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Merck Group

The Merck Group, branded and commonly known as Merck, is a German multinational science and technology company headquartered in Darmstadt, with about 60,000 employees and a presence in 66 countries. The group includes around 250 companies; the main company is Merck KGaA in Germany. The company is divided into three business lines: Healthcare, Life Sciences and Electronics. Merck was founded in 1668 and is the world's oldest operating chemical and pharmaceutical company, as well as one of the largest pharmaceutical companies globally.

Merck operates in Europe, Africa, Asia, Oceania and the Americas. It has major research and development centres in Darmstadt, Boston, Tokyo and Beijing, as well as other Research and Development units in Taiwan, France, Israel, South Korea, India, and the UK. Merck pioneered the commercial manufacture of morphine in the 19th century and for a time held a virtual monopoly on cocaine.

Merck was privately owned until going public on the Frankfurt Stock Exchange in 1995 and is listed on the DAX index of Germany's top companies. The Merck family still controls a majority of 70.3% of the company's shares. The Merck Group includes around 250 companies in 180 countries; the current main parent company of the group, since 1995, is named Merck KGaA, and is itself mainly owned by the former main parent company, E. Merck oHG, which now operates as a holding company.

The American pharmaceutical company Merck & Co. was established as a subsidiary of Merck in 1891, but was nationalized by the United States in 1917, before being privatized again when George W. Merck, a member of an American branch of the Merck family, repurchased the stock in 1919. It is known as MSD (Merck Sharp and Dohme) outside of North America. The original Merck of Darmstadt holds the rights to the name Merck in all countries except the U.S. and Canada, where it is known as EMD (Emanuel Merck, Darmstadt), and the life science business specifically is known as MilliporeSigma. In 2015 Merck adopted a uniform brand identity for all its subsidiaries, and the company has stressed its intention to protect the brand of "the real Merck" globally and initiated litigation against its former subsidiary over use of the name.

In 2018, the company celebrated their 350th anniversary. Merck has formed a strategic alliance with the Technische Universität Darmstadt, which is located in the same town as Merck.

Origins and confiscation
The roots of Merck reach back as far as the 17th century in the Landgraviate of Hesse-Darmstadt (now a part of Germany). In 1668, Friedrich Jacob Merck, an apothecary, assumed ownership of the Engel-Apotheke ("Angel Pharmacy") in Darmstadt.

In 1816, Emanuel Merck, a descendant of the original founder, took over the pharmacy. Thanks to his scientific education he was successful in isolating and characterizing several different alkaloids in the pharmacy's laboratory, and by doing so also invented a number of drugs. He began the manufacture of these substances "in bulk" in 1827, touting them as a "Cabinet of Pharmaceutical and Chemical Innovations". He and his successors gradually built up a chemical-pharmaceutical factory that produced — in addition to raw materials for pharmaceutical preparations — a multitude of other chemicals and (from 1890) medicines.

In 1891, Georg(e) Merck established himself in the United States and set up Merck & Co. with Theodore Weicker in New York. Merck & Co. was confiscated following the First World War and set up as an independent company in the United States. Today, the US company, which operates as Merck Sharp and Dohme (MSD) outside the U.S. and Canada, has about 68,000 employees (December 2021) in 120 countries. It is one of the top 5 pharmaceutical companies worldwide, larger than its German ancestor, which employs 60,334 people in 67 countries (December 2021). While Merck in Darmstadt is the legal successor of the original Merck and retains the rights to the name "Merck" in all countries except the U.S. and Canada, it is sometimes known as the "German Merck" or "Merck Darmstadt" in North America. The company was formerly also referred to as "E. Merck" (Emanuel Merck).

Nazi years
In the years of the Nazi rule, the company was led by Karl Emanuel Merck who became a member of the Nazi Party in 1933 and subsequently received the title of Wehrwirtschaftsführer. In addition, Merck was president of the Hessian Chamber of Commerce and Industry as well as performing an advisory function in the Expert Advisory Council for National Health ("Sachverständigenrat für Volksgesundheit") of the NSDAP. During World War II, Merck was manufacturing war essential products such as narcotics, vitamins, biocides and other chemicals. According to the company's account, 265 forced laborers were working in the plant in Darmstadt, most of them women from Russia and Poland. Additionally, several hundred Fremdarbeiter ("foreign workers") from France and Belgium were employed throughout the war years. An air raid on 12 December 1944 destroyed nearly 70 percent of the plant and killed 55 employees.

Post-war
In 1973, Merck Ltd. acquired BDH Chemicals from the Glaxo Group. In the early 1980s Merck Group built a visitor center at its Darmstadt headquarters that featured a pyramid.

Merck was legally named E. Merck oHG until 1995. In 1995 it was listed on the Frankfurt Stock Exchange and became a KGaA, legally named Merck KGaA.

Merck KGaA established its philanthropic foundation in 2008 called Merck Foundation and Rasha Kelej currently serves as its CEO.

2000 to 2009
On 13 March 2006, Merck announced a takeover bid for Schering AG, the world's largest producer of oral contraceptives. On 23 March 2006, Bayer AG made a supported offer for Schering and Merck decided to drop out of the bidding for the company. Schering is not to be confused with Schering-Plough which was once part of Schering AG but was acquired by Merck & Co. in 2009. In September 2006 the company announced a takeover bid of $13.2 billion for Serono SA, Switzerland's largest biotech firm. The deal included a buy-out of the Bertarelli family's 64.5% stake in Serono to be followed by a public tender offer for the remaining shares starting in November 2006. The combined company has an R&D budget of approximately $1.1 billion and sales of approximately $4.6 billion. Its approximately $2 billion in sales of biologics would make it 7th among pharmaceutical/biotech companies. The new entity, Merck Serono, began operations in 2007.

