title: History of Haiti

text: A new round of protests broke out in February 2021 amid a dispute over Moïse's presidential term. The protesters claim that Moïse's term officially ended on 7 February 2021 and demanded that he step down. Moïse, however, claimed that he has one more year to serve because of delays in starting his term. Protesters have also expressed concerns about a referendum proposed by Moïse, which would reportedly scrap the ban on consecutive presidential terms and enable Moïse to run again.


title: History of Haiti

text: On 7 July 2021 President Moïse was assassinated. Prime Minister Claude Joseph became interim president.


title: History of Haiti

text: On 14 August 2021, a strong 7.2 earthquake occurred in Haiti. The earthquake spawned tsunami warnings on the Haitian Coast. The warning was cancelled later that day. The death toll from the quake as of 15 August 2021 is 1,419 people.


title: History of Haiti

text: On 7 July 2022 masive clashes between two rival gangs began in Cite Soleil, an impoverished and densely populated neighborhood of Port-au-Prince. Thousands of families had to hide inside their homes, unable to get food or water; dozens of residents were killed by stray bullets. A week of gang violence has left at least 89 people dead. Since an oil terminal that supplies the capital and all of northern Haiti is located in Cite Soleil, the clashes have had a devastating effect on the region’s economy.


title: History of Haiti

text: On 11 October 2022, Henry and his cabinet requested the deployment of foreign troops to oppose the gangs and anti-government demonstrations in Port-au-Prince. On 15 October, the United States and Canada sent armored vehicles and military equipment to aid the Haitian government.


title: Olympic flame

text: The Olympic flame is a symbol used in the Olympic movement. It is also a symbol of continuity between ancient and modern games. Several months before the Olympic Games, the Olympic flame is lit at Olympia, Greece. This ceremony starts the Olympic torch relay, which formally ends with the lighting of the Olympic cauldron during the opening ceremony of the Olympic Games. The flame then continues to burn in the cauldron for the duration of the Games, until it is extinguished during the Olympic closing ceremony.


title: Olympic flame

text: The Olympic flame as a symbol of the modern Olympic movement was introduced by architect Jan Wils who designed the stadium for the 1928 Summer Olympics in Amsterdam.


title: Olympic flame

text: The idea for the Olympic flame was derived from ancient Greek ceremonies where a sacred fire was kept burning throughout the celebration of the ancient Olympics on the altar of the sanctuary of Hestia. In Ancient Greek mythology, fire had divine connotations and it was thought to have been stolen from the gods by Prometheus. Sacred fires were present at many ancient Greek sanctuaries, including those at Olympia. Every four years, when Zeus was honoured at the Olympic Games, additional fires were lit at his temple and that of his wife, Hera. The modern Olympic flame is ignited every two years in front of the ruins of the temple of Hera.


title: Olympic flame

text: When the tradition of an Olympic fire was reintroduced during the 1928 Summer Olympics, an employee of the Electric Utility of Amsterdam lit the first modern Olympic flame in the Marathon Tower of the Olympic Stadium in Amsterdam. The Olympic flame has been part of the Summer Olympics ever since. The Olympic torch relay was first introduced to the Summer Olympics at the 1936 Summer Olympics in Berlin.


title: Olympic flame

text: The Olympic fire is ignited several months before the opening ceremony of the Olympic Games at the site of the ancient Olympics in Olympia, Greece.


title: Olympic flame

text: Eleven women representing the Vestal Virgins, perform a celebration at the Temple of Hera in which the first torch of the Olympic Torch Relay is kindled by the light of the Sun. Its rays are concentrated by a parabolic mirror. A female performer acting as a priestess presents the torch and an olive branch to the first relay bearer (who also is a Greek athlete) followed by a dove release to symbolize peace.


title: Olympic flame

text: At the beginning of the ceremony, the Olympic anthem is sung first followed by the national anthem of the country hosting the Olympics and the national anthem of Greece along with the hoisting of the flags.


title: Olympic flame

text: After the ceremony at Olympia the Olympic flame first travels around Greece, and is then transferred during a ceremony in the Panathenaic Stadium in Athens from the previous Olympic city to the current year's host city.


title: Olympic flame

text: By contrast to the Olympic flame, the Olympic torch relay, which transports the flame from Olympia, Greece to the various designated sites of the Games, had no ancient precedent and was introduced by Carl Diem at the 1936 Summer Olympics in Berlin, Germany.


title: Olympic flame

text: At the first Olympic torch relay, the flame was transported from Olympia to Berlin over 3,187 kilometers (1,980 miles) by 3,331 runners in twelve days and eleven nights. There were minor protests in Yugoslavia and Czechoslovakia on the way, which were suppressed by the local security forces.


title: Olympic flame

text: In the 1956 Melbourne Games in Australia, local veterinary student Barry Larkin protested against the relay when he tricked onlookers by carrying a fake flame, consisting of a pair of underpants set on fire in a plum pudding can, attached to a chair leg. He successfully managed to hand over the fake flame to the Mayor of Sydney, Pat Hills and escape without being noticed.


title: Olympic flame

text: The Olympic torch travels routes that symbolise human achievement. Although most of the time the torch with the Olympic flame is still carried by runners, it has been transported in many different ways. The fire travelled by boat in 1948 and 2012 to cross the English Channel and was carried by rowers in Canberra as well as by dragon boat in Hong Kong in 2008.


title: Olympic flame

text: It was first transported by airplane in 1952 when the flame travelled to Helsinki. In 1956, all carriers in the torch relay to Stockholm, where the equestrian events were held instead of in Melbourne, travelled on horseback.


title: Olympic flame

text: Remarkable means of transportation were used in 1976, when the flame was transformed to a radio signal and transmitted from Europe to the New World: Heat sensors in Athens detected the flame, the signal was sent to Ottawa via satellite where it was received and used to trigger a laser beam to re-light the flame. The torch, but not the flame, was taken into space by astronauts in 1996, 2000 and 2013. Other unique means of transportation include a Native American canoe, a camel, and Concorde. The torch has been carried across water; the 1968 Grenoble Winter Games was carried across the port of Marseilles by a diver holding it aloft above the water. In 2000, an underwater flare was used by a diver across the Great Barrier Reef en route to the Sydney Games. In 2012 it was carried by boat across Bristol Harbour in the UK and on the front of a London Underground train to Wimbledon.


title: Olympic flame

text: In 2004, the first global torch relay was undertaken, a journey that lasted 78 days. The Olympic flame covered a distance of more than 78,000 km in the hands of some 11,300 torchbearers, travelling to Africa and South America for the first time, visiting all previous Olympic cities, and finally returning to Athens for the 2004 Summer Olympics.


title: Olympic flame

text: The 2008 Summer Olympics torch relay spanned all six inhabited continents before proceeding through China. However there was protests against China's human rights record in London where a "ring of steel" was formed around the flame to protect it, but one protester managed to grab hold of the torch while it was being held by television presenter Konnie Huq. In Paris the torch was extinguished at least twice by Chinese officials (five times according to French police) so that it could be transported in a bus amid protests while it was being paraded through Paris. This eventually led to the cancellation of the relay's last leg in the city. Demonstrations were also held in San Francisco and the route the torch would take was cut in half.


title: Olympic flame

text: As a result in 2009, the International Olympic Committee announced that future torch relays could be held only within the country hosting the Olympics after the initial Greek leg was finished. Although this rule took effect with the 2014 Winter Olympics, the organizers of the 2010 Winter Olympics in Vancouver and the 2012 Summer Olympics in London chose to hold their torch relays only in their respective hosting countries of Canada and the United Kingdom (except for brief stops in the United States and Ireland, respectively). In 2016, ten days before the beginning of the 2016 Summer Olympics in , citizens of , a city near , managed to extinguish the Olympic flame during a protest against the city spending money on hosting the Olympics despite an economic crisis in Brazil.


title: Olympic flame

text: The Olympic torch relay in the host country ends with the lighting of the Olympic cauldron during the opening ceremony in the central host stadium of the Games. The final carrier is often kept unannounced until the last moment. Over the years, it has become a tradition to let a famous athlete of the host nation, former athletes or athletes with significant achievements and milestones be the last runner in the Olympic torch relay.


title: Olympic flame

text: It is not uncommon for the Olympic flame to be accidentally or deliberately extinguished during the course of the torch relay (and on at least one occasion the cauldron itself has gone out during the Games). To guard against this eventuality, multiple copies of the flame are transported with the relay or maintained in backup locations. When a torch goes out, it is re-lit (or another torch is lit) from one of the backup sources. Thus, the fires contained in the torches and Olympic cauldrons all trace a common lineage back to the same Olympia lighting ceremony.


title: Olympic flame

text: The current design of the torch has a safeguard built into it: There are two flames inside the torch. There is a highly visible (yellow flame) portion that burns cooler and is more prone to extinguish in wind and rain, but there is also a smaller hotter (blue in the candle's wick) flame akin to a pilot light hidden inside the torch which is protected from wind and rain and is capable of relighting the cooler, more visible portion if it is extinguished. The fuel contained inside the torch is able to keep it lit for approximately 15 minutes before it would be extinguished.


title: Olympic flame

text: The flame is transported from Greece to the host country where the flame is transported by torch around the host nation to the main stadium.


title: Olympic flame

text: During the opening ceremony the final bearer of the torch runs towards the cauldron, often placed at the top of a grand staircase, and then uses the torch to start the flame in the stadium. The climactic transfer of the Olympic flame from the final torch to the cauldron at the central host stadium marks the symbolic commencement of the Games.


title: Olympic flame

text: As with being the final runner of the Olympic torch relay, it is considered to be a great honor to light the Olympic cauldron, and in the same way it has become a tradition to select notable athletes to conduct this part of the ceremony. On other occasions, the people who lit the cauldron in the stadium are not famous but nevertheless symbolize Olympic ideals. Japanese runner Yoshinori Sakai was born on the day of the atomic bombing of Hiroshima. He was chosen for the role to symbolize Japan's postwar reconstruction and peace, opening the 1964 Tokyo Games. At the 1976 Games in Montreal, two teenagers — one from the French-speaking part of the country, one from the English-speaking part — symbolized the unity of Canada.


title: Olympic flame

text: At the 2012 Games in London, the torch was carried by Sir Steve Redgrave to a group of seven young British athletes (Callum Airlie, Jordan Duckitt, Desiree Henry, Katie Kirk, Cameron MacRitchie, Aidan Reynolds and Adelle Tracey)  — each nominated by a British Olympic champion — who then each lit a single tiny flame on the ground, igniting 204 copper petals before they converged to form the cauldron for the Games.


