document_title: List of people considered father or mother of a scientific field

question_text: who is considered to be the father of genetics

text: Natural sciences[edit]

text: Biology[edit]

text:
Field
Person/s
considered "father" or "mother"
Rationale

Bacteriology
Robert Koch / Ferdinand Cohn[4] / Louis Pasteur
First to produce precise, correct descriptions of bacteria.

Antonie van Leeuwenhoek[5]

Biogeography
Alfred Russel Wallace
"...Often described as the Father of Biogeography, Wallace shows the impact of human activity on the natural world."[6]

Biology[n 1]
Aristotle
[7]

Ecology
Carl Linnaeus / Ernst Haeckel / Eugenius Warming[8]
Linnaeus founded an early branch of ecology that he called The Economy of Nature (1772), Haeckel coined the term "ecology" (German: Oekologie, Ökologie) (1866), Warming authored the first book on plant ecology. Plantesamfund (1895).

Entomology
Jan Swammerdam
[9]

Johan Christian Fabricius[10]
Fabricius described and published information on over 10,000 insects and refined Linnaeus's system of classification.

William Kirby
[11]

Ethology
Nikolaas Tinbergen
Karl von Frisch
Konrad Lorenz
The modern discipline of ethology is generally considered to have begun during the 1930s with the work of Nikolaas Tinbergen, Konrad Lorenz and Karl von Frisch, joint awardees of the 1973 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine.[12]

Evolution
Natural selection

Charles Darwin[13][14][15]
On the Origin of Species (1859).

Genetics
Gregor Mendel
For his study of the inheritance of traits in pea plants, which forms the basis for Mendelian inheritance.[16]

William Bateson
Proponent of Mendelism.[17]

Ichthyology
Peter Artedi
"Far greater than either of these… was he who has been justly called the Father of Ichthyology, Petrus (Peter) Artedi (1705–35)."[18]

Lichenology
Erik Acharius
"Erik Acharius, the father of lichenology..."[19]

Microbiology
Antonie van Leeuwenhoek[20]
The first to microscopically observe micro-organisms in water and the first to see bacteria.

Molecular biology
Linus Pauling
[21]

Molecular biophysics
Gopalasamudram Narayana Iyer Ramachandran[22]
Founded the [world's first?] molecular biophysics unit (1970).

Paleontology
Leonardo da Vinci
George Cuvier
[23]

Parasitology
Francesco Redi
The founder of experimental biology and the first person to challenge the theory of spontaneous generation by demonstrating that maggots come from eggs of flies.[24]

Protozoology
Antonie van Leeuwenhoek[5]
First to produce precise, correct descriptions of protozoa.

Taxonomy
Carl Linnaeus[25]
Devised the system of naming living organisms that became universally accepted in the scientific world.

Virology
Dmitry Ivanovsky
Martinus Beijerinck
The first men to discover viruses (1892).

text: Chemistry[edit]

text:
Field
Person/s
considered "father" or "mother"
Rationale

Atomic theory (early)
Democritus[26]
Founder of atomism in cosmology.

Atomic theory (modern)
Father Roger Boscovich[27]
First coherent description of atomic theory.

John Dalton[28]
First scientific description of the atom as a building block for more complex structures.

Chemical thermodynamics (modern)
Gilbert Lewis / Willard Gibbs / Merle Randall / Edward Guggenheim[29]
Thermodynamics and the Free Energy of Chemical Substances (1923) and Modern Thermodynamics by the Methods of Willard Gibbs (1933), which made a major contribution to the use of thermodynamics in chemistry.

Chemistry (early)
Jabir ("Geber") ibn Hayyan (died 815)[30][31][32][33]
Introduced the experimental method to Islamic alchemy.

Chemistry (modern)
Antoine Lavoisier[34]
Elements of Chemistry (1787)

Robert Boyle[34]
The Sceptical Chymist (1661)

Jöns Berzelius[35][36]
Development of chemical nomenclature (1800s)

John Dalton[34]
Revival of atomic theory (1803)

Green chemistry
Paul Anastas[37]
Design and manufacture of chemicals that are non-hazardous and environmentally benign.

Nuclear chemistry
Otto Hahn[38]

Applied Radiochemistry (1936)
First person to split an atomic nucleus (nuclear fission, 1938)
Nobel Prize in Chemistry for this discovery (1944)

Periodic table
Dmitri Mendeleev[39]
Arranged the sixty-six elements known at the time in order of atomic weight by periodic intervals (1869).

Physical chemistry
Mikhail Lomonosov
The first to read lectures in physical chemistry and coin the term (1752).

Jacobus van 't Hoff
Jacobus van 't Hoff is considered to be one of the founders of the discipline of physical chemistry. His work helped found the discipline as it is today.[40][41][42]

Svante Arrhenius[43]
Devised much of the theoretical foundation for physical chemistry. On the Equilibrium of Heterogeneous Substances (1876), Thermodynamik chemischer Vorgange (1882).

Wilhelm Ostwald
"Wilhelm Ostwald is considered one of the founders of the discipline of physical chemistry..."[44]

Hermann von Helmholtz
[citation needed]

text: Earth sciences[edit]

text:
Field
Person/s
considered "father" or "mother"
Rationale

Geochemistry (modern)
Victor Goldschmidt
For developing the Goldschmidt classification of elements.

Geodesy (mathematical geography)
Eratosthenes
[45][46]

Geology (modern)

Father Nicholas Steno[47]
James Hutton[48]

For setting down most of the principles of modern geology.
For formulating uniformitarianism and the Plutonic theory.

Limnology (modern)
G. Evelyn Hutchinson
[49]

Mineralogy
Georgius Agricola
[50]

Meteorology
Naval oceanography (modern)

Matthew Fontaine Maury
[51]

Plate tectonics
Alfred Wegener
[citation needed]

Acoustical oceanography
Leonid Brekhovskikh
[52]

Stratigraphy
Father Nicholas Steno
[47]

Speleology
Édouard-Alfred Martel
Began the first systematic exploration of cave systems and promoted speleology as a field separate from geology.

text: Medicine and physiology[edit]

text:
Field
Person/s
considered "father" or "mother"
Rationale

Anatomy (modern)
Marcello Malpighi

Audiology
Raymond Carhart

"…the Father of Audiology himself, Raymond Carhart at Northwestern University…"[53]
"Carhart notch: A decrease in the bone-conduction hearing at the 2000 Hz region of patients with otosclerosis first reported by and therefore named after the father of audiology, Raymond Carhart."[54]

Biophysics
Hermann von Helmholtz

Biomechanics
Christian Wilhelm Braune
First to describe the methodology of human gait walking.

Bioelectromagnetics
Luigi Galvani
First to discover animal electricity through a series of experiments.

Cognitive therapy
Aaron T. Beck

"In developing ways to do this, Beck became the father of cognitive therapy, one of the most important developments in psychotherapy in the last 50 years."[55]
The Prospect of Immortality (1962)

Cryonics
Robert Ettinger
[56]

Dentistry (modern)
Pierre Fauchard
[57]

Electrophysiology
Emil du Bois-Reymond
The discoverer of nerve action potential.

Emergency medicine

Peter Safar[58][59]
Frank Pantridge

Safar pioneered CPR, intensive-care units and developed standards for EMT, ambulance design and equipment.
Pantridge: [60]

Epidemiology (modern)
John Snow

Fitness
Jack LaLanne
[61]

Gynaecology
J. Marion Sims
[62][63]

Histology
Marcello Malpighi

Human anatomy (modern)
Vesalius[64]
De humani corporis fabrica (1543)

Medical genetics
Victor McKusick[65]
Mendelian Inheritance in Man

Medicine (early)

Imhotep[66][67]
Charaka[68]

Wrote the first medical treatise, the Edwin Smith papyrus.
Wrote the Charaka Samhitā and founded the Ayurveda system of medicine.

Medicine (modern)
Hippocrates[7][69][70][71]
Sir William Osler

Prescribed professional practices for physicians through the Hippocratic Oath.

Neurosurgery
Harvey Cushing[72]
Developed techniques that considerably reduced the risks involved with brain surgery in the early 20th Century.[72]

Neuroscience
Santiago Ramón y Cajal
Comprehensive work on structure of the brain.

Nursing (modern)
Florence Nightingale
See Nursing#History.

Nutrition (modern)

Justus von Liebig
Antoine-Laurent Lavoisier

"Justus Von Liebig, the 'father of modern nutrition', developed the perfect infant food. It consisted of [...]"[73]
"In addition to being known as the Father of Modern Chemistry, Lavoisier is also considered the Father of Modern Nutrition, as the first to discover the metabolism that occurs inside the human body..."[74]

Organ transplantation
Thomas Starzl[75]
Performed the first human liver transplant and established the clinical utility of anti-rejection drugs including ciclosporin. Developed major advances in organ preservation, procurement and transplantation.

Orthopedic surgery (modern)
Hugh Owen Thomas[76]
He stressed the importance of rest in treatment and was responsible for many landmark contributions to orthopaedic surgery. He was especially celebrated for his design and use of splints; the famous Thomas knee splint was still in wide use at the end of World War II.

Orthomolecular medicine
Linus Pauling

Pathology (modern)
Rudolf Virchow
Founded modern Pathology and Social Medicine and published Die Cellularpathologie in ihrer Begründung auf physiologische und pathologische Gewebelehre which is regarded as the basis of modern medical science.

Psychology (experimental)
Wilhelm Wundt[77]
Founded the first laboratory for psychological research.

Pediatrics
Muhammad ibn Zakarīya Rāzi ("Rhazes")[78]
Wrote The Diseases of Children, the first book to deal with pediatrics as an independent field.

Physiology
Claude Bernard[79]
An Introduction to the Study of Experimental Medicine (1865)

Physical culture
Bernarr Macfadden
"It delighted the heart of our old friend Bernarr Macfadden, 'the Father of Physical Culture,' when we told him how much athletic activity and good sportsmanship had to do with the rehabilitation of boys."[80]

Plastic surgery

Sushruta[81][82]
Harold Gillies

Wrote the Sushruta Samhita.

Psychoanalysis
Sigmund Freud
[83]

Psychophysics
Gustav Fechner[84]
Elements of Psychophysics (1860)

Space medicine
Hubertus Strughold
"After Wernher von Braun, he was the top Nazi scientist employed by the American government, and he was subsequently hailed by NASA as the 'father of space medicine'"[85]

Surgery (early)
Sushruta[81][82]
Wrote the Sushruta Samhita.

