Features

SAN FRANCISCO — Yahoo has added more layers of security in its effort to shield people’s online lives from government spying and other snooping.

The measures announced Wednesday include the completion of a system that encrypts all information being transmitted from one Yahoo data centre to another. 

The technology is designed to make the e-mails and other digital information flowing through data centres indecipherable to outsiders.

Search requests made from Yahoo’s home page are also now automatically encrypted, and the Sunnyvale, California, company is promising to make it more difficult for unauthorised intruders to hack into other services, including video chats, within the next few months. Yahoo strengthened the security of its e-mail in January.

“Whether or not our users understand it, I feel it’s our responsibility to keep them safe,” Alex Stamos, Yahoo’s recently hired chief of information security, told a small group of reporters.

Stamos, a former security consultant, joined Yahoo Inc. less than a month ago as part of the company’s anti-snooping crusade.

Yahoo and other major technology companies such as Google Inc. and Microsoft Crop. have made online security a top priority during the last 10 months amid a series of revelations about US government programmes that have vacuumed up personal information about millions of web surfers in an effort to thwart terrorism. 

The wide-ranging surveillance has been outlined in documents leaked to the media by former US National Security Agency contractor Edward Snowden.

The technology industry’s indignant response has been driven by financial self-interest as well as an aversion to government prying. 

Most Internet services make money from ads that could be more difficult to sell if spying fears cause their audiences to shrink.

Yahoo, which has more than 800 million worldwide users, vowed late last year to encrypt its data centres by March 31 after reports that the US government had been secretly infiltrating the lines that transfer information overseas.

Yahoo still lags behind Google’s encryption efforts. 

In an interview Wednesday, Stamos said Yahoo hasn’t been able to move as fast as it wants because many of its services rely on content and ads provided by thousands of other companies, including some that aren’t convinced that they need to encrypt.

For that reason, Yahoo’s widely used news, sports and finance sections still aren’t automatically encrypted. 

Visitors to those services can trigger an encrypted service by typing in “https” before the website’s address. 

Yahoo is confident that it will be able to persuade its content and advertising partners to take the steps needed to enable automatic encryption of those services later this year.

“Some partners already understand this is the way the wind is blowing,” Stamos said. “We are moving to a world where all content is encrypted all the time.”

SAN FRANCISCO — Microsoft on Wednesday took on Apple’s Siri and Google Now with a smartphone personal assistant dubbed “Cortana”.

Windows Phone Vice President Joe Belfiore introduced Cortana onstage at the technology titan’s annual developers conference.

“Cortana is the first truly personal digital assistant who learns about me, and the things that matter to me most, and knows about the whole Internet,” Belfiore said in a presentation.

Cortana responds to conversationally spoken requests or commands, using insights gleaned from calendars, contact lists, online searches and other smartphone sources to respond in a manner akin to a real-life aide, Belfiore said.

Cortana’s voice and character is based on a popular artificial intelligence character in Microsoft’s blockbuster Xbox console video game “Halo”.

It comes as a long-awaited counter to the Siri virtual assistant on Apple mobile devices and Google Now capabilities in Android tablets and smartphones.

Cortana will be in a test, or beta, mode when it becomes available in a Windows Phone 8.1 software update, which is to begin rolling out in the United States in coming months.

The new version of Windows Phone 8.1 should be available on new phones beginning in late April or early May, according to Belfiore.

Microsoft met with real-life personal assistants while designing Cortana, which is powered behind the scene by search engine Bing, he said.

As do Siri and Google Now, Cortana can remind users of flights, appointments, birthdays, routes, or other information for managing lives.

“Imagine a real personal assistant, and the kinds of things you might ask to be organised,” Belfiore said while extolling Cortana’s capabilities.

After being tested in the US, Cortana will expand to Britain and China, and then other countries.

In a sign that Microsoft gave Cortana a playful side, Belfiore asked the virtual assistant to reveal the storyline of the next “Halo” game only to be told “I’m quite certain you don’t have the proper security clearance for that information.”

