Independent Student Newspaper for the University of Texas at San Antonio
UTSA President Romo will deliver the annual State of the University Address, Tuesday Oct. 6, at 3 p.m. in the H-E-B Univeristy Center Ballroom.
Texas
Since 2014, the number of people killed on the job in Texas increased from 508 to 524, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. The Lone Star State has led the nation in workplace fatalities in 11 of the past 14 years.
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Volume 52
Issue 7
September 29 - October 6, 2015
Medical marijuana soon to take root in the Lone Star State Andrea Velgis Staff Writer
@ThePaisano news@paisano-online.com The recent legalization of marijuana in states like Colorado has paved the way toward legalization in other states. The Texas Compassionate Use Act was signed into law at the beginning of September and allows for patients with intractable epilepsy to use medical marijuana (only in the form of Cannabidiol)
to help ease their symptoms. A prescription will be available to Texas residents who suffer from seizures too strong for other medication. If a patient meets the requirements, a physician may prescribe them lowTHC cannabis oil to control his or her seizures. If necessary, the prescription would also allow the patient to receive Cannabidiol from a licensed marijuana establishment. A restriction to this law is that a caregiver may not legally receive the Can-
nabidiol for the purpose of delivering it to the patient. Also, patients cannot grow their own medical marijuana; they must receive it from a state regulated dispensing organization. “The problem is…it’s still in the investigational stage, but there are at least reputable facilities like hospitals and universities doing research to see if this works,” said Dr. Susan Dalterio, UTSA professor of Drugs in Society. “Unfortunately, most of the people that are on TV are only pointing at
cases, and that’s anecdotal evidence.” “It might help some people, but right now there is no way to know which people might be helped and which people might be harmed,” Dalterio said. “It’s not FDA approved, but it is in research phase.” Dalterio further expresses her hesitation on the drug. “Cannabidiol is not psychoactive, but that doesn’t mean it’s totally safe; it’s certainly safer than the THC which is the psychoactive part of the marijuana
U.S.
Michelle Obama announced a new campaign to highlight education and the 62 million girls around the world who are not attending school. The first lady asks supporters to post pictures of themselves with a message about what they learned in school along withthe hashtag #62MillionGirls
World
Mark Zuckerberg has announced that his company, Facebook, will work with the United Nations to help bring internet access to refugee camps.
Science
Photos from NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter portray dark streaks flowing down Martian craters. Scientists suspsect they are formed by water. The water could be monumental for future exploration; astronauts might use it for drinking water or rocket fuel depending on how much there is.
Health Many households may use pest control products to eradicate insects, but the consequences are detrimental to households with children. A recent study conducted by Chensheng Lu, an associate professor of environmental exposure to biology at the Harvard T. H. Chan School of Public Health, states that leukemia is increased by 47 percent and lymphomas by 43 percent when pest control products are used.
Fabian DeSoto, Paisano
plant. In any kind of drug discussion, whether it be drugs like this or any kind of drug, pharmaceutical drug or therapeutic drug, you have to look at the benefit to risk.” Despite its many restrictions, this law does not require a patient to be 18 years of age. A physician may prescribe to a minor if the benefits of using cannabis outweigh the risks. This law is different than laws of other states addressing marijuana. In other states, doctors are allowed to recommend marijuana therapy, or certify that a person is eligible. However, in Texas, doctors are now able to prescribe the drug directly to the patient. Fourteen other states have already passed laws similar to this. “In the case of marijuana, the benefit hasn’t been clearly established from FDA point of view, except for those few drugs, like Marinol, that are available for prescription because they’re FDA approved,” added Dalterio. Government officials have stressed that the oil will be strictly supervised and is in no way a step toward legal recreational marijuana.
Like it or not, new feature coming to Facebook Quentin Hemphill Staff Writer
@QuentinHemphill news@paisano-online.com For years, Facebook has resisted creating a dislike button, fearing it might create a more negative environment on the social networking site. However, it seems that attitudes at the tech company have changed and buttons that allow users to show more emotions than liking are in the works. According to USA Today, founder and chief executive Mark Zuckerberg made the announcement during a Q&A session streamed live online. He explained that Facebook is close to creating a new button feature, but it probably will not be a “dislike” button. The new feature may be a button that allows Facebook users to show compassion and understanding for others in times of despair, for instance, a person posting a status regarding a death in their family. “It’s important to give people more options than just ‘like’ to help express empathy and sympathy,” Zuckerberg said. “Not every moment is a good moment.” This new feature will not only allow Facebook users to illustrate different feelings about specific statuses, photos and comments, but will also prevent the negative atmosphere a dislike button may create. The popular social network encourages positive interactions among its billions of users, and a feature allowing people to dislike certain statuses and photos could lead to bullying and other harmful exchanges.Last December
“It’s important to give people more options than just ‘ like’ to help express empathy and sympathy.” Mark Zuckerberg Founder, CEO of Facebook
during another Q&A gathering, Zuckerberg stated that some people only want a dislike button so that they can express their disdain for another person’s post, regardless of the content. “Some people have asked for a dislike button because they want to say, ‘That thing isn’t good.’ And that’s not something that we think is good for the world. So we’re not going to build that,” Zuckerberg explained last December. Facebook would like to avoid petty conflicts between its users. An example of this could be a user posting a picture of their college acceptance letter on the news feed, and then another person dislikes it for whatever reason. Perhaps Zuckerberg hopes to prevent the negativity portrayed in YouTube’s comment section, and he wants to take preventative measures. No announcement has been made regarding the launch date of Facebook’s new button features. Social media observers believe that new additions to the site will increase the site’s popularity, a good thing for Facebook since many young adults have been migrating to other social networks
Cindy Hurtado, Paisano
UTSA collaborates with Rackspace to create OpenStack Anelia Gomez-Cordova Staff Writer @AneGomez94 news@paisano-online.com The OpenStack Innovation Center, a collaboration between Rackspace, Intel and UTSA was inaugurated earlier this month at Rackspace’s headquarters. OpenStack, an opensource software that functions as an operating system for the cloud (just like Windows does for the PC), is the product of an earlier collaboration between Rackspace and NASA. The new OpenStack Innovation Center will allow for further development
of the software. At work will be a group of software developers and engineers, both from Rackspace and Intel. As OpenStack and its acceptance grew worldwide, Intel decided they wanted to be involved in the software’s development. The fact that Intel is a chip manufacturer is key because that could mean future chips will be optimized to work with OpenStack software. There are a couple of proprietary systems out there (like Amazon’s) that run their own clouds. OpenStack’s differentiating factor is that it is free and open to everybody. This allows multiple people to contribute their
own improvements, accelerating the growth and maturation of the software. “All of a sudden, instead of a company just having a few hundred people developing the software, you have thousands across the world working at it,” says Vice-President of Research at UTSA, Dr. Mauli Agrawal, “It’s great for innovation.” With the launch of the Open Cloud Institute last year, UTSA now has one of the largest open clouds in academia running on open software. Since OpenStack is the dominant open software running the cloud, it is only natural that they would look to UTSA for the See Open cloud ,page 3