Surgery (modern)

Abu al-Qasim ("Abulcasis") al-Zahrawi[86]
Guy de Chauliac[87]
Ambroise Paré
John Hunter
Joseph Lister
William Stewart Halsted
See also Father of modern surgery

Kitab al-Tasrif (1000 AD).
Chirurgia magna
Leader in surgical techniques, especially the treatment of wounds.[88]
Experimental, scientific approach to surgery.[89][90]
Use of carbolic acid as an antiseptic.[91][92]
Introduction of residency system in the United States.[93]

Toxicology
Paracelsus
[94]

text: Physics and astronomy[edit]

text:
Field
Person/s
considered "father" or "mother"
Rationale

Acoustics
Ernst Chladni[95]
For important research in vibrating plates

Atomic bomb
Enrico Fermi
J. Robert Oppenheimer
Leslie Groves
Edward Teller
For their role in the Manhattan Project

Aerodynamics
Nikolai Zhukovsky
George Cayley[96]
Zhukovsky was the first to undertake the study of airflow, was the first engineer scientist to explain mathematically the origin of aerodynamic lift. Cayley Investigated theoretical aspects of flight and experimented with flight a century before the first airplane was built

Physical cosmology
Albert Einstein (founder)
Henrietta Leavitt (mother)[97]
Edwin Hubble (father)[97]

Leavitt discovered Cepheid variables, the "Standard Candle" by which Hubble later determined galactic distances. Einstein's general theory of relativity is usually recognized as the theoretic foundation of modern cosmology.

Classical mechanics
Isaac Newton (founder)[98]
Described laws of motion and law of gravity in Philosophiae Naturalis Principia Mathematica (1687)

Electricity
William Gilbert[99]
Michael Faraday[100]
Book: De Magnete (1600)
Discovered electromagnetic induction (1831)

Electrodynamics
André-Marie Ampère[101]
Book: Memoir on the Mathematical Theory of Electrodynamic Phenomena, Uniquely Deduced from Experience (1827)

Energetics
Willard Gibbs[102]
Publication: On the Equilibrium of Heterogeneous Substances (1876)

Experimental physics (founder)
Ibn al-Haytham (Alhazen)[103][104]
For introducing experimental method into physics with his Book of Optics (1021)

Modern astronomy
Nicolaus Copernicus[105]
Developed the first explicit heliocentric model in De revolutionibus orbium coelestium (1543)

Modern physics
Galileo Galilei[106]
His development and extensive use of experimental physics, e.g. the telescope

Nuclear physics
Ernest Rutherford[107]
Developed the Rutherford atom model (1909)

Nuclear science
Marie Curie
Pierre Curie[108]

Optics
Ibn al-Haytham (Alhazen)[109]
Correctly explained vision and carried out the first experiments on light and optics in the Book of Optics (1021).

Plasma physics
Irving Langmuir
Hannes Alfvén[110]
Langmuir first described ionised gas as plasma and observed fundamental plasma vibrations, Langmuir waves.
Alfvén pioneered the theoretical description of plasma by developing magnetohydrodynamics.

Quantum mechanics
Max Planck (founder)[111]Werner Heisenberg
Stated that electromagnetic energy could be emitted only in quantized form

Relativity
Albert Einstein (founder)[112]
Pioneered special relativity (1905) and general relativity (1915)

Spaceflight (rocketry)
Robert Hutchings Goddard
Konstantin Tsiolkovsky
Hermann Oberth
Goddard launched the first liquid-fueled rocket.
Tsiolkovsky created the Tsiolkovsky rocket equation.

Thermodynamics
Sadi Carnot (founder)[113]
Publication: On the Motive Power of Fire and Machines Fitted to Develop that Power (1824)

text: Formal sciences[edit]

text: Mathematics[edit]

text:
Field
Person/s
considered "father" or "mother"
Rationale

Algebra
(see also The father of algebra)
Muhammad Al-Khwarizmi (Algorismi)[114] Brahmagupta[115]
Diophantus[116][117]
Full exposition of solving quadratic equations in his Al-Jabr and recognized algebra as an independent discipline.
First use of symbolism (syncopation) in his Arithmetica.

Algebraic topology
Henri Poincaré[118]
Published Analysis Situs in 1895,[119] introducing the concepts of homotopy and homology, which are now considered part of algebraic topology.

Analysis
Augustin-Louis Cauchy[120]
Karl Weierstrass[121]

Analytic geometry
René Descartes
Pierre de Fermat[122](founders)
For their independent invention of the Cartesian Coordinate System

Calculus
Isaac Newton[123]
Gottfried Leibniz
See Leibniz and Newton calculus controversy.

Classical analysis
Madhava of Sangamagrama[124]
Developed Taylor series expansions of trigonometric functions

Computer science
George Boole
Alan Turing
Rózsa Péter[125][126]
Invented Boolean logic, which is the basis of modern digital computer logic
Provided an influential formalisation of the concept of the algorithm and computation with the Turing machine.
Considered the "founding mother of recursion theory", which provided the mathematical groundwork for computational theory.

Descriptive geometry
Gaspard Monge[127]
(founder)
Developed a graphical protocol that creates three-dimensional virtual space on a two-dimensional plane

Fractal geometry
Benoît B. Mandelbrot

Geometry
Euclid[128]
Euclid's Elements deduced the principles of Euclidean geometry from a set of axioms.

Graph theory
Leonhard Euler[129]
See Seven Bridges of Königsberg

Italian school of algebraic geometry
Corrado Segre[130]
Publications and students developing algebraic geometry

Modern algebra
Emmy Noether[131]
Provided the first general definitions of a commutative ring, and suggested that topology be studied algebraically.[132] Combined the structure theory of associative algebras and the representation theory of groups into a single arithmetic theory of modules and ideals in rings satisfying ascending chain conditions.[133]

Non-Euclidean geometry
János Bolyai,
Nikolai Lobachevsky[134](founders)
Independent development of hyperbolic geometry in which Euclid's fifth postulate is not true

Number theory
Pythagoras[135]

Probability
Gerolamo Cardano, Pierre de Fermat, Blaise Pascal, Christiaan Huygens[136] (founders)
Fermat and Pascal co-founded probability theory, about which Huygens wrote the first book

Projective geometry
Girard Desargues[137](founder)
By generalizing the use of vanishing points to include the case when these are infinitely far away

Tensor calculus
Gregorio Ricci-Curbastro[138]
(founder)
Book: The Absolute Differential Calculus

Trigonometry
Hipparchus[139][140]
Constructed the first trigonometric table.

Vector algebra,
vector calculus
Willard Gibbs[141]
Oliver Heaviside[142]
(founders)
For their development and use of vectors in algebra and calculus

text: Systems theory[edit]

text:
Field
Person/s
considered "father" or "mother"
Rationale

Chaos theory
Henri Poincaré[143]
Mary Cartwright[144][145]
Edward Lorenz[146]
Poincaré's work on the three-body problem was the first discovered example of a chaotic dynamical system. Cartwright made the first mathematical analysis of dynamical systems with chaos. Lorenz introduced strange attractor notation.

Cybernetics
Norbert Wiener[147]
Book Cybernetics: Or the Control and Communication in the Animal and the Machine. 1948.

Dynamic programming
Richard E. Bellman

Fuzzy logic
Lotfi Asker Zadeh

Information theory
Claude Shannon[148]
Article: A Mathematical Theory of Communication (1948)

Optimal control
Arthur E. Bryson[149]
Book: Applied Optimal Control[150]

Robust control
George Zames[citation needed]
Small gain theorem and H infinity control.

Stability theory
Alexander Lyapunov[citation needed]
Lyapunov function

System dynamics
Jay Wright Forrester[151]
Book: Industrial dynamics (1961)

text: Social sciences[edit]

text:
Field
Person/s
considered "father" or "mother"
Rationale

Anthropology
Herodotus[152]
Abū Rayhān al-Bīrūnī[153][154]

Demography
Ibn Khaldun[155]
Muqaddimah (Prolegomena) (1377)

Egyptology
Father Athanasius Kircher[156]
Jean-François Champollion[citation needed]

First to identify the phoenetic importance of the hieroglyph, and he demonstrated Coptic as a vestige of early Egyptian, before the Rosetta stone's discovery.
Translated parts of the Rosetta Stone.

Historiography
Ibn Khaldun
Wrote several essential books

History
Herodotus (who also coined the term)

Indology
Abū Rayhān al-Bīrūnī[154]
Wrote the Indica

International law
Alberico Gentili
Francisco de Vitoria
Hugo Grotius
Influential contributions to the theory of international law, war and human rights

Linguistics (early)
Panini
Wrote the first descriptive grammar (of Sanskrit)

Linguistics (modern)
Ferdinand de Saussure
Noam Chomsky

Sociology
Ibn Khaldun[155][157]
Adam Ferguson[158]
Auguste Comte (who also coined the term)[159]
Marquis de Condorcet (founder)[160]
Wrote the first sociological book, the Muqaddimah (Prolegomena).
"Father of modern sociology"
Introduced the scientific method into sociology.

text: Economics[edit]

text:
Field
Person/s
considered "father" or "mother"
Rationale

Accounting and Bookkeeping
Luca Pacioli[161]
Establisher of accounting and the first person to publish a work on bookkeeping.[161]

Economics (early)
Ibn Khaldun[162]
Chanakya / Kautilya[163]
Publication: Muqaddimah (1370)
Publication: Arthashastra (400 BCE - 200 CE)

Economics (modern)

Richard Cantillon[164]
Anders Chydenius[165]
Adam Smith[166]

First specific treatise on economics.
The National Gain (1765), a pamphlet that included key ideas about free trade.[167]
The Wealth of Nations (1776).