2010 onwards
In 2010, Merck took over Billerica (MA) based Millipore Corporation for EUR 5.3 billion (US$7.2 billion). It is now Merck's life science business unit. With the acquisition of Millipore, Merck is consolidating its US holdings and shutting down the Gibbstown facility and warehouse. Gibbstown operations will be transferred to the new Philadelphia office and Millipore headquarters.

Merck Korea received the "Leading Investor Award" at the 5th Korea-EU Industrial Cooperation Day in 2011.

In December 2013, the company bought AZ Electronic Materials SA (AZEM) for about $2.6 billion in cash to increase its offering of specialty chemicals to the electronics industry.

In September 2014 Merck halted the clinical development of two drug candidates in development with Oxygen Biotherapeutics. One drug candidate suffered a lack of success in patient recruitment, with its MUC1 antigen-specific cancer immunotherapy drug, tecemotide (L-BLP25), missing its Phase I/II endpoint of increasing overall survival in patients with Stage III non-small cell lung cancer. Later in September it was announced that the company would acquire Sigma-Aldrich for $17 billion. After the acquisition was completed in 2015, Merck had around 50,000 employees. In November 2014, Merck and Pfizer agreed a deal for the latter to sell the former sharing rights to develop an experimental immunotherapy drug for a fee of $850 million.

In October 2015, Merck revealed it would return the rights of the Kuvan drug to BioMarin Pharmaceutical Inc. The drug is effective in the treatment of the rare genetic disorder PKU, however Merck is moving away from genetics into cancer treatment, immunology and neurology. In October, it was announced that Karl-Ludwig Kley, CEO of Merck since April 2007, would retire in April 2016, and be succeeded by Stefan Oschmann, who has been a member of the executive board since 2011. The company started building new facilities for its R&D operations and a new visitor center at its Darmstadt site in the early 2010s by 2015 had torn down the site's pyramid as part of the renovations.

In April 2017, the company announced it had completed the acquisition of food safety testing company, BioControl Systems Inc. In August of the same year the company announced the acquisition of Natrix Separations for an undisclosed sum.

In April 2019, Merck announced it would acquire Versum Materials. The acquisition was completed in October 2019 and represented an equity value of about U$5.8 billion. In the same year, Merck has also announced the acquisition of Intermolecular Inc, the California-based company for advanced materials. The acquisition was completed in September 2019 and represented an equity value of U$62 million.

In February 2020, Merck announced the divestment of its Allergopharma Business to Dermapharm, under an unspecified fee. The deal includes Merck's Portfolio in Europe and parts of Asia, including China and India.

In January 2021, MilliporeSigma announced it would acquire AmpTec to expand and enhance the businesses mRNA vaccine capabilities as well as its treatment and diagnostics offerings. In March, its Performance Materials division changed name to Electronics division. In December of the same year, EMD Serono (Merck Group operations in the US and Canada) announced it would acquire Swiss-based Chord Therapeutics and its lead drug cladribine, used in generalised myasthenia gravis and neuromyelitis optica spectrum disorder.

Merck consumer-health
In September 2017, Merck said it is considering options for its consumer-health division, including a potential full or partial sale, or strategic partnership. An equity analyst estimated the unit could command a purchase price of €1.8 billion to €2.7 billion from a full sale. In December Reuters reported that both Nestlé and private equity owners of Stada were preparing bids for Merck's consumer health group. Days later, Reuters again reported that Perrigo was also preparing a bid for the division in the region of €4 billion ($4.7 billion to $4.8 billion). In April 2018, Reuters reported that generic drug manufacturer, Mylan was in advanced discussions to acquire the consumer health business for between €3.5–4 billion (£3–3.4 billion). Later in the month, Reuters reported that Procter & Gamble would purchase the division for €3.4 billion euros (£2.96 billion; $4.2 billion).

Name

Merck in Darmstadt is the sole legal successor of the original Merck and retains the rights to the trademark "Merck" in all countries except the U.S. and Canada, where "EMD" brand is mostly used (it was introduced alongside Merck's 2001 logo ). In recent branding campaigns, the company has referred to itself as "the original Merck" and "the real Merck". The company was legally known as E. Merck oHG until 1995, when Merck KGaA became the main parent company and the former a holding company. Both oHG and KGaA are generic business entity type designations and not used in everyday speech or branding.

In 2015 Merck adopted a new logo to increase the visual differences between both companies, while also visualizing "vibrant science and technology" as the new company's brand. It has initiated litigation in several countries against its former subsidiary Merck & Co. (MSD) over infringing use of the Merck name. In 2016, the High Court of Justice in the United Kingdom ruled that MSD had breached an agreement with its former parent company and that only Merck of Darmstadt is entitled to use the Merck name in the United Kingdom; the judge also held that MSD's use of "Merck" as part of branding on its global websites were directed to the UK and infringed Merck's trade mark rights in the UK. In response, MSD has initiated counter-litigation in the United States.

