaders of the company.


title: Liu Chuanzhi

text: By the early 1980s, Liu had achieved relative success as a computer scientist but still felt frustrated with his career. While his work on magnetic data storage was important, it lacked direct practical applications. He said, "We were the top computer technology research organization in China. We developed the first electron-tube computer and the first transistor computer. But we only produced one of each. Then we went on to develop something different. The work was just filed away." Liu was also anxious about his economic circumstances; in 1984, Liu had a growing family but an income of only 100RMB per month.


title: Liu Chuanzhi

text: Liu founded Lenovo (originally called Legend), in 1984 with a group of ten other engineers in Beijing with 200,000 yuan and an office roughly 20 square yards in size. Liu came up with the idea to start Lenovo in response to a lack of funding at the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS). Liu's superior arranged for the academy to loan him and the other co-founders the afore-mentioned 200,000 yuan. Of this time, Liu said, "It wasn't easy. The lowest thing you could do in the early '80s, as a scientist, was to go into business. China had a strict planned economy and there was barely room for a freewheeling company like ours."


title: Liu Chuanzhi

text: Liu emphasized developing an effective working relationship with his superiors at the CAS from the very start. Despite its rhetoric of market-oriented reform, the Chinese government was reluctant to relax state control of the economy. Liu feared that his company might fail due to government micro-management. Liu also worried about dealing with local government officials and party cadres. He said, "We were totally immersed in the environment of a planned economy. I didn't care that the investment was small, but I knew I must have control over finances, human resources and decision-making." Liu's superiors immediately granted his request for autonomy.


title: Liu Chuanzhi

text: Lenovo's founders, all scientists and engineers, faced difficulty from their lack of familiarity with market-oriented business practices, traditional Chinese ambivalence towards commerce, and anti-capitalist communist ideology. During this period many Chinese intellectuals felt that commerce was immoral and degrading. The fact that in the 1980s entrepreneurs were drawn from lower classes, and often dishonest as well, made the private sector even more unattractive. This was readily apparent to Liu and his collaborators due to their proximity to Zhongguancun, where the proliferation of fly-by-night electronics traders lead to the area being dubbed "Swindlers Valley."


title: Liu Chuanzhi

text: Their first significant transaction, an attempt to import televisions, failed. The group rebuilt itself within a year by conducting quality checks on computers for new buyers. Lenovo soon invested money in developing a circuit board that would allow IBM PCs to process Chinese characters. This product was Lenovo's first major success. In 1990, Lenovo started to assemble and sell computers under its original brand name, Legend.


title: Liu Chuanzhi

text: Lenovo also tried and failed to market a digital watch. Liu said, "Our management team often differed on which commercial road to travel. This led to big discussions, especially between the engineering chief and myself. He felt that if the quality of the product was good, then it would sell itself. But I knew this was not true, that marketing and other factors were part of the eventual success of a product." Lenovo's early difficulties were compounded by the fact that its staff had little business experience. "We were mainly scientists and didn't understand the market," Liu said. "We just learned by trial-and-error, which was very interesting—but also very dangerous," said Liu.


title: Liu Chuanzhi

text: Liu received government permission to open a subsidiary in Hong Kong and was allowed to move there along with five other employees. Liu's father, already in Hong Kong, supported his son's ambitions through mentoring and facilitating loans. Liu moved to Hong Kong in 1988. In order to save money during this period, Liu and his co-workers walked instead of taking public transportation. In order to keep up appearances they rented hotel rooms for meetings.


title: Liu Chuanzhi

text: Lenovo became a publicly traded company after listing in Hong Kong in 1994, raising nearly US$30 million. Prior to Lenovo's IPO, many analysts were optimistic. The company was praised for its good management, strong brand recognition, and growth potential. Analysts also worried about Lenovo's profitability. Lenovo's IPO was massively over-subscribed. During the first day of trading the company's stock price hit a high of HK$2.07 and closed at HK$2.00. Proceeds from the offering were used to finance sales offices in Europe, North America, and Australia; expand and improve production and research and development; and increase working capital. Lenovo's Hong Kong and Mainland China business units conducted a merger and secondary offering in 1997.


title: Liu Chuanzhi

text: When Lenovo was first listed, its managers thought the only purpose of going public was to raise capital. They had little understanding of the rules and responsibilities that went along with running a public company. Before Lenovo conducted its first secondary offering in 1997, Liu proudly announced the company's intent to mainland newspapers only to have its stock halted for two days by regulators to punish his statement. This occurred several times until Liu learned that he had to choose his words carefully in public. The first time Liu traveled to Europe on a "roadshow" to discuss his company's stock he was shocked by the skeptical questions he was subjected to and felt offended. Liu later came to understand that he was accountable to shareholders. He said, "Before I only had one boss, but CAS never asked me anything. I relied on my own initiative to do things. We began to think about issues of credibility. Legend began to learn how to become a truly international company."


