Features

After years of using and abusing the car-computers analogy that has been fashion since the 1980s I found a much better one: medicine-IT. With time and the incredible development of IT, it has become more relevant to compare these two sciences than to put a car and computer in the same comparison.

It starts with diversification and specialisation. We used to speak of computers, in a rather simplistic manner. Today with the cloud, smartphones, wireless technology everywhere, virtual servers, networks security, the IoT (the Internet of Things), social networking and countless other IT-related fields, the technology has become as diversified and specialised as medicine. This is true, notwithstanding any eventual objections from physicians who may consider their trade to be “above” IT.

We now refer to programmers, network specialists, IT administrators, web developers and other IT professions, the same way we think of ophthalmologists, dermatologists, ENT specialists, paediatricians, etc. Everything has become much specialised and the trend continues unabated.

Specialisation in high-tech is evolving at such speed that new fields are emerging faster than colleges and universities are able to catch up with the market demands to create corresponding curricula. This is leading giant companies like Microsoft and Cisco (networking) to have their own curriculum and to deliver their own certifications that often are more sought-after in the real world IT market than traditional college degrees. Naturally, Microsoft and Cisco certifications are focused on their own products, but this doesn’t reduce their importance an iota. Enterprises now look to hire specialists with direct industry certifications.

On the lighter side, IT technicians, in particular those who provide technical support for servers and networks are often called to the rescue with the same sense of emergency as doctors are. A colleague in the IT business in Amman recently told me a story that says it all.

One of his clients had called asking for a computer engineer to be dispatched to him to fix a network failure that was preventing their staff from accessing the shared data on the server. Though the engineer was immediately sent the client called a second time, a mere 10 minutes after the first, asking where on earth the engineer was, and why he hasn’t arrived yet. My colleague told him to be patient, adding that even an ambulance sometimes cannot make it in less than 10 minutes, given the morning traffic in the city. The client’s reply was most eloquent: “Do you think that transporting a patient in an ambulance is more vital than fixing our network?”

Alas, if clients ask for an IT technical support engineer as anxiously as if they were calling a doctor, overall and typically the first is still less rewarded financially than the second. Perhaps it is just a matter of time till things change and become more balanced. After all medicine goes back to circa 3000BC as most agree, or to the days of Hippocrates circa 400BC like some purists prefer to think of it. IT on the other hand is a mere 60-year-old, counting from when the science started using modern electronics.

Besides, the two worlds have been dramatically converging since the 1900s. From MRI (magnetic resonance imaging) to telemedicine and robotic surgery that is possible only thanks to high-tech and the Internet, the separation line is often blurred by the sophistication of the medical equipment that is heavily dependent on IT and all its various specialities. Hewlett-Packard, among others, has become a recognised global leader in both fields; the success story of the company is sign of how well they merge and blend.

Let us not forget the vocabulary that the two worlds share. It starts with the term virus and its derivatives: to disinfect, to place in quarantine, and it goes on with expressions such as “memory loss” when you lose data accidentally and “it alleviates the pain” when you find a solution to an IT problem after having “diagnosed” it. And when you say “scan” today you have to specify if you are scanning a printed document in your office or a patient’s brain in a hospital.

Perhaps IT technicians will soon start wearing the famous white coat when going to work on a computer problem.

Scientists are sending four strains of fungi to the International Space Station (ISS) to see what happens when the tiny organisms contend with the stress of microgravity and space radiation.

It’s not just for kicks. Researchers say that putting these fungi in an extraterrestrial environment could cause them to produce new medicines for use on Earth and perhaps even on long-term space missions.

The work is one of the first to look at the intersection of pharmaceutical science and space exploration, said principal investigator Clay Wang, a professor of pharmacology at the University of Southern California (USC).

Most of us think of fungus as something we don’t want around — not on our feet, not on our food and not on our plants. But some members of the vast fungi kingdom have been hugely beneficial to humans.

Decades ago, scientists discovered that certain species of fungi create molecules called secondary metabolites to help combat stressful situations. By harvesting these molecules, researchers have been able to make new and important drugs that have changed the trajectory of medicine.

