title: The Shining (miniseries)

text: "The Shining" won two Primetime Emmy Awards for Outstanding Makeup and Outstanding Sound Editing for a Miniseries or a Special. It was also nominated for Outstanding Miniseries but lost to "Prime Suspect 5: Errors of Judgement" in the category. It also won two Saturn Awards for Best Single Genre Television Presentation and Best Genre TV Actor (Steven Weber). Courtland Mead was nominated for a Young Artist Award for Best Performance in a TV Movie / Pilot / Mini-Series: Young Actor Age 10 or Under.


title: Cube (2021 film)

text: Cube is a 2021 Japanese science fiction horror film written by Koji Tokuo and directed by Yasuhiko Shimizu. It is a remake of the 1997 Canadian film of the same name, the first film in the "Cube" series. The film stars Masaki Suda, Anne Watanabe, Masaki Okada, Hikaru Tashiro, Takumi Saito and Kōtarō Yoshida. It was released in Japan on October 22, 2021.


title: Cube (2021 film)

text: A man wakes up in a mysterious and cold cube-shaped room. He finds hatches on each side, leading to different rooms. Upon entering a room, he is suddenly impaled by a large metal square, which retracts, taking out a square chunk from his body.


title: Cube (2021 film)

text: Three people, Goto, Uno, and Ochi wake up in a mysterious room. None of them can seem to recall how or why they got here. A woman, Kai, enters the room, as well as a man named Ide. They all have no memory or recollection of how they got here. Ochi, out of fear tries to escape, but Ide warns him there are traps as he tosses a boot into the room, setting off flamethrowers.


title: Military science fiction

text: Military science fiction is a subgenre of science fiction that features the use of science fiction technology, mainly weapons, for military purposes and usually principal characters who are members of a military organization involved in military activity, usually during a war; occurring sometimes on Earth in the future, or in outer space or on a different planet or planets. It exists in literature, comics, film, and video games.


title: Military science fiction

text: A detailed description of the conflict, the tactics and weapons used for it, and the role of a military service and the individual members of that military organization form the basis for a typical work of military science fiction. The stories often use features of actual past or current Earth conflicts, with countries being replaced by planets or galaxies of similar characteristics, battleships replaced by space battleships, and certain events changed so the author can extrapolate what might have occurred.


title: Military science fiction

text: Traditional military values of courage under fire, sense of duty, honor, sacrifice, loyalty, and camaraderie are often emphasized. The action is typically described from the point of view of a soldier in a science fictional setting of or near battle. Typically, the technology is more advanced than that of the present and described in detail. In some stories, however, technology is fairly static, and weapons that would be familiar to present-day soldiers are used, but other aspects of society have changed. Technology may not be emphasized in such stories as much as other aspects of the characters' military lives, cultures, or societies. For example, women may be accepted as equal partners for combat roles, or preferred over men.


title: Military science fiction

text: In many stories, the usage or advancement of a specific technology plays a role in advancing the plot, such as deploying a new weapon. Some works draw heavy parallels to human history and how a scientific breakthrough or new military doctrine can significantly change how war is fought, the outcome of a battle, and the fortunes of the combatants. Many works explore how human progress, discovery, and suffering affect military doctrine or battle, and how the protagonists and antagonists reflect on and adapt to such changes.


title: Military science fiction

text: Many authors have either used a galaxy-spanning fictional empire as a background for the story, or have explored the growth and/or decline of such an empire. The capital of a galactic empire is sometimes a "core world," such as a planet relatively near a galaxy's centrally-located supermassive black hole, which has advanced considerably in science and technology compared to current human civilization. Characterizations of these empires can vary wildly from malevolent forces that attack sympathetic victims, to apathetic or amoral bureaucracies, to more reasonable entities focused on social progress.


title: Military science fiction

text: A writer may posit a form of faster-than-light travel in order to facilitate the enormous scale of interstellar war. The long spans of time (e.g., decades or centuries) required for human soldiers to travel interstellar distances, even at relativistic speeds, and the consequences for the characters, is a dilemma examined by authors such as Joe Haldeman and Alastair Reynolds. Other writers such as Larry Niven have created plausible interplanetary conflict based on human colonization of the asteroid belt and outer planets by means of technologies utilizing the laws of physics as currently understood.


title: Military science fiction

text: Several subsets of military science fiction share characteristics of the space opera subgenre, concentrating on large-scale space battles with futuristic weapons in an interstellar war. Many stories can be considered to be in one or both the military science fiction and space opera subgenres, such as "The Sten Chronicles" by Allan Cole and Chris Bunch, "Ender's Game series" by Orson Scott Card, "Honorverse" by David Weber, "Deathstalker" by Simon R. Green, and Armor by John Steakley.


title: Military science fiction

text: At one extreme, a military science fiction story can speculate about war in the future, in space, or involving space travel, or the effects of such a war on humans; at the other, a story with a fictional military plot may have relatively superficial science fictional elements. The term "military space opera" may occasionally denote this latter style, as used for example by critic Sylvia Kelso when describing Lois McMaster Bujold's" Vorkosigan Saga". Examples that feature aspects of both military science fiction and space opera include the "Battlestar Galactica" franchise and Robert A. Heinlein's 1959 novel "Starship Troopers".


title: Military science fiction

text: A key distinction of military science fiction from space opera is that space operas focus more on adventurous stories and melodrama, while military science fiction focuses more on warfare and technical aspects. The principle characters in a space opera are also not military personnel, but civilians or paramilitary. Stories in both subgenres often concern an interstellar war in which humans fight themselves and/or nonhuman entities. Military science fiction, however, is not necessarily set in outer space or on multiple worlds, as in space opera and the space Western.


title: Military science fiction

text: Both military science fiction and the space Western may consider an interstellar war and oppression by a galactic empire as the story's backdrop. They may focus on a lone gunslinger, soldier, or veteran in a futuristic space frontier setting. Western elements and conventions in military science fiction may be explicit, such as cowboys in outer space, or more subtle, as in a space colony requiring defense against attack out on the frontier. Gene Roddenberry described "" as a Space Western (or more poetically, as ""Wagon Train" to the stars"). The TV series "Firefly" and its cinematic follow-up "Serenity" literalized the Western aspects of the space Western subgenre as popularized by "Star Trek": it features frontier towns, horses, and a visual style evocative of classic John Ford Westerns. Worlds that have been terraformed may be depicted as presenting similar challenges as that of a frontier settlement in a classic Western. Six-shooters and horses may be replaced by ray guns and rockets.


title: Military science fiction

text: Precursors for military science fiction can be found in "future war" stories dating back at least to George Chesney's story "The Battle of Dorking" (1871). Other works of fiction followed, including H.G. Wells's "The Land Ironclads". Eventually, as science fiction became an established and separate genre, military science fiction established itself as a subgenre. One such work is H. Beam Piper's "Uller Uprising" (1952) (based on the events of the Sepoy Mutiny). Robert A. Heinlein's "Starship Troopers" (1959) is another work of military science fiction, along with Gordon Dickson's "Dorsai" (1960), and these are thought to be mostly responsible for popularizing this subgenre's popularity among young readers of the time.


title: Military science fiction

text: The Vietnam War resulted in veterans with combat experience deciding to write science fiction, including Joe Haldeman and David Drake. Throughout the 1970s, works such as Haldeman's "The Forever War" and Drake's "Hammer's Slammers" helped increase the popularity of the genre. Short stories also were popular, collected in books such as "Combat SF", edited by Gordon R. Dickson. This anthology includes one of the first Hammer's Slammers stories, as well as one of the BOLO stories by Keith Laumer and one of the Berserker stories by Fred Saberhagen. This anthology seems to have been the first time these stories specifically dealing with war as a subject were collected and marketed as such. The series of anthologies with the group title "There Will be War" edited by Pournelle and John F. Carr (nine volumes from 1983 through 1990) helped keep the category active, and encouraged new writers to add to it.


title: Military science fiction

text: A special twist was introduced in Harry Turtledove's Worldwar series depicting an alternate history in which WWII is disrupted by extraterrestrials invading Earth in 1942, forcing humans to stop fighting each other and unite against this common enemy. Turtledove depicts the tactics and strategy of this new course of the war in great detail, showing how American, British, Soviet, and German soldiers and Jewish guerrillas (some of them historical figures) deal with this extraordinary new situation, as well as providing a not unsympathetic detailed point of view of individual invader warriors. In the war situation posited by Turtledove, the invaders have superior arms, but the gap is not too wide for the humans to bridge. For example, the invaders have more advanced tanks, but the German Wehrmacht's tank crews facing them – a major theme in the series – are more skilled and far more experienced.


title: Military science fiction

text: Several authors have presented stories with political messages of varying types as major or minor themes of their works.


title: Military science fiction

text: David Drake has often written of the horrors and futility of war. He has said, in the afterwords of several of his "Hammer's Slammers" books (1979 and later), that one of his reasons for writing is to educate those people who have not experienced war, but who might have to make the decision to start or endorse a war (as policymakers or as voters) about what war is really like, and what the powers and limits of the military as an instrument of policy are.


title: Michael Alan Singer

text: Michael Alan "Mickey" Singer (or Michael A. Singer; born 6 May 1947) is an American author, journalist, motivational speaker, and former software developer. Singer is best known for his writings on spirituality, meditation, and New Age philosophy, and two of his books on the subject, "The Untethered Soul" (2007) and "The Surrender Experiment" (2015), were "New York Times" bestsellers. Singer established the Temple of the Universe, a yoga and meditation center in Alachua, Florida, in 1975.


title: Michael Alan Singer

text: Singer is also involved in the medical software industry. In 1981, he co-founded Medical Manager, now called Greenway Health, which marketed software that helped medical practitioners manage and digitize their billing records. In 2002, Medical Manager and its subsidiaries were bought by WebMD, in an acquisition valued at roughly $5 billion. Singer continued his work in physician software strategies at WebMD, before resigning in 2005. In 2010, Singer was prosecuted in relation to securities fraud during his time at WebMD, and eventually forfeited $2.5 million in settlements.


