title: The Soloist

text: On its opening weekend, the film opened #4 behind "Obsessed", "17 Again", and "Fighting", grossing $9.7 million in 2,024 theaters, with a $4,800 average per theater. The film went on to gross just half of its $60 million budget, bringing in $31.7 million domestically and $6.6 million in other territories, for a worldwide total of $38.3 million. This was blamed on the film's initial release date being postponed, as well as the film's release coming one week before the 2009 summer movie season.


title: The Soloist

text: On Rotten Tomatoes, the film holds an approval rating of 57% based on 207 reviews, with an average score of 5.95/10. The site's critics consensus reads, "Though it features strong performances by its lead players, a lack of narrative focus prevents "The Soloist" from hitting its mark." On Metacritic the film has a weighted average score of 61 out of 100, based on reviews from 33 critics, indicating "generally favorable reviews". Audiences surveyed by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade "B+" on scale of A+ to F.


title: The Soloist

text: Reviewers generally praise the performances by Robert Downey Jr. and Jamie Foxx, but comment on the film's lack of narrative focus in attempting to tell a convincing or engaging story due to the somewhat "uneven" direction by director Joe Wright. Many felt that the project was a bit of a "mismatch" for Wright, and felt it was one of his weakest films to date, following the success of his adaptations of "Pride & Prejudice" and "Atonement".


title: The Soloist

text: Roger Ebert of the "Chicago Sun-Times" wrote: "The Soloist has all the elements of an uplifting drama, except for the uplift. The story is compelling, the actors are in place, but I was never sure what the filmmakers wanted me to feel about it."


title: Cloud Nine (George Harrison album)

text: Cloud Nine is the eleventh studio album by English musician George Harrison and the final released in his lifetime. The album was recorded and released in 1987 after Harrison had taken a five-year hiatus from his career as a solo artist. The hit single "Got My Mind Set on You" from this album re-established Harrison as a critically acclaimed and commercially significant recording artist. "Cloud Nine" was Harrison's last solo studio album released during his lifetime, as his next album "Brainwashed" was released in 2002, almost a year after his death.


title: Cloud Nine (George Harrison album)

text: Frustrated with the changing musical climate, Harrison suspended his recording career in the early 1980s. Instead of recording, he opted to pursue other interests, including film production with his own company, Handmade Films. The odd soundtrack or charity song would surface during this period, but otherwise, it was a musically silent period for Harrison.


title: Cloud Nine (George Harrison album)

text: By late 1986, after a substantial break, Harrison felt the desire to make music again. He asked former Electric Light Orchestra (ELO) leader and fellow musician Jeff Lynne to co-produce a new album with him. After writing a round of new compositions (including the songs already contributed to the 1986 film "Shanghai Surprise"), Harrison entered his home studio Friar Park in Henley-on-Thames on 5 January 1987 to begin recording his first new commercial album in five years. Having recorded the backing tracks for seventeen songs between January and March, he completed the album's overdubs in August 1987.


title: Cloud Nine (George Harrison album)

text: Besides Harrison and Lynne, other artists involved in the sessions included Jim Keltner and Ringo Starr on drums, Eric Clapton on guitar and both Gary Wright and Elton John on piano. (The latter was recovering from vocal surgery, at the time.) With new-found enthusiasm, Harrison actively promoted the album, even appearing with Starr at The Prince's Trust Concert that June to perform "While My Guitar Gently Weeps" and "Here Comes the Sun".


title: Cloud Nine (George Harrison album)

text: The cover features Harrison's first American-made guitar, a 1957 Gretsch 6128 that he purchased in Liverpool in 1961. Harrison called it his "old black Gretsch". Harrison gave the guitar to his longtime friend, Klaus Voormann who kept it for 20 years. The guitar had been left in Los Angeles and had been modified. Harrison asked for the return of the guitar, had it restored and used it for the cover shoot.


title: Cloud Nine (George Harrison album)

text: Harrison's cover of Rudy Clark's little-known song "Got My Mind Set on You" quickly reached number 1 in the United States and number 2 in the United Kingdom. It was Harrison's first single to top the US charts since "Give Me Love (Give Me Peace on Earth)" in 1973. A few weeks later, "Cloud Nine" was released to high anticipation and a favourable critical reception.


title: Cloud Nine (George Harrison album)

text: The album went to No. 10 in the UK. In the US, it peaked at No. 8 on the "Billboard" 200 chart and No. 4 on the "Cash Box" Top 200, and achieved platinum status. It was also number 1 on "Cash Box"s Top 40 Compact Discs chart. The success of the single "Got My Mind Set on You" and its accompanying video re-introduced Harrison to the mainstream. The Beatles tribute song "When We Was Fab" was a successful follow-up single, reaching the top 25 in both the UK and US. The next single, "This Is Love", was a minor hit in the UK.


title: Cloud Nine (George Harrison album)

text: While the success of "Cloud Nine" was not enough to spur Harrison into a tour, it inspired him to continue making music. In the spring of 1988, along with Lynne, he would call up friends Bob Dylan, Tom Petty and Roy Orbison and begin a project ultimately realised as the Traveling Wilburys.


title: Cloud Nine (George Harrison album)

text: In 2004, "Cloud Nine" was remastered and reissued both separately and as part of the deluxe box set "The Dark Horse Years 1976–1992" on Dark Horse Records with new distribution by EMI. The reissue included the bonus tracks "Shanghai Surprise" and "Zig Zag" (the latter also released as the B-side to "When We Was Fab") from the film "Shanghai Surprise" (1986).


title: Cloud Nine (George Harrison album)

text: Writing in "Rolling Stone", David Wild described "Cloud Nine" as "an expertly crafted, endlessly infectious record that constitutes Harrison's best album since 1970s inspired "All Things Must Pass"". Wild also acknowledged Lynne's input as co-producer and praised "When We Was Fab", "Cloud 9", "That's What It Takes" and "Wreck of the Hesperus" as "sublime pop". In "The New York Times", Stephen Holden noted the release as "crucial" to Harrison's career, adding: "A pleasingly tuneful album, its sound is deliberately quaint, as it explicitly evokes the Beatles' more romantic psychedelic music of the late 1960s." Although he regretted the inclusion of ballads such as "Breath Away from Heaven", Bill Holdship wrote in "Creem" that "a good album's a good album, and "Cloud Nine" is plenty good … it's the best record from a former Beatle in at least seven years."


title: Cloud Nine (George Harrison album)

text: Less impressed, Daniel Brogan of the "Chicago Tribune" opined: ""Cloud Nine" plods hopelessly. Most of the blame must fall on Harrison, though producer Jeff Lynne's influence is far too prevalent ... The album is occasionally redeemed by the deft guitar interplay between Harrison and Eric Clapton, as well as the perky single 'Got My Mind Set on You.'" In a five-star review for the "Houston Chronicle", J.D. Considine wrote: "Forget the 'former Beatle' stuff – this album would be worth snapping up even if Harrison were some unknown from Encino." After remarking on Harrison's "stellar" cast of backing musicians, Considine added: "But as much as the playing enlivens the material, as with the dark, bluesy guitar riffs that open the title tune, it's the writing that deserves credit for this album's luster." Far Out Magazine`s Eoghan Lyng was similarly underwhelmed by the work, describing the finished piece as "derivative" and "airless".


title: Cloud Nine (George Harrison album)

text: In a 2001 review, AllMusic editor Stephen Thomas Erlewine also gave the album five stars. He wrote that, with Lynne's help and "the focus on … snappy pop-rock numbers", Harrison "crafted a remarkably consistent and polished comeback effort with "Cloud Nine"", which Erlewine considered "one of his very best albums".<ref name="Erlewine/AM2001">Vladimir Bogdanov, Chris Woodstra & Stephen Thomas Erlewine (eds), "All Music Guide: The Definitive Guide to Popular Music" (4th edn), Backbeat Books (San Francisco, CA, 2001; ), p. 182.</ref> In his 2002 posthumous appraisal of Harrison's solo career, for "Goldmine" magazine, Dave Thompson described the album as "littered with highlights", of which "This Is Love" was "a jewel" and "When We Was Fab" benefited from Lynne "wringing every last Beatle-esque effect out of his box of sonic tricks".


title: Cloud Nine (George Harrison album)

text: Among reviews of the 2004 reissue, "Uncut" described "Cloud Nine" as "endowed with undeniable charm" and "Rolling Stone" deemed it to be a "late-career masterwork" from Harrison.<ref name="Cloud Nine/CD Universe">"George Harrison – Cloud Nine CD Album" > Product description . CD Universe/Muze. Retrieved 5 August 2014.</ref> Writing for "Mojo" in 2011, John Harris found the production dated but praised the quality of the songs, including the "splendidly gonzo version" of "Got My Mind Set on You" and the "irresistible" "When We Was Fab", and considered "Cloud Nine" a "deserved global hit".


title: Arctic tern

text: The Arctic tern (Sterna paradisaea) is a tern in the family Laridae. This bird has a circumpolar breeding distribution covering the Arctic and sub-Arctic regions of Europe (as far south as Brittany), Asia, and North America (as far south as Massachusetts). The species is strongly migratory, seeing two summers each year as it migrates along a convoluted route from its northern breeding grounds to the Antarctic coast for the southern summer and back again about six months later. Recent studies have shown average annual round-trip lengths of about for birds nesting in Iceland and Greenland and about for birds nesting in the Netherlands. These are by far the longest migrations known in the animal kingdom. The Arctic tern nests once every one to three years (depending on its mating cycle).


title: Arctic tern

text: Arctic terns are medium-sized birds. They have a length of and a wingspan of . They are mainly grey and white plumaged, with a red/orange beak and feet, white forehead, a black nape and crown (streaked white), and white cheeks. The grey mantle is , and the scapulae are fringed brown, some tipped white. The upper wing is grey with a white leading edge, and the collar is completely white, as is the rump. The deeply forked tail is whitish, with grey outer webs.


title: Arctic tern

text: Arctic terns are long-lived birds, with many reaching fifteen to thirty years of age. They eat mainly fish and small marine invertebrates. The species is abundant, with an estimated two million individuals. While the trend in the number of individuals in the species as a whole is not known, exploitation in the past has reduced this bird's numbers in the southern reaches of its ranges.


title: Arctic tern

text: The genus name "Sterna" is derived from Old English "stearn", "tern". The specific "paradisaea" is from Late Latin "paradisus", "paradise".


title: Arctic tern

text: The Scots names "pictarnie", "tarrock" and their many variants are also believed to be onomatopoeic, derived from the distinctive call. Due to the difficulty in distinguishing the two species, all the informal common names are shared with the common tern.


