It?s a day of big-time video game releases in the iTunes App Store. Grand Theft Auto 3, one of the most controversial (and extremely fun) games ever created, just landed this week for the incredibly low price of $5. It leads this week?s gaming selection, followed closely by an iOS version of Sonic CD, the platforming classic from 1993 from Sega. After that is a new Adult Swim title in the Angry Birds style called Snoticles, and a new brick-breaker title from Atari called Breakout: Boost.
The controversial third-person action game that has riled up parents and politicians for 10 years has finally jumped the gap from consoles to Apple?s iOS platform. That?s right, this is THE Grand Theft Auto III, the game in which you can steal cars, pick up prostitutes and get hunted down by the cops. It?s the PlayStation 2 title that took the world by storm, shrunk down to the size of your iPhone or iPad. Obviously, it?s more for adults than children.
Developer Rockstar Games has optimized the game for iOS with new touch controls and Retina-supporting HD graphics. It also has a huge amount of content ? everything that was available for PlayStation 2 players way back in 2001, which is hours and hours of missions, a huge locale to explore in Liberty City, and lots of hidden stuff to discover. If you like video games at all, you owe it to yourself to give Grand Theft Auto 3 a try.
Sonic CD (iPhone, iPad) $1.99
Another classic ported from the video game consoles of yesterday is Sonic CD, hailing from all the way back in 1993. Optimized for touch controls and packing a ton of classic side-scrolling Sonic action, this is a must-have for platforming fans and a great port from a developer, Sega, whose other games brought to iOS from other platforms can sometimes leave something to be desired.
Sonic CD has been optimized for iOS and touchscreen controls and packs HD Retina graphics for iPhone 4 and iPhone 4S users. It also includes both the original U.S. soundtrack, as well as the Japanese soundtrack for the game. On top of all that, Sega has secured Game Center support, which brings leaderboards, achievements and friends lists into the equation, too.
Snoticles (iPhone, iPad) $0.99
Taking a page from physics-based arcade games like Angry Birds is Snoticles, a game in which you control as many as four somewhat gross cartoony characters in a title that?s all about flinging things at other things to earn points. All four of your heroes (ones a pimple, ones a ball of snot and the other two are kind of unidentifiable) throw different implements of destruction and their weapons have different properties. You?ll have to use the right tool for the job to get maximum points as you clear each level of enemies by blowing up the ?alpha? enemy in each one.
Snoticles packs ?dozens? of levels across five separate worlds, each mixing an Angry Birds-style arcade feel with puzzles to solve. It also packs Game Center support, providing you with leaderboards and achievements that allow you to check your abilities against those of other players.
There are lots of brick-breaker titles in the iTunes App Store, but not all of them are free ? or at least partially free. Atari?s Breakout: Boost, on the other hand, comes with its first five levels for free. It also packs plenty of classic arcade action. You control a plate with by sliding your finger around, bouncing a ball toward the top of the screen and using it to break a bunch of bricks planted up there. The more you blast, the more points you earn.
After the first five free levels, you can purchase another 65 stages for $0.99. You also can earn a mess of power-ups in true brick-breaker fashion to add to your score, and see how you stack up against other players thanks to Game Center achievements and leaderboards.
Cox Communications announced that it has entered into an agreement to sell to Verizon Wireless its 20 MHz Advanced Wireless Services spectrum licenses covering 28 million POPs for $315 million. The sale of Cox's AWS spectrum to Verizon Wireless is an important step to ensure that consumers' growing demands for mobility will be met. This agreement does not include Cox's 700 MHz spectrum licenses, the company's Cox Wireless customer accounts or any other assets.
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Producer J.J. Abrams has established a great tradition within the "Mission: Impossible" franchise: in the last two "M:I" installments, Abrams has called in fan-favorite actors from his television past for brief but awesome roles. First Keri Russell popped into "Mission: Impossible III" in a blink-and-you'll-miss-it death scene, and today's newest movie ? "Ghost Protocol" ? [...]
ScienceDaily (Dec. 13, 2011) ? Imprinting electronic circuitry on backplanes that are both flexible and stretchable promises to revolutionize a number of industries and make "smart devices" nearly ubiquitous. Among the applications that have been envisioned are electronic pads that could be folded away like paper, coatings that could monitor surfaces for cracks and other structural failures, medical bandages that could treat infections and food packaging that could detect spoilage. From solar cells to pacemakers to clothing, the list of smart applications for so-called "plastic electronics" is both flexible and stretchable. First, however, suitable backplanes must be mass-produced in a cost-effective way.
Researchers with the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE)'s Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab) have developed a promising new inexpensive technique for fabricating large-scale flexible and stretchable backplanes using semiconductor-enriched carbon nanotube solutions that yield networks of thin film transistors with superb electrical properties, including a charge carrier mobility that is dramatically higher than that of organic counterparts. To demonstrate the utility of their carbon nanotube backplanes, the researchers constructed an artificial electronic skin (e-skin) capable of detecting and responding to touch.
