title: Registered nurse

text: In Denmark, nurses are certified by the Danish Ministry of Health. It is also the ministry that keeps track of violations and can retract individual authorization.


title: Registered nurse

text: Applicants must complete a pre-registration nursing program lasting not less than 3 years to enroll as registered nurses. Applicants trained outside Hong Kong must have a practicing certificate recognized by the Nursing Council of Hong Kong and pass the Licensing Examination for Registration.


title: Registered nurse

text: In the US, a registered nurse is a professional clinician who has completed at least an associate degree in nursing or a hospital-based diploma program, followed by successfully completing the NCLEX-RN examination for initial licensure. Other requirements vary by state. More information about the NCLEX-RN examination and specific state nursing boards is provided by the National Council of State Boards of Nursing. A BSN degree is preferred by many employers. To obtain state licensure, applicants must also meet clinical nursing requirements and pass the NCLEX-RN. Six weeks prior to graduation, students may submit an application for licensure and then sign up for the NCLEX-RN. Participants must finish at least 75 questions on this digital exam. To complete the exam, they have up to six hours.


title: Registered nurse

text: Although associate degree programs are often two years, Associate of Science in Nursing (ASN) degrees frequently take three years to complete because of the increased volume of undergraduate coursework related to the profession of nursing, sometimes as part of the program itself and sometimes as prerequisites for admission. Bachelor of Science in Nursing (BSN) degrees include more thorough coursework in leadership and community health, as well as more clinical hours, and can be completed as an extension of an Associate program or standalone. Accelerated versions of both exist, and are considered particularly challenging due to the increased course-load necessary to complete the program in a short time. Some employers, especially hospitals, may require a bachelor's degree even for entry-level positions, however it is also increasingly common for hospitals to hire ASN-licensed individuals for limited practice, under the condition that the individual complete a BSN within a designated time-frame, typically 2–3 years.


title: Registered nurse

text: Specialty certification is available through organizations such as the American Nurses Credentialing Center, a subsidiary of the American Nurses Association. After meeting the eligibility requirements and passing the appropriate specialty certification exam, the designation of Registered Nurse – Board Certified (RN-BC) credential is granted.


title: Registered nurse

text: Registered Nurses can work in a variety of settings including hospitals, physicians' offices, nursing homes, and home health care services. The median pay for a registered nurse in 2016, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, was $68,450.00 per year with a bachelor's degree. RNs can progress to become clinical nurse specialists, nurse practitioners, certified nurse midwives, or nurse anesthetists after obtaining a graduate nursing degree.


title: Registered nurse

text: In some states, the law allows nurses with higher-level degrees, such as Masters of Science in Nursing (MSN) or Doctor of Nursing Practice (DNP) to work with increased autonomy, permitting them to practice limited medicine including sometimes even the prescription of medication without the official supervision of a licensed physician (MD or DO). However, a number of advanced nursing degree programs are sufficiently specialized for work within a hospital setting (for example, Nurse Anesthetist) that it is uncommon for such nurses to run their own medical practice.


title: Registered nurse

text: Nurses in the United States follow the Nurse Practice Act (NPA) which are laws that protect the public's health and welfare by outlining the safe practices of nursing. All states and territories in the U.S. have a nurse practice act. The rules and regulations may vary from state to state. It is important to know the current laws governing nursing practices in their state.


title: Registered nurse

text: Typical requirements to get into a nursing school: High School diploma, required GPA for school of choice, admissions application, personal essay, personal interview, teacher recommendations, volunteer experience (preferably in healthcare), application fee, test of English as a Foreign Language (TOEFL) if applicable, minimum SAT scores or TEAS. Students who wish to pursue either an ADN or a BSN in nursing must first fulfill the necessary liberal arts, math, and scientific prerequisites. Basic anatomy, physiology, biology, psychology, and anatomy are frequently required courses for nursing programs. A minimum "C" grade in these courses is frequently needed for admission to nursing schools.


title: Registered nurse

text: As of 2011, there are 2.24 million registered nurses in China. In 2014, the United States had approximately 2,751,000 registered nurses and Canada had just over 250,000. In the US and Canada this works out to approximately eight nurses per 1,000 people. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, registered nursing jobs are projected to grow by 15% between 2016 and 2026, which is much faster than the average overall rate. The growth rate in the United States is due to a number of reasons, including an increased interest in preventative care, an increase in chronic illnesses, and the demands of services required by the baby boom generation. The highest-paid registered nurses in the United States are in California. California cities often comprise the top five highest-paying metropolitan areas for registered nurses in the country. Most registered nurses start working with competitive salaries. The median annual salary for registered nurses was $80,000 per year as of June 2020, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS.) The lowest 10 percent of RN's earned less than $70,000, and the highest 10 percent earned more than $101,360 for 2015.


title: Lactic acidosis

text: Lactic acidosis is a medical condition characterized by a build-up of lactate (especially -lactate) in the body, with formation of an excessively low pH in the bloodstream. It is a form of metabolic acidosis, in which excessive acid accumulates due to a problem with the body's oxidative metabolism.


title: Lactic acidosis

text: Lactic acidosis is typically the result of an underlying acute or chronic medical condition, medication, or poisoning. The symptoms are generally attributable to these underlying causes, but may include nausea, vomiting, Kussmaul breathing (laboured and deep), and generalised weakness.


title: Lactic acidosis

text: The diagnosis is made on biochemical analysis of blood (often initially on arterial blood gas samples), and once confirmed, generally prompts an investigation to establish the underlying cause to treat the acidosis. In some situations, hemofiltration (purification of the blood) is temporarily required. In rare chronic forms of lactic acidosis caused by mitochondrial disease, a specific diet or dichloroacetate may be used. The prognosis of lactic acidosis depends largely on the underlying cause; in some situations (such as severe infections), it indicates an increased risk of death.


title: Lactic acidosis

text: Lactic acidosis is commonly found in people who are unwell, such as those with severe heart and/or lung disease, a severe infection with sepsis, the systemic inflammatory response syndrome due to another cause, severe physical trauma, or severe depletion of body fluids. Symptoms in humans include all those of typical metabolic acidosis (nausea, vomiting, generalized muscle weakness, and laboured and deep breathing).


title: Lactic acidosis

text: Glucose metabolism begins with glycolysis, in which the molecule is broken down into pyruvate in ten enzymatic steps. A significant proportion of pyruvate is converted into lactate (usually 10:1). The human metabolism produces about 20 mmol/kg of lactic acid every 24 hours. This happens predominantly in tissues (especially muscle) that have high levels of the "A" isoform of the enzyme lactate dehydrogenase (LDHA), which predominantly converts pyruvate into lactate. The lactate is carried by the bloodstream to other tissues where it is converted at the expense of ATP back to pyruvate by the "B" isoform of LDH (LDHB). Firstly there is gluconeogenesis in the liver (as well as the kidney and some other tissues), where pyruvate is converted into glucose; this is known as the Cori cycle. In addition, lactate moved to other tissues enters the citric acid cycle and eventually oxidative phosphorylation, a process that yields ATP.


title: Lactic acidosis

text: Elevations in lactate are either a consequence of increased production or of decreased metabolism. With regards to metabolism, this predominantly takes place in the liver (70%), which explains that lactate levels may be elevated in the setting of liver disease.


title: Lactic acidosis

text: In "type A" lactic acidosis, the production of lactate is attributable to insufficient oxygen for aerobic metabolism. If there is no oxygen available for the parts of the glucose metabolism that require oxygen (citric acid cycle and oxidative phosphorylation), excess pyruvate will be converted in excess lactate. In "type B" lactic acidosis the lactate accumulates because there is a mismatch between glycolysis activity and the remainder of glucose metabolism. Examples are situations where the sympathetic nervous system is highly active (e.g. severe asthma). There is controversy as to whether elevated lactate in acute illness can be attributed to tissue hypoxia; there is limited empirical support for this theoretical notion.


title: Lactic acidosis

text: Acid-base disturbances such as lactic acidosis are typically first assessed using arterial blood gas tests. Testing of venous blood is also available as an alternative as they are effectively interchangeable. Normally resulting lactate concentrations are in the range indicated below:


title: Lactic acidosis

text: Lactic acidosis is classically defined as an elevated lactate together with pH < 7.35 and bicarbonate below 20 mmol/L, but this is not required as lactic acidosis may exist together with other acid-base abnormalities that may affect these two parameters.


title: Lactic acidosis

text: If elevated lactate is present in acute illness, supporting the oxygen supply and blood flow are key initial steps. Some vasopressors (drugs that augment the blood pressure) are less effective when lactate levels are high, and some agents that stimulate the beta-2 adrenergic receptor can elevate the lactate further.


title: Lactic acidosis

text: Direct removal of lactate from the body (e.g. with hemofiltration or dialysis) is difficult, with limited evidence for benefit; it may not be possible to keep up with the lactate production.


title: Lactic acidosis

text: Limited evidence supports the use of sodium bicarbonate solutions to improve the pH (which is associated with increased carbon dioxide generation and may reduce the calcium levels).


title: Lactic acidosis

text: Lactic acidosis caused by inherited mitochondrial disorders (type B3) may be treated with a ketogenic diet and possibly with dichloroacetate (DCA), although this may be complicated by peripheral neuropathy and has a weak evidence base.


title: Lactic acidosis

text: Mild and transient elevations in lactate have limited impact on mortality, whereas sustained and severe lactate elevations are associated with a high mortality.


title: Lactic acidosis

text: The mortality of lactic acidosis in people taking metformin was previously reported to be 50%, but in more recent reports this was closer to 25%.


title: Lactic acidosis

text: Reptiles, which rely primarily on anaerobic energy metabolism (glycolysis) for intense movements, can be particularly susceptible to lactic acidosis. In particular, during the capture of large crocodiles, the animals' use of their glycolytic muscles often alter the blood's pH to a point where they are unable to respond to stimuli or move. Cases are recorded in which particularly large crocodiles which put up extreme resistance to capture later died of the resulting pH imbalance.