title: Arctic tern

text: The Arctic tern has a continuous worldwide circumpolar breeding distribution; there are no recognized subspecies. It can be found in coastal regions in cooler temperate parts of North America and Eurasia during the northern summer. During the southern summer, it can be found at sea, reaching the northern edge of the Antarctic ice.


title: Arctic tern

text: The Arctic tern is famous for its migration; it flies from its Arctic breeding grounds to the Antarctic and back again each year. The shortest distance between these areas is . The long journey ensures that this bird sees two summers per year and more daylight than any other creature on the planet. One example of this bird's remarkable long-distance flying abilities involves an Arctic tern ringed as an unfledged chick on the Farne Islands, Northumberland, UK, in the northern summer of 1982 that reached Melbourne, Australia in October, just three months after fledging – a journey of more than . Another example is that of a chick ringed in Labrador, Canada, on 23 July 1928. It was found in South Africa four months later.


title: Arctic tern

text: A 2010 study using tracking devices attached to the birds showed that the above examples are not unusual for the species. In fact, the study showed that previous research had seriously underestimated the annual distances travelled by the Arctic tern. Eleven birds that bred in Greenland or Iceland covered on average in a year, with a maximum of . The difference from previous estimates is due to the birds taking meandering courses rather than following a straight route as was previously assumed. The birds follow a somewhat convoluted course in order to take advantage of prevailing winds. The average Arctic tern lives about 30 years and will, based on the above research, travel some during its lifetime, the equivalent of a roundtrip from Earth to the Moon more than three times.


title: Arctic tern

text: A 2013 tracking study of half a dozen Arctic terns breeding in the Netherlands shows average annual migrations of c. . On their way south, these birds roughly followed the coastlines of Europe and Africa.


title: Arctic tern

text: Arctic terns usually migrate sufficiently far offshore that they are rarely seen from land outside the breeding season.


title: Arctic tern

text: The Arctic tern is a medium-sized bird around from the tip of its beak to the tip of its tail. The wingspan is . The weight is . The beak is dark red, as are the short legs and webbed feet. Like most terns, the Arctic tern has high aspect ratio wings and a tail with a deep fork.


title: Arctic tern

text: The adult plumage is grey above, with a black nape and crown and white cheeks. The upperwings are pale grey, with the area near the wingtip being translucent. The tail is white, and the underparts pale grey. Both sexes are similar in appearance. The winter plumage is similar, but the crown is whiter and the bills are darker.


title: Arctic tern

text: Juveniles differ from adults in their black bill and legs, "scaly" appearing wings, and mantle with dark feather tips, dark carpal wing bar, and short tail streamers. During their first summer, juveniles also have a whiter forecrown.


title: Arctic tern

text: The species has a variety of calls; the two most common being the "alarm call", made when possible predators (such as humans or other mammals) enter the colonies, and the "advertising call".


title: Arctic tern

text: While the Arctic tern is similar to the common and roseate terns, its colouring, profile, and call are slightly different. Compared to the common tern, it has a longer tail and mono-coloured bill, while the main differences from the roseate are its slightly darker colour and longer wings. The Arctic tern's call is more nasal and rasping than that of the common, and is easily distinguishable from that of the roseate.


title: Arctic tern

text: This bird's closest relatives are a group of South Polar species, the South American ("Sterna hirundinacea"), Kerguelen ("S. virgata"), and Antarctic ("S. vittata") terns.


title: Arctic tern

text: The immature plumages of Arctic tern were originally described as separate species, "Sterna portlandica" and "Sterna pikei".


title: Arctic tern

text: Breeding begins around the third or fourth year. Arctic terns mate for life and, in most cases, return to the same colony each year. Courtship is elaborate, especially in birds nesting for the first time. Courtship begins with a so-called "high flight", where a female will chase the male to a high altitude and then slowly descend. This display is followed by "fish flights", where the male will offer fish to the female. Courtship on the ground involves strutting with a raised tail and lowered wings. After this, both birds will usually fly and circle each other.


title: Arctic tern

text: Both sexes agree on a site for a nest, and both will defend the site. During this time, the male continues to feed the female. Mating occurs shortly after this. Breeding takes place in colonies on coasts, islands and occasionally inland on tundra near water. It often forms mixed flocks with the common tern. It lays from one to three eggs per clutch, most often two.


title: Arctic tern

text: It is one of the most aggressive terns, fiercely defensive of its nest and young. It will attack humans and large predators, usually striking the top or back of the head. Although it is too small to cause serious injury to an animal of a human's size, it is still capable of drawing blood, and is capable of repelling many raptorial birds, polar bears and smaller mammalian predators such as foxes and cats.


title: Arctic tern

text: The nest is usually a depression in the ground, which may or may not be lined with bits of grass or similar materials. The eggs are mottled and camouflaged. Both sexes share incubation duties. The young hatch after 22–27 days and fledge after 21–24 days. If the parents are disturbed and flush from the nest frequently the incubation period could be extended to as long as 34 days.


title: Arctic tern

text: When hatched, the chicks are downy. Neither altricial nor precocial, the chicks begin to move around and explore their surroundings within one to three days after hatching. Usually they do not stray far from the nest. Chicks are brooded by the adults for the first ten days after hatching. Both parents care for hatchlings. Chick diets always include fish, and parents selectively bring larger prey items to chicks than they eat themselves. Males bring more food than females. Feeding by the parents lasts for roughly a month before being weaned off slowly. After fledging, the juveniles learn to feed themselves, including the difficult method of plunge-diving. They will fly south to winter with the help of their parents.


title: Arctic tern

text: Arctic terns are long-lived birds that spend considerable time raising only a few young, and are thus said to be K-selected. A 1957 study in the Farne Islands estimated an annual survival rate of 82%.


title: Arctic tern

text: The diet of the Arctic tern varies depending on location and time, but is usually carnivorous. In most cases, it eats small fish or marine crustaceans. Fish species comprise the most important part of the diet, and account for more of the biomass consumed than any other food. Prey species are immature (1–2-year-old) shoaling species such as herring, cod, sandlances, and capelin. Among the marine crustaceans eaten are amphipods, crabs and krill. Sometimes, these birds also eat molluscs, marine worms, or berries, and on their northern breeding grounds, insects.


title: Arctic tern

text: Arctic terns sometimes dip down to the surface of the water to catch prey close to the surface. They may also chase insects in the air when breeding. It is also thought that Arctic terns may, in spite of their small size, occasionally engage in kleptoparasitism by swooping at birds so as to startle them into releasing their catches. Several species are targeted—conspecifics, other terns (like the common tern), and some auk and grebe species.


title: Arctic tern

text: While nesting, Arctic terns are vulnerable to predation by cats and other animals. Besides being a competitor for nesting sites, the larger herring gull steals eggs and hatchlings. Camouflaged eggs help prevent this, as do isolated nesting sites. Scientists have experimented with bamboo canes erected around tern nests. Although they found fewer predation attempts in the caned areas than in the control areas, canes did not reduce the probability of predation success per attempt. While feeding, skuas, gulls, and other tern species will often harass the birds and steal their food.


title: Arctic tern

text: The total population for the arctic tern is estimated at more than two million individuals, with more than half of the population in Europe. The breeding range is very large, and although the population is considered to be decreasing, this species is evaluated as a species of least concern by the IUCN.


title: Arctic tern

text: Arctic terns are among the species to which the Agreement on the Conservation of African-Eurasian Migratory Waterbirds applies.


title: Arctic tern

text: The population in New England was reduced in the late nineteenth-century because of hunting for the millinery trade. Exploitation continues in western Greenland, where the population of the species has been reduced greatly since 1950. In Iceland, the Arctic tern has been regionally uplisted to Vulnerable as of 2018, due to the crash of sandeel ("Ammodytes" spp.) stocks.


title: Arctic tern

text: At the southern part of their range, the Arctic tern has been reducing in numbers. Much of this is due to a lack of food. However, most of these birds' range is extremely remote, with no apparent trend in the species as a whole. The Arctic terns' dispersal pattern is affected by changing climatic conditions, and its ability to feed in its Antarctic wintering is dependent on sea-ice cover, but unlike breeding species, it is able to move to a different area if necessary, and can be used as a control to investigate the effect of climate change on breeding species.


title: Arctic tern

text: The Arctic tern has appeared on the postage stamps of several countries and dependent territories. The territories include Åland, Alderney, and Faroe Islands. Countries include Canada, Finland, Iceland, and Cuba.


title: Delicious in Dungeon

text: In a fantasy world of dungeon exploration, guilds go out on expeditions to raid dungeons. Many hope to find the mysterious Golden Kingdom, which is said to be the treasure of a certain island dungeon.


title: Delicious in Dungeon

text: The story begins as a group of six adventurers attempt to slay a dragon; however, they are forced to escape, losing the leader's sister, Falin (a tallman spellcaster), to the dragon's stomach. After this failure, two members of the group leave to join another band of adventurers, leaving only the leader Laios (a tallman swordsman), Chilchuck (a halfling locksmith), and Marcille (an elven spellcaster) to grieve over Laios’ sister, Falin.


title: Delicious in Dungeon

text: Feeling indebted to their close teammate Falin, who used magic to teleport the team outside to safety, the remainder of the team brainstorms how to get back to the dungeon level with the dragon in time to save Falin from digestion. Much like Advanced Dungeons & Dragons, the team members must consider the cost of weapons, defense, recruitment fees for more team members, and food.


title: Delicious in Dungeon

text: With the majority of their supplies left behind in the dungeon, their mission seems impossible - until Laios suggests they sustain themselves by finding food inside the dungeon. Laios has secretly wanted to eat dungeon monsters for a long time, and presents Chilchuck and Marcille with a cookbook about making meals from monsters in an attempt to convince them of his plan. They agree reluctantly, and return to the dungeon.


title: Delicious in Dungeon

text: The first floor of the dungeon is filled with adventurers and resembles a marketplace; this is where the team meets and joins Senshi, a dwarf who has 10 years of experience sustaining himself in the dungeon by cooking monsters and harvesting food.


title: Delicious in Dungeon

text: The story then details their travels through the dungeon, the environments, traps, and monsters they encounter, and the meals they create. The pros and cons of these meals, and the characters' reactions to them, provide a running gag.


title: Delicious in Dungeon

text: Ryōko Kui began publishing the series in Enterbrain's "Harta" magazine on February 15, 2014. North American publisher Yen Press announced their license to the series on October 28, 2016.