The most famous of these is penicillin, an antibiotic produced by members of the Penicillium genus when they are exposed to bacteria. Penicillin’s bacteria-fighting properties were discovered by the Scottish pharmacologist Alexander Fleming in 1928, and the drug is now used throughout the world to fight infectious diseases.

Other fungi-produced medicines include the cholesterol-lowering drug lovastatin and the anti-fungal griseofluvin. Researchers are also looking into whether other secondary metabolites might also be used to fight cancer, osteoporosis and Alzheimer’s disease.

Wang has used genome sequencing to show that Aspergillus nidulans, one of the most studied fungi, has 40 different drugmaking pathways. However, most of them are never “turned on”.

“In nature, fungi only make what they need to respond to their environment,” Wang said. “These pathways are like a set of tools or weapons in their arsenal, and most of the time they are not in use.”

At his lab at USC, Wang and his students grow fungi in 60 different “stressful” environments, in an effort to coax the organisms to create new medicines that have never been seen before. But the only way to expose fungi to the stressors of a space environment is to send them off the planet.

To do that, Wang partnered with Kasthuri Venkateswaran, a microbiologist at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in La Canada Flintridge, California, who studies microbes in space. Venkateswaran said NASA has previously sent bacteria and yeast to the ISS, but this is the first time the space agency would be deliberately growing fungi inside the space laboratory.

On April 8, four different strains of the fungi Aspergillius nidulans will launch aboard a Falcon 9 rocket from the Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida. They are scheduled to return to Earth on May 10.

The actual experiment will last just three to seven days. One of the benefits of working with this particular fungi is that its growth can be controlled by temperature. For most of its time in space, the fungi will be stored at 4°C. When the experiment begins, the fungi will be placed in an ideal growth condition of 37°C.

At the same time, the same four strains of the fungi will be grown on Earth to serve as a control.

The research team, which includes USC School of Pharmacy doctoral students Jillian Romsdahl and Adriana Blachowicz, hope to get the fungi that journeyed to space back to the lab for testing by the middle of May.

One of the team’s hypotheses is that the extraterrestrial fungi will produce molecules to protect them from space radiation that they do not need to produce when they are living on Earth.

“We know if there is high radiation, they will adapt, but we are not sure what that adaptation will be,” Wang said.

When the space fungi samples return, the researchers will analyse what secondary metabolites they produced, as well as what genetic regulators or “switches” the fungi used to activate the genes that produce those metabolites. Once the scientists know that, they can genetically manipulate the organism into producing those same metabolites back home.

“The lessons we will learn in space will be brought to Earth,” Wang said.

Although it is still unclear exactly what those lessons will be, the researchers are confident they will learn something.

“Even if it doesn’t make something new, I know it will make more or less of something in space, and that will allow us to figure out how to amplify a drug or make less of something we don’t want,” he said. “This is one of those great experiments with no bad answer.”

Head oil massage is a specialty of my home country India. In fact, I would go as far as to call it a super specialty because no other nation dabbles in it. Not with as much enthusiasm and participation anyway. Every Indian, between the ages of zero and hundred, has had a head massage done at some point or another in their lives. For some it is a daily routine while for many others it is a weekend indulgence but nothing relaxes my fellow country people more than a vigorous hot oil head massage. 

The benefits of this are manifold and they are instilled in our upbringing from a very early age by our grandmothers or nannies. They are the ones who introduce the infants to this procedure in the first place. A small bowl of lukewarm almond, coconut or mustard oil is kept handy which is regularly applied to the scalp of a newborn with gentle strokes. Along with soothing the baby, it is supposed to give it sound sleep as well. The soft fluff on the head also miraculously becomes a thick mop of hair in the process. Nobody questions the veracity of this diktat because most of us are inured into believing it. 

In fact there is a Bollywood film that was released in the late 1950s that has an entire song dedicated to head massage. Believe me, it’s true. The movie is called “Pyasa” which means “The thirsty one” and has a serious storyline about a struggling poet who becomes famous posthumously when everyone thinks that he has died but actually it is a case of mistaken identity and someone else is dead. In the midst of all this melodrama, our film industry’s favourite comedienne Johnny Walker starts singing, extolling the virtues of a head massage. For sheer comic relief, they have yet to create a song to beat this all time classic.