"With our solution-based processing technology, we have produced mechanically flexible and stretchable active-matrix backplanes, based on fully passivated and highly uniform arrays of thin film transistors made from single walled carbon nanotubes that evenly cover areas of approximately 56 square centimeters," says Ali Javey, a faculty scientist in Berkeley Lab's Materials Sciences Division and a professor of electrical engineering and computer science at the University of California (UC) Berkeley. "This technology, in combination with inkjet printing of metal contacts, should provide lithography-free fabrication of low-cost flexible and stretchable electronics in the future."
Javey is the corresponding author of a paper in the journal NanoLetters that describes this work titled "Carbon Nanotube Active-Matrix Backplanes for Conformal Electronics and Sensors." Co-authoring this paper were Toshitake Takahashi, Kuniharu Takei, Andrew Gillies and Ronald Fearing.
With the demand for plastic electronics so high, research and development in this area has been intense over the past decade. Single walled carbon nanotubes (SWNTs) have emerged as one of the top contending semiconductor materials for plastic electronics, primarily because they feature high mobility for electrons -- a measure of how fast a semiconductor conducts electricity. However, SWNTs can take the form of either a semiconductor or a metal and a typical SWNT solution consists of two-thirds semiconducting and one-third metallic tubes. This mix yields nanotube networks that exhibit low on/off current ratios, which poses a major problem for electronic applications as lead author of the NanoLetters paper Takahashi explains.
"An on/off current ratio as high as possible is essential for reducing the interruption from pixels in an off-state," he says. "For example, with our e-skin device, when we are pressure mapping, we want to get the signal only from the on-state pixel on which pressure is applied. In other words, we want to minimize the current as small as possible from the other pixels which are supposed to be turned off. For this we need a high on/off current ratio."
To make their backplanes, Javey, Takahashi and their co-authors used a SWNT solution enriched to be 99-percent semiconductor tubes. This highly purified solution provided the researchers with a high on/off ratio (approximately 100) for their backplanes. Working with a thin substrate of polymide, a high-strength polymer with superior flexibility, they laser-cut a honeycomb pattern of hexagonal holes that made the substrate stretchable as well. The holes were cut with a fixed pitch of 3.3 millimeters and a varied hole-side length that ranged from 1.0 to 1.85 millimeters.
"The degree to which the substrate could be stretched increased from 0 to 60-percent as the side length of the hexagonal holes increased to 1.85 mm," Takahashi says. "In the future, the degrees of stretchability and directionality should be tunable by either changing the hole size or optimizing the mesh design."
Backplanes were completed with the deposition on the substrates of layers of silicon and aluminum oxides followed by the semiconductor-enriched SWNTs. The resulting SWNT thin film transistor backplanes were used to create e-skin for spatial pressure mapping. The e-skin consisted of an array of 96 sensor pixels, measuring 24 square centimeters in area, with each pixel being actively controlled by a single thin film transistor. To demonstrate pressure mapping, an L-shaped weight was placed on top of the e-skin sensor array with the normal pressure of approximately 15 kilo Pascals (313 pounds per square foot).
"In the linear operation regime, the measured sensor sensitivity reflected a threefold improvement compared with previous nanowire-based e-skin sensors reported last year by our group," Takahashi says. "This improved sensitivity was a result of the improved device performance of the SWNT backplanes. In the future we should be able to expand our backplane technology by adding various sensor and/or other active device components to enable multifunctional artificial skins. In addition, the SWNT backplane could be used for flexible displays."
This research was supported in part by the DOE Office of Science and in part by the National Science Foundation.
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The above story is reprinted from materials provided by DOE/Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory.
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Journal Reference:
Toshitake Takahashi, Kuniharu Takei, Andrew G. Gillies, Ronald S. Fearing, Ali Javey. Carbon Nanotube Active-Matrix Backplanes for Conformal Electronics and Sensors. Nano Letters, 2011; 111109092850009 DOI: 10.1021/nl203117h
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Contact: David Malmquist davem@vims.edu 804-684-7011 Virginia Institute of Marine Science
Managing commercial and recreational fisheries is a complex and sometimes contentious process in which fishing interests, scientists, and regulatory agencies don't always see eye-to-eye.
Researchers from the Virginia Institute of Marine Science (VIMS) are now working with commercial fishermen to collect and share fisheries data in a cooperative venture that promises to build trust and foster the mutual goal of sustainable and profitable fisheries in the Mid-Atlantic and New England regions.
The VIMS team, led by fisheries scientists Rob Latour, Chris Bonzek, and Jim Gartland, is a key part of NEAMAPthe NorthEast Area Monitoring and Assessment Program. The NEAMAP Mid-Atlantic/Southern New England Near Shore Trawl Survey team at VIMS also includes Jameson Gregg, Evan McOmber, Deb Gauthier, Melanie Chattin, Greg Mears, Kristene Parsons, and Kevin Spanik.