title: Delicious in Dungeon

text: In August 2022, it was announced that the series would be receiving an anime television series adaptation produced by Studio Trigger.


title: Delicious in Dungeon

text: Volume 1 reached the 11th place on the weekly Oricon manga charts and it was the 87th best-selling manga volume in Japan from November 17, 2014 to May 17, 2015, with 315,298 copies sold. As of August 16, 2015, it had sold 381,614 copies. Volume 2 reached the 3rd place on the charts and, as of September 17, 2015, had sold 362,906 copies. As of August 2017, the first 4 volumes had over 2 million copies in print.


title: Delicious in Dungeon

text: The manga was chosen as the 13th best manga of 2015 in the Book of the Year manga ranking of "Da Vinci" magazine. The 2016 edition of the "Kono Manga ga Sugoi!" guidebook ranked the series at number one on its list of top 20 manga for male readers.


title: Delicious in Dungeon

text: In 2017, a stop motion animation, subtitled , was released on YouTube to commemorate the release of the manga's fifth volume. In 2019, an animated commercial produced by Studio Trigger was released to promote the manga's eighth volume.


title: Lorien Legacies

text: Lorien Legacies is a series of young adult science fiction books, written by James Frey, Jobie Hughes, and formerly, Greg Boose, under the collective pseudonym Pittacus Lore.


title: Lorien Legacies

text: The 1st book of The Lorien Legacies was released on August 3, 2010. The Loric are a nearly extinct race of extraterrestrials due to a deadly battle with another alien race, the Mogadorians. The only survivors are nine teenagers and their corresponding guardians, Cêpans, who escaped to Earth. Now the Mogadorians intend to finish the job. Numbers One, Two, and Three have already been killed, causing three circular brands to appear on the ankles of the remaining Loric. The book is told from the perspective of Number Four, also known as John Smith. John is the next target for the Mogadorians, who must kill the Loric in the order of their numbers. He and his Cêpan, Henri, move from place to place, changing their identities to keep hidden. John begins inheriting Legacies, the ancestral right of special Loric known as Garde, and must learn to keep his powers hidden from his human friends.


title: Lorien Legacies

text: The 2nd book of The Lorien Legacies was released on August 23, 2011. The story is told by two members of the Garde: Number Seven (Marina), who is hiding at a convent in Spain, and Number Four (John Smith), who is on the run with Sam, Number Six, and Bernie Kosar (John Smith's Chimæra). While John, Six and Sam try to stay ahead of the Mogadorians while searching for the other surviving Loric, Marina searches for news of John after his battle at the school that came at the end of "I Am Number Four".


title: Lorien Legacies

text: The 3rd book of The Lorien Legacies was released on August 21, 2012. John and Nine escape from the Mogadorian base and head to Chicago, where Nine's penthouse is located. They meet up with Six, Eight, Marina and Ella, the tenth child who escaped on the only other ship to escape Lorien during the Mogadorian invasion with three others. While Six, Eight, Marina and Ella attempt to teleport to New Mexico, Six becomes stranded and gets kidnapped by the Mogadorians. The remaining Loric invade Dulce base in order to free Six, Sarah, and Sam, as well as fight Sertakus Ra, leader of the Mogadorians.


title: Lorien Legacies

text: The 4th book of The Lorien Legacies was released on August 27, 2013. This book is also told in the first person perspective, between Sam Goode, John Smith (Four), and Marina (Seven).


title: Lorien Legacies

text: The 5th book of The Lorien Legacies was released on August 26, 2014. It is narrated in the first person, with Number Four (John), Number Six, and Ella as narrators.


title: Lorien Legacies

text: The 6th book of The Lorien Legacies was released on September 1, 2015. Its title was revealed via the Facebook page for the series. It was also revealed that there would be seven books in the series, rather than the previously believed six. The cover for the book was released on the 23rd of April 2015 in an interview with MTV. The book is primarily narrated in first person from the perspectives of Four (John), Six and, towards the end of the book, Ten (Ella). A prologue in third person briefly narrates the story of an unnamed human-turned-Garde (later known as Daniela) as she survives a Mogadorian attack on New York.


title: Lorien Legacies

text: The 7th and final book of The Lorien Legacies. The title was revealed on October 26, 2015. It was released on June 28, 2016. United as One is told in first perspective of two characters, Number Four (John Smith) and Number Six.


title: Lorien Legacies

text: The fact that Four (John) has Ximic may hint at the fact that he is Pittacus' descendant, as Ella is Setrákus'. Other clues include physical features, such as blonde hair, and Pittacus' Lumen.


title: Lorien Legacies

text: Marina stands on the edge of a cliff in a dream, after she was left unconscious after a fight with Setrákus Ra. She sees Setrákus Ra taking the appearance of Eight, convincing her to let go and be with Eight, but she refuses and chooses to continue to fight. Five is in a padded cell, locked up by Nine and John. Setrákus Ra also comes to him in a dream to convince him to come back on his side. Five refuses. Mark walking the football field of his old school in Paradise, clutching a photo of Sarah. He is met by Setrákus Ra who tries to tell Mark he can bring Sarah back and they can fight together. It is unknown if Mark accepts the offer.


title: Lorien Legacies

text: The Garde regroup and John has a moment with the deceased Sarah, and Mark is disgusted at his lack of emotion and blames him for her death. The Garde talk tactics with Lawson, the acting general. John becomes increasingly cold and distant, no longer content with playing defense. A plan is hatched to hijack one of the warships and to strip the skimmers of their cloaking devices to co-ordinate a united strike against the other Mogadorian warships.


title: Lorien Legacies

text: Some new Human-Garde post a video on the internet to attract John's attention to have him pick them up as they stand by a Loralite stone in Niagara Falls. The team splits, with half going to rescue the human garde, while John and Nine meet with Five, who is locked away in a cell. John wants Five to teach him how to fly so he can board the warship. However, he struggles to pick up the legacy, so Five attacks him, hoping the battle rush would help him learn the skill, which he does. However, Marina wakes up and levitates an icicle in front of Five's face, threatening to kill him.


title: Lorien Legacies

text: The other team, en route to Niagara Falls, encounter turbulence when Sam uses his technopathic legacy to accidentally turn off the ship's engines. With some help from Ella, Sam is able to visualize the workings of the ship and turn them back on. When they arrive on the scene they see fresh signs of a battle, with Skimmers destroyed and fire and ash swirling. The human garde managed to hold their own and fought off the Mogadorians. However, there is some disagreement if the teens are ready for war. To avoid any further people teleporting to Niagara Falls, Ella turns off the Loralite stone. As a neighboring warship makes its way there to check in, the team leaves for base.


title: Lorien Legacies

text: Adam instigates dissension in the Mogadorian ranks. A warship fires on Sydney while another captain in Moscow declares himself the beloved leader, which leads to the captain in Berlin making an assassination attempt on the usurper. In Kazakhstan another 2 warships meet and began to blow each other apart.


title: Lorien Legacies

text: Sam attempts to use his techno legacy to copy the cloaking device codes into everyday electronics, he builds a prototype that he asks the team to test when they attack the warship.


title: Lorien Legacies

text: John, Six, and Adam board the warship. John begins killing all the Mogadorians in a cold ruthless manner, while Adam and Six strip the skimmers of their cloaking devices. Before the day is done the Garde have stolen a warship. They meet a Mogadorian named Rex, whom Adam recognizes and saves from John's attack. Sam's tech is found to be successful.


title: Lorien Legacies

text: John, not wanting to sacrifice any more friends, takes off to finish Setrákus without the others knowing. He realizes he needs a cloaking device and heads back to Patience Creek. However, the base is overrun by Mogadorians, who found the place through a mind controlled Mark James. Some of the true-borns have augmentations, twisted forms of legacies. Phiri dun Ra is there, whose arm has been replaced with black ooze-like tendrils, then she impales John and begins to drain his legacies while he's helpless. While helpless, Mark James slips the Voron noose around John's neck. The damage from this weapon cannot be healed.


title: Lorien Legacies

text: The others find out about John's suicide mission and argue among themselves over his chosen course of action. Six calls Sam to tell him about his prototype's success when she hears firing in the background. Sam tells Six he thinks they are under attack.


title: Lorien Legacies

text: Back at the base, John is helpless as he's dragged along the inside of the base, with Phiri mocking his failure at being a hero and his delusional idea of being able to save everyone. To prove a point she kills Mark. Phiri, John and the mind controlling Mogadorians run into resistance. The mind controlling Mogadorian releases a swarm of seemingly black flies that force half the marines to open fire on the others. The human garde make an appearance and are shocked to see John crawling on all fours with a noose around his neck. he screams at them to run but Phiri manages to kill 2 while the other 2 manage to escape. Sam shouts at the lights to turn off and frees Five who immediately attacks Phiri, however the mind controlling Mogadorian manages to overtake Five, but is quickly killed by Sam. Phiri screams for extraction and loses her grip on John as Five slams into her. The shadow Mogadorian makes an appearance and teleports both Phiri and Five. The shadow Mogadorian tries to finish them off, but Sam tells the lights to turn on while he's in a mid teleport, which slices him in half.


title: Lorien Legacies

text: The others have no time to mourn the dead and set their plan in motion. The garde use the loralite stone to teleport across the world arming the governments with cloaking tech.


title: Lorien Legacies

text: The Garde aboard their stolen warship make their way to the West Virginia base where Setrákus waits. Six summons the biggest storm she has ever created to damage the Anubis, destroying it. Five flies Six and Adam into the base to deactivate the shield, once that's done, Marina, John, Five, and Nine make their way underground to find Setrákus.


title: Lorien Legacies

text: They find a mass grave of Mogadorians and Garde Humans, which repulses them all and steels their drives to end this. Setrákus emerges from a pool of black ooze covered in black slime that has given him a youthful appearance and effective immortality. They try to fight against him, however, their legacies are ineffective against him. Setrákus grabs Five and drowns him in the black puddle. He maims Nine, taking off his arm. While trying to heal him, Marina attacks Setrákus with her healing legacy, to which he recoils in pain. John, picking up on this, continues the healing assault and urges Marina to run with Nine, who is no shape to fight, she protests but John insists. Nine transfers his strength and anti gravity legacy to her and she slings him over her shoulder and runs. John is locked in battle with Setrákus with both of them taking heavy damage, while John pours his healing legacy into him, while also using it on himself in small bursts to keep him going. He establishes telepathic contact with Sam and tells him to blow up the mountain.


