Akio Suyama (陶山 章央, Suyama Akio) is a seiyū who was born on July 8, 1968.

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The History of the Jews in the Land of Israel begins with the ancient Israelites (also known as Hebrews), who settled in the land of Israel. The Israelites traced their common lineage to the biblical patriarch Abraham through Isaac and Jacob. Jewish tradition holds that the Israelites were the descendants of Jacob's twelve sons (one of which was named Judah), who settled in Egypt. Their direct descendants respectively divided into twelve tribes, who were enslaved under the rule of an Egyptian pharaoh. In the Jewish faith, the emigration of the Israelites from Egypt to Canaan (the Exodus), led by the prophet Moses, marks the formation of the Israelites as a people.
Throughout the centuries, in spite of oppression, banishment, and slaughter, there was an uninterrupted continuity of Jewish life in the country. The Jewish community in the land of Israel has always played a unique role in Jewish history.
This article refers to the history in the Land of Israel in the boundaries defined by Canaan or as the region later also known by the Roman name of Palestina.

Early times
The kingdom of Judah was conquered by a Babylonian army in the early 6th century BCE. The Judahite elite was exiled to Babylon, but later at least a part of them returned to their homeland, led by prophets Ezra and Nehemiah, after the subsequent conquest of Babylonia by the Persians. Jews were allowed to return with the Temple vessels that the Babylonians had taken. Construction of the Second Temple was completed under the spiritual leadership of the Prophets Haggai and Zechariah.
At this point there was the formation of Jewish political-religious factions, the most important of which would later be called Sadduccees and Pharisees.

Fall of the Kingdom of Judah
After the Persians were defeated by Alexander the Great, his demise, and the division of Alexander's empire among his generals, the Seleucid Kingdom was formed. A deterioration of relations between hellenized Jews and religious Jews led the Seleucid king Antiochus IV Epiphanes to impose decrees banning certain Jewish religious rites and traditions. Consequently, the orthodox Jews revolted under the leadership of the Hasmonean family, (also known as the Maccabees). This revolt eventually led to the formation of an independent Jewish kingdom, known as the Hasmonaean Dynasty, which lasted from 165 BCE to 63 BCE. The Maccabees purified the Jewish Temple in Jerusalem, an event that to this day is celebrated on by Jews on Chanukkah. The Hasmonean Dynasty eventually disintegrated as a result of civil war between the sons of Salome Alexandra, Hyrcanus II and Aristobulus II. The people, who did not want to be governed by a king but by theocratic clergy, made appeals in this spirit to the Roman authorities. A Roman campaign of conquest and annexation, led by Pompey, soon followed.
Judea under Roman rule was at first an independent Jewish kingdom, but gradually the rule over Judea became less and less Jewish, until it became under the direct rule of Roman administration (and renamed the Iudaea Province), which was often callous and brutal in its treatment of its Judean subjects. In 66 CE, Judeans began to revolt against the Roman rulers of Judea. The revolt was defeated by the Roman emperors Vespasian and Titus. The Romans destroyed much of the Temple in Jerusalem and, according to some accounts, stole artifacts from the temple, such as the Menorah. Altogether, 1,100,000 Jews perished during the revolt and another 97,000 were taken captive.
Major battles were in Masada and in Gamla. Gamla was the district capital of the Golan Heights first established by the last king of the Hasmonean dynasty. Gamla's citizens saw their battle as directly connected to Jerusalem and fiercely defended their stronghold. Eventually, all of the 9000 city's residents were killed. Both historical sites of Masada and Gamla have been excavated and are frequently visited in the modern State of Israel.
Judeans continued to live in their land in significant numbers, and were allowed to practice their religion, until the 2nd century when Julius Severus ravaged Judea while putting down the Bar Kokhba revolt. 985 villages were destroyed. Banished from Jerusalem, the Jewish population now centred on Galilee.
This was also the time of Schism between Judaism and Christianity. Many Christians considered the new religion to supersede Judaism. See also Council of Jamnia.

Late Roman period
Jews at this time in Israel were living under the oppressive rule of the Byzantines under whom there were two more Jewish revolts and three Samaritan revolts. Under the oppression, Jews still lived in at least forty-three Jewish communities in Israel: twelve towns on the coast, in the Negev, and east of the Jordan, and thirty-one villages in Galilee and in the Jordan valley.
In 438, The Empress Eudocia removed the ban on Jews' praying at the Temple site and the heads of the Community in Galilee issued a call "to the great and mighty people of the Jews": "Know that the end of the exile of our people has come"!
In about 450, the Jerusalem Talmud is completed.
In 613, a Jewish revolt against the Byzantine Empire coming into aid of the Persian invaders erupted. The Jews gained autonomy in Jerusalem for 5 years but were frustrated with its limitations. At that time the Persians betrayed the agreements with the Jews and Jews were again expelled from Jerusalem. The Byzantine Emperor Heraclius then managed to overcome the Persian forces with the aid of Jewish leader Benjamin of Tiberias. Nevertheless, he betrayed the Jews too and put thousands of Jewish refugees to flight from Israel to Egypt.