Since 2007, the VIMS team has partnered for one spring and one fall survey each year with the crew of the fishing vessel Darana R, a 90-foot commercial trawler out of Hampton, Virginia. The boat is captained by Jimmy Ruhle from Wanchese, North Carolina, with help from mates Bobby Ruhle and Rigo Rodriguez. When not doing survey work, the trio mainly fishes squid and herring.
Gartland, who leads the VIMS team at sea, says "The way we conduct our surveycooperative research where scientists team up with commercial fishermenis coming more into favor. One of its big advantages is that it allows us, as scientists, to do what we're best atdata collection and analysis, and lets the fisherman do what they're best atfishing and making the gear work correctly and consistently. Putting that together makes a great partnership."
Each survey keeps the team at sea for four to five weeks depending on weather and other factors. They tow a trawl net for 20 minutes at 150 randomly selected sites per cruise, in inshore waters from Cape Hatteras north to Cape Cod. All told, they've spent 262 days at sea during the last 4 years, plus countless hours in the lab at VIMS processing samples and analyzing data.
Their datarecording factors such as length, weight, age, sex ratio, and diethave now been used to help manage commercially and recreationally important species throughout the coastal waters of the northeastern U.S. These include spot, croaker, drum, summer flounder, and weakfish in the more southerly waters, and black sea bass, scup, squid, spiny dogfish, and winter flounder toward the north. NOAA's latest estimate of the annual ex-vessel value of commercial landings from these waters is $283 million (2008 data).
"The selection of a team from VIMS to manage this interstate survey reflects the reputation our scientists have earned through decades of monitoring work in Chesapeake Bay," says VIMS Dean and Director John Wells. "Their work helps ensure sustainable fisheries not only along the Atlantic seaboard, but also in the Bay, since many of the fishes they monitor spend considerable time in local waters both as juveniles and adults."
Praise for the survey also comes from U.S. Senator Charles Schumer, who in a letter to former U.S. Commerce Secretary Gary Locke wrote "The Inshore Ocean Trawl Survey is a model of cooperative research... Along with New York, NEAMAP surveys will benefit all of the Atlantic coast states north of South Carolina."
Even though the researchers keep only five fish of each species and size group (small, medium, and large) for full analysis per towquickly identifying, weighing, measuring, and releasing the resttheir workload rapidly adds up. In 2010 alone, they caught and released 1,087,000 fishes weighing approximately 171,961 pounds, recorded the length of 143,642 of those, and spent months in the lab studying the stomach contents of 7,586 fishes and using ear bones to age 10,434 others. All told, the team has so far recorded 146 different species, including boreal, temperate, and tropical forms.
Fishery-Independent Data
An important aspect of the VIMS NEAMAP survey is that it provides "fishery-independent" data. Unlike "fisheries-dependent" datainformation from fishermen and dealers regarding catch, landings, and effortfisheries-independent data are designed to be free from vagaries introduced by changes in factors such as fuel costs, fishing gear, market price, and consumer demand. They are thus much more suitable for assessing the true population characteristics of a particular species.
"Fisheries-dependent data give managers and scientists a picture of the fishery," says Bonzek, "while fisheries-independent data, over the long term, provide information on the stock status of a species."
The NEAMAP team ensures the validity of their data by sampling in a consistent manner from cruise-to-cruise and year-to-year. Whereas commercial fishermen will readily change to a more efficient net and move to where the fish are in an attempt to optimize their target catch, NEAMAP teams always use a standardized trawl net and sample randomly within their study area.
"We select our tows using a stratified random design," says Gartland. "That means we break the survey up into different regions and use a computer to randomly select tows within each. That ensures that we have good spatial coverage and statistical validity."
The team's neta 3-bridle, 4-seam bottom trawlwas specifically designed for survey work by an advisory panel that included commercial fishermen, trawl-gear manufacturers, academic scientists, and federal researchers at the Northeast Fisheries Science Center (NEFSC).
During each tow, the scientists and crew use electronic sensors to ensure that the net's "wingspread," "door-spread," and "headrope height" remain within accepted values. "When you're working with a survey net you want consistency so that your data are comparable across tows and surveys," says Gartland. "That way, you can tell if a species is on the increase, the decrease, or holding steady."
"Consistency in the performance of the survey gear ensures consistency in the catch data," adds Latour. "The more robust and sound the data, the more effective the fisheries management program."
Filling a "Data Gap"
NEAMAP was established in 2006 to meet the needs of fisheries management and stock assessment in the marine waters of the northeastern U.S. It complements a similar program called SEAMAP (Southeast Area Monitoring and Assessment Program), which operates from Cape Hatteras south into the Gulf of Mexico and Caribbean.
Neither NEAMAP nor SEAMAP was designed to replace existing fishery programs, but rather to coordinate and standardize procedures and improve data quality and accessibility among existing programswhether state or federal.
The impetus for this NEAMAP survey, which was established by the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission in 2003, was a concern that existing surveys weren't collecting enough data from inshore waters to effectively manage certain fisheries along the lengthy stretch of seaboard between Cape Hatteras and the U.S.-Canadian border.