title: Lorien Legacies

text: While this is going on Adam and Six run into Phiri, who wounds Six and attacks Adam, Dust attacks Phiri but is quickly overwhelmed. Six manages to telekinetically pin Phiri to the wall, but a Mogadoraian sneaks behind her and shoots her, Adam promptly kills the Mogadorian but Phiri impales him and begins to drain his Loric spark, she releases a seismic wave that knocks Six back. Adam plunges his hands into the black oily tentacles and begins to tear itself away from Phiri's stump and bond with Adam. He uses his seismic legacy and collapses the floor with both Adam and Phiri falling in. Six attempts to save him but there's nothing there to telekinetically grab. Six realizes Dust has disappeared. Ella urges Six to make her way to the main entrance where Marina and Nine are on their way. Marina tries to get Six out of the base, but she refuses, asking Marina to heal her so she can finish the battle.


title: Lorien Legacies

text: Six makes her way to the central chamber where John lays beaten and broken. She sees a frail withered old man crawling across the cavern floor she picks up the Voron dagger and decapitates him. She makes her way over to John who she thinks is dead but a gasp from John proves otherwise. His eyes swollen shut he grasps six's arm and whispers 'Sarah?', Six gives him a quick kiss before he falls unconscious. Six grabs John and they climb on to Bernie Kosar's back and fly up. John remembers snippets after that such as seeing Adam crying as he clutched the final form of Dust who was frozen in a wolf/snake form. John decides to close his eyes not wanting to see any more sadness.


title: Lorien Legacies

text: One year later John is secluded in the Himalayas restoring the cave that Eight had found. He scrubs the prophecies from the wall and Ella, who has kept him company for some months, tells him it's time. Clutching a small box, he flies to the Garde academy under construction in San Francisco to meet the others. John apologizes and gives Nine something from his box. Lexa is also at the academy hacking into the dark web protecting the human garde from potential threats.


title: Lorien Legacies

text: He then goes to New York where repairs and construction is still under way. He observes Daniela from afar who uses her stone legacy to repair building foundations before embracing her mother.


title: Lorien Legacies

text: John sees Agent Walker in a Montreal car park where she kills someone. John reveals himself to her and she is pleased to see him, he says to her you better have a good reason for that, in response she shows what was in the man's briefcase, 3 vials of black ooze which surprises John. Walker takes out a vial from her pocket and pours it into the black ooze, destroying the substance. Walker says she could use some help tracking this down and John hands her a blue loralite pendant from his box and says they will talk about it soon.


title: Lorien Legacies

text: He finds Adam in Alaska with Rex in a prison camp with other Mogs who surrendered, John says he can break them out and he replies saying this is the best place for him to rehabilitate his people. It's mentioned he got a full pardon but didn't use it. John gives him a pendant.


title: Lorien Legacies

text: He goes to paradise and hugs Malcolm which brings back memories of Henri. He ruminates on tracking Mark James' father to tell him what really happened. Finally he steps on Sarah's doorstep still unable to tell her parents what happened.


title: Lorien Legacies

text: He tracks Six and Sam who are on their vacation. He observes them in the ocean in an embrace and leaves 2 pendants with a note.


title: Lorien Legacies

text: Lastly he looks for Marina who John says would have taken ages to track if it weren't for her sporadic calls to Ella. Ella says she's not the same and has become paranoid and angry. He finds her in a speedboat navigating islands in the south pacific. John recognizes the signs of isolation from his own experiences. When he appears she isn't startled and asks if he's really there or has gone crazy. He replies that it's really him and she smiles. She says that he's come at a good time and shows him a video footage of the West Virginia base where an object that looked like a missile shoots up into the sky. Marina says she found Five last week on one of the small deserted islands. His body is very skinny with lumps of skin hanging off with dark patches of obsidian blotching his skin. Marina confides in John that she has tried to get over the war and all the death and destruction but she just can't. She tells John that he said she could decide what to do with Five but she doesn't want to carry it around with her. John suggests her to get out of here and Marina asks what to do with Five to which John says that he's a ghost we aren't.


title: Lorien Legacies

text: Marina returns with John to the Himalayas. She finally cries when she sees what he's done with the cave. She reaches out to John before thanking him and she kisses him. He's not sure what it means ruminating maybe nothing, maybe something. He shows Marina what he's been working for the past year: a massive wooden table with a loralite stone in the middle reminiscent of the table in the Elder's chamber with the Loric symbol of unity burned into the table and the pendants. John plans to use this as a meeting place for friends and allies where they will gather to solve problems, with a space at the table for Loric/Garde/humans/allies. The only exception is that there are not nine seats around the table as he's done with numbers.


title: Lorien Legacies

text: Released on July 24, 2012, "The Legacies" is a paperback edition of three previously released Lost Files novellas — "Six’s Legacy", "Nine’s Legacy", and "The Fallen Legacies". Originally published as individual e-books, this was the first time they were available in print.


title: Lorien Legacies

text: Before she met John in Paradise, Ohio, she lived with her Cêpan Katarina. They were captured by the Mogadorians in NY. Katarina was killed after Six gives the Mogs false information. While in prison, Six developed her legacy of invisibility (Novis) and used it to escape. Before leaving she took revenge on the Mogadorian who killed Katarina. After years, she hears of Number Four in Ohio and takes a bus there.


title: Lorien Legacies

text: Released on February 28, 2012, it is told from the first person perspective of Pittacus Lore's character, Nine.


title: Lorien Legacies

text: Nine and his Cêpan, Sandor, live in a penthouse on top of the John Hancock Center in Chicago. Nine starts to date a girl. He realizes she was being used to find him and gets captured. The Mogadorians torture Sandor to break Nine. Eventually Nine kills him to put him out of his misery. Nine is held in the West Virginia Mog compound until he's rescued by John.


title: Lorien Legacies

text: Released on July 24, 2012, it is told from the first person perspective of Adamus Sutekh, a Mogadorian general's son.


title: Lorien Legacies

text: The book starts with in front of the Washington Monument in Washington D.C. Adam and his adopted brother Ivan are doing homework. Then Adam and Ivan are called by their father. The Mogadorians have found a lead on Number One. Adam and Ivan accompany their father to Malaysia to kill Number One. A vat-born soldier (a Mogadorian soldier grown through genetic engineering) kills Number One right as she develops the legacy to create earthquakes (Terric). Once back at Ashwood Estates, a Mogadorian compound, Adam is asked by his father to be hooked up to a special machine that is connected to One's body. He falls asleep. In his deep sleep, he meets the ghost of One. One takes him through her life on Earth up until she is killed and tries to see doubt in Mogadorian progress. When Adam awakes it has been three years. Adam can't believe he's been asleep that long. But, he is just in time to accompany his father and Ivan on a mission to find Number Two. Adam gets to the apartment where she's staying first. He tells her he's there to help. Just then Ivan arrives. He thinks Adam is trying to trick the Garde and kills her himself. After however Adam deletes a post that Number Two was using to try and contact the other members of the Garde. Time passes and Number Three is located. The Mogs proceed to Kenya to find him. Adam and Ivan meet a boy named Hannu. He is Number Three. Adam tries to warn him but is too late. His father kills Three. The book ends when Adam falls down a ravine.


title: Lorien Legacies

text: Released on July 23, 2013, "Secret Histories" is a paperback edition of the second compilation of Lost Files novellas — "The Search for Sam," "Last Days of Lorien," and "The Forgotten Ones". Originally published as e-novellas, this was the first time they were available in print.


title: Lorien Legacies

text: Released on December 26, 2012, it is told from the first person perspective of Adamus Sutekh. It picks up where "The Fallen Legacies" left off.


title: Lorien Legacies

text: Released on April 9, 2013, it is set on Lorien before it was attacked by the Mogadorians, and is told from the perspective of Sandor (Nine's Cêpan).


title: Lorien Legacies

text: Released on July 23, 2013, it is told from the first person perspective of Adamus Sutekh. It is the third and final of Pittacus Lore's novellas told by the son of a mogadorian general turned to the Loric side.


title: Lorien Legacies

text: Released on July 22, 2014, in the US and August 14, 2014, in the UK, "Hidden Enemy" is the third compilation of Lost Files novellas — "Five's Legacy", "Return to Paradise", and "Five's Betrayal". Originally published as separate e-novellas this was the first time they were available in print.


title: Lorien Legacies

text: Initially scheduled to be released on December 23, 2013, "Five's Legacy" was released as an e-Book on February 11, 2014. The novella centers around the origins of Number Five, including the short amount of time he spent with his Cêpan, Rey, and his eventual "capture" by Mogadorians.


title: Lorien Legacies

text: Released on April 15, 2014 exclusively as an e-Book, this prequel companion novella covers what happened in the aftermath of the Mogadorian attack on Paradise, Ohio, from the perspective of Mark James —Number Four's bully-turned-ally.


title: Lorien Legacies

text: After Four leaves town to find the rest of the Garde, Mark is left behind to pick up the pieces. His school has been destroyed, his home burned down, and, worst yet, Mark now knows the horrifying truth: aliens live among us and some of them seek to destroy us. Even with the FBI tailing him and Sarah Hart, Mark tries to return to a normal life. But when Sarah goes missing, he knows he can no longer sit back and do nothing.


title: Lorien Legacies

text: Released on July 22, 2014, this sequel to "Five's Legacy" finds Number Five entering the ranks of the Mogadorian army. The Mogs have convinced him that they will be the victors in the war for Earth, and Five decides he would rather be on the winning side, realizing that the only thing that matters is his survival.


title: Lorien Legacies

text: Released on July 28, 2015, the fourth compilation of Lost Files novellas consists of "The Fugitive", "The Navigator", and "The Guard." Originally published as separate e-novellas this was the first time they were available in print.


title: Lorien Legacies

text: Released on December 23, 2014, "The Fugitive" follows Mark James as he tries to track down Sarah Hart, evade the Mogadorians and the FBI, and discover the identity of the mysterious blogger he knows only as GUARD.


title: Lorien Legacies

text: Released on April 21, 2015, "The Navigator" reveals the truth about the crew of the two Loric spaceships who escaped to Earth and shows what happened to the pilots after they arrived and parted ways with the Garde.


title: Lorien Legacies

text: Released on July 28, 2015, "The Guard" tells the story of the hacker who has been aiding the Lorien survivors from the shadows for years. She's determined to defeat the Mogs—and she just found her secret weapon.


title: Lorien Legacies

text: Released on May 31, 2016, the fifth compilation of Lost Files novellas consists of "Legacies Reborn", "Last Defense", and "Hunt for The Garde." Originally published as separate e-novellas this was the first time they were available in print.