Byzantine period
In 638 CE, the Byzantine Empire lost control of the Mideast. The Arab Islamic Empire under Caliph Omar conquered Jerusalem and the lands of Mesopotamia, Syria, Palaestina, and Egypt. Under the various rules, Jews suffered and moved from driven from villages, to towns to coastal towns being reduced in numbers due to massacres. Nevertheless, the Jews still controlled much of the commerce in Israel. The Jews worked as assayers of coins, dyers, tanners and bankers in the community.
Professor Moshe Gil Maimonides established a yearly holiday for himself and his sons, the 6th of Cheshvan, commemorating the day he went up to pray on the Temple Mount, and another, the 9th of Cheshvan, commemorating the day he merited to pray at the Cave of the Patriarchs in Hebron.
In 1141 Yehuda Halevi issued a call to the Jews to emigrate to the land of Israel and took on the long journey himself. After a stormy passage from Córdoba, he arrived in Egyptian Alexandria, where he was enthusiastically greeted by friends and admirers. At Damietta, he had to struggle against the promptings of his own heart, and the pleadings of his friend Ḥalfon ha-Levi, that he remain in Egypt; which also was Jewish soil, and free from intolerant oppression. He, however resisted the temptation to remain there, and started on the tedious land route, trodden of old by the Israelite wanderers in the desert. Again he is met with, worn-out, with broken heart and whitened hair, in Tyre and Damascus. Jewish legend relates that as he came near Jerusalem, over-powered by the sight of the Holy City, he sang his most beautiful elegy, the celebrated "Zionide," "Zion ha-lo Tish'ali." At that instant, he was ridden down and killed by an Arab, who dashed forth from a gate.

Islamic and Crusader periods
In the years 1260-1516, Palestine was part of the Empire of the Mamluks who ruled first from Turkey, then from Egypt. War and uprisings, bloodshed and destruction followed. Jews suffered persecution and humiliation but the surviving records cite at least 30 Jewish urban and rural communities at the opening of the 16th century.
A notable event during the period was the settlement of Nachmanides in the Old City of Jerusalem in 1267 which since then a continuous Jewish presence existed in Jerusalem until modern day occupation of Jordan in 1948. Nahmanides then settled at Acre, where he was very active in spreading Jewish learning, which was at that time very much neglected in the Holy Land. He gathered a circle of pupils around him, and people came in crowds, even from the district of the Euphrates, to hear him. Karaites were said to have attended his lectures, among them being Aaron ben Joseph the Elder, who later became one of the greatest Karaite authorities. Shortly after his arrival in Jerusalem he addressed a letter to his son Nahman, in which he described the desolation of the Holy City, where there were at that time only two Jewish inhabitants — two brothers, dyers by trade. In a later letter from Acre he counsels his son to cultivate humility, which he considers to be the first of virtues. In another, addressed to his second son, who occupied an official position at the Castilian court, Nahmanides recommends the recitation of the daily prayers and warns above all against immorality. Nahmanides died after having passed the age of seventy-six, and his remains were interred at Haifa, by the grave of Yechiel of Paris. Yechiel emigrated to Acre in 1260, along with his son and a large group of followers[1][2] There he established the Tamudic academy Midrash haGadol d'Paris.[3] He is believed to have died there between 1265 and 1268.
In 1488 Obadiah ben Abraham, commentator on the Mishnah, arrived in Jerusalem and marked a new epoch for the Jewish community in The Land.

Mamluk period
The Cambridge Encyclopedia of the Middle East and North Africa estimates the Jewish population of the Palestine region at "approximately 10,000 during the first half-century of Ottoman rule. Bold development projects for reviving the Holy Land were conceived by Jewish courtiers in Constantinople, such as Don Garcia Mendes and Don Joseph Nasi. Jerusalem, Tiberias and above all, Safad, became centres of Jewish spiritual and commercial activity... Many of the gains achieved by Islamic Jewry during the 16th century were lost over the next 200 years ... as Ottoman rule became more inefficient, corrupt and religiously conservative."

Ottoman period

20th Century
Between 1882 and 1948, a series of Jewish migrations to what is the modern nation of Israel, known as Aliyahs commenced. These migrations preceded the Zionist period.
For full article, see Aliyah.
In 1917, at the end of World War I, Israel (known at the time as Palestine) changed hands from the defeated Ottoman Empire to the occupying British forces. The United Kingdom was granted control of Palestine by the Versailles Peace Conference which established the League of Nations in 1919 and appointed Herbert Samuel, a former Postmaster General in the British cabinet, who was instrumental in drafting the Balfour Declaration, as its first High Commissioner in Palestine. During World War I the British had made two promises regarding territory in the Middle East. Britain had promised the local Arabs, through Lawrence of Arabia, independence for a united Arab country covering most of the Arab Middle East, in exchange for their supporting the British; and Britain had promised to create and foster a Jewish national home as laid out in the Balfour Declaration, 1917.
For full article, see British Mandate of Palestine.

British Mandate
In 1947 Britain announced its intention to withdraw from Palestine, and on 29 November the United Nations General Assembly voted to partition Palestine into an Arab state and a Jewish state (with Jerusalem becoming an international enclave). The Jewish Agency accepted the plan, while the Arabs of Palestine and the neighboring countries rejected it and commenced to use force to abort the establishment of a Jewish state in the area allotted to it by the UN.
Having developed since the 18th century, the political movement to establish an autonomous Jewish state in Israel, known as Zionism, reached its pinnacle on May 14, 1948, when the leaders of the Jewish community in Palestine led by prime minister Ben-Gurion, made a declaration of independence, and the state of Israel was established.
For full article, see Zionism.

War of Independence
Since 1948, Israel has been involved in a series of major military conflicts, including the 1956 Suez War, 1967 Six-Day War, 1973 Yom Kippur War, 1982 Lebanon War, and 2006 Israel-Lebanon conflict, as well as a nearly constant series of ongoing minor conflicts to preserve its national interests.
Since 1977, an ongoing and largely unsuccessful series of diplomatic efforts have been initiated by Israel, it's neighbors, and other parties, including the United States and the European Union, to bring about a peace process to resolve conflicts between Israel and its neighbors, mostly over the fate of the Palestinian people.