title: Lactic acidosis

text: Certain turtle species have been found to be capable of tolerating high levels of lactic acid without experiencing the effects of lactic acidosis. Painted turtles hibernate buried in mud or underwater and do not resurface for the entire winter. As a result, they rely on anaerobic respiration to provide the majority of their energy needs. Adaptations in particular in the turtle's blood composition and shell allow it to tolerate high levels of lactic acid accumulation. In the anoxic conditions where anaerobic respiration is dominant, calcium levels in the blood plasma increase. This calcium serves as a buffer, reacting with the excess lactate to form the precipitate calcium lactate. This precipitate is suggested to be reabsorbed by the shell and skeleton, thereby removing it from the bloodstream; studies examining turtles that have been subjected to prolonged anoxic conditions have up to 45% of their lactate stored within their skeletal structure.


title: Lactic acidosis

text: In ruminant livestock, the cause of clinically serious lactic acidosis is different from the causes described above.


title: Lactic acidosis

text: In domesticated ruminants, lactic acidosis may occur as a consequence of ingesting large amounts of grain, especially when the rumen population is poorly adapted to deal with grain. Activity of various rumen organisms results in accumulation of various volatile fatty acids (normally, mostly acetic, propionic, and butyric acids), which are partially dissociated. Although some lactate is normally produced in the rumen, it is normally metabolized by such organisms as "Megasphaera elsdenii" and, to a lesser extent, "Selenomonas ruminantium" and some other organisms. With high grain consumption, the concentration of dissociated organic acids can become quite high, resulting in rumen pH dropping below 6. Within this lower pH range, "Lactobacillus" spp. (producing lactate and hydrogen ions) are favored, and "M. elsdenii" and "S. ruminantium" are inhibited, tending to result in a considerable rise of lactate and hydrogen ion concentrations in the rumen fluid. The pKa of lactic acid is low, about 3.9, versus, for example, 4.8 for acetic acid; this contributes to the considerable drop in rumen pH which can occur.


title: Lactic acidosis

text: Because of the high solute concentration of the rumen fluid under such conditions, considerable water is translocated from the blood to the rumen along the osmotic potential gradient, resulting in dehydration which cannot be relieved by drinking, and which can ultimately lead to hypovolemic shock. As more lactate accumulates and rumen pH drops, the ruminal concentration of undissociated lactic acid increases. Undissociated lactic acid can cross the rumen wall to the blood, where it dissociates, lowering blood pH. Both L and D isomers of lactic acid are produced in the rumen; these isomers are metabolized by different metabolic pathways, and activity of the principal enzyme involved in metabolism of the D isomer declines greatly with lower pH, tending to result in an increased ratio of D:L isomers as acidosis progresses.


title: Lactic acidosis

text: Measures for preventing lactic acidosis in ruminants include avoidance of excessive amounts of grain in the diet, and gradual introduction of grain over a period of several days, to develop a rumen population capable of safely dealing with a relatively high grain intake. Administration of lasalocid or monensin in feed can reduce risk of lactic acidosis in ruminants, inhibiting most of the lactate-producing bacterial species without inhibiting the major lactate fermenters. Also, using a higher feeding frequency to provide the daily grain ration can allow higher grain intake without reducing the pH of the rumen fluid.


title: Lactic acidosis

text: Treatment of lactic acidosis in ruminants may involve intravenous administration of dilute sodium bicarbonate, oral administration of magnesium hydroxide, and/or repeated removal of rumen fluids and replacement with water (followed by reinoculation with rumen organisms, if necessary).


title: Southern African Development Community

text: The Southern African Development Community (SADC) is an inter-governmental organization headquartered in Gaborone, Botswana.


title: Southern African Development Community

text: Its goal is to further regional socio-economic cooperation and integration as well as political and security cooperation among 16 countries in southern Africa.


title: Southern African Development Community

text: The origins of SADC are in the 1960s and 1970s, when the leaders of majority-ruled countries and national liberation movements coordinated their political, diplomatic and military struggles to bring an end to colonial and white-minority rule in southern Africa. The immediate forerunner of the political and security cooperation leg of today's SADC was the informal Frontline States (FLS) grouping. It was formed in 1980.


title: Southern African Development Community

text: The Southern African Development Coordination Conference (SADCC) was the forerunner of the socio-economic cooperation leg of today's SADC. The adoption by nine majority-ruled southern African countries of the Lusaka declaration on 1 April 1980 paved the way for the formal establishment of SADCC in April 1980.


title: Southern African Development Community

text: SADCC was transformed into SADC on 17 August 1992, with the adoption by the founding members of SADCC and newly independent Namibia of the Windhoek declaration and treaty establishing SADC. The 1992 SADC provided for both socio-economic cooperation and political and security cooperation. In reality, the FLS was dissolved only in 1994, after South Africa's first democratic elections. Subsequent efforts to place political and security cooperation on a firm institutional footing under SADC's umbrella failed.


title: Southern African Development Community

text: On 14 August 2001, the 1992 SADC treaty was amended. The amendment heralded the overhaul of the structures, policies and procedures of SADC, a process which is ongoing. One of the changes is that political and security cooperation is institutionalised in the Organ on Politics, Defence and Security (OPDS); one of the principal SADC bodies. It is subject to the oversight of the organisation's supreme body, the Summit, which comprises the heads of state or government.


title: Southern African Development Community

text: The organisation holds its own multi-sport event in the form of the SADC Games , which was first held in 2004 in Maputo. Originally planned for an earlier date in Malawi and Lesotho, organisational issues led to abandonment of the plan and the SADC issuing a fine of $100,000 against Malawi. The first event in 2004 in Maputo resulted in over 1000 youths under-20 from 10 countries taking part in a sports programme including athletics, football, netball, boxing and basketball.


title: Southern African Development Community

text: In August 2019 SADC adopted Swahili as its fourth working language, alongside English, French and Portuguese. Kiswahili – a lingua franca in the African Great Lakes region, other parts of East Africa, and to a lesser degree, parts of Southern Africa – is an official language of Tanzania, Kenya and Uganda and of the African Union.


title: Southern African Development Community

text: SADC has 27 legally binding protocols dealing with issues such as Defence, Development, Illicit Drug Trade, Free Trade and Movement of People.


title: Southern African Development Community

text: The SADC Free Trade Area was established in August 2008, after the implementation of the SADC Protocol on Trade in 2000 laid the foundation for its formation. Its original members were Botswana, Lesotho, Madagascar, Mauritius, Mozambique, Namibia, South Africa, Eswatini, Tanzania, Zambia and Zimbabwe, with Malawi and Seychelles joining later. Of the 15 SADC member states, only Angola and the Democratic Republic of Congo are not yet participating, however Angolan trade minister Joffre Van-Dúnen Júnior said in Luanda that his ministry is working to create conditions for Angola's accession to the SADC Free Trade Area in 2019. The SADC-Customs Union, scheduled to be established by 2010 according to SADC's Regional Indicative Strategic Development Plan (RISDP), is unlikely to become reality in the near future. This is because the European Union's Economic Partnership Agreements (EPA) with their inherent extra-regional freetrade regimes provided for several SADC members more benefits than deeper regional market integration within the framework of a SADC-Customs Union. Since these SADC countries formed four different groupings to negotiate and implement different Economic Partnership Agreements with European Union, the chance to establish a SADC-wide common external tariff as prerequisite for a regional customs union is missed.


title: Southern African Development Community

text: On Wednesday 22 October 2008, SADC joined with the Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa and the East African Community to form the African Free Trade Zone, including all members of each of the organizations. The leaders of the three trading blocs agreed to create a single free trade zone, the African Free Trade Zone, consisting of 26 countries with a GDP of an estimated $624bn (£382.9bn). It is hoped the African Free Trade Zone agreement would ease access to markets within the zone and end problems arising from the fact that several of the member countries belong to multiple groups.


title: Southern African Development Community

text: The African Free Trade Zone effective has been more than a hundred years in the making—a trade zone spanning the whole African continent from Cape to Cairo and envisioned by Cecil Rhodes and other British imperialists in the 1890s. The only difference is that the African Free Trade Zone is the creation of independent African Countries. The idea is a free trade zone spanning the whole continent from the Cape to Cairo (Cape Town in the Republic of South Africa to Cairo in Egypt).


title: Southern African Development Community

text: In addition to eliminating duplicative membership and the problem member states also participating in other regional economic cooperation schemes and regional political and security cooperation schemes that may compete with or undermine each other, the African Free Trade Zone further aims to strengthen the bloc's bargaining power when negotiating international deals.


title: Southern African Development Community

text: SADC countries face many social, development, economic, trade, education, health, diplomatic, defence, security and political challenges. Some of these challenges cannot be tackled effectively by individual members. Cattle diseases and organised-crime gangs know no boundaries. War in one country can suck in its neighbours and damage their economies. The sustainable development that trade could bring is threatened by the existence of different product standards and tariff regimes, weak customs infrastructure and bad roads. The socio-economic and political and security cooperation aims of SADC are equally wide-ranging, and intended to address the various common challenges.


title: Southern African Development Community

text: One significant challenge is that member states also participate in other regional economic cooperation schemes and regional political and security cooperation schemes that may compete with or undermine SADC's aims. For example, South Africa and Botswana both belong to the Southern Africa Customs Union, Zambia is a part of the Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa, and Tanzania is a member of the East African Community.


title: Southern African Development Community

text: According to Human Rights Watch, "SADC has been criticized for its laxity on making human rights compliance within its member states a priority".


title: Southern African Development Community

text: Except for the Tribunal (based in Windhoek, Namibia), SNCs and Secretariat, decision-making is by consensus.


title: Turo (company)

text: Turo is an American peer-to-peer carsharing company based in San Francisco, United States. The company allows private car owners to rent out their vehicles via an online and mobile interface in over 56 countries.


title: Turo (company)

text: In July 2019, the American holding company IAC invested $250 million in Turo, a deal that valued the company at more than $1 billion.


title: Turo (company)

text: As of 2020, the website has 14 million members and 450,000 vehicles listed operating in over 56 countries.


title: Turo (company)

text: On January 1, 2021, the "Wall Street Journal" reported that Turo CEO Andre Haddad planned to take the company public in 2021, either through a traditional IPO or some alternative method. The company will be listed on the New York Stock Exchange on the ticker symbol TURO from their S-1 filing and plans for the IPO to take place in 2022.


title: Turo (company)

text: RelayRides was launched in Boston in June 2010. The peer-to-peer car-sharing concept was inspired by similar online marketplaces such as Airbnb and eBay. In late 2010, the company expanded to San Francisco, where it is now headquartered. In 2012, it launched nationwide in the U.S.


