And still yet even more primeval tech v. Darwin.

 The Electric Cell: More Synergy with Physics Found in Cellular Coding 

David Coppedge 

New imaging techniques down to the picometer scale are permitting the detection of previously unknown alliances of cellular software with electrostatics and mechanics. Such knowledge was unattainable until biophysicists gained the ability to measure phenomena at the atomic level. What they are finding multiplies the information content embedded in the molecules of life.

Early depictions of molecules in the nucleus showed them drifting around aimlessly. How could molecules do otherwise without membranes to hold them together? Organelles are defined by their lipid membranes. The simplified picture of molecules in lipid cages, like animals in a zoo, raised questions about how enzymes locate their substrates in regions that, at their scale, would be distant. Last December, we reported findings at Caltech that revealed smaller levels of organization at play: nuclear speckles, transcriptional condensates and other “membraneless organelles” coordinated by non-coding RNAs. These erstwhile “junk” parts of the genome turned out to play key roles in architecting the “office layout” of the cellular factory. Some ncRNAs actually recruit the partners needing to associate like managers calling a meeting. 

The Electric Cell 

New findings reported in PNAS by Toyama et al. are uncovering a role for electrostatics in enzymatic activity. Simultaneously, the discovery may offer insight into the function of so-called “disordered proteins” that never fold into stable structures, and other proteins containing disordered regions that would seem to flail about like loose cables. But there is order in the disorder! How big is this discovery? 

Electrostatic interactions play important roles in regulating a plethora of different biochemical processes and in providing stability to biomolecules and their complexes 

6What the team from the University of Toronto found, discussed below, was only made possible by “solution NMR spectroscopy.” This technique allows them, for the first time, to measure the near-surface electrostatic potentials of individual atoms in proteins and follow changes in those potentials during an enzyme’s action. 

Our results collectively show that a subtle balance between electrostatic repulsion and interchain attractive interactions regulates CAPRIN1 phase separation and provides insight into how nucleotides, such as ATP, can induce formation of and subsequently dissolve protein condensates. [Emphasis added.] 

CAPRIN1 (cell cycle associated protein 1) is an RNA-binding protein “localized to membraneless organelles playing an important role in messenger RNA (mRNA) storage and translation.” It may act as a negative regulator of translation, confining mRNAs in condensates at times to prevent overproduction of proteins. “CAPRIN1 is found in membraneless organelles, such as stress granules, P bodies, and messenger RNA (mRNA) transport granules, where, in concert with a variety of other RNA-binding proteins, it plays an important role in regulating RNA processing,” the paper explains. In humans, this enzyme appears associated with long-term memory through the regulation of dendritic spine density. If so, our memories are not just dependent on chemistry, but on electrostatics, too.

CAPRIN1 contains IDP tails at both ends which, it turns out, are the key to condensate formation. The Toronto team found, importantly, that ATP plays a dynamic role in the electrostatic changes of CAPRIN1, especially in its IDP regions. In brief, here is what happens (see Figure 5 in the paper). Specific amino acid residues in the IDP regions confer on them a net positive charge. This makes the tails repel each other, resisting condensate formation (and preventing self-association of the tails). When ATP attaches to the IDP regions, however, the net charge is reduced, permitting intermolecular interactions. As more ATP is added, the collection becomes neutral, and a condensate forms. Additional ATP inverts the electrical potential, making it negative. Electrostatic repulsion ensues again, causing breakup of the condensate, separating the contents and freeing them up for the next round.  

This implies that condensate formation has an electrical aspect to it. Since it relies on the sequence and position of specific amino acid residues, one might even call it an electric code. 

Our interest in these experiments lies in applications to intrinsically disordered proteins (IDPs) and to intrinsically disordered regions (IDRs) of proteins, collectively referred to as IDPs in what follows. It is estimated that ∼30% of residues within human proteins encode regions of disorder, comprising at least 30 amino acids, with many of these proteins playing critical roles in cellular function, including modulating the formation of membraneless biomolecular condensates that organize proteins and/or nucleic acids, along with a variety of small molecules to regulate biochemical processes in the cell. At least 75% of IDPs contain both positively and negatively charged residues, with charge–charge interactions important in defining their physical and chemical properties and, in some cases, their propensities to phase separate. 