Evolutionary economics
Ecological economics
Thermoeconomics
bioeconomics

Nicholas Georgescu-Roegen[168][169][170][171][172]
The Entropy Law and the Economic Process (1971)

Macroeconomics
John Maynard Keynes[173]
Author of The General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money and groundbreaking economist, Keynes spearheaded a revolution in economic thinking. Prior to Keynes, the general consensus among economists was that the economy was self-fixing. During the Great Depression, when people began to realize that the economy would not fix itself, Keynes proposed that the government needed to intervene to combat excessive boom and bust. This idea was the largest influence in U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt's New Deal.[174][175]

Mathematical economics
Daniel Bernoulli
Forerunner of the Tableau économique.[176]

Monetary economics

Nicole Oresme (c.1322-1382)[177]
Irving Fisher (1867-1947)
Milton Friedman (1912-2006)

Oresme's De Moneta.
"Irving Fisher [...] spent his career studying questions about money and the economy - how money affects interest rates, how money affects inflation, and the impact of money on overall economic activity. For this work, he is regarded as the father of monetary economics."[178]
"[...] no less an authority than the University of Chicago's Milton Friedman, the father of monetary economics, [...]"[179]

Microcredit
Muhammad Yunus[180]
Founded Grameen Bank

Personnel economics
Edward Lazear
Published the first paper in the field.

text: Schools of thought[edit]

text:
Field
Person/s
considered "father" or "mother"
Rationale

Austrian School
Carl Menger[181]

Communism
Karl Marx
Friedrich Engels
David Ricardo[182]

School of Salamanca
Francisco de Vitoria[183]
Highly influential teacher and lecturer on commercial morality

text: Theories[edit]

text:
Field
Person/s
considered "father" or "mother"
Rationale

Expectations theory
Thomas Cardinal Cajetan[184]
Recognised the effect of market expectations on the value of money

Modern portfolio theory
Harry Markowitz[185]

Social choice theory
Kenneth Arrow
Created the field with his 1951 book, Social Choice and Individual Values

text: Other fields[edit]

text:
Field
Person/s
considered "father" or "mother"
Rationale

Science (modern)
Galileo Galilei[186]
[187][188]
For systemic use of experimentation in science and contributions to scientific method, physics and observational astronomy

Physics (early)
Ibn al-Haytham (Alhazen)[189][190]
Alhazen developed rigorous experimental methods of controlled scientific testing to verify theoretical hypotheses and substantiate inductive conjectures.
Developed Baconian method in his Novum Organum (1620).

Family and consumer science
Ellen Swallow Richards
Founded the American Association of Home Economics, currently the American Association of Family & Consumer Sciences. "Bringing science into the home, Richards hoped to "...attain the best physical, mental, and moral development" for the family, which she believed was the basic unit of civilization."[191]


document_title: Transfer RNA

question_text: where is the anticodon site on a trna molecule

root

text: Transfer RNA

text: Overview[edit]

text: While the specific nucleotide sequence of an mRNA specifies which amino acids are incorporated into the protein product of the gene from which the mRNA is transcribed, the role of tRNA is to specify which sequence from the genetic code corresponds to which amino acid.[3] The mRNA encodes a protein as a series of contiguous codons, each of which is recognized by a particular tRNA. One end of the tRNA matches the genetic code in a three-nucleotide sequence called the anticodon. The anticodon forms three complementary base pairs with a codon in mRNA during protein biosynthesis. On the other end of the tRNA is a covalent attachment to the amino acid that corresponds to the anticodon sequence. Each type of tRNA molecule can be attached to only one type of amino acid, so each organism has many types of tRNA. Because the genetic code contains multiple codons that specify the same amino acid, there are several tRNA molecules bearing different anticodons which carry the same amino acid.

tag: p

text: The covalent attachment to the tRNA 3’ end is catalyzed by enzymes called aminoacyl tRNA synthetases. During protein synthesis, tRNAs with attached amino acids are delivered to the ribosome by proteins called elongation factors, which aid in association of the tRNA with the ribosome, synthesis of the new polypeptide and translocation (movement) of the ribosome along the mRNA. If the tRNA's anticodon matches the mRNA, another tRNA already bound to the ribosome transfers the growing polypeptide chain from its 3’ end to the amino acid attached to the 3’ end of the newly delivered tRNA, a reaction catalyzed by the ribosome.

text: A large number of the individual nucleotides in a tRNA molecule may be chemically modified, often by methylation or deamidation. These unusual bases sometimes affect the tRNA's interaction with ribosomes and sometimes occur in the anticodon to alter base-pairing properties.[4]:29.1.2

text: Structure[edit]

text: The structure of tRNA can be decomposed into its primary structure, its secondary structure (usually visualized as the cloverleaf structure), and its tertiary structure[5] (all tRNAs have a similar L-shaped 3D structure that allows them to fit into the P and A sites of the ribosome). The cloverleaf structure becomes the 3D L-shaped structure through coaxial stacking of the helices, which is a common RNA tertiary structure motif.

text: The lengths of each arm, as well as the loop 'diameter', in a tRNA molecule vary from species to species.[5][6]

text: The tRNA structure consists of the following:

text:
A 5'-terminal phosphate group.
The acceptor stem is a 7- to 9-base pair (bp) stem made by the base pairing of the 5'-terminal nucleotide with the 3'-terminal nucleotide (which contains the CCA 3'-terminal group used to attach the amino acid). In general, such 3'-terminal tRNA-like structures are referred to as 'genomic tags'. The acceptor stem may contain non-Watson-Crick base pairs.[5][7]
The CCA tail is a cytosine-cytosine-adenine sequence at the 3' end of the tRNA molecule. The amino acid loaded onto the tRNA by aminoacyl tRNA synthetases, to form aminoacyl-tRNA, is covalently bonded to the 3'-hydroxyl group on the CCA tail.[8] This sequence is important for the recognition of tRNA by enzymes and critical in translation.[9][10] In prokaryotes, the CCA sequence is transcribed in some tRNA sequences. In most prokaryotic tRNAs and eukaryotic tRNAs, the CCA sequence is added during processing and therefore does not appear in the tRNA gene.[11]
The D arm is a 4- to 6-bp stem ending in a loop that often contains dihydrouridine.[5]
The anticodon arm is a 5-bp stem whose loop contains the anticodon.[5] The tRNA 5'-to-3' primary structure contains the anticodon but in reverse order, since 3'-to-5' directionality is required to read the mRNA from 5'-to-3'.
The T arm is a 4- to 5- bp stem containing the sequence TΨC where Ψ is pseudouridine, a modified uridine.[5]
Bases that have been modified, especially by methylation (e.g. tRNA (guanine-N7-)-methyltransferase), occur in several positions throughout the tRNA. The first anticodon base, or wobble-position, is sometimes modified to inosine (derived from adenine), pseudouridine or lysidine (derived from cytosine).[12]

tag: ol

text: Anticodon[edit]

text: An anticodon[13] is a unit made up of three nucleotides that correspond to the three bases of the codon on the mRNA. Each tRNA contains a distinct anticodon triplet sequence that can form 3 complementary base pairs to one or more codons for an amino acid. Some anticodons can pair with more than one codon due to a phenomenon known as wobble base pairing. Frequently, the first nucleotide of the anticodon is one not found on mRNA: inosine, which can hydrogen bond to more than one base in the corresponding codon position.[4]:29.3.9 In the genetic code, it is common for a single amino acid to be specified by all four third-position possibilities, or at least by both pyrimidines and purines; for example, the amino acid glycine is coded for by the codon sequences GGU, GGC, GGA, and GGG. Other modified nucleotides may also appear at the first anticodon position—sometimes known as the "wobble position"—resulting in subtle changes to the genetic code, as for example in mitochondria.[14]

text: To provide a one-to-one correspondence between tRNA molecules and codons that specify amino acids, 61 types of tRNA molecules would be required per cell, as there are 61 sense codons of the standard genetic code. However, many cells contain fewer than 61 types of tRNAs because the wobble base is capable of binding to several, though not necessarily all, of the codons that specify a particular amino acid. A minimum of 31 tRNAs are required to translate, unambiguously, all 61 sense codons. The maximum observed is 41.[3][15]

text: Aminoacylation[edit]

text: Aminoacylation is the process of adding an aminoacyl group to a compound. It covalently links an amino acid to the CCA 3' end of a tRNA molecule.

text: Each tRNA is aminoacylated (or charged) with a specific amino acid by an aminoacyl tRNA synthetase. There is normally a single aminoacyl tRNA synthetase for each amino acid, despite the fact that there can be more than one tRNA, and more than one anticodon, for an amino acid. Recognition of the appropriate tRNA by the synthetases is not mediated solely by the anticodon, and the acceptor stem often plays a prominent role.[16] Reaction:

text:
amino acid + ATP → aminoacyl-AMP + PPi
aminoacyl-AMP + tRNA → aminoacyl-tRNA + AMP

text: Certain organisms can have one or more aminoacyl tRNA synthetases missing. This leads to charging of the tRNA by a chemically related amino acid. An enzyme or enzymes modify the charged amino acid to the final one. For example, Helicobacter pylori has glutaminyl tRNA synthetase missing. Thus, glutamate tRNA synthetase charges tRNA-glutamine(tRNA-Gln) with glutamate. An amidotransferase then converts the acid side chain of the glutamate to the amide, forming the correctly charged gln-tRNA-Gln.

text: Binding to ribosome[edit]

text: The ribosome has three binding sites for tRNA molecules that span the space between the two ribosomal subunits: the A (aminoacyl),[18] P (peptidyl), and E (exit) sites. In addition, the ribosome has two other sites for tRNA binding that are used during mRNA decoding or during the initiation of protein synthesis. These are the T site (named elongation factor Tu) and I site (initiation).[19][20] By convention, the tRNA binding sites are denoted with the site on the small ribosomal subunit listed first and the site on the large ribosomal subunit listed second. For example, the A site is often written A/A, the P site, P/P, and the E site, E/E.[19] The binding proteins like L27, L2, L14, L15, L16 at the A- and P- sites have been determined by affinity labeling by A.P. Czernilofsky et al. (Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci, USA, pp 230–234, 1974).

text: Once translation initiation is complete, the first aminoacyl tRNA is located in the P/P site, ready for the elongation cycle described below. During translation elongation, tRNA first binds to the ribosome as part of a complex with elongation factor Tu (EF-Tu) or its eukaryotic (eEF-1) or archaeal counterpart. This initial tRNA binding site is called the A/T site. In the A/T site, the A-site half resides in the small ribosomal subunit where the mRNA decoding site is located. The mRNA decoding site is where the mRNA codon is read out during translation. The T-site half resides mainly on the large ribosomal subunit where EF-Tu or eEF-1 interacts with the ribosome. Once mRNA decoding is complete, the aminoacyl-tRNA is bound in the A/A site and is ready for the next peptide bond to be formed to its attached amino acid. The peptidyl-tRNA, which transfers the growing polypeptide to the aminoacyl-tRNA bound in the A/A site, is bound in the P/P site. Once the peptide bond is formed, the tRNA in the P/P site is deacylated, or has a free 3’ end, and the tRNA in the A/A site carries the growing polypeptide chain. To allow for the next elongation cycle, the tRNAs then move through hybrid A/P and P/E binding sites, before completing the cycle and residing in the P/P and E/E sites. Once the A/A and P/P tRNAs have moved to the P/P and E/E sites, the mRNA has also moved over by one codon and the A/T site is vacant, ready for the next round of mRNA decoding. The tRNA bound in the E/E site then leaves the ribosome.