title: Turo (company)

text: Initially, renting a car through RelayRides required installing an in-car device that enabled GPS monitoring, remote unlocking, and smart card entry, similar to Zipcar. In 2012, Turo partnered with major automaker General Motors and their OnStar division with the goal of enabling renters to unlock GM cars with their mobile phones without installing additional technology. In 2013, however, RelayRides discontinued both its in-car device and its Onstar technology integration in favor of in-person key exchange.


title: Turo (company)

text: Between 2010 and 2014, RelayRides received $52.5 million in funding from Canaan Partners, August Capital, Google Ventures, Shasta Ventures, and Trinity Ventures.


title: Turo (company)

text: In November 2015, RelayRides changed its name to Turo in order, the company said, to reflect the company's shift away from short-term to long-term rentals. Forbes included it among 14 "hottest on-demand startups" in 2015, with a valuation of $311 million.


title: Turo (company)

text: In June 2018, Turo announced plans to offer a new in-car device allowing GPS monitoring and remote unlocking through the Turo app.


title: Turo (company)

text: In 2016 and 2017, Turo launched in three Canadian provinces: Alberta, Ontario, and Quebec. Also in 2016, Turo launched in the United Kingdom.


title: Turo (company)

text: In July 2019, InterActiveCorp (IAC) invested $250 million in venture capital funding. The investment made IAC Turo's largest shareholder.


title: Turo (company)

text: While Turo has a good neighbor policy in place, the company has been accused of being a bad neighbor as the app can crowd out street parking in busy urban areas.


title: Turo (company)

text: In 2019, Turo updated their terms of service to prevent hosts from sharing their car on any other car-sharing services. Turo declared that "failure to abide by this condition may result in fines, penalties, denial of a physical damage claim, removal of the vehicle from the Services, account closure, or other action, in Turo’s sole discretion." The change was formally implemented on July 15, 2019. Avoiding claims that this could be "failure to deal" or reduction in competition, they stated that their service "tends" to perform badly when dealing with other companies' booking software.


title: Turo (company)

text: In May 2013, the New York State Department of Financial Services issued a consumer alert, warning that RelayRides misrepresented insurance coverage for users of its program. New York issued a cease-and-desist letter ordering RelayRides to stop operations, and RelayRides suspended operations in the state. RelayRides was fined $200,000 for false advertising for engaging in unlicensed insurance activity, and other violations.


title: Turo (company)

text: Unlike traditional car-rental services, Turo does not own or maintain any cars. The company offers a platform on which car owners can rent their cars. Turo claims that its rental costs are lower compared to traditional car rental services.


title: Turo (company)

text: People who wish to rent their cars can register their cars online to be rented by other Turo members. The car owner states when and where the car will be available. A Turo member who wants to rent a car reserves a specific time slot for the car online. Turo takes 10 to 40 percent of rental income, depending on the insurance coverage it provides the car owner.


title: Turo (company)

text: Turo does not require renters to have personal coverage if the renter books a trip with a protection plan provided by Turo. Turo provides up to $750,000 in third party liability insurance from Travelers Insurance in the United States, up to $2 million in Canada, and up to £20 million in the UK, with 5 plans varying in vehicle protection.


title: Turo (company)

text: On June 28, 2022, a California Appellate Court found that Turo is not a car rental company at all. Their reasoning was that Turo is merely an online platform that helps car owners find people to rent from them. This will have two legal effects: first, the protections afforded to car rental companies will not be extended to Turo, second, services like Uber will try to leverage this case so that they are no longer deemed to be a transportation company.


title: Illinois Institute of Technology

text: Illinois Institute of Technology (IIT) is a private research university in Chicago, Illinois. Tracing its history to 1890, the present name was adopted upon the merger of the Armour Institute and Lewis Institute in 1940. The university has programs in architecture, business, communications, design, engineering, industrial technology, information technology, law, psychology, and science. It is classified among "R2: Doctoral Universities – High research activity".


title: Illinois Institute of Technology

text: The university's historic roots are in several 19th-century engineering and professional education institutions in the United States. In the mid 20th century, it became closely associated with trends in modernist architecture through the work of its Dean of Architecture Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, who designed its campus. The Institute of Design, Chicago-Kent College of Law, and Midwest College of Engineering were also merged into Illinois Tech.


title: Illinois Institute of Technology

text: In 1890, when advanced education was often reserved for society's elite, Chicago minister Frank Wakely Gunsaulus delivered what came to be known as the "Million Dollar Sermon." From the pulpit of his South Side church, near the site Illinois Institute of Technology now occupies, Gunsaulus said that with a million dollars he could build a school where students can learn to think in practical not theoretical terms; where they could be taught to "learn by doing."


title: Illinois Institute of Technology

text: Inspired by Gunsaulus' vision, Philip Danforth Armour, Sr. (1832–1901) gave $1 million to found the Armour Institute—and Armour, his wife, Malvina Belle Ogden Armour (1842–1927) and their son J. (Jonathan) Ogden Armour (1863–1927) continued to support the university in its early years. Armour claimed it was his best paying investment. When Armour Institute opened in 1893, it offered professional courses in engineering, chemistry, architecture and library science.


title: Illinois Institute of Technology

text: Illinois Tech was created in 1940 by the merger of Armour Institute and Lewis Institute. Located on the west side of Chicago, Lewis Institute, established in 1895 by the estate of hardware merchant and investor Allen C. Lewis, offered liberal arts as well as science and engineering courses for both men and women. At separate meetings held by their respective boards on October 26, 1939, the trustees of Armour and Lewis voted to merge the two colleges. A Cook County circuit court decision on April 23, 1940, solidified the merger.


title: Illinois Institute of Technology

text: The Institute of Design (ID), founded in Chicago by László Moholy-Nagy in 1937, merged with Illinois Tech in 1949.


title: Illinois Institute of Technology

text: Chicago-Kent College of Law, founded in 1887, became part of the university in 1969, making Illinois Institute of Technology one of the few technology-based universities with a law school.


title: Illinois Institute of Technology

text: Also in 1969, the Stuart School of Management and Finance—now known as the Stuart School of Business – was established thanks to a gift from the estate of Lewis Institute alumnus and Chicago financier Harold Leonard Stuart. The program became the Stuart School of Business in 1999.


title: Illinois Institute of Technology

text: The Midwest College of Engineering, founded in 1967, joined the university in 1986, giving Illinois Tech a presence in west suburban Wheaton with what is today known as the Rice Campus.


title: Illinois Institute of Technology

text: In December 2006, the University Technology Park at Illinois Institute of Technology, an incubator and life sciences/tech start-up facility, was started in existing research buildings located on the south end of Mies Campus. , University Tech Park at Illinois Institute of Technology is home to many companies.


title: Illinois Institute of Technology

text: Today, Illinois Tech is a private, PhD-granting university with programs in engineering, science, human sciences, applied technology, architecture, business, design, and law. It is one of 23 institutions that comprise the Association of Independent Technological Universities (AITU).


title: Illinois Institute of Technology

text: Illinois Tech continued to expand after the merger. As one of the first American universities to host a Navy V-12 program during World War II the school saw a large increase in students and expanded the Armour campus beyond its original . Two years before the merger, German architect Ludwig Mies van der Rohe joined the then Armour Institute of Technology to head both Armour's and the Art Institute of Chicago's architecture program. The Art Institute would later separate and form its own program. Mies was given the task of designing a completely new campus, and the result was a spacious, open, campus set in contrast to the busy, crowded urban neighborhood around it. The first Mies-designed buildings were completed in the mid-1940s, and construction on what is considered the "Mies Campus" continued until the early 1970s.


title: Illinois Institute of Technology

text: Engineering and research also saw great growth and expansion from the post-war period until the early 1970s. Illinois Tech experienced its greatest period of growth from 1952 to 1973 under President John T. Rettaliata, a fluid dynamicist whose research accomplishments included work on early development of the jet engine and a seat on the National Aeronautics and Space Council. This period saw Illinois Tech as the largest engineering school in the United States, as stated in a feature in the September 1953 issue of "Popular Science" magazine. Illinois Tech housed many research organizations: IIT Research Institute (formerly Armour Research Foundation and birthplace of magnetic recording wire and tape as well as audio and video cassettes), the Institute of Gas Technology, and the American Association of Railroads, among others.


title: Illinois Institute of Technology

text: Three colleges merged with Illinois Tech after the 1940 Armor/Lewis merger: Institute of Design in 1949, Chicago-Kent College of Law in 1969, and Midwest College of Engineering in 1986. Illinois Tech's Stuart School of Business was founded by a gift from Lewis Institute alumnus Harold Leonard Stuart in 1969, and joined Chicago-Kent at Illinois Tech's Downtown Campus in 1992; it phased out its undergraduate program (becoming graduate-only) after spring 1995. (An undergraduate business program focusing on technology and entrepreneurship was launched in fall 2004 and was for a while administratively separate from the Stuart School. It is now part of the school, but remains on Main Campus.) The Institute of Design, once housed on the Mies Campus in S.R. Crown Hall, also phased out its undergraduate programs and moved downtown in the early 1990s.


title: Illinois Institute of Technology

text: Although not used in official communication, the nickname "Illinois Tech" has long been a favorite of students, inspiring the name of the student newspaper; (renamed in 1928 from "Armour Tech News" to "TechNews"), and the former mascot of the university's collegiate sports teams, the Techawks. During the 1950s and 1960s, the nickname was actually more prevalent than "IIT." This was reflected by the Chicago Transit Authority's Green Line rapid transit station at 35th and State being named "Tech-35th", but has since been changed to "35th-Bronzeville-IIT." In the 2010s, school administrators began a move to reintroduce the "Illinois Tech" nickname, to decrease confusion with the Indian Institutes of Technology that share the IIT abbreviation and with ITT Technical Institute whose abbreviation is similar.


title: Illinois Institute of Technology

text: In June 2020 Illinois Tech launched the College of Computing and the revamped Lewis College of Science and Letters. The College of Computing houses the computer science, applied mathematics, and information technology and management departments, as well as the industrial technology and management program. The revamped Lewis College added the biology, chemistry, food science and nutrition, and physics departments to the remaining humanities, psychology, and social science departments. With the launch of the College of Computing and revamped Lewis College of Science and Letters, the School of Applied Technology and College of Science were dissolved.