title: Michael Alan Singer

text: Singer studied economics at the University of Florida, and was awarded a master's degree in 1971. While working on a doctorate program, Singer reportedly had a spiritual awakening and went into seclusion to focus on meditation and yoga. After refusing to write a dissertation, Singer wrote and submitted his first book, "The Search for Truth", to his professor instead. He was awarded a doctorate in 1972. One professor on the committee got Singer in contact with a publisher, Shanti Publications, which published "The Search for Truth" in 1974. This experience inspired him to establish the Temple of the Universe in 1975, a meditation center in Alachua, Florida, open to all men and women, regardless of religion. That same year, Singer published his second book, "Three Essays on Universal Law", exploring themes of karma, fate, and love.


title: Michael Alan Singer

text: In 1981, he co-founded Medical Manager, which marketed software that helped doctors manage their patient and billing records. Medical Manager was taken public in 1997, registering $45 million in stock. In 2000, Medical Manager was recognized by the Smithsonian Institution for its achievements in information technology. In 2002, Medical Manager was bought by WebMD, in an acquisition valued at roughly $5 billion after buying each share for $55 each. As part of the deal, Singer remained at WebMD as the company's executive vice president of physician software strategies, and chief software architect of WebMD Practices Services, which Medical Manager was incorporated into. On February 9, 2005, Singer resigned from the company. In 2006, Medical Manager was renamed Emdeon, and was sold by WebMD to Sage Software, a private equity firm, for $565 million; five years later, Sage Software was bought out by Vista Equity Partners, an investment firm based in San Francisco, for $320 million.


title: Michael Alan Singer

text: Singer published his third book, "The Untethered Soul", in 2007. In the book, Singer explores themes of yoga, the meaning of life, and New Age philosophical theories on the concept of self, and the theory of mind. The book rose to popularity in 2012 after Singer appeared on "Super Soul Sunday" on to promote it, giving his first televised interview to host Oprah Winfrey. After the interview, "The Untethered Soul" was featured as a "New York Times" bestselling book, Singer's first book to do so, where it spent seven weeks on the list. Singer continued his thesis in "The Surrender Experiment", published in 2015, and "Living Untethered", published in 2022.


title: Michael Alan Singer

text: On December 22, 2009, in relation to his time at WebMD, Singer was prosecuted by the Department of Justice, along with other members of Medical Manager's top management staff, for securities fraud. Medical Manager's business dealings were previously investigated by the FBI and IRS, who executed a search warrant on Medical Manager's offices in Florida and New Jersey in 2003. On January 11, 2010, Singer entered into a deferred prosecution agreement and agreed to forfeit $2.5 million in settlements. Following this, the charges against Singer were dropped. Six executives of Medical Manager pleaded guilty to their roles in the scheme. Singer claims he was being framed by another top executive, who invented the fraud story in order to "work a deal" with the FBI to reduce his own punishment, though these claims are unverified.


title: Michael Alan Singer

text: "The Search for Truth" (1974) is Singer's first book, which was written long before he became famous as a writer. According to Singer's account, this book was written as a request from his mentor in his university, as the latter insisted the former to “turn in something for him to read” after the young Singer refused to do a doctoral dissertation.


title: Michael Alan Singer

text: "Three Essays on Universal Law" (1975) is Singer's second book which continues along the theme of his previous book.


title: Michael Alan Singer

text: "The Untethered Soul" (2007) is Singer's first "New York Times" bestseller. It is a collection of lectures which cover topics on yoga, philosophy, the concept of self, the meaning of life, and the theory of mind. The book caught the attention of talk show host Oprah Winfrey, with whom Singer later gave his first televised interview.


title: Michael Alan Singer

text: "The Surrender Experiment" (2015) is Singer's second bestselling book. In the autobiography, Singer describes his journey of how he became interested in meditation, how he started the Temple of the Universe and the Medical Manager Corporation, among other things. Singer mixes his life story with teachings of his philosophy, and the central theme of the book is his attempts at "surrendering yourself to life itself", and not letting his personal ego intervene with the flow of life. He identifies "The Three Pillars of Zen" (1965) by Philip Kapleau and "Autobiography of a Yogi" (1946) by Paramahansa Yogananda as his influences, naming them responsible for starting his lifelong exploration of Zen and spirituality.


title: Lindworm

text: The lindworm ("worm" meaning snake), also spelled lindwyrm or lindwurm, is a mythical creature in Northern and Central European folklore living deep in the forest that traditionally has the shape of a giant serpent monster. It can be seen as a sort of dragon.


title: Lindworm

text: According to legend, everything that lies under the lindworm will increase as the lindworm grows, giving rise to tales of dragons that brood over treasures to become richer. Legend tells of two kinds of lindworm, a good one associated with luck, often a cursed prince who has been transformed into another beast (as in the fairy tale The Frog Prince), and a bad one, a dangerous man-eater which will attack humans on sight. A lindworm may swallow its own tail, turning itself into a rolling wheel, as a method of pursuing fleeing humans.


title: Lindworm

text: The head of the 16th-century lindworm statue at Lindwurm Fountain () in Klagenfurt, Austria, is modeled on the skull of a woolly rhinoceros found in a nearby quarry in 1335. It has been cited as the earliest reconstruction of an extinct animal.


title: Lindworm

text: Lindworm derives from Old High German "lint" and "orm", perhaps from the Proto-Germanic adjective "*linþia-" meaning "flexible", or perhaps by way of Old Danish/Old Saxon "lithi", Old High German "lindi", "soft, mild" (German "lind", "(ge)linde"), Old English "liðe" (English "lithe", "agile"). The term occurs in Middle High German as "lintwurm" and was adopted from German into Scandinavia as Old Swedish "lindormber" (modern Swedish "lindorm"), Danish "lindorm", meaning "lind-snake". In Icelandic, the term "linnormr" was used to translate German sources to produce Þiðreks saga (an Old Norse chivalric saga adapted from the Continent from the late 13th c.)


title: Lindworm

text: In Swedish folklore, lindworms traditionally appear as giant forest serpents without limbs, living between the rocks deep in the forest. They are said to be dark in color with a brighter underside. Along the spine it has fish like dorsal fins or horse like mane, sometimes being called a "mane snake" (). For defence and attack it can spit out a foul milk-like substance which can blind enemies.


title: Lindworm

text: Lindworm eggs are laid under the bark of Tilia cordata trees (, thereof the name) and once hatched they slither away and make a home in some pile of rocks. When fully grown they can become extremely long. To counter this during hunting they swallow their own tail to become a wheel, after which they roll at extremely high speeds to pursue prey. This has given them the nickname wheel snake ().


title: Lindworm

text: The belief in the reality of a "lindorm", a giant limbless serpent, persisted well into the 19th century in some parts. The Swedish folklorist Gunnar Olof Hyltén-Cavallius (1818–1889) collected in the mid 19th century stories of legendary creatures in Sweden and met several people in Småland, Sweden who said they had encountered giant snakes, sometimes equipped with a long mane. He gathered around 50 eyewitness reports, and in 1884 offered a cash reward for a captured specimen, dead or alive. Hyltén-Cavallius came to be ridiculed by Swedish scholars and as no one ever managed to claim the reward it resulted in a cryptozoological defeat. Rumours of the existence of lindworms in Småland soon abated.


title: Lindworm

text: In Central Europe the lindworm usually resembles a dragon or similar. It generally appears with a scaly serpentine body, dragon's head and two clawed forelimbs, sometimes also with wings. Some examples, such as the 16th-century lindworm statue at Lindwurm Fountain in Klagenfurt, Austria, has four limbs and two wings.


title: Lindworm

text: Most limbed depictions imply lindworms do not walk on their two limbs like a wyvern, but move like a mole lizard: they slither like a snake and use their arms for traction.


title: Lindworm

text: There exist several related offshoots of the winged lindworm outside Northern and Central Europe, such as the French guivre and vouivre, and to some extent the British wyvern. The French guivre and vouivre are more dragon-like than the traditional lindworms while the British wyvern is a full fletched dragon canonically.


title: Lindworm

text: According to the 19th-century English archaeologist Charles Boutell, a lindworm in heraldry is basically "a dragon without wings". A different heraldic definition by German historian Maximilian Gritzner was "a dragon with four feet" instead of usual two, so that depictions with - comparatively smaller - wings exist as well.


title: Lindworm

text: An Austrian tale from the 13th century tells of a lindworm that lived near Klagenfurt. Flooding threatened travelers along the river, and the presence of the lindworm was blamed. A duke offered a reward to anyone who could capture it and so some young men tied a bull to a chain, and when the lindworm swallowed the bull, it was hooked like a fish and killed.


title: Lindworm

text: The shed skin of a lindworm was believed to greatly increase a person's knowledge about nature and medicine.


title: Lindworm

text: A serpentine monster with the head of a "salamander" features in the legend of the Lambton Worm, a serpent caught in the River Wear and dropped in a well, which 3–4 years thence, terrorized the countryside of Durham while the nobleman who caught it was at the Crusades. Upon return, he received spiked armour and instructions to kill the serpent, but thereafter to kill the next living thing he saw. His father arranged that after the lindworm was killed, a dog would be released for that purpose; but instead of releasing the dog the nobleman's father ran to his son, and so incurred a malediction by the son's refusal to commit patricide. Bram Stoker used this legend in his short story "Lair of the White Worm".


title: Lindworm

text: The knucker or the Tatzelwurm is a wingless biped, and often identified as a lindworm. In legends, lindworms are often very large and eat cattle and human corpses, sometimes invading churchyards and eating the dead from cemeteries.


title: Lindworm

text: In the 19th-century tale of "Prince Lindworm" (also "King Lindworm") from Scandinavian folklore, a "half-man half-snake" lindworm is born, as one of twins, to a queen, who, in an effort to overcome her childlessness, followed the advice of an old crone who instructed her to eat two onions. As she did not peel the first onion, the first twin was born a lindworm. The second twin is perfect in every way. When he grows up and sets off to find a bride, the lindworm insists that a bride be found for him before his younger brother can marry. Because none of the chosen maidens are pleased by him, he eats each one until a shepherd's daughter who spoke to the same crone, is brought to marry him, wearing every dress she owns. The lindworm tells her to take off her dress, but she insists that he shed a skin for each dress she removes. Eventually his human form is revealed beneath the last skin. Some versions of the story omit the lindworm's twin, and the gender of the soothsayer varies. A similar tale occurs in the 1952 novel "The Voyage of the Dawn Treader" by C. S. Lewis.


