Acupuncture is a form of alternative medicine and a key component of traditional Chinese medicine in which thin needles are inserted into the body. Acupuncture is a pseudoscience because the theories and practices of TCM are not based on scientific knowledge, it has been characterized as quackery. There is a range of acupuncture variants which originated in different philosophies, techniques vary depending on the country in which it is performed, it is most used to attempt pain relief, though acupuncturists say that it can be used for a wide range of other conditions. Acupuncture is used only in combination with other forms of treatment; the conclusions of numerous trials and systematic reviews of acupuncture are inconsistent, which suggests that it is not effective. An overview of Cochrane reviews found that acupuncture is not effective for a wide range of conditions. A systematic review conducted by medical scientists at the Universities of Exeter and Plymouth found little evidence of acupuncture's effectiveness in treating pain.

Overall, the evidence suggests that short-term treatment with acupuncture does not produce long-term benefits. Some research results suggest that acupuncture can alleviate some forms of pain, though the majority of research suggests that acupuncture's apparent effects are not caused by the treatment itself. A systematic review concluded that the analgesic effect of acupuncture seemed to lack clinical relevance and could not be distinguished from bias. One meta-analysis found that acupuncture for chronic low back pain was cost-effective as an adjunct to standard care, while a separate systematic review found insufficient evidence for the cost-effectiveness of acupuncture in the treatment of chronic low back pain. Acupuncture is safe when done by appropriately trained practitioners using clean needle technique and single-use needles; when properly delivered, it has a low rate of minor adverse effects. Accidents and infections do occur and are associated with neglect on the part of the practitioner in the application of sterile techniques.

A review conducted in 2013 stated that reports of infection transmission increased in the preceding decade. The most reported adverse events were pneumothorax and infections. Since serious adverse events continue to be reported, it is recommended that acupuncturists be trained sufficiently to reduce the risk. Scientific investigation has not found any histological or physiological evidence for traditional Chinese concepts such as qi, acupuncture points, many modern practitioners no longer support the existence of life force energy or meridians, a major part of early belief systems. Acupuncture is believed to have originated around 100 BC in China, around the time The Yellow Emperor's Classic of Internal Medicine was published, though some experts suggest it could have been practiced earlier. Over time, conflicting claims and belief systems emerged about the effect of lunar and earthly cycles and yang energies, a body's "rhythm" on the effectiveness of treatment. Acupuncture fluctuated in popularity in China due to changes in the country's political leadership and the preferential use of rationalism or Western medicine.

Acupuncture spread first to Korea in the 6th century AD to Japan through medical missionaries, to Europe, beginning with France. In the 20th century, as it spread to the United States and Western countries, spiritual elements of acupuncture that conflicted with Western beliefs were sometimes abandoned in favor of tapping needles into acupuncture points. Acupuncture is a form of alternative medicine, it is used most for pain relief, though it is used to treat a wide range of conditions. Acupuncture is only used in combination with other forms of treatment. For example, the American Society of Anesthesiologists states it may be considered in the treatment for nonspecific, noninflammatory low back pain only in conjunction with conventional therapy. Acupuncture is the insertion of thin needles into the skin. According to the Mayo Foundation for Medical Education and Research, a typical session entails lying still while five to twenty needles are inserted, it can be associated with the application of pressure, or laser light.

Classically, acupuncture is individualized and based on philosophy and intuition, not on scientific research. There is a non-invasive therapy developed in early 20th century Japan using an elaborate set of instruments other than needles for the treatment of children. Clinical practice varies depending on the country. A comparison of the average number of patients treated per hour found significant differences between China and the United States. Chinese herbs are used. There is a diverse range of acupuncture approaches. Although various different techniques of acupuncture practice have emerged, the method used in traditional Chinese medicine seems to be the most adopted in the US. Traditional acupuncture involves needle insertion and cupping therapy, may be accompanied by other procedures such as feeling the pulse and other parts of the body and examining the tongue. Traditional acupuncture involves the belief that a "life force" circulates within the body in lines called meridians; the main methods practiced in the UK are Western medical acupuncture.