After those controversies, Merck also adopted a new logo for EMD. The same look was also given to the logos of EMD Serono, MilliporeSigma, and EMD Performance Materials (renamed EMD Electronics in March 2021) divisions. Its corporate website is merckgroup.com in the world excluding U.S. and Canada, displaying normal Merck logo in the header, and emdgroup.com in U.S. and Canada, displaying use of its corporate name, Merck KGaA, Darmstadt, Germany, in the header and additionally displaying a disclaimer about trademark ownership in the footer.

On 7 December 2021, Merck, which uses the name EMD Electronics in North America, announced they would be investing $1 billion in a U.S. operations joint venture with Palantir Technologies to assist in solving some of the chip industries supply chain problems. The plan is for sites in Pennsylvania, Texas, California, and Arizona.

Price fixing settlement
Generics UK (Merck's former British subsidiary, the global Generics business being sold on 2 October 2007) paid a £12M out-of-court settlement with the Department of Health and Social Care of the UK over involvement in an alleged price and supply fixing cartel.

The NHS alleges various drugs companies exploited the oligopolistic market conditions, forcing the NHS to pay inflated prices. NHS fraud investigators believe there was a conspiracy to limit the supply of 30 of its most commonly prescribed drugs, including a class of penicillin antibiotics and to a generic version of best-selling ulcer treatment Zantac. The NHS has so far filed claims in relation to just three drugs, seeking damages of more than £150m, while the Serious Fraud Office (SFO) is conducting a parallel investigation into the price-fixing allegations limited to the supply of blood-thinning pill warfarin and penicillin-based antibiotics. Homes and offices of executives at six firms, including Ranbaxy, Generics UK, Norton Healthcare, Goldshield and Regent-GM were raided by the SFO in May 2002.

Acquisition history
The following is an illustration of the company's mergers, acquisitions, spin-offs and historical predecessors:

 * Merck Group
 * MilliporeSigma
 * Merck Millipore
 * Merck Serono
 * Merck (Founded 1668 by Jacob Friedrich Merck)
 * Serono (Acq 2006)
 * Millipore Corporation (Acq 2010)
 * Waters Associates Inc (Acq 1979)
 * Waters Chromatography Division (Sold 1994)
 * Amicon Separation Sciences (Acq 1996)
 * Tylan General (Acq 1997)
 * Bioprocessing Ltd (Acq 1999)
 * Microelectronics Division (Spun off 2001 as Mykrolis)
 * MicroSafe (Acq 2005)
 * NovAseptic (Acq 2005)
 * Newport Bio Systems (Acq 2006)
 * Serologicals Corporation (Acq 2006)
 * Guava Technologies (Acq 2009)
 * BioAnaLab (Acq 2009)
 * AZ Electronic Materials (Acq 2013)
 * Sigma-Aldrich (Acq 2014)
 * Sigma-Aldrich Corporation
 * Aldrich Chemical Co. (Merged 1975)
 * Sigma International Ltd (Merged 1975)
 * Ultrafine (Acq 2004)
 * JRH Biosciences (Acq 2005)
 * Proligo Group (Acq 2005)
 * Beijing Superior Chemicals and Instruments Co (Acq 2006)
 * Iropharm (Acq 2006)
 * Pharmorphix Ltd (Acq 2006)
 * Advanced Separation Technologies (Acq 2006)
 * Epichem Group Ltd (Acq 2007)
 * Molecular Medicine BioServices (Acq 2007)
 * BioReliance (Acq 2012)
 * BioControl Systems Inc. (Acq 2017)
 * Natrix Separations (Acq 2017)
 * AmpTec (Acq 2021)
 * Erbi Biosystems (Acq 2022)
 * Mirus Bio (Acq 2024)
 * Versum Materials (Acq 2019)
 * Dynaloy (Acq 2017)
 * Intermolecular Inc (Acq 2019)
 * Chord Therapeutics (Acq 2021)

Healthcare
After Wilhelm Adam Sertürner's isolation of morphine from opium in 1805, Merck pioneered (from 1827) the commercial manufacture of morphine for an expanding global market. From 1884 onwards, Merck also played role in the production and marketing of cocaine. Sigmund Freud, author of Über Coca (1884), was an enthusiastic collaborator in Merck's cocaine research, though the methodological sophistication of his self-experimentation studies has been challenged. Attention was directed at vitamins as a new product category, and Vigantol was introduced in 1927, followed by Cebion in 1934.

Following the defeat of Germany in World War II, Merck was granted permission by the military government to produce drugs, pesticides, food preservatives, reagents, and fine chemicals for laboratory use. Soon afterward the boom that is commonly known as the "Wirtschaftswunder" (economic miracle) set in. For Merck, this meant two-digit sales-growth figures for many years. Products of this time included corticoid preparations — for example Fortecortin, which is still used today — the cold remedy Nasivin or the hormone preparations Gestafortin and Mantova.

Merck currently employs over 2,500 people in its 4 R&D hubs via. Boston, Darmstadt, Beijing and Tokyo. In the year 2018, Merck invested over €1,6 billion in its R&D operations. The focus of Merck's current pharmaceutical R&D is on oncology, neurology and immunology. In oncology, its first marketed product is Erbitux (cetuximab), for which it has marketing rights worldwide, apart from North America. (Cetuximab was discovered by Imclone Systems, and is marketed in North America by Bristol-Myers Squibb.) Other areas of Expertise from Merck Healthcare include Fertility, Endocrinology and General Medicine, the later focusing on treatments for Diabetes, Thyroid disease and Cardiovascular diseases. Some products from Merck include Metformin, Bisoprolol, Levothyroxine and Digitoxin. Merck's clinical research strategy consists of a partnership with Quintiles in which the latter helps the former in the clinical development of all its compounds. In February 2019, Merck also announced a partnership with GSK to develop and commercialize M7824 (bintrafusp alfa*), a new Immunotherapy with potential in various difficult-to-treat cancers. In 2020, Merck launched partnership with Pechoin in China to develop "high-tech herbal" skincare products.