The information in the sequence of amino acids, and of the codons in the genes that encode them, appears to play critical roles in condensate formation and, simultaneously, in enzymatic behavior. Some amino acids they dub “stickers” promote phase separation. The specific electrostatic attractions and repulsions that give rise to the enzyme’s function during condensate formation and dissolution is dependent on the positions of these stickers.

This remarkable revelation begins to give insight into the participation of cell coding with electrophysics. Get a charge out of that! 

CAPRIN1 coexists with negatively charged RNA molecules in cells and, along with FMRP and other proteins, is implicated in the regulation of RNA processing and translational activity. Thus, electrostatics play a central role in modulating the biological functions of this protein, and measurement of electrostatic potentials at each site along its backbone, as reported here, provides an opportunity to understand in more detail the important role of charge in this system. 

The paper only investigated one enzyme, so caution is advised before generalizing. The authors feel, though, that this electrical code model will help explain many other processes that require molecules to come together, perform their work, and then separate. It’s the new Electric Cell. 

Future applications of these methods will pave the way for mapping the role of electrostatics in phase separation in a more general sense, including the effects of sequence, charge patterning, posttranslational modifications, and the presence of nucleic acids. 

Coded Mechanics, Too 

Another case of physics in cellular processing was uncovered by a team from the University of Washington who also published their work in PNAS. And once again, it was new creative imaging at the atomic scale that made the discovery possible.

This team worked on a helicase enzyme named PcrA, which unwinds DNA for transcription. This enzyme works so fast (1000 bases per second!) it’s been like trying to describe the blur of a racecar speeding down a track. Using a new technique called “single-molecule picometer-resolution nanopore tweezers” (SPRNT), they were able to slow down the action and watch the racecar move with its “inchworm mechanism” one base at a time. This blends chemistry with another branch of physics, mechanics: “mechanochemistry." 

We recorded more than two million enzyme steps under various assisting and opposing forces in diverse adenosine tri- and diphosphate conditions to comprehensively explore the mechanochemistry of PcrA motion.…Our data reveal that the underlying DNA sequence passing through the helicase strongly influences the kinetics during translocation and unwinding. Surprisingly, unwinding kinetics are not solely dominated by the base pairs being unwound. Instead, the sequence of the single-stranded DNA on which the PcrA walks determines much of the kinetics of unwinding. 

The authors are not clear why this is. What is evolution up to? They figure that there must be a reason. 

Unlike protein filaments (e.g., actin), DNA is not a homogeneous track; sequence-dependent behavior may be the norm rather than the exception. Strong sequence-dependent enzyme kinetics such as those observed in our data likely affect PcrA’s role in vivo and could thereby exert selective pressure on both DNA and protein evolution. Therefore, sequence-dependent behavior should be carefully considered in future studies of any enzyme that walks along DNA or RNA, since the sequence-dependent kinetics may reveal essential features of an enzyme’s function. Such effects are almost certainly used by life to achieve various ends, and SPRNT is well suited to discovering how and why such sequence dependence occurs and opens the possibility of uncovering enzyme functions that were hereto unknown. 

Why are they giving the credit to blind evolution? If life uses “sequence-dependent kinetics…to achieve various ends,” that sounds like intelligent design, not evolution. Design advocates are accustomed to forgiving logical malapropisms like this. They look past the magical thinking and see the operation of a designing mind with foresight and purpose, intimately familiar with the laws of physics, able to write code to utilize those laws in precision operations. Now, it becomes clear that the precision goes deeper than previously known. 

The Navajo nation: a brief history.