title: Lorien Legacies

text: Released on November 24, 2015, "Legacies Reborn" gives a look at the Mogadorian invasion from the perspective of Daniela Morales, a human teen who’s shocked to discover aliens are attacking New York—and that she suddenly has the power to fight back.


title: Lorien Legacies

text: Released on February 23, 2016, "Last Defense" reveals what happens to Malcolm Goode after the warships descend. To get to the president’s secret bunker near Washington, DC, he’ll have to fight his way through a war zone.


title: Lorien Legacies

text: Released on May 31, 2016, "Hunt for the Garde" picks up after the events of "The Fate of Ten", following the stories of three different Mogadorians. One will do anything for redemption; One has a thirst for blood; One questions everything.


title: Lorien Legacies

text: Reception to the series has been mostly positive. The first two books, "I Am Number Four" and "The Power of Six", both reached #1 on The New York Times Best Seller list, collectively spending ten weeks in the top spot.


title: Lorien Legacies

text: In 2009 DreamWorks Pictures bought the rights to I Am Number Four and released the movie on February 18, 2011. The movie was the first DreamWorks film to be distributed by Disney's Touchstone Pictures and received generally negative reviews from critics, with review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes giving a score of 32% based on 156 reviews. The movie had a worldwide gross of $145,982,798 and a budget of $50 million, but still fell short of expectations.


title: Lorien Legacies

text: Plans for any future installments for the series have been shelved. Director D. J. Caruso confirmed that he would like to direct a sequel, but in an interview with MTV Hollywood Crush Lore has stated that any questions or requests for a sequel should be directed to producer Michael Bay.


title: My Country: The New Age

text: My Country: The New Age () is a 2019 South Korean television series starring Yang Se-jong, Woo Do-hwan, Kim Seol-hyun and Jang Hyuk. It aired on JTBC and Netflix at 22:50 KST from October 4 to November 23, 2019.


title: My Country: The New Age

text: During the transitional period between the end of the Goryeo dynasty and the beginning of the Joseon dynasty, two friends become enemies following a misunderstanding. They try to protect their country, and the people they love, their own way.


title: Hannelore Schmatz

text: Hannelore Schmatz (16 February 1940 – 2 October 1979) was a German mountaineer who was the fourth woman to summit Mount Everest. She collapsed and died as she was returning from summiting Everest via the southern route; Schmatz was the first woman and first German citizen to die on the upper slopes of Everest.


title: Hannelore Schmatz

text: Schmatz was on an expedition via the South East Ridge route with her husband, Gerhard Schmatz, when she died at 8,300 metres (27,200 ft). Gerhard Schmatz was the expedition leader, then 50 years of age, and the oldest man to summit Everest. On the same expedition was the American Ray Genet, who also died while descending from the summit. Exhausted from the climb, they had stopped to bivouac at as the night approached, despite their Sherpa guides urging them not to stop. Ray Genet died later that night and both the Sherpa and Schmatz were distressed, but decided to continue their descent. Then at Schmatz sat down, said "Water, Water" to her Sherpa and died. Sungdare Sherpa, one of the Sherpa guides, remained with her body, and as a result, lost most of his fingers and toes.


title: Hannelore Schmatz

text: Genet's body ultimately disappeared under the snow, but Schmatz's body remained where she died on the mountain.


title: Hannelore Schmatz

text: For years, Schmatz's remains could be seen by anyone attempting to summit Everest by the southern route. Her body was frozen in a sitting position, leaning against her backpack with eyes open and hair blowing in the wind, about above Camp IV.


title: Hannelore Schmatz

text: During a 1981 expedition Sungdare Sherpa was the guide again for a new group of climbers. He had refused at first due to losing his fingers and toes during the 1979 expedition, but was paid extra by climber Chris Kopcjynski. During this climb down as they passed Schmatz's body, Kopcjynski was shocked, thinking it was a tent and stated "We did not touch it. I could see she had on her watch still."


title: Hannelore Schmatz

text: In 1984, police inspector Yogendra Bahadur Thapa fell to his death while trying to recover Schmatz's body on a Nepalese police expedition.


title: Hannelore Schmatz

text: British mountaineer Chris Bonington spotted Schmatz from a distance in 1985, and initially mistook her body for a tent until he got a closer look.


title: Hannelore Schmatz

text: Lene Gammelgaard, the first Scandinavian woman to reach the peak of Everest, quotes the Norwegian mountaineer and expedition leader Arne Næss Jr. describing his encounter with Schmatz's remains, in her book "Climbing High: A Woman's Account of Surviving the Everest Tragedy" (1999), which recounts her own 1996 expedition. Næss' description is as follows:


title: Selene (comics)

text: Selene Gallio is a supervillain appearing in American comic books published by Marvel Comics. As a mutant and an enemy of the X-Men, she is often associated with the Hellfire Club's Inner Circle.


title: Selene (comics)

text: Selene was portrayed by Kota Eberhardt in the 20th Century Fox "X-Men" film "Dark Phoenix" (2019). A character based on the Marvel Comics character was previously portrayed by Kate Beckinsale in the Sony Pictures "Underworld" film series (2003–2016).


title: Selene (comics)

text: Selene first appeared in "New Mutants" #9 (November 1983), written by Chris Claremont and illustrated by Sal Buscema.


title: Selene (comics)

text: Selene is the oldest known human mutant. Functionally immortal, her millennia-long life is attributed to her ability to drain the life essence from other beings to extend her own existence indefinitely. Her name derives from the ancient lunar goddess Selene, daughter of the Titans Hyperion and Theia. Claiming to have already been old when modern mankind was just emerging, Selene was born over 17,000 years ago, somewhere in what is now Central Europe, "after the Oceans swallowed Atlantis and before the rise of the Aryas". Her tribe's elders recognized her for what she was and commanded the entire tribe, including her own mother, to sacrifice their lives to feed her.


title: Selene (comics)

text: Selene was revealed to have been an old enemy of the sorcerer Kulan Gath. Kulan Gath was active during the Hyborian Age (before any recorded civilizations) and is known to have faced both Conan the Barbarian and Red Sonja. In fact, Sonja reportedly managed to kill him and his spirit would not manifest again until the modern era. Thus, Selene was active at least as early as the Hyborian age.


title: Selene (comics)

text: Selene came to reside in Rome during the height of its empire. She approached Eliphas, a well-respected senator whose wife had left for a general named Mascius. Selene offered Eliphas immortality in exchange for helping her kill and absorb every soul in Rome. Eliphas went about drawing pentagrams and performing rituals at several locations in the city, but warned a small girl to get her family out. The girl's father alerted the authorities and Eliphas and Selene were captured before the spell could be carried out. Just before they were burned at the stake Selene killed the guards. She then cursed Eliphas for the perceived betrayal with an eternal life of torture, transforming the latter into a vampire-like creature. Eliphas was buried alive for 700 years until being discovered by a farmer in a field.


title: Selene (comics)

text: In relatively recent times, Selene was trapped for centuries in the Amazon in the Romanesque town of Nova Roma. She was worshipped as a goddess and worked to maintain the isolation of the town so she could maintain control. Eli Bard finally locates Selene in Nova Roma. Still in love with her despite her curse, Bard realizes of having to make an offering to her before approaching her. She also was able to marry several times and have descendants, including Amara Aquilla. Her most recent known husband was Marcus Domitius Gallio, a senator of Nova Roma.


title: Selene (comics)

text: In Nova Roma, Selene attempted to kill Amara Aquilla. She knocked Amara into a lava pool, thereby releasing the latter's latent mutant powers as Magma. Selene fought and defeated Magma, and plotted to turn Danielle Moonstar into a psychic vampire like herself and conquer the world. Selene fought the New Mutants, and was cast into lava and buried alive.


title: Selene (comics)

text: Selene directed her worshippers to undertake tasks that eventually allowed her to leave Nova Roma. She made her way to New York City, where she encountered Juggernaut at a bar. Selene planned to seduce and murder Juggernaut, but was prevented when Wolverine manipulated a bar-room brawl between Juggernaut and Colossus. She then discovered the existence of Rachel Summers, whom she sought to turn into a slave only to be defeated by the X-Men. Prior to the X-Men saving Rachel, Selene had tracked Rachel down to the home of a young man named Nicholas Damiano who had let the homeless Rachel spend the night. Selene savagely murdered the young man, resulting in Rachel swearing revenge against Selene.


title: Selene (comics)

text: With help from Friedrich Von Roehm (one of her worshippers), Selene made contact with the Hellfire Club and forced the group to take her on as the new Black Queen. She became critical in the X-Men's attempt to stop Kulan Gath, after he conquered New York City with a reality-altering spell though she ultimately attempted to double-cross the X-Men in order to steal Gath's talisman of power.


title: Selene (comics)

text: Selene's time with the Hellfire Club was a turbulent time, due to her contempt for Sebastian Shaw and quite open desire to rule the Hellfire Club as its sole leader. This led Shaw and Emma Frost to conspire to kill Selene by manipulating and training the young mutant Firestar to assassinate her. This failed when Firestar realized their plan.


title: Selene (comics)

text: Selene and the Hellfire Club's relationship with the X-Men came to a head with Rachel making an unauthorized assassination attempt on Selene. Wolverine felt honor-bound to prevent Rachel from being a murderer, and so, saved Selene's life by severely injuring Rachel. Selene herself was enraged, and used the incident to force the Lords Cardinal to agree to hunt and kill Rachel. A battle over this issue immediately commenced between the X-Men and Lords Cardinal, but it was unexpectedly halted when it drew the attention of Nimrod, the super-sentinel who had murdered Selene's assistant Rhoem, and was as bent on killing the X-Men and the Lords Cardinal. The Lords Cardinal and the X-Men hastily agreed to a truce, fighting well-enough to cause Nimrod to flee.


title: Selene (comics)

text: After this battle, in the pages of "New Mutants", much was made about Selene having secret plans involving Nova Roma and Magma. Due to a love for Empath, Magma left the New Mutants to join the Hellions, only to be called home by her father to enter into an arranged marriage with a resident there. Magma's escort back home to Nova Roma turned out to be Empath who ultimately decided to stay in the city with her. The two became lovers and Magma was freed from her arranged marriage plans so that she could be with him. Writer changes and the book's transition into "X-Force" caused the storyline to be aborted. Furthermore, it was revealed in "New Warriors" #31, via Empath, that Nova Roma was nothing more than an elaborate lie, concocted by Selene several decades prior. In a desperate bid to relive happier days in which she lived in ancient Rome, Selene arranged for hundreds of people to be kidnapped and taken to the jungles of the Amazon, to a city constructed per her designs. There she was somehow able to utterly brainwash her prisoners to believe themselves descendants of ancient Romans living in the Amazon. Magma was one of these kidnapped and brainwashed souls, according to Empath. The city was disbanded and the residents returned to their regular lives across the globe.


