Friday, May 17, 2013

Study: Patient openness to research can depend on race and sex of study personnel

Study: Patient openness to research can depend on race and sex of study personnel [ Back to EurekAlert! ] Public release date: 17-May-2013
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Contact: Katy Cosse
kcosse@gmail.com
513-558-0207
University of Cincinnati Academic Health Center

CINCINNATIResearchers at the University of Cincinnati (UC) have found that the race and sex of study personnel can influence a patient's decision on whether or not to participate in clinical research.

The study, presented today at the Society for Academic Emergency Medicine's annual meeting in Atlanta, that there is an interaction of the race and sex of the study assistant and the race of the patient.

Lead author Kimberly Hart says that her team found that black patients, both male and female, were about 15 percent less likely to be willing to participate in research when approached by a white male study assistant, compared to white patients.

However, black patients were about 15 percent more likely to be willing when approached by a white female study assistant. Conversely, black patients were about 50 percent less likely to be willing to participate in research when approached by a black female study assistant, compared to white patients.

The study builds on previous UC research reporting that black and female patients are less likely to agree to participate in research, despite being offered more frequent opportunities to participate.

"Social theories about relationships between medical providers or researchers and patients suggest that patients may have more trust in providers who are similar to them in terms of gender and race, but there are few research studies that directly address race and sex differences between medical researchers and patient participants," says Hart, a research associate in the department of emergency medicine. "Our team hypothesized that when a patient was approached by a study assistant of the same race or sex, the patient would be more willing to participate than when race and sex were different."

To test this, the team studied nearly 160,000 patients screened for clinical research by 89 different study assistants at the UC Medical Center emergency department and Jewish Hospital emergency department from January 2007 to December 2011.

The patient population was 60 percent white and 44 percent male, while the study assistants were 75 percent white and 44 percent male. Most patients, 89 percent, were willing to be approached for research.

"We found that willingness to participate in research is influenced by the race and sex of the study assistant, but the impact is different for different groups," says Hart. "As researchers, we should be aware of the impact of race and sex on our relationships with study participants. The relationship is much more complicated than we thought it would be, and we hope to conduct further research to better understand the reasons behind our observations. It is important to ensure equal representation of all persons in clinical research and only by understanding the factors that influence willingness to participate can we begin to prevent bias."

###

Co-authors of, "The Impact Of Race And Sex Of Study Personnel On The Decision To Participate In Research," include Andrew Ruffner, MPH, Carla McTaggert and Christopher Lindsell, PhD.


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AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.


Study: Patient openness to research can depend on race and sex of study personnel [ Back to EurekAlert! ] Public release date: 17-May-2013
[ | E-mail | Share Share ]

Contact: Katy Cosse
kcosse@gmail.com
513-558-0207
University of Cincinnati Academic Health Center

CINCINNATIResearchers at the University of Cincinnati (UC) have found that the race and sex of study personnel can influence a patient's decision on whether or not to participate in clinical research.

The study, presented today at the Society for Academic Emergency Medicine's annual meeting in Atlanta, that there is an interaction of the race and sex of the study assistant and the race of the patient.

Lead author Kimberly Hart says that her team found that black patients, both male and female, were about 15 percent less likely to be willing to participate in research when approached by a white male study assistant, compared to white patients.

However, black patients were about 15 percent more likely to be willing when approached by a white female study assistant. Conversely, black patients were about 50 percent less likely to be willing to participate in research when approached by a black female study assistant, compared to white patients.

The study builds on previous UC research reporting that black and female patients are less likely to agree to participate in research, despite being offered more frequent opportunities to participate.

"Social theories about relationships between medical providers or researchers and patients suggest that patients may have more trust in providers who are similar to them in terms of gender and race, but there are few research studies that directly address race and sex differences between medical researchers and patient participants," says Hart, a research associate in the department of emergency medicine. "Our team hypothesized that when a patient was approached by a study assistant of the same race or sex, the patient would be more willing to participate than when race and sex were different."

To test this, the team studied nearly 160,000 patients screened for clinical research by 89 different study assistants at the UC Medical Center emergency department and Jewish Hospital emergency department from January 2007 to December 2011.

The patient population was 60 percent white and 44 percent male, while the study assistants were 75 percent white and 44 percent male. Most patients, 89 percent, were willing to be approached for research.