Insights into updates of Windows software for mobile devices and traditional computers came as Microsoft wooed developers of the fun, hip, or functional applications that strongly influence decisions about what gadgets to buy.

Microsoft is also keen to entice business and consumers to remain faithful to its computer operating system — the software platform on which the Redmond, Washington-based company’s fortune was built — as it phases out support for its much-loved but ageing version Windows XP.

“We have a billion-plus PCs [personal computers] that will all be upgrading,” freshly-minted Microsoft Chief Executive Satya Nadella told the gathering of developers.

“That is a significant opportunity for any application that targets Windows.”

Nadella told the gathering of developers that Microsoft is “innovating in every dimension” to gain momentum in lifestyles increasingly revolving around mobile devices and services offered by computers in the Internet “cloud”.

Software improvements were aimed at business, where Microsoft products remain strong, as well as at the booming tablet and smartphone markets.

Microsoft also used the stage to announce that Nokia will release a set of low-priced Windows-powered Lumia smartphones, starting in developing markets in Asia and India next month before gradually working its way to the US in July.

The move takes aim at markets being overlooked and underserved, and breaks from trying to slug it out with Apple iPhones and Android-powered Samsung handsets in countries where buyers are more interested in high-end or medium-tier devices, according to Gartner principal research analyst Tuong Huy Nguyen.

“They really needed to move the price point of Windows devices down market, and this seems to be a step in that direction,” Nguyen said.

“The US is essentially a two-horse market with Apple and Samsung; they have tried to push in with previous Lumia devices but it is hard.”

I realised that I think too much. Thinking, in small doses, is a pleasant sort of activity. Here one employs one’s mind objectively in order to form an opinion or evaluate a situation. This is rational behaviour and under no circumstance should it be condemned. 

The problem arises when one’s thoughts, sort of, go on an over-drive where instead of reaching reasonable conclusions, one reaches inconclusive dead ends. For want of a better term, I call such people over thinkers, and to my utter surprise I found myself fitting into this category. 

To correct this bit of irrationality, and before it developed into a habit, I decided to write a diary. Putting my thoughts, frenzied, jumbled up and all several of them, on paper, could help me train myself. To think in a crystal clear manner, that is. 

Not finding a conventional diary at hand, I put a writing pad that I had pinched from a five-star hotel, and a pencil on my bedside table. At various intervals throughout the day I made hasty entries on it. Neither my domestic staff, nor my immediate family members could understand why I needed to trudge back to my room every few hours and scribble something into a book. Raised eyebrows and strange looks were thrown in my direction, but I ignored them all. 

Training needs discipline, and to train something as intangible as one’s own over thinking, required more strictness. My first entry of the day read: “woke up to troubled thoughts”. I was tempted to describe those troublesome apprehensions, but I stopped myself and left it at that. There was a niggling feeling that tried to pull me back to the notepaper but I snapped out of it, literally and figuratively. 

Subsequently, I kept jotting down my numerous activities during the day. The accompanying mental commotion also, which was going on in my brain, I wrote down in a concise method, without going into too much of detail. 

Opening my diary late at night I was pleased with my self-discipline. I was cured of over thinking I thought. One day is all it took. I was so happy with this discovery, that I invited my husband to peruse my day’s writings. 

“Burnt the cake,” he read out in a clear voice. 

“Slightly singed,” I corrected him. 

“Fought with the gardener,” he continued.

“Yes, I fired him today,” I said. 

“Why?” my spouse was curious.

“He beat up his wife,” I explained. 

“Ah that is terrible!” he exclaimed.

“Go on,” I prompted.

“There was a missed call on the phone at noontime,” he stated. 

I tried desperately to hold onto my wayward thoughts and did not answer for a few moments. In retrospect, I remember I even took a deep breath to calm myself down. And then the dam burst. 