title: Olympic flame

text: The first well-known athlete to light the cauldron in the stadium was the ninefold Olympic Champion Paavo Nurmi, who excited the home crowd in Helsinki in 1952. In 1968, Enriqueta Basilio became the first woman to light the Olympic Cauldron at the Olympic Games in Mexico City.


title: Olympic flame

text: Perhaps one of the most spectacular of Olympic cauldron lighting ceremonies took place at the 1992 Summer Olympics, when Paralympic archer Antonio Rebollo lit the cauldron by shooting a burning arrow over it, which ignited gas rising from the cauldron. Unofficial videos seem to indicate that the flame was lit from below. Twenty years after the Barcelona Games one of those involved said that the flame was "switched on" ("Se encendió con un botón", in Spanish). Two years later, the Olympic fire was brought into the stadium of Lillehammer by a ski jumper. In Beijing 2008, Li Ning "ran" on air around the interior edge of the Beijing National Stadium's roof, and lit a cauldron attached to it.


title: Olympic flame

text: The cauldron and the pedestal are always the subjects of unique and often dramatic design. These also tie in with "how" the cauldron is lit during the Opening Ceremony.


title: Olympic flame

text: After being lit the flame in the Olympic cauldron continues to burn during the Games, until the closing ceremony, when it is finally put out symbolizing the official end of the Games.


title: Olympic flame

text: The Olympic flame has been used as a symbol and a main motif numerous times in different commemorative coins. A recent example was the 50th anniversary of the Helsinki Olympic Games commemorative coin, minted in 2002. In the obverse, the Olympic flame above the Earth can be seen. Finland is the only country highlighted; it was the host of the 1952 games.


title: The Vengeance Trilogy

text: The Vengeance Trilogy () is the name given to a South Korean thematically-linked unofficial film trilogy directed by Park Chan-wook, comprising "Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance" (2002), "Oldboy" (2003) and "Lady Vengeance" (2005). Each film deals with the themes of revenge, ethics, violence and salvation. The films are not narratively connected and were dubbed a trilogy by international critics due to their thematic links. The trilogy is considered a revision of the European revenge tradition set amid the 21st century globalization traumas in South Korea.


title: The Vengeance Trilogy

text: The first installment in Park's trilogy was the 2002 film, "Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance", a bleak and violent tale of revenge gone wrong. It tells the story of a deaf-mute man who kidnaps a young girl to pay for his sister's much-needed kidney transplant. When the young girl accidentally dies, her bereaved father goes on a search for answers and vengeance. The film did relatively poorly at the box office in South Korea finishing 30th in ticket rank. It covered less than half its production costs in both domestic and international box office gates, where in the U.S. it garnered gross revenues of $45,243.


title: The Vengeance Trilogy

text: Park's next film in the trilogy was the hugely successful 2003 film, "Oldboy". It told the story of a man who is imprisoned for fifteen years and then released with no explanation as to why he was confined and released. Now, he has been given five days to learn his captor's true identity and find out why he was imprisoned, or his new love interest will be killed. The film was very well received at film festivals and at the box office in South Korea. It won the Grand Prix award at the 2004 Cannes Film Festival and received positive reviews from critics. The film has gained a cult following in the years following its release and is considered a modern classic.


title: The Vengeance Trilogy

text: The third and final installment in the trilogy was the 2005 film, "Lady Vengeance". The film tells the tale of an innocent young woman released from prison after doing time for a child-killer still at large. Once freed, she seeks out her long-lost daughter and unveils her plan for revenge against the ghastly man for whom she served time. This film was also well received by critics and South Korean audiences alike. It grossed $7,382,034 in its opening week and competed for the Golden Lion at the 62nd Venice International Film Festival in September 2005.


title: The Vengeance Trilogy

text: Kim Se Young explained the Trilogy's violence as "an allegorical tool which serves to convey social commentary pointed at the processes of democratization and capitalism in South Korea".


title: The Vengeance Trilogy

text: In the United Kingdom, Tartan Films issued a box set on DVD. In the United States, Vivendi Entertainment released the same set.


title: Sergei Krikalev

text: Sergei Konstantinovich Krikalev (, also transliterated as Sergei Krikalyov; born 27 August 1958) is a Russian mechanical engineer, former cosmonaut and former head of the Yuri Gagarin Cosmonaut Training Center.


title: Sergei Krikalev

text: As a prominent rocket scientist, he is a veteran of six space flights and ranks third to Gennady Padalka and Yuri Malenchenko for the most time spent in space: a total of 803 days, 9 hours, and 39 minutes.


title: Sergei Krikalev

text: Krikalev was stranded on board the Mir during the dissolution of the Soviet Union. As the country that had sent him into space no longer existed, his return was delayed and he stayed in space for 311 consecutive days, twice as long as the mission had originally called for.


title: Sergei Krikalev

text: He retired as a cosmonaut in 2007 and was working as vice president of Space Corporation Energia. From 2009 to 2014, he headed the Yuri Gagarin Cosmonaut Training Center.


title: Sergei Krikalev

text: Krikalev was born in Leningrad in the Soviet Union (now Saint Petersburg, Russia). He enjoyed swimming, skiing, cycling, aerobatic flying, and amateur radio operations, particularly from space (callsign U5MIR). He graduated from high school in 1975. In 1981, he received a mechanical engineering degree from the Leningrad Mechanical Institute, now called Baltic State Technical University.


title: Sergei Krikalev

text: After graduation in 1981, he joined NPO Energia, the Russian industrial organization responsible for manned space flight activities. He tested space flight equipment, developed space operations methods, and participated in ground control operations. When the Salyut 7 space station failed in 1985, he worked on the rescue mission team, developing procedures for docking with the uncontrolled station and repairing the station's on-board system.


title: Sergei Krikalev

text: Krikalev was selected as a cosmonaut in 1985, completed his basic training in 1986, and, for a time, was assigned to the Buran Shuttle program. In early 1988, he began training for his first long-duration flight aboard the Mir space station.


title: Sergei Krikalev

text: This training included preparations for at least six EVAs (space walks), installation of a new module, the first test of the new Manned Maneuvering Unit (MMU), and the second joint Soviet-French science mission. Soyuz TM-7 was launched on 26 November 1988, with Krikalev as flight engineer, Commander Aleksandr Volkov, and French astronaut Jean-Loup Chrétien. The previous crew (Vladimir Titov, Musa Manarov, and Valeri Polyakov) remained on Mir for another 25 days, marking the longest period a six-person crew had been in orbit. After the previous crew returned to Earth, Krikalev, Polyakov, and Volkov continued to conduct experiments aboard the Mir station. Because arrival of the next crew had been delayed, they prepared the Mir for a period of unmanned operations before returning to Earth on 27 April 1989.


title: Sergei Krikalev

text: In April 1990, Krikalev began preparing for his second flight as a member of the backup crew for the eighth long-duration Mir mission, which also included five EVAs and a week of Soviet-Japanese operations. In December 1990, Krikalev began training for the ninth Mir mission which included training for ten EVAs. Soyuz TM-12 launched on 19 May 1991, with Krikalev as flight engineer, Commander Anatoly Artsebarsky, and British astronaut Helen Sharman. Sharman returned to Earth with the following crew after one week, while Krikalev and Artsebarsky remained on Mir. During the summer, they conducted six EVAs to perform a variety of experiments and some station maintenance tasks.


title: Sergei Krikalev

text: In July 1991, Krikalev agreed to stay on Mir as flight engineer for the next crew, scheduled to arrive in October because the next two planned flights had been reduced to one. The engineer slot on the Soyuz TM-13 flight on 2 October 1991, was filled by Toktar Aubakirov, an astronaut from the Kazakh Soviet Socialist Republic, who had not been trained for a long-duration mission. Both Aubakirov and Franz Viehböck, the first Austrian astronaut, returned with Artsebarsky on 10 October 1991. Commander Alexander Volkov remained on board with Krikalev. After the crew replacement in October, Volkov and Krikalev continued Mir experiment operations and conducted another EVA before returning to Earth on 25 March 1992.


title: Sergei Krikalev

text: Throughout his various missions aboard Mir, Krikalev regularly communicated with various amateur radio operators (hams) across the globe. A particularly lengthy relationship was formed between Krikalev and amateur radio operator Margaret Iaquinto. At one point during one of his stays in space, he contacted her once a day for an entire year. Krikalev and Iaquinto successfully communicated via packet radio for the first time in history between an orbiting space station and an amateur radio operator. They communicated about personal matters, as well as political ones. Iaquinto set up a makeshift digital bulletin board that the Mir cosmonauts would often use to obtain uncensored western news and information regarding the state of the collapsing Soviet Union.


title: Sergei Krikalev

text: Krikalev was in space when the Soviet Union was dissolved on 26 December 1991. With the Baikonur Cosmodrome and the landing area both being located in the newly independent Kazakhstan, there was a great deal of uncertainty about the fate of his mission. He remained in space twice as long as originally planned, spending a total of 311 days in space. Because Krikalev spent so much time in space away from Earth’s center of gravity, time dilation (or the slowing down of clocks) caused him to be 0.02 seconds younger than other people born at the same time as him. He returned to Earth on 25 March and is sometimes referred to as the "last Soviet citizen". These events are documented and contextualized in Romanian filmmaker Andrei Ujică's 1995 documentary "Out of the Present". Krikalev's story inspired the 2017 film "Sergio & Sergei", directed by Ernesto Daranas.


title: Sergei Krikalev

text: In October 1992, NASA announced that an experienced cosmonaut would fly aboard a future Space Shuttle mission. Krikalev was one of two candidates named by the Russian Space Agency for mission specialist training with the crew of STS-60. In April 1993, he was assigned as prime mission specialist. In September 1993, Vladimir Titov was selected to fly on STS-63 with Krikalev training as his back-up.


title: Sergei Krikalev

text: Krikalev flew on STS-60, the first joint U.S./Russian Space Shuttle Mission. Launched on 3 February 1994, STS-60 was the second flight of the Space Habitation Module-2 (Spacehab-2), and the first flight of the Wake Shield Facility (WSF-1). During the eight-day flight, the crew of "Discovery" conducted a wide variety of materials science experiments, both on the Wake Shield Facility and in the Spacehab, Earth observation, and life science experiments. Krikalev conducted significant portions of the Remote Manipulator System (RMS) operations during the flight. Following 130 orbits of the Earth in , STS-60 landed at Kennedy Space Center, Florida, on 11 February 1994. With the completion of this flight, Krikalev logged an additional eight days, seven hours, nine minutes in space.