text: The P/I site is actually the first to bind to aminoacyl tRNA, which is delivered by an initiation factor called IF2 in bacteria.[20] However, the existence of the P/I site in eukaryotic or archaeal ribosomes has not yet been confirmed. The P-site protein L27 has been determined by affinity labeling by E. Collatz and A.P. Czernilofsky (FEBS Lett., Vol. 63, pp 283–286, 1976).

text: tRNA genes[edit]

text: Organisms vary in the number of tRNA genes in their genome. The nematode worm C. elegans, a commonly used model organism in genetics studies, has 29,647 [21] genes in its nuclear genome, of which 620 code for tRNA.[22][23] The budding yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae has 275 tRNA genes in its genome.

text: In the human genome, which, according to January 2013 estimates, has about 20,848 protein coding genes [24] in total, there are 497 nuclear genes encoding cytoplasmic tRNA molecules, and 324 tRNA-derived pseudogenes—tRNA genes thought to be no longer functional[25] (although pseudo tRNAs have been shown to be involved in antibiotic resistance in bacteria ).[26] Regions in nuclear chromosomes, very similar in sequence to mitochondrial tRNA genes, have also been identified (tRNA-lookalikes).[27] These tRNA-lookalikes are also considered part of the nuclear mitochondrial DNA (genes transferred from the mitochondria to the nucleus).[27][28]

text: As with all eukaryotes, there are 22 mitochondrial tRNA genes[29] in humans. Mutations in some of these genes have been associated with severe diseases like the MELAS syndrome.

text: Cytoplasmic tRNA genes can be grouped into 49 families according to their anticodon features. These genes are found on all chromosomes, except 22 and Y chromosome. High clustering on 6p is observed (140 tRNA genes), as well on 1 chromosome.[25]

text: The HGNC, in collaboration with the Genomic tRNA Database (GtRNAdb) and experts in the field, has approved unique names for human genes that encode tRNAs.

text: Evolution[edit]

text: The top half of tRNA (consisting of the D arm and the acceptor stem with 5'-terminal phosphate group and 3'-terminal CCA group) and the bottom half (consisting of the T arm and the anticodon arm) are independent units in structure as well as in function. The top half may have evolved first including the 3'-terminal genomic tag which originally may have marked tRNA-like molecules for replication in early RNA world. The bottom half may have evolved later as an expansion, e. g. as protein synthesis started in RNA world and turned it into a (ribonucleoprotein world (RNP world). This proposed scenario is called genomic tag hypothesis. In fact, tRNA and tRNA-like aggregates have an important catalytic influence (i. e. as ribozymes) on replication still today. These roles may be regarded as 'molecular (or chemical) fossiles' of RNA world.[30]

text: Genomic tRNA content is a differentiating feature of genomes among biological domains of life: Archaea present the simplest situation in terms of genomic tRNA content with a uniform number of gene copies, Bacteria have an intermediate situation and Eukarya present the most complex situation.[31] Eukarya present not only more tRNA gene content than the other two kingdoms but also a high variation in gene copy number among different isoacceptors, and this complexity seem to be due to duplications of tRNA genes and changes in anticodon specificity[citation needed].

text: Evolution of the tRNA gene copy number across different species has been linked to the appearance of specific tRNA modification enzymes (uridine methyltransferases in Bacteria, and adenosine deaminases in Eukarya), which increase the decoding capacity of a given tRNA.[31] As an example, tRNAAla encodes four different tRNA isoacceptors (AGC, UGC, GGC and CGC). In Eukarya, AGC isoacceptors are extremely enriched in gene copy number in comparison to the rest of isoacceptors, and this has been correlated with its A-to-I modification of its wobble base. This same trend has been shown for most amino acids of eukaryal species. Indeed, the effect of these two tRNA modifications is also seen in codon usage bias. Highly expressed genes seem to be enriched in codons that are exclusively using codons that will be decoded by these modified tRNAs, which suggests a possible role of these codons—and consequently of these tRNA modifications—in translation efficiency.[31]

text: tRNA-derived fragments[edit]

text: tRNA-derived fragments (or tRFs) are short molecules that emerge after cleavage of the mature tRNAs or the precursor transcript.[32][33][34][35] Both cytoplasmic and mitochondrial tRNAs can produce fragments.[36] There are at least four structural types of tRFs believed to originate from mature tRNAs, including the relatively long tRNA halves and short 5’-tRFs, 3’-tRFs and i-tRFs.[32][36][37] The precursor tRNA can be cleaved to produce molecules from the 5’ leader or 3’ trail sequences. Cleavage enzymes include Angiogenin, Dicer, RNase Z and RNase P.[32][33] Especially in the case of Angiogenin, the tRFs have a characteristically unusual cyclic phosphate at their 3’ end and a hydroxyl group at the 5’ end.[38]

text: tRFs have multiple dependencies and roles. They exhibit significant changes between sexes, among races and disease status.[36] Functionally, they can be loaded on Ago and act through RNAi pathways,[34][36][37][39] participate in the formation of stress granules,[40] displace mRNAs from RNA-binding proteins[41] or inhibit translation.[42] At the system or the organismal level, the four types of tRFs have a diverse spectrum of activities. Functionally, tRFs are associated with viral infection,[43] cancer,[36][37] cell proliferation [38] and also with epigenetic transgenerational regulation of metabolism.[44]

text: tRFs are not restricted to humans but have been shown to exist in multiple organisms.[37][45][46][47]

text: Two online tools are available for those wishing to learn more about tRFs: the framework for the interactive exploration of mitochondrial and nuclear tRNA fragments (MINTbase)[48] and the relational database of Transfer RNA related Fragments(tRFdb).[49] MINTbase also provides a naming scheme for the naming of tRFs called tRF-license plates that is genome independent.

text: tRNA biogenesis[edit]

text: In eukaryotic cells, tRNAs are transcribed by RNA polymerase III as pre-tRNAs in the nucleus.[50] RNA polymerase III recognizes two highly conserved downstream promoter sequences: the 5' intragenic control region (5'-ICR, D-control region, or A box), and the 3'-ICR (T-control region or B box) inside tRNA genes.[2][51][52] The first promoter begins at +8 of mature tRNAs and the second promoter is located 30-60 nucleotides downstream of the first promoter. The transcription terminates after a stretch of four or more thymidines.[2][52]

text: Pre-tRNAs undergo extensive modifications inside the nucleus. Some pre-tRNAs contain introns that are spliced, or cut, to form the functional tRNA molecule;[53] in bacteria these self-splice, whereas in eukaryotes and archaea they are removed by tRNA-splicing endonucleases.[54] Eukaryotic pre-tRNA contains bulge-helix-bulge (BHB) structure motif that is important for recognition and precise splicing of tRNA intron by endonucleases.[55] This motif position and structure are evolutionary conserved. However, some organisms, such as unicellular algae have a non-canonical position of BHB-motif as well as 5'- and 3'-ends of the spliced intron sequence.[55] The 5' sequence is removed by RNase P,[56] whereas the 3' end is removed by the tRNase Z enzyme.[57] A notable exception is in the archaeon Nanoarchaeum equitans, which does not possess an RNase P enzyme and has a promoter placed such that transcription starts at the 5' end of the mature tRNA.[58] The non-templated 3' CCA tail is added by a nucleotidyl transferase.[59] Before tRNAs are exported into the cytoplasm by Los1/Xpo-t,[60][61] tRNAs are aminoacylated.[62] The order of the processing events is not conserved. For example, in yeast, the splicing is not carried out in the nucleus but at the cytoplasmic side of mitochondrial membranes.[63]

text: History[edit]

text: The existence of tRNA was first hypothesized by Francis Crick, based on the assumption that there must exist an adapter molecule capable of mediating the translation of the RNA alphabet into the protein alphabet. Significant research on structure was conducted in the early 1960s by Alex Rich and Don Caspar, two researchers in Boston, the Jacques Fresco group in Princeton University and a United Kingdom group at King's College London.[64] In 1965, Robert W. Holley of Cornell University reported the primary structure and suggested three secondary structures.[65] tRNA was first crystallized in Madison, Wisconsin, by Robert M. Bock.[66] The cloverleaf structure was ascertained by several other studies in the following years[67] and was finally confirmed using X-ray crystallography studies in 1974. Two independent groups, Kim Sung-Hou working under Alexander Rich and a British group headed by Aaron Klug, published the same crystallography findings within a year.[68][69]


document_title: Betty Draper

question_text: what is wrong with betty draper's hands

question_tokens: what is wrong with betty draper 's hands

text: Betty Draper

text: Casting and character development[edit]

text: The character of Betty Draper was not originally part of the pilot episode, though she did appear in the pilot. The script established that lead character Don Draper was married, but only by a mention in dialogue, and there was no intention to show his home life. January Jones was instead initially considered, along with Elisabeth Moss, for the ambitious workplace character Peggy Olson; Moss was ultimately cast as Peggy. Show creator Matthew Weiner then wrote two scenes featuring Betty Draper, and Jones successfully auditioned for the part two days later. Although there were no full script or any plots written for Betty Draper at the time, Jones was promised by Weiner that the character would be developed.[4]

text: Weiner has attributed Mad Men's visual style to the influence of film director Alfred Hitchcock, who featured a signature "icy blonde" female character in many of his films.[5] Betty Draper's character has also been compared to that of Peyton Place's Constance MacKenzie: "cold, remote, and emotionally unavailable."[6]

text: Fictional character biography[edit]

text: Backstory[edit]

text: Betty was born Elizabeth Hofstadt in 1932.[1] According to her son's birth certificate, she was born in Cape May, New Jersey, where her wealthy family summered. She grew up in Lower Merion, Pennsylvania, a suburb of Philadelphia located on the "Main Line". She is of German ancestry. Betty graduated from Bryn Mawr College with an anthropology degree and briefly modeled in Italy (where she learned fluent Italian) before moving to Manhattan. It was during this time that she met Don Draper – he was writing ad copy for a fur company, and she was one of their models. He began courting her by buying her the fur coat she wore at a shoot. Betty and Don were married in May 1953. Her favorite movie is Singin' in the Rain (1952). Betty's mother Ruth died early in 1960, three months before the events of the episode "Ladies Room". Her father, Gene (Ryan Cutrona), had a girlfriend named Gloria, whom Betty disliked and whom her father married sometime in the 18 months between seasons 1 and 2; Gloria left Gene when he began showing signs of mental deterioration in Season 3. He moved in with the Drapers during season 3 and later died in that season, set in 1963. Betty has a brother, William, who is married to Judy and whose daughters Don and Betty consider to be "rowdy." Betty's confidantes have included her neighbor Francine Hanson and Glen Bishop, the young son of divorcée Helen Bishop. Ill-suited for parenting, Betty has a strained relationship with her children, particularly with her daughter Sally.