“Gosh! Where was the call from? Why did the name not show up along with the number? Who was trying to get in touch with me? Maybe it was something important, a life or death situation? If it was so imperative, the caller would have called back, in fact he should have called back. Perhaps I should have dialed the number? What if it went into an answering machine? It could also be possible that one of my friends’ relative was trying to contact me, could they be in trouble? Dear God, please let them be safe,” I babbled. 

The more things change the more they stay the same?

SAN JOSE, United States — Lawyers for Apple and Samsung exchanged barbs as a major new patent trial opened Tuesday, debating the role of a company not even part of the case — Google.

Apple’s legal team vowed to prove that Samsung flagrantly copied iPhone features and should pay more than $2 billion in damages, as the two smartphone giants squared off anew in a California courtroom.

Apple attorney Harold McElhinny opened his presentation with a video showing legendary Apple co-founder Steve Jobs introducing the first iPhone in 2007.

By putting computing power in smartphones powered by fun software and easy-to-use touch-screens, Apple transformed the market, sending Samsung onto its heels, according to McElhinny.

The attorney told jurors in his opening statement that they would see internal Samsung documents and messages showing that the company felt it was suffering “a crisis of design” with the difference between its devices and the smartphone “a difference between Heaven and Earth”.

Apple said evidence will show that the South Korean electronics giant sold more than 37 million infringing smartphones and tablets in the United States.

California-based Apple would have demanded royalties of about $40 per device to license the patented technology to Samsung, according to McElhinny.

The overall amount being sought by Apple in damages from Samsung will top $2 billion, the lawyer explained.

“This case is not about Google,” McElhinny told jurors.

“It is Samsung, not Google, that chose to put these features into its phones.”

But Samsung’s lawyer told the jurors in the San Jose, California court that the case was indeed about Google, and Apple’s struggle against the maker of the Android operating system which is now winning in the global marketplace.

‘Attack on Android’ 

“It’s an attack on Android; that is what this case is,” attorney John Quinn said.

“Apple is trying to limit consumer choice and gain an unfair advantage over Google’s Android.”

Quinn contended that four of the five patents at issue in the trial are not used in Apple mobile devices, but because of features built into Android software by Google engineers litigation was pursued.

He promised jurors that Google engineers would be called to testify to how they independently designed Android software and did not copy Apple.

Samsung is the world’s leading maker of smartphones and tablets built using Google’s free Android mobile operating system.

Android smartphones dominate the global market, particularly in devices offered for lower prices than iPhones.

“Apple is an amazingly innovative company, but in some respects, Google’s Android has passed them,” Quinn said.

“Apple is trying to gain from you in this courtroom what it has lost in the marketplace.”

In August 2012, a separate jury in the same court decided that Samsung should pay Apple $1.049 billion in damages for illegally copying iPhone and iPad features, in one of the biggest patent cases in decades.

The damage award was later trimmed to $929 million and is being appealed.

If this new trial goes in Apple’s favour, it could result in an even bigger award since it involves better-selling Samsung devices, such as the Galaxy S3 smartphone.

Quinn attacked expert witnesses Apple planned to call to back its case in the sky-high damages claim. The attorney contended the lawsuit extended from a war that Jobs declared on Google because of Android in 2010.

“A holy war on Android, that was Apple’s strategy,” Quinn said. “This lawsuit is part of a strategy to catch up with Google.”

Dark side 

Apple lawyers accused Samsung of going far beyond competitive intelligence to the “dark side” of intentional copying.

Jurors will also consider Samsung’s claims that Apple infringed on patents related to transmitting digital video and storing digital images.

McElhinny called Apple vice president of worldwide marketing Philip Schiller as the first witness in the case.

Under questioning, Schiller described how Apple took a big risk betting on the iPhone, which was created during a top-secret project over the course of three years.

NEW YORK – A review of 50 years of studies on the risks and benefits of yearly mammograms has tied them to a 19 per cent  drop overall in breast cancer deaths, but whether a woman benefits depends on factors such as age and family history, US researchers said on Tuesday.