Present day

Olympia , 1863 A Bar at the Folies-Bergère (Le Bar aux Folies-Bergère), 1882

Édouard Manet (French IPA: [e'dwaʁ man'ɛ]) (January 23, 1832 – April 30, 1883) was a French painter. One of the first nineteenth century artists to approach modern-life subjects, he was a pivotal figure in the transition from Realism to Impressionism. His early masterworks The Luncheon on the Grass and Olympia engendered great controversy, and served as rallying points for the young painters who would create Impressionism—today these are considered watershed paintings that mark the genesis of modern art.

Biography
Édouard Manet was born in Paris in 1832 to an affluent and well connected family. His mother, Eugénie-Desirée Fournier, was the goddaughter of the Swedish crown prince, Charles Bernadotte, from whom the current Swedish monarchs are descended. His father, Auguste Manet, was a French judge who expected Édouard to pursue a career in law. His uncle, Charles Fournier, encouraged him to pursue painting and often took young Manet to the Louvre.
From 1850 to 1856, after failing the examination to join the navy, Manet studied under the academic painter Thomas Couture. In his spare time he copied the old masters in the Louvre.
He visited Germany, Italy, and the Netherlands, during which time he absorbed the influences of the Dutch painter Frans Hals, and the Spanish artists Diego Velázquez and Francisco José de Goya.
In 1856, he opened his own studio. His style in this period was characterized by loose brush strokes, simplification of details, and the suppression of transitional tones. Adopting the current style of realism initiated by Gustave Courbet, he painted The Absinthe Drinker (1858-59) and other contemporary subjects such as beggars, singers, Gypsies, people in cafés, and bullfights. After his early years, he rarely painted religious, mythological, or historical subjects; examples include his Christ Mocked, now in the Art Institute of Chicago, and Christ with Angels, in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York.

Early life
Music in the Tuileries is an early example of Manet's painterly style, inspired by Hals and Velázquez, and it is a harbinger of his life-long interest in the subject of leisure.
While the picture was not regarded as finished by some, the suggested atmosphere imparts a sense of what the Tuileries gardens were like at the time; one may imagine the music and conversation.
Here Manet has depicted his friends, artists, authors, and musicians who take part, and he has included a self-portrait among the subjects.

Music in the Tuileries

Main article: The Luncheon on the Grass Luncheon on the Grass (Le déjeuner sur l'herbe)

Main article: Olympia (painting) Life and times
Manet's paintings of cafe scenes are observations of social life in nineteenth century Paris. People are depicted drinking beer, listening to music, flirting, reading, or waiting. Many of these paintings were based on sketches executed on the spot. He often visited the Brasserie Reichshoffen on boulevard de Rochechourt, upon which he based At the Cafe in 1878. Several people are at the bar, and one woman confronts the viewer while others wait to be served. Such depictions represent the painted journal of a flâneur. These are painted in a style which is loose, referencing Hals and Velázquez, yet they capture the mood and feeling of Parisian night life. They are painted snapshots of bohemianism, urban working people, as well as some of the bourgeoisie.
In Corner of a Cafe Concert, a man smokes while behind him a waitress serves drinks. In The Beer Drinkers a woman enjoys her beer in the company of a friend. In The Cafe Concert, shown at right, a sophisticated gentleman sits at a bar while a waitress stands resolutely in the background, sipping her drink. In The Waitress, a serving woman pauses for a moment behind a seated customer smoking a pipe, while a ballet dancer, with arms extended as she is about to turn, is on stage in the background.
Manet also sat at the restaurant on the Avenue de Clichy called Pere Lathuille's, which had a garden as well as the dining area. One of the paintings he produced here was, At Pere Lathuille's, in which a man displays an unrequited interest in a woman dining near him.
In Le Bon Bock, a large, cheerful, bearded man sits with a pipe in one hand and a glass of beer in the other, looking straight at the viewer.

Cafe scenes
Manet also painted the upper class enjoying more formal social activities. In Masked ball at the Opera, Manet shows a lively crowd of people enjoying a party. Men stand with top hats and long black suits while talking to women with masks and costumes. He included portraits of his friends in this picture.
Manet depicted other popular activities in his work. In Racing at Longchamp, an unusual perspective is employed to underscore the furious energy of racehorses as they rush toward the viewer. In Skating Manet shows a well dressed woman in the foreground, while others skate behind her. Always there is the sense of active urban life continuing behind the subject, extending outside the frame of the canvas.
In View of the International Exhibition, soldiers relax, seated and standing, prosperous couples are talking. There is a gardener, a boy with a dog, a woman on horseback—in short, a sample of the classes and ages of the people of Paris.