 Navajo Nation 

The Navajo Nation (Navajo: Naabeehó Bináhásdzo), also known as Navajoland,[3] is a Native American reservation in the United States. It occupies portions of northeastern Arizona, northwestern New Mexico, and southeastern Utah; at roughly 17,544,500 acres (71,000 km2; 27,413 sq mi), the Navajo Nation is the largest land area held by a Native American tribe in the U.S., exceeding ten U.S. states. In 2010, the reservation was home to 173,667 out of 332,129 Navajo tribal members; the remaining 158,462 tribal members lived outside the reservation, in urban areas (26 percent), border towns (10 percent), and elsewhere in the U.S. (17 percent).[4][5] The seat of government is located in Window Rock, Arizona. The United States gained ownership of this territory in 1848 after acquiring it in the Mexican-American War. The reservation was within New Mexico Territory and straddled what became the Arizona-New Mexico border in 1912, when the states were admitted to the union. Unlike many reservations, it has expanded several times since its establishment in 1868 to include most of northeastern Arizona, a sizable portion of northwestern New Mexico, and most of the area south of the San Juan River in southeastern Utah. It is one of a few Indigenous nations whose reservation lands overlap its traditional homelands. 

In English, the official name for the area was "Navajo Indian Reservation", as outlined in Article II of the 1868 Treaty of Bosque Redondo. On April 15, 1969, the tribe changed its official name to the "Navajo Nation", which is displayed on its seal.[6] In 1994, the Tribal Council rejected a proposal to change the official designation from "Navajo" to "Diné", a traditional name for the people. Some people said that Diné represented the people in their time of suffering before the Long Walk, and that Navajo is the appropriate designation for the future.[7] In the Navajo language, Diné means "the People", a term many Indigenous nations identify with in their respective languages. Among the Navajo populace, both terms are employed. In 2017, the Navajo Nation Council again rejected legislation to change the name to "Diné Nation," citing potential "confusion and frustration among Navajo citizens and non-Navajos."[8][9]

In Navajo, the geographic entity with its legally defined borders is known as "Naabeehó Bináhásdzo". This contrasts with "Diné Bikéyah" and "Naabeehó Bikéyah" for the general idea of "Navajoland".[10] Neither of these terms should be confused with "Dinétah," the term used for the traditional homeland of the Navajo. This is located in the area among the four sacred Navajo mountains of Dookʼoʼoosłííd (San Francisco Peaks), Dibé Ntsaa (Hesperus Mountain), Sisnaajiní (Blanca Peak), and Tsoodził (Mount Taylor). 

The Navajo people's tradition of governance is rooted in their clans and oral history.[11] The clan system of the Diné is integral to their society. The system has rules of behavior that extend to the manner of refined culture that the Navajo people call "walking in beauty".[12] The philosophy and clan system were established long before the Spanish colonial occupation of Dinétah, through to July 25, 1868, when Congress ratified the Navajo Treaty with President Andrew Johnson, signed by Barboncito, Armijo, and other chiefs and headmen present at Bosque Redondo, New Mexico.

The Navajo people have continued to transform their conceptual understandings of government since signing the Treaty of 1868. Social, cultural, and political academics continue to debate the nature of modern Navajo governance and how it has evolved to include the systems and economies of the "western world".[13] 

Reservation and expansion 

In the mid-19th century, primarily in the 1860s, most of the Navajo were forced to abandon their homes due to a series of military campaigns by the U.S. Army conducted with a scorched-earth policy and sanctioned by the U.S. government. The Army burned their homes and agricultural fields, and stole or killed livestock, to weaken and starve the Navajo into submission. In 1864, the main body of Navajo, numbering 8,000 adults and children, were marched 300 miles on the Long Walk to imprisonment in Bosque Redondo.[14] The Treaty of 1868 established the "Navajo Indian Reservation" and the Navajo people left Bosque Redondo for this territory.