title: Illinois Institute of Technology

text: In 1994 the National Commission on IIT considered leaving Mies Campus and moving to the Chicago suburbs. Construction of a veritable wall of Chicago Housing Authority high-rises replaced virtually all of Illinois Tech's neighbors in the 1950s and 1960s, a well-meaning but flawed attempt to improve conditions in an economically declining portion of the city. The closest high-rise, Stateway Gardens, was located just south of the Illinois Tech campus boundary, the last building of which was demolished in 2006. But the Dearborn Homes to the immediate north of campus still remain. The past decade has seen a redevelopment of Stateway Gardens into a new, mixed-income neighborhood dubbed Park Boulevard; the completion of the new central station of the Chicago Police Department a block east of the campus; and major commercial development at Roosevelt Road, just north of the campus, and residential development as close as Michigan Avenue on the east boundary of the school.


title: Illinois Institute of Technology

text: Bolstered by a $120 million gift in the mid-1990s from Illinois Tech alumnus Robert Pritzker, former chairman of IIT's board of trustees, and Robert Galvin, former chairman of the board and former Motorola executive, the university has benefited from a revitalization. The first new buildings on Mies Campus since the "completion" of the Mies Campus in the early 1970s were finished in 2003—Rem Koolhaas's McCormick Tribune Campus Center and Helmut Jahn's State Street Village. S. R. Crown Hall, a National Historic Landmark, saw renovation in 2005 and the renovation of Wishnick Hall was completed in 2007. Undergraduate enrollment has breached 3,000. To further boost their focus on biotechnology and the melding of business and technology, University Technology Park at Illinois Tech, an expansive research park, has been developed by remodeling former Institute of Gas Technology and research buildings on the south end of Mies Campus.


title: Illinois Institute of Technology

text: Illinois Tech is divided into five colleges (College of Computing, Armour College of Engineering, Lewis College of Science and Letters, College of Architecture, Chicago-Kent College of Law), an institute (Institute of Design), one school (Stuart School of Business), and a number of research centers, some of which provide academic programs independent of the other academic units. While many maintain undergraduate programs, some only offer graduate or certificate programs.


title: Illinois Institute of Technology

text: In 2003 Illinois Tech administrators split the former Armour College of Engineering and Science into two colleges known as the Armour College of Engineering and the College of Science and Letters. The Armour College of Engineering is composed of five departments: the Department of Biomedical Engineering, the Department of Biological and Chemical Engineering, the Department of Civil, Architectural and Environmental Engineering, the Department of Mechanical, Materials and Aerospace Engineering, and the Department of Computer and Electrical Engineering.


title: Illinois Institute of Technology

text: In 2013, Illinois Tech administrators reorganized the College of Science and Letters and Institute of Psychology, forming the College of Science (Department of Applied Mathematics, the Department of Biology, the Department of Chemistry, the Department of Physics, the Department of Computer Science, and the Department of Mathematics and Science Education), and the Lewis College of Human Sciences (the Department of Humanities, the Department of Psychology, and the Department of Social Sciences).


title: Illinois Institute of Technology

text: The Institute of Design was founded in 1937 as the New Bauhaus: Chicago School of Design by László Moholy-Nagy. It became known as the Institute of Design in 1944 and later joined Illinois Institute of Technology in 1949.


title: Illinois Institute of Technology

text: Illinois Tech also contains the College of Architecture. This college began in 1895 when trustees of Armour Institute and Art Institute merged the architectural programs of both schools to form the Chicago School of Architecture of Armour Institute.


title: Illinois Institute of Technology

text: The School of Applied Technology was founded as the Center for Professional Development in 2001 to provide technology oriented education for working professionals. In December 2009 Illinois Tech announced the formation of the School of Applied Technology, composed of undergraduate and graduate degree programs in Industrial Technology and Management (INTM) and Information Technology and Management (ITM), as well as non-credit Professional Learning Programs (PLP). These programs were all formerly part of the Center for Professional Development. Professional Learning Programs offers noncredit continuing education courses and certificates, corporate training, a Professional Engineering Exam Review program, international programs including English as a Second Language instruction, short courses and seminars ranging from a few hours to several days in length. In 2014 the Department of Food Science and Nutrition was formally launched within the School of Applied Technology, formed from degree programs originating within Illinois Tech's Institute for Food Safety and Health (IFSH). The School of Applied Technology was dissolved in June 2020; its departments and programs remained, split between the new College of Computing and Lewis College of Science and Letters.


title: Illinois Institute of Technology

text: Chicago-Kent College of Law began in 1886 with law clerks receiving tutorials from Appellate Judge Joseph M. Bailey to prepare for the newly instated Illinois Bar Examination. By 1888 these evening sessions developed into formal classes and the Chicago College of Law was established. It was not until 1969 that the school was incorporated into Illinois Institute of Technology.


title: Illinois Institute of Technology

text: With a bequest from Illinois Tech alumnus and financier Harold Leonard Stuart the Stuart School of Business was established in 1969. In addition to the M.B.A. and PhD, Stuart offers specialized programs in Finance, Mathematical Finance (provided in conjunction with the Illinois Tech Department of Applied Mathematics), Environmental Management and Sustainability (provided in conjunction with the Chicago-Kent College of Law and Department of Civic, Architectural, and Environmental Engineering), Marketing Analytics, and Public Administration. The PhD program in Management Science offers specializations in Finance and Analytics.


title: Illinois Institute of Technology

text: Illinois Tech also offers many dual admission programs including programs in medicine, optometry, pharmacy, law, and business.


title: Illinois Institute of Technology

text: The main campus is located at 10 West 35th Street in Chicago's Bronzeville neighborhood and houses all undergraduate programs and graduate programs in engineering, sciences, architecture, communications, and psychology. The downtown campus, which was renamed the Conviser Law Center in early 2020, at 565 West Adams Street in Chicago houses Chicago-Kent College of Law, Stuart School of Business, and the graduate programs in Public Administration. The Daniel F. and Ada L. Rice Campus in Wheaton, Illinois houses some degree programs in Information Technology and Management. This campus opened its doors in January 1991. Moffett Campus in Bedford Park, Illinois, is home to the Institute for Food Safety and Health. Moffett Campus was donated to Illinois Tech by CPC International Inc. in 1988.


title: Illinois Institute of Technology

text: VanderCook College of Music shares Illinois Tech's Main Campus: VanderCook College of Music and offers cross-registration for Illinois Tech students.


title: Illinois Institute of Technology

text: The Illinois Tech main campus, known as Mies Campus, is centered around 33rd and State Streets, approximately south of the Chicago Loop in the historic Bronzeville neighborhood on the South Side of Chicago, part of the Douglas community area. Also known as the Black Metropolis District, the area is a landmark in African-American history. Following rapid growth during the Great Migration of African-Americans from the south between 1910 and 1920, it became home to numerous African-American owned businesses and cultural institutions and offered an alternative to the race restrictions that were prevalent in the rest of the city. The area was home to author Gwendolyn Brooks, civil rights activist Ida B. Wells, bandleader Louis Armstrong, pilot Bessie Coleman and many other famous African-Americans during the mid-20th century. The church where Emmett Till's funeral was held is less than a mile south of the campus. The nine extant structures from the period during the Great Migration when the area became known as the Black Metropolis District were added jointly to the National Register of Historic Places in 1986 and designated a Chicago Landmark in 1998.


title: Illinois Institute of Technology

text: In 1941, the Chicago Housing Authority began erecting massive public housing developments in the area. By 1990, the Illinois Tech campus was encircled by high-rise housing projects rife with crime. The projects were demolished beginning in 1999, and the area began to revitalize, with major renovations to King Drive and many of the historic structures and an influx of new, upscale, housing developments. Neighborhood features include Guaranteed Rate Field—home of the Chicago White Sox—Burnham Park, and 31st Street Beach on the Lake Michigan waterfront, and historical buildings from the heyday of the Black Metropolis era, including the Chicago Bee Building, the Eighth Regiment Armory, and the Overton Hygienic Building. The campus is bordered on the west by the Chicago 'L' Red Line, which runs parallel to Lake Michigan north to Rogers Park and south to 95th street. The Green Line bisects the campus and runs north to the Loop and then west to the near west suburbs and south to the Museum Campus and the University of Chicago.


title: Illinois Institute of Technology

text: Today, Illinois Tech continues to support the Historic Bronzeville area by sponsoring non-for-profits such as The Renaissance Collaborative.


title: Illinois Institute of Technology

text: The campus, roughly bounded between 31st and 35th streets, Michigan Avenue, and the Dan Ryan Expressway, was designed by modernist architect Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, "one of the great figures of 20th-century architecture," who chaired the IIT School of Architecture from 1938 to 1958. Van der Rohe's master plan for the Illinois Tech campus was one of the most ambitious projects he ever conceived and the campus, with 20 of his works, is the greatest concentration of his buildings in the world. The layout of the campus departs radically from "traditional college quadrangles and limestone buildings". The materials are inspired by the factories and warehouses of Chicago's South Side and "embod[y] 20th century methods and materials: steel and concrete frames with curtain walls of brick and glass." The campus was landscaped by van der Rohe's close colleague at Illinois Tech, Alfred Caldwell, "the last representative of the Prairie School of landscape architects." Known as "the nature poet", Caldwell's plan reinforced van der Rohe's design with "landscaping planted in a free-flowing manner, which in its interaction with the pristine qualities of the architecture, introduce[d] a poetic aspect."


title: Illinois Institute of Technology

text: On the west side of Mies Campus are three red brick buildings that were original to Armour Institute, built between 1891 and 1901. In 1938 Ludwig Mies van der Rohe began his 20-year tenure as director of IIT's School of Architecture (1938–1959). The university was on the verge of building a brand new campus, to be one of the nation's first federally funded urban renewal projects. Mies was given carte blanche in the large commission, and the university grew fast enough during and after World War II to allow much of the new plan to be realized. From 1943 to 1957, several new Mies buildings rose across campus, including the S.R. Crown Hall, which houses the architecture school, and was designated a National Historic Landmark in 2001.