"We found that willingness to participate in research is influenced by the race and sex of the study assistant, but the impact is different for different groups," says Hart. "As researchers, we should be aware of the impact of race and sex on our relationships with study participants. The relationship is much more complicated than we thought it would be, and we hope to conduct further research to better understand the reasons behind our observations. It is important to ensure equal representation of all persons in clinical research and only by understanding the factors that influence willingness to participate can we begin to prevent bias."

###

Co-authors of, "The Impact Of Race And Sex Of Study Personnel On The Decision To Participate In Research," include Andrew Ruffner, MPH, Carla McTaggert and Christopher Lindsell, PhD.


[ Back to EurekAlert! ] [ | E-mail | Share Share ]

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AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.


Source: http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2013-05/uoca-spo051713.php

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Lower income shoppers still feeling pinched, U.S. retailers say

By Phil Wahba and Jessica Wohl

NEW YORK/CHICAGO (Reuters) - Cooler than usual weather and belt-tightening by shoppers still struggling with higher payroll taxes and stubborn unemployment dampened sales last quarter at chains from Macy's Inc to Wal-Mart Stores Inc .

Wal-Mart reported a 1.4 percent drop in sales at Walmart U.S. stores open at least a year, and gave a profit forecast for the second quarter that missed Wall Street estimates. The world's largest retailer expects same-store sales at its namesake U.S. discount chain to be up 2 percent at best in the current quarter.

Kohl's Corp , a department store chain that caters to lower-to-middle income families, posted a 1.9 percent decline in same-store sales. Last week, J.C. Penney Co Inc , dealing with some self-inflicted problems, said its same-store sales fell 16.6 percent. Dillard's Inc reported a 1 percent increase.

"We are seeing some weakness amongst our more budget-conscious, what we call deal-hunting, customers," Macy's Chief Financial Officer Karen Hoguet told analysts this week.

Macy's first-quarter same-store sales rose 3.8 percent, slightly below Wall Street's expectations.

Though splurging on more fashionable clothing may be on the rise, retailers are noting that shoppers' top priority is buying basics at a good price.

"There's going to be some choppiness" in any recovery of consumer demand given how easy it is to spook shoppers, said ITG analyst John Tomlinson.

Wal-Mart has many shoppers who live paycheck to paycheck. The company's CFO Charles Holley said his customers' top concern is still jobs, followed by food costs and gas prices.

Kohl's said sales of merchandise by fashion designer Derek Lam, who also sells pricier clothes at luxury chain Neiman Marcus , were disappointing in April as customers moved toward basics.

"We have to continue to improve the quality of our merchandise and offer items at a great value," Kohl's CEO Kevin Mansell told analysts.

WEATHER WOES

Sales at several U.S. chains during the first quarter were hurt by cold weather that prompted many shoppers to delay purchases of spring clothing and sporting goods.

"Though no one likes to talk about weather, it was a real factor across the United States," said Mike Duke, CEO of Wal-Mart Stores.

The problem was visible in the company's own backyard. In Bentonville, Arkansas, where Wal-Mart is based, daily May temperatures typically reached highs in the 70s. Earlier this month, the area was hit with snow.

(Reporting by Phil Wahba in New York and Jessica Wohl in Chicago. Editing by Christopher Wilson)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/lower-income-shoppers-still-feeling-pinched-u-retailers-213759487.html

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New Orleans police arrest second suspect in Mother's Day parade shooting

Orleans Parish Sheriff's Office via AFP - Getty Images

Akein Scott, the first suspect arrested by New Orleans police in a shooting at a parade Sunday.

By Erin McClam, Staff Writer, NBC News

New Orleans police said Thursday that they had arrested a second suspect in a shooting rampage that left 19 people injured at a Mother?s Day parade.

Police identified the suspect as Shawn Scott, 24. His brother, Akein, was arrested late Wednesday and ordered held Thursday on $10 million bond. Each faces 20 counts of attempted murder, police said.

Police Superintendent Ronal Serpas said four other people were arrested and charged with harboring the brothers.

The wounded at the parade included two 10-year-old children, a boy and a girl. Surveillance footage captured a man stepping into the street, opening fire on the crowd and running away.

On Monday, Serpas named Akein Scott as a suspect, flashed a photo of him and warned: ?We know more about you than you think.? He said Scott had previous arrests on gun and drug charges and was free on $15,000 bail.