title: Lindworm

text: The tale of Prince Lindworm is part of a multiverse of tales in which a maiden is betrothed or wooed by a prince enchanted to be a snake or other serpentine creature (ATU 433B, "The Prince as Serpent"; "King Lindworm").


title: Lindworm

text: In a short Swiss tale, a Lindworm terrorises the area around Grabs "It was as big as a tree trunk, dark red in colour and, according to its nature, extraordinarily vicious". It was defeated by a bull that had been fed milk for seven years and had hooks attached its horns. A girl, who had committed an offense, was tasked with bringing the Bull to the Lindworm. After the beast was defeated, the enraged bull threw itself off a cliff, but the girl survived. In another tale, a cowherd falls into a cave where a Lindworm lives. Instead of eating him, the Lindwurm shares his food source, a spring of liquid gold. After seven years, they are discovered by a Venetian who hauls up the Lindworm and ties it up. The cowherd, releases the Lindworm, who kills the Venetian and then leaves. When the cowherd goes home, no-one recognises him and he no longer likes human food.


title: Los Tigres del Norte

text: Los Tigres del Norte (English: "The Tigers of the North") are a norteño band from San Jose, California. Originally founded in Mocorito, Sinaloa, Mexico, with sales of 60 million albums, the band is one of the most recognized groups in the genre, due to its long history and its successes within the Mexican community in the diaspora. The band is famous for its political corridos, some of which have been censored, even in its own country. The band is the only Mexican group to win 6 Grammy awards and 12 Latin Grammys. In addition, the band has made 40 films alongside the Almada brothers (Mario and Fernando) among other well-known Mexican actors.


title: Los Tigres del Norte

text: The band's style is based on regional music of Mexico, using mainly instruments such as the electric bass (or double bass), accordion, bass, drums, and sometimes other percussion instruments. The lyrics in their songs fluctuate between the romantic and the corrido. In recent years the band has begun to make music in a new genre called narcocorrido, in which they narrate the experience of members of drug gangs operating in Mexico. The narcocorrido song "Death Announced", for example, stands out, as it is dedicated to the legendary Colombian drug trafficker Pablo Escobar, "El Jefe de Jefes." In that song, the band tells the story of the power and influence of the now imprisoned Miguel Ángel Félix Gallardo. Another of their famous narcocorridos, "The Queen of the South", is based on a literary novel by Arturo Pérez-Reverte from which a television series was made based on the Spanish writer's work. They have become famous in Mexico and the United States, especially in California and Texas, mainly due to the large number of Mexicans living there. They also have found considerable fame in Colombia.


title: Los Tigres del Norte

text: The band won a Grammy Award in 1988 for their album "Gracias, América sin Fronteras", and twelve years later their album "Herencia de Familia" won the award for Best Norteño Album at the first ever Latin Grammys. A year later, in the second edition of the awards, they were nominated again for Best Norteño Album, this time for "De Paisano a Paisano", and Best Regional Mexican Song for the song of the same title from that album.


title: Los Tigres del Norte

text: The band was started by Rosa Morada, Mocorito, Sinaloa, Mexico natives Jorge Hernández, his brothers, and their cousins. They began recording after moving to San Jose, California in the late 1960s, when all the members were still in their teens. They were sponsored by a local record company, Discos Fama, owned by an Englishman named Art Walker, who took them under his wing and helped them find jobs and material, as well as recording all of their early albums.


title: Los Tigres del Norte

text: The Tigres were at first only locally popular, but took off after Jorge and Art Walker heard a Los Angeles mariachi singer perform a song in early 1971 about a couple of drug runners, Emilio Varela and Camelia la Texana. There had been occasional ballads (corridos, in Mexican terminology) about the cross-border drug trade ever since Prohibition in the 1920s, but never a song as cinematic as this, featuring a woman smuggler who shoots the man and takes off with the money. After getting permission to record this song, Los Tigres del Norte released "Contrabando y traición" ("Contraband and Betrayal") in 1974. The song quickly hit on both sides of the border, inspired a series of movies, and kicked off one of the most remarkable careers in Spanish-language music.


title: Los Tigres del Norte

text: In norteño form, Los Tigres del Norte have been able to portray "real life" in a manner that strikes a chord with people across the Americas. Many of their most popular songs consist of tales or corridos about life, love, and the struggle to survive in an imperfect world. They regularly touch on the subject of narcotics and illegal immigration, but they have also shared stories of love and betrayal between a man and a woman. Together, the band and its public has turned norteño music into an international genre. The band has modernized the music, infusing it with bolero, cumbia, rock rhythms, and waltzes. They also prominently incorporate a saxophone into some of their songs. As a result, it can be said that they also perform norteño-sax in addition to traditional accordion-led norteño.


title: Los Tigres del Norte

text: On January 9, 2007, Los Tigres del Norte was honored as a BMI Icon at the 14th annual BMI Latin Awards. Los Tigres, who were saluted that evening with an all-star musical tribute, were being honored as BMI Icons for their "unique and indelible influence on generations of music makers." They joined an elite list that includes such Latin music giants as Juan Luis Guerra and Carlos Santana.


title: Los Tigres del Norte

text: On October 16, 2009, Los Tigres del Norte held a Concert in Guadalupe, Nuevo León (outside of Monterrey) at the Annual Expo Guadalupe that lasted 12 hours, breaking their own record of 9 hours from previous year. It began on Saturday night and ended on Sunday at 9 a.m., not uncommon for Los Tigres del Norte. They are known for having encores at their concerts that can last more than an hour after the scheduled ending of the concert.


title: Los Tigres del Norte

text: In 2010, the band made headlines by joining in a massive international boycott of the U.S. state of Arizona, in response to the Support Our Law Enforcement and Safe Neighborhoods Act.


title: Los Tigres del Norte

text: On October 8, 2013, Los Tigres del Norte played at an immigration reform rally on the National Mall in Washington, D.C. Their set list included songs that underscored the themes the rally would address including “La Puerta Negra” (1986), “De Paisano a Paisano” (2000), and “Mis Dos Patrias.” The band was introduced by then Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.). Mexican-American singer-songwriter and actress Lila Downs also accompanied the group in a series of duets.


title: Los Tigres del Norte

text: In 2014 Los Tigres del Norte released the album "Realidades", which contains the song “Era Diferente” (meaning “She Was Different”) about a lesbian teenager who falls in love with her best friend; according to lead singer and songwriter Jorge Hernández, this is the first time a norteño group has ever written a gay love song.


title: Los Tigres del Norte

text: The band had sold 32 million records as of 2007. As of 2015, they had won 7 Grammy Awards, 6 Latin Grammy Awards, and a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. They received the Special Recognition (Spanish language) Award at the 26th annual GLAAD Media Awards in 2015, for their song "Era Diferente" ("She Was Different"). The band ranked number 15 in the list for "The 30 Most Influential Latin Artists of All Time" by "Billboard" magazine.


title: Los Tigres del Norte

text: In 2018, many artists sought permission to record at Folsom Prison, more so for the 50th anniversary of Johnny Cash's recording there. However, Los Tigres del Norte was the only act authorized by the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation. In fact, Los Tigres are the only band to record an album at Folsom since Johnny Cash released his 1968 opus.


title: Los Tigres del Norte

text: In May 2000, Los Tigres del Norte founded the Los Tigres del Norte Foundation, which is committed to fostering appreciation and preservation of Mexican and Mexican-American folklore. The Los Tigres del Norte Foundation donated $500,000 to the UCLA Chicano Studies Research Center, which was used to digitize over 32,000 Spanish-language recordings contained in the Strachwitz Frontera Collection.


title: Los Tigres del Norte

text: Through their career, Los Tigres del Norte have appeared in numerous Mexican films, many of which are based on some of their hit songs. In genre, they range from action to drama. Many of the actors in these films include Mario and Fernando Almada, Eric Del Castillo, Pedro Infante, Jr., Jorge Reynoso, Lucha Villa, Cecilia Camacho, and Bernabe Melendez "El Gatillero".


title: Los Tigres del Norte

text: In December 2016, media reports stated that Amateur Films would be producing "Jefes De Jefes", a feature-length documentary about Los Tigres del Norte's history and cultural influence; no release date was announced.


title: Sioux City, Iowa

text: Sioux City () is a city in Woodbury and Plymouth counties in the northwestern part of the U.S. state of Iowa. The population was 85,797 in the 2020 census, making it the fourth-largest city in Iowa. The bulk of the city is in Woodbury County, of which it is the county seat, though a small portion is in Plymouth County. Sioux City is located at the navigational head of the Missouri River. The city is home to several cultural points of interest including the Sioux City Public Museum, Sioux City Art Center and Sergeant Floyd Monument, which is a National Historic Landmark. The city is also home to Chris Larsen Park, commonly referred to as "the Riverfront", which includes the Anderson Dance Pavilion, Sergeant Floyd Riverboat Museum and Lewis and Clark Interpretive Center.


title: Sioux City, Iowa

text: Sioux City is the primary city of the five-county Sioux City, IA–NE–SD Metropolitan Statistical Area (MSA), with a population of 149,940 in the 2020 census. The Sioux City–Vermillion, IA–NE–SD Combined Statistical Area had a population of 175,638 as of 2020.


title: Sioux City, Iowa

text: Sioux City is at the navigational head, or the furthest upstream point to which general cargo ships can travel, of the Missouri River, approximately north of the Omaha–Council Bluffs metropolitan area. Sioux City and the surrounding areas of northwestern Iowa, northeastern Nebraska and southeastern South Dakota are sometimes referred to as Siouxland, especially by local media and residents.


title: Sioux City, Iowa

text: Iowa is in the tallgrass prairie of the North American Great Plains, historically inhabited by speakers of Siouan languages.


title: Sioux City, Iowa

text: The area of Sioux City was inhabited by Yankton Sioux when it was first reached by Spanish and French furtrappers in the 18th century. The first documented US citizens to record their travels through this area were Meriwether Lewis and William Clark during the summer of 1804. Sergeant Charles Floyd, a member of the Lewis and Clark Expedition, died here on August 20, 1804, the only death during the two and a half-year expedition.