When I was growing up, my granny would catch hold of me every other day and subject me to a brisk head rub. I hated the greasy oil that she poured all over my pate but she was adamant and for a fragile lady, she had surprisingly strong hands. The shampoos we had back then were not mild like the ones we have now and when she gave me a bath afterwards it would get into my eyes and make them sting. My hair would be shining and lustrous but my vision would be blurred for the rest of the evening. The result was that I must be probably the only Indian who did not like her head to be massaged and given a choice I would happily run in the opposite direction. 

I stayed away from it all for as long as I could. And then I moved to Jordan. For some reason Jordanians think that Indians have lustrous hair because of regular head massages. Every time I meet someone in Amman, after a few minutes, the conversation veers towards this topic.

“Your hair is lovely habibti,” a young woman greets me in the gym. 

“Thank you, shukran,” I reply. 

“You massage it?” she asks. 

“No, but I dye it,” I answer truthfully. 

“Oil massage before dying?” she persists. 

“No,” I shake my head. 

“Aha! After dying then?” she probes. 

“Actually no,” I admit. 

“You don’t want to tell me?” she snaps. 

“No, I mean yes,” I falter. 

“So then?” she prompts. 

“Before, I mean after,” I improvise instantly.

Watching videos of kids eating vegetables may encourage small children to follow suit, a new study suggests.

Preschoolers who watched a short video of kids eating bell peppers later ate more of the vegetables themselves, the researchers reported in the Journal of Nutrition Education and Behaviour. 

They also presented their findings this month at the annual meeting of the Society of Behavioural Medicine in Washington, DC.

The difference in consumption was not immediate, however. Instead, a week after seeing the video, the children ate about 16 grammes of bell pepper. Kids who hadn’t seen the video only ate about 6 grammes. 

“The DVD segment we assembled was 7.5 minutes in length, and after just one exposure the preschoolers increased vegetable consumption one week later. So a brief DVD exposure... between children’s TV programming, or during a transition time at daycare before snack or meal time, [may] influence children to make healthier food choices,” Amanda Staiano, at Biomedical Research Centre in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, who led the study, told Reuters Health by e-mail.

Staiano’s team randomly assigned 42 youngsters, ages three to five, to watch either the video of other children eating bell pepper, or a video on brushing teeth or no video at all. 

The next day, those who watched the veggie video actually ate less bell pepper than the others. But one week later, after accounting for the amount of bell pepper that each child ate on day one, the veggie video group’s consumption was higher and the difference was statistically significant, the researchers found. 

“This indicates that the children retained the positive experience of watching peers eating the vegetable and were able to reproduce that action one week later,” Staiano says. 

Childhood obesity has more than doubled in the past 30 years according to the US Centres for Disease Control and Prevention. And one of the CDC’s recommendations to combat the rise is to eat more servings of vegetables. 

The children in the video may serve as ambassadors for healthier eating. 

“The kids were positively influenced by their peers through role modelling of healthy behaviours,” says Amy Yaroch, executive director of the Gretchen Swanson Centre for Nutrition in Omaha, Nebraska, who was not involved in the research.

“We know from behavioural theory that role modelling is an effective strategy to get people [including young kids] to adopt healthy behaviours. Parents typically serve as role models, but peers can be a very strong influence as well, especially if they are viewed as ‘cool’ by their peers,” Yaroch says.

Staiano and her team still have several questions they’d like to investigate, including how to increase the effect and whether repeated video exposure could convince a kid to choose a vegetable over candy.

“Figuring out ways to make screen time into healthy time is critical for our young children, who are expected to have shorter lifespans than their parents due to obesity-related diseases,” Staiano says.

Held concurrently at the Abu Dhabi National Exhibition Centre and seemingly melding one huge festival, the Dhabi International Motor Show and Custom Show Emirates events reflected a variety of motoring niches, subcultures and businesses. Expected to attract considerably more than last year’s 12,000 visitors and 100 local and 57 international exhibitors, the events also include large outdoor activities. 

Billed as both International and Emirati events, large mainstream auto manufacturers were largely represented at a dealership and regional level, and showcased their latest and current vehicle line-ups. However, the event took on a more international flavour in regards to its custom car component, with many aftermarket tuning and customisation firms taking part, given the UAE’s and GCC’s rich market for such wares in particular, and the region in general.