Life science
The life science business of Merck, formerly known as Merck Millipore, was created in July 2010 following the completed acquisition of the US company Millipore. It employs around 19'000 people in 66 countries and runs 65 manufacturing sites and uses the brands Sigma-Aldrich, Milli-Q and Millipore. This division comprises all Millipore activities and major segments of the former Merck division Performance & Life Science Chemicals.Merck Millipore had three business units: Bioscience, Lab Solutions and Process Solutions. The Bioscience business unit is dedicated to solutions and reagents for protein research and cell biology, cell culture solutions, as well as to products and services for the development of biopharmaceutical agents. The scope of activities of Lab Solutions included laboratory chemicals and other materials for research, science and industry, products and services for sampling, and test kits for the pharmaceutical, foods and diagnostics industries, along with products, consumables and services surrounding highly purified laboratory water for science and industry. Process Solutions focused on products and services for the production of chemical and biopharmaceutical agents. In 2022 the business was restructured and consisted afterwards of the entities Life Science Services, Science & Lab Solutions, and Process Solutions. The Life Science Services include the Contract Development and Manufacturing Organization (CDMO) and contract testing services. Science & Lab Solutions includes products for Laboratories and Quality Control organizations. Process Solutions supports the biopharma manufacturing processes of its clients with single-use products.

In 2015, Merck acquired SigmaAldrich and combined it with Merck Millipore. The company was branded Merck globally and MilliporeSigma in the United States and Canada The newly established life science business of Merck has 300,000 products and three business units: Research Solutions, Process Solutions and Applied Solutions. The company serves customers in biotech, pharma, diagnostics, food safety, academia, and environmental. Matthias Heinzel serves as the CEO of the life science business of Merck.

The Life Science business sponsors several award programs for graduate students. One of these awards, the Alfred R. Bader Award for Student Innovation recognizes advanced chemistry graduate students, typically in the field of synthetic organic chemistry.

Semiconductors
Semiconductor Solutions is the largest business unit within Merck's Electronics business sector. It provides materials, delivery systems, and services for the semiconductor industry. The business unit supplies products for every major production step in the wafer processing, including doping, lithography, patterning, deposition, planarization, etching, and cleaning. After the acquisition of Intermolecular, its capabilities allow material combinations to be tested directly in the specific application environment accelerating learning cycles. Since the acquisition of Versum and Intermolecular, inc., the company's portfolio in electronic materials was significantly expanded. The launch of the integrated organization was done on 1 June 2020.

Pigments and cosmetics
Merck started working on effect pigments in 1957. The business unit is called Surface Solutions. The core markets for Surface Solutions are automotive coatings, cosmetics, and, to a smaller extent, industrials. An example of its pigments is alumina effect pigments sold under the brand name Xirallic. Currently, this business unit pools all activities for pigments in lacquering, printing, and plastic applications, in the field of security technology (for instance counterfeiting protection), pigments for applications in the food and pharmaceutical areas, functional materials, and active substances and pigments for cosmetics.

M Ventures
M Ventures is a venture capital fund of Merck. In 2021, the funds available for investment were increased by Eur 600M to enable investments Biotechnology and Technology.

Emanuel Merck Lectureship award
The award was jointly established by Merck and the Technische Universität Darmstadt in 1992. It recognizes scientists who have made contributions to chemical and pharmaceutical research.

Future Insight Prize
During the company's 350th anniversary in 2018, Merck announced the Future Insight Prize The prize consists of a research grant of €1,000,000 ($1.1 million) every year through the next 35 years, to motivate innovation in areas that could solve humanity's most pressing issues.

title: Merck Group


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Edward Wilson (explorer)

Edward Adrian Wilson (23 July 1872 – 29 March 1912) was an English polar explorer, ornithologist, natural historian, physician and artist.

Early life
Born in Cheltenham on 23 July 1872, Wilson was the second son and fifth child of physician Edward Thomas Wilson and his wife, Mary Agnes, née Whishaw. A clever, sensitive, but boisterous boy, he developed a love of the countryside, natural history and drawing from an early age. He was sent as a boarder to a preparatory school in Clifton, Bristol, but after failing to gain a scholarship to public school, he attended Cheltenham College for boys as a day pupil.

His mother was a poultry breeder and he spent much of his youth at The Crippetts farm, Leckhampton near Cheltenham. By the age of nine, he had announced to his parents that he was going to become a naturalist. With encouragement and tuition from his father, he started to draw pictures of the wildlife and fauna in the fields around the farm. After passing his exams with honours in science in 1891, he went to Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge, where he read Natural Sciences, obtaining a first-class degree in 1894.

It was during his time there that he developed the deep Christian faith and asceticism by which he lived his life. He studied for his Bachelor of Medicine degree at St George's Hospital Medical School, London and undertook mission work in the slums of Battersea in his spare time. In February 1898, shortly before qualifying as a doctor, Wilson became seriously ill and was diagnosed with pulmonary tuberculosis, contracted during his mission work.

During a long convalescence from this illness he spent months in Norway and Switzerland, time he used to practise and develop his skills as an artist. He qualified in medicine in 1900, and the next year was appointed junior house surgeon at Cheltenham General Hospital.