title: Sioux City, Iowa

text: Sioux City was laid out in the winter of 1854–1855. It became a major transportation hub to the western Plains, including Mormons heading to Salt Lake City and speculators heading to Wyoming goldfields.


title: Sioux City, Iowa

text: In 1891, the Sioux City Elevated Railway was opened and became the third steam-powered elevated rapid transit system in the world, and later the first electric-powered elevated railway in the world after conversion in 1892. However, the system fell into bankruptcy and closed within a decade.


title: Sioux City, Iowa

text: The city gained the nickname "Little Chicago" during the Prohibition era due to its reputation for being a purveyor of alcoholic beverages.


title: Sioux City, Iowa

text: On , United Airlines Flight 232 crash-landed at Sioux Gateway Airport, killing 111 people, but 184 survived the crash and ensuing fire due to outstandingly quick performances by fire and emergency local teams.


title: Sioux City, Iowa

text: According to the United States Census Bureau, the city has a total area of , of which is land and is water.


title: Sioux City, Iowa

text: As is typical of Iowa, Sioux City has a humid continental climate, with very warm, humid summers, cold, dry winters, and wide temperature extremes; it is part of USDA Hardiness zone 5a. The normal monthly mean temperature ranges from in January to in July. On average, there are 25 days that reach or higher, 52 days that do not climb above freezing, and 17 days with a low of or below annually. The average window for freezing temperatures is October 1 through April 26, allowing a growing season of 157 days. Extreme temperatures officially range from on up to on and , as well as ; the record cold daily maximum is on , while, conversely, the record warm daily minimum is on .


title: Sioux City, Iowa

text: Precipitation is greatest in May and June and averages annually, but has ranged from in 1976 to in 1903. Snowfall averages per season, and has historically ranged from in 1895–1896 to in 1961–1962; the average window for measurable (≥) snowfall is November 8 through April 7, although snow in October occurs several times per decade. On , the high temperature reached , setting a new all-time May record high, along with a rise from the morning of the 12th.


title: Sioux City, Iowa

text: As of the census of 2020, there were 85,797 people. The racial makeup of the city was 62.9% Non-Hispanic White,5.9% African American, 2.8% Native American, 3.3% Asian, 0.7% Pacific Islander, 9.2% from other races, and 10.2% from two or more races. Hispanic or Latino of any race were 20.9% of the population.


title: Sioux City, Iowa

text: As of the census of 2010, there were 82,684 people, 31,571 households, and 20,144 families residing in the city. The population density was . There were 33,425 housing units at an average density of . The racial makeup of the city was 80.6% White, 2.9% African American, 2.6% Native American, 2.7% Asian, 0.1% Pacific Islander, 7.4% from other races, and 3.7% from two or more races. Hispanic or Latino of any race were 16.4% of the population.


title: Sioux City, Iowa

text: There were 31,571 households, of which 34.3% had children under the age of 18 living with them, 44.2% were married couples living together, 13.8% had a female householder with no husband present, 5.9% had a male householder with no wife present, and 36.2% were non-families. 29.4% of all households were made up of individuals, and 11.1% had someone living alone who was 65 years of age or older. The average household size was 2.54 and the average family size was 3.14.


title: Sioux City, Iowa

text: The median age in the city was 33.7 years. 26.6% of residents were under the age of 18; 11.4% were between the ages of 18 and 24; 25.6% were from 25 to 44; 24% were from 45 to 64, and 12.4% were 65 years of age or older. The gender makeup of the city was 49.2% male and 50.8% female.


title: Sioux City, Iowa

text: As of the census of 2000, there were 85,013 people, 32,054 households, and 21,091 families residing in the city. The population density was . There were 33,816 housing units at an average density of . The racial makeup of the city was 85.23% White, 2.41% African American, 1.95% Native American, 2.82% Asian, 0.04% Pacific Islander, 5.27% from other races, and 2.28% from two or more races. Hispanic or Latino of any race were 10.89% of the population.


title: Sioux City, Iowa

text: There were 32,054 households, of which 33.4% had children under the age of 18 living with them, 49.1% were married couples living together, 12.2% had a female householder with no husband present, and 34.2% were non-families. 27.7% of all households were made up of individuals, and 11.3% had someone living alone who was 65 years of age or older. The average household size was 2.57 and the average family size was 3.14.


title: Sioux City, Iowa

text: Age spread: 27.1% under the age of 18, 11.0% from 18 to 24, 28.5% from 25 to 44, 20.2% from 45 to 64, and 13.3% who were 65 years of age or older. The median age was 33 years. For every 100 females, there were 95.4 males. For every 100 females age 18 and over, there were 92.2 males.


title: Sioux City, Iowa

text: The median income for a household in the city was , and the median income for a family was . Males had a median income of versus for females. The per capita income for the city was . About 7.9% of families and 11.2% of the population were below the poverty line, including 15.0% of those under age 18 and 7.8% of those age 65 or over. This compares with a median household income for the state of Iowa of and an Iowa median family income of . (current data from State of Iowa, see also List of U.S. states by income for historical data).


title: Sioux City, Iowa

text: As of the 2020 census, the Sioux City Metropolitan Area had 149,940 residents in four counties. As defined by the Office of Management and Budget, the counties comprising the metropolitan area are (in descending order of population):


title: Sioux City, Iowa

text: Golf courses, city parks, and aquatics: Sioux City is also home to several municipal public golf courses, including Floyd Park in Morningside, Green Valley near the Southern Hills, Sun Valley on the northern West Side, and Hidden Acres in nearby Plymouth County. Sioux City also has a number of private golf clubs, including Sioux City Country Club, and Whispering Creek Golf Club. The city has over of public parkland located at 53 locations, including the riverfront and many miles of recreation trails. Five public swimming pools/aquatics centers are located within Sioux City neighborhoods.


title: Sioux City, Iowa

text: The Sioux City Community School District served 14,569 students in the 2018-2019 school year; there are three public high schools West High School, North High School, East High School (grades 9-12), three public Middle Schools, West Middle, North Middle, and East Middle (grades 6-8), and 19 Elementary Schools (grades K-5).


title: Sioux City, Iowa

text: Bishop Heelan Catholic Schools is a centralized private Catholic School System that includes six schools: They teach preschool through twelfth grade.


title: Sioux City, Iowa

text: Sioux City is home to Briar Cliff University, Morningside College, Western Iowa Tech Community College, St. Luke's College of Nursing, and the Bellevue University outreach center.


title: Sioux City, Iowa

text: Sioux City has a crime rate that is 91% higher than the average for Iowa and 63% higher than the national average. The violent crime rate is 90% above the Iowa average and 49% higher than the national average, based on the FBI's uniform crime reports for the year of 2020. According to the report, this represented an 12% decrease over the prior year.


title: Sioux City, Iowa

text: According to a 2015 University of Iowa study for the Iowa Initiative for Sustainable Communities, blight and disinvestment are serious problems in the downtown core as investment has shifted to suburbs.


title: Sioux City, Iowa

text: Interstate 29 is a major controlled-access highway in Sioux City and the surrounding area providing easy access of the 20-mile stretch covering Sioux City and the majority of its suburbs. It approaches the city from Omaha to the south before curving northwest along the Missouri River near downtown. The highway then enters South Dakota and curves back to the north as it approaches Sioux Falls. Interstate 129 is an auxiliary Interstate that connects South Sioux City, Nebraska, to the south side of Sioux City and works as a bypass for travelers to other surrounding suburbs. Interstate 129 also interconnects with U.S. Route 75, which is in expansion to expressway form connecting Sioux City to Worthington, Minnesota. U.S. Route 20, the longest road in the United States, spanning , is also in the process of expanding from a two-lane highway to four-lanes from Sioux City to Dubuque, which will provide faster and easier access comparable to Interstate 80. Until 2020, Sioux City operated automatic speed cameras on Interstate 29. Redflex Holdings, the camera operator, and the city extricated from drivers while they were operating. The state of South Dakota has been refusing to provide addresses associated with license plates due to the large number of South Dakota residents fined by Sioux City.


title: Sioux City, Iowa

text: Sioux City Transit, the local public transit organization, operates several bus lines within the city. Buses transfer downtown in the Martin Luther King Jr. Transportation Center at 505 Nebraska Street. The Sioux City Paratransit serves members of the community who would otherwise not be able to travel by providing door to door service.


title: Sioux City, Iowa

text: The city is served by Sioux Gateway Airport (SUX) to its south where United Airlines' affiliate SkyWest Airlines has announced it plans to discontinue the one flight per day each to Chicago and Denver it currently offers. As those flights are federally subsidized under the Essential Air Service program, SkyWest is required to continue those flights until a replacement is found.


title: Sioux City, Iowa

text: In 2019, the Federal Aviation Administration proposed a civil penalty against SUX Airport for numerous alleged safety violations including alleging that the airport repeatedly failed to maintain surfaces, runway and taxiway markings, and visual wind direction indicators. The FAA inspected the airport in May 2018, June 2019, and September 2019, and each time found numerous alleged violations.


title: Sioux City, Iowa

text: Jefferson Lines runs long-distance bus routes to Sioux City. Non-Transfer destinations include Winnipeg, Kansas City, Minneapolis, and Omaha.


title: Sioux City, Iowa

text: There is no established water or rail passenger transportation in the area. The last passenger train was the Illinois Central's "Hawkeye," a daily train to Chicago via Waterloo, Dubuque and Rockford, discontinued in 1971.


title: Longevity claims

text: Longevity claims are unsubstantiated cases of asserted human longevity. Those asserting lifespans of 110 years or more are referred to as supercentenarians. Many have either no official verification or are backed only by partial evidence. Cases where longevity has been fully verified, according to modern standards of longevity research, are reflected in an established list of supercentenarians based on the work of organizations such as the Gerontology Research Group (GRG) or "Guinness World Records". This article lists living claims greater than that of the oldest living person whose age has been independently verified, French woman Lucile Randon, at , and deceased claims greater than that of the oldest person ever whose age has been verified, namely her compatriot Jeanne Calment, who died at the age of 122 years and 164 days. The upper limit for both lists is 130 years.