text: Season one[edit]

text: Betty and Don Draper live in a large house in suburban Ossining, New York, with their children Sally (played by Kiernan Shipka) and Bobby. In the second episode, set in the spring of 1960, Betty starts to see a psychiatrist to address repeated spells of numbness in her hands, which medical doctors have indicated are psychosomatic. It was during these meetings that, after having discovered the psychiatrist was giving reports of her sessions to Don, she voiced her suspicion that her husband was unfaithful. By the start of the second season, set in February 1962, she had discontinued the consultations.

text: Season two[edit]

text: During the second season episode "A Night to Remember", Betty and Don seem to have reached an agreement, but after a dinner party where Betty is embarrassed to be considered a "demographic" by Don and his associates, she confronts her husband for the first time about his adultery, specifically with Bobbie Barrett. Don, however, denies having an affair. The next day, with a glass of wine in hand, Betty searches through Don's belongings for proof of his indiscretions but does not find any. Betty awakens Don - who is sleeping on the couch - that night and explains that she doesn't want things to "be like this." He repeats that he did not do anything, and when she asks if he hates her, he insists that he loves her and doesn't want to "lose this." When preparing dinner the next day, an Utz commercial featuring Jimmy Barrett airs on the television. After seeing this, Betty calls Don at work and tells him she doesn't want him to come home.

text: Betty does turn to Don when she learns her father Gene has suffered a stroke. She and Don leave the children with a neighbor and drive to visit her father. Betty is visibly impatient with both her father's wife Gloria and her brother William. She and Don are careful to present a united front. At the end of a stressful day, Betty makes Don sleep on the floor of the guestroom, but later joins him on the floor where they make love. The next morning, Betty's father mistakes Betty for her mother Ruth, suggesting they "go upstairs." Betty is severely shocked and frightened, but tries to pretend that everything is all right. When she and Don return to New York, Betty surprises Don by asking him to leave again.

text: In the Season 2 finale, Betty discovers she is pregnant. Although she brings up the subject of abortion with her doctor and has sex with a random man she picks up at a bar, at the end of the episode she asks Don to return home, and tells him she is pregnant.

text: Season three[edit]

text: Season 3 begins with Betty in her third trimester, seemingly reconciled with Don. In Episode 5, she gives birth to Eugene Scott Draper, whom she names after her father. After giving birth, Betty comes to the quick realization that her dream of everything being perfect will never come true.

text: During Episode 3, Betty and Don attend a country club party hosted by Roger Sterling and his new wife, Jane Siegel Sterling, where Betty meets Henry Francis, who is later revealed to be an advisor to then-New York governor Nelson A. Rockefeller. Henry is infatuated with Betty, and though she seems reluctant to return his feelings at first, as the season progresses, their affair intensifies. Betty eventually ends it, feeling guilty.

text: In Episode 11, Betty corners Don, after getting into a locked drawer in the desk in his home office that contains pictures and documents of Don's past life. (Don had inadvertently left his keys in his clothes, and Betty heard them jingling in the dryer.) She forces him to give her an explanation, and he haltingly tells her about his life as Dick Whitman, how he came to exchange dog tags with Lieutenant Don Draper, and his half-brother Adam's suicide. While apparently somewhat sympathetic to his feelings of guilt about Adam's death, Betty is highly conflicted about Don's having hidden this aspect of his life from her.

text: After President Kennedy's assassination and Margaret Sterling's wedding (the following day), Betty meets with Henry, who confesses his desire to marry her. They passionately kiss, and after the encounter, Betty returns home to tell Don she no longer loves him, leaving him stunned. This culminates in her seeing a divorce lawyer in the season 3 finale. During the same episode, Roger, whose daughter is friends with Henry's daughter, unintentionally reveals to Don that Betty and Francis are involved. An incensed Don confronts Betty. After calling her a whore, he assures her that she "won't get a nickel" in the ensuing divorce, and he intends to seek sole custody of the children. The next morning, Don and Betty inform the children they are separating, and both older children react badly.

text: After moving into Sterling Cooper Draper Pryce's new office, Don calls Betty and tells her he will not fight her, and he wishes her the best. She tells him he'll always be their children's father. The season ends with Betty taking a plane to Reno with baby Gene and Henry.

text: Season four[edit]

text: Betty's presence in season four is diminished compared to the previous seasons. Season 4 opens with Betty, Henry, and the children still living in the former Draper residence (which Don owns) following Betty's marriage to Henry. The residence is a point of contention for Don and Betty, as Don is still paying the mortgage, and Betty is required by their divorce agreement to move out but has not.

text: Throughout Season 4, Betty finds her marriage to Henry strained by tensions with Don and by deteriorating relations with Sally. When she discovers Sally has become friends with her old confidant, Glen Bishop, Betty forces them to end the friendship. Glen's reappearance is the catalyst for Betty to finally insist to Henry that it's time for them to move because of the "low-caliber people" taking over the neighborhood, much to Sally's distress.

text: In the season finale "Tomorrowland", Betty and Francis are packing to move out of the Ossining house and into a new home in nearby Rye, New York. When the children's nanny, Carla, lets Glen into the house to say goodbye to Sally, Betty becomes upset and fires Carla, refusing to give her a reference. This angers Henry, with whom Betty feels increasingly dissatisfied. At the end of the episode Betty waits for Don at the now-empty Ossining house, telling him she is unhappy with her new life. Don senses her desire to try and repair things between them, but instead informs her of his engagement to Megan Calvet. Betty congratulates him but is visibly disheartened and angry that Don has moved on. They leave the house through opposite doors.

text: Season five[edit]

text: Betty's presence in season five is further reduced due to January Jones' pregnancy. In the episode, "Tea Leaves", Betty and her family are now shown to be living in a large Victorian estate in Rye, New York. Since the season four finale, she has put on a significant amount of weight and dislikes leaving the house. Her mother-in-law, Pauline, advises Betty to take diet pills since Pauline believes Henry is unhappy in the marriage. Betty goes to her doctor to get a prescription, but he finds a lump in her throat that could be cancerous. When it turns out to be benign, Betty is barely relieved and returns to focusing on her dumpy physical condition. By the episode "Dark Shadows", Betty attends Weight Watchers meetings to attempt to regain her old form but receives mixed results; she notes that it is difficult to take the weight off. Betty is often seen eating very little in an attempt to lose weight but appears to weaken when she consumes whipped cream directly from the can and occasionally sneaks sweets. Betty regresses further when she goes to Don's NYC apartment to pick up her kids and becomes jealous and bitter over the lovely, modern accommodations and Megan's lissome beauty. She then tries to stir up rancor by mentioning Anna Draper to Sally, but after Megan and (particularly) Don tell Sally more about Anna, Betty is defeated, as Sally expresses visible contempt for her mother, further straining their relationship. However, when Sally begins menstruating for the first time while visiting her father in New York, she immediately returns to Rye and seeks out her mother for help. Here, Betty is finally shown to be a reasonably caring mother to Sally. Showing what is at this point uncharacteristic warmth, Betty recognizes that Sally needs her and provides comfort and guidance to her daughter.

text: Season six[edit]

text: Betty spends most of the beginning of the sixth season losing the excess weight she gained over the past year. After visiting NYC's Lower East Side in search of one of Sally's friends and being snidely dismissed by one of the young people there as a bottle blonde, she dyes her hair brunette. Betty's hair later reverts to its original blonde color. When Henry announces that he wants to run for public office, she has mixed feelings about the idea (still being concerned about her weight).

text: In episode 8 ("The Better Half"), Betty is back to her original weight and actively campaigning alongside her husband. Henry sees the excess attention that Betty receives and is turned on by it, as is Betty, who is beginning to feel more confident about herself. When one of Henry's colleagues makes a pass at her at a fundraising dinner, she informs him that she's had three children, to which he replies that he doesn't care. But he's misunderstood her meaning; she then tells him triumphantly, "No, look at me. Can you believe I've had three children?" before leaving with Henry.

text: Betty goes to Bobby's summer camp for a family weekend in "The Better Half", driving down without Henry. Don, also on his way to the camp, sees the newly svelte Betty lost at a gas station, and they go down to the campground together. They spend the afternoon with Bobby, and everyone has a wonderful time. That night Don visits Betty's cabin, and they share a drink, reminiscing about the early years of their marriage and the kids. Don accepts Betty's tacit invitation to enter her cabin, and they make love. Betty and Don talk afterward, and Betty admits that she's happy with Henry, is no longer as mad at Don as she once was, and feels sorry for Megan, who doesn't know that loving Don is the worst way of getting to him. The next morning Don wakes up alone and goes down to the cafeteria, where he sees Betty and Henry eating together. Don says hello to them and goes off to eat, alone, at the other side of the room.

text: In "The Quality of Mercy", Betty takes Sally on an overnight trip to interview at Miss Porter's boarding school. She detects Sally is troubled by something but doesn't realize it's because Sally saw Don in bed with his downstairs neighbor, Sylvia Rosen. Sally is accepted at Miss Porter's, but Betty soon calls Don with the news that Sally has gotten suspended because she bought beer with a fake I.D. and got drunk with some other girls. Betty sadly blames herself for Sally's troubles and tells Don, "the good isn't beating out the bad."

text: Season seven[edit]

text: In episode 3, "Field Trip," the distinctly un-maternal Betty questions if she is a good mother, and if her children love her, after a field trip with Bobby to a farm goes sour. Bobby trades Betty's sandwich for a bag of gumdrops, leaving Betty with no food. Betty orders Bobby to eat the candy and is visibly irritated with him for the rest of the day. When they return home, neither is willing to talk about what happened. Henry insists that the children love her, but Betty believes it will change in time.