The victims were marching in what is known as a second line parade, common in New Orleans: A brass band plays while marching in the streets, while a ?second line? of people follows the band, celebrating.

The parade was two blocks long and included about 400 people. The crime scene was a mile and a half from the heart of the French Quarter and near the Treme neighborhood, the centerpiece for the HBO series of the same name.

This story was originally published on

Source: http://feeds.nbcnews.com/c/35002/f/653381/s/2c050d3b/l/0Lusnews0Bnbcnews0N0C0Inews0C20A130C0A50C160C182988630Enew0Eorleans0Epolice0Earrest0Esecond0Esuspect0Ein0Emothers0Eday0Eparade0Eshooting0Dlite/story01.htm

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Star Trek Into Darkness

Chris Pine and Zachary Quinto in "Star Trek Into Darkness" Chris Pine and Zachary Quinto in Star Trek Into Darkness

Courtesy of Zade Rosenthal/Paramount Pictures

In Slate?s Star Trek reader poll this week, The Wrath of Khan is handily (and deservedly) walloping every other Star Trek?based movie. As of this writing, 46.8 percent of respondents prefer the 1982 Shatner-vs.-Montalban showdown to any other cinematic installment in the ever-expanding, Talmudically complex Trek polyverse. (Khan?s closest competition, Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home?the one where the Enterprise gang travels back in time to save the whales ?has garnered less than 10 percent of the vote.)

But in a more disturbing development, the original 1960s show is getting schooled by its ?80s/?90s descendant, Star Trek: The Next Generation. Only 18.7 percent of poll-takers thought the short-lived show starring William Shatner and Leonard Nimoy was the best Star Trek television series, with a heart-sinking 51 percent opting for TNG instead.

Matthew Yglesias has already made the case for TNG?s superiority in his galactically well-researched Completist essay. I won?t make an attempt here to defend the (in my view self-evident) position that the original Star Trek?utopian naivet?, salt-shaker props, and all?is not only the crowning glory of the Trek franchise, but one of the great achievements of late 20th-century American popular culture. I?ll just let it be known that for better or worse I?m something of an original-series purist, someone in whose 1970s childhood the presence of Star Trek reruns loomed large, and who still revisits the show every few years not just with nostalgic pleasure but with renewed aesthetic admiration. I watched the first season of The Next Generation with a Star Trek?loving boyfriend (is there any other kind?), but we always fell, despite ourselves, into a mode of genial hate-watching. We just couldn?t get past the stupidity of the holodeck as a narrative device.

All that is to say that J.J. Abrams? theatrical reboot of the original Star Trek, now in its second installment with Star Trek Into Darkness, had a lot of hurdles to clear with me. Forget about trying to spin off new universes from the inimitably weird original?now you want to recast the roles of Kirk and Spock themselves? Dammit, J.J., you?re a director, not a magician!

Actually, Abrams may be a bit of both, because for two movies in a row now?and possibly even more in the second than the first?he?s caught some of the spark of the first Star Trek without either mimicking or desecrating the original. Into Darkness? cumbersome action plot may not quite track (and the semi-gory gun battles and alarming body count aren?t really true to the series? constitutive pacifism). But Abrams? film succeeds where many recent big-budget ransackings of the pop-culture archive have failed: It takes familiar, beloved characters who are strongly associated with very distinctive actors and somehow makes us not mind imagining them in the body of someone else. Chris Pine?s James T. Kirk isn?t at all an impersonation of the young William Shatner (Shatner impersonation being a rich career path unto itself). But Pine convincingly channels Kirk?s hotheaded management style and Clintonesque appetites?he makes us believe that this is a man who needs to sit at the helm of a starship, just as he needs, every once in a while, to share his shore leave with a pair of identical-twin alien honeys with long, switching tails.

In this jump-started Star Trek timeline (remember how Eric Bana?s villain in the 2009 Star Trek movie changed history so that continuity with previous story events could be broken? Now you do), the familiar crew is getting used to life after the academy, flying on peaceful missions around Federation space. When Kirk, newly in command of the Enterprise, salvages a botched rescue by violating the Prime Directive (don?t even make me tell you what that means. It?s the Prime Directive, for God?s sake), he?s relieved of his post by his superior, Admiral Pike (Bruce Greenwood), and the crew is dispersed to different vessels. But Kirk convinces the top brass to give him back his ship and his crew when a mysterious terrorist known as John Harrison (an icy-eyed but underutilized Benedict Cumberbatch) starts bombing Federation strongholds.