title: Liu Chuanzhi

text: Liu claims Hewlett-Packard as a key source of inspiration for Lenovo. In an interview with The Economist he said, "Our earliest and best teacher was Hewlett-Packard." For more than ten years, Lenovo served as Hewlett-Packard's distributor in China. Speaking about Lenovo's later acquisition of IBM's personal computer unit Liu said, "I remember the first time I took part in a meeting of IBM agents. I was wearing an old business suit of my father's and I sat in the back row. Even in my dreams, I never imagined that one day we could buy the IBM PC business. It was unthinkable. Impossible."


title: Liu Chuanzhi

text: Lenovo's later takeover of IBM's personal computing business made him the first Chinese CEO to lead the takeover of a major American firm. During an interview, Liu acknowledged the major risks involved with the IBM deal. "We had three serious risks. Number one: After the acquisition, would clients buy from the new owner? Number two: Would employees continue to work for the new owner? Number three: Would there be potential conflicts between the Chinese management and the Western management?"


title: Liu Chuanzhi

text: Business ethics were a key challenge for Liu in establishing and expanding Lenovo. Liu says that at first he behaved "like a kind of dictator" and spent much time yelling. He had five corrupt executives imprisoned. Being late for a meeting could be punished by having to stand in silence before the group, a punishment that Liu accepted three times himself. Lenovo's culture gradually changed and Liu was able to relax his authoritarian style. Lenovo became an employer of choice for Chinese engineers and managers with overseas education.


title: Liu Chuanzhi

text: In June 2012, Liu stepped down as chairman of Legend Holdings, the parent company of Lenovo. In the years just prior to his resignation, Liu focused on improving Legend's growth, building-up its core assets, and conducting a public stock offering between 2014 and 2016. Legend's major assets include Lenovo, Legend Capital, a real-estate venture called Raycom, Digital China, and Hony Capital.


title: Liu Chuanzhi

text: In an interview with the BBC, Liu said that his vision for Legend was for it "to become an industry in its own right" and that he wants it "to become the top enterprise across industries...not only in China, but in the whole world." Liu said that he realized that his vision was extremely ambitious and may have to be left to his successors to implement.


title: Liu Chuanzhi

text: Liu said in an interview with "Forbes" that he hoped to diversify away from IT-related businesses and that Legend Holding's assets would be mainly concentrated in information technology, real estate, services, coal processing, and agriculture. He said agriculture "will become the next strategic development area for Legend Holdings." Liu said agriculture is just one part of what he sees as "huge" opportunities in sectors that cater to Chinese consumers. In the same interview, Liu said that Legend's focus would continue to remain on China. "Whatever we do has to fit into something we are doing in China," said Liu when referring to plans for overseas investment. Liu said in July 2012 that he plans to take Legend Holdings public with a listing in Hong Kong. Forbes speculated that Liu may be trying to "create a Chinese version of General Electric."


title: Liu Chuanzhi

text: Liu led an initial public offering for Legend on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange in 2015. The offering received regulatory approval in June of that year. Liu said in an interview that he planned to float Legend's stock on a domestic Chinese exchange before his retirement.


title: Liu Chuanzhi

text: In 2019, Liu Chuanzhi, the 75-year-old founder of Lenovo Group, has resigned as chairman of Legend Holdings, the parent company of the world's largest personal computer supplier.


title: Liu Chuanzhi

text: Joyvio is Legend Holdings' vehicle for investment in the food industry. Legend has invested more than 1 billion yuan in Joyvio. Joyvio will pursue complete vertical integration from farming all the way to retailing. Joyvio's first product was blueberries. In November 2013, its product range was expanded to kiwifruit. The kiwifruit has been named "Liu Kiwi," in honor of Liu Chuanzhi. Liu is responsible for Legend's move into food. Since 2011, Joyvio has acquired farms around the world including blueberry fields in Shandong and Chile and kiwifruit plantations in Sichuan, Shaanxi, Henan, and Chile. The firm had plans to start selling cherries and grapes from the United States, Australia, and Chile by the end of 2013.


title: Liu Chuanzhi

text: Joyvio took advantage of Legend's experience in information technology to set up a tracking system to ensure the quality and safety of its products. Customers can scan codes on its packages in order to find out what farm the product came from, who supervised production, what tests were performed, and information on soil and water quality. The company is also applying the OEM business model common in the technology industry in order to work effectively with small family farms and agricultural cooperatives. Joyvio holds training exercises with farmers in order to prepare them to deal quickly and effectively with bad weather.