"When we sat down and mapped out which groups were sampling where, we realized that we had a problem in the coastal Mid-Atlantic and Southern New England regions," says Gartland. "New Jersey is the only state running a survey in their coastal waters, and the federal governmentthe NEFSCwas about to abandon their sampling of the near shore zone because their new boat had a very deep draft. These inshore waters support abundant populations and a rich diversity of fishes, and in turn valuable commercial and recreational fisheries, so ignoring these areas could make it difficult to generate reliable stock assessments and management plans for certain species. Our survey was designed to fill this sampling gap by providing high quality data to assessment scientists and managers for this critical area. So far we've been successful."
The VIMS component of NEAMAPthe Mid-Atlantic/Southern New England Near Shore Trawl Surveycurrently supplements and extends the federal survey, with responsibility for sampling all waters shallower than 60 feet between Cape Hatteras and Cape Codan area of roughly 4,500 square miles.
In addition to NEAMAP, VIMS researchers also operate ChesMMAPthe Chesapeake Bay Multispecies Monitoring and Assessment Program. Data from the ChesMMAP surveys help quantify major links in the Bay's food web, estimate population sizes for recreationally, commercially, and ecologically important species, and identify their geographic and seasonal distribution.
###
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Contact: David Malmquist davem@vims.edu 804-684-7011 Virginia Institute of Marine Science
Managing commercial and recreational fisheries is a complex and sometimes contentious process in which fishing interests, scientists, and regulatory agencies don't always see eye-to-eye.
Researchers from the Virginia Institute of Marine Science (VIMS) are now working with commercial fishermen to collect and share fisheries data in a cooperative venture that promises to build trust and foster the mutual goal of sustainable and profitable fisheries in the Mid-Atlantic and New England regions.
The VIMS team, led by fisheries scientists Rob Latour, Chris Bonzek, and Jim Gartland, is a key part of NEAMAPthe NorthEast Area Monitoring and Assessment Program. The NEAMAP Mid-Atlantic/Southern New England Near Shore Trawl Survey team at VIMS also includes Jameson Gregg, Evan McOmber, Deb Gauthier, Melanie Chattin, Greg Mears, Kristene Parsons, and Kevin Spanik.
Since 2007, the VIMS team has partnered for one spring and one fall survey each year with the crew of the fishing vessel Darana R, a 90-foot commercial trawler out of Hampton, Virginia. The boat is captained by Jimmy Ruhle from Wanchese, North Carolina, with help from mates Bobby Ruhle and Rigo Rodriguez. When not doing survey work, the trio mainly fishes squid and herring.
Gartland, who leads the VIMS team at sea, says "The way we conduct our surveycooperative research where scientists team up with commercial fishermenis coming more into favor. One of its big advantages is that it allows us, as scientists, to do what we're best atdata collection and analysis, and lets the fisherman do what they're best atfishing and making the gear work correctly and consistently. Putting that together makes a great partnership."
Each survey keeps the team at sea for four to five weeks depending on weather and other factors. They tow a trawl net for 20 minutes at 150 randomly selected sites per cruise, in inshore waters from Cape Hatteras north to Cape Cod. All told, they've spent 262 days at sea during the last 4 years, plus countless hours in the lab at VIMS processing samples and analyzing data.
Their datarecording factors such as length, weight, age, sex ratio, and diethave now been used to help manage commercially and recreationally important species throughout the coastal waters of the northeastern U.S. These include spot, croaker, drum, summer flounder, and weakfish in the more southerly waters, and black sea bass, scup, squid, spiny dogfish, and winter flounder toward the north. NOAA's latest estimate of the annual ex-vessel value of commercial landings from these waters is $283 million (2008 data).
"The selection of a team from VIMS to manage this interstate survey reflects the reputation our scientists have earned through decades of monitoring work in Chesapeake Bay," says VIMS Dean and Director John Wells. "Their work helps ensure sustainable fisheries not only along the Atlantic seaboard, but also in the Bay, since many of the fishes they monitor spend considerable time in local waters both as juveniles and adults."
Praise for the survey also comes from U.S. Senator Charles Schumer, who in a letter to former U.S. Commerce Secretary Gary Locke wrote "The Inshore Ocean Trawl Survey is a model of cooperative research... Along with New York, NEAMAP surveys will benefit all of the Atlantic coast states north of South Carolina."
Even though the researchers keep only five fish of each species and size group (small, medium, and large) for full analysis per towquickly identifying, weighing, measuring, and releasing the resttheir workload rapidly adds up. In 2010 alone, they caught and released 1,087,000 fishes weighing approximately 171,961 pounds, recorded the length of 143,642 of those, and spent months in the lab studying the stomach contents of 7,586 fishes and using ear bones to age 10,434 others. All told, the team has so far recorded 146 different species, including boreal, temperate, and tropical forms.