A report published in the Journal of the American Medical Association is the latest attempt to sort out mixed messages about mammogram screening, once an annual chore whose merits have been questioned by some studies suggesting that mammograms save far fewer women than previously thought.

“It would be easier for everyone if there was a clear, pre-specified pathway with a given risk profile, but we don’t have that because our data is not perfect and everyone is different,” Dr Lydia Pace of Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston, who led the study, told Reuters Health. “I wish that we had more certainty.”

Five years ago, US women routinely started getting annual mammograms at age 40. That practice came under fire in 2009 when the US Preventive Services Task Force, an independent group of experts that advises US policy makers, said evidence suggested that women of average breast cancer risk could get mammograms every two years starting at age 50.

A large, 25-year Canadian study published in February found yearly mammogram screenings did not reduce the chance that a woman would die of breast cancer and confirmed earlier findings that many abnormalities detected by these X-rays would never have been fatal, even if untreated.

Despite mounting evidence, many US organizations still recommend annual mammograms starting at age 40, but most other countries have guidelines similar to the task force’s recommendation, Pace said.

For their review, Pace and Dr Nancy Keating, also of Brigham, gathered several previous studies that examined the risks and benefits of mammograms. They found that annual mammograms reduced breast cancer deaths by 19 per cent  on average, but the actual decrease depended on a woman’s age.

For example, if 10,000 women in their 40s received an annual mammogram, doctors would find 190 invasive breast cancers. Of those, mammography would save about five lives but 25 women would have died with or without the mammogram.

Among women in their 50s who had a yearly mammogram, the benefits increased slightly, with between three and 32 lives saved for every 10,000 women screened over the next 15 years.

LONDON — Men who start smoking before the age of 11 risk having sons who are overweight, British researchers have found, adding to evidence that lifestyle factors even in childhood can affect the health of future offspring. 

The scientists said the findings, part of ongoing work in a larger “Children of the 1990s” study, could indicate that exposure to tobacco smoke before the start of puberty in men may lead to metabolic changes in the next generation.

“This discovery of trans-generational effects has big implications for research into the current rise in obesity and the evaluation of preventative measures,” said Marcus Pembrey, a professor of genetics at University College London, who led the study and presented its findings at a briefing on Wednesday.

Smoking rates in Britain and some other parts of Europe are on the decline, but worldwide, almost one billion men smoke — about 35 per cent of men in developed countries and 50 per cent in developing ones, according to the World Health Organisation.

While previous studies in animals and in people have found some trans-generational health impacts, the evidence so far is limited. It points, however, to epigenetics — a process where lifestyle and environmental factors can turn certain genes on or off — having an effect on the health of descendants.    

Pembrey said his team’s research was prompted in part by signals from earlier Swedish studies that linked how plentiful a paternal ancestor’s food supply was in mid-childhood with future death rates in grandchildren.

For the new study, published in the European Journal of Human Genetics, the researchers had access to detailed lifestyle, genetic and other health data from 9,886 fathers.

Of these, 5,376, or 54 per cent, were smokers at some time and of those, 166, or 3 per cent, said they had started smoking regularly before the age of 11.

Looking at the next generation, the team found that at age 13, 15 and 17, the sons of men who started smoking before 11 had the highest Body Mass Index (BMI) scores compared with the sons of men who had started smoking later or who had never smoked. 

“These boys had markedly higher levels of fat mass — ranging from an extra five kilogrammes (kg) to 10kg between ages 13 and 17,” the study said.

Although it was there, the effect was not seen to the same degree in daughters.

External experts not involved with the research were more guarded about drawing firm conclusions from its findings.

Graham Burdge, an expert in human nutrition at the University of Southampton said the findings “may potentially provide new insights into factors that may influence development of obesity in childhood”.

“However, the findings only show associations and cannot be interpreted as indicating that paternal smoking at an early age causes obesity in their sons,” he added.