title: Sergei Krikalev

text: Krikalev returned to duty in Russia following his American experience on STS-60. Periodically he returned to the Johnson Space Center in Houston to work with CAPCOM in Mission Control and ground controllers in Russia supporting joint U.S./Russian Missions STS-63, STS-71, STS-74 and STS-76.


title: Sergei Krikalev

text: Krikalev and Robert Cabana became the first people to enter the ISS in December 1998, when they turned on the lights in the US module "Unity".


title: Sergei Krikalev

text: Krikalev flew on STS-88 "Endeavour" (4–15 December 1998), the first International Space Station assembly mission. During the 12-day mission the "Unity" module was mated with "Zarya" module. Two crew members performed three space walks to connect umbilicals and attach tools and hardware for use in future EVAs. The crew also performed IMAX Cargo Bay Camera (ICBC) operations, and deployed two satellites, Mighty Sat 1 and SAC-A. The mission was accomplished in 185 orbits of the Earth in 283 hours and 18 minutes.


title: Sergei Krikalev

text: Krikalev was a member of the Expedition 1 crew. They launched 31 October 2000, on a Soyuz rocket from Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan, successfully docking with the station on 2 November 2000. During their stay on the station they prepared the inside of the orbital outpost for future crews. They also saw the station grow in size with the installation of the U.S. solar array structure and the U.S. "Destiny" Laboratory Module. They left the station with the STS-102 crew, undocking from the station on 18 March with landing at the Kennedy Space Center, Florida, on 21 March 2001.


title: Sergei Krikalev

text: Krikalev was also the Commander of Expedition 11. He lived and worked aboard the International Space Station on a six-month tour of duty. This was the third time he had flown to the International Space Station. Expedition 11 launched from Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan on 14 April 2005 aboard a Soyuz spacecraft and docked with the ISS on 16 April 2005. Following eight days of joint operations and handover briefings, they replaced the Expedition 10 crew who returned to earth aboard Soyuz. Expedition 11 plans called for two spacewalks, the first in August from the US "Quest" airlock in US spacesuits, and the second, in September, in Russian spacesuits from the "Pirs" airlock. On 16 August 2005 at 1:44 a.m. EDT he passed the record of 748 days in space held by Sergei Avdeyev.


title: Sergei Krikalev

text: Expedition 11 undocked from the ISS on 10 October 2005 at 5:49 p.m. EDT and landed in Kazakhstan on 10 October 2005 at 9:09 p.m. EDT. They were replaced by William S. McArthur and Valeri Tokarev, the crew of Expedition 12.


title: Sergei Krikalev

text: In completing his sixth space flight, Krikalev logged 803 days and 9 hours and 39 minutes in space, including eight EVAs. He is currently third to Gennady Padalka and Yuri Malenchenko in the record for the most time spent in space.


title: Sergei Krikalev

text: Krikalev's contributions to the ISS were not limited to his on-orbit time. On 15 June 2007, Krikalev was brought to the Russian Mission Control center to instruct Expedition 15 Flight Engineer Oleg Kotov on how he and ISS Commander Fyodor Yurchikhin could jump-start the Russian segment's crippled computer systems.


title: Sergei Krikalev

text: On 15 February 2007, Krikalev was appointed Vice President of the S.P. Korolev Rocket and Space Corporation Energia (Russian: Ракетно-космическая корпорация "Энергия" им. С.П.Королева) in charge of manned space flights. In that office, he was the administrator of the Yuri Gagarin Cosmonaut Training Center from 2009 to 2014.


title: Sergei Krikalev

text: A character based on Krikalev features in the 2017 Cuban film drama "Sergio and Sergei", in which a professor and amateur radio enthusiast in Havana contacts a cosmonaut named Sergei aboard the "Mir" space station. The film draws parallels between economic hardships in Cuba at the time and the fall of the Soviet Union, which occurred as the real-life Krikalev was aboard "Mir".


title: Sergei Krikalev

text: Chilean rock band "Fulano" composed a song after him, named Krikalev, included in their 1997 album "Trabajos Inútiles" (Useless works).


title: Sergei Krikalev

text: He was a member of the Russian and Soviet national aerobatic flying teams, and was Champion of Moscow in 1983, and Champion of the Soviet Union in 1986.


title: Sergei Krikalev

text: For his contributions to the Russian space program, he was the very first person awarded with the title of Hero of the Russian Federation.


title: Sergei Krikalev

text: He overtook Sergei Avdeyev's previous record for the career total time spent in space (747.59 days) during Expedition 11 to the International Space Station. Krikalev has logged a total of 803 days and 9 hours and 39 minutes in space.


title: Sergei Krikalev

text: On 23 May 2007 Sergei Krikalev was selected as an honorary citizen of Saint Petersburg together with conductor Valery Gergiev.


title: Sergei Krikalev

text: Krikalev was one of five cosmonauts selected to raise the Russian flag at the Sochi 2014 Winter Olympics opening ceremony.


title: Julie Hesmondhalgh

text: Julie Claire Hesmondhalgh (born 25 February 1970) is an English actress and narrator. She is known for her role as Hayley Cropper in the ITV soap opera "Coronation Street" between 1998 and 2014. For this role, she won Best Serial Drama Performance at the 2014 National Television Awards and Best Actress at the 2014 British Soap Awards.


title: Julie Hesmondhalgh

text: Hesmondhalgh's other regular television roles include "Cucumber" (2015), "Happy Valley" (2016), "Broadchurch" (2017) and "The Pact" (2021). Her stage credits include "God Bless the Child" at the Royal Court Theatre in London (2014), and "Wit" at the Royal Exchange, Manchester (2016).


title: Julie Hesmondhalgh

text: Hesmondhalgh was born in Accrington, Lancashire. She applied to drama school aged 18, and studied at the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art from 1988 to 1991 (one of her classmates was Benito Martinez). On finishing her training, Hesmondhalgh was a part of Arts Threshold, a small independent theatre in London, for several years, and worked with Rufus Norris in his directorial debut. In the 1990s, she appeared in such television dramas as "The Bill", Catherine Cookson's "The Dwelling Place", and in the Victoria Wood comedic television movie "Pat and Margaret".


title: Julie Hesmondhalgh

text: Hesmondhalgh is best known for playing Hayley Cropper in the ITV soap opera "Coronation Street". Making her debut appearance on the show in January 1998, she played the first transgender character in a British soap opera. She took maternity leave from the soap between 2000 and 2001 after the birth of her first daughter. After nearly ten years on the show, Hesmondhalgh decided to take another break for a year in order to spend more time with her family. She left on 22 October 2007 and returned on 17 November 2008. On 24 December 2011, Hesmondhalgh appeared on ITV's "The Cube", winning £20,000 for her Accrington-based anti-poverty charity, Maundy Relief.


title: Julie Hesmondhalgh

text: Hesmondhalgh's character Hayley was involved in high-profile storylines, including one concerning a gender transition, and a hostage storyline in the Underworld factory in which Hayley and Carla Connor (Alison King) were kidnapped, bound and gagged by rogue businessman Tony Gordon, who intended to murder them. They escaped unharmed, although Tony was killed in the ensuing explosion. On 11 January 2013, ITV announced that Hesmondhalgh would be leaving "Coronation Street" in January 2014 after 15 years on the show, and that her character Hayley was to leave in a controversial right-to-die storyline, following a battle with pancreatic cancer. Hesmondhalgh filmed her final scenes on 18 November 2013; they were broadcast on 22 January 2014, the night she won a National Television Award for Best Performance in a Serial Drama, which she shared with her longtime co-star, David Neilson. Over 10 million viewers tuned in to Hayley's final episode, where she ended her life. She worked with pancreatic cancer charities to raise awareness of the disease, and was involved in a petition and attended a parliamentary debate on the subject in 2014.


title: Julie Hesmondhalgh

text: From 22 January 2015, Hesmondhalgh played the role of Cleo Whitaker in the Channel 4 drama series "Cucumber", written by Russell T Davies. She also appeared in the BBC Four film "Black Roses: The Killing of Sophie Lancaster," a television film about the murder of Sophie Lancaster. Hesmondhalgh played the role of Sophie's mother, Sylvia Lancaster, a role which she previously portrayed on stage. Hesmondhalgh is friends with Sylvia Lancaster and patron of the Sophie Lancaster Foundation. In 2015, Hesmondhalgh won a Royal Television Society Award for Best Female Actor in a Drama for her role as Sylvia.


title: Julie Hesmondhalgh

text: In 2015, Hesmondhalgh appeared in an episode of the BBC drama "Moving On", with Shane Richie and John Thomson, as well as the one episode of "Inside No 9", written by Steve Pemberton and Reece Shearsmith.


title: Julie Hesmondhalgh

text: In 2016, Hesmondhalgh joined the cast of acclaimed drama thriller "Happy Valley" for its second series on BBC One. She was offered the role by creator, writer and executive producer Sally Wainwright. Hesmondhalgh's character Amanda Wadsworth, is a midwife and working mother from Yorkshire who has a fraught relationship with her husband, John (Kevin Doyle).


title: Julie Hesmondhalgh

text: In 2017, Hesmondhalgh played the role of rape victim Trish in the third and final series of "Broadchurch" on ITV.


title: Julie Hesmondhalgh

text: In 2019, Hesmondhalgh played Amanda in the first episode of the final season of Channel 4's "Catastrophe" with Rob Delaney and Sharon Horgan. In March 2019, it was announced that Hesmondhalgh would be appearing in a new six part ITV comedy drama, "The Trouble with Maggie Cole", with Dawn French.


title: Julie Hesmondhalgh

text: In 2019 Methuen Drama published her Working Diary as part of their Theatre Makers series. She is, with writer Becx Harrison and visual artist Grant Archer, co-founder of Take Back, a Manchester-based theatre collective dedicated to making script in hand rapid responses to social and political events.


title: Julie Hesmondhalgh

text: In 2020, Hesmondhalgh played Heather in the third series of "The A Word". In May 2021, Hesmondhalgh played Nancy in the BBC1 series "The Pact", alongside Laura Fraser, Rakie Ayola, Eiry Thomas, Aneurin Barnard and Jason Hughes. The series, set in Wales, was written by Pete McTighe.


title: Julie Hesmondhalgh

text: In 2021, Hesmondhalgh started narrating the revival of The Weakest Link, taking over from Jon Briggs.