Connecting aftermarket companies showcasing products with consumers, the event featured local, regional and international companies coming from afar as the US, Japan, Australia, Russia, China, New Zealand, India and elsewhere. Most notable among international exhibitors was a pavilion of some 50 companies representing the highly Specialty Equipment Market Association, well renowned for their own annual US event.

Another particular attraction representing both tuning and customisation worlds and well capturing the zeitgeist of the event was Japanese firm Kuhl Racing’s “golden Godzilla”. A Nissan GT-R with intricately engraved gold chrome body, the flamboyant GT-R is also tuned to produce some 800BHP, in place of a standard model’s 542BHP.

Offering much for enthusiasts of different tastes and persuasions, the event included contrasts such as stand for quintessentially British classic Minis right next to one showcasing the US urban subculture of lowriders. Comprised almost exclusively of modified and immense classic American, saloons, coupes and convertibles, lowriders alternatively ride on stilts or sit near tarmac scraping clearance, owing to extreme hydraulic suspension kits 

In addition to the many modified, tuned, customised, hot rods and otherwise fettled cars and motorcycles, the event also featured numerous classic cars, both modified and in stock condition. Consisting of mainly luxury, sports and SUV models of various vintage and including a rare 1980 Lamborghini LM002 SUV, the classic cars on display even included less expected compact peoples cars like the Fiat 500 and Citroen 2CV.

Held over the weekend, the event featured numerous activities including crowd-pleasing outdoor skid pan with saloon car, SUV, taxi and bike drifting exhibits and car and bike parade. Contests were also held, with awards going for best bike builds, custom cars and bikes, photos, in addition to an engine competition. Meanwhile, the annual and regional Middle East Car of the Year awards ceremony was also held at the exhibition events, on the opening night.

AMMAN — In his latest works of acrylic and pastel on canvas, Jordanian artist Muhammad Afefa explores instinct in its most raw and refined forms.

His artworks on display at Societá Dante Alighieri Amman in the exhibition “Memories and Fish” delve into the psyche of human and animal instinct with a sense of rawness reflective of its subject matter.

Building his paintings on the recurring motifs of a female, a shark-like fish and a chair, Afefa, also a political cartoonist, creates new meanings by juxtaposing these three shapes — and at times even combining them — in a strange twist on the traditional trinity of the id, ego and superego. 

“I see the female as representative of humans, the fish as a manifestation of raw instinct, and the chair as the ‘humanised’ form of instinct — the hunger for power,” Afefa told The Jordan Times in an interview.

In his paintings, the three shapes are seen existing each in their own vacuums, closely interacting with each other in harmony, or struggling to gain the upper hand in a savage conflict.

The female is at times seen flirting with the fish, reaching out in an attempt to gain an understanding, and at other times standing separately with a bag in hand as if parting ways.

Other images are more violent, showing the three shapes caught in a struggle of dominion, each perhaps vying for absolute control over the psyche — lusting for that elusive chair of power.

Afefa’s background as a cartoonist gives him a sure hand in sketching out his ideas, but he makes sure not to take away from the mystery of the work by leaving it open to a kaleidoscope of interpretations.

He employs rich, textured colours to give a bold background to his paintings, capitalising on the harmonious mixture of hues, and on their staggering conflict as well to add dimensions to the struggle between the figures in his work.

Seemingly random doodles sometimes pervade his pieces, revealing another level of meaning at a closer inspection.

“I don’t plan how a painting is going to end up looking. I simply absorb whatever experiences I encounter and let my subconscious express them through my work,” Afefa said.

Acknowledging that there is a sense of symbolism in the paintings akin to his work as a cartoonist, the artist stressed, however, that the pieces give him and the viewer more freedom to explore different meanings and impressions.

“Cartoons may have a wider audience, but you have to think, rethink and redo them a hundred times as you take in so many variables,” Afefa, who has been a cartoonist for over 10 years, explained.

“As a cartoonist, you want your audience to understand the idea you are imparting, but you also try to make sure that your editors also understand and approve the work,” he added.