In 1897, he met Oriana Fanny Souper at Caius House, Battersea, while he was conducting mission work. They married on 16 July 1901, three weeks before setting off for the Antarctic as a member of Robert Falcon Scott's expedition. The wedding was in Hilton, Huntingdonshire, where her father was vicar.

Discovery Expedition
From 1901 to 1904, Wilson acted as junior surgeon, zoologist and expedition artist, setting off on the Discovery Expedition on 6 August 1901. They reached Antarctica in January 1902. On 2 November, Wilson, Scott and Ernest Shackleton set off on a journey that, at the time, was the southernmost trek achieved by any explorer. The party had dogs but they were not experienced in using them and the food brought for the dogs had gone bad. With many of the dogs dead, they turned back on 31 December, having reached latitude 82° 17'S. They had travelled 300 mi farther south than anyone before them and were only 480 mi from the Pole.

Shackleton was deteriorating rapidly, coughing blood and suffering fainting spells and unable to help pull the sledge. Scott and Wilson, themselves suffering, struggled to get the party home. It was a close call. However, 93 days after setting off, having covered 960 mi, they reached the Discovery and safety in February 1903. The following month, Shackleton, having suffered particularly badly from scurvy and exhaustion, was sent home early by Scott on the relief ship Morning. On his return, Shackleton asked Wilson to join his Nimrod Expedition to Antarctica in 1907, but partly out of loyalty to Scott, Wilson declined.

Terra Nova Expedition
On 15 June 1910, Wilson set sail from Cardiff on the Terra Nova, as chief of the scientific staff of Scott's final journey, the Terra Nova Expedition. After making stops in Madeira, South Trinidad, South Africa, Australia and New Zealand, the Terra Nova was trapped for three weeks by pack ice, and finally arrived at Cape Evans in McMurdo Sound in early January 1911. A base camp hut was built and three weeks later work began to establish the supply depots in preparation for the journey to the South Pole the following austral spring. Deteriorating weather conditions and weak, unacclimatised ponies meant that the main supply point, One Ton Depot, was laid 35 mi further north of its planned location at 80°S, something that was to prove critical during the return journey from the Pole the following year.

In the austral winter of 1911, Wilson led the "winter journey", a journey with Henry Robertson Bowers and Apsley Cherry-Garrard, to the emperor penguin breeding grounds at Cape Crozier to collect eggs for scientific study. The 60 mi journey was made in almost total darkness, with temperatures reaching as low as -70 °F.

Frozen and exhausted, they reached their goal only to be stopped by a blizzard, during which their tent was ripped away and carried off by the wind, leaving the men trapped in their sleeping bags for a day and a half under a thickening drift of snow. When the winds subsided, by great fortune they found their tent lodged about half a mile away in rocks. Having successfully collected three eggs, and desperately exhausted, they returned to Cape Evans on 1 August 1911, five weeks after setting off. Cherry-Garrard later described this expedition in his memoir, The Worst Journey in the World.

On 1 November, 14 men set off from Cape Evans on the long trip to the South Pole. Seventy-nine days later, Wilson was one of the five-man Polar party that reached the Pole on 18 January 1912, only to find the pole had been claimed by Norwegian Roald Amundsen and his team just five weeks earlier.

Their return journey soon became a desperate affair due to the combination of exhaustion, lack of nutrients in their diet and exceptionally adverse weather. On 17 February, near the base of the Beardmore Glacier, petty officer Edgar Evans died, suspected to be from a brain injury sustained after a fall into a crevasse two weeks earlier. Then, in a vain attempt to save his companions, Captain Lawrence Oates deliberately walked out of their tent to his death on 16 March after his frostbitten feet developed gangrene. Wilson, Scott and Bowers continued on for three more days, progressing an extra 20 mi, but were stopped by a blizzard on 20 March, 11 mi short of the 'One Ton' food depot that could have saved them.

The blizzard continued for days, longer than they had fuel and food for. Too weak, cold and hungry to continue, they died in their tent on or soon after 29 March—Scott's last diary entry—still 148 mi from their base camp. Their bodies were found by a search party the following spring on 12 November 1912. Their tent was collapsed over them by the search party who then buried them where they lay, under a snow cairn, topped by a cross made from a pair of skis. When news of the tragedy reached Britain in February 1913, it was mourned nationally.

Affectionately nicknamed "Uncle Bill" by the men of the expedition, Wilson was the confidant of many, respected for his judgement, skills at mediation and dedication to others. By all accounts, Wilson was probably Scott's closest comrade of the expedition. Scott wrote, "Words must always fail me when I talk of Bill Wilson. I believe he really is the finest character I ever met." When Scott's final camp was discovered by a search team in November 1912, Bowers and Wilson were found frozen in their sleeping bags. Scott's bag was open and his body partially out of his bag – his left arm was extended across Wilson.

Legacy
In 1913 Wilson was posthumously awarded the Patron's Medal by the Royal Geographical Society for his work in the Antarctic. At Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge, the college flag, which Wilson took to the South Pole, is preserved.