title: Julie Hesmondhalgh

text: From 19–29 September 2012, Hesmondhalgh appeared at the Royal Exchange Theatre in Manchester, portraying Sylvia Lancaster in "Black Roses: The Killing of Sophie Lancaster" opposite Rachel Austin. The play was based on the real-life story of Sylvia's late daughter, Sophie Lancaster. Hesmondhalgh won a Manchester Theatre Award for Best Studio Performance in 2013.


title: Julie Hesmondhalgh

text: On 23 January 2014, she returned to the Royal Exchange Theatre for her first role since leaving "Coronation Street", in the Simon Stephens play "Blindsided", which ran until 15 February that year. From 12 November to 20 December 2014, she appeared in "God Bless The Child" at the Royal Court Theatre in London, directed by Vicky Featherstone, playing Mrs Bradley, with Amanda Abbington.


title: Julie Hesmondhalgh

text: In June 2015, Hesmondhalgh performed a script-in-hand scratch performance of her first one-woman play, "These I Love", at Gulliver's in Manchester.


title: Julie Hesmondhalgh

text: In January 2016, she played Vivian Bearing, an American Professor of Poetry dying of ovarian cancer, in Margaret Edson's "Wit" at The Royal Exchange main stage, directed by Raz Shaw, for which she was nominated for a TMA and won a Manchester Theatre Award for Best Female Performance.


title: Julie Hesmondhalgh

text: She is a founder member of a Manchester-based grassroots theatre company creating work about social issues, Take Back, which she runs with Rebekah Harrison and Grant Archer, and to which she has contributed as a writer and actor. She is a member of The Gap collective, a new writing company in Manchester and performed their first gala performance at Halle St Peters in September 2015, in a piece by her husband Ian Kershaw.


title: Julie Hesmondhalgh

text: On 30 April 2017, Hesmondhalgh starred in a one-off performance at the Royal Court Theatre, of Lemn Sissay's "The Report", directed by John E. McGrath.


title: Julie Hesmondhalgh

text: In February 2018, she starred as Renee in "The Almighty Sometimes" by Kendall Feaver. It was directed by Katy Rudd at the Royal Exchange.


title: Julie Hesmondhalgh

text: In February 2019, she performed the title role in "Mother Courage and Her Children" by Bertolt Brecht, adapted by Anna Jordan. It was directed by Amy Hodge at the Royal Exchange, Manchester.


title: Julie Hesmondhalgh

text: Hesmondhalgh is married to screenwriter Ian Kershaw. The couple live in Tameside with their two daughters.


title: Julie Hesmondhalgh

text: Hesmondhalgh is a Labour Party member. In August 2015, she endorsed Jeremy Corbyn's campaign in the Labour Party leadership election. She tweeted: "Proudly supporting Jeremy Corbyn in the Labour leadership contest." She campaigned for Corbyn as party leader in the 2017 UK general election. In May 2017, speaking at Labour's general election campaign launch in Manchester, she said: "I realised the Labour party and its core values would finally be in line with my own deeply held socialist beliefs about equality, justice and peace."


title: Julie Hesmondhalgh

text: On 1 May 2013, Hesmondhalgh appeared on ITV game show "All Star Mr & Mrs" with husband Ian, and won £20,000 for Maundy Relief.


title: Julie Hesmondhalgh

text: Hesmondhalgh is a patron of the following organisations: Trans Media Watch, Maundy Relief, Marple Drama, WAST, Manchester People's Assembly, Reuben's Retreat, The Alex Williams Believe and Achieve Trust, and The Sophie Lancaster Foundation (for whom she and Ian held a creative writing competition in schools across the North West in 2011). The latter organisation was set up following the murder of Sophie Lancaster.


title: Julie Hesmondhalgh

text: In 2019, she set up the group 500 Acts of Kindness, a fundraising community where 500 members donate a pound a week to give to an individual, group, family or organisation in need.


title: Blackpool Tower

text: Blackpool Tower is a tourist attraction in Blackpool, Lancashire, England, which was opened to the public on 14 May 1894. When it opened, Blackpool Tower was the tallest man made structure in the British Empire. Inspired by the Eiffel Tower in Paris, it is tall and is the 125th-tallest freestanding tower in the world. Blackpool Tower is also the common name for the Tower Buildings, an entertainment complex in a red-brick three-storey block that comprises the tower, Tower Circus, the Tower Ballroom, and roof gardens, which was designated a Grade I listed building in 1973.


title: Blackpool Tower

text: The Blackpool Tower Company was founded by London-based Standard Contract & Debenture Corporation in 1890; it bought an aquarium on Central Promenade with the intention of building a replica Eiffel Tower on the site. John Bickerstaffe, a former mayor of Blackpool, was asked to become chairman of the new company, and its shares went on sale in July 1891. The Standard Corporation kept 30,000 £1 shares and offered £150,000 worth of shares to the public; initially only two-thirds were taken up, forcing the company to ask for more cash contributions from its existing shareholders, but the poor financial situation of the company, exacerbated by the falling share price, rendered it unable to pay. Bickerstaffe, to avoid the potential collapse of the venture, bought any available shares until his original holding of £500 amounted to £20,000. He also released the Standard Corporation from its share commitments. When the Tower opened in 1894, its success justified the investment of nearly £300,000, and the company made a £30,000 profit in 1896.


title: Blackpool Tower

text: Two Lancashire architects, James Maxwell and Charles Tuke, designed the tower and oversaw the laying of its foundation stone on 29 September 1891. By the time the Tower finally opened on 14 May 1894, both men had died. Heenan & Froude, then of Manchester, were appointed structural engineers, supplying and constructing both the tower, the electric lighting and the steel front pieces for the aquariums. A new system of hydraulic riveting was used, based on the technology of Fielding & Platt of Gloucester.


title: Blackpool Tower

text: The total cost for the design and construction of the tower and buildings was about £290,000. Five million Accrington bricks, of steel and of cast iron were used to construct the tower and base. Unlike the Eiffel Tower, Blackpool Tower is not freestanding. Its base is hidden by the building that houses Blackpool Tower Circus. The building occupies a total of . At the summit of the tower there is a flagpole where the height at the top measures from the ground. A time capsule was buried under the foundation stone on 25 September 1891.


title: Blackpool Tower

text: The tower's design was ahead of its time. As a writer for the BBC noted: "In heavy winds the building will gently sway, what a magnificent Victorian engineering masterpiece."


title: Blackpool Tower

text: When the Tower opened, 3,000 customers took the first rides to the top. Tourists paid sixpence for admission, sixpence more for a ride in the lifts to the top, and a further sixpence for the circus. The first members of the public to ascend the tower had been local journalists in September 1893, using constructors' ladders. The top of the Tower caught fire in 1897, and the platform was seen on fire from up to away.


title: Blackpool Tower

text: The Tower was not painted properly during its first thirty years and became corroded, leading to discussions about demolishing it. However, it was decided to rebuild it instead, and all the steelwork in the structure was replaced and renewed between 1920 and 1924. On 22 December 1894, Norwegian ship "Abana" was sailing from Liverpool to Savannah, Georgia, but was caught up in a storm, and mistook the recently built Blackpool Tower for a lighthouse. "Abana" was first seen off North Pier, and later drifted to Little Bispham where she was wrecked, and can still be seen at low tide. The ship's bell still hangs in St Andrews Church in Cleveleys.


title: Blackpool Tower

text: In 1940, during the Second World War, the crow's nest was removed to allow the structure to be used as a Royal Air Force radar station known as 'RAF Tower', which proved unsuccessful.


title: Blackpool Tower

text: A post box was opened at the top of the tower in 1949. The hydraulic lifts to the top of the tower were replaced in 1956–57 and the winding-gear was converted to use an electric motor.


title: Blackpool Tower

text: The top of the tower was painted silver in 1977 as part of Queen Elizabeth's Silver Jubilee celebrations. A giant model of King Kong was placed on the side of the tower in 1984. In 1985, escapologist Karl Bartoni and his bride were married suspended in a cage from the tower.


title: Blackpool Tower

text: The lifts and winding gear were again replaced in 1992. The same year, the tower complex was renamed Tower World, and was opened by Diana, Princess of Wales. The tower is usually painted in dark red, except for its centenary year in 1994 when it was painted gold by abseiling painters. In 1998, a "Walk of Faith" glass floor panel was opened at the top of the tower. Made up of two sheets of laminated glass, it weighs half a tonne and is two inches thick. In October 2007, a laser beam installed on the Tower for the duration of the annual Illuminations was criticised by astronomer Sir Patrick Moore, presenter of television programme "The Sky at Night", who said: "Light pollution is a huge problem. I am not saying we should turn all the lights out, that is not practical, but there are some things which are very unnecessary. The Blackpool Tower light is certainly something I do not think we should be doing. I very much oppose it." The beam could be seen away; Moore called for it to be stopped. The centre for Astrophysics at the University of Central Lancashire in Preston said the laser has added to a spiralling problem affecting astronomy.


title: Blackpool Tower

text: The tower continued to be owned by the Bickerstaffe family until 1964, when the Blackpool Tower Company was sold to EMI. Since then it has been owned by Trust House Forte, First Leisure, and Leisure Parcs Ltd, owned by Trevor Hemmings. In March 2010, it was announced that Blackpool Council had bought Blackpool Tower, and that the Merlin Entertainment Group would manage it and add various attractions, including a new Dungeon attraction, and a new observation deck called Blackpool Tower Eye would operate at the top of the tower. The company was also to manage the Blackpool Louis Tussauds waxwork museum, to be rebranded as Madame Tussauds.


title: Blackpool Tower

text: On 12 December 2021, the Tower was evacuated after reports of smoke. Fire services found it was caused by an electrical fault in a neighbouring property.


title: Blackpool Tower

text: The top of the tower is currently known as the Blackpool Tower Eye. At a height of , the Eye is the highest observation deck in North West England. It was previously known simply as the Tower Top, until it reopened in September 2011. Reopening after a major renovation, new owner Blackpool Council brought in Merlin Entertainments to manage the attractions, with Merlin deciding to incorporate the tower into its range of "Eye" branded attractions.


title: Blackpool Tower

text: The original ballroom, the Tower Pavilion, opened in August 1894. It was smaller than the present ballroom, and occupied the front of the tower complex. The Tower Ballroom was built between 1897 and 1898 to the designs of Frank Matcham, who also designed Blackpool Grand Theatre, and it opened in 1899. It was commissioned by the Tower company in response to the opening of the Empress Ballroom in the Winter Gardens. The ballroom floor is and is made up of 30,602 blocks of mahogany, oak and walnut. Above the stage is the inscription ""Bid me discourse, I will enchant thine ear"", from the poem "Venus and Adonis" by William Shakespeare. Each crystal chandelier in the ballroom can be lowered to the floor to be cleaned, which takes over a week.