The borders were defined as the 37th parallel in the north; the southern border as a line running through Fort Defiance; the eastern border as a line running through Fort Lyon; and in the west as longitude 109°30′.[15]: 68 

As drafted in 1868, the boundaries were defined as:

the following district of country, to wit: bounded on the north by the 37th degree of north latitude, south by an east and west line passing through the site of old Fort Defiance, in Canon Bonito, east by the parallel of longitude which, if prolonged south, would pass through old Fort Lyon, or the Ojo-de-oso, Bear Spring, and west by a parallel of longitude about 109º 30' west of Greenwich, provided it embraces the outlet of the Canon-de-Chilly [Canyon de Chelly], which canyon is to be all included in this reservation, shall be, and the same hereby, set apart for the use and occupation ofthe Navajo tribe of Indians, and for such other friendly tribes or individual Indians as from time to time they may be willing, with the consent of the United States, to admit among them; and the United States agrees that no persons except those herein so authorized to do, and except such officers, soldiers agents, and employees of the Government, or of the Indians, as may be authorized to enter upon Indian reservations in discharge of duties imposed by law, or the orders of the President, shall ever be permitted to pass over, settle upon, or reside in, the territory described in this article.[16]

Though the treaty had provided for one hundred miles by one hundred miles in the New Mexico Territory, the size of the territory was 3,328,302 acres (13,470 km2; 5,200 sq mi)[15]—slightly more than half. This initial piece of land is represented in the design of the Navajo Nation's flag by a dark-brown rectangle.[17]

As no physical boundaries or signposts were set in place, many Navajo ignored these formal boundaries and returned to where they had been living prior to US occupation.[15] A significant number of Navajo had never lived in the Hwéeldi (near Fort Sumner). They remained or moved near the Little Colorado and Colorado rivers, on Naatsisʼáán (Navajo Mountain), and some lived with Apache bands.[14]

The first expansion of the territory occurred on October 28, 1878, when President Rutherford Hayes signed an executive order pushing the reservation boundary 20 miles to the west.[15] Further additions followed throughout the late 19th and early 20th century (see map). Most of these additions were achieved through executive orders, some of which were confirmed by acts of Congress. For example, President Theodore Roosevelt's executive order to add the region around Aneth, Utah in 1905 was confirmed by Congress in 1933.[18]

The eastern border was shaped primarily as a result of allotments of land to individual Navajo households under the Dawes Act of 1887. This experiment was designed to assimilate Native Americans to mainstream American culture. The federal government proposed to divide communal lands into plots assignable to heads of household – tribal members – for their subsistence farming, in the pattern of small family farms common among Americans. This was intended to extinguish tribal land claims for such territory. The land allocated to these Navajo heads of household was initially not considered part of the reservation. Further, the federal government determined that land "left over" after all members had received allotments was to be considered "surplus" and available for sale to non-Native Americans. The allotment program continued until 1934. Today, this patchwork of reservation and non-reservation land is called the "checkerboard area". It resulted in the loss of much Navajo land.[19] 

In the southeastern area of the reservation, the Navajo Nation has purchased some ranches, which it refers to as its Nahata Dził, or New Lands. These lands are leased to Navajo individuals, livestock companies, and grazing associations.

In 1996, Elouise Cobell (Blackfeet) filed a class action lawsuit against the federal government on behalf of an estimated 250,000–500,000 plaintiffs, Native Americans whose trust accounts did not reflect an accurate accounting of money owed them under leases or fees on trust lands. The settlement of Cobell v. Salazar in 2009 included a provision for a nearly $2 billion fund for the government to buy fractionated interests and restore land to tribal reservations. Individuals could sell their fractionated land interests on a voluntary basis, at market rates, through this program if their tribe participated.

Through March 2017, under the Tribal Nations Buy-Back Program, individual Navajo members received $104 million for purchase of their interests in land; 155,503 acres were returned to the Navajo Nation for its territory by the Department of Interior under this program.[20] The program is intended to help tribes restore the land bases of their reservations. Almost 11,000 Navajo citizens were paid for their interests under this program.[citation needed] The tribe intends to use the consolidated lands to "streamline infrastructure projects," such as running power lines. 