The term Western medical acupuncture is used to indicate an adaptation of TCM-based acupuncture which focuses less on TCM. The Western medical acupuncture approach involves using acupun

The 24. Edizione Mille Miglia was an auto race held on a course totalling 992.332 miles, made up of public roads around Italy on the outer parts of the country on 11–12 May 1957. The route was based with start/finish, in Brescia, it was the 3rd round of the 1957 World Sportscar Championship season. As in previous years, the event this not a race against each other, this is race against the clock, as the cars are released at one-minute intervals with the larger professional class cars going before the slower cars, in the Mille Miglia, however the smaller displacement slower cars started first; each car number related to their allocated start time. For example, Wolfgang von Trips’s car had the number 532, he left Brescia at 5:32am, while the first cars had started late in the evening on the previous day; some drivers went with navigators, others didn't. This race was won by Scuderia Ferrari driver Piero Taruffi without the aid of a navigator, he completed the 992-mile distance in 10 hours, 27 minutes and 47 seconds- an average speed of 94.841 mph.

The Italian finished 3 minutes in front of his second-placed team-mate, the German driver, von Trips. Olivier Gendebien and Jacques Washer were next ensuring Scuderia Ferrari finished 1-2-3. A total of 391 cars were entered for the event, across 25 classes based on engine sizes, ranging from up to 750cc to over 2.0-litre, for Grand Touring Cars, Touring Cars and Sport Cars. Of these, 310 cars started the event; the limit on the number of starts was reduced from previous years. The Auto Club of Brescia took steps to try to combat the unsportsmanlike tactics by which some competitors sough to negate the procedure of drawing lots for departure times. Though the event continued to count towards the World Sportscar Championship, only Ferrari and Maserati entered work teams. Officine Alfieri Maserati was in administration though still managed to have two 450Ss for Stirling Moss and Jean Behra, a brand new 350S for Hans Herrmann and older 300S for the Italian Giorgio Scarlatti. Meanwhile, Scuderia Ferrari entered four Sports cars, to be driven by Taruffi, von Trips, Peter Collins and Alfonso de Portago.

They entered Gendebien in a Grand Touring car. Britain was represented by a single semi-works Jaguar D-Type, entered by the Scottish team Ecurie Ecosse for Ron Flockhart. One of the more unusual entrants was a Caballo de Hiero for Akton Miller, a car constructed in the USA, with a powerful 6.4 litre Chrysler engine, mounted on a rudimentary single seat chassis, designed for use on oval circuits. Soon after the race started, Maserati’s hopes vanished. Before the event started, Behra was out, having crashed his 450S during pre-test; as for Moss, he was forced to retire soon after the start having rather dangerously snapped a brake pedal and Herrmann did not get as far as the Ravenna checkpoint. In Guidizzolo, less than 40 miles from Brescia, de Portago’s front tyre exploded, he lost control of the car. The Ferrari bounced back on the road, hitting more spectators, slid over the road and ended up, wheels down, in a brook at the other side of the road. Besides de Portago, his American navigator Edmont Nelson, ten spectators – among them five children – lost their lives.

A further 20 were injured. De Portago’s body was found near the car, severed in half. Furthermore, Dutchman Joseph Göttgens crashed his Triumph TR3 near Florence and would die of his injuries in a Florence hospital; when Taruffi arrived back in Brescia, he had more than a three-minute advantage over von Trips. With Gendebien in third, competing a sorrowful top three clean sweep for Ferrari. Maserati experienced a debacle with only Scarlatti making back to Brescia in fourth place overall, followed 15 minutes by the Porsche 550 RS of Umberto Maglioli. Taruffi reached Brescia after racing for 10 hours and 27 minutes after he left Brescia at 05:35. Three days after the race, the Italian government had enough and decreed the end of the Mille Miglia and banned all motor racing on the public roads of Italy. Taruffi thus became the last winner of this infamous event. Of the 310 starters, 172 were classified as finishers. Therefore, only a selection of notable racers has been listed below. Class Winners are in Bold text.