Wilson's artwork and objects relating to him appear in several museum collections. The largest collection of his artwork is held at the Scott Polar Research Institute, part of the University of Cambridge, which cares for over 200 watercolours of British birds by Wilson, as well as a further 150 paintings made in Antarctica. The institute's Polar Museum displays a range of objects associated with Wilson, including:

 * A sledging flag his wife sewed for him, was, after his death, first displayed in Gloucester Cathedral, is now in the collection of the Scott Polar Research Institute.
 * A black flag from the Amundsen's South Pole expedition found near the South Pole and brought back by Wilson on the British Antarctic Expedition of 1910–1913.
 * A Royal Geographical Society Patron's Medal (George V issue), in a dark blue case, awarded posthumously to Wilson and presented to Mrs Wilson in 1913.
 * A candlestick made by Wilson out of a Huntley & Palmers biscuit tin during the British Antarctic Expedition.

The journal kept by Wilson during the South Polar journey on the Terra Nova expedition is held in the British Library, along with Captain Scott's diary from the expedition. The Wilson art gallery and museum in Cheltenham, holds a collection of watercolours and drawings made by Wilson, as well as the family papers of his father, Edward Thomas Wilson, who was instrumental in founding the Camera Club, museum, library, a fever hospital, district nursing organisation, and clean water provision for the town.

The in Dundee, the ship Wilson first travelled to Antarctica on, is preserved as a heritage site, and accessible to visitors. The Dundee Heritage Trust collection also includes a small collection of material including a scrapbook and photographs from the Terra Nova expedition.

The statue of Wilson on the Promenade in Cheltenham, modelled by Scott's widow Kathleen Scott, was unveiled on 9 July 1914 by Arctic explorer Sir Clements Markham. In September 2013 the Cheltenham Art Gallery & Museum was renamed 'The Wilson' in his honour. There is a large block of flats named after him in Hesters Way, Cheltenham. One of the houses at Cheltenham College is named Westal, after Wilson's family home on Montpellier Parade, Cheltenham.

There is a blue plaque on the former Caius House in Battersea. The Edward Wilson Primary School in Paddington, London is named after him. The students' café at St George's Hospital Medical School is named Eddie Wilson's.

In the 1948 film Scott of the Antarctic, Wilson was played by Harold Warrender. In the 1985 Central TV serial The Last Place on Earth, Wilson was played by Stephen Moore. In the 2007 BBC Four production The Worst Journey in the World, Wilson was played by John Arthur.

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

title: Edward Wilson (explorer)


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United State

United State may refer to :

 * Misnomer for United States, a sovereign state of North America
 * U.S. states, fifty of which make up (the majority of) the United States of America
 * Union of Russia and Belarus, sometimes called the United State (Союзное государство Soyuznoye gosudarstvo)
 * Former states of India, formed after the political integration of India:
 * United States of Matsya
 * United State of Rajasthan
 * United State of Saurashtra or United State of Kathiawar
 * United State of Travancore-Cochin
 * Unitary state
 * United State of Electronica, the Seattle dance/rock band
 * U.S.A. (United State of Atlanta), the album by rap duo Ying Yang Twins
 * "United State", the third track on the album Voices by Hall & Oates
 * "United State", the 2011 album by rock band Brand New Sin

title: United State


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Comfort Eagle

Comfort Eagle is the fourth studio album by American alternative rock band Cake. It was released on July 24, 2001, on Columbia Records, their first with the company.

Release
In its opening week, Comfort Eagle sold about 72,000 copies, debuting at number 13 on the Billboard 200. By 2002, the album had sold 408,000 copies. On February 2, 2003, it was certified gold by the RIAA for shipments of half a million copies.

Critical reception
Comfort Eagle was generally well received by critics, some noting its similarity to the band's previous albums, for better or worse.

Personnel

 * Cake
 * John McCrea – vocals, acoustic guitar, keyboards, percussion
 * Vince DiFiore – trumpet, keyboards, backing vocals
 * Xan McCurdy – electric guitar, keyboards, backing vocals
 * Gabriel Nelson – bass guitar, keyboards, backing vocals
 * Todd Roper – drums, percussion, Moog synthesizer, backing vocals
 * Tyler Pope – keyboard, electric guitar ("Opera Singer", "Short Skirt/Long Jacket", "Arco Arena")
 * Technical
 * Kirt Shearer – mixing
 * David Cole – mixing
 * Craig Long – mixing
 * Gabriel Shepard – mixing
 * Don C. Taylor – mastering

Charts

 * Album

 * Year-end

 * Single

title: Comfort Eagle


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Sevmorput

Sevmorput (Севморпуть, lit. Northeast Passage) is a Russian nuclear-powered cargo ship. The 1988-built vessel is one of only four nuclear-powered merchant ships ever built and, after returning to service in 2016 following an extensive refit, the only such vessel to remain in service.

Development and construction
After the Second World War, the Soviet Union began developing the Northern Sea Route in order to support the economic exploitation of the vast natural resources of the northern regions. The ambitious plan initiated by the 20th Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union in the 1950s led to the construction of powerful icebreakers to escort cargo ships through the ice-covered waters and extend the navigating season in the Russian Arctic. The flagship of the post-war Soviet icebreaker fleet was the world's first nuclear-powered icebreaker, Lenin.

While numerous warships and submarines were built with nuclear marine propulsion, attempts to utilize the nearly unlimited range provided by an onboard nuclear reactor to transport commercial cargo were limited to a small number of experimental prototypes. The United States had built the world's first nuclear-powered merchant ship, Savannah, primarily as a technological demonstrator and ambassador for the peaceful use of atomic power rather than an economically viable cargo ship. Similarly, both the West German Otto Hahn and the Japanese Mutsu were intended to be research ships and to provide experience from nuclear propulsion; the latter also never carried any commercial cargo.