Fishery-Independent Data
An important aspect of the VIMS NEAMAP survey is that it provides "fishery-independent" data. Unlike "fisheries-dependent" datainformation from fishermen and dealers regarding catch, landings, and effortfisheries-independent data are designed to be free from vagaries introduced by changes in factors such as fuel costs, fishing gear, market price, and consumer demand. They are thus much more suitable for assessing the true population characteristics of a particular species.
"Fisheries-dependent data give managers and scientists a picture of the fishery," says Bonzek, "while fisheries-independent data, over the long term, provide information on the stock status of a species."
The NEAMAP team ensures the validity of their data by sampling in a consistent manner from cruise-to-cruise and year-to-year. Whereas commercial fishermen will readily change to a more efficient net and move to where the fish are in an attempt to optimize their target catch, NEAMAP teams always use a standardized trawl net and sample randomly within their study area.
"We select our tows using a stratified random design," says Gartland. "That means we break the survey up into different regions and use a computer to randomly select tows within each. That ensures that we have good spatial coverage and statistical validity."
The team's neta 3-bridle, 4-seam bottom trawlwas specifically designed for survey work by an advisory panel that included commercial fishermen, trawl-gear manufacturers, academic scientists, and federal researchers at the Northeast Fisheries Science Center (NEFSC).
During each tow, the scientists and crew use electronic sensors to ensure that the net's "wingspread," "door-spread," and "headrope height" remain within accepted values. "When you're working with a survey net you want consistency so that your data are comparable across tows and surveys," says Gartland. "That way, you can tell if a species is on the increase, the decrease, or holding steady."
"Consistency in the performance of the survey gear ensures consistency in the catch data," adds Latour. "The more robust and sound the data, the more effective the fisheries management program."
Filling a "Data Gap"
NEAMAP was established in 2006 to meet the needs of fisheries management and stock assessment in the marine waters of the northeastern U.S. It complements a similar program called SEAMAP (Southeast Area Monitoring and Assessment Program), which operates from Cape Hatteras south into the Gulf of Mexico and Caribbean.
Neither NEAMAP nor SEAMAP was designed to replace existing fishery programs, but rather to coordinate and standardize procedures and improve data quality and accessibility among existing programswhether state or federal.
The impetus for this NEAMAP survey, which was established by the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission in 2003, was a concern that existing surveys weren't collecting enough data from inshore waters to effectively manage certain fisheries along the lengthy stretch of seaboard between Cape Hatteras and the U.S.-Canadian border.
"When we sat down and mapped out which groups were sampling where, we realized that we had a problem in the coastal Mid-Atlantic and Southern New England regions," says Gartland. "New Jersey is the only state running a survey in their coastal waters, and the federal governmentthe NEFSCwas about to abandon their sampling of the near shore zone because their new boat had a very deep draft. These inshore waters support abundant populations and a rich diversity of fishes, and in turn valuable commercial and recreational fisheries, so ignoring these areas could make it difficult to generate reliable stock assessments and management plans for certain species. Our survey was designed to fill this sampling gap by providing high quality data to assessment scientists and managers for this critical area. So far we've been successful."
The VIMS component of NEAMAPthe Mid-Atlantic/Southern New England Near Shore Trawl Surveycurrently supplements and extends the federal survey, with responsibility for sampling all waters shallower than 60 feet between Cape Hatteras and Cape Codan area of roughly 4,500 square miles.
In addition to NEAMAP, VIMS researchers also operate ChesMMAPthe Chesapeake Bay Multispecies Monitoring and Assessment Program. Data from the ChesMMAP surveys help quantify major links in the Bay's food web, estimate population sizes for recreationally, commercially, and ecologically important species, and identify their geographic and seasonal distribution.
###
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AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.