title: Longevity claims

text: Prior to the 19th century, there was insufficient evidence either to demonstrate or to refute centenarian longevity. Even today, no fixed theoretical limit to human longevity is apparent. Studies in the biodemography of human longevity indicate a "late-life mortality deceleration law": that death rates level off at advanced ages to a late-life mortality plateau. This implies that there is no fixed upper limit to human longevity, or fixed maximum human lifespan.


title: Longevity claims

text: Researchers in Denmark have found a way to determine when a deceased person was born using radiocarbon dating done on the lens of the eye.


title: Longevity claims

text: "Guinness World Records" from its inception in 1955, began maintaining a list of the verified oldest people. It developed into a list of all supercentenarians whose lifespan had been verified by at least three documents, in a standardized process, according to the norms of modern longevity research. Many unverified cases ("claims" or "traditions") have been controverted by reliable sources. Taking reliable demographic data into account, these unverified cases vary widely in their plausibility.


title: Longevity claims

text: In numerous editions from the 1960s through the 1980s, "Guinness" stated thatNo single subject is more obscured by vanity, deceit, falsehood, and deliberate fraud than the extremes of human longevity.


title: Longevity claims

text: Despite demographic evidence of the known extremes of modern longevity, stories in otherwise reliable sources still surface regularly, stating that these extremes have been exceeded. Responsible, modern, scientific validation of human longevity requires investigation of records following an individual from birth to the present (or to death); purported longevity claims far outside the demonstrated records regularly fail such scrutiny.


title: Longevity claims

text: Actuary Walter G. Bowerman stated that ill-founded longevity assertions originate mainly in remote, underdeveloped regions, among non-literate peoples, with only family testimony available as evidence. This means that people living in areas of the world with historically more comprehensive resources for record-keeping have tended to hold more claims to longevity, regardless of whether or not individuals in other parts of the world have lived longer.


title: Longevity claims

text: In the transitional period of record-keeping, records tend to exist for the wealthy and upper-middle classes, but are often spotty and nonexistent for the middle classes and the poor. In the United States, birth registration did not begin in Mississippi until 1912 and was not universal until 1933. Hence, in many longevity cases, no actual birth record exists. This type of case is classified by gerontologists as "partially validated".


title: Longevity claims

text: Since some cases were recorded in a census or in other reliable sources, obtainable evidence may complete full verification.


title: Longevity claims

text: In another type of case, the only records that exist are late-life documents. Because age inflation often occurs in adulthood (to avoid military service or to apply for a pension early), or because the government may have begun record-keeping during an individual's lifetime, cases unverified by proximate records exist. These unverified cases are less likely to be true (because the records are written later), but are still possible. Longevity narratives were not subjected to rigorous scrutiny until the work of William Thoms in 1873. Thoms proposed the 100th-birthday test: is there evidence to support an individual's claimed age at what would be their centenary birthday? This test does not prove a person's age, but does winnow out typical pension-claim longevity exaggerations and spontaneous claims that a certain relative is over 150.


title: Longevity claims

text: These are standardized lists of people whose lifespans remain unverified by proximate records, including both modern ("Guinness"-era) and historical cases. All cases in which an individual's supercentenarian lifespan is not (yet) backed by records sufficient to the standards of modern longevity research are listed as unverified. They may be factually true, even though records do not exist (or have not yet been found), so such lists include these grey-area cases.


title: Longevity claims

text: These living supercentenarian cases, in descending order of claimed age, with full birth and review dates, have been updated within the past two years, but have not had their claimed age validated by an independent body such as the Gerontology Research Group or Guinness World Records. The list includes only those claims that are greater than the age of the oldest verified living person, Lucile Randon, who is currently aged , but under 130 years.


title: Longevity claims

text: This table contains supercentenarian claims with either a known death date or no confirmation for more than two years that they were still alive. Only claims greater than that of Jeanne Calment, who died at the age of 122 years, 164 days, but under 130 years are included. They are listed in order of age as of the date of death or date last reported alive.


title: Common loon

text: The common loon or great northern diver (Gavia immer) is a large member of the loon, or diver, family of birds. Breeding adults have a plumage that includes a broad black head and neck with a greenish, purplish, or bluish sheen, blackish or blackish-grey upperparts, and pure white underparts except some black on the undertail coverts and vent. Non-breeding adults are brownish with a dark neck and head marked with dark grey-brown. Their upperparts are dark brownish-grey with an unclear pattern of squares on the shoulders, and the underparts, lower face, chin, and throat are whitish. The sexes look alike, though males are significantly heavier than females. During the breeding season, loons live on lakes and other waterways in Canada; the northern United States (including Alaska); and southern parts of Greenland and Iceland. Small numbers breed on Svalbard and sporadically elsewhere in Arctic Eurasia. Common loons winter on both coasts of the US as far south as Mexico, and on the Atlantic coast of Europe.


title: Common loon

text: Common loons eat a variety of animal prey including fish, crustaceans, insect larvae, molluscs, and occasionally aquatic plant life. They swallow most of their prey underwater, where it is caught, but some larger items are first brought to the surface. Loons are monogamous; that is, a single female and male often together defend a territory and may breed together for a decade or more. Both members of a pair build a large nest out of dead marsh grasses and other plants formed into a mound along the vegetated shores of lakes. A single brood is raised each year from a clutch of one or two olive-brown oval eggs with dark brown spots which are incubated for about 28 days by both parents. Fed by both parents, the chicks fledge in 70 to 77 days. The chicks are capable of diving underwater when just a few days old, and they fly to their wintering areas before ice forms in the fall.


title: Common loon

text: The common loon is assessed as a species of least concern on the IUCN Red List of Endangered Species. It is one of the species to which the Agreement on the Conservation of African-Eurasian Migratory Waterbirds applies. The United States Forest Service has designated the common loon a species of special status because of threats from habitat loss and toxic metal poisoning in its US range.


title: Common loon

text: The common loon is the provincial bird of Ontario, and it appears on Canadian currency, including the one-dollar "loonie" coin and a previous series of $20 bills. In 1961, it was designated the state bird of Minnesota, and appears on the Minnesota State Quarter.


title: Common loon

text: The common loon is also known as the great northern diver in Eurasia. (Another former name, great northern loon, was a compromise proposed by the International Ornithological Committee.) It is one of five loon species that make up the genus "Gavia", the only genus of the family Gaviidae and order Gaviiformes. Its closest relative is another large black-headed species, the yellow-billed loon or white-billed diver ("Gavia adamsii"). There are no recognized subspecies of the common loon.


title: Common loon

text: Danish zoologist and mineralogist Morten Thrane Brünnich first described the common loon in 1764, as "Colymbus" "immer" in his "Ornithologia Borealis". The now-defunct genus "Colymbus" contained grebes as well as loons, and remained in use until the International Commission on Zoological Nomenclature attempted to clarify the nomenclature in 1956 by declaring "Colymbus" a suppressed name unfit for further use and establishing "Gavia", created by Johann Reinhold Forster in 1788, as the valid genus name for the loons.


title: Common loon

text: The current genus name "Gavia" was the Latin term for an unidentified seabird and the specific "immer" is derived from a Norwegian name for the bird, similar to the modern Icelandic word "himbrimi". The word may be related to Swedish "immer" and "emmer": the grey or blackened ashes of a fire (referring to the loon's dark plumage); or to Latin "immergo", to immerse, and "immersus", submerged.


title: Common loon

text: The European name "diver" comes from the bird's practice of catching fish by diving. The North American name "loon" was first recorded in this sense in "New Englands Prospect" (1634) by William Wood (1580-1639); "The Loone is an ill shap'd thing like a Cormorant". It may be derived from Old Norse "lómr", as are modern Swedish and Danish "lom", in each case referring to the distinctive call.


title: Common loon

text: A number of fossil loon species are known from the Pliocene, and specimens from the Pleistocene of California and Florida appear to represent a paleosubspecies of the common loon.


title: Common loon

text: The adult common loon can range from in length with a wingspan, slightly smaller than the similar yellow-billed loon. On average, it is about long and has a wingspan of . Its weight can vary anywhere from . Sizes vary regionally, especially by body mass, with the smallest bodied loons on average from lower-central Canada and the Great Lakes, while westerly birds are similar or mildly larger, and loons breeding further east can appear to be significantly larger. Furthermore, males average up to nearly 27% more massive than females in some populations. Breeding loons in Maine averaged in females and in males, essentially the same weight as the yellow-billed loon although the yellow-billed is still larger than in linear dimensions (especially bill length) than the Maine loons. In Ontario, 20 females averaged and 20 males averaged . In contrast, in the Gulf of Alaska, adults of both sexes reportedly averaged . Adult breeding plumage consists of a broad black head and neck with greenish, purplish, or bluish sheen. It has a black bill sometimes with a pale tip, and red eyes. The neck is encircled with a characteristic black ring and has two white necklaces of eight to ten short streaks on the upper foreneck, and a noticeable collar of white, parallel lines forming a large oval on the neck-side. The central lower foreneck is pure white, and the lower neck-sides has longitudinal white lines becoming rows of small spots and black lines becoming very narrow. The upperparts are blackish or blackish grey, and each feather has small white spots on it. The upperwing is blackish and with small white spots on the non-primary coverts, whereas the underwing is paler with white coverts except the long black shaft-streaks on the axillaries. The underparts are pure white, but have some black on the undertail coverts and vent. It has a checkered black-and-white mantle and a blackish tail. The legs are pale grey on the inner half and blackish on the outer half, and the webs between the toes are flesh colored.


title: Common loon

text: Adult non-breeding plumage is brownish with a dark neck and head marked with dark grey-brown. The eyes are surrounded with white, and the eyelids are pale. The bill is mostly pale grey, with a dark culmen and tip, but in early spring the tip may turn whitish. The underparts, lower face, chin, and throat are also whitish. The foreneck is whitish, usually forming wedge-shaped notch in dark neck-sides, and may sometimes reveal a shadowy trace of the neck ring or a pale collar. It has dark brownish grey upperparts with an unclear pattern of squares on the shoulders and some wing coverts spotted with white, which are usually concealed while swimming. The male and the female have similar appearances, although they exhibit sexual dimorphism in their physical dimensions with the male larger and significantly heavier than the female.