Paintings of social activities
The Prints and Drawings Collection of the Museum of Fine Arts (Budapest) has a watercolour/gouache (The Barricade) by Manet depicting a summary execution of Communards by Versailles troops based on a lithograph of the execution of Maximilian. The Execution was one of Manet's largest paintings, and judging by the full-scale preparatory study, one which the painter regarded as most important. Its subject is the execution by Mexican firing squad of a Hapsburg emperor, who had been installed by Napoleon III. As an indictment of formalized slaughter it looks back to Goya, and anticipates Picasso's Guernica.
In January 1871 Manet traveled to Oloron-Sainte-Marie in the Pyrenees. In his absence his friends added his name to the "Féderation des artistes" (see:Courbet) of the Paris Commune. Manet stayed away from Paris, perhaps, until after the semaine sanglante. In a letter to Berthe Morisot at Cherbourg (June 10,1871) he writes :" We came back to Paris a few days ago...".(the semaine sanglante ended on 28 May).
On 18 March 1871 he wrote to his (confederate) friend Félix Bracquemond in Paris about his visit to Bordeaux, the provisory seat of the French National Assembly of the Third French Republic where Emile Zola introduced him to the sites: " I never imagined that France could be represented by such doddering old fools, not excepting that little twit Thiers..." (some colorful language unsuitable at social events followed, see "Manet by himself" 1991/2004). If this could be interpreted as support of the Commune a following letter to Bracquemond (March 21, 1871) expressed his idea more clearly: "Only party hacks and the ambitious, the Henrys of this world following on the heels of the Milliéres, the grotesque imitators of the Commune of 1793..." He knew the communard Lucien Henry to have been a former painters model and Millière, an insurance agent. "What an encouragement all these bloodthirsty caperings are for the arts! But there is at least one consolation in our misfortunes: that we're not politicians and have no desire to be elected as deputies". (the letters are published in Julliet Wilson-Bareau ed "Manet by himself" UK: Times Warner, 2004)

Politics
Manet depicted many scenes of the streets of Paris in his works. The Rue Mosnier Decked with Flags depicts red, white, and blue pennants covering buildings on either side of the street--another painting of the same title features a one-legged man walking with crutches. Again depicting the same street, but this time in a different context, is Rue Monsnier with Pavers, in which men repair the roadway while people and horses move past.
The Railway, widely known as The Gare Saint-Lazare, was painted in 1873. The setting is the urban landscape of Paris in the late nineteenth century. Using his favorite model in his last painting of her, a fellow painter, Victorine Meurent, also the model for Olympia and the Luncheon on the Grass, sits before an iron fence holding a sleeping puppy and an open book in her lap. Next to her is a little girl with her back to the painter, who watches a train pass beneath them.
Instead of choosing the traditional natural view as background for an outdoor scene, Manet opts for the iron grating which "boldly stretches across the canvas" (Gay 106). The only evidence of the train is its white cloud of steam. In the distance, modern apartment buildings are seen. This arrangement compresses the foreground into a narrow focus. The traditional convention of deep space is ignored.
When the painting was first exhibited at the official Paris Salon of 1874: "Visitors and critics found its subject baffling, its composition incoherent, and its execution sketchy. Caricaturists ridiculed Manet's picture, in which only a few recognized the symbol of modernity that it has become today"(Dervaux 1). The painting is currently displayed at the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C.

Paris
He completed painting his last major work, A Bar at the Folies-Bergère (Le Bar aux Folies-Bergère), in 1882 and it hung in the Salon that year.
In 1875, a French edition of Edgar Allan Poe's The Raven included lithographs by Manet and translation by Mallarmé.
In 1881, with pressure from his friend Antonin Proust, the French government awarded Manet the Légion d'honneur.

Late works
In 1863 Manet married Suzanne Leenhoff, a Dutch-born piano teacher of his own age with whom he had been romantically involved for approximately ten years. Leenhoff initially had been employed by Manet's father, Auguste, to teach Manet and his younger brother piano. She also may have been Auguste's mistress. In 1852, Leenhoff gave birth, out of wedlock, to a son, Leon Koella Leenhoff.
After the death of his father in 1862, Manet married Suzanne. Eleven-year-old Leon Leenhoff, whose father may have been either of the Manets, posed often for Manet. Most famously, he is the subject of the Boy with a Sword in 1861.

Private life
Manet died of untreated syphilis and rheumatism, which he contracted in his forties. The disease caused him considerable pain and partial paralysis from locomotor ataxia in the years prior to his death.
His left foot was amputated because of gangrene, an operation followed eleven days later by his death. He died at the age of fifty-one in Paris in 1883, and is buried in the Cimetière de Passy in the city.
In 2000, one of his paintings sold for over $20 million.

Death

History of painting
Western painting Further reading
Flowers in a Crystal Vase
Femme au Chapeau a plume grise
Baudelaire's Mistress, Reclining

The main document defining the Energy policy of Russia is the Energy Strategy, which sets out policy for the period up to 2020. Energy policy is the stated and unstated government legislated use of energy.
Russia, one of the world's energy superpowers, is rich in natural energy resources, the world's leading net energy exporter, and a major supplier to the European Union.

Overview
The main objective of Russian energy strategy is defined to be determination of the ways of reaching a new quality of fuel and energy complex, the growth of competitive ability of its production and services on the world market. For this purpose the long-term energy policy should concentrate on energy safety, energy effectiveness, budget effectiveness and ecological energy security.
The energy strategy document defines as the main priority of Russian energy strategy an increase in energy efficiency (meaning decreasing of energy intensity in production and energy supply expenditures), reducing the impact on environment, sustainable development, energy development and technological development, as well as an improvement of effectiveness and competitiveness.

Objectives
Russia is rich on energy resources. Russia has the largest known natural gas reserves of any state on earth, along with the second largest coal reserves, and the eighth largest oil reserves. This is 32% of the world proven natural gas reserves (23% of the probable reserves), 12% of the proven oil reserves (42% of the probable reserves), 10% of the explored coal reserves (14% of the estimated reserves) and 8% of the proven uranium reserves.

Primary energy sources
In recent years Russia has identified the gas sector as being of key strategic importance. The share of natural gas as a primary energy source is remarkably high compared to the rest of world. Russia has the world biggest natural gas reserves, mainly owned and operated by the Russian monopoly Gazprom, which produces 94% of Russia's natural gas production. In global context Gazprom holds 25% of the world's known gas reserves and produces of 16% of global output.), and also Ukraine, Italy, Turkey, France and Hungary.