“With paintings, you don’t have to worry about this. I’m done with the work when I want to be. No one can change it.” 

Exploring his latest exhibition, one can surmise that Afefa the artist and the cartoonist are one and the same.

Being a cartoonist has become part of his identity as an artist, enriching his paintings and informing his style in a unique advantage that adds more layers to his work.

The paintings are on display until April 10.

The most powerful of the modern mega- or hyper-hatch segment, the Mercedes-Benz AMG A45 was first launched in 2013 boasting a then unheard of 355BHP for the broader hot hatch segment. However, with the arrival of the Audi RS3 Sportback and then imminent introduction of the Ford Focus RS, Mercedes responded by hiking the A45’s power to 376BHP late last year.

An extreme five-door family hatchback reworked as high performance machine, the A45 and its peers are largely inspired by rally cars like the Lancia delta Integrale and subsequent hatchbacks dominating the sport. Rally inspired but not derived from motorsport, the AMG A45 and its cohorts are too heavy, big and luxurious to be rally derived, but utilise four-wheel drive and contemporary electronic driver assistance systems to effectively channel such high output.

Compact luxury

Elegantly restrained in standard guise, with little outward signs of its brutal capability, the A45 features a luxurious and thoroughly well equipped yet sportily driver-focused cabin. Developed by Mercedes’ inhouse AMG Skunk Works division, it is the result of and natural evolution of the emergence of a broader compact premium automotive segment catering to a more urbanised milieu of fuel efficient cars.

Virtually unaltered in appearance apart from lighting elements, the refreshed AMG A45 retains its discretely athletic character and road presence, and elegantly translates Mercedes’ design language and identity. With sporty concave grilled design with large tri-star emblem mounted within, the A45 also features aggressively wide intakes, road-hugging front bumper and side skirts, and huge optional 19-inch alloy wheels.

Discreet in basic spec, the AMG A45 can also be optioned with more vivid colour schemes and graphics, and appearance packages. Including a prominent tailgate mounted wing, rear air diffuser, painted brake callipers and contrasting alloy wheel pinstripes, such packages highlight the A45’s wild side and underscore its performance potential, and even include a Petronas edition in homage to Mercedes’ championship-winning Formula 1 team.

Prodigious power

Powered by the world’s most powerful regular production 2-litre 4-cylinder engine, the AMG A45 uprated powerhouse retains the same 1.8-bar turbo boost pressure as before, and retains almost identical fuel consumption figures. Instead, it achieves its 21BHP power and
18lb/ft torque hikes through the use of reworked valve assembly, timing and turbocharger, which also yield improved throttle response.

Prodigiously powerful, with high
188BHP/litre power the AMG A45’s turbocharged four-pot engine develops 376BHP at 6000rpm and 350lb/ft throughout 2250-5000rpm, which with a 1,555kg mass and tenacious off-the-line four-wheel traction allows for a scorching swift acceleration. Using a twin-scroll turbocharger and short gas flow pathways, the A45’s moment of inertia from standstill is reduced, if not eliminated.

After a moment of initial turbo lag, the A45 bolts through the 0-100km/h benchmark in 4.2 seconds, which helped by shortened gear ratios for enhanced fluency, response and performance, constitutes an improvement of 0.4 seconds. Capable of an electronically governed 250km/h top speed, the A45 proved relentlessly swift and muscular on track at the Yas Marina Formula 1 circuit in Abu-Dhabi, with broad and versatile mid-range allows effortless on-the-move acceleration.

Agile and aggressive

Intense and aggressive in delivery and rorting, popping soundtrack, the A45’s savage power build-up is underwritten by its vast mid-range muscle. However, it is most eager and alert when revs are kept high, either by using its 7-speed gearbox’s more snappily aggressive Sport+mode, or manual steering-mounted paddle-shift manual actuation mode when driving through a tighter auto-cross like handling course.

Able to automatically interrupt ignition and injection for swifter gear shifts at full load, the AMG’s surge of power is thus little interrupted. In default conditions, the A45 drives the front wheels but is able to re-distribute power to all four wheels — with up to 50 per cent rearwards — when necessary to maintain traction. Additionally, it features a torque vectoring system to brake selectively inside wheels for better cornering agility.