Tim Spector, a professor of genetic epidemiology at King’s College London, said the findings were intriguing and rare.

“The data are persuasive but not yet definitive as we need to confirm the same smoking-related epigenetics changes in the kids’ DNA,” he said.

NEW YORK – A smoker’s coronary artery disease is likely to be as advanced as that of a non-smoker who is 10 years older when both show up at the hospital with a heart attack, according to a new study.

Researchers looked at nearly 14,000 patients hospitalised with blockages in arteries supplying the heart muscle and found smokers were more likely than non-smokers to die within a year.

Despite their being younger, and otherwise healthier, the smokers’ heart arteries were in a condition similar to those of non-smokers 10 years older.

“We saw smokers presenting the disease at age 55 and non-smokers presenting the same disease at 65,” said Dr Alexandra Lansky, a researcher on the study.

Smoking can cause blood clots, which often get lodged in the rigid and narrow arteries that have already been clogged by the buildup of cholesterol and fat deposits, according to Lansky and her colleagues.

Although the fat build-up and stiffening of the artery walls, known as atherosclerosis, becomes more likely with age for everyone, the clots caused by smoking worsen the blockages.

That makes smokers more likely to have a heart attack at a younger age, but less likely to have the other conditions, known as comorbidities, that go along with ageing, such as diabetes and high blood pressure.

“Smoking accelerates the manifestation of coronary disease but in the absence of these comorbidities,” Lansky told Reuters Health.

Past research has identified a “smoker’s paradox” — because smokers are younger, with fewer other health problems, when they had a heart attack, they were more likely to recover it. Or so it seemed.

“We wanted to look at longer-term effects of smoking rather just the short-term effect,” Lansky said.

The researchers analysed medical records for 13,819 patients, almost 4,000 of them smokers, hospitalised with chest pain or a heart attack caused by a blocked coronary artery.

The study team organised the data to match the smokers and nonsmokers by age, weight, comorbidities and other risk factors.

When compared to non-smokers with similar overall health, the smokers were ten years younger, on average, and more likely to have already been treated with blood thinners — suggesting they had already experienced problems with blood flow.

Imaging of the coronary artery showed the smokers had atherosclerosis comparable to the non-smokers ten years their senior, the researchers report in the journal JACC: Cardiovascular Interventions.

Before the adjustments for age and other health conditions, the smokers and non-smokers were about equally likely to survive the first 30 days after hospitalisation, and smokers were about 20 per cent less likely to die within a year.

But once smokers and non-smokers with similar health profiles were compared to each other, the smokers were 37 per cent more likely to die within the first year.

“What makes it novel, is that we are showing that if you come in, your chance of survival is already reduced, as a smoker,” Lansky said.

The findings are not surprising, according to Dr Robert Giugliano, a cardiologist at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston.

“Nonetheless, the public does need to know that there is now even more evidence that smoking is bad for your health, accelerates the process of atherosclerosis (so smokers have heart and vascular disease on average 10 years early than non-smokers), and leads to worse outcomes compared to non-smokers of a similar age,” said Giugliano, who also teaches at Harvard Medical School.

Dr Elliot Antman, also of Brigham and Women’s Hospital and Harvard, said it would be interesting to follow the patients for longer than a year to see what happened to survival rates among smokers who quit.

Antman was not surprised by the findings either. “I always suspected this was the case but it is nice to see the data,” he told Reuters Health.

“There just aren’t many healthy people in their 80’s who smoke regularly... if you want to live a healthy, long life, smoking stacks the odds against you,” Giugliano said.

WASHINGTON – Ever wondered if you look happily disgusted? Or sadly angry? There may one day be an app for that.

US researchers have uncovered a way for computers to recognise 21 distinct and often complex facial expressions, in what is being hailed as a breakthrough in the field of cognitive analysis.

A team from Ohio State University devised a way for computers to pinpoint more than triple the number of documented facial expressions than currently can be detected.