title: Blackpool Tower

text: From 1930 until his retirement in 1970, the resident organist was Reginald Dixon, known affectionately worldwide as "Mr. Blackpool". The first Wurlitzer organ was installed in 1929, but it was replaced in 1935 by one designed by Dixon. Ernest Broadbent took over as resident organist in 1970, retiring due to ill-health in 1977. The current resident organist is Phil Kelsall who has been playing the organ at the Tower since 1975, when he started in the circus. Kelsall became resident in the ballroom in 1977, and he was awarded an MBE like Dixon in 2010 for services to music.


title: Blackpool Tower

text: The ballroom was damaged by fire in December 1956; the dance floor was destroyed, along with the restaurant underneath the ballroom. Restoration took two years and cost £500,000, with many of the former designers and builders coming out of retirement to assist; the restaurant then became the Tower Lounge.


title: Blackpool Tower

text: The BBC series "Come Dancing" was televised from the Tower Ballroom for many years; it has also hosted editions of "Strictly Come Dancing", including the grand finals of the second and ninth series, on 11 December 2004 and 17 December 2011 respectively.


title: Blackpool Tower

text: The Blackpool Junior Dance Festival ("Open to the World") has been held each year in the ballroom since 1964.


title: Blackpool Tower

text: Dancing was not originally allowed on Sundays; instead, sacred music was played. The ballroom also originally had very strict rules, including:


title: Blackpool Tower

text: The ballroom has had a number of resident dance bands including Bertini and his band, and Charlie Barlow. Other smaller dance bands have also appeared as residents, including the Eric Delaney Band and the Mike James Band.


title: Blackpool Tower

text: Under the management of Leisure Parcs, and the direction of bandleader Greg Francis, the Blackpool Tower Big Band was reformed in 2001 after an absence of 25 years. The New Squadronaires, the Memphis Belle Swing Orchestra and the Glenn Miller Tribute Orchestra also performed. Themed nights were also introduced along with the sixteen-piece orchestra, with resident singers including Tony Benedict, Lynn Kennedy, Robert Young and Mark Porter. The Empress Orchestra became resident in the ballroom in 2005, alongside the specially created and smaller Empress Dance Band.


title: Blackpool Tower

text: The Tower's orchestrion is now in the collection of Thinktank, Birmingham Science Museum. The ballroom, together with the Tower, Circus and Roof Garden, were designated a Grade I listed building in 1973.


title: Blackpool Tower

text: The Tower Circus is positioned at the base of the tower, between its four legs. The circus first opened to the public on 14 May 1894, when admission was from 6d, and has not missed a season since.


title: Blackpool Tower

text: The circus ring can be lowered into a pool of water and holds at a depth of up to , which allows for Grand Finales with Dancing Fountains. The Tower Circus is one of four left in the world that can do this.


title: Blackpool Tower

text: The clown Charlie Cairoli appeared at the tower for 39 years. Britain's best-known ringmaster Norman Barrett worked the ring for 25 years, while Henry Lytton Jr. was Ringmaster here from 1954 to 1965.


title: Blackpool Tower

text: Animals appeared in the circus until 1990. It was planned to close the circus at the end of the 1990 season and replace it with an animatronic attraction. Public opinion and the fact the animatronics were not ready meant that the circus continued.


title: Blackpool Tower

text: Today, the circus is produced and directed by Hungarian Laci Endresz, who is married to Maureen, one of the Roberts family who have a long association with the Tower Circus. A live band (sometimes accompanied by Mooky the Clown) provides all the music for the show, often dynamically syncing with the performers' movements. The circus band play a variety of different songs, usually Latin for the acts. In winter, the circus stages a pantomime instead of the regular show.


title: Blackpool Tower

text: Dr. Cocker's Aquarium, Aviary and Menagerie had existed on the site since 1873. It was kept open to earn revenue while the Tower building went up around it, and then became one of the Tower's major attractions. The aquarium was modelled on the limestone caverns in Derbyshire. It housed 57 different species of fresh water and salt water fish, and the largest tank held of salt water. The menagerie and aviary were regarded as one of the finest collections in the country, and included lions, tigers, and polar bears.


title: Blackpool Tower

text: The menagerie continued until 1973, when it was closed following the opening of Blackpool Zoo near Stanley Park. Due to the Tower being run by Merlin Entertainments, which also runs the nearby Sea Life Centre, the aquarium closed in 2010, and was remodelled to make way for a new "Dungeons" attraction.


title: Blackpool Tower

text: Jungle Jim's Children's Indoor Play was a large indoor children's adventure playground situated within the Tower. It featured a £3 million interactive play scheme, based on a notional lost city, covering over . Children could tackle a series of adventures in search of hidden treasure. A new attraction "The Fifth Floor" which is a brand new multi-functional free family entertainment and events area opened in September 2019 as well as a VR roller coaster ride and a circus themed arcade.


title: Blackpool Tower

text: The Tower Lounge Bar was a large pub with a capacity of 1,700, but staff usually limited occupancy to 1,400 for a more relaxed atmosphere. It closed down in 2014, and has since reopened as a Harry Ramsden's fish and chip restaurant.


title: Blackpool Tower

text: The Blackpool Tower Dungeon is part of an international chain of Dungeon experiences operated by Merlin Entertainments. Opened in 2011, it incorporates elements of history with fear, and shows based on gallows humour. It also features "Drop Dead", a drop tower that simulates being executed by hanging. As an addition to the Dungeon brand Merlin introduced the first ever Dungeon themed Escape Room in 2017.


title: Blackpool Tower

text: Merlin Entertainments launched Dino Mini Golf, an indoor crazy golf course with "9 holes of prehistoric fun", in March 2018. It has been described by Aaron Edgar, the Blackpool Tower Operations manager, as "65 years in the making".


title: Blackpool Tower

text: Visible through the glass floor of the Tower Eye on the promenade some below, is Blackpool's famous "Comedy Carpet". In front of the tower, the "Comedy Carpet" by Gordon Young is a celebration of the resort's long comedic history in the form of a visual pavement of jokes and catchphrases, embedded into the surface of the revamped promenade. From above, it is easy to read the eternal catchphrase of the late Sir Bruce Forsyth, "Nice to see you - to see you... nice!".


title: Blackpool Tower

text: Painting the Tower structure takes seven years to complete, and the workers who maintain the structure are known as "Stick Men". There are 563 steps from the roof of the Tower building to the top of the Tower, which the maintenance teams use for the structure's upkeep. If the wind speed exceeds , the top of the Tower is closed as a safety precaution; if the wind reaches the tower top sways by an inch. of cables are used to feed the 10,000 light bulbs which are used to illuminate the Tower. In April 2002, the Tower maintenance team was featured in the BBC One programme "Britain’s Toughest Jobs".


title: Blackpool Tower

text: The tower is a visual reporting point (VRP) for general aviation aircraft in the local Blackpool airspace.


title: BioShock: The Collection

text: BioShock: The Collection is a compilation of the "BioShock" video games, developed by Blind Squirrel Games and published by 2K Games. The collection features upgraded versions of "BioShock", "BioShock 2", and "BioShock Infinite", with new textures and support for higher resolution displays and framerates. The collection was released in September 2016 for Microsoft Windows, PlayStation 4, and Xbox One; versions for macOS and Nintendo Switch followed in August 2017 and May 2020, respectively.


title: BioShock: The Collection

text: A remaster of the "BioShock" series was widely rumored for years before its official announcement. After its release, the game was updated to address bugs and crashes. Critical reception of "The Collection" was generally positive, with praise focusing on the value of the collection and its appeal for new players of the franchise. Complaints included the relative lack of updates to later games in the collection and technical performance. The game was a bestselling title in the United States and United Kingdom in its initial months of release.


title: BioShock: The Collection

text: "BioShock: The Collection" contains all three titles in the "BioShock" series: "BioShock", "BioShock 2", and "BioShock Infinite". The games are first-person shooters, with a focus on story and character customization. Players wield guns and superpower-granting genetic modifications called Plasmids. Also included in the collection are the games' single-player content originally released as exclusives or downloadable content packs, including "" and "". The multiplayer component of "BioShock 2" is not included. It includes the challenge game modes from all three releases, and the Museum of Orphaned Concepts, a feature from in which the player explores an in-game gallery of abandoned development concepts.


title: BioShock: The Collection

text: "BioShock" and "BioShock 2" were remastered for the collection, with higher-resolution textures and new effects. The collection adds a director's commentary called "Imagining BioShock", featuring the series' creative director Ken Levine and lead artist Shawn Robertson. Players unlock episodes of the commentary by finding new collectible objects added to the remastered "BioShock". The remastered games run in 1080p resolution at 60 frames per second on Xbox One and Playstation 4.


title: BioShock: The Collection

text: Blind Squirrel Games, who previously worked with "BioShock" series developers Irrational Games on "BioShock Infinite", assisted series producer 2K Games with development of the remastered collection. 2K decided not to remaster the Microsoft Windows edition of "BioShock Infinite", which already met their graphical standards for the updated console editions when configured to use its highest graphical settings. News of the remastered collection leaked from retailers and trademarks several times in advance of its June 2016 announcement.


title: BioShock: The Collection

text: The collection was released on PlayStation 4 and Xbox One platforms in North America on September 13, 2016, and worldwide two days later, on September 15, 2016. The collection was released for Microsoft Windows on September 15, 2016, and its remastered versions of "BioShock" and "BioShock 2" were given as upgrades for those who owned the original Windows PC editions. A macOS version published by Feral Interactive released on August 22, 2017. Also produced was a limited run of 450 "Ultra Limited Edition" copies of the game which included an art book, reversible poster, and coin. The Xbox One and PlayStation 4 retail release is spread across 2 discs.


title: BioShock: The Collection

text: On release, players of the Windows versions noted that the remastered versions of the games retained bugs and removed graphic options without tweaking configuration files. 2K acknowledged issues with the game, and subsequently released a patch in early October 2016 to address a lack of graphics options, crashes, better monitor support and mouse controls.


title: BioShock: The Collection

text: In 2020, enhancement patches were released to increase the resolution of the games when played on Xbox One X and Playstation 4 Pro. The patch boosted the resolution of the first two games to 1440p on PS4 Pro and 2160p on Xbox One X, and 1440p for both consoles for "Infinite". The collection was also released on the Nintendo Switch in May. It maintains the upgraded assets for the remasters of "BioShock" and "BioShock 2", and runs at 1080p at 30 frames per second when docked, dropping to 720p in portable mode.