Note: Only the top five positions are included in this set of standings. Championship points were awarded for the first six places in each race in the order of 8-6-4-3-2-1. Manufacturers were only awarded points for their highest finishing car with no points awarded for positions filled by additional cars. Only the best 4 results out of the 6 races could be retained by each manufacturer. Points earned but not counted towards the championship totals are listed within brackets in the above table. Anthony Pritchard; the Mille Miglia: The World’s Greatest Road Race. J H Haynes & Co Ltd. ISBN 978-1844251391 Leonardo Acerbi. Mille Miglia Story 1927-1957. Giorgio Nada Editore. ISBN 978-8879115490 Mille Miglia 1957: L’Ultimo Atto Di Una Corsa Leggendaria. Giorgio Nada Editore. ISBN 978-8879115322

Harry Leonard Shorto was a British philologist and linguist who specialized on the Mon language and Mon-Khmer studies. He authored both a dictionary of Mon epigraphy, he worked for most of his career at the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London as Professor of Mon-Khmer Studies at the University of London until his retirement in 1984. Shorto is the author of two standard reference works, A Dictionary of Modern Spoken Mon and the respected author of the standard reference to epigraphic Mon - A Dictionary of the Mon Inscriptions - as well as the classic dictionary, his magnum opus was the Mon-Khmer comparative dictionary, meant to be published in the early 1980s. It was rediscovered by his daughter Anna, was published only in 2006, it presents 2,246 etymologies with 30,000 lexical citations. It is the most extensive analysis of Mon-Khmer to appear since Wilhelm Schmidt laid the foundations of comparative Mon-Khmer with the Grundzüge einer Lautlehre der Mon-Khmer-Sprachen and Die Mon-Khmer-Völker.

1960. Word and syllable patterns in Palaung. Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies 23:544-57. 1961. “A Mon Genealogy of Kings: Observations on the Nidana Arambhakatha,” In In D. G. E. Hall. Historians of South-East Asia, London: Oxford University Press, pp. 62–72. 1962. A Dictionary of Modern Spoken Mon. Shorto, H. L.. The 32 myos in the medieval Mon kingdom. Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies, 26, 572-591. 1963. The Structural pattern of northern Mon-Khmer languages. In H. L. Shorto, Linguistic Comparison in South-East Asia and the Pacific, pp. 45–61. 1963. Shorto, Harry L.. Bibliographies of Mon-Khmer and Tai linguistics. London. 1971. A Dictionary of the Mon Inscriptions from the sixth to the sixteenth centuries. London: Oxford University Press. 1972. “The word for ‘two’ in Austroasiatic.” Jacqueline M. C. Thomas & Lucien Bernot. Langues et techniques, nature et société, Vol. 1, “Approche linguistique”. Paris: Klincksieck. 233-35 Shorto, H. L.. Three Mon-Khmer word families.

Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies, 36, 374-381. Shorto, H. L.. The vocalism of proto-Mon-Khmer. Oceanic Linguistics Special Publication, 1041-1067. Shorto, H. L.. The Planets, the Days of the Week, the Points of the Compass: Orientation Symbolism in Burma. Natural Symbols in South East Asia, 152-164. 2006. A Mon-Khmer comparative dictionary. Edited by Paul J. Sidwell, Doug Cooper, Christian Bauer. Canberra: Australian National University. Shorto, H. L. No Date. Nidana Ramadhipati-katha. Unpublished typescript translation of pp. 34–44, 61-264 of Phra Candakanto. On binding Rajawamsa Dhammaceti Mahapitakadhara. Pak Lat, Siam. Shorto, Harry L.. 2006. A Mon-Khmer Comparative Dictionary. Canberra: Australian National University. Pacific Linguistics. ISBN 0-85883-570-3. Harry Shorto papers