Agile and swift through a fast and tight slalom circuit at Yas Marina, the A45 tucks in tidily into corners with good commitment and high rear grip levels when pushed hard through corners and leaning on the outside tyres. Taken to its dynamic limits, the A45 has a natural tendency to oversteer, but this can be controlled by easing off the throttle, but for yet nimbler, crisper and more confident cornering, an optional mechanical limited-slip front differential is available.

Well-equipped and ergonomic

Composed, quick and capable pouncing from one corner to the next and superb control, the AMG A45 is a car best driven in a brisk and meaningful manner to get the most of its agile handling, massive performance potential and grippy-when-loaded chassis set-up. Responding particularly well to being pointed early and deliberately into an apex, the A45 shift its weigh out to tighten a cornering line before digging in and blasting out.

Smoothly firm with good body control and quick precise steering, the A45 was at home during smooth track driving. Sporty and stylish inside, the A45 features supportive leather sports seats, round crosshair air vents, chunky flat-bottom steering wheel, carbon-fibre trim and intuitive layouts including clear instrumentation and enlarged tablet-style infotainment screen for 2015+ models.

A practical well-equipped 5-seat 5-door high performance hatchback, the A45 features a well-adjustable driving position and visibility, remote central locking, parking assistance, climate control and Collision Prevention Assist system. With versatile fold down rear seats for expanding luggage volume, the Middle East spec A45’s boot floor mounted spare tyre reduces boot space from a 341-litre minimum available for Euro-spec models with a tyre repair kit.

TECHNICAL SPECIFICATIONS

Engine: 2-litre, turbocharged transverse 4 cylinders

Bore x stroke: 83 x 92mm

Compression ratio: 8.6:1

Valve-train: 16-valve, DOHC, direct injection,

Maximum boost: 1.8-bar

Gearbox: 7-speed automatic, four-wheel drive

Top gear/final drive: 0.94:1/4.13:1

0-100km/h: 4.2 seconds

Top speed: 250km/h (electronically governed)

Redline: 6700rpm

Power, BHP (PS) [kW]: 376 (381) [280] @6000rpm

Specific power: 188.8BHP/litre

Power-to-weight: 241.8BHP/tonne

Torque, lb/ft (Nm): 350 (475) @2250-5000rpm

Specific torque: 238.5Nm/litre

Torque-to-weight: 305.4Nm/tonne

Fuel consumption, urban/extra-urban/combined:9.6-/6-/7.3-litres/100km

CO2 emissions, combined: 171g/km

Fuel capacity: 56 litres

Length: 4299mm

Width: 1780mm

Height: 1433mm

Wheelbase: 2699mm

Track, F/R: 1553/1552mm

Overhang, F/R: 913/687mm

Kerb weight: 1555kg

Headroom, F/R: 1017/952mm

Luggage volume, min/max: 341-/1157-litres

Steering: Variable assistance, rack and pinion

Turning circle: 11.04 metres

Suspension: Multi-link

Brakes: Ventilated, perforated discs, 350mm/330mm

Tyres: 235/35R19

WASHINGTON — There may be a reason why people have trouble seeing while driving at night, and it’s not their eyesight. A new rating of the headlights of more than 30 mid-sized car models gave only one model a grade of “good”.

Of the rest, about a third were rated “acceptable”, a third “marginal” and a third “poor”. The difference between the top- and bottom-rated models for a driver’s ability to see down a dark road was substantial, according to the study released Wednesday by the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety, an industry-funded organisation that evaluates automotive safety.

The LED headlights in the top trim level Toyota Prius V — the only one of 31 models tested to get the “good” rating — were able to illuminate a straight roadway sufficiently to see a pedestrian, bicyclist or obstacle up to 387 feet ahead. At that distance, the vehicle could be travelling up to 70mph and still have time to stop.

But halogen headlights in the BMW 3 series, the worst-rated ones, were able to illuminate only 128 feet ahead. At that distance, the vehicle couldn’t be travelling at more than 35mph and still have time to stop, according to the study.

That’s important because of the more than 32,000 traffic deaths last year, about half happened at night or during dawn and dusk when visibility is lower.