Natural gas

Main article: Oil industry of Russia Oil
Russia is the world's leader by 375 billion tonnes of geologic reserves, of which more than 250 billion tonnes are economically recoverable (including 140 billion tonnes of lignite).

Coal

Non-conventional oil
Russia owns the biggest oil shale reserves in Europe equal to 35.47 billion tonnes of shale oil. More than 80 oil shale deposits have been identified. Main deposits are located in the Volga-Petchyorsk province and the Baltic Basin. Extraction of the deposits in the Volga-Petchyorsk province began in the 1930s, but was abandoned due the environmental problems. Main oil shale industry was concentrated on the Baltic Basin in Slantsy, but at the end of 1990s the Slantsy oil shale processing plant and oil shale-fired power station were converted to use traditional hydrocarbons, and the mining activities were stopped at the beginning of 2000s. In Syzran a small processing plant continues to operate.

Oil shale
Small amount of extra-heavy oil reserves have been identified in the Volga-Urals and North Caucasus-Mangyshlak basins. Large deposits of natural bitumen are located in Eastern Siberia in the Lena-Tunguska basin. Other bitumen deposits are located in the Timan-Pechora and Volga-Urals Basins, and in Tatarstan. It is unlikely that natural bitumen deposits will be exploited in the near future.

Natural bitumen and extra-heavy oil
Uranium exploration and development activities have been largely concentrated on three east-of-Urals uranium districts (Transural, West Siberia and Vitim). The most important uranium producing area has been the Streltsovsky region near Krasnokamensk in the Chitinskaya Oblast. The Russian Federation was the world's fourth largest producer of uranium in 2002, accounting for 7.9% of global output.

Uranium
Russia is the world fourth largest electricity producer after the USA, China, and Japan. In 2004, Russia produced 930 TWh and exported 20 TWh of electricity.

Electricity production
The Russia's gross theoretical potential of hydro resource base is 2,295 TWh/yr, of which 852 TWh is regarded as economically feasible. Most of this potential is located in Siberia and the Far East.

Hydropower

Main article: Nuclear power in Russia Nuclear energy
Renewable energy in Russia is largely undeveloped although Russia has potential in renewable energy resources.

Renewable energy
The principal peat areas are located in the north-western parts of Russia, in West Siberia, near the western coast of Kamchatka and in several other far-eastern regions. The Siberian peatlands account for nearly 75% of Russia's total reserves of 186 billion tonnes, second biggest in the world to Canada's. Approximately 5% of the exploitable peat deposits (2.5 million tonnes per annum) are used for fuel production. Although peat was used as industrial fuel for power generation in Russia for long period, its share has been in long-term decline, and since 1980 has amounted to less than 1%.

Peat
It has been estimated that the Russia's gross potential for solar energy is 2.3 trillion tce. The regions with the best solar radiation potential are the North Caucasus, the Black Sea and the Caspian Sea areas, and the southern parts of Siberia and the Far East. This potential is mainly not used, although the possibilities for off-grid solar energy or hybrid applications in remote areas are huge.

Solar energy
Geothermal energy, which is in use for heating and electricity production in some regions of the Northern Caucasus and the Far East, is the most developed renewable energy source in Russia.

Geothermal energy
Russia has high wind resource with the highest potential areas at the coastal areas of the Pacific and Arctic Oceans, and the vast steppe and the mountain areas. Large-scale wind energy systems can be applied in in Siberia and the Far East (east of Sakhalin Island, the south of Kamchatka, the Chukotka Peninsula, Vladivostok), the steppes along the Volga river, the northern Caucasus steppes and mountains, and the Kola Peninsula, where the resource is favourable and power infrastructure and major industrial consumers in place. Offshore wind farms could be considered in the Magadan Oblast and in the Kola Peninsula where the intermittent wind power could be compensated by existing hydroelectric power stations.

Wind energy
A small pilot tidal power plant with a capacity of 400 kW was constructed at Kislaya Guba near Murmansk in 1968. It followed by tidal power stations at Lumbov (67 MW) and Mezen Bay (15 000 MW) in the White Sea, and Penzhinskaya Bay (87 400 MW) and Tugur Bay (6 800 MW) in the Sea of Okhotsk. Only the Tugur Bay station emerged as feasible.

Tidal energy
Vladimir Putin approved the Kyoto Protocol on November 4, 2004 and Russia officially notified the United Nations of its ratification on November 18, 2004. The issue of Russian ratification was particularly closely watched in the international community, as the accord was brought into force 90 days after Russian ratification (February 16, 2005).
President Putin had earlier decided in favour of the protocol in September 2004, along with the Russian cabinet,

Climate change
In terms of the Russian energy demand structure, domestic production exceeds largely domestic demand, making Russia the world's leading net energy exporter.

Energy usage
Russia's energy superpower status has recently become a hot topic in the European Union.

Energy in foreign policy
Russia has recently been accused in the West (i.e. Europe and the United States) of using its natural resources as a policy tool to be wielded against offending states like Georgia, the Ukraine, and other states it perceives as hindrances to its power. According to one estimate, since 1991 there were more than 55 energy incidents, of which more than 30 had political underpinnings. Only 11 incidents had no political connections.
Russia, in turn, accuses the West of applying double-standards relating to market principles, pointing out that it has been supplying gas to the states in question at prices that were significantly below world market levels, and in some cases remain so even after the increases. Russia argues that it is not obligated to effectively subsidize the economies of post-Soviet states by offering them resources at below-market prices.

Energy disputes
Starting 1 January 2007 Gazprom increased the price of natural gas for Azerbaijan to 235 USD per thousand cubic metres. Azerbaijan refused to pay this price and the gas export to Azerbaijan stopped. On its side, Azerbaijan stopped oil export to and via Russia.