title: Selene (comics)

text: Years later, due to Chris Claremont wishing to undo writer Fabian Nieciza's dismantling of the concept of Nova Roma, Claremont ignored said story and wrote Magma as originally, and later had Magma make cryptic references to having been manipulated into believing Nova Roma was a lie by parties unknown that sought to hurt Magma. Furthermore, the five-issue mini-series "New Mutants Forever" revealed that Claremont originally planned on revealing Magma to be Selene's granddaughter. This family connection would be stated as well (with no build-up) in "New Mutants" Vol 3 #6-8, which had Selene resurrect Magma's teammate Cypher to try to kill Magma. Furthermore, it was strongly implied during "Necrosha" that Shaw and Emma Frost manipulated the Empath/Magma relationship in order to get Empath inside Nova Roma. In the event that Selene struck first and eliminated both, Empath's powers would then be used to dismantle the city via convincing the residents that their lives were lies concocted by Selene.


title: Selene (comics)

text: Selene ultimately was the deciding vote to vote Shaw out of the Hellfire Club, when tension between Shaw and the newly recruited White King Magneto came to blows. Unknown to Magneto or Frost, however, Selene had decided that she no longer had any need for the Hellfire Club and began plotting its destruction by gathering an army of young mutants, with help from the mutant omnipath known as the Gamesmaster. Under her authority, the Upstarts engaged in a killing spree that led to many presumed deaths (Magneto, Sebastian Shaw, Donald Pierce, and the Reavers), mortal injuries (Emma Frost), and outright deaths (the Hellions). Selene manipulated her young followers with the promise of a game, where each murder committed would land them points that would ultimately lead to them being granted a prize, described as "being the next best thing to immortality" by the Gamemaster. However (with another writer change), Selene's involvement with the Upstarts was cut short as she herself was betrayed by Trevor Fitzroy. Selene was kept in a torture device that repeatedly ripped her flesh from her body (to attract the attention of the Gamesmaster who took advantage of the situation as the Upstarts' new leader). She would be freed by Amanda Sefton, though the torture left her weak and scarred.


title: Selene (comics)

text: Needing to replenish her power, Selene first attacked and killed the other surviving Externals. Though she was opposed by X-Force, she managed to complete the slaughter and knock out the mutants, until Cable arrived. Selene's attempt to absorb Cable's life backfired when she touched his techno-organic arm and she was forced to flee to maintain her power. Shortly afterwards, she tried to access the power of a mystical convergence using a Runestaff made from the roots of Yggdrasil, the Norse World Tree. She came to the Exploding Colossal Man festival in New Mexico, but was again opposed by X-Force, who managed to wrest the Runestaff away from her and destroy the Colossal Man mannequin it activated. Selene missed her opportunity for ultimate power and vowed vengeance on X-Force.


title: Selene (comics)

text: She next appeared back in Brazil, where she had tracked Sunspot, along with Deviants posing as S.H.I.E.L.D. agents. She lured Sunspot to her defense, and offered the latter a position of power in the Hellfire Club, which the man refused, regardless of the illusions with which she tempted. However, Sunspot went along with Selene to stop the Deviants in the Damocles Foundation from activating a Celestial Gatherer. Selene herself was attacked by the Sword strike team, but she managed to cast a spell that devolved them back to lizards. Along with the rest of X-Force, Selene was able to usurp control of the machinery that activated the Gatherer, but Moonstar and Arcadia destroyed the Celestial artifact before Selene could access its power.


title: Selene (comics)

text: Selene then returned to her post as the Black Queen of the Hellfire Club, after striking a deal with the demon Blackheart and seemingly throwing out the rest of the Inner Circle. She offered Sunspot the position of Black Rook, which the latter initially refused but then accepted when Selene and Blackheart revealed that doing so would allow them to resurrect the spirit of Juliana Sandoval, the girl who died saving Sunspot's life when the latter first joined the New Mutants. Sunspot had no choice to accept and become Selene's protégé.


title: Selene (comics)

text: But with Shaw's return to the Hellfire Club, Selene was somehow trapped inside the catacombs under the Hellfire Club. However, she gained limited mobility from an alliance with Donald Pierce. When the X-Men, including Rachel arrived, during a membership change in the Hellfire Club, Selene plotted to use Rachel to completely free herself. She followed Rachel to Hong Kong via a transport portal and saved the female from being corrupted by a telepathic agent of Courtney Ross who was trying to become the next White Queen. This move was only a prelude to Selene taking over Rachel's mind, but Marvel Girl was too strong for Selene and expelled her, keeping Selene trapped for a time beneath the Hellfire Club headquarters.


title: Selene (comics)

text: Selene (disguised as an old woman) befriends Wither and they live together in Mutant Town. She encourages him to use his powers and not be afraid of his natural gifts. She then asks him if he would use his powers to save his or her life. She had been killing a large number of people by draining their life-forces, and during her last feeding her disguise was spotted by a witness. She reveals to Wither that Laurie has died, while he was away. Later she is attacked by the police and managed to kill two of them before being shot multiple times. Wither arrives and kills the other two officers, only for Selene to drop her disguise, telling him she is immortal and that they are two of a kind and should be together. She tells Wither that she will be his queen if he agrees, then kisses him, and he consents.


title: Selene (comics)

text: Selene's relationship with Eli Bard is explained by Warpath to the other members of X-Force. It is revealed he had originally planned to sacrifice the Purifiers to Selene but changed his plans upon seeing Bastion reprogram an offspring of Magus. Using the Technarch transmode virus he reanimated the corpses in the burial grounds of the Apache tribe that he had decimated decades earlier along with Caliban. He presented them to Selene for the purpose of finding other dead mutants and resurrecting them by the same means, so that Bard can sacrifice them and their powers to her.


title: Selene (comics)

text: One week before the event of Necrosha, Selene has the recently resurrected Destiny brought before her where she asks what her future holds.


title: Selene (comics)

text: Selene returns to the place of her birth in central Europe, accompanied by a new Inner Circle, consisting of Blink, Senyaka, Mortis, Wither, and Eli Bard. She sets her plan into motion of becoming a goddess with the Inner Circle; they go to the New York branch of the Hellfire Club, where they slaughter everyone present. Selene then targets others who she feels have obstructed, or otherwise failed, her in her quest for divinity, namely Shaw, Pierce, Frost (against whom she especially holds a grudge because of Frost's use of the "Black Queen" codename when working for the Dark X-Men), the X-Men, and Magma. Caliban and Thunderbird then lead her to the ruins of Genosha which are dubbed "Necrosha" by Selene and swears that her journey will end here. While most of the resurrected mutants attack the X-Men and Utopia, Selene is seen with Bard resurrecting the massacred residents of Genosha, with Cerebro detecting the rise of mutant numbers in millions (the first life-signs detected by Bastion's computers include Spoor, Katu, Unus, REM-RAM, Static, and Barnacle). There is a major problem though: a lot of the deceased have been depowered, despite having been killed BEFORE M-day. Wither and Mortis explain what happened and the Coven begins to set up base at Necrosha. It turns out that Selene can't do the ritual yet, because Bard lost the knife that was required to do it. She then dispatches her crew and they end up taking the knife back, capturing Warpath in the process. Once Bard gives Selene the knife and proclaims eternal love for her, Selene stabs Eli, killing the latter (much to Wither's delight). Warpath is eventually rescued by the Vanisher but Selene absorbs the many souls around her, turning light blue and growing in size. She finally becomes the goddess she had sought to be for so long. Turning to her followers, she commands them to get her more souls. Warpath was able to destroy Selene by plunging his dagger into her chest, after teaching X-Force the Ghost Dance, a ritual meant to kill evil spirits such as Selene. Shocked that her moment of godhood was taken away so quickly, Selene explodes into rays of light.


title: Selene (comics)

text: Sometime after Selene's death, Blink attempted to resurrect the Black Queen. Blink was eventually stopped by Frost and a small team of X-Men (consisting of Blindfold, Pixie, Husk, Warpath) along with former Sorcerer Supreme Doctor Strange who managed successfully to purge Blink of Selene's corrupted influence.


title: Selene (comics)

text: It was later revealed that Selene's body and soul had been preserved as airborne particles and somehow stored in stasis in a vault located somewhere in New York City. Lady Deathstrike and the Enchantress gained access to the vault and through the newly enhanced magic granted to her by the sentient virus, Arkea, she was able to fully restore Selene to physical life for the purpose of adding her to the newly formed Sisterhood of Mutants.


title: Selene (comics)

text: In the aftermath of the "Secret Empire", Selene has publicly become head of the White House's "Task Force of Faith-Based Initiatives", and joined the "Power Elite", an alliance of powerful people including Thunderbolt Ross, Baron von Strucker, and Alexa Lukin. She also assisted in the resurrection of Aleksander Lukin but also revived a remnant of the Red Skull's mind.


title: Selene (comics)

text: In the "House of X" storyline, Selene, along with other villainous and fractious mutants, is welcomed to the new mutant island nation of Krakoa, which has been created by Professor X, Magneto and Moira MacTaggart, in order to heal mutantdom and start over as a whole species together. In a storyline in "X-Men" (vol. 5), Selene and Emplate have been tasked by Xavier with measuring the amount of psychic energy that Krakoa would take from its inhabitants. A similar protocol is put in place for them both as they also need to nourish on mutants for survival.


title: Selene (comics)

text: Selene is both a mutant and a powerful sorceress who is immortal. She possesses a wide range of superhuman abilities, but it has never been clearly defined which of these are her actual mutant abilities and which are skills derived from magic or other sources.


title: Selene (comics)

text: Selene is a "psychic vampire" with the ability to sustain herself by psionically draining the life force of other human beings into herself. If she drains a person's entire life force, the victim dies and crumbles to dust in seconds. If Selene only drains the victim's life force partially, she achieves a measure of psychic control over her victim's mind, thereby subverting them to her will. Through unknown means Selene can also cause a human being to become a psychic vampire like herself, but be subordinate to Selene's own will. Selene's youthful appearance and vitality depends upon her absorbing the life forces of one or more people on a regular basis. This restores Selene to a youthful and healthy appearance when she has been injured, or when she over-exerts her other powers, and sustains her centuries-long life. A side effect of this process is that Selene remembers the life of anyone she absorbs.