title: Illinois Institute of Technology

text: Although Mies had emphasized his wish to complete the campus he had begun, commissions from the late 50s onward were given to Skidmore, Owings & Merrill (SOM), prompting Mies to never return to the campus that had changed architecture the world over. SOM architect Walter Netsch designed a few buildings, including the new library that Mies had wished to create, all of them similar to Mies's style. By the late 1960s, campus addition projects were given to SOM's Myron Goldsmith, who had worked with Mies during his education at Illinois Tech and thus was able to design several new buildings to harmonize well with the original campus. In 1976, the American Institute of Architects recognized the campus as one of the 200 most significant works of architecture in the United States. The new campus center, designed by Rem Koolhaas, and a new state-of-the-art residence hall designed by Helmut Jahn, State Street Village, opened in 2003. These were the first new buildings built on the Main Campus in 32 years. Illinois Tech opened its first new academic building in nearly 40 years in October 2018, when it dedicated the Ed Kaplan Family Institute for Innovation and Tech Entrepreneurship.


title: Illinois Institute of Technology

text: In 1976, American Institute of Architects named the Illinois Tech campus one of the 200 most significant works of architecture in the United States. Mies Campus was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 2005.


title: Illinois Institute of Technology

text: In 2010 Illinois Tech received the Princeton Review's highest sustainability rating among universities in Illinois, tied with the University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign.


title: Illinois Institute of Technology

text: S. R. Crown Hall, erected in 1955, was considered by Mies to be one of his greatest architectural achievements. To provide for a flexible, columnless interior, he suspended the roof from four steel girders supported by eight external columns spaced 60 feet apart. S. R. Crown Hall, home to Illinois Tech's College of Architecture, has been described as an "immortal contribution to the architecture of Chicago and the world." S. R. Crown Hall was granted National Historic Landmark status in 2001. A $15 million renovation, completed in August 2005, modernized the structure with energy-saving mechanicals and windows, along with needed technology upgrades for computers and the Internet—all while carefully preserving the architectural integrity of the building, inside and out. Additional improvements were completed in 2013.


title: Illinois Institute of Technology

text: State Street Village (SSV), a student residence hall designed by Murphy/Jahn architects on the southeast corner of 33rd and State Streets just south of the campus center, was completed in August 2003. Helmut Jahn, who studied architecture at Illinois Tech under Mies van der Rohe in the late 1960s, is responsible for the innovative design of the residence hall. The structure is composed of three separate five-story buildings, joined by exterior glass walls that muffle noise from passing trains on the adjacent "L" tracks. SSV houses 367 students in apartment-style and suite-style units.


title: Illinois Institute of Technology

text: The McCormick Tribune Campus Center (MTCC) at 33rd and State Streets opened in September 2003. Designed by Dutch architect Rem Koolhaas, considered one of the "10 most influential living architects by the American Institute of Architects," the campus center arranges various areas around diagonal pathways, resembling interior streets, that are extensions of the paths students use to cross the campus. The design includes a concrete and stainless steel tube that encloses a 530-foot stretch of the Green Line elevated commuter rail ("L") tracks, passing directly over the one-story campus center building. The tube dampens the sound of trains overhead as students enjoy food courts, student organization offices, retail shops, a recreational facility and campus events.


title: Illinois Institute of Technology

text: The newest addition to the Mies Campus came from Chicago architect, and College of Architecture professor John Ronan, who was selected to design the Ed Kaplan Family Institute for Innovation and Tech Entrepreneurship. Ronan's building, the first new academic building in more than 40 years, was completed in 2018. In 2019, the Kaplan Center won the American Institute of Architects Chicago Chapter' s highest architectural design award.


title: Illinois Institute of Technology

text: Illinois Institute of Technology has four campuses in the Chicago area. A portion of the 120-acre Main Campus, identified as the Illinois Institute of Technology Academic Campus, was entered onto the National Register of Historic Places in 2005. The complete 120-acre campus, also known as the Mies Campus, was designed by Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, universally considered one of the 20th century's most influential architects and the director of the architecture program at Illinois Tech from 1938 to 1958. In 1976, the American Institute of Architects recognized the Illinois Tech main campus, centered at 33rd and State Streets in Chicago, as one of the 200 most significant works of architecture in the United States. S. R. Crown Hall, home of Illinois Tech's College of Architecture, was named a National Historic Landmark in 2001.


title: Illinois Institute of Technology

text: The Illinois Institute of Technology Academic Campus undertook a series of projects with Peter Lindsay Schaudt Landscape Architecture, Inc. (now Hoerr Schaudt) in 2000 to revitalize the historic campus. Keeping in spirit with the original design of landscape architect Alfred Caldwell (1903–1998) who worked closely with van der Rohe, the landscape architects at Peter Lindsay Schaudt played upon his concept of horizontality and favored a native plant palette. The projects created cohesive formal and informal spaces for students and faculty to relax and gather that honor the connection between the original architecture and landscape architecture. The projects included State Street Boulevard, Crown Hall, Federal Street, State Street Village, a planting restoration for Crown Hall, the IITRI Tower Renovation, and the IIT Research Park. Upon their completion in 2005, the firm Peter Lindsay Schaudt submitted the projects as a single entry for the National ASLA design competition, winning the General Design Award of Honor.


title: Illinois Institute of Technology

text: The 10-story Downtown Campus at 565 West Adams Street, designed by Gerald Horn of Holabird & Root and built by Illinois Tech in 1992, is home to Illinois Tech's Chicago-Kent College of Law and Institute of Design (ID), as well as the downtown campus for the Stuart School of Business. The Downtown Campus was renamed the Conviser Law Center in early 2020. The Institute of Design has re-located to the Ed Kaplan Family Institute for Innovation and Tech Entrepreneurship on the Mies Campus.


title: Illinois Institute of Technology

text: The 19-acre Daniel F. and Ada L. Rice Campus in west suburban Wheaton, designed by Solomon Cordwell Buenz & Associates, Inc. for Illinois Tech and dedicated in 1990, offers graduate programs, upper-level undergraduate courses, and continuing professional education.


title: Illinois Institute of Technology

text: The five-acre Moffett Campus in southwest suburban Bedford Park was designed in 1947 by Schmidt, Garden, and Erickson and was donated to Illinois Tech in 1988. It houses the Institute for Food Safety and Health (IFSH), which includes the National Center for Food Safety and Technology, a unique consortium of government, industry, and academic partners.


title: Illinois Institute of Technology

text: There are numerous student organizations available on campus, including religious groups, academic groups, and student activity groups.


title: Illinois Institute of Technology

text: Three of Illinois Tech's major student organizations serve the entire student body: the Student Government Association (SGA), the Student Union Board (UB), and "TechNews". SGA is the governing student body and acts as a liaison between university administration and the student body, serves as a forum to express student opinion, and provides certain services to student organizations such as official recognition and distribution of funds. Union Board serves as the main event programming group and plans more than 180 on- and off-campus events for students annually. Founded in 1938 UB is responsible for the emergence of the school spirit and booster group Scarlet Fever. "TechNews" is the campus paper and serves as a news outlet for campus interests and as another outlet for student opinion in both a weekly paper edition and online format; it has existed since at least the 1930s.


title: Illinois Institute of Technology

text: Illinois Tech hosts a campus radio station, WIIT, with a radio studio in The McCormick Tribune Campus Center. WIIT was originally an AM radio station through the 1960s, using the name WIIT Radio 64. It was simulcast on AM 640 and stereo FM 88.9 by the end of January 1972. The station was forced to change its callsign to WOUI in 1972 because WIIT was similar to WAIT (AM). After the WAIT callsign was dropped, the IIT station eventually returned to its original call letters, WIIT, on February 23, 2001.


title: Illinois Institute of Technology

text: In September 2007 the university opened a nine-hole disc golf course that weaves around the academic buildings on Mies Campus and is the first disc golf course to appear within the Chicago city limits.


title: Illinois Institute of Technology

text: In anticipation of the opening of The McCormick Tribune Campus Center, the on-campus pub and bowling alley known as "The Bog" ceased operations in 2003. However, in response to students, faculty, and staff who missed the former campus hangout, The Bog reopened in February 2007 and is now open every Thursday and Friday night offering bowling, billiards, table tennis, and video games. The Bog is also home to the campus bar, which serves beer and wine, and hosts weekly events such as comedians, live bands, or karaoke nights on its stage.


title: Illinois Institute of Technology

text: In fall 2007, the third generation of a cappella groups was formed, The TechTonics, a coed group of students. Within a year the organization expanded and now includes an all-male group, the Crown Joules, and an all-female group, the X-Chromotones. IIT A Cappella performs a variety of shows on campus as well as off campus and in the midwest. They perform shows at the end of each semester which showcase everything they have learned.


title: Illinois Institute of Technology

text: Illinois Institute of Technology Mies (Main) Campus has an established Greek System, which consists of seven Illinois Tech fraternities (and one VanderCook College of Music fraternity) and three sororities. Fraternities Pi Kappa Phi, Delta Tau Delta, Alpha Sigma Phi, Phi Kappa Sigma, Sigma Phi Epsilon and Triangle Fraternity and sororities Kappa Phi Delta, and Alpha Sigma Alpha have chapter houses on The Quad. The Omega Delta fraternity do not.


title: Illinois Institute of Technology

text: The Illinois Tech (IIT) athletic teams are called the Scarlet Hawks. The university is a member of the Division III level of the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA), primarily competing in the Northern Athletics Collegiate Conference (NACC) since the 2018–19 academic year; coinciding with the program's acceptance as a full NCAA Division III member. The Scarlet Hawks previously competed in the Division I level of the National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics (NAIA), primarily competing in the Chicagoland Collegiate Athletic Conference (CCAC) until after the 2012–13 season, as well as a member of the United States Collegiate Athletic Association (USCAA), until the athletic program completed the transition to NCAA Division III after the 2017–18 season (which competed during five seasons as an NCAA D-III Independent during its provisional member status from 2013–14 to 2017–18).


title: Illinois Institute of Technology

text: Illinois Tech competes in 19 intercollegiate varsity sports: Men's sports include baseball, basketball, cross country, lacrosse, soccer, swimming & diving, tennis, track & field (indoor and outdoor) and volleyball; while women's sports include basketball, cross country, lacrosse, soccer, swimming & diving, tennis, track & field (indoor and outdoor) and volleyball.