Azerbaijan and Armenia

Main article: Russia-Belarus energy dispute Belarus
See also: Georgian-Russian relations
In the January 2006 alleged North Ossetia sabotage, two simultaneous explosions occurred on the main branch and a reserve branch of the Mozdok-Tbilisi pipeline in the Russian border region of North Ossetia. The electricity transmission line in Russia's southern region of Karachayevo-Cherkessiya near the Georgian border was brought down by an explosion just hours later. Georgian president Mikhail Saakashvili blamed Russia for putting pressure on Georgia's energy system at the time of the coldest weather. Starting 1 January 2007 Gazprom increased natural gas prices to Georgia following an international incident in an alleged effort to strongly influence the Georgian leadership's defiance of Moscow. The current price is 235 USD per thousand cubic metre, which is the highest among the CIS countries.

Lithuania

Main article: Russia-Ukraine gas dispute Ukraine
The EU-Russia Energy Dialogue was launched at the EU-Russia Summit in Paris in October 2000. At the working level the Energy Dialogue consists three thematic working groups. The Energy Dialogue involves the EU Member States, energy industry and the international financial institutions.

Ratification of the Energy Charter Treaty

Economy of Russia
Energy policy

• Energy policy of the European Union
  Energy superpower

This article is about Frank Drake's equation. For the Tub Ring music album, see Drake Equation (album).
The Drake equation (rarely also called the Green Bank equation or the Sagan equation) is a famous result in the speculative fields of exobiology, astrosociobiology and the search for extraterrestrial intelligence.
This equation was devised by Dr Frank Drake (now Professor Emeritus of Astronomy and Astrophysics at the University of California, Santa Cruz) in 1960, in an attempt to estimate the number of extraterrestrial civilizations in our galaxy with which we might come in contact. The main purpose of the equation is to allow scientists to quantify the uncertainty of the factors which determine the number of such extraterrestrial civilizations.
The Drake equation is closely related to the Fermi paradox.

Historical estimates of the parameters
This section attempts to list best current estimates for the parameters of the Drake equation.
R* = the rate of star creation in our galaxy
Estimated by Drake as 10/year. Latest calculations from NASA and the European Space Agency indicates that the current rate of star formation in our galaxy is about 6 per year..
f_c = the fraction of the above which are willing and able to communicate
Estimated by Drake as 0.01.
L = the expected lifetime of such a civilization for the period that it can communicate across interstellar space.
Estimated by Drake as 10,000 years.
In an article in Scientific American, Michael Shermer estimated L as 420 years, based on compiling the durations of sixty historical civilizations. Using twenty-eight civilizations more recent than the Roman Empire he calculates a figure of 304 years for "modern" civilizations. It could also be argued from Michael Shermer's results that the fall of most of these civilizations was followed by later civilizations which carried on the technologies, so its doubtful that they are separate civilizations in the context of the Drake equation. Furthermore since none could communicate over interstellar space, the value of L here could also be argued to be zero.
The value of L can be estimated from the lifetime of our current civilization from the advent of radio astronomy in 1938 (dated from Grote Reber's parabolic dish radio telescope) to the current date. In 2007, this gives an L of 69 years. However such an assumption would be erroneous. 69 for the value of L would be an artificial minimum based on Earth's broadcasting history to date and would make unlikely the possibility of other civilizations existing. 10,000 for L is still the most popular estimate
Values based on the above estimates,
R* = 6/year, f_p = 0.5, n_e = 2, f_l = 0.33, f_i = 0.01, f_c = 0.01, and L = 10000 years
result in
N = 6 × 0.5 × 2 × 0.33 × 0.01 × 0.01 × 10000 = 2
It is worth noting that the uncertainty in the revised equation is determined primarily by the last 3 factors, f_i, f_c, and L. If any of these are far smaller than assumed above, as some have argued, then the average number of civilizations may be much less than one.

Current estimates of the parameters
Since there exists only one known example of a planet with advanced life forms, some critics view the Drake equation as unreliable. However, based on Earth's experience, some scientists view intelligent life on other planets as possible and the replication of this event elsewhere is at least plausible.. Crichton's criticism might be flawed if extraterrestrial civilizations existed since the negative hypothesis (i.e., "extraterrestrial civilizations do not exist") could be tested: it would be falsified by the discovery of one of them.
It is also noteworthy that actual experiments by SETI scientists do not attempt to address the Drake equations for the existence of extraterrestrial civilizations anywhere in the universe, but are focused on specific, testable hypotheses (i.e., "do extraterrestrial civilizations communicating in the radio spectrum exist near sunlike stars within 50 light years of the Earth?"). These questions are testable (either yes or no).
Some people argue that even though the Drake equation currently involves speculation about parameters that are, as of the moment, unmeasured, it serves a useful purpose by stimulating dialogue between people about these topics, leading to focus and how to proceed experimentally -- and this was Drake's intent in the first place.
One can question why the number of civilizations should be proportional to the star formation rate, though this makes technical sense. (The product of all the terms except L tells how many new communicating civilizations are born each year. Then you multiply by the lifetime to get the expected number. For example, if an average of 0.01 new civilizations are born each year, and they each last 500 years on the average, then on the average 5 will exist at any time.) The original Drake Equation can be extended to a more realistic model, where the equation uses not the number of stars that are forming now, but those that were forming several billion years ago. The alternate formulation, in terms of the number of stars in the galaxy, is easier to explain and understand, but implicitly assumes the star formation rate is constant over the life of the galaxy.