French President Nicolas Sarkozy, left, smiles as he greets German Chancellor Angela Merkel prior to their meeting at the Elysee Palace in Paris, Monday Dec. 5, 2011. The leaders of Germany and France will try to agree Monday on a cohesive plan to help save the euro through stricter oversight of government budgets. Financial markets signaled optimism that French President Nicolas Sarkozy and German Chancellor Angela Merkel will unveil a unified plan that tightens political and economic cooperation among the 17 European Union countries that use the euro and sets the stage for more aggressive aid from the European Central Bank. (AP Photo/Remy de la Mauviniere)
French President Nicolas Sarkozy, left, smiles as he greets German Chancellor Angela Merkel prior to their meeting at the Elysee Palace in Paris, Monday Dec. 5, 2011. The leaders of Germany and France will try to agree Monday on a cohesive plan to help save the euro through stricter oversight of government budgets. Financial markets signaled optimism that French President Nicolas Sarkozy and German Chancellor Angela Merkel will unveil a unified plan that tightens political and economic cooperation among the 17 European Union countries that use the euro and sets the stage for more aggressive aid from the European Central Bank. (AP Photo/Remy de la Mauviniere)
France's President Nicolas Sarkozy awaits German Chancellor Angela Merkel to discuss Europe's financial crisis at the Elysee Palace in Paris, Monday , Dec. 5, 2011. The leaders of Germany and France will try to agree on Monday on a cohesive plan to help save the euro through stricter oversight of government budgets. (AP Photo/Michel Euler)
France's President Nicolas Sarkozy, left, welcomes German Chancellor Angela Merkel, right, to discuss Europe's financial crisis at the Elysee Palace in Paris, Monday, Dec. 5, 2011. The leaders of Germany and France will try to agree on Monday on a cohesive plan to help save the euro through stricter oversight of government budgets.(AP Photo/Michel Euler)
French President Nicolas Sarkozy greets German Chancellor Angela Merkel prior to their meeting at the Elysee Palace in Paris, Monday Dec. 5, 2011.The leaders of Germany and France will try to agree on Monday on a cohesive plan to help save the euro through stricter oversight of government budgets.(AP Photo/Remy de la Mauviniere)
French President Nicolas Sarkozy, right, smiles as he shakes hands with German Chancellor Angela Merkel prior to their meeting at the Elysee Palace in Paris, Monday Dec. 5, 2011. The leaders of Germany and France will try to agree Monday on a cohesive plan to help save the euro through stricter oversight of government budgets. Financial markets signaled optimism that French President Nicolas Sarkozy and German Chancellor Angela Merkel will unveil a unified plan that tightens political and economic cooperation among the 17 European Union countries that use the euro and sets the stage for more aggressive aid from the European Central Bank. (AP Photo/Remy de la Mauviniere)
PARIS (AP) ? Seeking to restore confidence in the euro, the leaders of France and Germany jointly called on Monday for changes to the European Union treaty so that countries using the euro would face automatic penalities if budget deficits ran too high.
But not everyone on Wall Street was reassured that Europe would get control of its 2-year-old debt crisis.
Stock prices rose and borrowing costs for European governments dropped sharply in response to the changes proposed by French President Nikolas Sarkozy and German Chancellor Angela Merkel. But some of the optimism faded late Monday when Standard and Poor's threatened to cut its credit ratings on 15 eurozone countries, including the likes of Germany, France and Austria which have been considered Europe's safest government debt issuers.
The announcement came only hours after Sarkozy and Merkel revealed sweeping plans to change the EU treaty in an effort to keep tighter checks on overspending nations. The proposal is set to form the basis of discussions at a summit of EU leaders on Thursday and Friday that is expected to provide a blueprint for an exit from the crisis.
While the Franco-German plan would tie the 17-eurozone nations closer together, a tighter union would likely also result in heavier financial burdens for the region's stronger economies, which have already put up billions of euros to rescue Greece, Ireland and Portugal.
Analysts noted that the proposals did not foresee a clear roadmap on how to get the eurozone economies growing again and to reduce funding costs for struggling nations in the longterm.
"If this is all we get it's really very bad news for the future of the euro," said Simon Tilford, chief economist at London's Centre for European Reform.
Many analysts have called on the European Central Bank to intervene in debt markets to lower struggling countries' borrowing costs or the creation of eurobonds ? debt backed by all 17 euro countries.
"The onus is still on the ECB to print money to make huge loans or bond purchases and draw a line under the crisis," said Jennifer McKeown, senior European economist at Capital Economics.
The euro fell after the S&P announcement, trading down 0.1 percent at $1.339, and trading in futures on the S&P 500 and Dow Jones Industrial Average turned negative.
After the New York markets closed, S&P confirmed that it had placed 15 nations on notice for possible downgrades. Only two countries that use the euro weren't affected: Cyprus already had that designation and Greece already has ratings low enough to suggest that it's likely to default soon anyway.
France and Germany, the eurozone's two largest economies which currently both have a AAA-rating, quickly came out against the S&P move.
"Germany and France reaffirm that the proposals they made jointly today will reinforce the governance of the euro area in order to foster stability, competitiveness and growth," they said in a joint statement. "France and Germany, in full solidarity, confirm their determination to take all the necessary measures, in liaison with their partners and the European institutions to ensure the stability of the euro area."
Stocks had risen after the leaders of France and Germany called for a new treaty to impose greater fiscal discipline on European countries. Yields on Italian government bonds receded sharply after the new premier Mario Monti introduced sweeping austerity measures over the weekend. That suggests traders believe Italy is less likely to default.
Investors are hoping that the summit of European leaders on Thursday and Friday will produce concrete measures to prevent a messy breakup of the euro currency, which is shared by 17 nations. Markets have been jittery because of fears that the euro might disintegrate, causing a sharp recession in Europe that would spread through the world economy.
"Our wish is to go on a forced march toward re-establishing confidence in the eurozone," Sarkozy said at a news conference in Paris on Monday, with Merkel at his side. "We are conscious of the gravity of the situation and of the responsibility that rests on our shoulders."
EU treaty changes could take months, if not years, to implement and don't wipe away the mountains of government debt dragging down Europe's economy. But preliminary buy-in Friday from the 17 countries that use the euro could set the stage for further emergency aid from the European Central Bank, the International Monetary Fund or some combination.