title: Illinois Institute of Technology

text: Illinois Tech discontinued its men's and women's basketball programs after the 2008–09 season, but re-instated them beginning with the 2012–13 season. The men's basketball team played in its first USCAA Division I Championship in March 2017. Although the team lost to Concordia Alabama, the Scarlet Hawks finished the season at 22–6. Illinois Tech also has a cricket team as a part of non-varsity sports level that competes in Division II of the Midwest Cricket Conference.


title: Gentiana

text: Gentiana is a genus of flowering plants belonging to the gentian family (Gentianaceae), the tribe Gentianeae, and the monophyletic subtribe Gentianinae. With about 400 species it is considered a large genus. They are notable for their mostly large, trumpet-shaped flowers, which are often of an intense blue.


title: Gentiana

text: The genus name is a tribute to Gentius, an Illyrian king who may have been the discoverer of tonic properties in gentians.


title: Gentiana

text: This is a cosmopolitan genus, occurring in alpine habitats in temperate regions of Asia, Europe and the Americas. Some species also occur in northwestern Africa, eastern Australia, and New Zealand. They are annual, biennial, and perennial plants. Some are evergreen, others are not.


title: Gentiana

text: Many gentians are difficult to grow outside their wild habitat, but several species are available in cultivation. Gentians are fully hardy and can grow in full sun or partial shade. They grow in well-drained, neutral-to-acid soils rich in humus. They are popular in rock gardens.


title: Gentiana

text: Many beverages are made with gentian root. "Gentiana lutea" is used to produce "gentian", a distilled beverage produced in the Alps and in the Auvergne. Some species are harvested for the manufacture of apéritifs, liqueurs, and tonics.


title: Gentiana

text: Gentian root is a common beverage flavouring for bitters. The soft drink Moxie contains gentian root. The French apéritif Suze is made with gentian. Americano apéritifs contain gentian root for bitter flavoring. It is an ingredient in the Italian liqueur Aperol. It is also used as the main flavor in the German after-dinner digestif called Underberg, and the main ingredient in Angostura bitters and Peychaud's Bitters.


title: Gentiana

text: The bitter principle of gentian root is primarily gentiopicrin (also called gentiopicroside), a glycoside. A 2007 paper by a Japanese group identified 23 compounds in fresh gentian root. Gentiopicrin was absent from fresh root, so it possibly develops during drying and storage of the root.


title: Gentiana

text: Gentian has had a limited use in perfumery, most notably as a glycerine soap (Crabtree & Evelyn) and a perfume (Corday's Possession, 1937).


title: Gentiana

text: Great yellow gentian ("Gentiana lutea") is used in herbal medicine for digestive problems, fever, hypertension, muscle spasms, parasitic worms, wounds, cancer, sinusitis, and malaria, although studies have shown minimal efficacy beyond that of a placebo with regard to the treatment of anxiety and ADHD in children. It has been studied and proven in effectively managing dyspepsia.


title: Gentiana

text: "Gentiana punctata" leaves and roots have been used in traditional Austrian medicine internally and externally as liqueur or tea for disorders of the gastrointestinal tract, skin, locomotor system, liver and bile, and for pediatric problems, fever, flu, rheumatism, and gout.


title: Gentiana

text: "Gentiana purpurea", "Gentiana punctata", and "Gentiana pannonica" are used to produce bitter schnapps, traditionally used as a digestive aid. In Ayurvedic medicine the endangered Indian gentian "Gentiana kurroo" has been used as a medical herb, but has been replaced with the Himalayan plant "Picrorhiza kurroa", Plantaginaceae or "Picrorhiza scrophulariiflora" (胡黃蓮 Hú Huáng Lián) from traditional Chinese medicine.


title: Gentiana

text: The gentian flower was used as the emblem of the Minamoto clan, one of the four great clans that dominated Japanese politics during the Heian period and went on to establish the first Shogunate in the aftermath of the Genpei War. It is the official flower of the German-speaking community of Belgium.


title: Gentiana

text: Gentians have oppositely arranged leaves, sometimes in a basal rosette. The trumpet-shaped flowers are usually deep blue or azure, but can be white, cream, yellow, or red. Many species are polymorphic with respect to flower color, bearing flowers of different colors. Blue-flowered species predominate in the Northern Hemisphere, with red-flowered species dominant in the Andes, where bird pollination is probably more often favored by natural selection. White-flowered species are scattered throughout the range of the genus but dominate in New Zealand. Most flowers are pentamerous, with five lobes in the corolla and five sepals. A few species have four to seven flower parts. The corolla has folds called plicae between the lobes. The style is short or absent. The ovary is mostly sessile and has nectary glands.


title: Gentiana

text: Several gentian species may be found in cultivation, and are valued for the unusual intensity of their blue flowers. They have a reputation for being difficult to grow. All require similar conditions – moist, rich, free-draining soil with an acid to neutral pH. They include:


title: Gentiana

text: In addition, the following cultivars, of mixed or uncertain parentage, have gained the Royal Horticultural Society’s Award of Garden Merit:


title: Alfonso VI of León and Castile

text: Alfonso VI (1 July 1109), nicknamed the Brave ("El Bravo") or the Valiant, was king of León (10651109), Galicia (10711109), and Castile (10721109).


title: Alfonso VI of León and Castile

text: After the conquest of Toledo in 1085, Alfonso proclaimed himself (most victorious king of Toledo, and of Hispania and Galicia). This conquest, along with El Cid's taking of Valencia would greatly expand the territory and influence of the Leonese/Castilian realm, but also provoked an Almoravid invasion that Alfonso would spend the remainder of his reign resisting. The Leonese and Castilian armies suffered defeats in battles at Sagrajas (1086) and Uclés (1108), in the latter of which his only son and heir, Sancho Alfónsez, died, and Valencia was abandoned but Toledo remained part of an expanded realm that he passed to his daughter.


title: Alfonso VI of León and Castile

text: The son of Ferdinand I, King of León and Count of Castile and his wife, Queen Sancha, Alfonso was a "Leonese "infante" [prince] with Navarrese and Castilian blood". His paternal grandparents were Sancho Garcés III, king of Pamplona and his wife Muniadona of Castile, and his maternal grandparents were Alfonso V of León (after whom he was probably named) and his first wife Elvira Menéndez.


title: Alfonso VI of León and Castile

text: The year of Alfonso's birth is not recorded in the medieval documentation. According to one of the authors of the "Anonymous Chronicle of Sahagún", who met the monarch and was present at his death, he died at age 62 after reigning 44 years. This indicates that he was born in the second half of 1047 or in the first half of 1048. Pelagius of Oviedo wrote that Alfonso was 79 when he died, but that would place his birth around 1030, before his parents' marriage.


title: Alfonso VI of León and Castile

text: According to the "Historia silense", the eldest child of Ferdinand I and Sancha, a daughter called Urraca, was born when her parents were still Count and Countess of Castile, so her birth could be placed in 1033–34. The second child and eldest son, Sancho, must have been born in the second half of 1038 or in 1039. The third child and second daughter, Elvira, may have been born in 1039–40, followed by Alfonso in 1040–41, and finally the youngest of the siblings, García, sometime between 1041 and 24 April 1043, the date on which King Ferdinand I, in a donation to the Abbey of San Andrés de Espinareda, mentions his five children. All of them except Elvira signed a document in the monastery of San Juan Bautista de Corias on 26 April 1046.


title: Alfonso VI of León and Castile

text: All the children of King Ferdinand I, according to the "Historia silense", were educated in the liberal arts, and the sons were also trained in arms, the "art of running horses in the Spanish usage", and hunting. The cleric Raimundo was in charge of Alfonso's early education. Once king, Alfonso appointed him Bishop of Palencia and referred to him as "magistro nostro, viro nobile et Deum timenti" ("our master, a noble man who fears God"). Alfonso probably spent long periods in Tierra de Campos, where, along with Pedro Ansúrez, the son of Ansur Díaz and nephew of Count Gómez Díaz de Saldaña (both members of the Banu Gómez lineage), he learned the art of war and what was expected of a knight.


title: Alfonso VI of León and Castile

text: As the second son of the king of León and Count of Castile, Alfonso would not have been entitled to inherit the throne. At the end of 1063, probably on 22 December, taking advantage of the fact that numerous magnates had gathered in León, capital of the kingdom, for the consecration of the Basílica of San Isidoro, Ferdinand I summoned a "Curia Regia" to make known his testamentary dispositions, under which he decided to distribute his patrimony among his children, a distribution that would not become effective until the death of the monarch in order to prevent any disputes arising after his death:


title: Alfonso VI of León and Castile

text: The historian Alfonso Sánchez Candeira suggests that the reasons leading King Ferdinand I to divide the kingdom (with Alfonso VI inheriting the royal title) are unknown, but the distribution was probably made because the king considered it proper that each son should inherit the region where he had been educated and spent his early years.


title: Alfonso VI of León and Castile

text: After his coronation in the city of León in January 1066, Alfonso VI had to confront the expansionist desires (although Alfonso would prove himself as having the same or more so) of his brother Sancho II, who, as the eldest son, considered himself the sole legitimate heir of all the kingdoms of their father. The conflicts began after the death of their mother Queen Sancha on 7 November 1067, leading to seven years of war among the three brothers. The first skirmish was the Battle of Llantada, a trial by ordeal in which both brothers agreed that the one who was victorious would obtain the kingdom of the defeated brother. Although Sancho II was the winner, Alfonso VI did not comply with the agreement; even so, relations between them remained cordial as evidenced by the fact that Alfonso was present at the wedding of Sancho II to an English noblewoman named Alberta on 26 May 1069. This was the same event where both decided to join forces to divide between themselves the Kingdom of Galicia that had been assigned to their younger brother García II. In the wake of the fratricidal war waged between the successors of al-Muzaffar, ruler of the taifa of Badajoz, upon the latter's death in 1068, Alfonso managed to exploit the situation in order to extract economic profit, even though the taifa nominally fell under García's sphere of influence.


title: Alfonso VI of León and Castile

text: With the complicity of Alfonso VI, Sancho II invaded Galicia in 1071, defeating their brother García II who was arrested in Santarém and imprisoned in Burgos until he was exiled to the Taifa of Seville, then under the rule of Al-Mu'tamid ibn Abbad. After eliminating their brother, Alfonso VI and Sancho II titled themselves kings of Galicia and signed a truce.