title: Selene (comics)

text: By using the absorbed life energies that sustain her, Selene can enhance her physical strength, speed, stamina, agility, reflexes, and durability to superhuman levels. The amount of energy she has retained from her victims does seem to correlate somewhat with her physical strength and resistance to injury. Selene can momentarily move at superhuman speeds of around 175 miles/hour, though this requires a heavy expenditure of energy and can cause her to age rapidly and require more life energy immediately. It is not known how often Selene must drain a human's life force in order to survive. Great expenditure of power causes Selene to age rapidly, but she can rejuvenate herself by absorbing more life force.


title: Selene (comics)

text: Selene appears to be immune to most forms of conventional injury; she has survived both a knife wound and a crossbow bolt to her heart with no apparent lasting effects. While not indestructible, she once survived and recovered completely from molecular discorporation, though it took considerable time to reconstitute herself.


title: Selene (comics)

text: Selene is also a powerful telekinetic. Her most direct weapon is the telekinetic power to animate and/or levitate inorganic matter on a molecular level, by projecting part of her absorbed life force into it. She can affect nearly anything within her line of sight, and can warp and alter the molecules of inanimate matter to her whim, causing objects to wrap around and constrict others, creating lifelike humanoid structures to combat her opponents, or simply reducing objects to dust. She can use this power in more standard ways, such as creating powerful force fields around herself, and can levitate herself and others but cannot truly fly. Selene can also control and manipulate fire in a variety of ways, though she cannot create the fire herself; whether this is a facet of her telekinesis or a separate power is unclear.


title: Selene (comics)

text: Selene possesses an undefined level of telepathic ability. Selene has used her abilities to scan minds for information and was able to communicate mentally. She often uses her telepathy to blend her psychic signature into the background thoughts around her, making her difficult for other psionics to locate or track, or to induce a hypnotic trance in others, during which she slips away at superhuman speed, leaving them with the impression that she simply vanished.


title: Selene (comics)

text: Selene is able to temporarily assume the appearance of others. Like many of her other abilities, it is unknown if this is achieved through magic, telepathy, or other means.


title: Selene (comics)

text: Selene possesses considerable magical abilities and extensive knowledge of sorcery, enabling her to cast and counteract spells. While the full extent of Selene's magical skill is not known, her greatly extended lifespan has given her sufficient knowledge and experience to be considered a threat to Kulan Gath. She was able to cast an illusion sufficient to fool Kulan Gath at his most powerful. Selene was revealed by the Eye of Agamotto to be one of several magic-users with the potential to be Doctor Strange's successor as Sorcerer Supreme.


title: Harajuku

text: Harajuku is known internationally as a center of Japanese youth culture and fashion. Shopping and dining options include many small, youth-oriented, independent boutiques and cafés, but the neighborhood also attracts many larger international chain stores with high-end luxury merchandisers extensively represented along Omotesando.


title: Harajuku

text: Harajuku Station on the East Japan Railway (JR East) Yamanote Line and Meiji-jingumae 'Harajuku' Station served by the Tokyo Metro Chiyoda Line and Tokyo Metro Fukutoshin Line also act as gateways to local attractions such as the Meiji Shrine, Yoyogi Park and Yoyogi National Gymnasium, making Harajuku and its environs one of the most popular destinations in Tokyo for both domestic and international tourists.


title: Harajuku

text: In the pre-Edo period, the area that came to be known as Harajuku was a small post town on the Kamakura Highway. It was said that in the Gosannen War, Minamoto no Yoshiie mustered his soldiers in this area and the hill here is called Seizoroi-saka (current Jingūmae 2 chōme). It is said that as the "Igagoe" reward for delivering Ieyasu Tokugawa safely from Sakai to Mikawa in the 1582 Honno-ji Incident, Onden-mura (隠田村) together with Harajuku-mura (原宿村) were given to the Iga ninja in 1590.


title: Harajuku

text: In the Edo period, an Iga clan residence was put in Harajuku to defend Edo, due to its strategic location south of the Koshu Road. Other than the mansion of the Hiroshima Domain feudal lord Asano (current Jingūmae 4 and 5 chōme), there were many mansions of shogunate retainers.


title: Harajuku

text: The livelihood of the farmers consisted mainly of rice cleaning and flour milling with the watermill at the Shibuya River. However, due to the poor quality of the land, production never succeeded and the villages never prospered. It is said that local farmers often performed rain-making invocations at local shrines in an attempt to improve their fortunes. There are also the tales "Oyama-Afuri Shrine of Tanzawa" and "Worship on the day trip to Mt Haruna" remaining.


title: Harajuku

text: At the start of the Meiji period in 1868, the land around Harajuku Village was owned by the shogunate. In November of the same year, the towns and villages of Shibuya Ward, including Harajuku Village, were placed under the jurisdiction of the Tokyo Prefecture.


title: Harajuku

text: In 1906, Harajuku Station was opened as a part of the expansion of the Yamanote Line. In 1919, with the establishment of Meiji Shrine, Omotesando was widened and reordered as a formal approach route.


title: Harajuku

text: In 1943, the Tōgō Shrine was built and consecrated in honor of Imperial Japanese Navy Marshal-Admiral Marquis Tōgō Heihachirō.


title: Harajuku

text: In the final period of the Pacific War in 1945, much of the area was burned to the ground during the Great Tokyo Air Raid.


title: Harajuku

text: During the postwar occupation, military housing in the area named Washington Heights was constructed on land now occupied by Yoyogi Park and the Yoyogi National Gymnasium. Shops that appealed to the US soldiers and their families, such as Kiddyland, Oriental Bazaar, and the Fuji Tori, opened along Omotesando during this period.


title: Harajuku

text: In 1964, swimming, diving, and basketball events for the Tokyo Olympics were held at nearby Yoyogi National Gymnasium.


title: Harajuku

text: In 1965, the name of the area in the Japanese address system was officially changed from Harajuku to Jingumae. The name Harajuku has persisted due to the earlier naming of the nearby JR East Harajuku Station. Prior to 1965, Onden, referred to the low-lying area close to Meiji Street and the Shibuya River while "Harajuku" referred to the northern end of Omotesando, the plateau around Aoyama, currently known as Jingu-mae block 2, a large area of Jingu-mae block 3, and the plateau extending behind Togo Shrine in Jingu-mae block 1. The area from Harajuku station to the area surrounding Takeshita Street was called "Takeshita-cho".


title: Harajuku

text: Coming into the 1970s, fashion-obsessed youth culture experienced a transition, from Shinjuku to Harajuku, then to Shibuya. Palais France, a building that sold fashion clothing and accessories, furniture, and other goods, was constructed on Meiji Street near the exit of Takeshita Street. In 1978, the fashion building Laforet Harajuku was opened; thus, Harajuku came to be widely known as a fashion and retail centre.


title: Harajuku

text: From 1977, a Sundays only pedestrian precinct was established by closing local roads. This produced a surge in people gathering close to entrances of Yoyogi Park to watch Rock 'n' Rollers and other new bands performing impromptu open air gigs. In the peak period, crowds of up to 10,000 people would gather. In 1998, the Sundays only pedestrian paradise was abolished.


title: Harajuku

text: In the 1990s and 2000s, with the rise of fast fashion, there was an influx of international fashion brand flagship store openings including Gap Inc., Forever 21, Uniqlo, Topshop and H&M. At the same time, new independent fashion trend shops spread into the previously residential areas of Jingumae 3 and 4 chome, with this area becoming known as Ura-Harajuku. (The "Harajuku Backstreets").


title: Harajuku

text: In 2008, the Tokyo Metro Fukutoshin Line opened providing an alternative metro access linking Harajuku to Shibuya and Ikebukuro.


title: Harajuku

text: During the early morning of January 1, 2019, a 21-year-old man named Kazuhiro Kusakabe drove his Kei car into the crowd of pedestrians celebrating New Year's Day on Takeshita Street. The man claimed his actions were a terrorist attack, and later stated that his intention was to retaliate against the usage of the death penalty. The man attempted to flee from the scene but was soon apprehended by authorities in a nearby park.


title: Harajuku

text: Harajuku is a retail fashion and dining destination in its own right, but still earns much of its wider reputation as a gathering place for fans and aficionados of Japanese street fashion and associated subcultures. Jingu Bashi, the pedestrian bridge between Harajuku Station and the entrance to the Meiji Shrine used to act as a gathering place on Sundays to showcase some of the more theatrical styles. Another gathering place was the lower part of Omotesandō avenue, as it used to be pedestrian-only ("Hokosha Tengoku") on Sundays.


title: Theyazin bin Haitham

text: Theyazin bin Haitham Al Said (; born 21 August 1990) is the Crown Prince of Oman as the son of Sultan Haitham bin Tariq. He is also the Minister of Culture, Youth and Sports. He was officially appointed as Crown Prince after the Omani government decreed a constitutional adjustment which allows the Sultan to select an heir.


title: Theyazin bin Haitham

text: Sayyid Theyazin ("pronounced Dhi-Yazan") bin Haitham bin Tariq attended the Oxford Brookes University, graduating with a bachelor's degree in Political Science.


title: Theyazin bin Haitham

text: His father is Sayyid Haitham bin Tariq, the current Sultan of Oman. His mother is Sayyida Ahad bint Abdullah bin Hamad Al Busaidiyah, the Honorable Lady. He has one brother and two sisters. His paternal uncle Sayyid Asad bin Tariq is the Deputy Prime Minister for relations and international cooperation affairs, and his other paternal uncle Sayyid Shihab bin Tariq is the Deputy Prime Minister for Defense Affairs. The former Sultan, Qaboos bin Said, is his father's cousin.


title: Theyazin bin Haitham

text: Theyazin has been Minister of Culture, Sports and Youth since 18 August 2020. He previously worked at the Omani Embassy in London for five years from 2014. He has also worked at the foreign ministry from 2013, according to Omani media. In July 2022 he graduated from the Royal Military Academy Sandhurst.


title: Differential amplifier

text: A differential amplifier is a type of electronic amplifier that amplifies the difference between two input voltages but suppresses any voltage common to the two inputs. It is an analog circuit with two inputs formula_1 and formula_2 and one output formula_3, in which the output is ideally proportional to the difference between the two voltages:


title: Differential amplifier

text: Single amplifiers are usually implemented by either adding the appropriate feedback resistors to a standard op-amp, or with a dedicated integrated circuit containing internal feedback resistors. It is also a common sub-component of larger integrated circuits handling analog signals.