title: BioShock: The Collection

text: "BioShock: The Collection" received "generally favorable" reviews according to video game review aggregator Metacritic, with platform scores between 80 and 84 out of 100. Critics generally recommended the collection for players unfamiliar with the franchise, as well as returning players, though others, such as "IGN"s Jonathon Dornbush, felt that the collection's appeal to longtime players was less clear.


title: BioShock: The Collection

text: "Game Revolution"s Peter Paras praised the updated visuals for the first two games, although they also noted that they felt dated graphically compared to modern games. While reviews generally noted improved performance on most games, others highlighted frame rate inconsistencies that "Infinite" still suffered from. The games' atmosphere was regarded to have remained intact and effective, beyond the aging of the graphics themselves.


title: BioShock: The Collection

text: "Nintendo Life" noted that the earlier game's lack of more recent genre conventions such as aim down sights or sprinting gave them a decidedly "old school" feel that took time to get acclimated to. More critically, "Insider Gamer"s Derek Taal said that the gameplay of the early games had aged poorly, and occasionally proved frustrating. Dornbush and others lamented that most of the improvements were for the first "BioShock" and the subsequent titles received less attention. Other criticisms included inconsistent controls between games and audiovisual glitches.


title: BioShock: The Collection

text: The game was the first best-selling retail video game in the United Kingdom in its week of release in competition with seven other new releases. Sales dropped by 50% in its second week, but it maintained its top position on the charts. It dropped to fourth place the following week, and out of the top 10 games the next. In the United States, the collection was the fifth best-selling title of September according to NPD Group, before dropping out of the top ten the following month.<ref name="venturebeat-npd 09/2016"></ref>


title: Romee Strijd

text: Romee Strijd ( , ; born 19 July 1995) is a Dutch model. A former Victoria's Secret Angel, she appeared in the brand's annual fashion show from 2014 to 2018. She has worked for brands including Alexander McQueen, Michael Kors, and Carolina Herrera. She has also appeared in magazines such as Vogue, Elle, and Harper's Bazaar.


title: Romee Strijd

text: Strijd was born in Zoetermeer, South Holland. She has one younger sister Ise Strijd. She was approached by a scout when she was 13 in Amsterdam and turned it down as she was too nervous and had other dreams. After two years, at 15, she wanted to give modelling a try and was signed to DNA model agency in 2011. She left school to pursue modelling, but returned at the age of 17 to the Netherlands to finish school because the career was overwhelming and she missed home. After time off from modelling she realized her love for modelling and moved to New York City after graduating.


title: Romee Strijd

text: Strijd signed with the DNA Model Management agency at 15 years old and worked for two years in Milan, Paris and New York City for brands like Burberry, Louis Vuitton and Prada before taking a break. She has appeared in editorials for British, German, Spanish, Turkish, Japanese and Dutch "Vogue", French, Italian, and Dutch "Elle", Spanish and Greek "Harper's Bazaar", Dutch "Marie Claire", and French "Madame Figaro".


title: Romee Strijd

text: She has been on the cover of several versions of Vogue, Unconditional Magazine, Harper's Bazaar, Exit, Elle and Maxim (magazine). She posed 26 weeks pregnant on the cover of the November 2020 issue of Dutch Vogue, after She inspired the magazine to dedicate an issue to motherhood.


title: Romee Strijd

text: She has walked runway shows for Alexander McQueen, Badgley Mischka, Balmain, Burberry, Calvin Klein, Celine, Christopher Kane, DKNY, Jeremy Scott, Donna Karan, EDUN, Giambattista Valli, Hussein Chalayan, Isabel Marant, Jil Sander, Jill Stuart, Kenzo, Loewe, Louis Vuitton, Marchesa, Michael Kors, Nina Ricci, Peter Som, Phillip Lim, Prabal Gurung, Prada, Rag & Bone, Rochas, Roland Mouret, Vera Wang, Off White and Victoria's Secret.


title: Romee Strijd

text: She has appeared in campaigns for Carolina Herrera, Alexander McQueen, Donna Karan, Stradivarius, Michael Kors, Giuseppe Zanotti, H&M, Juicy Couture, Victoria's Secret, and Marchesa.


title: Romee Strijd

text: In 2014, she was chosen to be one of the newcomers at the Victoria's Secret Fashion Show. In 2015, she became a Victoria's Secret Angel. In March 2017 she announced that she was now represented by IMG Models.


title: Romee Strijd

text: In 2018, She was chosen to wear the Shooting Star Swarovski Look in the Victoria's Secret Fashion Show. In 2018, she became a brand ambassador for popular Australian swimwear brand Seafolly.


title: Romee Strijd

text: Strijd started her YouTube channel on 16 July 2017 where she posts vlogs, behind-the-scenes, and beauty content. As of 2022, the channel has reached 1.88 million subscribers and a total of 180 million views.


title: Romee Strijd

text: Since January 2010, Strijd has been in a relationship with Laurens van Leeuwen, son of television presenter Bert van Leeuwen. The couple have since gotten their marriage certificate in the United States and plan on eventually having a formal wedding. The couple announced their engagement on 25 January 2022.


title: Romee Strijd

text: In May 2020, Strijd and van Leeuwen announced they were expecting their first child, a girl. Their daughter was born on 2 December 2020. She also revealed that she struggled with PCOS for years, claiming that her weight and high-intensity workouts due to her modeling career were not good for her body, and after she had started being nicer to herself, finally got her period back after seven years. In May 2022, Strijd and Van Leeuwen announced they were expecting their second child. In June, she announced she is expecting another baby girl. Their second daughter was born on 11 November 2022.


title: Geography of Australia

text: The geography of Australia encompasses a wide variety of biogeographic regions being the world's smallest continent, while comprising the territory of the sixth-largest country in the world. The population of Australia is concentrated along the eastern and south-eastern coasts. The geography of the continent is extremely diverse, ranging from the snow-capped mountains of the Australian Alps and Tasmania to large deserts, tropical and temperate forests, grasslands, heathlands and woodlands.


title: Geography of Australia

text: The countries that govern nearby regions include Indonesia, East Timor, and Papua New Guinea to the north; the Solomon Islands, Vanuatu, and the French dependency of New Caledonia to the east; and New Zealand to the southeast.


title: Geography of Australia

text: Australia is a continent and an island located in Oceania between the Indian Ocean and the South Pacific Ocean. It shares its name with the country that claims control over it. Properly called the Commonwealth of Australia, its territory consists of the entire continent and smaller outlying islands. This makes it the sixth-largest country in the world by area of jurisdiction, which comprises (including Lord Howe Island and Macquarie Island), which is slightly smaller than the 48 states of the contiguous United States and 31.5 times larger than that of the United Kingdom.


title: Geography of Australia

text: The Australian mainland has a total coastline length of with an additional of island coastlines. There are 758 estuaries around the country with most located in the tropical and sub-tropical zones. A recent global remote sensing analysis suggested that there was of tidal flat area in Australia, making it the third-ranked country in terms of how much tidal flat occurs there. Australia has the third-largest exclusive economic zone of . This EEZ does not include the Australian Antarctic Territory (an additional ).


title: Geography of Australia

text: Australia has the largest area of ocean jurisdiction of any country on Earth. It has no land borders. The northernmost points of the continental mainland are the Cape York Peninsula of Queensland and the Top End of the Northern Territory, but the northernmost point of the country lies in the Torres Strait Islands.


title: Geography of Australia

text: The western half of Australia consists of the Western Plateau, which rises to mountain heights near the west coast and falls to lower elevations near the continental centre. The Western Plateau region is generally flat, though broken by various mountain ranges such as the Hamersley Range, the MacDonnell Ranges, and the Musgrave Range. Surface water is generally lacking in the Western Plateau, although there are several larger rivers in the west and north, such as the Murchison, Ashburton, and Victoria rivers.


title: Geography of Australia

text: The Eastern Highlands, or Great Dividing Range, lie near the eastern coast of Australia, separating the relatively narrow eastern coastal plain from the rest of the continent. These Eastern Australian temperate forests have the greatest relief, the most rainfall, the most abundant and varied flora and fauna, and the densest human settlement.


title: Geography of Australia

text: Between the Eastern Highlands and the Western Plateau lie the Central Lowlands, which are made up of the Great Artesian Basin and Australia's largest river systems, the Murray-Darling Basin and the Lake Eyre Basin.


title: Geography of Australia

text: Off the north-eastern coast of Australia is the world's largest coral reef complex, the Great Barrier Reef. The large and mountainous island of Tasmania, also a State of Australia, lies south of the south-eastern corner of the Australian mainland. It receives abundant rainfall, and has highly fertile soils particularly in comparison to the mainland.


title: Geography of Australia

text: Australia is the lowest, flattest, and oldest continental landmass on Earth and it has had a relatively stable geological history. Geological forces such as tectonic uplift of mountain ranges and clashes between tectonic plates occurred mainly in Australia's early prehistory, when it was still a part of Gondwana. Its highest peak is Mount Kosciuszko at , which is relatively low in comparison to the highest mountains on other continents.


title: Geography of Australia

text: Charles Rowland Twidale estimates that between 10% and 20% of Australia's modern landscapes formed during the Mesozoic when the continent was part of Gondwana.


title: Geography of Australia

text: Australia is situated in the middle of the tectonic plate, and therefore currently has no active volcanism. Minor earthquakes which produce no damage occur frequently, while major earthquakes measuring greater than magnitude 6 occur on average every five years. The terrain is mostly low plateau with deserts, rangelands and a fertile plain in the southeast. Tasmania and the Australian Alps do not contain any permanent icefields or glaciers, although these may have existed in the past. The Great Barrier Reef, by far the world's largest coral reef, lies a short distance off the north-east coast.


title: Geography of Australia

text: Much of Australia's interior is arid; the low average annual rainfall and high temperatures mean interior rivers are often dry and lakes empty. The headwaters of some waterways are located in tropical regions where summer rains create a high rate of discharge. Flood events drastically alter the dry environment; thus the ecology of central Australia has had to adapt to the boom and bust cycle.


title: Geography of Australia

text: The Great Artesian Basin is an important source of water, the world's largest and deepest fresh water basin. Access to water from the basin has led to the expansion of grazing into areas that were previously far too dry for livestock. Towns and cities across the country sometimes face major water storage and usage crises in which restrictions and other measures are implemented to reduce water consumption. Water restrictions are based on a gradient of activities that become progressively banned as the situation worsens.