“We’ve gone beyond facial expressions for simple emotions like ‘happy’ or ‘sad’. We found a strong consistency in how people move their facial muscles to express 21 categories of emotions,” said Aleix Martinez, a cognitive scientist and associate professor of electrical and computer engineering at Ohio State.

“That is simply stunning. That tells us that these 21 emotions are expressed in the same way by nearly everyone, at least in our culture.”

The research, detailed in the current issue of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, could eventually aid the diagnosis and treatment of mental conditions such as autism and post-traumatic stress disorder.

Until now, cognitive scientists have limited their studies to tracking six basic emotions –– happy, sad, fearful, angry, surprised and disgusted.

However, Ohio researchers have been able to vastly increase the range of detectable emotions after photographing the responses of 230 volunteers to verbal cues such as “you just got some great unexpected news” (“happily surprised”), or “you smell a bad odor” (“disgusted”).

Painstaking analysis of the resulting 5,000 images allowed researchers to pinpoint variations on prominent landmarks for facial muscles, such as the corners of the mouth or the outer edge of the eyebrow.

The researchers pored over data from the Facial Action Coding System or FACS, a standard tool in body language analysis, checking for similarities and differences in expressions.

As a result they were able to uncover 21 emotions –– the six basic emotions –– plus “compound emotions” which were a combination.

For example, “happily surprised”, was a reaction to someone receiving unexpected good news.

Researchers were able to identify the emotion after analysing the expressions for happy –– a drawing up of the cheeks into a smile –– and surprise, which saw participants widen their eyes and allow their mouths to drop open.

In 93 per cent of cases, participants reflected “happily surprised” with a mixture of the two reactions for “happy” and “surprised”.

Face-lifted for 2014 with a moodier and a more charismatic fascia, more sophisticated and efficient eight-speed automatic gearbox and a more advanced infotainment unit, the latest Dodge Durango is a welcome update to an already well-sorted medium- to large-family SUV. First launched in 2011, the Durango is modern SUV unibody built on Mercedes ML Class derived architecture and is to rival both rear- and four-wheel-drive traditional body-on-frame American SUVs and road-biased and family-oriented front- and four-wheel-drive crossover SUVs. With the aggressively macho looks of the former and refinement of the latter, the Durango makes a sensible addition to either genre.

Moody and charismatic

Offered with a choice of modern 3.6-litre V6 or traditionally flavoured 5.7-litre V8, rear- or four-wheel-drive and a host of trim levels from sporty and basic Rallye, well-appointed Limited, luxurious Citadel or sporty and luxurious R/T, the entry-level SXT with rear-wheel-drive is, however, the most affordable and lightest. Without the four-wheel-drive and low ratios, the rear-drive SXT may lack the other version’s all-paw traction and off-road abilities, but with less weight, it is a more eager handling vehicle, while its beige cloth upholstery creates an airy cabin ambiance with grippy seat textures to keep one in place through hard corners, 

Though it shares common underpinnings with the Mercedes ML Class and seven-seat GL Class, the Dodge Durango’s styling is distinctly American, with a moody sense of menace that owes more to Dodge’s classic muscle cars in spirit if not actual design. Having gotten it right to begin with, the Durango’s aesthetics are only mildly refreshed for a sharper and more contemporary look, with a high-set and more sculpted bumper, with a honeycomb mesh and split crosshair design for its gaping wide and hungry grille. The deep-set headlights receive revised arrangements, including a “hockey stick” running light element to complement the equally sporting and macho “race track” rear light LED outline.

Efficient engine

Wide, tall, long and with assertive fascia, tight design lines and muscular sheet metal, the Durango cuts an impressive figure, while under its heavily browed front and muscular bonnet, the entry-level model SXT version tested featured the Chrysler group’s much lauded and modern 3.6-litre V6 Pentastar engine. High-revving yet smooth and refined engine with a 6,400rpm rev limit — at which point power peaks at 290HP — the Pentastar is, however, a willing mid-range performer, with 260lb/ft torque peaking at 4,800rpm. With 90 per cent of its maximum torque online throughout a broad 1,600-6,400rpm range, the Durango 3.6 is flexible and confident on inclines and when overtaking.