The Enterprise crew locates Harrison on the home planet of the bellicose Klingons, meaning that they can?t go after him without provoking an intergalactic war. To the extent that Into Darkness makes the now perfunctory gesture of linking its fictional mayhem to contemporary political events, it does so in the scenes between Kirk and his first mate Spock (Zachary Quinto), as they argue over whether to take their prisoner alive or torpedo him into oblivion. Extraordinary rendition? Ticking time bomb? Imprecise drone-strike analogy? Abrams seems eager to get through this part of the shooting schedule and on with the planet-exploding, eyebrow-raising action.

Michael Giacchino?s playful, un-pompous score and Abrams? never-still camera keep the action scenes moving along at a reasonable clip. But there are more Die Hard?style shootouts and shattering plate-glass windows than anyone who cares about this series needs or wants. The warp core of the original Star Trek has always been the deep, conflicted love between Kirk and Spock. Not for nothing were these two among the early muses of slashfic. They can be seen as unrequited lovers, romantic rivals, wisecracking space-bros, or (to get fancy) a single divided self locked in eternal struggle: the Vulcan and the human, reason and instinct, head and heart.

Abrams seems to get that the connection between these two men is crucial, and Quinto and Pine?s scenes together crackle with alternating currents of affection and resentment?which makes it even more inexplicable why so much time is spent on a curiously un-juicy office romance between Spock and Uhura (Zoe Saldana). Both actors are attractive and appealing (as is the whole cast, almost to a fault), but their love for one another (and Jim?s vaguely implied envy) never stopped seeming like a screenwriter?s contrivance. The overfocus on the Spock-Kirk-Uhura love triangle also cuts into our time with the rest of the likeable crew, especially Karl Urban?s laconic Dr. Leonard ?Bones? McCoy, who?s absent or sidelined for virtually all the film?s big dramatic moments. I hope in future installments (whose abundance is plainly hinted at by the closing voiceover reminding us of the Enterprise?s ?five-year mission?), Uhura will be allowed to be more than Spock?s girlfriend?maybe she?ll even be relieved of that no doubt thankless post, the better to up her quota of digitally augmented stunts and, who knows, perhaps even a character-developing scene or two.

Zachary Quinto?s Spock looks and sounds persuasively Vulcan, with some of the quiet, catlike hyperawareness that made Leonard Nimoy?s performance on the show so memorable. But when this Spock?s tamped-down human half makes an appearance, he can lean on the scenery a little hard. I?m not sure I?m ready to see a tear roll down Mr. Spock?s face midway into the second installment of an ongoing J.J. Abrams Star Trek series (a concept to which I wouldn?t be at all averse). In one of my favorite moments from the original show, Nimoy?s Spock didn?t even recognize what human tears were: ?Your face is wet.? At the rate Abrams has him growing emotionally, by the time they reach the Delta Quadrant he?ll be journaling.

Source: http://feeds.slate.com/click.phdo?i=2dd2f3309e8de35f2e09a86d034c2657

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Making frequency-hopping radios practical

May 15, 2013 ? New hardware could lead to wireless devices that identify and exploit unused transmission frequencies, using radio spectrum much more efficiently.

The way in which radio spectrum is currently allocated to different wireless technologies can lead to gross inefficiencies. In some regions, for instance, the frequencies used by cellphones can be desperately congested, while large swaths of the broadcast-television spectrum stand idle.

One solution to that problem is the 15-year-old idea of "cognitive radio," in which wireless devices would scan their environments for vacant frequencies and use these for transmissions. Different proposals for cognitive radio place different emphases on hardware and software, but the chief component of many hardware approaches is a bank of filters that can isolate any frequency in a wide band.

Researchers at MIT's Microsystems Technology Laboratory (MTL) have developed a new method for manufacturing such filters that should improve their performance while enabling 14 times as many of them to be crammed on a single chip. That's a vital consideration in handheld devices where space is tight. But just as important, the new method uses techniques already common in the production of signal-processing chips, so it should be easy for manufacturers to adopt.