title: Geography of Australia

text: Billabong is the Australian name given to the oxbow lakes that can form along a meandering river's course. In a worldwide comparison of height, Australia's waterfalls are relatively insignificant, with the longest drop ranked 135th according to the World Waterfall Database.


title: Geography of Australia

text: Australia consists of six states, two major mainland territories, and other minor territories. The states are New South Wales, Queensland, South Australia, Tasmania, Victoria, and Western Australia. The two major mainland territories are the Northern Territory and the Australian Capital Territory. Western Australia is the largest state, covering just under one third of the Australian landmass, followed by Queensland, South Australia, and New South Wales.


title: Geography of Australia

text: Australia also has several minor territories; the federal government administers a separate area within New South Wales, the Jervis Bay Territory, as a naval base and seaport for the national capital. In addition Australia has the following inhabited, external territories: Norfolk Island, Christmas Island, Cocos (Keeling) Islands, and several largely uninhabited external territories: Ashmore and Cartier Islands, Coral Sea Islands, and Heard Island and McDonald Islands. Australia also claims a portion of Antarctica as the Australian Antarctic Territory, although this claim is not widely recognized.


title: Geography of Australia

text: Australians have settled in several capital cities and their suburban satellites at various points along a vast coastline. A significant immigrant population occupied these places with relatively little dispute and few inner city ghettoes. Australia’s mean population density is 3.3/km, one of the lowest in the world.


title: Geography of Australia

text: Sport plays an important social and cultural role in Australia with more than 90% of adults having an interest in sport. English is the most common language in Australia. Australians enjoy a very high rate of private property ownership. Australians have a preponderance to engage in gambling, experiencing the largest per capita losses in the world.


title: Geography of Australia

text: By far the largest part of Australia is arid or semi-arid. A total of 18% of Australia's mainland consists of named deserts, while additional areas are considered to have a desert climate based on low rainfall and high temperature. Only the south-east and south-west corners have a temperate climate and moderately fertile soil. The northern part of the continent has a tropical climate: part is tropical rainforests, part grasslands, and part desert.


title: Geography of Australia

text: Rainfall is highly variable, with frequent droughts lasting several seasons thought to be caused in part by the El Niño-Southern Oscillation. Occasionally a dust storm will blanket a region or even several states and there are reports of the occasional large tornado. Rising levels of salinity and desertification in some areas is ravaging the landscape.


title: Geography of Australia

text: Australia's tropical/subtropical location and cold waters off the western coast make most of western Australia a hot desert, with aridity a marked feature of the greater part of the continent. These cold waters produce little moisture needed on the mainland. A 2005 study by Australian and American researchers investigated the desertification of the interior, and suggested that one explanation was related to human settlers who arrived about 50,000 years ago. Regular burning by these settlers could have prevented monsoons from reaching interior Australia. The outback covers 70 percent of the continent.


title: Geography of Australia

text: Cyclones along the northern coasts, severe thunderstorms, droughts, occasional floods, heat waves, and frequent bushfires are natural hazards that are present in Australia.


title: Geography of Australia

text: Current environmental issues include: soil erosion from overgrazing, industrial development, urbanization, and poor farming practices; soil salinity rising due to the use of poor quality water; desertification (partly as a result of the introduction by European settlers of rabbits); introduced pest species; clearing for agricultural purposes threatens the natural habitat of many unique animal and plant species; the Great Barrier Reef off the northeast coast, the largest coral reef in the world, is threatened by increased shipping and its popularity as a tourist site; limited natural fresh water resources; threats from invasive species.


title: Sense of smell

text: The sense of smell, or olfaction, is the special sense through which smells (or odors) are perceived. The sense of smell has many functions, including detecting desirable foods, hazards, and pheromones, and plays a role in taste.


title: Sense of smell

text: In humans, it occurs when an odor binds to a receptor within the nasal cavity, transmitting a signal through the olfactory system. Glomeruli aggregate signals from these receptors and transmit them to the olfactory bulb, where the sensory input will start to interact with parts of the brain responsible for smell identification, memory, and emotion.


title: Sense of smell

text: There are many different causes for alteration, lack, or disturbance to a normal sense of smell, and can include damage to the nose or smell receptors, or central problems affecting the brain. Some causes include upper respiratory infections, traumatic brain injury, and neurodegenerative disease.


title: Sense of smell

text: Early scientific study of the sense of smell includes the extensive doctoral dissertation of Eleanor Gamble, published in 1898, which compared olfactory to other stimulus modalities, and implied that smell had a lower intensity discrimination.


title: Sense of smell

text: As the Epicurean and atomistic Roman philosopher Lucretius (1stcentury BCE) speculated, different odors are attributed to different shapes and sizes of "atoms" (odor molecules in the modern understanding) that stimulate the olfactory organ.


title: Sense of smell

text: A modern demonstration of that theory was the cloning of olfactory receptor proteins by Linda B. Buck and Richard Axel (who were awarded the Nobel Prize in 2004), and subsequent pairing of odor molecules to specific receptor proteins. Each odor receptor molecule recognizes only a particular molecular feature or class of odor molecules. Mammals have about a thousand genes that code for odor reception. Of the genes that code for odor receptors, only a portion are functional. Humans have far fewer active odor receptor genes than other primates and other mammals. In mammals, each olfactory receptor neuron expresses only one functional odor receptor. Odor receptor nerve cells function like a key–lock system: if the airborne molecules of a certain chemical can fit into the lock, the nerve cell will respond.


title: Sense of smell

text: There are, at present, a number of competing theories regarding the mechanism of odor coding and perception. According to the shape theory, each receptor detects a feature of the odor molecule. The weak-shape theory, known as the odotope theory, suggests that different receptors detect only small pieces of molecules, and these minimal inputs are combined to form a larger olfactory perception (similar to the way visual perception is built up of smaller, information-poor sensations, combined and refined to create a detailed overall perception).


title: Sense of smell

text: According to a new study, researchers have found that a functional relationship exists between molecular volume of odorants and the olfactory neural response. An alternative theory, the vibration theory proposed by Luca Turin, posits that odor receptors detect the frequencies of vibrations of odor molecules in the infrared range by quantum tunnelling. However, the behavioral predictions of this theory have been called into question. There is no theory yet that explains olfactory perception completely.


title: Sense of smell

text: Flavor perception is an aggregation of auditory, taste, haptic, and smell sensory information. Retronasal smell plays the biggest role in the sensation of flavor. During the process of mastication, the tongue manipulates food to release odorants. These odorants enter the nasal cavity during exhalation. The smell of food has the sensation of being in the mouth because of co-activation of the motor cortex and olfactory epithelium during mastication.


title: Sense of smell

text: Smell, taste, and trigeminal receptors (also called chemesthesis) together contribute to flavor. The human tongue can distinguish only among five distinct qualities of taste, while the nose can distinguish among hundreds of substances, even in minute quantities. It is during exhalation that the smell's contribution to flavor occurs, in contrast to that of proper smell, which occurs during the inhalation phase of breathing. The olfactory system is the only human sense that bypasses the thalamus and connects directly to the forebrain.


title: Sense of smell

text: Smell and sound information has been shown to converge in the olfactory tubercles of rodents. This neural convergence is proposed to give rise to a perception termed smound. Whereas a flavor results from interactions between smell and taste, a smound may result from interactions between smell and sound.


title: Sense of smell

text: The MHC genes (known as HLA in humans) are a group of genes present in many animals and important for the immune system; in general, offspring from parents with differing MHC genes have a stronger immune system. Fish, mice, and female humans are able to smell some aspect of the MHC genes of potential sex partners and prefer partners with MHC genes different from their own.


title: Sense of smell

text: Humans can detect blood relatives from olfaction. Mothers can identify by body odor their biological children but not their stepchildren. Pre-adolescent children can olfactorily detect their full siblings but not half-siblings or step siblings, and this might explain incest avoidance and the Westermarck effect. Functional imaging shows that this olfactory kinship detection process involves the frontal-temporal junction, the insula, and the dorsomedial prefrontal cortex, but not the primary or secondary olfactory cortices, or the related piriform cortex or orbitofrontal cortex.


title: Sense of smell

text: Since inbreeding is detrimental, it tends to be avoided. In the house mouse, the major urinary protein (MUP) gene cluster provides a highly polymorphic scent signal of genetic identity that appears to underlie kin recognition and inbreeding avoidance. Thus, there are fewer matings between mice sharing MUP haplotypes than would be expected if there were random mating.


title: Sense of smell

text: Some animals use scent trails to guide movement, for example social insects may lay down a trail to a food source, or a tracking dog may follow the scent of its target.


title: Sense of smell

text: Different people smell different odors, and most of these differences are caused by genetic differences. Although odorant receptor genes make up one of the largest gene families in the human genome, only a handful of genes have been linked conclusively to particular smells. For instance, the odorant receptor OR5A1 and its genetic variants (alleles) are responsible for our ability (or failure) to smell β-ionone, a key aroma in foods and beverages. Similarly, the odorant receptor OR2J3 is associated with the ability to detect the "grassy" odor, cis-3-hexen-1-ol. The preference (or dislike) of cilantro (coriander) has been linked to the olfactory receptor OR6A2.


title: Sense of smell

text: The importance and sensitivity of smell varies among different organisms; most mammals have a good sense of smell, whereas most birds do not, except the tubenoses (e.g., petrels and albatrosses), certain species of new world vultures, and the kiwis. Also, birds have hundreds of olfactory receptors. Although, recent analysis of the chemical composition of volatile organic compounds (VOCs) from king penguin feathers suggest that VOCs may provide olfactory cues, used by the penguins to locate their colony and recognize individuals. Among mammals, it is well developed in the carnivores and ungulates, which must always be aware of each other, and in those that smell for their food, such as moles. Having a strong sense of smell is referred to as macrosmatic.


title: Sense of smell

text: Figures suggesting greater or lesser sensitivity in various species reflect experimental findings from the reactions of animals exposed to aromas in known extreme dilutions. These are, therefore, based on perceptions by these animals, rather than mere nasal function. That is, the brain's smell-recognizing centers must react to the stimulus detected for the animal to be said to show a response to the smell in question. It is estimated that dogs, in general, have an olfactory sense approximately ten thousand to a hundred thousand times more acute than a human's. This does not mean they are overwhelmed by smells our noses can detect; rather, it means they can discern a molecular presence when it is in much greater dilution in the carrier, air.