In fiction

Astrosociobiology
Fermi Paradox
Kardashev scale
Sentience Quotient
SETI
Zoo hypothesis

Ophthalmology is the branch of medicine which deals with the diseases and surgery of the visual pathways, including the eye, brain, and areas surrounding the eye, such as the lacrimal system and eyelids. The word ophthalmology comes from the Greek roots ophthalmos meaning eye and logos meaning word, thought or discourse; ophthalmology literally means "The science of eyes." As a discipline it applies to animal eyes also, since the differences from human practice are surprisingly minor and are related mainly to differences in anatomy or prevalence, not differences in disease processes. However, veterinary medicine is regulated separately in many countries and states/provinces resulting in few ophthalmologists treating both humans and animals. By convention the term ophthalmologist is more restricted and implies a medically trained specialist. Since ophthalmologists perform operations on eyes, they are generally categorized as surgeons.

History of ophthalmology
Sushruta wrote Sushruta Samhita in about fifth Century BCE in India. He described about 72 ocular diseases as well as several ophthalmological surgical instruments and techniques. Sushruta has been described as the first Indian cataract surgeon. [1] [2] [3] Arab scientists are some of the earliest to have written about and drawn the anatomy of the eye—the earliest known diagram being in Hunain ibn Is-hâq's Book of the Ten Treatises on the Eye. Earlier manuscripts exist which refer to diagrams which are not known to have survived. Current knowledge of the Græco-Roman understanding of the eye is limited, as many manuscripts lacked diagrams. In fact, there are very few Græco-Roman diagrams of the eye still in existence. Thus, it is not clear to which structures the texts refer, and what purpose they were thought to have.

Sushruta
The pre-Hippocratics largely based their anatomical conceptions of the eye on speculation, rather than empiricism. They recognized the sclera and transparent cornea running flushly as the outer coating of the eye, with an inner layer with pupil, and a fluid at the centre. It was believed, by Alcamaeon and others, that this fluid was the medium of vision and flowed from the eye to the brain via a tube. Aristotle advanced such ideas with empiricism. He dissected the eyes of animals, and discovering three layers (not two), found that the fluid was of a constant consistency with the lens forming (or congealing) after death, and the surrounding layers were seen to be juxtaposed. He, and his contemporaries, further put forth the existence of three tubes leading from the eye, not one. One tube from each eye met within the skull.

Pre-Hippocrates
Alexandrian studies extensively contributed to knowledge of the eye. Aëtius tells us that Herophilus dedicated an entire study to the eye which no longer exists. In fact, no manuscripts from the region and time are known to have survived, leading us to rely on Celsius' account—which is seen as a confused account written by a man who did not know the subject matter. From Celsius it is known that the lens had been recognised, and they no longer saw a fluid flowing to the brain through some hollow tube, but likely a continuation of layers of tissue into the brain. Celsius failed to recognise the retina's role, and did not think it was the tissue that continued into the brain.

Alexandrian studies
Rufus recognised a more modern eye, with conjunctiva, extending as a fourth epithelial layer over the eye. Rufus was the first to recognise a two chambered eye - with one chamber from cornea to lens (filled with water), the other from lens to retina (filled with an egg-white-like substance). Galen remedied some mistakes including the curvature of the cornea and lens, the nature of the optic nerve, and the existence of a posterior chamber. Though this model was roughly a correct but simplistic modern model of the eye, it contained errors. Yet it was not advanced upon again until after Vesalius. A ciliary body was then discovered and the sclera, retina, choroid and cornea were seen to meet at the same point. The two chambers were seen to hold the same fluid as well as the lens being attached to the choroid. Galen continued the notion of a central canal, though he dissected the optic nerve, and saw it was solid, He mistakenly counted seven optical muscles, one too many. He also knew of the tear ducts.

Rufus
After Galen a period of speculation is again noted by Arab scientists - the lens modified Galen's model to place the lens in the middle of the eye, a notion which lasted until Vesalius reversed the era of speculation. However, Vesalius was not an ophthalmologist and taught that the eye was a more primitive notion than the notion of both Galen and the Arabian scientists - the cornea was not seen as being of greater curvature and the posterior side of the lens wasn't seen to be larger.
Understanding of the eye had been so slow to develop because for a long time the lens was perceived to be the seat of vision, not as part of the pathway for vision. This mistake was corrected when Fabricius and his successors correctly placed the lens and developed the modern notion of the structure of the eye. They removed the idea of Galen's seventh muscle (the retractor bulbi) and reinstated the correct curvatures of the lens and cornea, as well as stating the ciliary body as a connective structure between the lens and the choroid.

After Galen

Main article: Ophthalmology in medieval Islam Muslim ophthalmology
The seventeenth and eighteenth century saw the use of hand-lenses (by Malpighi), microscopes (van Leeuwenhoek), preparations for fixing the eye for study (Ruysch) and later the freezing of the eye (Petit). This allowed for detailed study of the eye and an advanced model. Some mistakes persisted such as: why the pupil changed size (seen to be vessels of the iris filling with blood), the existence of the posterior chamber, and of course the nature of the retina. In 1722 Leeuwenhoek noted the existence of rods and cones though they were not properly discovered until Gottfried Reinhold Treviranus in 1834 by use of a microscope.

Seventeenth and eighteenth century
The first ophthalmic surgeon was John Freke, appointed to the position by the Governors of St Bartholomew's Hospital in 1727, but the establishment of the first dedicated ophthalmic hospital in 1805 - now called Moorfields Eye Hospital in London, England was a transforming event in modern ophthalmology. Clinical developments at Moorfields and the founding of the Institute of Ophthalmology by Sir Stewart Duke-Elder established the site as the largest eye hospital in the world and a nexus for ophthalmic research.