There are two main approaches to hardware-based radio-signal filtration: one is to perform the filtration electronically; the other is to convert the radio signal to an acoustic signal -- a physical vibration -- and then convert it back to an electrical signal. In work to be presented in June at the International Conference on Solid-State Sensors, Actuators and Microsystems, Dana Weinstein, the Steve and Renee Finn Career Development Assistant Professor of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, and Laura Popa, a graduate student in physics, adopted the second approach.

Resonant ideas

Both types of filtration use devices called resonators, and acoustic resonators have a couple of clear advantages over electronic ones. One is that their filtration is more precise.

"If I pluck a guitar string -- that's the easiest resonator to think of -- it's going to resonate at some frequency, and it's going to die down due to losses," Weinstein explains. "That loss is related to, basically, energy leaked away from that resonance mode into all other frequencies. Less loss means better frequency selectivity, and mechanical acoustic resonators have less loss than electrical resonators."

Acoustic resonators' other advantage is that, in principle, they can be packed more densely than electrical-filtration circuits. "Acoustic wavelengths are much smaller than electromagnetic wavelengths," Weinstein says. "So for a given frequency, my mechanical resonator is going to be much smaller."

But in practice, the number of acoustic resonators in a filtration bank has been limited. The heart of any device that converts electrical signals to mechanical vibrations, or vice versa, is a capacitor, which can be thought of as two parallel metal plates separated by a small distance.

"The capacitors change the impedance" -- a measure of the ease with which a wave propagates -- "that the antenna sees, so you may have unwanted reflections back into the antenna," Weinstein says. "Each capacitor from each filter is going to affect the antenna, and that's no good. It means I can only have so many filters, and therefore so many frequencies that I can separate my signal into."

Another problem with acoustic resonators is that turning them on or off -- a necessary step in the isolation of a particular transmission frequency -- requires giving each resonator its own electrical switch. Traditionally, an incoming radio-frequency signal has had to pass through that switch before reaching the resonator, suffering some loss of quality in the process.

Switching channels

Weinstein and Popa solve both these problems at a stroke. Moreover, they do it by adapting a technology already common in wireless devices: a gallium nitride transistor.

Almost all commercial transistors use semiconductors: materials, like gallium nitride, that can be switched between a conductive and a nonconductive state by the application of a voltage. In Weinstein and Popa's new resonator, the lower "plate" of the capacitor is in fact a gallium nitride channel in its conductive state.

Switching that channel to its nonconductive state is like removing the lower plate of the capacitor, which drastically reduces the capacitors' effect on the quality of the radio signal. In experiments, the MTL researchers found that their resonators had only one-fourteenth the "capacitive load" of conventional resonators. "The radio can now afford to have 14 times as many filters attached to the antenna," Weinstein says, "so we can span more frequencies."

Switching the channel to its nonconductive state also turns the resonator off, so the researchers' new design requires no additional switch in the path of the incoming signal, improving signal quality.

Finally, the new resonator uses only materials already found in the gallium arsenide transistors common in wireless devices, so mass-producing it should require no major modifications of existing manufacturing processes.

Commercial adoption of cognitive radio has been slow for a number of reasons. "Part of it is being able to get the frequency-agile components and do it in a cost-effective manner," says Thomas Kazior, a principal engineering fellow at Raytheon. "Plus the size constraint: Filters tend to be big to begin with, and banks of tunable filters just make things even bigger."

The MTL researchers' work could help with both problems, Kazior says. "We're talking about making filters that are directly integrated onto, say, a receiver chip, because the little resonator devices are literally the size of a transistor," he says. "These are all on a tiny scale."

"They can help with the cost problem because these resonator-type structures almost come for free," Kazior adds. "Building them is part of the semiconductor fabrication process, using pretty much the existing fabrication steps that you're using to build the transistor and the rest of the circuits. You just may need to add one, or two at the most, additional steps -- out of 100 or more steps."

Source: http://feeds.sciencedaily.com/~r/sciencedaily/computers_math/information_technology/~3/MGM2ZhYQt0Y/130515113914.htm

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Thursday, May 16, 2013

NASA's Mission To Find Earth-Like Planets Might Be Over

May 15 (Reuters) - Post positions for the 138th running of the Preakness Stakes, to be run at Pimlico on Saturday (Post Position, Horse, Jockey, Trainer, Odds) 1. Orb, Joel Rosario, Shug McGaughey, even 2. Goldencents, Kevin Krigger, Doug O'Neill, 8-1 3. Titletown Five, Julien Leparoux, D. Wayne Lukas, 30-1 4. Departing, Brian Hernandez, Al Stall, 6-1 5. Mylute, Rosie Napravnik, Tom Amoss, 5-1 6. Oxbow, Gary Stevens, D. Wayne Lukas, 15-1 7. Will Take Charge, Mike Smith, D. Wayne Lukas, 12-1 8. Govenor Charlie, Martin Garcia, Bob Baffert, 12-1 9. ...