"The onus is still on the ECB to print money to make huge loans or bond purchases and draw a line under the crisis," said Jennifer McKeown, senior European economist at Capital Economics. "Perhaps if other member states sign up to Merkel's and Sarkozy's proposals this week the (ECB) will step in."
Sarkozy pledged to have a revised EU treaty ready for signing by March. It would then need to be ratified in each country, which could mean lengthy parliamentary debates or national referendums in some cases.
"A lot depends on the specifics and how these are going to be framed by lawyers," said Piotr Maciej Kaczynski, an expert on EU constitutional issues at the Center for European Policy Studies in Brussels.
At the very least, it could take at least 18 months to ratify a new treaty once it has been signed by all heads of state, said Kaczynski. "That is a much longer timeline than what markets might want," he said.
Bond-market analysts said they remain skeptical of Europe's ability to prevent future profligacy. "If you say it strong enough and often enough maybe people will believe it," said Guy LeBas, chief fixed income strategist at Janney Montgomery Scott. "But I don't think the markets believe 'Merkozy' at this point."
EU governments reacted with caution.
No other EU leaders came out against the Franco-German proposals, but no strong statements in favor were immediately forthcoming. The reaction from Austrain Finance Minister Harald Waiglein was fairly typical: "There is nothing here that contradicts our position," although more details are needed, he said.
The modern EU is based on a set of treaties, dating as far back as the 1950s, when the project of consolidating the continent began. The treaties detail the rules that countries must follow and outline the mandates of institutions like the ECB. The most recent was the Lisbon Treaty, which was ratified in 2009, giving additional powers to the European Commission and European Parliament.
Sarkozy said he and Merkel would prefer that the treaty changes they're proposing be agreed to by all 27 members of the EU. But he left the door open to an agreement only among the 17 euro countries and anyone else "who wants to join us."
Sarkozy and Merkel discussed several broad changes for the EU treaty, but failed to provide much detail. The changes they outlined included:
? Introducing an automatic penalty for any government that allows its deficit to exceed 3 percent of GDP. A majority of nations would need to oppose automatic sanctions for a country to avoid them.
Governments are supposed to abide by the deficit limit under existing rules, but many, including France, have flouted it. Further, punishment only occurs after a majority of euro countries votes to impose them.
? Requiring countries to enshrine in law a promise to balance their budgets.
A key issue for the proposal's final approval will be how much flexibility countries can have to run temporary deficits during economic downturns.
? Pledging that any future bailouts would not require private bond investors to absorb a part of the costs, as was the case for the Greek bailout.
Germany had earlier insisted that Europe's permanent bailout fund would demand private investors take losses if a country in the future needs rescuing.
? Promising to not criticize or otherwise comment on the work of the ECB.
This is intended to ensure the bank's independence and its ability to act without pressure from European leaders.
Sarkozy said more details would be included in a letter sent Wednesday to European Council President Herman Van Rompuy.
After Sarkozy and Merkel spoke, stocks rose and borrowing rates for governments across Europe plunged, indicating a sharp rise in investor confidence in the continent's ability to resolve the crisis.
France's CAC-40 index climbed 1.2 percent, Germany's DAX rose 0.4 percent and markets outside of Europe also pushed higher, with the Dow Jones industrial average up 1.2 percent.
French banks, which have been hit hard this year over fears about their large exposure to the government bonds of financially weak countries like Greece, saw some of the biggest gains.
Societe Generale's stock price climbed 6.2 percent while BNP Paribas rose 4.9 percent. In Italy, shares of Unicredit rose 5.4 percent while Spain's Santander rose 3.6 percent.
Worries about the stability of the euro reached a fever pitch in recent weeks as the yields on Italy's bonds ? in a nutshell, its borrowing costs ? jumped above 7 percent. That is the level that eventually forced Greece, Ireland and Portugal to require bailouts. By comparison, bond yields in Germany, Europe's largest and most stable economy, are roughly 2 percent.
Italian and Spanish bond yields fell sharply on Monday, an indication of growing investor confidence in their financial future. The yield on Italy's benchmark 10-year bond fell from 6.65 percent to 5.93 percent.
Italy, whose government debt is equivalent to 120 percent of the country's annual economic output, needs to refinance $270 billion of its $2.6 trillion of outstanding debt by the end of April.
The size of the problems facing Italy and Spain are considered too large for the existing funds available to the European Financial Stability Facility ($590 billion) and the IMF ($389 billion.) To boost the firepower of the IMF, several economists have proposed that the ECB lend to it.
The big threat to the global financial system is that Europe's debt crisis could spiral out of control.
If governments default on their bonds, banks that own them could take a significant hit. It could become very difficult for these banks to borrow and nervous depositors could flee with their cash. In the worst case, a global financial panic could be triggered, in which banks all over are too skittish to lend to each other. That would cause a credit crunch that deprives businesses of the short-term financing they depend on for day-to-day operations.
With such fears in the air, the United States is ratcheting up its involvement.