title: Common loon

text: The heavy dagger-like bill is evenly tapered and greyish, sometimes having a black tip. The bill colour and angle distinguish this species from the yellow-billed loon. The neck is short and thick. It swims very low in the water, with sometimes only its head held above and horizontal to water. It must run across the water surface to get in flight. During flight, its head is slightly lower than its body, with its feet trailing behind. It has a skeletal structure made up of a number of solid bones (this is usual for the Gaviiformes and penguins but unlike most flying birds which have bones with extensive pneumatization, hollow and filled with air to make the skeleton lighter), which adds weight but helps in diving.


title: Common loon

text: A juvenile often has a dark, brownish-grey nape that may look darker than the pale-edged black feathers. It has a dark grey to black head, neck, and upperparts, with white throat, cheeks, and underparts. During the first winter, the bill shape of the young may not be as fully developed as that of the adult, and during the second winter, it much resembles the breeding adult, but with wing coverts lacking white spots.


title: Common loon

text: The common loon is distinguished from the black-throated loon ("G. arctica") and the red-throated loon ("G. stellata") mainly by its larger size. It usually has a steeper forehead and a bulging forecrown, somewhat similar to the black-throated loon. Its bill is heavier and the back is paler than its hindneck. It is more difficult to separate from the yellow-billed loon, but its breeding plumage has more white markings on the neck and the squares on its shoulders are usually smaller; the non-breeding plumage has darker neck-sides contrasting more sharply with pale areas and bill colour.


title: Common loon

text: The scaly juvenile plumage is retained until January or February of the year following hatching, when a lengthy moult of head and body feathers gives them a more adult-like appearance. Adults shed all their flight feathers simultaneously around this time, leaving them temporarily flightless, prior to gaining breeding plumage, but second-year birds delay this substantial moult until the summer. The adult winter plumage is attained between October and January by partial moult mainly of head, body and tail feathers.


title: Common loon

text: With improved gene-sequencing technology, a draft genome of the common loon has assembled and identified at least 14,169 common loon genes. 80.7% of chicken genes are found in the common loon genome. The physiological costs of deep-water diving and long distance aerial migration of loons have greatly affected loon evolution. Many identified genes are candidate genes for positive selection since the common loon-chicken split 90 million years ago. It is theorized that these candidate genes are related to hemoglobin affinity for oxygen, solute exchange, immunoglobulin function related to immune defense, nervous system development and a number of molecular pathways related to DNA metabolic function, and G-receptor pathways potentially involved in low-light visual acuity. For example, SLC48A, and SLC20A1 are candidate genes in the Gavia lineage for maintaining homeostasis due to maybe having a role in maintaining ion and pH balance.


title: Common loon

text: Common loons are mainly Nearctic, and breed from 48° N to the Arctic Circle, locally south to 40° N and north to 78° N. During their breeding season in spring and summer, most common loons live on lakes and other waterways in the northern United States and Canada, as well as in southern parts of Greenland, in Iceland, in Svalbard, in Jan Mayen, and in Bear Island in Norway; and in Alaska, to the west, and very rarely in Scotland, to the east. Their summer habitat ranges from wooded lakes to tundra ponds. The lakes must be large enough for flight take-off, and provide a large population of small fish. Deep lakes with warm surface waters, relatively low biological productivity and low turbidity where their fish prey are easy to see are habitats where breeding loons are more successful in raising young. For protection from predators, common loons favour lakes with islands and coves. They are rare visitors to the Arctic coast. They are known to exhibit high breeding site fidelity.


title: Common loon

text: Some common loons remain in Iceland year-round, although most migrate. In North America, they winter mainly along north Atlantic and north-east Pacific coasts, many stopping off on the Great Lakes during their migration. They migrate in the day, starting about two hours after sunrise and flying at altitudes of 1500 to 2700 m above sea level, above the convective and turbulent layer of air. In winter they can be seen on North America coasts as far south as Baja California, Sonora, northern Sinaloa, southern Texas, and rarely northern Tamaulipas. In the east, several thousand winter along western European coasts, probably originating from Iceland, Greenland, and Canada. Their range extends into northwestern Europe from Finland to Portugal and southern and northwestern Spain (Galicia and Asturias), as well as the western Mediterranean off Catalonia, and off Morocco in Africa, although only a few hundred travel as far south as Iberia. Although wintering site fidelity is not well known, annually, adults are observed to return to the same wintering locations in the Pacific Ocean (Morro Bay), the Gulf of Mexico (Barataria Bay), the Atlantic Ocean (Maryland and Massachusetts), and the reservoir Lake Pateros.


title: Common loon

text: They usually winter along coasts and on inland lakes, bays, inlets, and streams, with birds migrating to the nearest body of water that will not freeze over in the winter: western Canadian loons go to the Pacific, Great Lakes loons to the Gulf of Mexico region, eastern Canadian loons to the Atlantic, and some loons to large inland lakes and reservoirs. They appear in most of the inland waters of the United States. The South Carolina coast, the Gulf coast adjacent to the Florida panhandle, and the Atlantic seaboard from Massachusetts to Maine have some of the highest concentrations of common loons. Occasional vagrants are recorded inland in Mexico, in San Luis Potosí and Coahuila, as well as in Chiapas and Oaxaca in the south. They are accidental in northern Japan and the Commander Islands in northwestern Pacific, and Cuba in the West Indies.


title: Common loon

text: The common loon is an expert fisher, catching its prey underwater by diving as deep as . With its large webbed feet, the common loon is an efficient underwater pursuit predator and adroit diver. It needs a long run-up distance to gain momentum for flight take-off and is ungainly on land, sliding on its belly and pushing itself forward with its legs. Its clumsiness on land is due to the legs being positioned at the rear of its body; the pelvic muscles are well developed, ideal for swimming but not well-suited for walking. When it lands on water, it skims along on its belly to slow down, rather than braking with its feet, as they are set too far back. The common loon swims and dives well, and flies competently for hundreds of kilometres in migration. It flies with its neck outstretched, usually calling a particular tremolo that can be used to identify a flying loon. Its flying speed is as much as during migration. Particularly during the breeding season, common loons frequently engage in territorial disputes against other water birds, including ducks and geese, and will attack or drive off competitors and intruders to their territory.


title: Common loon

text: Fish account for about 80% of the diet of the common loon. It forages on fish of up to in length, including minnows, suckers, gizzard shad, rock bass, alewife, northern pike, whitefish, sauger, brown bullhead, pumpkinseed, burbot, walleye, bluegill, white crappie, black crappie, rainbow smelt, and killifish. The young typically eat small minnows, and sometimes insects and fragments of green vegetation. The freshwater diet primarily consists of pike, perch, sunfish, trout, and bass; the saltwater diet primarily consists of rock fish, flounder, sea trout, herring, Atlantic croaker, haddock, and Gulf silverside. When there is either a lack of fish or they are difficult to catch, it preys on crustaceans, crayfish, snails, leeches, insect larvae, molluscs, frogs, annelids, and occasionally aquatic plant matter such as pondweed, roots, moss, willow shoots, seeds, and algae. It has also been known to eat ducklings.


title: Common loon

text: The common loon uses its powerful hind legs to propel its body underwater at high speed to catch its prey, which it then swallows head-first. If the fish attempts to evade the common loon, the bird chases it down with excellent underwater manoeuvrability due to its tremendously strong legs. Most prey are swallowed underwater, where they are caught, but some larger prey are first brought to the surface. It is a visual predator, so it is essential to hunting success that the water is clear. It normally dives , but has been recorded to dive up to . The average diving time is 42 seconds, but the maximum duration spent underwater is about .


title: Common loon

text: The common loon's mating system is serially monogamous; breeding pairs jointly defend a territory consisting of an entire small lake or a protected bay within a large lake. A given male and female remain together throughout a breeding attempt, rear their own biological offspring, reunite each spring, and may breed together for many consecutive years. However, in the event of death or territorial eviction of one pair member by an intruding loon of the same sex, the other pair member quickly establishes a pair bond with the evicting bird. (Hence, most adult loons have two or more different mates during their lives.) Evicting individuals tend to be young males and females (5 to 9 years old), while evicted adults are often those 15 years and older.


title: Common loon

text: Pairs do not remain together during winter; in addition, males usually precede females by a few days to a few weeks during spring migration, settling on their lake once a portion of it becomes ice-free. Copulation takes place ashore, often on the nest site, repeated daily until the eggs are laid. The preceding courtship is very simple, with mutual bill-dipping and dives. The displays towards intruders, such as bow-jumping (an alternation of fencing and bill-dipping postures and rushing (running "along the surface with its wings either folded or half-extended and flapping at about the same speed as when taking off") are often misinterpreted as courtship.


title: Common loon

text: Nesting typically begins in early May. Significantly more nesting sites are found on islands than on mainland shoreline. Breeding pairs patrol their territories routinely, even at night, defending the territory both physically and vocally. Pairs that nested together the preceding year typically reuse the nest site from the previous year, if they hatched chicks successfully there. In contrast, pairs that lost their eggs to a predator usually shift the nest to a new location. This logical behaviour pattern appears to depend upon the male, because breeding pairs consisting of last year's male and a female not present during the preceding year continue to exhibit the behaviour; pairs composed of last year's female and a new male tend to select a new nest site, regardless of the success or failure of the previous year's attempt. Despite the lead role of males in nest site selection, both sexes contribute substantially to nest construction. The nest is about wide and is constructed out of dead marsh grasses and other indigenous plants, and formed into a mound along the vegetated coasts of lakes greater than . After a week of construction in late spring, one parent climbs on top to mold the interior of the nest to the shape of its body. Based on a number of studies, nesting success averages about 40%, and most newly hatched young survive due to parental care.


title: Common loon

text: Eggs from first clutches are typically laid in May or early June, the timing depending largely upon the date that lakes become ice-free and inhabitable. A clutch consists of two (occasionally one) olive-brown oval eggs with dark brown spots. Incubation is carried out jointly by male and female and lasts about 28 days. Loons often place nests along steep lake shorelines where adults can quickly dive underwater when approached by predators. The eggs are about long and wide and the two eggs are laid with an interval of one to three days between them, and hatch asynchronously.