The reason for the big performance gap is that there’s a lot more to how well headlights help drivers see than merely the brightness of the bulb or even what type of bulb is used, said David Zuby, the institute’s executive vice president and chief researcher.

“We found the same light bulb, depending upon what reflector or lens it’s paired with and how it’s mounted on the vehicle, can give you very different visibility down the road,” he said.

It gets more complicated. Consumers can’t buy a more expensive model or add an expensive technology package and necessarily expect to get better headlights, the report said. The halogen headlights in the economically priced base model 4-door Honda Accord, for example, earned an acceptable rating while halogen and LED headlights in two pricier Mercedes-Benz models were rated poor.

Zuby said with no reliable clues such as the price of the car or the type of light, it’s hard for consumers to figure out which vehicles will provide the safest visibility. He recommended car buyers check the institute’s ratings at http://www.iihs.org.

The report comes as halogen lamps are being replaced by high-intensity discharge (HID) and LED lamps in many vehicles. Headlights that swivel with the car’s steering to help see around curves are also becoming more widespread. While these changes can have advantages, they don’t guarantee good performance, the report said.

Researchers tested the headlights after dark at the institute’s test track in Ruckersville, Virginia. A special device measured the light from both low beams and high beams as the vehicles were driven on five different approaches: travelling straight, a sharp left curve, a sharp right curve, a gradual left curve and a gradual right curve. Researchers also evaluated headlights for excessive glare.

They were surprised to find how much headlights varied from the base model to higher trim or accessory packages, Zuby said. Eighty-two different headlight systems were available for the 31 2016 models assessed in the study. To get the top-rated headlights in the Prius V, consumers would have to purchase the advanced technology package, which is only available in the top trim level. Standard halogen lights without high-beam assist in less expensive Prius V trim levels received a poor rating.

High-beam assist automatically adjusts the headlamp range for the distance of vehicles ahead or oncoming traffic.

Toyota officials declined to comment, and BMW officials didn’t immediately reply to a request for comment.

Mercedes-Benz said in a statement that it was “greatly surprised” by the test, and remains “confident our lighting systems provide important safety benefits for real world conditions”.

Government standards for judging the performance of headlights “are essentially unchanged” since they were set back in the 1960s, Zuby said.

“In the standard, they are measuring the light coming out of the light source — right in front of the light bulb, in essence — and not looking at how the light is projected down the road, which is what our tests do,” he said.

The institute hopes its study will encourage the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration to improve standards, or inspire automakers to make better headlights on their own, Zuby said.

There’s no shortage of worthy new cars for buyers’ consideration, but figuring out the worst of the lot is another matter.

Consumer Reportstackled the challenge, looking for the lowest-rated car in 10 vehicle categories. In this case, the low score wasn’t just about the car’s projected propensity to break down.

Rather, the magazine says it chose its losers based on a variety of factors — road-test score, projected reliability, owner satisfaction and safety. While there is no shortage of publications rating cars, Consumer Reports commands special attention in the auto industry because it buys all the cars it tests from dealerships just like a typical customer, rather than borrowing them from automakers, as a way of preserving its independence.

Of course, some of the underperforming models make up for their unimpressiveness with a lower price tag. Consumer Reports notes some of them are due to be replaced soon with newer models that could perform better.

For now, though, here’s the list and a synopsis of what the magazine had to say about the models it chose:

• Lowest-rated subcompact: Mitsubishi Mirage. Cheap to buy and good gas mileage, but it’s “tiny, tinny” and the three-cylinder engine vibrates.

• Lowest-rated compact: Fiat 500L. Worst reliability of any new car and a “dismal” road-test score.

• Lowest-rated midsize sedan: Chrysler 200. “Mediocre”, with clumsy handling and poor on the road.

• Lowest-rated compact luxury car: Mercedes-Benz CLA250. Stiff ride, noisy, cramped.

• Lowest-rated midsize luxury car: Lincoln MKS. — Outdated and outclassed.

• Lowest-rated family SUV: Dodge Journey. V-6 engine had poor gas mileage.

• Lowest-rated luxury compact SUV: Land Rover Discovery Sport. Too little or too much acceleration, and a balky transmission.