title: Alfonso VI of León and Castile

text: The truce was broken with the Battle of Golpejera on 12 January 1072. Although Sancho II's troops were victorious, he decided not to persecute his brother Alfonso, who was imprisoned in Burgos and later transferred to the monastery of Sahagún, where his head was shaved and he was forced to wear a chasuble. Thanks to the intercession of their sister Urraca, Sancho and Alfonso reached an agreement under which Alfonso VI was able to take refuge in the Taifa of Toledo under the protection of his vassal Al-Mamun, accompanied by his childhood friend, the faithful Pedro Ansúrez and his two brothers Gonzalo and Fernando.


title: Alfonso VI of León and Castile

text: Alfonso VI, from his exile in Toledo, obtained the support of the Leonese nobility and his sister Urraca, who remained strong in the city of Zamora, a lordship that Ferdinand I had granted her previously. When Urraca refused to exchange Zamora for other cities that Sancho had offered her in an effort to control the fortress of Zamora, "key to the future expansion south of the Duero", Sancho besieged the city. However, during the siege, Sancho II was murdered. According to tradition, during the siege a nobleman named Vellido Dolfos appeared before the king, claiming to have changed his loyalty from Urraca to Sancho. Under the pretense of showing him the weak parts of the city's walls, Dolfos separated the king from his guard and killed him with a spear. Although there is no clear evidence that Sancho II's death was due to treason rather than deceit, since Dolfos was Sancho II's enemy, his murder occurred in a warlike attack during the siege, not near the city walls, but rather in a nearby forest where Dolfos lured the Castilian king away from his armed protection. The violent death of Sancho II, who had no descendants, allowed Alfonso VI to reclaim his throne as well as Sancho's and Garcia's original inheritances of Castile and Galicia, respectively.


title: Alfonso VI of León and Castile

text: Although Rodrigo Díaz de Vivar (El Cid), the standard-bearer and confidant of King Sancho II, was present at the siege of Zamora, the role he played in this event is not known. Neither can Sancho II's death be blamed on Alfonso VI, who, when his brother was killed, was in exile far from the events. However, this did nothing to prevent speculation that Alfonso was somehow involved in Sancho's murder; despite a paucity of evidence, "minstrels and ballads filled this void with beautiful literary creations devoid of any historical reality".


title: Alfonso VI of León and Castile

text: The lingering suspicion over this event would later become part of the "Leyenda de Cardeña", a set of legendary narrative materials concerning El Cid which began to develop in the 13th century.


title: Alfonso VI of León and Castile

text: According to legend, Alfonso VI was forced by El Cid to take an oath denying that he had been involved in his brother's death, thus giving rise to mutual distrust between the two men, despite Alfonso VI's efforts at rapprochement by offering his kinswoman Jimena Díaz to El Cid in marriage as well as the immunity of his patrimony. These events and their consequences would eventually come to be considered historical by many later chroniclers and historians; however, most modern historians deny that such an event ever took place.


title: Alfonso VI of León and Castile

text: Thanks to Sancho II's death, García II could regain his own throne of Galicia; however, the following year, on 13 February 1073, Alfonso summoned García to a meeting, whereupon he imprisoned his younger brother. Garcia was held at the castle of Luna for seventeen years, where he eventually died on 22 March 1090. With his two brothers out of the way, Alfonso VI was able to secure the loyalty of both the high clergy and the nobility of his territories with ease; to confirm this, he spent the next two years visiting them.


title: Alfonso VI of León and Castile

text: Now established on the Leonese throne, and with the title of "Emperor", a relic of the Gothic tradition, Alfonso VI spent the following fourteen years of his reign expanding his territories through conquests such as that of Uclés and the lands of the Banu Di-l-Nun family. In 1072 he entitled himself "rex Spanie".


title: Alfonso VI of León and Castile

text: In 1074, in alliance with Al-Mamun, ruler of the Taifa of Toledo, Alfonso waged an offensive against the Zirid ruler of the Taifa of Granada, Abd Allâh, taking the strategic fortress of Alcalá la Real.


title: Alfonso VI of León and Castile

text: Following the assassination of Sancho IV of Navarre in 1076, leaving only minor sons, the local Navarrese nobility divided over the succession to the Navareese crown. Alfonso VI had immediately taken possession of Calahorra and Najera, and also received the support of the nobility of Vizcaya-Álava and La Rioja, while the eastern nobility supported Sancho Ramírez of Aragon, who moved into the remainder of the kingdom. After the two kings reached an accord, Sancho Ramírez was recognized as king of Navarre and Alfonso VI annexed the territories of Álava, Vizcaya, part of Guipúzcoa and La Bureba, adopting in 1077 the title of "Imperator totius Hispaniae" ("Emperor of all Spain").


title: Alfonso VI of León and Castile

text: His great territorial expansion came at the expense of the Taifa Muslim kingdoms. Alfonso VI continued their economic exploitation by means of the system of "parias", and succeeded in subduing most of the Taifa kingdoms as his tributaries, enforced by the threat of military intervention. In 1074, he probably recovered payment of the "parias" of Toledo, and the same year, helped by troops of that city, he cut down trees on the lands of the Taifa of Granada, which consequently also began to pay him taxes. In 1076, the Emir of Zaragoza, who wished to seize Valencia without being disturbed by Alfonso VI, agreed to resume payment of the "parias". In 1079, he conquered Coria.


title: Alfonso VI of León and Castile

text: One of the initiatives of these years, known as the "Treason of Rueda", ended in failure. It took place in 1083 in the castle of Rueda de Jalón, when Alfonso VI received news that the governor of that stronghold, which belonged to the Taifa of Zaragoza, intended to surrender it to the Leonese king. The king's troops were ambushed when they entered the castle and several of the most important magnates of the kingdom were killed.


title: Alfonso VI of León and Castile

text: In 1074, Alfonso VI's vassal and friend Al-Mamun, king of the Taifa of Toledo died of poisoning in Córdoba, and was succeeded by his grandson Al-Qádir, who asked for help from the Leonese monarch to end an uprising against him. Alfonso VI took advantage of this request to besiege Toledo, which finally fell on 25 May 1085. After losing his throne, Al-Qádir was sent by Alfonso VI as king of the Taifa of Valencia under the protection of Álvar Fáñez. To facilitate this operation and to recover payment of the "parias" owed by the city, which had failed to pay him since the previous year, Alfonso VI besieged Zaragoza in the spring of 1086. In early March, Valencia accepted the rule of Al-Qádir; Xàtiva resisted requesting the aid of the rulers of Tortosa and Lérida until he was forced to do so. Their raid of the region failed, and they withdrew under harassment by the troops of Fáñez.


title: Alfonso VI of León and Castile

text: After this important conquest, Alfonso VI was entitled "al-Imbraţūr dhī-l-Millatayn" ("Emperor of the Two Religions") and as a gesture to the important Muslim population of the city, he promised them, in addition to respecting their properties, the right to use the main Mosque for their religious activities. This decision was later revoked by the newly appointed Archbishop of Toledo, Bernard of Sédirac, who took advantage of the king's absence from Toledo and with the support of Queen Constance of Burgundy.


title: Alfonso VI of León and Castile

text: The occupation of Toledo—which allowed Alfonso VI to incorporate the title of King of Toledo with those he already used ()—led to the taking of cities such as Talavera and fortresses including the castle of Aledo. He also occupied Mayrit (now Madrid) in 1085 without resistance, probably by capitulation. The incorporation of the territory situated between the Sistema Central and the Tajo river would serve as the base of operations for the Kingdom of León, from where he could launch more attacks against the Taifas of Cordoba, Seville, Badajoz and Granada.


title: Alfonso VI of León and Castile

text: The conquest of the extensive and strategic Taifa of Toledo, the control of Valencia and the possession of Aledo, which isolated Murcia from the rest of Al-Andalus, worried the Muslim sovereigns of the Iberian Peninsula. The military and economic pressure on the Taifa kingdoms led the rulers of the Taifas of Seville, Granada, Badajoz, and Almeria to seek help from Yusuf ibn Tashfin, the Almoravid Emir who ruled the Maghreb. At the end of July 1086, Almoravid troops crossed the Strait of Gibraltar and landed in Algeciras.


title: Alfonso VI of León and Castile

text: In Seville, the Almoravid army joined the troops of the Taifa kingdoms, and together they marched to Extremadura. There, on 23 October 1086, they faced the troops of Alfonso VI (who had to abandon the siege of Zaragoza) in the Battle of Sagrajas. Álvar Fáñez, who had been called from Valencia, came and joined the king's forces. The battle ended with the defeat of the Christian troops, who returned to Toledo to defend themselves. The Emir, however, did not take advantage of the victory since he had to rush back to Africa because of the death of his son. The defeat marked the beginning of a new era in the Iberian Peninsula that lasted about three decades, in which the military initiative was taken by the Almoravids and Alfonso VI had to remain on the defensive. Nevertheless, he was able to retain Toledo, the main target of the Almoravid attacks.


title: Alfonso VI of León and Castile

text: Alfonso VI asked the Christian kingdoms of Europe to organize a Crusade against the Almoravids, who had recovered almost all the territories he had conquered, with the exception of Toledo, where the king remained strong. To reinforce his position, he reconciled with El Cid, who came to Toledo in late 1086 or early 1087. As a consequence of the serious defeat, the Andalusian taifas stopped paying the "parias". The Cid, however, succeeded in re-subjugating the rebel Taifas over next two years.


title: Alfonso VI of León and Castile

text: Even though the crusade did not finally materialize, a large number of foreign knights came to the Iberian Peninsula. They included Raymond and Henry of Burgundy, who married Alfonso VI's daughters Urraca (1090) and Teresa (1094), respectively, which led to the establishment of the Anscarid and Capetian dynasties in the peninsular kingdoms. Some of the crusaders unsuccessfully besieged Tudela in the winter of 1087, before withdrawing. That same year, the king crushed a revolt in Galicia aimed at releasing his brother García II.