title: Common loon

text: Newly hatched chicks are dark chocolate brown in color and have a white belly. Within hours of hatching, the young begin to leave the nest with the parents, swimming close by and sometimes riding on one parent's back. Parents and chicks initially stay in shallow, isolated bays where the parents are able to defend the chicks better from intruding loons and eagles, which are their main predators. Male parents defend broods consisting of two chicks more vigorously than singleton chicks, chiefly with the territorial yodel call. The chicks are capable of making shallow dives from their first day but make deeper dives as they grow. Fledging takes 70 to 77 days. Usually, only one brood is raised. Both parents feed the chicks live prey from hatching to fledging. As they grow, chicks are able to catch an increasingly large proportion of their diet by themselves; they can feed and fend for themselves after about two months, although many juveniles continue to beg from adults well beyond this age. The parent birds capture small fish and hold them crosswise in their bill, call and approach the chicks with their head lowered so that the chicks can grasp them. If food is scarce, the larger chick may peck its small sibling incessantly; on small lakes with limited food, only one chick often survives. Juveniles leave the breeding ground before ice formation in the fall, weeks after their parents. A pair of loons raising two chicks have been estimated to feed on 423 kg of fish during the five and a half months that they spend in their breeding territory.


title: Common loon

text: Loons exhibit a strong tendency to settle as breeders on a lake that resembles their natal one, a phenomenon termed natal habitat imprinting. This preference is based on two lake attributes: size and pH. The behaviour is puzzling, because it is as strong in loons hatched on small, acidic lakes as those from large lakes of neutral pH. Hence, the former group is exhibiting active preference for lakes that have been shown to result in higher chick mortality and lower breeding success.


title: Common loon

text: The common loon produces a variety of vocalizations, the most common of which are the tremolo, the yodel, the wail, and the hoot. Each of these calls communicates a distinct message. The frequency at which it vocalizes has been shown to vary based on time of day, weather, and season. It is most vocally active between mid-May and mid-June. The wail, yodel, and tremolo calls are sounded more frequently at night than during the day; calls have also been shown to occur more frequently in cold temperatures and when there is little to no rain.


title: Common loon

text: The tremolo call—sometimes called the "laughing" call—is characterized by its short, wavering quality. It often uses this call to signal distress or alarm caused by territorial disputes or perceived threats. It emits a tremulous series of up to 10 rather high notes "(hu)-heheheheheheha". It also uses the tremolo to communicate its presence to other loons when they arrive at a lake, often when they are flying overhead. It is the only vocalization used in flight. The tremolo call has varying three levels of intensities that correlate with a loon's level of distress, and the types are differentiated by increasingly higher pitch frequencies added to the call.


title: Common loon

text: The yodel is a long and complex call made only by the male. It is used in the establishment of territorial boundaries and in territorial confrontations, and the length of the call corresponds with the loon's level of aggression. The dominant frequencies in the yodel indicate the body mass and thereby the health of males. A male that occupies a new territory appears to alter its yodel to be clearly distinguishable from the call of the previous territory owner.


title: Common loon

text: A loon's wail is a long call consisting of up to three notes, and is often compared to a wolf's howl. It uses this call to communicate its location to other loons. The call is given back and forth between breeding pairs or an adult and its chick, either to maintain contact or in an attempt to move closer together after being separated. It is a loud "aaoo", "weee-wea weee-wea weee-wea", or "ooo-aaah-éééé".


title: Common loon

text: The hoot is a short, soft call and is another form of contact call. It is a more intimate call than the wail and is used exclusively between small family groups or flocks. The common loon hoots to let other family or flock members know where it is. This call is often heard when the adult loon is summoning its chicks to feed.


title: Common loon

text: Considerable information on longevity and survival rates has been collected in the past two decades, owing to the implementation of an efficient capture protocol that permits marking and monitoring of large study populations. A rough preliminary analysis showed that common loons of both sexes survive at an annual rate of over 90% until they reach their mid-20s, but show a survival rate of only about 75% thereafter. However, a second, finer-scaled analysis made clear that male loons begin to show higher mortality, increased territory loss and lower body condition starting at age 15. Perhaps in response to their physical decline, males 15 and older show increased rates of both territorial aggression and territorial vocalization. This age-related shift in behaviour is interpreted as terminal investment, a "go for broke" strategy seen in senescing animals that are attempting to eke out another year or two of breeding before they die.


title: Common loon

text: Adult common loons have few predators, although bald eagles will attack incubating birds. Attacks by sharks in winter have also been recorded. When a predator approaches (either the loon's nest or the loon itself), the common loon sometimes attacks the predator by rushing at it and trying to stab it with its dagger-like bill, aiming its attacks either at the predator's abdomen or the back of its head or neck, which may be deadly to predators up to the size of a fox or raccoon.


title: Common loon

text: Eggs are taken by a number of mammals, including American mink, striped skunk, otters, foxes and raccoons, with the latter being responsible for nearly 40% of all nest failures. Birds such as herring gulls, northern ravens and American crows will eat unattended eggs. Because their nests are at the water's edge, common loon eggs are especially vulnerable if the adult is absent.


title: Common loon

text: Chicks may be killed by common snapping turtles, large gulls, bald eagles and large fish such as northern pike and largemouth bass. The eagle in particular is a significant predator of chicks.


title: Common loon

text: Internal parasites of the common loon include many species of worms, including flatworms, tapeworms, nematodes and spiny-headed worms. High levels of worms may result from feeding changes due to low availability of fish, and can lead to illness and death. Protozoal infections including one caused by "Eimeria gaviae" and avian malaria have been recorded in this loon. The black fly "Simulium annulus" is closely associated with the common loon to which it is attracted to chemicals in the uropygial gland secretions as well as by visual and tactile cues. This fly is detrimental to loons, their preferred hosts, transmitting blood-borne parasites and viruses, and causing nest abandonment when numbers are high. External parasites include ischnoceran feather lice, although these are not found on the bird's head.


title: Common loon

text: Botulism, acquired by eating infected fish, can lead to paralysis and drowning. Aspergillosis is another cause of emaciation and death. Outbreaks sometimes lead to thousands of deaths.


title: Common loon

text: Since 1998, the common loon has been rated as a species of least concern on the IUCN Red List of Endangered Species. This is because it has a large range – more than – and because it has a stable population trend that does not warrant a vulnerable rating. It also has a large population size of 612,000 to 640,000 individuals. The estimated breeding population ranges from 1,400 to 2,600 mature individuals in Europe. Over half of the breeding population in North America is found in Ontario with 97,000 territorial pairs, and in Quebec with 50,000 territorial pairs. About 2,400 individuals occur in each of the maritime provinces of Canada—Nova Scotia and New Brunswick. British Columbia accounts for 25,000 territorial pairs. In far northern Canada, about 50,000 territorial pairs are known to occur, and 12,500 to 15,000 territorial pairs occur in the Prairie Provinces of Alberta, Manitoba, and Saskatchewan. In the United States, the largest breeding population is present in Alaska with 3,600 to 6,000 territorial pairs. The U.S. Great Lakes region has 5,900 to 7,200 territorial pairs which accounts for over half of the breeding population in the United States. There are about 100 territorial pairs in the northwestern U.S. states of Washington, Idaho, Montana, and Wyoming. About 2,250 territorial pairs are found in New England and New York. In winter, 3,500 to 4,500 individuals are found in the United Kingdom, and even fewer individuals are found in the western European coastline and in Iceland. Along the Pacific Coast, about 184,000 to 189,000 adults and 31,000 to 32,000 juveniles are found, and along the Atlantic Coast, 423,000 to 446,000 adults and 72,000 to 76,000 juveniles are found.


title: Common loon

text: The common loon is listed under Appendix II of the Convention on the Conservation of Migratory Species, and in Article I under the European Union (EU) Birds Directive. It is one of the species to which the Agreement on the Conservation of African-Eurasian Migratory Waterbirds (AEWA) is applied. In Europe it appears in 20 Important Bird Areas (IBAs), including Ireland, Svalbard, mainland Norway, Iceland, Spain, and the United Kingdom. It is also a listed species in 83 Special Protection Areas in the EU Natura 2000 network. The USDA National Forest Service has designated the common loon a species of special status, and in the upper Great Lake regions of the Huron-Manistee, Ottawa, and Hiawatha national forests as a regional forester sensitive species.


title: Common loon

text: The common loon is a key indicator of mercury deposition in aquatic environments due to its position at the top of the food chain. The main contributors to elevated mercury concentrations in aquatic environments are coal burning power plants, waste incineration, and metal production. Although environmental mercury (Hg) is naturally occurring, methylmercury (MeHg) is a biologically toxic form that accumulates throughout aquatic environments in the northeastern United States. Methylmercury, a neurotoxin, has been shown to have a wide range of behavioral, reproductive, and survival effects on the common loon. Previous research has found a correlation between mercury levels and pH, with more acidic aquatic environments being at the highest risk for elevated methylmercury concentrations. Once mercury enters the water, it is taken up by fish and spread throughout the food chain. Resulting from this transmission of mercury, there is a significant positive correlation between mercury levels in fish and mercury levels in male, female, and chick blood of common loons; consequently, an increase in mercury concentration in the blood of common loons and fish was seen with a decrease in local aquatic pH. Although there have been reductions in recent years in acidifying emissions, there has been limited biological recovery in these lakes most likely due to climate change. Research has shown that warmer summer temperatures can inhibit reestablishment of cold-water fish species in acidified lakes and droughts brought on by increased summer temperatures can further acidify lakes.


title: Common loon

text: Although the common loon are able to decrease their methylmercury levels by molting and laying eggs, continued consumption of fish with raised methylmercury levels prevents these mechanisms from effectively lowering methylmercury levels. Mercury concentrations have been shown to vary by the sex and age of common loons. Male common loons were found to contain the highest blood mercury concentration likely due to the fact that they tend to consume bigger fish with higher mercury concentrations. Females contained the second highest blood mercury concentration with differences between the males likely being due to the fact that females can expel mercury into the eggs they lay. Juveniles had the lowest blood mercury concentration. Scientists found that the data from juveniles helped to best indicate the local mercury availability as they are fed exclusively from their natal territory.