However, the Soviet Union continued developing nuclear-powered ships to support Arctic shipping and began building new nuclear-powered icebreakers in the 1970s. On 30 May 1978, the Ministry of the Merchant Marine (MORFLOT) and the Ministry of Shipbuilding Industry of the Soviet Union signed a joint decision No. C-13/01360 for the development of an ice-strengthened nuclear-powered lighter aboard ship (LASH) carrier. The design work was assigned to the Leningrad-based Central Design Bureau "Baltsudoproekt".

The keel of "Project 10081" was laid at Zaliv Shipyard in Kerch, Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic, on 1 June 1982 and the ship was launched on 20 February 1986. The nuclear-powered LASH carrier was named Sevmorput (Севморпуть) after the Russian abbreviation for the Northern Sea Route (Се́верный морско́й путь). The ship's KLT-40 reactor plant reached criticality on 26 October 1986. Sevmorput was delivered to the state-owned Murmansk Shipping Company (MSCO) on 31 December 1988.

The overall price of the nuclear-powered cargo ship was reported to be around US$265 million.

Murmansk Shipping Company (1988–2008)
After leaving the shipyard and entering commercial service, Sevmorput sailed through the Mediterranean and around Africa until finally reaching the Soviet Far East. However, authorities in Nakhodka, Vostochny, Magadan and Vladivostok refused to accept the two-month-old ship into their ports due to popular protests. In addition the harbour workers also refused to load or unload any cargo or provide any port services due to fears of radiation leakage. This was caused by uncertainty about the safety of the ship's nuclear propulsion system and the shadow of the Chernobyl disaster only a few years earlier. The local newspapers had also reported a four-minute emergency on board the nuclear icebreaker Rossiya only a week before the arrival of Sevmorput. The ship was finally allowed to dock at Vladivostok on 13 March 1989.

The initial plan was to utilize Sevmorput in international transport, and the Soviet government applied for a permission to have the ship make several stops in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada, in March 1990. However, the permission was denied because the evacuation and emergency response measures of the city were not deemed adequate in case of an accident involving the ship's nuclear reactor. Later the ship was mainly used on the Murmansk-Dudinka route, but also made several trips to Vietnam in the early 1990s. The daily operating expenses of Sevmorput were reportedly around US$90,000 and she was not expected to make profit during the first two years of her career.

In the late 1990s, Sevmorput was laid up in Murmansk due to delays in the refueling of her reactor. The refueling finally took place in 2001 and later the ship resumed service on the Dudinka route.

In August 2007, it was reported that Sevmorput would be converted into the world's first nuclear-powered drillship due to lack of demand for cargo operators for lighters and the need of specialized drilling vessels in the Russian Arctic. The conversion at the Zvezdochka plant in Severodvinsk was to take only 18 months. However, the renovation project was cancelled in February 2008.

Atomflot (2008–present)
The management of the Russian nuclear-powered icebreaker fleet was transferred from MSCO to Rosatom in 2008. In October 2009, the general director of Atomflot announced that Sevmorput could remain in service for 15 years.

In late October 2012, it was reported that Sevmorput, which had been lying idle at the Atomflot base outside Murmansk since 2007, had been removed from the Russian Ship Register in July and would be sold for scrap. However, in December 2013 it was reported that the decision to decommission the nuclear-powered ship had been cancelled and that the vessel would be brought back to service by February 2016. Following a two-year refit and refueling of the reactor, Sevmorput left Murmansk in November 2015 for the first time in nine years to carry out sea trials in the Barents Sea.

Since returning to service in 2016, the world's only nuclear-powered cargo ship has been chartered mainly by the Russian Ministry of Defence for transporting cargo related to the development of military infrastructure in the Arctic. In addition, the vessel has occasionally transported supplies for oil and gas projects.

In October 2018, the Russian Federal Agency for Fishery (Rosrybolovstvo), Rosatom and various Russian fishing industry organizations began discussing the possibility of transporting Pacific salmon caught in Kamchatka to western Russia along the Northern Sea Route using Sevmorput. Initially, two test shipments of 5,000tonnes of frozen fish from Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky to Saint Petersburg were planned for 2019, but the second voyage was later cancelled after the first voyage turned out to be less profitable than expected. On 21 March 2019, Sevmporput sailed for the first time from Archangelsk to Utrenneye (Salmanovskoye) natural gas field at Gyda Peninsula to transport 17,000 tons of construction goods for Novatek's Arctic LNG-2 project. The passage took in total of five days. The ship completed the same journey also the next year in March 2020, delivering 20,000 tons of goods.

While Russian nuclear-powered icebreakers had occasionally operated in the Gulf of Finland, Sevmorput's pilot voyage in September 2019 marked the first time commercial cargo was carried to the Baltic Sea on board a Russian nuclear-powered vessel. While the vessel later returned to Murmansk, the sinking of the only Russian floating dock capable of accommodating the vessel in November 2018 forced Sevmorput to sail back to Saint Petersburg for propeller repairs in December 2019.