text: In episode 5, "Runaways", Betty speaks her mind about the Vietnam War, causing a rough patch between herself and the conservative Henry during a dinner party. Bobby overhears the arguing and sees Henry sleeping in the den. When Sally comes home after getting hurt faux sword-fighting at Miss Porter's, Bobby asks her if Betty and Henry are getting a divorce. Sally assures him they aren't, and Bobby tells her he wishes he could go with her to school. At the end of the episode, Betty resents Henry for telling her what to do, say, and think.

text: In episode 9, "New Business," Betty is revealed to be pursuing a master's degree in psychology at Fairfield University in Connecticut.

text: In episode 13, "The Milk and Honey Route," Betty begins to feel dizzy and winded at school and falls down while climbing the stairs, fracturing her rib. When she sees her doctor, Betty is shocked to discover that her recent lightheadedness is a sign of aggressive, advanced lung cancer that has begun to spread throughout her body. Both Henry and Sally pressure her to undergo chemotherapy, but she stoically refuses, saying "I've learned to believe people when they say it's over." She writes a letter to Sally, telling her in a matter-of-fact way how she wants to be dressed and made up for her funeral, and then stating: "Sally, I always worried about you because you marched to the beat of your own drum, but now I know that's good. I know your life will be an adventure. I love you, Mom."

text: In the series finale, "Person to Person," Betty insists to Don (and apparently to Henry) that her children should live with her brother William and his wife after her death, so that the boys will have a woman in their lives. Betty is last seen reading a newspaper at her kitchen table while smoking a cigarette, as Sally washes dishes in the background.

text: Reception[edit]

text: Betty Draper appeared in Comcast's list of TV's Most Intriguing Characters.[7] TV Guide named her one of the most fashionable TV characters.[8] She was also included in Glamour's list of the 12 Most Stylish TV Characters.[9] The Huffington Post named her as one of the Worst TV Characters in 2012, saying "her unchanging narcissism and her selfish petulance simply bore us to tears".[10]

text: Awards and nominations[edit]

text: This section does not cite any sources. Please help improve this section by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. (February 2013) (Learn how and when to remove this template message)

tag: table

text: January Jones has earned nominations and accolades for her portrayal of Betty Draper. She was jointly nominated on six occasions for the Screen Actors Guild Award for Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Drama Series, in 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2013, and 2015, winning twice in 2009 and 2010. In 2009 and 2010, Jones was nominated for the Golden Globe Award for Best Actress – Television Series (Drama). In 2010, Jones was nominated for the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Drama Series.


document_title: Uncle Tom's Cabin (song)

question_text: who sang the song uncle tom's cabin

question_tokens: who sang the song uncle tom 's cabin

text: Uncle Tom's Cabin (song)

text:
"Uncle Tom's Cabin"

Single by Warrant

from the album Cherry Pie

B-side
"Sure Feels Good To Me"

Released
April 1991

Format
7", CD, Cassette

Recorded
1990

Length
4:01

Label
Columbia

Songwriter(s)
Jani Lane

Warrant singles chronology

"I Saw Red"
(1991)
"Uncle Tom's Cabin"
(1991)
"Blind Faith"
(1991)

"I Saw Red"
(1991)
"Uncle Tom's Cabin"
(1991)
"Blind Faith"
(1991)

text: "Uncle Tom's Cabin" is a song by American band Warrant. It was released in April 1991 as the third single from Warrant's second album Cherry Pie. The song charted at #78 on the Billboard Hot 100 and #19 on the Mainstream Rock Tracks chart.[1] In Australia, the single peaked at #85 on the ARIA singles chart in May 1991.[2]

text: A music video was made for the song, and later the song was re-visited by the band in 1999 on their Greatest & Latest album.

text: Background[edit]

text: According to frontman Jani Lane, the original working title for the song was "I Know a Secret".

text: Prior to the writing of the song "Cherry Pie", the album's title and first single was to have been "Uncle Tom's Cabin", a track which foreshadowed the kind of imaginative song writing which would later be more fully revealed on the Dog Eat Dog record. Although named after the classic novel by Harriet Beecher Stowe, the song tells the story of a witness to the involvement of local police in a double murder and appears at first to have nothing to do with slavery, racism, or the U.S. South (although the video for the song was set in Louisiana). Many fans have speculated that the lyrics could relate to the murders of civil rights activists at the hands of racist police officers that occurred in the U.S. during the 1960s, an example being the "Mississippi Burning" events, but things remain ambiguous.[citation needed]

text: Track listing[edit]

text:
No.
Title
Length

1.
"Uncle Tom's Cabin" (radio edit)
3:27

2.
"Sure Feels Fine"
2:38


document_title: Elections in the United States

question_text: who decides when where and how elections for senators and reps will be held

text: Elections in the United States

text: Voting[edit]

text: The most common method used in U.S. elections is the first-past-the-post system, where the highest polling candidate wins the election. Some may use a two-round system, where if no candidate receives a required number of votes then there is a runoff between the two candidates with the most votes.[citation needed]

text: Since 2002, several cities have adopted instant-runoff voting in their elections. Voters rank the candidates in order of preference rather than voting for a single candidate. If a candidate secures more than half of votes cast, that candidate wins. Otherwise, the candidate with the fewest votes is eliminated. Ballots assigned to the eliminated candidate are recounted and assigned to those of the remaining candidates who rank next in order of preference on each ballot. This process continues until one candidate wins by obtaining more than half the votes.[citation needed]

text: Eligibility[edit]

text: The eligibility of an individual for voting is set out in the constitution and also regulated at state level. The constitution states that suffrage cannot be denied on grounds of race or color, sex or age for citizens eighteen years or older. Beyond these basic qualifications, it is the responsibility of state legislatures to regulate voter eligibility. Some states ban convicted criminals, especially felons, from voting for a fixed period of time or indefinitely.[3] The number of American adults who are currently or permanently ineligible to vote due to felony convictions is estimated to be 5.3 million.[4] Some states also have legacy constitutional statements barring legally declared incompetent from voting; such references are generally considered obsolete and are being considered for review or removal where they appear.[5]

text: Voter registration[edit]

text: While the federal government has jurisdiction over federal elections, most election laws are decided at the state level. All U.S. states except North Dakota require that citizens who wish to vote be registered. Traditionally, voters had to register at state offices to vote, but in the mid-1990s efforts were made by the federal government to make registering easier, in an attempt to increase turnout. The National Voter Registration Act of 1993 (the "Motor Voter" law) required state governments that receive certain types of federal funding to make the voter registration process easier by providing uniform registration services through drivers' license registration centers, disability centers, schools, libraries, and mail-in registration. Other states allow citizens same-day registration on Election Day.

text: In many states, citizens registering to vote may declare an affiliation with a political party.[6] This declaration of affiliation does not cost money, and does not make the citizen a dues-paying member of a party. A party cannot prevent a voter from declaring his or her affiliation with them, but it can refuse requests for full membership. In some states, only voters affiliated with a party may vote in that party's primary elections (see below). Declaring a party affiliation is never required. Some states, including Georgia, Michigan, Minnesota, Virginia, Wisconsin, and Washington, practice non-partisan registration.[7]

text: Absentee voting[edit]

text: Voters unable or unwilling to vote at polling stations on Election Day can vote via absentee ballots. Absentee ballots are most commonly sent and received via the United States Postal Service. Despite their name, absentee ballots are often requested and submitted in person. About half of all states and U.S. territories allow "no excuse absentee," where no reason is required to request an absentee ballot. Others require a valid reason, such as infirmity or travel, be given before a voter can participate using an absentee ballot. Some states, including California,[8] and Washington[9][10] allow citizens to apply for permanent absentee voter status, which will automatically receive an absentee ballot for each election. Typically a voter must request an absentee ballot before the election occurs.

text: A significant source of absentee ballots is the population of Americans living outside the United States. In 1986 Congress enacted the Uniformed and Overseas Citizens Absentee Voting Act (UOCAVA). UOCAVA requires that the states and territories allow members of the United States Uniformed Services and merchant marine, their family members, and United States citizens residing outside the United States to register and vote absentee in elections for Federal offices. Though many states had pre-existing statutes in place UOCAVA made it mandatory and nationally uniform. "Generally, all U.S. citizens 19 years or older who are or will be residing outside the United States during an election period are eligible to vote absentee in any election for Federal office. In addition, all members of the Uniformed Services, their family members and members of the Merchant Marine and their family members, who are U.S. citizens, may vote absentee in Federal, state and local elections."[11] Absentee ballots from these voters can often be transmitted private delivery services, fax, or email.[12]

text: Mail ballots[edit]

text: Mail ballots are similar in many respects to an absentee ballot. However they are used for Mailing Precincts where on Election Day no polling place is opened for a specific precinct.[13] In Oregon, Washington, and Colorado, all ballots are delivered through the mail.

text: Early voting[edit]

text: Early voting is a formal process where voters can cast their ballots prior to the official Election Day. Early voting in person is allowed in 33 states and in Washington, D.C., with no excuse required.[14]

text: Voting equipment[edit]

text: Voters casting their ballots in polling places record their votes most commonly with optical scan voting machines or DRE voting machines. Voting machine selection is typically done through a state's local election jurisdiction including counties, cities, and townships. Many of these local jurisdictions have changed their voting equipment since 2000 due to the passage of the Help America Vote Act (HAVA), which allocated funds for the replacement of lever machine and punch card voting equipment.

text: Since the 1980s many jurisdictions and voting locations have given out "I Voted" stickers to people casting ballots. In the state of Illinois it's a state law to have stickers available to voters after they have cast their ballots. State and local governments pay $30 million per year for the stickers that cost about one cent each.[15]

text: Levels of election[edit]

text: Federal elections[edit]

text: The United States has a presidential system of government, which means that the executive and legislature are elected separately. Article One of the United States Constitution requires that any election for the U.S. President must occur on a single day throughout the country; elections for Congressional offices, however, can be held at different times. Congressional and presidential elections take place simultaneously every four years, and the intervening Congressional elections, which take place every two years, are called Midterm elections.

text: The constitution states that members of the United States House of Representatives must be at least 25 years old, a citizen of the United States for at least seven years, and be a (legal) inhabitant of the state they represent. Senators must be at least 30 years old, a citizen of the United States for at least nine years, and be a (legal) inhabitant of the state they represent. The President must be at least 35 years old, a natural born citizen of the United States and a resident in the United States for at least fourteen years. It is the responsibility of state legislatures to regulate the qualifications for a candidate appearing on a ballot paper, although in order to get onto the ballot, a candidate must often collect a legally defined number of signatures.

text: Presidential elections[edit]

text: The President and the Vice President are elected together in a Presidential election.[16] It is an indirect election, with the winner being determined by votes cast by electors of the Electoral College. In modern times, voters in each state select a slate of electors from a list of several slates designated by different parties or candidates, and the electors typically promise in advance to vote for the candidates of their party (whose names of the presidential candidates usually appear on the ballot rather than those of the individual electors). The winner of the election is the candidate with at least 270 Electoral College votes. It is possible for a candidate to win the electoral vote, and lose the (nationwide) popular vote (receive fewer votes nationwide than the second ranked candidate). Prior to ratification of the Twelfth Amendment to the United States Constitution (1804), the runner-up in a Presidential election[17] became the Vice President.

text: Electoral College votes are cast by individual states by a group of electors; each elector casts one electoral college vote. Until the Twenty-third Amendment to the United States Constitution of 1961 the District of Columbia citizens did not have representation and/or electors in the electoral college. In modern times, with electors usually committed to vote for a party candidate in advance, electors that vote against the popular vote in their state are called faithless electors, and occurrences are rare. State law regulates how states cast their electoral college votes. In all states except Maine and Nebraska, the candidate that wins the most votes in the state receives all its electoral college votes (a "winner takes all" system). From 1969 in Maine, and from 1991 in Nebraska, two electoral votes are awarded based on the winner of the statewide election, and the rest (two in Maine, three in Nebraska) go to the highest vote-winner in each of the state's congressional districts.