Clan governance 

In the traditional Navajo culture, local leadership was organized around clans, which are matrilineal kinship groups. Children are considered born into the mother's family and gain their social status from her and her clan. Her eldest brother traditionally has a strong influence on rearing the children.

The clan leadership have served as a de facto government on the local level of the Navajo Nation.

Rejection of Indian Reorganization Act

Edit

In 1933, during the Great Depression, the Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) attempted to mitigate environmental damage due to over-grazing on reservations. Significant pushback was given by the Navajo, who did not feel that they had been sufficiently consulted before the measures were implemented. BIA Superintendent John Collier's attempt to reduce livestock herd size affected responses to his other efforts to improve conditions for Native Americans. The herds had been central to Navajo culture, and were a source of prestige.[21]

Also during this period, under the Indian Reorganization Act (IRA) of 1934, the federal government was encouraging tribes to revive their governments according to constitutional models shaped after that of the United States. Because of the outrage and discontent about the herd issues, the Navajo voters did not trust the language of the proposed initial constitution outlined in the legislation. This contributed to their rejection of the first version of a proposed tribal constitution.

In the various attempts since, members found the process to be too cumbersome and a potential threat to tribal self-determination. The constitution was supposed to be reviewed and approved by BIA. The earliest efforts were rejected primarily because segments of the tribe did not find enough freedom in the proposed forms of government. In 1935 they feared that the proposed government would hinder development and recovery of their livestock industries; in 1953 they worried about restrictions on development of mineral resources.

They continued a government based on traditional models, with headmen chosen by clan groups. 

Navajo Nation and federal government jurisdictions 

The United States asserts plenary power and thus requires the territory of the Navajo Nation to submit all proposed laws to the United States Secretary of the Interior for Secretarial Review, through the Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA).

The US Supreme Court in United States v. Kagama (1889) affirmed that Congress has plenary power over all Indian tribes within United States borders, saying that "The power of the general government over these remnants of a race once powerful ... is necessary to their protection as well as to the safety of those among whom they dwell".[22] It noted that the tribes did not owe allegiance to the states within which their reservations were located; they are considered wards of the federal government.[23]

Most conflicts and controversies between the federal government of the United States and the Nation are settled by negotiations outlined in political agreements. The Navajo Nation Code comprises the rules and laws of the Navajo Nation as codified in the latest edition.

Lands within the exterior boundaries of the Navajo Nation are composed of Public, Tribal Trust, Tribal Fee, Bureau of Land Management (BLM), Private, State, and BIA Indian Allotment Lands. On the Arizona and Utah portions of the Navajo Nation, there are a few private and BIA Indian Allotments in comparison to New Mexico's portion, which consists of a checkerboard pattern of all the aforementioned lands. The Eastern Agency, as it is referred to, consists of primarily Tribal Fee, BIA Indian Allotments, and BLM Lands. Although there are more Tribal Fee Lands in New Mexico, the Navajo Nation government intends to convert most or all Tribal Fee Lands to Tribal Trust. 

Economy 

The Navajo economy and culture has long been based on the raising of sheep and goats. Navajo families process the wool and sell it for cash, or spin it into yarn and weave blankets and rugs for sale. The Navajo are also noted for their skill in creating turquoise and silver jewelry. Navajo artists have other traditional arts, such as sand painting, sculpture, and pottery. 

The Navajo Nation has created a mixture of industry and business that has provided the Navajo with alternative opportunities to traditional occupations. The Nation's median cash household income is around $20,000 per year. However, using federal standards, unemployment levels fluctuates between 40 and 45%. About 40% of families live below the federal poverty rate.[100]

Economic development within the Navajo Nation has fluctuated over its history but has largely remained limited. One obstacle to investment has been the incompatibility of its two land management systems. Tribal lands are held in common and leased to individuals for specific purposes, such as home construction or for livestock grazing. Financial institutions outside of tribal lands require assets, including land, to be used as collateral when potential borrowers seek capital. Since individuals do not own the land outright, financial institutions have little recourse if borrowers default on their loans. Additionally, the wide-ranging bureaucracy involving elements of the U.S. Department of Interior,the Bureau of Indian Affairs, and the tribal government has created a complex network that is cumbersome and time-consuming for investors and businesses to navigate.