U.S. Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner Geithner will meet Tuesday in Germany with ECB President Mario Draghi and German Finance Minister Wolfgang Schauble. On Wednesday, he travels to France for talks with Sarkozy and the prime minister-elect of Spain, Mariano Rajoy Brey.
___
Pan Pylas in London, Sarah DiLorenzo in Paris and Raf Casert in Brussels also contributed to this report.
QB connects with WR Holmes late in the 4th quarter as NY stays alive in the playoff hunt
Evan Vucci / AP
Jets quarterback Mark Sanchez and receiver Santonio Holmes celebrate a touchdown in the second half.
updated 4:41 p.m. ET Dec. 4, 2011
LANDOVER, Md. - With the New York Jets trying to close out another too-close-for-comfort fourth-quarter comeback, coach Rex Ryan walked up to the player known as "Mayhem."
"Fourth-quarter sacks win games," Ryan said.
Linebacker Aaron Maybin then took his spot on the field and did one better. He not only sacked Rex Grossman, but also dislodged the ball from the Washington Redskins quarterback. The Jets recovered, setting up the first of two insurance touchdown runs by Shonn Greene that closed out Sunday's 34-19 win.
"Fourth-quarter fumbles," Ryan said, "are even better. ... I think we need to get some jerseys out there with 'Mayhem' on their back."
The Jets needed big plays in the waning minutes because, for the second straight game, their first three quarters were so-so. Yet, when the game was on the line, Mark Sanchez was able to lead his 10th career fourth-quarter or overtime comeback victory ? and his second in two weeks ? highlighted by his 30-yard pass to Santonio Holmes for the go-ahead touchdown with 4:49 to play.
The victory kept New York (7-5) in the realistic hunt for an AFC playoff berth. The Jets scraped by the Buffalo Bills in similar fashion last Sunday, the first step in the team's stated mission to win out and make the postseason for a third straight year.
"It tells us we have to get better," Ryan said. "Sometimes, you don't like it to come down to that."
The Jets had only 168 total yards after three quarters, committed untimely penalties and had another special teams turnover against the Redskins (4-8), who have lost seven of eight and are expected to lose two starters ? tight end Fred Davis and left tackle Trent Williams ? for the remainder of the season for violating the NFL's substance abuse policy.
Sanchez completed 19 of 32 passes for only 165 yards, but avoided throwing an interception after having at least one in five straight games. He also didn't get sacked for the second straight week.
Greene ran for three touchdowns and finished with 88 yards on 22 carries. He again carried the load despite the return of LaDainian Tomlinson, who had missed the two previous games with an ailing left knee. Tomlinson appeared to reinjure the knee in the first quarter but later came back into the game.
"It was rough the first half," Greene said. "But we just kept together and kept plugging away."
Grossman completed 19 of 46 passes for 221 yards and one interception, and the sack-and-fumble by Maybin deep in Washington territory with the score 20-16 thwarted the Redskins' chance for a fourth-quarter comeback. Calvin Pace recovered, and Greene took a direct snap and scored on a 9-yard run two plays later to give the Jets an 11-point lead.
"That was just one of those situations where we knew as a defense it was crunch time," said Maybin, who has six sacks on the season and wore a black T-shirt that read, "Duh, winning" in the locker room. "We've been in those situations."
Graham Gano's fourth field goal, a 43-yarder with 1:59 to play, pulled the Redskins within eight. Washington then failed to recover an onside kick, and Greene scooted in from 25 yards with 1:47 remaining.
The Jets trailed 16-13 after Gano's 46-yard field goal with 7:52 to go, but a mis-hit kickoff was returned by Josh Baker near midfield. Sanchez and the New York offense then came back to life, with the quarterback scrambling to avoid pressure before completing a 10-yard pass to Greene on a third-and-4 two plays before the big throw to Holmes down the left sideline.
A tough Redskins season took another blow with the news about Davis and Williams. A person with knowledge of the situation, speaking on condition of anonymity because no official announcement has been made, told The Associated Press that the players are expected to be suspended by the NFL for four games.
Davis had one of his best games of the season, catching six passes for 99 yards.
The Redskins didn't comment on the suspensions, so most of the public thoughts expressed after the game concerned an offense that produced a touchdown on the game's opening drive ? then didn't find the end zone again. The score came on a 2-yard run by rookie Roy Helu, who rushed for 100 yards for the second straight week.
"The first half was all right," said Grossman, who needed a shot for his sore left shoulder before the game. "The second half, it was always something. ... It's just frustrating. I don't really have an answer for you."
The Jets responded with a real clock-eater: 17 plays, 74 yards over 9:06, including three wildcat plays and a fourth-and-1 conversion.
After the teams traded field goals, rookie Jeremy Kerley muffed a punt deep in New York territory and the Redskins recovered ? the NFL-high sixth special teams turnover committed by the Jets this season. It set up another field goal by Gano to give Washington a 13-10 lead at the half.
But it was another late surge that left Ryan confident that the Jets are playoff-bound.
"We know where we think we're going," he said. "More confident than 100 percent."
? 2011 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
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Public release date: 5-Dec-2011
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