title: Differential amplifier

text: In practice, however, the gain is not quite equal for the two inputs. This means, for instance, that if formula_2 and formula_1 are equal, the output will not be zero, as it would be in the ideal case. A more realistic expression for the output of a differential amplifier thus includes a second term:


title: Differential amplifier

text: As differential amplifiers are often used to null out noise or bias voltages that appear at both inputs, a low common-mode gain is usually desired.


title: Differential amplifier

text: The common-mode rejection ratio (CMRR), usually defined as the ratio between differential-mode gain and common-mode gain, indicates the ability of the amplifier to accurately cancel voltages that are common to both inputs. The common-mode rejection ratio is defined as


title: Differential amplifier

text: In a perfectly symmetric differential amplifier, formula_13 is zero, and the CMRR is infinite. Note that a differential amplifier is a more general form of amplifier than one with a single input; by grounding one input of a differential amplifier, a single-ended amplifier results.


title: Differential amplifier

text: Modern differential amplifiers are usually implemented with a basic two-transistor circuit called a "“long-tailed” pair" or "differential pair". This circuit was originally implemented using a pair of vacuum tubes. The circuit works the same way for all three-terminal devices with current gain. The bias points of “long-tail” resistor circuit are largely determined by Ohm's law and less so by active-component characteristics.


title: Differential amplifier

text: The long-tailed pair was developed from earlier knowledge of push–pull circuit techniques and measurement bridges. An early circuit which closely resembles a long-tailed pair was published by British neurologist Bryan Matthews in 1934, and it seems likely that this was intended to be a true long-tailed pair but was published with a drawing error. The earliest definite long-tailed pair circuit appears in a patent submitted by Alan Blumlein in 1936. By the end of the 1930s the topology was well established and had been described by various authors, including Frank Offner (1937), Otto Schmitt (1937) and Jan Friedrich Toennies (1938), and it was particularly used for detection and measurement of physiological impulses.


title: Differential amplifier

text: The long-tailed pair was very successfully used in early British computing, most notably the Pilot ACE model and descendants, Maurice Wilkes’ EDSAC, and probably others designed by people who worked with Blumlein or his peers. The long-tailed pair has many favorable attributes if used as a switch: largely immune to tube (transistor) variations (of great importance when machines contained 1,000 tubes or more), high gain, gain stability, high input impedance, medium/low output impedance, good clipper (with a not-too-long tail), non-inverting ("EDSAC contained no inverters!") and large output voltage swings. One disadvantage is that the output voltage swing (typically ±10–20 V) was imposed upon a high DC voltage (200 V or so), requiring care in signal coupling, usually some form of wide-band DC coupling. Many computers of this time tried to avoid this problem by using only AC-coupled pulse logic, which made them very large and overly complex (ENIAC: 18,000 tubes for a 20-digit calculator) or unreliable. DC-coupled circuitry became the norm after the first generation of vacuum-tube computers.


title: Differential amplifier

text: A differential (long-tailed, emitter-coupled) pair amplifier consists of two amplifying stages with common (emitter, source or cathode) degeneration.


title: Differential amplifier

text: With two inputs and two outputs, this forms a differential amplifier stage (Figure 2). The two bases (or grids or gates) are inputs which are differentially amplified (subtracted and multiplied) by the transistor pair; they can be fed with a differential (balanced) input signal, or one input could be grounded to form a phase splitter circuit. An amplifier with differential output can drive a floating load or another stage with differential input.


title: Differential amplifier

text: If the differential output is not desired, then only one output can be used (taken from just one of the collectors (or anodes or drains), disregarding the other output; this configuration is referred to as "single-ended output". The gain is half that of the stage with differential output. To avoid sacrificing gain, a differential to single-ended converter can be utilized. This is often implemented as a current mirror (Figure 3, below).


title: Differential amplifier

text: The differential pair can be used as an amplifier with a single-ended input if one of the inputs is grounded or fixed to a reference voltage (usually, the other collector is used as a single-ended output) This arrangement can be thought of as cascaded common-collector and common-base stages or as a buffered common-base stage.


title: Differential amplifier

text: The emitter-coupled amplifier is compensated for temperature drifts, V is cancelled, and the Miller effect and transistor saturation are avoided. That is why it is used to form emitter-coupled amplifiers (avoiding Miller effect), phase splitter circuits (obtaining two inverse voltages), ECL gates and switches (avoiding transistor saturation), etc.


title: Differential amplifier

text: To explain the circuit operation, four particular modes are isolated below although, in practice, some of them act simultaneously and their effects are superimposed.


title: Differential amplifier

text: In contrast with classic amplifying stages that are biased from the side of the base (and so they are highly β-dependent), the differential pair is directly biased from the side of the emitters by sinking/injecting the total quiescent current. The series negative feedback (the emitter degeneration) makes the transistors act as voltage stabilizers; it forces them to adjust their V voltages (base currents) to pass the quiescent current through their collector-emitter junctions. So, due to the negative feedback, the quiescent current depends only slightly on the transistor's β.


title: Differential amplifier

text: The biasing base currents needed to evoke the quiescent collector currents usually come from the ground, pass through the input sources and enter the bases. So, the sources have to be galvanic (DC) to ensure paths for the biasing current and low resistive enough to not create significant voltage drops across them. Otherwise, additional DC elements should be connected between the bases and the ground (or the positive power supply).


title: Differential amplifier

text: In common mode (the two input voltages change in the same directions), the two voltage (emitter) followers cooperate with each other working together on the common high-resistive emitter load (the "long tail"). They all together increase or decrease the voltage of the common emitter point (figuratively speaking, they together "pull up" or "pull down" it so that it moves). In addition, the dynamic load "helps" them by changing its instant ohmic resistance in the same direction as the input voltages (it increases when the voltage increases and vice versa.) thus keeping up constant total resistance between the two supply rails. There is a full (100%) negative feedback; the two input base voltages and the emitter voltage change simultaneously while the collector currents and the total current do not change. As a result, the output collector voltages do not change as well.


title: Differential amplifier

text: Normal. In differential mode (the two input voltages change in opposite directions), the two voltage (emitter) followers oppose each other—while one of them tries to increase the voltage of the common emitter point, the other tries to decrease it (figuratively speaking, one of them "pulls up" the common point while the other "pulls down" it so that it stays immovable) and vice versa. So, the common point does not change its voltage; it behaves like a virtual ground with a magnitude determined by the common-mode input voltages. The high-resistance emitter element does not play any role—it is shunted by the other low-resistance emitter follower. There is no negative feedback, since the emitter voltage does not change at all when the input base voltages change. The common quiescent current vigorously steers between the two transistors and the output collector voltages vigorously change. The two transistors mutually ground their emitters; so, although they are common-collector stages, they actually act as common-emitter stages with maximum gain. Bias stability and independence from variations in device parameters can be improved by negative feedback introduced via cathode/emitter resistors with relatively small resistances.


title: Differential amplifier

text: Overdriven. If the input differential voltage changes significantly (more than about a hundred millivolts), the transistor driven by the lower input voltage turns off and its collector voltage reaches the positive supply rail. At high overdrive the base-emitter junction gets reversed. The other transistor (driven by the higher input voltage) drives all the current. If the resistor at the collector is relatively large, the transistor will saturate. With relatively small collector resistor and moderate overdrive, the emitter can still follow the input signal without saturation. This mode is used in differential switches and ECL gates.


title: Differential amplifier

text: Breakdown. If the input voltage continues increasing and exceeds the base-emitter breakdown voltage, the base-emitter junction of the transistor driven by the lower input voltage breaks down. If the input sources are low resistive, an unlimited current will flow directly through the "diode bridge" between the two input sources and will damage them.


title: Differential amplifier

text: "In common mode, the emitter voltage follows the input voltage variations; there is a full negative feedback and the gain is minimum. In differential mode, the emitter voltage is fixed (equal to the instant common input voltage); there is no negative feedback and the gain is maximum."


title: Differential amplifier

text: The quiescent current has to be constant to ensure constant collector voltages at common mode. This requirement is not so important in the case of a differential output since the two collector voltages will vary simultaneously but their difference (the output voltage) will not vary. But in the case of a single-ended output, it is extremely important to keep a constant current since the output collector voltage will vary. Thus the higher the resistance of the current source formula_16, the lower (better) is the common-mode gain formula_17. The constant current needed can be produced by connecting an element (resistor) with very high resistance between the shared emitter node and the supply rail (negative for NPN and positive for PNP transistors) but this will require high supply voltage. That is why, in more sophisticated designs, an element with high differential (dynamic) resistance approximating a constant current source/sink is substituted for the “long tail” (Figure 3). It is usually implemented by a current mirror because of its high compliance voltage (small voltage drop across the output transistor).


title: Differential amplifier

text: The collector resistors can be replaced by a current mirror, whose output part acts as an active load (Fig. 3). Thus the differential collector current signal is converted to a single-ended voltage signal without the intrinsic 50% losses, and the gain is greatly increased. This is achieved by copying the input collector current from the left to the right side, where the magnitudes of the two input signals add. For this purpose, the input of the current mirror is connected to the left output, and the output of the current mirror is connected to the right output of the differential amplifier.


title: Differential amplifier

text: The current mirror copies the left collector current and passes it through the right transistor that produces the right collector current. At this right output of the differential amplifier, the two signal currents (pos. and neg. current changes) are subtracted. In this case (differential input signal), they are equal and opposite. Thus, the difference is twice the individual signal currents (Δ"I" − (−Δ"I") = 2Δ"I"), and the differential to single-ended conversion is completed without gain losses. Fig. 4 shows the transmission characteristic of this circuit.


title: Differential amplifier

text: It is possible to connect a floating source between the two bases, but it is necessary to ensure paths for the biasing base currents. In the case of galvanic source, only one resistor has to be connected between one of the bases and the ground. The biasing current will enter directly this base and indirectly (through the input source) the other one. If the source is capacitive, two resistors have to be connected between the two bases and the ground to ensure different paths for the base currents.


title: Differential amplifier

text: The input impedance of the differential pair highly depends on the input mode. At common mode, the two parts behave as common-collector stages with high emitter loads; so, the input impedances are extremely high. At differential mode, they behave as common-emitter stages with grounded emitters; so, the input impedances are low.


title: Differential amplifier

text: The output impedance of the differential pair is high (especially for the improved differential pair with a current mirror as shown in Figure 3).


title: Differential amplifier

text: The common-mode input voltage can vary between the two supply rails but cannot closely reach them since some voltage drops (minimum 1 volt) have to remain across the output transistors of the two current mirrors.