Self-employed Navajo workers and Navajo entrepreneurs are often involved in the grey economy. For instance, artisans staff roadside shops and cater to American and international tourists, travelers passing through Navajo Nation, and to the Navajo people themselves. Other Navajo workers find employment in the nearby cities and towns of Page, Arizona; Flagstaff, Arizona; Farmington, New Mexico; Gallup, New Mexico; Cortez, Colorado; and other towns along the I-40 corridor. Commute times vary for these workers. Because of the remoteness of some Navajo communities, they can last up to several hours. Economic push-pull factors have led a sizeable portion of the workforce to temporarily or permanently relocate to these border towns or to large metropolitan areas further away, such as Phoenix, Arizona; Albuquerque, New Mexico; Los Angeles, California; Chicago, Illinois; Denver, Colorado; and Salt Lake City, Utah. With nearly half of all Navajo tribal members living off the reservation, it is more difficult for the tribe to build social capital there and to draw from those people's talents. 

Navajo college students and graduates studying at universities in cities and towns outside the reservation may elect to stay there rather than relocate to the Navajo Nation because of the relative abundance of employment opportunities, connections with other classmates, and higher quality of life. This phenomenon contributes to human capital flight or "the brain drain", where highly skilled or highly educated individuals are attracted or pushed to a location with different or more economic opportunities. They are not incorporated into the community and local economy of origin.

The tribe has grown peaches (Prunus persica) since the 1700s.[101] Wytsalucy 2019 genotypes some of the trees here and distinguishes them from those grown elsewhere.[101] This analysis illuminates the different course that Navajo breeding of peach has taken from peach breeding elsewhere.[101]

Natural resources

Edit

Mining – especially of coal and uranium – provided significant income to both the Navajo Nation and individual Navajos in the second half of the 20th century.[102] Many of these mines have closed. But in the early 21st century, mining still provides significant revenues to the tribe in terms of leases (51% of all tribal income in 2003).[103] Navajos are among the 1,000 people employed in mining.[104]

Coal

Edit

The volume of coal mined on the Navajo Nation land has declined in the early 21st century.

Peabody Energy's Black Mesa coal mine, a controversial strip mine, was shut down in December 2005 because of its adverse environmental impacts. It lost an appeal in January 2010 to reopen.[105]

The Black Mesa mine fed the 1.5 GW Mohave Power Station at Laughlin, Nevada, via a slurry pipeline that used water from the Black Mesa aquifer. The nearby Kayenta Mine used the Black Mesa & Lake Powell Railroad to move coal to the former Navajo Generating Station (2.2 GW) at Page, Arizona. The Kayenta mine provided the majority of leased revenues for the tribe. The Kayenta mine also provided wages to those Navajo who were among its 400 employees.[106]

The Chevron Corporation's P&M McKinley Mine was the first large-scale, surface coal mine in New Mexico when it opened in 1961. It closed in January 2010.[107]

The Navajo Mine opened in 1963 near Fruitland, New Mexico, and employs about 350 people. It supplies sub-bituminous coal to the 2 GW Four Corners Power Plant via the isolated 13-mile Navajo Mine Railroad.[108] Parts of the Navajo Nation, through the Navajo Transitional Energy Company, acquired the mine and three mines in Montana and Wyoming.[109][110]

Uranium

Edit

The uranium market, which was active during and after the Second World War, slowed near the end of that period. The Navajo Nation has suffered considerable environmental contamination and health effects as a result of poor regulation of uranium mining in that period. As of 2005, the Navajo Nation has prohibited uranium mining altogether within its borders.