title: Alfonso VI of León and Castile

text: In 1088 Yusuf ibn Tashfin crossed the Strait of Gibraltar for the second time, but was defeated at the siege of Aledo and suffered the desertion of many of the rulers of the taifas. When the emir came again to the peninsula, he decided to depose all the taifa rulers and became the sole king of the entire Al-Andalus territory. Thanks to the Muslim defeat in Aledo, Alfonso VI had been able to resume the collection of the "parias" by threatening the ruler of the city that he would chop all the trees in the territory of Granada and then went to Seville to subjugate the city again. Abdallah ibn Buluggin of Granada had distanced himself definitively from Yusuf ibn Tashfin and Alfonso VI promised to help him in exchange for his submission.


title: Alfonso VI of León and Castile

text: In June 1090, the Almoravids launched a third attack, deposed the king of Granada, defeated the governor of Córdoba, and after the Battle of Almodóvar del Río, entered Seville and sent King al-Mutamid into exile. In the second half of the year, all the southern taifas had been conquered by the Almoravids and Alfonso was not able to fulfill his promise to help the king of Seville. The king suffered setbacks on all fronts: in the east he failed to seize Tortosa due to the late arrival of the Genoese fleet that was to take part in its capture; further south, Al-Qádir was deposed in a revolt; in the south, his relation with Zaida, daughter-in-law of the king of Seville failed to enhance his image as the champion of the Muslims of the peninsula against the Almoravids; and, finally, in the west, the alliance with the king of Badajoz did not stop the North Africans from conquering this territory. As the price for this alliance, Alfonso VI had obtained Lisbon, Sintra, and Santarém, but lost them in November 1094 when his son-in-law Raymond of Burgundy, responsible for defending these cities, was defeated by the Almoravid army that had taken Badajoz shortly before. The only good news for Alfonso VI was the recovery of Valencia in June by El Cid, who had defeated the Almoravid army that had advanced against him in the Battle of Cuarte on 21 October. This victory set the eastern border for about a decade.


title: Alfonso VI of León and Castile

text: According to some historians, Alfonso VI later defeated a conspiracy of his sons-in-law Raymond and Henry who had plotted to divide the kingdom at his death. To turn them against each other, he gave Henry and Teresa the government of the County of Portugal, until then ruled by Raymond, which comprised the lands from the Minho river to Santarém, while the government of Raymond was limited to Galicia. Other scholars however have demonstrated that the pact could not have been made before 1103, several years after the two counts had been granted their respective title, suggesting instead that Henry's appointment was made in response to the military defeat of 1094.


title: Alfonso VI of León and Castile

text: In 1097, there was a fourth Almoravid invasion. Alfonso received the news when he was on his way to Zaragoza to assist his vassal Al-Mustain II in his confrontation with King Peter I of Aragon and Navarre. Once again, the Almoravid objective was Toledo, and they defeated the Christian forces at the Battle of Consuegra on 15 August, thus confirming the decline of the reign of Alfonso VI that had begun in 1086 with the defeat at Sagrajas.


title: Alfonso VI of León and Castile

text: In 1099, the Almoravids conquered a large number of the castles that defended Toledo and the surrounding areas and, in the following year, they tried unsuccessfully to seize the city. Henry of Burgundy, Alfonso's son-in-law, was in charge of defending Toledo since the king, at that time, was in Valencia inspecting its defenses. El Cid had died the previous year and his widow, Jimena, was governing the city.


title: Alfonso VI of León and Castile

text: In 1102, Alfonso VI sent troops to help Valencia against the Almoravid threat. The battle took place in Cullera and ended without a clear winner, although Valencia fell into Almoravid hands regardless because Alfonso decided it was too expensive to defend. Alfonso VI supervised the evacuation of Valencia in March and April and set fire to it before leaving; in May, the Almoravids took possession of the remains. The same year, he undertook the repopulation of Salamanca, which protected Coria, and Ávila, which defended the mountain pass that was more accessible from Guadarrama, trying to prepare for an eventual loss of Toledo. To protect the area from the east, in 1104 he besieged and conquered Medinaceli, a key location from which the region of Toledo could be attacked from the east along the valley of the Jalón River. In 1104, 1105, and 1106, the king made several incursions into Andalusian territory, reaching Málaga in 1106, and returned with many Mozarabs, who settled in his kingdom.


title: Alfonso VI of León and Castile

text: In 1108 the troops of the Almoravid Tamim, governor of Córdoba and son of Yusuf ibn Tashfin, attacked Christian territories, but this time the chosen city was not Toledo but Uclés. Alfonso VI was in Sahagún, recently married, elderly and with an old wound that prevented him from riding. Álvar Fáñez, governor of the lands of the Banu Di-l-Nun, was the commander of the army. He was accompanied by Sancho Alfónsez, the king's only son and heir. The armies clashed in the Battle of Uclés on 29 May 1108 and the Christian troops suffered another defeat. The young Sancho Alfónsez, heir to the throne, was killed in battle. As a consequence, the "reconquista" came to a 30-year standstill, and the County of Portugal eventually became an independent kingdom. The military situation was also serious since the Almoravids almost immediately seized the entire defensive border of the Tagus valley from Aranjuez to Zorita and there were uprisings of the Muslim population in this region.


title: Alfonso VI of León and Castile

text: Alfonso VI, already old, had to deal with the problem of his succession. Berta had died without giving him an heir at the end of 1099; shortly after, Alfonso married Isabel who gave him two daughters, but no sons. To further complicate the situation, in March 1105 his grandson Alfonso Raimúndez, son of Urraca and Raymond of Burgundy, was born, a possible contender to the throne in detriment to Sancho Alfónsez, the king's son with Zaida. Montenegro thinks that Alfonso VI legitimized Sancho probably coinciding with the meeting of a council in Carrión de los Condes in January 1103 because from that date onwards, Sancho began to confirm royal charters before his brothers-in-law Raymond and Henry of Burgundy. In May 1107, Alfonso imposed the recognition of Sancho as heir, despite the probable opposition of his daughters and sons-in-law, in the course of a "Curia Regia" held in León. The situation improved for the king with the death of Raymond of Burgundy in September and the agreement with Urraca so that she remained as sovereign Lady of Galicia, except in the case of remarrying since, in that case, Galicia would pass to her son.


title: Alfonso VI of León and Castile

text: The death of Sancho in the Battle of Uclés on 29 May 1108 left Alfonso VI without his only male heir. He then chose his eldest legitimate daughter Urraca as his successor, but decided to marry her to his rival and famous warrior King Alfonso I of Aragon and Navarre in the fall of 1108. Although the marriage was celebrated at the end of the following year, it did not lead to the expected stability, but to a long civil war that lasted eight years.


title: Alfonso VI of León and Castile

text: Alfonso VI died in Toledo on 1 July 1109. The king had come to the city to try to defend it from an imminent Almoravid attack. His body was taken to the locality of Sahagún, and was buried in the Royal Monastery of San Benito, thus fulfilling the wishes of the monarch. The mortal remains of the king were deposited in a stone sepulcher, which was placed at the feet of the church of the Royal Monastery, until the reign of Sancho IV, who deemed it unseemly that his ancestor was buried at the foot of the temple and ordered the tomb to be moved inside and placed in the church's transept, near the tomb of Beatriz, Dowager Lady of Los Cameros and daughter of Infante Frederick of Castile who had been executed by orders of his brother, King Alfonso X the Wise in 1277.


title: Alfonso VI of León and Castile

text: The sepulcher that contained the remains of the king, now disappeared, was supported on alabaster lions, and was a large ark of white marble, eight feet long and four wide and tall, being covered by a smooth black lid. The tomb was usually covered by a silk tapestry, woven in Flanders, bearing the image of the king crowned and armed, with the representation of the arms of Castile and León on the sides, and a crucifix at the head of the tomb.


title: Alfonso VI of León and Castile

text: The tomb that contained the remains of Alfonso VI was destroyed in 1810, during the fire at the Royal Monastery of San Benito. The mortal remains of the king and those of several of his wives were collected and preserved in the abbey chamber until 1821, when the monks were expelled, and were then deposited by the abbot Ramón Alegrías in a box, which was placed in the southern wall of the chapel of the Crucifix until January 1835, when the remains were collected again and placed in another box and taken to the archive where the remains of the wives of the sovereign were at that time. The purpose was to place all the royal remains in a new sanctuary that was being built at that time. However, when the Royal Monastery of San Benito was dissolved in 1835, the monks delivered the two boxes with the royal remains to a relative of one of them, who kept it hidden until 1902, when these were discovered by Rodrigo Fernández Núñez, a professor at the Institute of Zamora Rodrigo.


title: Alfonso VI of León and Castile

text: The mortal remains of Alfonso VI are now in the Monastery of the Benedictine nuns of Sahagún, at the foot of the temple, in a smooth stone ark and with a cover of modern marble, and in a nearby sepulcher, equally smooth, lies the remains of several of the king's wives.


title: Alfonso VI of León and Castile

text: According to Bishop Pelagius of Oviedo, contemporary of the king, in his "Chronicon regum Legionensium" ("Chronicle of the Kings of León"), Alfonso VI had five wives and two concubines "nobilissimas" (most noble). The wives were, according to the bishop, Agnes, Constance, Berta, Isabel, and Beatrice and the concubines Jimena Muñoz and Zaida. Some chroniclers from north of the Pyrenees report an earlier espousal, to a daughter of William the Conqueror, King of England and Duke of Normandy named Agatha.


title: Alfonso VI of León and Castile

text: Several northern sources report that Alfonso was affianced to Agatha, the daughter of William the Conqueror, King of England and Duke of Normandy, an arrangement negotiated in 1067. She is said to have been sent to Iberia, but to have died before the marriage could take place. There is scholarly dispute over whether Alfonso was the Iberian king involved, and if so, whether the daughter of William involved was Agatha or a different daughter, Adelaide.


title: Alfonso VI of León and Castile

text: In 1069, the betrothal with Agnes, daughter of Duke William VIII of Aquitaine, was signed. At the time, she was barely 10 years old and so it was necessary to wait until she reached age 14 for the official wedding, which took place in late 1073 or early 1074. She appears in royal diplomas until 22 May 1077; from that date, the king appears alone in the documentation.


title: Alfonso VI of León and Castile

text: Agnes is said to have died on 6 June 1078, On the other hand, Orderic Vitalis, an English chronicler of the 12th century, said that the marriage of Agnes and Alfonso VI had been annulled in 1080 for reasons of consanguinity, and that Agnes was remarried in 1109 to Count Elias I of Maine.