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/nasas-mission-earth-planets-might-over-020428753.html

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Sentences continue in Minn. Somali terror case

MINNEAPOLIS (AP) ? Two men who left Minnesota to join the terrorist group al-Shabab in Somalia were sentenced to three years in federal prison Tuesday, getting reduced sentences for their cooperation with the government's investigation into what has been called one of the largest efforts to recruit U.S. fighters into a foreign terror group.

Abdifatah Yusuf Isse and Salah Osman Ahmed both traveled to Somalia in 2007 and spent about a week in an al-Shabab training camp. They found a way to leave the camp once they learned what al-Shabab was all about.

They each pleaded guilty in 2009 to one count of providing material support to a terrorist group. They each faced a maximum of 15 years in prison. But prosecutors asked for sentences of around six to seven years because both cooperated with the investigation into recruiting and financing for al-Shabab.

U.S. District Judge Michael Davis gave the two men three years apiece, and they're expected to get credit for time served.

Later Tuesday, Davis handed down a 12-year sentence to Omer Abdi Mohamed, who has been characterized as a recruiter for al-Shabab in the U.S. He pleaded guilty in 2011 to one count of conspiracy to provide material support to terrorists. He also faced a maximum of 15 years in prison but prosecutors asked for less time because of his cooperation.

Unlike several other defendants in the case, Mohamed was not accused of traveling to Somalia to fight for al-Shabab, though he admitted to helping some Minnesota men get plane tickets to Somalia. During last year's trial of another defendant, witnesses said Mohamed used his knowledge of the Quran to convince young men that they had a duty to fight.

His attorney denied that he played any role in recruiting. But after that trial, Mohamed was re-arrested when the court learned he was working at a school. At the time, Davis called him "a danger to the community."

An Ohio man who admitted that he helped raise money so others could travel from Minnesota to Somalia was also sentenced Tuesday.

Ahmed Hussein Mahamud received three years in prison. He pleaded guilty in 2012 to conspiracy to provide material support to a foreign terrorist organization. He lived in Eden Prairie until 2011, when he moved to Ohio.

Three more people face sentencing later this week in this case and a case on terror financing.

Davis handed down two sentences in the long-running case on Monday. A man who authorities say played a key role in funneling young men from Minnesota to al-Shabab got 20 years in prison, while a foot soldier for al-Shabab, who participated in an ambush on Ethiopian troops, got 10 years.

"I'm going to take a chance on you," Davis told Isse when granting him a lesser sentence.

He pointed to Isse's decision to leave the al-Shabab training camp: "You devised a scheme to get away. That told me a lot about you. ... If you had been involved in the ambush, you'd be doing a lot of time."

Davis did not explain the 12-year sentence he handed down to Mohamed, who asked him for mercy and said he never would want to harm the U.S.

"I made a terrible, a wrong," Mohamed told the judge. "I regret it."

The courtroom was packed with dozens of his supporters, while others had to wait downstairs. Defense attorney Peter Wold told the judge about 200 Somali community members had written letters to the court on his behalf, calling him respectful, kind and helpful.

"I have a very strong community that knows my heart," Mohamed said.

Authorities say that more than 20 young men left Minnesota to join al-Shabab starting in 2007, when small groups of local Somalis began holding secret meetings to talk about returning to their homeland to wage jihad against Ethiopians. The Ethiopian army was brought into Somalia in 2006 by its weak U.N.-backed government, but the troops were viewed by many Somalis as invaders.

Davis, who has overseen these cases for years, said he still struggles to understand what would make young men from good families, who came to Minnesota as refugees, choose to return to violence.

"We have to figure out what's going on and try to make sure this never happens again," he said.

___

Follow Amy Forliti on Twitter: http://twitter.com/amyforliti .

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/sentences-continue-minn-somali-terror-case-224631987.html

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