Oil and natural gas

Edit

There are developed and potential oil and gas fields on the Navajo Nation. The oldest and largest group of fields is in the Paradox Basin in the Four Corners area. Most of these fields are located in the Aneth Extension in Utah, but there are a few wells in Colorado, New Mexico and Arizona. The first well was drilled in the Aneth Extension in 1956. In 2006 the Paradox Basin fields were injected with water and carbon dioxide to increase declining production.[111] There are also wells in the Checkerboard area in New Mexico that are on leased land owned by individual Navajo.

The selling of leases and oil royalties have changed over the years. The Aneth Extension was created from Public Domain lands as part of a 1933 exchange with the federal government for lands flooded by Lake Powell. Congress appointed Utah as trustee on behalf of Navajos living in San Juan County, Utah for any potential revenues that came from natural resources in the area. Utah initially created a 3-person committee to make leases, receive royalties and improve the living conditions for Utah Navajo. As the revenues and resulting expenditures increased, Utah created the 12-member Navajo Commission to do the operational work. The Navajo Nation and Bureau of Indian Affairs are also involved.[112Several Navajo organizations deal with oil and gas. The Utah Diné Corporation is a nonprofit organization established to take over from the Navajo Commission. The Navajo Nation Oil and Gas Company owns and operates oil and natural gas interests, primarily in New Mexico, Colorado, and Utah.[113] Federally incorporated, it is wholly owned by the Navajo Nation.[114]

Renewables

Edit

In early 2008, the Navajo Nation and Houston-based International Piping Products entered into an agreement to monitor wind resources, with the potential to build a 500-megawatt wind farm some 50 miles (80 km) north of Flagstaff, Arizona. Known as the Navajo Wind Project, it is proposed as the second commercial wind farm in Arizona after Iberdrola's Dry Lake Wind Power Project between Holbrook and Overgaard-Heber. The project is to be built on Aubrey Cliffs in Coconino County, Arizona.[115]

In December 2010, the President and Navajo Council approved a proposal by the Navajo Tribal Utility Authority (NTUA), an enterprise of the Navajo Nation, and Edison Mission Energy to develop an 85-megawatt wind project at Big Boquillas Ranch, which is owned by the Navajo Nation and is located 80 miles west of Flagstaff. The NTUA plans to develop this into a 200-megawatt capacity at peak. This has been planned as the first majority-owned native project; NTUS was to own 51%. An estimated 300–350 people will construct the facility; it will have 10 permanent jobs.[115] In August 2011, the Salt River Project, an Arizona utility, was announced as the first utility customer. Permitting and negotiations involve tribal, federal, state and local stakeholders.[116] The project is intended not only as a shift to renewable energy but to increase access for tribal members; an estimated 16,000 homes are without access to electricity.[117]

The wind project has foundered because of a "long feud between Cameron [Chapter] and Window Rock [central government] over which company to back".[118] Both companies pulled out. Negotiations with Clipper Windpower looked promising, but that company was put up for sale after the recession.[118]

Parks and attractions

Tourism is important to the Navajo Nation. Parks and attractions within traditional Navajo lands include:

Shiprock Pinnacle (large volcanic remnants, elevation 7,178 ft, located in New Mexico near Shiprock)

Navajo Mountain (mountain along Utah and Arizona border, elevation 10,318 ft)

Chaco Canyon

Bisti/De-Na-Zin Wilderness

Canyon De Chelly National Monument

Navajo National Monument

Window Rock Tribal Park

Navajo Nation Museum

Navajo Nation Zoological and Botanical Park

Navajo Bridge

Kinlichee Ruins

Hubbell Trading Post National Historic Site

Grand Falls

Narbona Pass

Navajo Tribal Parks

Edit

The Navajo Nation has four Tribal Parks, which bring tourists and revenue to the Tribe.[119]

Monument Valley Navajo Tribal Park (on the Utah and Arizona border, near the town of Kayenta, Arizona)

Little Colorado River Gorge Navajo Tribal Park

Lake Powell Navajo Tribal Park – includes Antelope Canyon and hiking trail to Rainbow Bridge National Monument

Four Corners Monument Navajo Tribal Park

Navajo Nation Parks & Recreation also operates Tseyi Heritage Cottonwood Campground at Canyon de Chelly, Camp Asaayi at Bowl Canyon, and the Navajo Veterans Memorial Park.