• Lowest-rated large luxury SUV: Cadillac Escalade. Stiff ride, not that roomy and the Cue infotainment system is “confounding.”

• Lowest-rated minivan: Chrysler Town & Country. Poor gas mileage and didn’t fare well in the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety’s small overlap crash tests.

• Lowest-rated green car: Mitsubishi i-MiEV. A “half-step up from a golf cart,” slow and clumsy.

Felatun Bey and Rakim Efendi
Ahmet Midhat Efendi
Translated by Melih Levi and Monica M. Ringer
New York: Syracuse University Press, 2016
Pp. 167

Almost a century and a half after its publication in Ottoman Turkish, Ahmet Midhat Efendi’s short novel, “Felatun Bey and Rakim Efendi”, is still an enchanting read. While rather simplistic in plot and character development, it more than compensates by the nuanced insight it gives into changing times and attitudes in late-Ottoman Istanbul.

Some consider Ahmet Midhat to be the father of the Turkish novel. Like many educated Ottoman subjects of his time, he was preoccupied with his society’s relationship to modernity and Europe, and made it a main theme of this story, causing Orhan Pamuk to credit him with inventing the East-West novel.

The plot builds on the contrast between the two characters named in the title. Felatun Bey is born into riches but squanders his sizeable fortune on a French mistress and gambling, pursuing what he considers to be an alafranga (foreign) life style. Ironically, his name means Plato in Turkish, but his intellectual side is mainly pretention, while his demeanour is often abrasive, and he shows up at his clerical job only three hours a week.

Rakim Efendi is quite the opposite. Born into a family of modest means, he loses his father early and leaves school at 16 to work at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. On his own volition, he becomes proficient in French and a range of subjects, enabling him to earn a comfortable living by tutoring, translation and petition-writing for foreign residents. He gets along easily with Europeans and adapts to their ways when in their company, but his home life is decidedly alaturka. 

Obviously, the author is making a moral point about the benefits of hard work and education, but he delivers it in such a humorous way that one doesn’t feel he is lecturing. He satirises Felatun Bey’s show-off version of being alafranga in a teasing way akin to a comedy of manners, replete with a few minor scandals. More crucial for Midhat’s reformist agenda is his use of Rakim Efendi’s character to dissect what it means to be modern, a concept that is not synonymous with foreignness. 

Rakim is sensitive, considerate, rational and charming. Ottoman-style, he has an Arab servant and buys a Circassian slave, but their mutual relations are not entirely traditional. Slave proves to be a malleable status as Rakim feels that he has bought Janan’s freedom, and provides her with French and piano lessons, as well as an elegant wardrobe and jewellery. While friends of all types urge him to take her as a mistress, he insists he loves her like a sister. How their relationship will evolve adds a bit of mystery and tension to the story, and makes parts of it serve as a treatise on love and its different varieties, suggesting the idea of companionable rather than arranged marriages.

Midhat is on record as opposing slavery, and the novel was written at a time when the slave trade was being gradually phased out in the Ottoman Empire, yet the author takes the opportunity to show that Ottoman slavery was kinder than its American version. 

Midhat’s style is fast-paced and often playful, combining straight narration with lively but subtle dialogue, and frequent author interventions related in a confidential tone as if sharing some well-intentioned gossip, or justifying how the characters are treated. Midhat seems to enjoy drawing comparisons between the alafranga and alaturka life styles wherein the latter are usually shown to be superior, at least for Turks, but without a trace of chauvinism. That’s just how it is, he seems to say. 

A. Holly Shissler’s afterword, which contains a fascinating biographical sketch of the author, explains that this was Midhat’s way of critiquing the notion prevalent during the Tanzimat reform era that the Ottoman state and society could be saved by “uncritical and indeed superficial adoption of European modes of life.” (p. 150)

To remind the reader that this novel was written in Ottoman Turkish with Arabic letters, several illustrations of the original text are included, which also show French words printed in Latin letters. Translation of the book was quite a project, as explained in the translators’ note. Special efforts were needed to capture Midhat’s experimental style which “moved rapidly between Ottoman conventions and newer forms of language, syntax, and narration influenced by contemporary French and British novels”. (p. xiii) 

The result is a unique, entertaining and enlightening book.