title: Sense of smell

text: Scenthounds as a group can smell one- to ten-million times more acutely than a human, and bloodhounds, which have the keenest sense of smell of any dogs, have noses ten- to one-hundred-million times more sensitive than a human's. They were bred for the specific purpose of tracking humans, and can detect a scent trail a few days old. The second-most-sensitive nose is possessed by the Basset Hound, which was bred to track and hunt rabbits and other small animals.


title: Sense of smell

text: Grizzly bears have a sense of smell seven times stronger than that of the bloodhound, essential for locating food underground. Using their elongated claws, bears dig deep trenches in search of burrowing animals and nests as well as roots, bulbs, and insects. Bears can detect the scent of food from up to eighteen miles away; because of their immense size, they often scavenge new kills, driving away the predators (including packs of wolves and human hunters) in the process.


title: Sense of smell

text: The sense of smell is less developed in the catarrhine primates, and nonexistent in cetaceans, which compensate with a well-developed sense of taste. In some strepsirrhines, such as the red-bellied lemur, scent glands occur atop the head. In many species, smell is highly tuned to pheromones; a male silkworm moth, for example, can sense a single molecule of bombykol.


title: Sense of smell

text: Fish, too, have a well-developed sense of smell, even though they inhabit an aquatic environment. Salmon utilize their sense of smell to identify and return to their home stream waters. Catfish use their sense of smell to identify other individual catfish and to maintain a social hierarchy. Many fishes use the sense of smell to identify mating partners or to alert to the presence of food.


title: Sense of smell

text: Although conventional wisdom and lay literature, based on impressionistic findings in the 1920s, have long presented human smell as capable of distinguishing between roughly 10,000 unique odors, recent research has suggested that the average individual is capable of distinguishing over one trillion unique odors. Researchers in the most recent study, which tested the psychophysical responses to combinations of over 128 unique odor molecules with combinations composed of up to 30 different component molecules, noted that this estimate is "conservative" and that some subjects of their research might be capable of deciphering between a thousand trillion odorants, adding that their worst performer could probably still distinguish between 80million scents. Authors of the study concluded, "This is far more than previous estimates of distinguishable olfactory stimuli. It demonstrates that the human olfactory system, with its hundreds of different olfactory receptors, far out performs the other senses in the number of physically different stimuli it can discriminate." However, it was also noted by the authors that the ability to distinguish between smells is not analogous to being able to consistently identify them, and that subjects were not typically capable of identifying individual odor stimulants from within the odors the researchers had prepared from multiple odor molecules. In November 2014 the study was strongly criticized by Caltech scientist Markus Meister, who wrote that the study's "extravagant claims are based on errors of mathematical logic." The logic of his paper has in turn been criticized by the authors of the original paper.


title: Sense of smell

text: In humans and other vertebrates, smells are sensed by olfactory sensory neurons in the olfactory epithelium. The olfactory epithelium is made up of at least six morphologically and biochemically different cell types. The proportion of olfactory epithelium compared to respiratory epithelium (not innervated, or supplied with nerves) gives an indication of the animal's olfactory sensitivity. Humans have about of olfactory epithelium, whereas some dogs have . A dog's olfactory epithelium is also considerably more densely innervated, with a hundred times more receptors per square centimeter. The sensory olfactory system integrates with other senses to form the perception of flavor. Often, land organisms will have separate olfaction systems for smell and taste (orthonasal smell and retronasal smell), but water-dwelling organisms usually have only one system.


title: Sense of smell

text: Molecules of odorants passing through the superior nasal concha of the nasal passages dissolve in the mucus that lines the superior portion of the cavity and are detected by olfactory receptors on the dendrites of the olfactory sensory neurons. This may occur by diffusion or by the binding of the odorant to odorant-binding proteins. The mucus overlying the epithelium contains mucopolysaccharides, salts, enzymes, and antibodies (these are highly important, as the olfactory neurons provide a direct passage for infection to pass to the brain). This mucus acts as a solvent for odor molecules, flows constantly, and is replaced approximately every ten minutes.


title: Sense of smell

text: In insects, smells are sensed by olfactory sensory neurons in the chemosensory sensilla, which are present in insect antenna, palps, and tarsa, but also on other parts of the insect body. Odorants penetrate into the cuticle pores of chemosensory sensilla and get in contact with insect odorant-binding proteins (OBPs) or Chemosensory proteins (CSPs), before activating the sensory neurons.


title: Sense of smell

text: The binding of the ligand (odor molecule or odorant) to the receptor leads to an action potential in the receptor neuron, via a second messenger pathway, depending on the organism. In mammals, the odorants stimulate adenylate cyclase to synthesize cAMP via a G protein called G. cAMP, which is the second messenger here, opens a cyclic nucleotide-gated ion channel (CNG), producing an influx of cations (largely Ca with some Na) into the cell, slightly depolarising it. The Ca in turn opens a Ca-activated chloride channel, leading to efflux of Cl, further depolarizing the cell and triggering an action potential. Ca is then extruded through a sodium-calcium exchanger. A calcium-calmodulin complex also acts to inhibit the binding of cAMP to the cAMP-dependent channel, thus contributing to olfactory adaptation.


title: Sense of smell

text: The main olfactory system of some mammals also contains small subpopulations of olfactory sensory neurons that detect and transduce odors somewhat differently. Olfactory sensory neurons that use trace amine-associated receptors (TAARs) to detect odors use the same second messenger signaling cascade as do the canonical olfactory sensory neurons. Other subpopulations, such as those that express the receptor guanylyl cyclase GC-D (Gucy2d) or the soluble guanylyl cyclase Gucy1b2, use a cGMP cascade to transduce their odorant ligands. These distinct subpopulations (olfactory subsystems) appear specialized for the detection of small groups of chemical stimuli.


title: Sense of smell

text: This mechanism of transduction is somewhat unusual, in that cAMP works by directly binding to the ion channel rather than through activation of protein kinase A. It is similar to the transduction mechanism for photoreceptors, in which the second messenger cGMP works by directly binding to ion channels, suggesting that maybe one of these receptors was evolutionarily adapted into the other. There are also considerable similarities in the immediate processing of stimuli by lateral inhibition.


title: Sense of smell

text: Averaged activity of the receptor neurons can be measured in several ways. In vertebrates, responses to an odor can be measured by an electro-olfactogram or through calcium imaging of receptor neuron terminals in the olfactory bulb. In insects, one can perform electroantennography or calcium imaging within the olfactory bulb.


title: Sense of smell

text: Olfactory sensory neurons project axons to the brain within the olfactory nerve, (cranial nerveI). These nerve fibers, lacking myelin sheaths, pass to the olfactory bulb of the brain through perforations in the cribriform plate, which in turn projects olfactory information to the olfactory cortex and other areas. The axons from the olfactory receptors converge in the outer layer of the olfactory bulb within small (≈50 micrometers in diameter) structures called glomeruli. Mitral cells, located in the inner layer of the olfactory bulb, form synapses with the axons of the sensory neurons within glomeruli and send the information about the odor to other parts of the olfactory system, where multiple signals may be processed to form a synthesized olfactory perception. A large degree of convergence occurs, with 25,000 axons synapsing on 25 or so mitral cells, and with each of these mitral cells projecting to multiple glomeruli. Mitral cells also project to periglomerular cells and granular cells that inhibit the mitral cells surrounding it (lateral inhibition). Granular cells also mediate inhibition and excitation of mitral cells through pathways from centrifugal fibers and the anterior olfactory nuclei. Neuromodulators like acetylcholine, serotonin and norepinephrine all send axons to the olfactory bulb and have been implicated in gain modulation, pattern separation, and memory functions, respectively.


title: Sense of smell

text: The mitral cells leave the olfactory bulb in the lateral olfactory tract, which synapses on five major regions of the cerebrum: the anterior olfactory nucleus, the olfactory tubercle, the amygdala, the piriform cortex, and the entorhinal cortex. The anterior olfactory nucleus projects, via the anterior commissure, to the contralateral olfactory bulb, inhibiting it. The piriform cortex has two major divisions with anatomically distinct organizations and functions. The anterior piriform cortex (APC) appears to be better at determining the chemical structure of the odorant molecules, and the posterior piriform cortex (PPC) has a strong role in categorizing odors and assessing similarities between odors (e.g. minty, woody, and citrus are odors that can, despite being highly variant chemicals, be distinguished via the PPC in a concentration-independent manner). The piriform cortex projects to the medial dorsal nucleus of the thalamus, which then projects to the orbitofrontal cortex. The orbitofrontal cortex mediates conscious perception of the odor. The three-layered piriform cortex projects to a number of thalamic and hypothalamic nuclei, the hippocampus and amygdala and the orbitofrontal cortex, but its function is largely unknown. The entorhinal cortex projects to the amygdala and is involved in emotional and autonomic responses to odor. It also projects to the hippocampus and is involved in motivation and memory. Odor information is stored in long-term memory and has strong connections to emotional memory. This is possibly due to the olfactory system's close anatomical ties to the limbic system and hippocampus, areas of the brain that have long been known to be involved in emotion and place memory, respectively.


title: Sense of smell

text: Since any one receptor is responsive to various odorants, and there is a great deal of convergence at the level of the olfactory bulb, it may seem strange that human beings are able to distinguish so many different odors. It seems that a highly complex form of processing must be occurring; however, as it can be shown that, while many neurons in the olfactory bulb (and even the pyriform cortex and amygdala) are responsive to many different odors, half the neurons in the orbitofrontal cortex are responsive to only one odor, and the rest to only a few. It has been shown through microelectrode studies that each individual odor gives a particular spatial map of excitation in the olfactory bulb. It is possible that the brain is able to distinguish specific odors through spatial encoding, but temporal coding must also be taken into account. Over time, the spatial maps change, even for one particular odor, and the brain must be able to process these details as well.


title: Sense of smell

text: Inputs from the two nostrils have separate inputs to the brain, with the result that, when each nostril takes up a different odorant, a person may experience perceptual rivalry in the olfactory sense akin to that of binocular rivalry.


title: Sense of smell

text: In insects, smells are sensed by sensilla located on the antenna and maxillary palp and first processed by the antennal lobe (analogous to the olfactory bulb), and next by the mushroom bodies and lateral horn.


title: Sense of smell

text: The process by which olfactory information is coded in the brain to allow for proper perception is still being researched, and is not completely understood. When an odorant is detected by receptors, they in a sense break the odorant down, and then the brain puts the odorant back together for identification and perception. The odorant binds to receptors that recognize only a specific functional group, or feature, of the odorant, which is why the chemical nature of the odorant is important.