First ophthalmic surgeon
Ophthalmologists are medical doctors (M.D.) or Doctors of Osteopathy (D.O.) who have completed medical school and completed a further four years post-graduate training in ophthalmology in many countries. Many ophthalmologists also undergo additional specialized training in one of the many subspecialities. Ophthalmology was the first branch of medicine to offer board certification, now a standard practice among all specialties.

Professional requirements
In the United States, four years of training after medical school are required, with the first year being an internship in surgery, internal medicine, pediatrics, or a general transition year. The scope of a physician's licensure is such that he or she need not be board certified in ophthalmology to practice as an ophthalmologist. The American Academy of Ophthalmology (AAO) promotes the use of the phrase "Eye MD" to distinguish ophthalmologists from optometrists who hold the degree OD (Doctorate in Optometry). (This, however, sometimes leads to confusion among patients, since a few ophthalmologists' primary medical degree is a D.O., or Doctor of Osteopathic Medicine, rather than an M.D. In both cases, the same residency and certification requirements must be fulfilled.) Completing the requirements of continuing medical education is mandatory for continuing licensure and re-certification. Professional bodies like AAO, ASCRS organise conferences and help members through CME programs to maintain certification, in addition to congress advocacy and peer support.

United States
In the United Kingdom, there are four colleges that grant postgraduate degrees in ophthalmology. The Royal College of Ophthalmologists grants MRCOphth and FRCOphth (postgraduate exams), the Royal College of Edinburgh grants MRCSEd, the Royal College of Glasgow grants FRCS and Royal College of Ireland grants FRCSI. Work experience as a specialist registrar and one of these degrees is required for specialisation in eye diseases.

United Kingdom
In Australia and New Zealand, the FRACO/FRANZCO is the equivalent postgraduate specialist qualification. They do not generally accept overseas-trained Ophthalmologists as having equivalent qualifications, except those who have completed their formal training in the UK.
On case by case basis, they will allow suitably-qualified Ophthalmologists to work in Area of Need positions, usually in regional areas. However, such appointments are generally only limited to South African/Canadian trained Ophthalmologists.

Australia and New Zealand
In India, after completing MBBS degree, post-graduation in Ophthalmology is required. The degrees are Doctor of Medicine (MD), Master of Surgery (MS), Diploma in Ophthalmic Medicine and Surgery (DOMS) or Diplomate of National Board (DNB). The concurrent training and work experience is in the form of a Junior Residency at a Medical College, Eye Hospital or Institution under the supervision of experienced faculty. Further work experience in form of fellowship, registrar or senior resident refines the skills of these eye surgeons. All India Ophthalmological Society (AIOS) and various state level Ophthalmological Societies (like DOS) hold regular conferences and actively promote continuing medical education.

India
In Pakistan, there is a residency program leading into FCPS which is composed of two parts.

Pakistan
In Canada, an Ophthalmology residency after medical school. A minimum of 5 years after the MD. degree although subspecialty training is undertaken by about 30% of fellows (FRCSC). There are about 30 vacancies per year for ophthalmology training in all of Canada.

Finland
Formal specialty training programs in veterinary ophthalmology now exist in some countries [4] [5] [6].

Veterinary
Ophthalmologists are trained and licensed to perform surgery and prescribe ocular, oral and systemic medications. They can manage diseases and conditions of the eye, the visual pathway, and structures surrounding the eye, with medical and/or surgical treatments. For example this may include:
Optometrists, or optometric physicians, are not medical doctors. Instead, optometrists usually receive 4-5 years training in vision science, eye health and optometry-related areas, sometimes following a bachelor's degree (usually in science) in some countries.
While both ophthalmologists and optometrists are trained in refraction, it is generally accepted that optometrists receive more thorough training in prescribing optical aids such as spectacles, contact lens and magnifiers.
The two fields often have a mutually beneficial relationship.

cataract extraction with intra-ocular lens replacement for cataracts,
laser refractive surgery on cornea for refractive error remediation
extra-ocular muscle surgery for strabismus,
prescribing topical medication, performing trabeculoplasty or iridotomy surgery for glaucoma
laser surgery for some retinal diseases
excision or biopsy of tumors on eyelid or in the eye
prescribing temporary topical medical treatment for amblyopia
Ophthalmologists may refer patients to optometrists for optical aids or low vision rehabilitation whilst continuing to treat the ocular disease/condition that may have reduced vision.
Both optometrists and ophthalmologists perform screening for common ocular problems affecting children (i.e., amblyopia and strabismus) and the adult population (cataract, glaucoma, and diabetic retinopathy). Optometrists may refer to ophthalmology for further assessment and medical treatment of ocular disease or condition.
Optometrists and ophthalmologists sometimes co-manage treatment of strabismus and amblyopia with a combination of vision therapy, medical or surgical treatment. Distinction from Optometry
Ophthalmology includes sub-specialities which deal either with certain diseases or diseases of certain parts of the eye. Some of them are:

Anterior segment surgery
Cataract - not considered a subspecialty per se, since most general ophthalmologists do surgery for this.
Cornea, ocular surface, and external disease
Glaucoma
Neuro-ophthalmology
Ocular oncology
Oculoplastics & Orbit surgery
Ophthalmic pathology
Pediatric ophthalmology/Strabismus (squint)
Refractive surgery
Retina and Vitreous (sometimes labelled as a posterior segment specialization)
Uveitis/Immunology Sub-specialities

Famous ophthalmologists

Eye examination
Eye care professional
History of eye colors
Ophthalmology in medieval Islam
Optometry
Optics
Orthoptics
Prentice position