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United States presidential elections

Elections by year

1788–89
1792
1796
1800
1804
1808
1812
1816
1820
1824
1828
1832
1836
1840
1844
1848
1852
1856
1860
1864
1868
1872
1876
1880
1884
1888
1892
1896
1900
1904
1908
1912
1916
1920
1924
1928
1932
1936
1940
1944
1948
1952
1956
1960
1964
1968
1972
1976
1980
1984
1988
1992
1996
2000
2004
2008
2012
2016
2020

Elections by state

Alabama
Alaska
Arizona
Arkansas
California
Colorado
Connecticut
Delaware
Florida
Georgia
Hawaii
Idaho
Illinois
Indiana
Iowa
Kansas
Kentucky
Louisiana
Maine
Maryland
Massachusetts
Michigan
Minnesota
Mississippi
Missouri
Montana
Nebraska
Nevada
New Hampshire
New Jersey
New Mexico
New York
North Carolina
North Dakota
Ohio
Oklahoma
Oregon
Pennsylvania
Rhode Island
South Carolina
South Dakota
Tennessee
Texas
Utah
Vermont
Virginia
Washington
Washington, D.C.
West Virginia
Wisconsin
Wyoming

Primaries and caucuses

Iowa caucuses
New Hampshire primary
South Carolina primary
Super Tuesday

Nominating conventions

Brokered convention
Convention bounce
Superdelegate

Electoral College
and Popular vote

Results

Summary
Elections in which the winner lost the popular vote
Electoral College margins
Electoral College results by state
Electoral vote changes between elections
Electoral vote recipients
Popular vote margins

Contingent election
Faithless elector
Unpledged elector
Voter turnout

Related topics

Campaign slogans
Historical election polling
Election Day
Major party tickets
Major party losers
Presidential debates
October surprise
Red states and blue states
Swing state
Election recount

House elections
Senate elections
Gubernatorial elections

text: Congressional elections[edit]

text: Congress has two chambers: the Senate and the House of Representatives.

text: Senate elections[edit]

text: The Senate has 100 members, elected for a six-year term in dual-seat constituencies (2 from each state), with one-third being renewed every two years. The group of the Senate seats that is up for election during a given year is known as a "class"; the three classes are staggered so that only one of the three groups is renewed every two years. Until the Seventeenth Amendment to the United States Constitution in 1913, States chose how to elect Senators, and they were often elected by state legislatures, not the electorate of states.

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United States Senate elections

1788/89
1790/91
1792/93
1794/95
1796/97
1798/99
1800/01
1802/03
1804/05
1806/07
1808/09
1810/11
1812/13
1814/15
1816/17
1818/19
1820/21
1822/23
1824/25
1826/27
1828/29
1830/31
1832/33
1834/35
1836/37
1838/39
1840/41
1842/43
1844/45
1846/47
1848/49
1850/51
1852/53
1854/55
1856/57
1858/59
1860/61
1862/63
1864/65
1866/67
1868/69
1870/71
1872/73
1874/75
1876/77
1878/79
1880/81
1882/83
1884/85
1886/87
1888/89
1890/91
1892/93
1894/95
1896/97
1898/99
1900/01
1902/03
1904/05
1906/07
1908/09
1910/11
1912/13
1914/15
1916
1918
1920/21
1922/23
1924/25
1926
1928
1930/31
1932/33
1934
1936/37
1938
1940/41
1942
1944
1946/47
1948/49
1950
1952
1954
1956/57
1958/59
1960/61
1962
1964
1966
1968
1970
1972
1974/75
1976
1978
1980
1982/83
1984
1986
1988
1990/91
1992/93
1994
1996
1998
2000
2002
2004
2006
2008
2010
2012
2014
2016
2018
2020
2022

Special elections
Election disputes
Results by state
List of elections in the United States
House elections
Presidential elections
Gubernatorial elections

text: House of Representatives elections[edit]

text: The House of Representatives has 435 members, elected for a two-year term in single-seat constituencies. House of Representatives elections are held every two years on the first Tuesday after November 1 in even years. Special House elections can occur between if a member dies or resigns during a term. House elections are first-past-the-post elections that elect a Representative from each of 435 House districts which cover the United States. The non-voting delegates of Washington, D.C. and the territories of American Samoa, Guam, the Northern Mariana Islands, Puerto Rico and the United States Virgin Islands are also elected.

text: House elections occur every two years, correlated with presidential elections or halfway through a President's term. The House delegate of Puerto Rico, officially known as the Resident Commissioner of Puerto Rico, is elected to a four-year term, coinciding with those of the President.

text: As the redistricting commissions of states are often partisan, districts are often drawn which benefit incumbents. An increasing trend has been for incumbents to have an overwhelming advantage in House elections, and since the 1994 election, an unusually low number of seats has changed hands in each election.[citation needed] Due to gerrymandering, fewer than 10% of all House seats are contested in each election cycle. Over 90% of House members are reelected every two years, due to lack of electoral competition. Gerrymandering of the House, combined with the divisions inherent in the design of the Senate and of the Electoral College, result in a discrepancy between the percentage of popular support for various political parties and the actual level of the parties' representation.

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United States House of Representatives elections

Years

1788/89
1790
1792
1794
1796
1798
1800
1802
1804
1806
1808
1810
1812
1814
1816
1818
1820
1822
1824
1826
1828
1830
1832
1834
1836
1838
1840
1842
1844
1846
1848
1850
1852
1854
1856
1858/59
1860
1862
1864
1866
1868
1870/71
1872
1874
1876
1878
1880
1882
1884
1886
1888
1890
1892
1894
1896
1898
1900
1902
1904
1906
1908
1910
1912
1914
1916
1918
1920
1922
1924
1926
1928
1930
1932
1934
1936
1938
1940
1942
1944
1946
1948
1950
1952
1954
1956
1958
1960
1962
1964
1966
1968
1970
1972
1974
1976
1978
1980
1982
1984
1986
1988
1990
1992
1994
1996
1998
2000
2002
2004
2006
2008
2010
2012
2014
2016
2018

Special

1917
110th Congress
111th Congress
All

Senate elections
Presidential elections
Gubernatorial elections

text: State elections[edit]

text: State law and state constitutions, controlled by state legislatures regulate elections at state level and local level. Various officials at state level are elected. Since the separation of powers applies to states as well as the federal government, state legislatures and the executive (the governor) are elected separately. Governors and lieutenant governor are elected in all states, in some states on a joint ticket and in some states separately, some separately in different electoral cycles. The governors of the territories of American Samoa, Guam, the Northern Mariana Islands, Puerto Rico and the United States Virgin Islands are also elected. In some states, executive positions such as Attorney General and Secretary of State are also elected offices. All members of state legislatures and territorial jurisdiction legislatures are elected. In some states, members of the state supreme court and other members of the state judiciary are elected. Proposals to amend the state constitution are also placed on the ballot in some states.

text: As a matter of convenience and cost saving, elections for many of these state and local offices are held at the same time as either the federal presidential or midterm elections. There are a handful of states, however, that instead hold their elections during odd-numbered "off years."

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United States gubernatorial elections

List of current Governors

1928
1929
1930
1931
1932
1933
1934
1935
1936
1937
1938
1939
1940
1941
1942
1943
1944
1945
1946
1947
1948
1949
1950
1951
1952
1953
1954
1955
1956
1957
1958
1959
1960
1961
1962
1963
1964
1965
1966
1967
1968
1969
1970
1971
1972
1973
1974
1975
1976
1977
1978
1979
1980
1981
1982
1983
1984
1985
1986
1987
1988
1989
1990
1991
1992
1993
1994
1995
1996
1997
1998
1999
2000
2001
2002
2003
2004
2005
2006
2007
2008
2009
2010
2011
2012
2013
2014
2015
2016
2017
2018
2019
2020
2021

House elections
Senate elections
Presidential elections

text: Local elections[edit]

text: At the local level, county and city government positions are usually filled by election, especially within the legislative branch. The extent to which offices in the executive or judicial branches are elected vary from county-to-county or city-to-city. Some examples of local elected positions include sheriffs at the county level and mayors and school board members at the city level. Like state elections, an election for a specific local office may be held at the same time as either the presidential, midterm, or off-year elections.

text: Comparison of recent and upcoming election years[edit]

text:
Basic rotation of U.S. general elections (fixed-terms only[1])

Year
2016
2017
2018
2019
2020

Type
Presidential
Off-yeara
Midterm
Off-yearb
Presidential

President
Yes
No
Yes

Senate
Class III (34 seats)
No
Class I (33 seats)
No
Class II (33 seats)

House
All 435 seats[2]
No
All 435 seats[3]
No
All 435 seats[2]

Gubernatorial
11 states
DE, IN, MO, MT, NH, NC, ND, UT, VT, WA, WV
2 states
NJ, VA
36 states[4]
AL, AK, AZ, AR, CA, CO, CT, FL, GA, HI, ID, IL, IA, KS, ME, MD, MA, MI, MN, NE, NV, NH, NM, NY, OH, OK, OR, PA, RI, SC, SD, TN, TX, VT, WI, WY
3 states
KY, LA, MS
11 states
DE, IN, MO, MT, NH, NC, ND, UT, VT, WA, WV