title: Common loon

text: Elevated levels of mercury have been associated with changes in foraging and brooding behavior among adult common loons, especially in higher concentrations. Studies have found that elevated levels of methylmercury are associated with lethargy and decreased time spent foraging in adult common loons. A different study carried out in the Adirondack Mountains found that elevated levels of methylmercury are associated with reduced diving frequency in adult common loons. One study found that brood productivity was reduced by half when female blood mercury levels exceeded 4.3 μg/g and productivity completely failed when female blood mercury levels exceeded 8.6 μg/g. These results are related to fish mercury levels of 0.21 μg/g and 0.41 μg/g, respectively. As mercury levels and pH are correlated, scientists have found that brood success decreases with decreasing pH such that environments with a pH at around 4.5 exhibited reproductive success below a calculated positive growth rate threshold. An association has also been observed between elevated blood methylmercury levels and aberrant incubation patterns. Adult common loons with high levels of methylmercury were found to spend less time incubating and in the nest, increasing the risks of predation and the eggs overheating/overcooling. Together, the effects of heightened methylmercury levels on parenting behaviors may contribute to lower chick survival rates. One study in Maine and New Hampshire found that high levels of methylmercury in parents are associated with a significant decrease in the number of fledged young, with common loons in the highest risk group producing 41% fewer fledged young than common loons with low levels of methylmercury.


title: Common loon

text: The common loons of the Adirondack Mountains are particularly affected by methylmercury as the acidity of the lakes provides an environment conducive to converting environmental mercury to methylmercury. One study found that 21% of the male Adirondack common loon and 8% of the female Adirondacks common loon sampled were at high risk for detrimental impacts such as behavioral and reproductive abnormalities. In the Adirondacks, bioaccumulation factors for methylmercury were found to increase up the food chain, leaving common loons at the highest risk for detrimental effects from methylmercury. Spatial analysis indicates that the highest aquatic mercury concentrations are found in the southwestern portion of the Adirondacks, an area with lakes heavily affected by acid rain. Organizations such as the Adirondack Loon Center and the Adirondack Cooperative Loon Program spearhead loon conservation efforts in the Adirondacks by performing research, engaging the public, and informing public policy.


title: Common loon

text: The common loon's breeding range has moved northward, the species breeding as far south as Iowa a century ago. It too is adversely affected by acid rain and pollution, as well as lead poisoning from fishing sinkers (especially those that are about the size of the grit stones they ingest) and mercury contamination from industrial waste. Heavy metals such as mercury may be partially removed through biological processes such as excretion or deposition in feathers, but their adverse effects are magnified through concentration of the toxic elements in organs such as the liver. Eggs shells may also contain metal contaminants, leading to low reproductive productivity. High levels of heavy metals are linked to loons being in poor condition, males being affected more because they eat larger fish.


title: Common loon

text: The common loon has also faced a decline in breeding range due to hunting, predation, and water-level fluctuations, or flooding. Some environmentalists attempt to increase nesting success by mitigating the effects of some of these threats, namely terrestrial predation and water-level fluctuations, through the deployment of rafts in the loon's breeding territories. In addition, artificial floating nesting platforms have been provided for the common loon in some lakes to reduce the impact of changing water levels due to dams and other human activities. The common loon abandons lakes that fail to provide suitable nesting habitat due to shoreline development. It is endangered by personal water-craft and powerboats that may drown newly born chicks, wash eggs away, or swamp nests. It is still considered an "injured" species in Alaska as a result of the Exxon Valdez oil spill.


title: Common loon

text: The common loon appears on Canadian currency, including the one-dollar "loonie" coin and the previous series of $20 bills. It is the provincial bird of Ontario. It was designated the state bird of the U.S. state of Minnesota in 1961, and also appears on the Minnesota State Quarter.


title: Common loon

text: The voice and appearance of the common loon has made it prominent in several Native American tales. These include an Ojibwe story of a loon that created the world, and a Mi'kmaq saga describing Kwee-moo, the loon who was a special messenger of Glooscap (Glu-skap), the tribal hero. The tale of the loon's necklace was handed down in many versions among Pacific Coast peoples. The Delaware in the east of North America and the Buryats of Siberia also had creation stories involving the loon.


title: Common loon

text: Folk names for the common loon include "big loon", "call-up-a-storm", "greenhead", "hell-diver", "walloon", "black-billed loon", "guinea duck", "imber diver", "ring-necked loon", and "ember-goose". An old colloquial name from New England was "call-up-a-storm", as its noisy cries supposedly foretold stormy weather. Some old Scottish names such as arran hawk and carara are corruptions of old Scottish Gaelic onomatopoeic names representing the bird's call; others, like bishop and ember goose, were used to avoid older names for this sometimes ill-omened bird.


title: Common loon

text: The common loon was eaten in the Scottish Islands from the Neolithic until the eighteenth century, and its thick layer of fat beneath the skin was used as a cure for sciatica.


title: Common loon

text: The bird is central to the plot of the children's novel "Great Northern?" by Arthur Ransome (in which it is referred to throughout as "great northern diver", with the then current scientific name "Colymbus immer"). The story is set in the Outer Hebrides, where the main characters—a group of children on holiday—notice a pair of divers apparently nesting there. Checking their bird book, they believe that these are great northern divers. However, these have not previously been seen to nest in northern Scotland, and so they ask for help from an ornithologist. He confirms that these birds are indeed the great northern; unfortunately, it soon transpires that he does not wish merely to observe, but wants to steal the eggs and add them to his collection; and to do this, he must first kill the birds. Published in 1947, the story is one where the conservationists are the eventual victors over the egg collector, at a time when the latter hobby was not widely considered to be harmful.


title: Common loon

text: Major League Soccer club Minnesota United FC uses the loon in its crest and nickname, as well as a mascot.


title: Common loon

text: The wailing call of the loon is widely used in film and television to evoke wilderness and suspense, and is referenced in songs such as "Old Devil Moon" ("wanna laugh like a loon").


title: Common loon

text: Loons are featured prominently in the 1981 film "On Golden Pond". Its distinctive sound also appeared in "Conan the Barbarian", "Out of Africa", "Platoon", "Guinevere", "Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban", "Rick and Morty", "Watchmen", "Godzilla", "Kubo and the Two Strings", "", "Pet Sematary", "1917" and "", among others.


title: Common loon

text: In the 2016 Pixar movie "Finding Dory", a somewhat bedraggled and dimwitted loon named Becky is persuaded to use a bucket to help two of the main characters, Nemo and Marlin, get into a marine life institute where the titular Dory is trapped.


title: IEEE 802.1X

text: IEEE 802.1X is an IEEE Standard for port-based Network Access Control (PNAC). It is part of the IEEE 802.1 group of networking protocols. It provides an authentication mechanism to devices wishing to attach to a LAN or WLAN.


title: IEEE 802.1X

text: IEEE 802.1X defines the encapsulation of the Extensible Authentication Protocol (EAP) over wired IEEE 802 networksand over 802.11 wireless networks, which is known as "EAP over LAN" or EAPOL. EAPOL was originally specified for IEEE 802.3 Ethernet, IEEE 802.5 Token Ring, and FDDI (ANSI X3T9.5/X3T12 and ISO 9314) in 802.1X-2001, but was extended to suit other IEEE 802 LAN technologies such as IEEE 802.11 wireless in 802.1X-2004. The EAPOL was also modified for use with IEEE 802.1AE ("MACsec") and IEEE 802.1AR (Secure Device Identity, DevID) in 802.1X-2010 to support service identification and optional point to point encryption over the internal LAN segment.


title: IEEE 802.1X

text: 802.1X authentication involves three parties: a supplicant, an authenticator, and an authentication server. The supplicant is a client device (such as a laptop) that wishes to attach to the LAN/WLAN. The term 'supplicant' is also used interchangeably to refer to the software running on the client that provides credentials to the authenticator. The authenticator is a network device that provides a data link between the client and the network and can allow or block network traffic between the two, such as an Ethernet switch or wireless access point; and the authentication server is typically a trusted server that can receive and respond to requests for network access, and can tell the authenticator if the connection is to be allowed, and various settings that should apply to that client's connection or setting. Authentication servers typically run software supporting the RADIUS and EAP protocols. In some cases, the authentication server software may be running on the authenticator hardware.


title: IEEE 802.1X

text: The authenticator acts like a security guard to a protected network. The supplicant (i.e., client device) is not allowed access through the authenticator to the protected side of the network until the supplicant's identity has been validated and authorized. With 802.1X port-based authentication, the supplicant must initially provide the required credentials to the authenticator - these will have been specified in advance by the network administrator and could include a user name/password or a permitted digital certificate. The authenticator forwards these credentials to the authentication server to decide whether access is to be granted. If the authentication server determines the credentials are valid, it informs the authenticator, which in turn allows the supplicant (client device) to access resources located on the protected side of the network.


title: IEEE 802.1X

text: EAPOL operates over the data link layer, and in Ethernet II framing protocol has an EtherType value of 0x888E.


title: IEEE 802.1X

text: 802.1X-2001 defines two logical port entities for an authenticated port—the "controlled port" and the "uncontrolled port". The controlled port is manipulated by the 802.1X PAE (Port Access Entity) to allow (in the authorized state) or prevent (in the unauthorized state) network traffic ingress and egress to/from the controlled port. The uncontrolled port is used by the 802.1X PAE to transmit and receive EAPOL frames.


title: IEEE 802.1X

text: 802.1X-2004 defines the equivalent port entities for the supplicant; so a supplicant implementing 802.1X-2004 may prevent higher-level protocols from being used if it is not content that authentication has successfully completed. This is particularly useful when an EAP method providing mutual authentication is used, as the supplicant can prevent data leakage when connected to an unauthorized network.


title: IEEE 802.1X

text: An open-source project known as Open1X produces a client, Xsupplicant. This client is currently available for both Linux and Windows. The main drawbacks of the Open1X client are that it does not provide comprehensible and extensive user documentation and the fact that most Linux vendors do not provide a package for it. The more general wpa_supplicant can be used for 802.11 wireless networks and wired networks. Both support a very wide range of EAP types.