Art and crafts 

An important small business group on the Navajo Nation is handmade arts and crafts industry, which markets both high- and medium-end quality goods made by Navajo artisans, jewelers and silversmiths. A 2004 study by the Navajo Division of Economic Development found that at least 60% of all families have at least one family member producing arts and crafts for the market.[citation needed]. A survey conducted by the Arizona Hospitality Research & Resource Center reported that the Navajo nation made $20,428,039 from the art and crafts trade in 2011.[120] 

Diné Development Corp. 

The Diné Development Corporation was formed in 2004 to promote Navajo business and seek viable business development to make use of casino revenues.[121]

The kuleshov effect: a brief history.

 Kuleshov effect 

The Kuleshov effect is a film editing (montage) effect demonstrated by Russian film-maker Lev Kuleshov in the 1910s and 1920s. It is a mental phenomenon by which viewers derive more meaning from the interaction of two sequential shots than from a single shot in isolation. 

Kuleshov edited a short film in which a shot of the expressionless face of Tsarist matinee idol Ivan Mosjoukine was alternated with various other shots (a bowl of soup, a girl in a coffin, a woman on a divan). The film was shown to an audience who believed that the expression on Mosjoukine's face was different each time he appeared, depending on whether he was "looking at" the bowl of soup, the girl in the coffin, or the woman on the divan, showing an expression of hunger, grief, or desire, respectively. The footage of Mosjoukine was actually the same shot each time. Vsevolod Pudovkin (who later claimed to have been the co-creator of the experiment) described in 1929 how the audience "raved about the acting... the heavy pensiveness of his mood over the forgotten soup, were touched and moved by the deep sorrow with which he looked on the dead child, and noted the lust with which he observed the woman. But we knew that in all three cases the face was exactly the same."[1]

Kuleshov used the experiment to indicate the usefulness and effectiveness of film editing. The implication is that viewers brought their own emotional reactions to this sequence of images, and then moreover attributed those reactions to the actor, investing his impassive face with their own feelings. Kuleshov believed this, along with montage, had to be the basis of cinema as an independent art form.[2][incomplete short citation]

The effect has also been studied by psychologists and is well-known among modern film-makers. Alfred Hitchcock refers to the effect in his conversations with François Truffaut, using actor James Stewart as the example.[3][4]

In the famous "Definition of Happiness" interview which was part of the CBC Telescope program, Hitchcock also explained in detail many types of editing to Fletcher Markle.[5] The final form, which he calls "pure editing", is explained visually using the Kuleshov effect. In the first version of the example, Hitchcock is squinting, and the audience sees footage of a woman with a baby. The screen then returns to Hitchcock's face, now smiling. In effect, he is a kind old man. In the second example, the woman and baby are replaced with a woman in a bikini, Hitchcock explains: "What is he now? He's a dirty old man."

The experiment itself was created by assembling fragments of pre-existing film from the Tsarist film industry, with no new material. Mosjoukine had been the leading romantic "star" of Tsarist cinema, and familiar to the audience.

Kuleshov demonstrated the necessity of considering montage as the basic tool of cinema. In Kuleshov's view, the cinema consists of fragments and the assembly of those fragments, the assembly of elements which in reality are distinct. It is therefore not the content of the images in a film which is important, but their combination. The raw materials of such an art work need not be original, but are prefabricated elements which can be disassembled and reassembled by the artist into new juxtapositions.

The montage experiments carried out by Kuleshov in the late 1910s and early 1920s formed the theoretical basis of Soviet montage cinema, culminating in the famous films of the late 1920s by directors such as Sergei Eisenstein, Vsevolod Pudovkin and Dziga Vertov, among others. These films included The Battleship Potemkin, October, Mother, The End of St. Petersburg, and The Man with a Movie Camera.