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May 23, 2012 Ex-CIA spy in Iran's Revolutionary Guard: Baghdad talks highlight Western naivete Putin's latest defiance shows Obama's whisper didn't work Tony Pugh: More private colleges offering tuition discounts Lisa Gerstner: 4 Money-Etiquette Questions Answered Mary Beth Franklin: How to Choose the Right Annuity for You Art Markman, Ph.D.: Get smart: How to bulk up your creativity muscles Israeli scientists use skin cells to help repair heart muscle Tina Susman: The wig wasn't enough: Man gets 13 years for posing as his dead mom The Kosher Gourmet by Emma Christensen:A simple way to do fish right May 22, 2012 David S. Cloud and Kathleen Hennessey: Obama changes mind on Pakistan invite to NATO summit --- and then gets dissed by country's president US Senate approves new sanctions against Iran ahead of Baghdad talks Warren Richey: Can US group challenge overseas surveillance act? Supreme Court to decide Supreme Court: Twins can't claim dead dad's benefits Thomas M. Anderson: Walking Away From a Mortgage Environmental Nutrition editors: The lowdown on a low-acid diet Pomegranate juice maker used deceptive ads, FTC judge rules Relatives outraged over spoof on Hamas chief's killing The Kosher Gourmet by Megan Gordon: Enjoy a celebration of the most rich and layered flavors: Black bean, sweet potato and quinoa chili May 21, 2012 Mark Clayton: Cybersecurity: How US utilities passed up chance to protect their networks Howard LaFranchi: NATO summit: Who will foot the bill for long-term Afghanistan security? Chris Farrell : Earn Dividends in Emerging Markets with This WisdomTree ETF James K. Glassman: 5 Stock Picks Among Online Retailers Stephen Whiteside, Ph.D. : Mayo Clinic Medical Edge: Social anxiety disorder --- or just shy? 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Jewish World Review How Tasers work By Marshall Brain http://www.JewishWorldReview.com | (MCT) Tasers are in the news often right now. Police officers are using Tasers more and more, people sometimes die after being hit by a Taser, the United Nations is looking into the possibility that a Taser is an instrument of torture, and so on. Which leads to the obvious question: How does a Taser work? So let's start at the beginning. Taser is the name of a company. The company makes a wide range of products designed to incapacitate people using high voltage shocks. There really is no magic here. Farmers have been using high voltage shocks - in the form of electric fences - for decades. Taser is the company that popularized the pistol version of this idea for use on people. I got my indoctrination to high voltage shocks on an otherwise peaceful summer day. When I was in college I worked on a farm that raised cattle, and they used electric fencing to keep the cows in their pasture. An electric fence is just a strand of bare wire that connects to an electric fence charger in the barn. About once a second, the charger sends out a high voltage pulse along the bare wire. It was raining and I was working with a cow when I accidentally touched the wire with my arm. It is hard to describe how it feels, but imagine all of your muscles tensing at once. It is not really painful, but you are incapacitated for sure. The voltage overwhelms the signals that your brain is sending to the muscles, and you lose control of your own body. A Taser pistol is a modernized, portable version of the farmer's electric fence. The gun contains a small version of an electric fence charger that can produce up to 50,000 volts. It is a battery-operated circuit that creates a high voltage pulse. That part is easy. The problem is this: how do you get the voltage into the criminal to incapacitate him? Taser solved this problem using darts. At the front of the gun are two small metal darts. The tip of the dart is a stainless steel needle with a barb on it like a fishhook. Each dart is connected to a thin, 20-foot-long wire. When the officer pulls the trigger, it opens a cartridge filled with high-pressure gas. The gas shoots the two darts out of the barrel of the gun, and the wires uncoil behind them. When the darts hit the criminal, the high voltage charge flows through the wires, into the darts and into the criminal's body. Most people fall to the ground when they get hit. Usually that is enough, but if necessary the officer can apply more that one dose of electricity. Two other things happen when the officer pulls the trigger. First there is a little shower of confetti. The dart cartridge contains small tags printed with the serial number of the cartridge. The tags show where the officer was standing when he fired and which cartridge was fired from that position. Second there is a data record that gets created. A Taser pistol can record the date, time and temperature at the time the officer fired the gun, as well as the length of each pulse and the number of pulses sent into the darts. This information makes it easier to reconstruct what actually happened at the scene. Thousands of Tasers in the United States have also been outfitted with small digital video cameras. They start recording as soon as the officer releases the gun's safety. The Taser Cam records audio and video, and has an infrared capability so it can record in the dark. The recording makes it easier to understand exactly what was happening when the officer fired the Taser. A Taser is supposed to be a non-lethal product, but people sometimes die after being hit by a Taser. In fact, dozens of people have died in the United States shortly after a Tasering. The question: Is the Taser the cause of death? The jury is out on this. Animal tests show that Tasers are not lethal, at least to animals. And in many cases where people die after being Tased, there are extenuating circumstances such as drug use or extreme exertion during arrest. One large scale study performed by Wake Forest University showed most Taser injuries to be minor. Both the United Nations and Amnesty International are studying Tasers to determine whether or not they should be classified as instruments of torture. If so, police would have go back to using pepper spray. Every weekday JewishWorldReview.com publishes what many in the media and Washington consider "must-reading". Sign up for the daily JWR update. It's free. Just click here. Comment by clicking here. Previously: How giant TV screens work How foreclosure works How Air Force One works How wildfire fighting works How vitamins work How ejection seats work How reattaching limbs works How hot air balloons work How paparazzi work How counterfeiting works How CDs work How the Edsel worked How Stinger missiles work How hybrid cars work How sharks work How mosquitoes work How diesel engines work How water towers work How the Dawn mission works How Kassam rockets work How the North American Eagle works Why aren't we flying to work? How tofu and soy milk work How Colony Collapse Disorder works How airbags work How the U.S. income tax works How gum works How caffeine works How Daylight Saving Time works How a cruise missile works How snow making works © 2007, How Stuff Works Inc. Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Information Services.

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