Other state and local offices
Varies

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tag: ul

text: Features of the election system[edit]

text: Party systems[edit]

text: Americans vote for a specific candidate instead of directly selecting a particular political party. The United States Constitution has never formally addressed the issue of political parties. The Founding Fathers such as Alexander Hamilton and James Madison did not support domestic political factions at the time the Constitution was written.[18] In addition, the first President of the United States, George Washington, was not a member of any political party at the time of his election or throughout his tenure as president. Furthermore, he hoped that political parties would not be formed, fearing conflict and stagnation. Nevertheless, the beginnings of the American two-party system emerged from his immediate circle of advisers, with Hamilton and Madison ending up being the core leaders in this emerging party system.

text: Thus, it is up to the candidate to decide under what party he/she should run, registers to run, pays the fees, etc. In the primary elections, the party organization stays neutral until one candidate has been elected. The platform of the party is written by the winning candidate (in presidential elections; in other elections no platform is involved). Each candidate has his or her own campaign, fund raising organization, etc. The primary elections in the main parties are organized by the states, who also register the party affiliation of the voters (this also makes it easier to gerrymander the congressional districts). The party is thus little more than a campaign organization for the main elections.

text: However, elections in the United States often do become de facto national races between the political parties. In what is known as "presidential coattails", candidates in presidential elections usually bring out supporters who then vote for his or her party's candidates for other offices, usually resulting in the presidential winner's party gaining seats in Congress. On the other hand, midterm elections are sometimes regarded as a referendum on the sitting president's and/or incumbent party's performance.[19][20] There is a historical pattern that the incumbent president's party loses seats in midterm elections. This may be because the President's popularity has slipped since election, or because the President's popularity encouraged supporters to come out to vote for him or her in the presidential election, but these supporters are less likely to vote when the President is not up for election.

text: Ballot access[edit]

text: Ballot access refers to the laws which regulate under what conditions access is granted for a candidate or political party to appear on voters' ballots. Each State has its own ballot access laws to determine who may appear on ballots and who may not. According to Article I, Section 4, of the United States Constitution, the authority to regulate the time, place, and manner of federal elections is up to each State, unless Congress legislates otherwise. Depending on the office and the state, it may be possible for a voter to cast a write-in vote for a candidate whose name does not appear on the ballot, but it is extremely rare for such a candidate to win office.

text: Campaign finance[edit]

text: The funding of electoral campaigns has always been a controversial issue in American politics. Infringement of free speech (First Amendment) is an argument against restrictions on campaign contributions, while allegations of corruption arising from unlimited contributions and the need for political equality are arguments for the other side.[21] Private funds are a major source of finance, from individuals and organizations. The first attempt to regulate campaign finance by legislation was in 1867, but major legislation, with the intention to widely enforce, on campaign finance was not introduced until the 1970s.

text: Money contributed to campaigns can be classified into "hard money" and "soft money". Hard money is money contributed directly to a campaign, by an individual or organization. Soft money is money from an individual or organization not contributed to a campaign, but spent in candidate specific advertising or other efforts that benefits that candidate by groups supporting the candidate, but legally not coordinated by the official campaign.

text: The Federal Election Campaign Act of 1971 required candidates to disclose sources of campaign contributions and campaign expenditure. It was amended in 1974 to legally limit campaign contributions. It banned direct contributing to campaigns by corporations and trade unions and limited individual donations to $1,000 per campaign. It introduced public funding for Presidential primaries and elections. The Act also placed limits of $5,000 per campaign on PACs (political action committees). The limits on individual contributions and prohibition of direct corporate or labor union campaigns led to a huge increase in the number of PACs. Today many labor unions and corporations have their own PACs, and over 4,000 in total exist. The 1974 amendment also specified a Federal Election Commission, created in 1975 to administer and enforce campaign finance law. Various other provisions were also included, such as a ban on contributions or expenditures by foreign nationals (incorporated from the Foreign Agents Registration Act (FARA) (1966)).

text: The case of Buckley v. Valeo (1976) challenged the Act. Most provisions were upheld, but the court found that the mandatory spending limit imposed was unconstitutional, as was the limit placed on campaign spending from the candidate's personal fortune and the provision that limited independent expenditures by individuals and organizations supporting but not officially linked to a campaign. The effect of the first decision was to allow candidates such as Ross Perot and Steve Forbes to spend enormous amounts of their own money in their own campaigns. The effect of the second decision was to allow the culture of "soft money" to develop.

text: A 1979 amendment to the Federal Election Campaign Act allowed political parties to spend without limit on get-out-the-vote and voter registration activities conducted primarily for a presidential candidate. Later, they were permitted by FECA to use "soft money", unregulated, unlimited contributions to fund this effort. Increasingly, the money began to be spent on issue advertising, candidate specific advertising that was being funded mostly by soft money.

text: The Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act of 2002 banned local and national parties from spending "soft money" and banned national party committees from accepting or spending soft money. It increased the limit of contributions by individuals from $1,000 to $2,000. It banned corporations or labor unions from funding issue advertising directly, and banned the use of corporate or labor money for advertisements that mention a federal candidate within 60 days of a general election or 30 days of a primary. The constitutionality of the bill was challenged and in December 2003, the Supreme Court upheld most provisions of the legislation. (See McConnell v. FEC.)

text: A large number of "527 groups" were active for the first time in the 2004 election. These groups receive donations from individuals and groups and then spend the money on issue advocacy, such as the anti-Kerry ads by Swift Boat Veterans For Truth. This is a new form of soft money, and not surprisingly it is controversial. Many 527 groups have close links with the Democratic or Republican Parties, even though legally they cannot coordinate their activities with them. John McCain, one of the Senators behind the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act, and President Bush have both declared a desire to ban 527s.

text: Changing campaign finance laws is a highly controversial issue. Some reformers wish to see laws changed in order to improve electoral competition and political equality. Opponents wish to see the system stay as it is, whereas other reformers wish even fewer restrictions on the freedom to spend and contribute money. The Supreme Court has made it increasingly difficult for those who wish to regulate election financing, but options like partial public funding of campaigns are still possible and offer the potential to address reformers' concerns with minimal restrictions on the freedom to contribute.[22]

text: Primaries and caucuses[edit]

text: In partisan elections, candidates are chosen by primary elections (abbreviated to "primaries") and caucuses in the states, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico, American Samoa, Guam, and the U.S. Virgin Islands.

text: A primary election is an election in which registered voters in a jurisdiction (nominating primary) select a political party's candidate for a later election. There are various types of primary: either the whole electorate is eligible, and voters choose one party's primary at the polling booth (an open primary); or only independent voters can choose a party's primary at the polling booth (a semi-closed primary); or only registered members of the party are allowed to vote (closed primary). The blanket primary, when voters could vote for all parties' primaries on the same ballot was struck down by the United States Supreme Court as violating the First Amendment guarantee of freedom of assembly in the case California Democratic Party v. Jones. Primaries are also used to select candidates at the state level, for example in gubernatorial elections.

text: Caucuses also nominate candidates by election, but they are very different from primaries. Caucuses are meetings that occur at precincts and involve discussion of each party's platform and issues such as voter turnout in addition to voting. Eleven states: Iowa, New Mexico, North Dakota, Maine, Nevada, Hawaii, Minnesota, Kansas, Alaska, Wyoming, Colorado and the District of Columbia use caucuses, for one or more political parties.

text: The primary and caucus season in Presidential elections lasts from the Iowa caucus in January to the last primaries in June. Front-loading - when larger numbers of contests take place in the opening weeks of the season—can have an effect on the nomination process, potentially reducing the number of realistic candidates, as fund-raisers and donors quickly abandon those they see as untenable. However, it is not the case that the successful candidate is always the candidate that does the best in the early primaries. There is also a period dubbed the "invisible primary" that takes place before the primary season, when candidates attempt to solicit media coverage and funding well before the real primary season begins.

text: A state's presidential primary election or caucus usually is an indirect election: instead of voters directly selecting a particular person running for President, it determines how many delegates each party's national political convention will receive from their respective state. These delegates then in turn select their party's presidential nominee. Held in the summer, a political convention's purpose is also to adopt a statement of the party's principles and goals known as the platform and adopt the rules for the party's activities.

text: The day on which primaries are held for congressional seats, and state and local offices may also vary between states. The only federally mandated day for elections is Election Day for the general elections of the President and Congress; all other elections are at the discretion of the individual state and local governments.

text: Election information on the web[edit]

text: In most states of the U.S., the chief election officer is the Secretary of state. In some states, local officials like a county Registrar of Voters or Supervisor of Elections manages the conduct of elections under the supervision of (or in coordination with) the chief election officer of the state. Many of these state and county offices have web sites that provide information to help voters obtain information on their polling places for each election, the various districts to which they belong (e.g., house and senate districts in the state and federal legislature, school boards, water districts, municipalities, etc.), as well as dates of elections and deadlines to file to run or register to vote. Some allow voters to download a sample ballot in advance of the election.

text: Beyond this, various media outlets provide information they think will interest their audience.

text: More systematic coverage is provided by web sites devoted specifically to collecting election information and making it available to the public. Two of the better known such sites are Ballotpedia and Vote Smart. These are run by non-profit, non-partisan organizations. They have paid staffs and are much more tightly controlled than Wikipedia.

text: USElections.com[23] tries to provide similar information but relies on volunteers in a way that is more like Wikipedia than Ballotpedia and Vote Smart.

text: The website 270towin provides actual electoral college maps (both current and historic) but also the ability to use an interactive 3d map in order to make election predictions. Ongoing election news is reported as well as data on Senate and House races.[24]

text: The Center for Responsive Politics (opensecrets.org) and the National Institute on Money in State Politics (followthemoney.org) also provide useful election information focusing especially on campaign finance.

text: Hurdles[edit]

text: In 2014 scientists from Princeton University did a study on the influence of the "elite", and their derived power from special interest lobbying, versus the "ordinary" US citizen within the US political system. They found that the US was looking more like an oligarchy than a real representative democracy; thus eroding a government of the people, by the people, for the people as stated by Abraham Lincoln in his Gettysburg Address. In fact, the study found that average citizens had an almost nonexistent influence on public policies and that the ordinary citizen had little or no independent influence on policy at all.[25]

text: There were many US presidential elections in which foreign countries manipulate the voters.[26] Electoral College is criticised for being un-democratic (it can choose candidate who did not win the popular vote) and for focusing campaigns only on swing states.[27]