After transporting a second shipment of fish from Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky to Saint Petersburg in September 2020, reportedly on the orders of President Vladimir Putin, Sevmorput loaded prefabricated building modules for the new Vostok Station in Antarctica and departed on 5 October. This would mark the first time a nuclear-powered surface ship would sail to the Earth's southernmost continent. After leaving the Baltic Sea and passing through the English Channel, Sevmorput headed south along the European and African coasts. However, shortly after crossing the Equator the vessel unexpectedly slowed down from its usual transit speed of about 18 kn to about 6 to 7 kn and, after sailing back and forth along its past track for a while, changed course towards Africa. Although Rosatomflot initially declined to comment the situation, unofficial reports implied that Sevmorput lost one of its four propeller blades and divers had to remove the opposite blade to balance the propeller. On 26 November, it was confirmed that Sevmorput would have to head back to Saint Petersburg for repairs and the construction of the new Vostok station would be postponed to 2021 due to deteriorating ice conditions in Antarctica. After a winter lay-up, the vessel was drydocked in April 2021 and the repairs were completed in July. Although metal fatigue, foreign object and improper operation were all considered potential explanations, the root cause of the propeller blade failure could not be determined.

In August 2021, Sevmorput sailed to Murmansk. After spending two months at quayside, the ship returned again to Saint Petersburg to load nuclear power plant components for Rooppur Nuclear Power Plant under construction in Bangladesh. The cargo will be shipped to Vladivostok for transshipment.

In October 2021, BSK-Rybnaya Kompaniya chartered the nuclear-powered cargo ship to transport frozen fish from Kamchatka. The first voyage along the Northern Sea Route was scheduled for November 2021.

In October 2023, Sevmorput was one of the ships suspected by Finnish police of possible involvement in damage to the Balticconnector natural gas pipeline and telecommunication cables that occurred in the Gulf of Finland on 8 October. However, the anchor retrieved from the seabed next to the damaged pipeline was later identified as having come from the Chinese container ship Newnew Polar Bear that sailed alongside Sevmorput at the time of the incident.

On 24 December 2023, a fire broke out onboard Sevmorput while the vessel was moored at Atomflot's base in Murmansk. The fire was reportedly contained in one of the vessel's cabins and affected an area of about 30 sqm, was promptly extinguished, and caused no injuries.

According to Atomflot, Sevmorput is expected to remain in service until 2024.

General characteristics
Sevmorput is 260.30 m long overall and 236.60 m between perpendiculars. The breadth and depth of her hull are 32.20 m and 18.30 m, respectively. When loaded to the summer waterline, the ship draws 11.80 m of water. However, in ice-covered waters she operates with a slightly smaller draught of 10.65 m to improve the icebreaking characteristics of her raked stem. The gross tonnage of Sevmorput is 38,226 and net tonnage 11,468. The ship's deadweight tonnage is 33,980 tons at maximum draught and 26,480 tons while operating at reduced draught in ice. Her maximum displacement is 61,880 tons.

Although originally designed according to the USSR Register of Shipping rules of 1981 to the highest Soviet ice class available for merchant ships, ULA, Sevmorput is currently classified by the Russian Maritime Register of Shipping with a slightly lower ice class, UL. In addition to the national rules she was built according to the latest international regulations and conventions at the time, becoming the first ship built according to the Code of Safety for Nuclear Merchant Ships adopted by the International Maritime Organization in 1981. Special attention was paid to the safety aspects of the vessel and, in addition to running aground or colliding with the reinforced bow of an icebreaker, the Soviet naval architects even took into account the possibility of a passenger aircraft crashing on Sevmorput.

Power and propulsion
Sevmorput is powered by a single KLT-40 nuclear fission reactor with a thermal output of 135 megawatts. The reactor core contains 150.7 kg of 30–40- or 90-percent enriched uranium in uranium-zirconium alloy and has reportedly required refueling only twice. The nuclear power plant on board the vessel produces 215 tons of steam per hour at a pressure level of 40 atm and temperature of 290 C. In case of emergency steam can also be produced by a diesel-powered boiler (50 t/h, 2.45 MPa, 360 °C).

Unlike the Russian Arktika- and Taymyr-class nuclear-powered icebreakers, which have three fixed-pitch propellers and utilize nuclear-turbo-electric powertrain, Sevmorput is propelled by a single 4-bladed ducted controllable-pitch propeller mechanically coupled to a GTZA 684 OM5 steam turbine which has a maximum output of 29420 kW and turns the 6.7 m propeller at 115 rpm. At full power the propulsion system gives the ship a maximum speed of 20.8 kn at a draught of 10 m. She can also maintain a speed of 2 kn in 1 m thick level ice.

For electricity production Sevmorput has three 1,700 kW turbogenerators and three 2,000 kW standby diesel generators. In addition in case of blackout the vessel also has two 200 kW emergency diesel generators.

Cargo capacity and handling
Sevmorput can carry 74 lighters, each with a cargo capacity of 300 tons, in six holds and in two layers on the stern deck. The cargo hold hatches are designed for lighters with a total weight of 450 tons. The lighters are loaded and unloaded with a large gantry crane, manufactured by KONE, with a span of 21.3 m and lifting capacity of 500 tons. The gantry crane has two three-ton auxiliary cranes.

When not carrying lighters, Sevmorput can carry both 20- and 40-foot containers weighing up to 20.3 and 30.5 tons, respectively, in three layers. The total container capacity of the ship is. While loading and unloading are usually done by shore-based cranes, a small number of containers can be handled with two container attachments to the gantry crane in ports that do not have cranes capable of handling containers. The lifting capacity of the attachments is 38 tons. Later, Sevmorput has been fitted with two Russian-manufactured 60-tonne hydraulic boom cranes with a lifting radius of 43 m. The new cranes can also be used in tandem to lift 120-tonne loads.

title: Sevmorput