Isabella Haleʻala Kaʻili Desha was a regarded Hawaiian composer and kumu hula during the Kingdom of Hawaii and throughout her life. She is descended from notable chiefly lines, she was one of five children. Her father was Alika Mela. She, along with her mother, Kapuailohiawahine Kanuha Miller, herself a notable kumu hula and dancer of her time, would teach the dance in a secret Hawaiian hālau. Isabella's sibling's included John Mahiʻai Miller/Kāneakua. Isabella married George Langhern Desha, the Postmaster for Hilo and had four children, including William Francis Desha and Helen Desha Beamer. Writing in his book, "Learn to Play Hawaiian Slack Key Guitar", Keola Beamer states that Helen Beamer and her mother Isabella would dance the hula, Kūwili as a spontaneous celebration during family gatherings, she is the matriarch of the Beamer musical dynasty, considered the most notable musical family in the history of the Hawaiian islands. The family includes award winning musicians, composers and activists that have perpetuated Hawaiian culture and history for over 100 years.

She was forced to teach the hula in secret due to the puritanical beliefs of the Calvinist missionaries. During the reign of King David Kalakaua, the banned native dance known as hula was given a mandate from the monarch to be brought back to both the Royal Court and in public display. Many of the hula master of the time came forward from different parts of the islands representing different parts of the old aliʻi kingdoms. Through this restoration of the dance, was preserved the identification of the original four aliʻi kingdoms through chant

Ari Pekka Mannio is a Finnish javelin thrower. Mannio first represented Finland internationally at the 2003 European Youth Olympic Festival in Paris, where he won the bronze medal; the next year, he competed in the 2004 World Junior Championships in Grosseto, placing 6th against boys up to two years older and setting a new personal best of 70.63 metres with the men's 800 gram javelin. In 2005, Mannio's first full year with the men's implement, he claimed a bronze at the European Junior Championships in Kaunas, Lithuania.2006 saw Mannio's first successes against adult throwers, as he claimed a bronze medal at the 2006 Finnish Championships. However though he entered the World Junior Championships in Beijing, China, as the world junior leader, he was convincingly beaten in the final by South Africa's Robert Oosthuizen; the next year, he again failed to claim international gold despite having the best mark coming in. However, he was still only the sixth best thrower in Finland that year and nowhere near making the three-man team for the Beijing Olympics.

Mannio opened 2009 with a massive personal best of 85.70, an improvement of more than four metres on his previous best. This mark was only beaten that year by five throwers worldwide and would remain his season best though he exceeded his 2008 best in all of his next four competitions and either exceeded or equalled it in a total of ten competitions over the year, he finally struck international gold: again entering the European U23 Championships as the leading favorite, he was passed in the last round by Czech Republic's Petr Frydrych but rebounded with a championship record of 84.57. So, he missed making Finland's four-man team for the 2009 World Championships. Tero Pitkämäki was named as the defending World Champion and Tero Järvenpää based on his stellar 2008 season, while Teemu Wirkkala, who like the other two had represented Finland at the Olympics the year before, qualified in the first trial meet at Pihtipudas; this left the fourth spot between Antti Ruuskanen. Ruuskanen beat Mannio in many of the remaining meets, crucially including the Finnish Championships, got the last spot while Mannio was named a reserve.

He qualified for the 2012 and 2016 Olympic games, reaching the final in 2012. 2003 - 60.58 2004 - 70.63 2005 - 76.40 2006 - 79.68 2007 - 80.31 2008 - 81.54 2009 - 85.70 2010 - 85.12 2011 - 85.12 2012 - 84.62 2013 - 84.65 2014 - 83.70 2015 - 86.82 2016 - 81.38 Ari Mannio at World Athletics

The Guardian, is a public artwork by artist Ante Buljan, located at the front of the Redwood City Police Station, in Redwood City, CA, United States. The Guardian is a 12-foot bronze and granite sculpture, commissioned by Redwood City for the entrance to its police department complex. Commissioned by the Redwood City Civic Cultural Commission in 1995 as part of new development for the Redwood City Police Station Located at the entrance to the Police Station at 1301 Maple Street, Redwood City, CA 94063-2766 Ante Buljan was born in Croatia but moved to California at the age of 9, he is a graduate of UCLA, studied at John F. Kennedy University in Orinda. For several years he maintained a working studio in the 1870 Art Center in Belmont