Driving the rear wheels through a ZF eight-speed gearbox — similar to those employed by BMW and Rolls Royce — the revised Durango is able to achieve better acceleration, efficiency and on-the-move flexibility owing to a wider and more closely spaced series of ratios, which allow it to better utilise its engine output and stay within the optimum performance and efficiency bands. Smooth and swift shifting, the Durango SXT gearbox’s taller overdrive ratios helps the 2,157kg SUV achieve 11.7L/100km combined cycle fuel efficiency, while more aggressive lower gears and good rear wheel traction allow for 7.4-second 0-100km/h off-the-line acceleration.

Refined ride

With ideal 50:50 weight distribution and lighter than four-wheel drive and high spec version, the rear-driven Durango SXT turns in more eagerly, with its front tyres gripping hard, while through corners, its gas-charged dampers and firm optional low profile 265/50R20 footwear well contain body roll for such a large SUV. With stiff unibody construction and all-round independent suspension, the Durango is far ahead of its body-on-frame rivals for handling finesse and precision ride quality, and noise, vibration and harshness isolation. A more road-oriented vehicle than its Jeep Grand Cherokee cousin, the Durango’s longer wheelbase lends it more lateral grip and stability.

Steel — rather than air — suspension feels more nuanced and buttoned down, especially through winding backroads, where the Durango fluidly tackles corners with unexpected, agility, control and precision. Despite a light resistance and tall gearing, the Durango’s steering has a hint of fluency that is rarely encountered in a large SUV. Stable at highway speeds and under sudden braking, the Durango takes roughness and imperfections with composure and comfort. Without four-wheel drive or low gear ratios the rear-driven Durango is not as off-road capable as four-wheel-drive versions, but its generous low-end torque, 207mm ground clearance and modestly generous angles allow it a useful measure of off-road ability.

Cabin comfort

More spacious than traditional SUV rivals despite a smaller size, the Durango’s cabin is comfortable and accommodating, with room to comfortably fit large adults front and rear, while the third row of seats adds practicality. Good front visibility combines with good seat and steering adjustability, while cabin access is aided by wide door swing angles. Cabin fit, finish and design are above expectations for the Durango’s segment, with soft textures prominently used and uncluttered, user-friendly controls, including a classy rotary dial gear selector, similar in design to the luxury Range Rover, in addition to steering-mounted sequential paddle shifters.

High tech and user-friendly inside, the Durango features a customisable seven-inch (17.8cm)  TFT instrument display, and standard  five-inch (12.7cm) Uconnect infotainment touch screen, that can access smart phones and features voice command operation for various settings, sat nav, climate control and entertainment systems. USB, SD and auxiliary jacks are standard, and an 8.4-inch (21.3cm) Uconnect screen is optional. Seven airbags are standard safety equipment, while adaptive cruise control, blind spot monitoring and rear cross-path detection are optional. With its sizeable luggage volume expanding from a 487-litre minimum to a 2,392-litre maximum, the Durango can carry a 605kg payload, while flat folding third row seats provide a uniform loading bay.

SPECIFICATIONS

Engine: 3.6-litre, in-line V6-cylinders

Bore x Stroke: 96 x 83mm

Compression ratio: 10.2:1

Valve-train: 24-valve, DOHC

Gearbox: 8-speed automatic, rear-wheel-drive

Ratios: 1st 4.174; 2nd 3.143; 3rd 2.106; 4th 1.667; 5th 1.285; 6th 1.0; 7th 0.839; 8th 0.667

Reverse / axle ratios: 3.295 / 3.45

Power, HP (kW): 290 (216) @ 6,400rpm

Torque lb/ft (Nm): 260 (520) @ 4,800rpm

Redline: 6,400rpm

0-100 km/h: 7.4-seconds (est.)

Fuel consumption, city / highway / combined: 13 / 9.4 / 11.7l/100km

Fuel capacity: 93.1 Litres

Minimum fuel requirement: 91RON

Length: 5,110mm

Width, with (without) mirrors: 2,172 (1,924)mm 

Height, (antenna): 1,800 (1,847)mm

Wheelbase: 3042mm

Track, F/R: 1623 / 1627mm

Minimum ground clearance: 207mm

Load floor height: 817mm

Kerb weight: 2,157kg

Payload: 605kg

Gross vehicle weight rating (GVWR): 2,948kg

Aerodynamic drag co-efficiency: 0.35

Approach / break-over / departure angles: 16.3° / 18.1° / 21.5°

Seating capacity: 7

Headroom, 1st / 2nd / 3rd row: 1,013 / 1,011 / 960mm

Legroom, 1st / 2nd / 3rd row: 1,025 / 981/ 800mm

Shoulder room, 1st / 2nd / 3rd row: 1,486 / 1,281 / 1,281mm

Cargo volume, behind 1st / 2nd / 3rd rows: 2,392- / 1,350- / 487-litres

Steering: Hydraulic rack & pinion

Turning circle: 11.3-metres

Lock-to-lock: 3.67-turns

Suspension, F/R: SLA / Multi-link, coil spring, twin-dampers, stabiliser bar

Brakes, F/R: Ventilated discs 330 x 32mm / 330 x 14mm discs

Tyres: 265/50R20

WASHINGTON  – When it comes to managing type 2 diabetes in overweight people, stomach-shrinking surgeries are still more effective than trying to shed pounds with pills and lifestyle changes, researchers said Monday.

Three years into a study that compares the various approaches –– medical therapy, gastric bypass and sleeve gastrectomy –– the findings show that the two procedures are still superior at reducing glycemic levels and weight.

The latest results from the largest randomised controlled trial of its kind were published in the New England Journal of Medicine and discussed at the American College of Cardiology annual meeting.

“Both surgical options maintain their supremacy over standard intensive medical therapy at the three-year mark,” said lead investigator Philip Schauer, director of the Bariatric and Metabolic Institute at the Cleveland Clinic. 

“There is this notion that if we keep adding medications and pushing patients to lose weight on their own, they will eventually achieve the same type of results as those undergoing surgery, but that wasn’t the case here.”

The research includes 150 people, who were aged 41 to 57 when they began the study. They were all overweight or obese, with uncontrolled diabetes that had persisted for at least eight years. Each was taking at least three diabetes medications.

At the start of the trial, patients had an average blood glucose level of 9.2 per cent.

The goal of achieving glycemic control was defined as a three-month average blood glucose level of 6 per cent or lower.

That target is slightly more aggressive than the American Diabetes Association recommendation of 7 per cent. 

After three years, just 5 per cent of patients who did not have surgery but attempted to lose weight through counselling sessions, diet and medication had achieved the desired level of glycemic control.

The surgery groups did much better, with 37.5 per cent of gastric bypass and 24.5 per cent of sleeve gastrectomy patients meeting the mark.

Gastric bypass involves reducing the stomach to below 3 per cent of its natural volume, then connecting a new gastric pouch that bypasses the stomach and goes straight to the intestine.

In sleeve gastrectomy, part of the patient’s stomach is removed to reduce its volume by about 75 per cent.

Weight loss after three years was also five to six times greater in patients who had one of the surgeries.

The gastric bypass group lost on average 24 per cent of their body weight while the sleeve gastrectomy patients shed 21 per cent. Those on medical therapy alone lost 4 per cent.

Surgical patients also did better on measures of body mass index, weight control, and cholesterol levels.

Some 23 million American adults have type 2 diabetes, and most of them are overweight or obese.