Residents Urged To Evacuate After Ooisonous Gas Detected At Japanese Hot Spring

Tokyo Residents close to a Japanese hot spring have been urged to evacuate after a family of four was killed by poisonous fumes. A local official says hydrogen sulfide gas has been detected near their homes.Sixteen people from four households near the hot spring, about 280 miles north of Tokyo, have been advised to leave their homes. While the levels detected are not dangerous, authorities say they're being cautious as they try to determine the exact source of the gas. Autopsy results indicate the family died from hydrogen sulfide gas poisoning. Heavy snow may have led to the build up of gas, which was then released in heavy concentrations into the air. Hydrogen sulfide gas is released at most hot springs in Japan, but it isn't a health hazard at low concentrations.

Do-It-Yourself Burial Grounds

A family in St. George, Vt., wants to turn 50 acres of undeveloped land into a natural burial ground for do-it-yourself funerals.One of the people proposing the plan, Lisa Carlson, said families could actually dig a grave or pick a spot to leave cremated remains -- no caskets, no concrete vaults and no embalming. "The idea of a garden park and nature reserve just makes so much sense," she said. The town select board has the final say on what happens to the land.No decision has been made yet, but the board's chair said the land might be better suited for commercial or residential use. Plans for similar natural burial grounds also are being considered in California, Ohio and Wisconsin.

Satan Taken Into Custody In Florida

A naked man in Lake County, Fla., claiming to be Satan was arrested after he threatened to kill a sheriff's deputy and then injured the man in a neighborhood street, according to a police report. Officers responded to complaints of a naked man screaming in the streets in the area of Wall Street and Grant Avenue in Eustis, Fla. Roy Lee HensonWhen deputies arrived, they found Roy Lee Henson walking with his boxer shorts around his ankles and screaming wildly, according to the report. Henson then lunged at a sheriff's deputy, the report said. Backup officers arrived and took Henson into custody as the man screamed he was Satan. The sheriff's deputy suffered minor injuries when he was kicked during the struggle with Henson, according to the report. Henson has been booked into the Lake County Jail on $10,000 bond. He faces charges of aggravated assault on a officer, resisting arrest with violence, exposure of sexual organs and disorderly conduct.

UFO Enthusiasts Gather In Rendlesham Forest

More than 100 people will gather in a Suffolk forest to mark 25 years since a famous UFO sighting of December 1980, US servicemen at RAF Woodbridge and Bentwaters reported mysterious lights in Rendlesham Forest.The strange lights included a glowing metallic triangle and a hovering object with red and blue lights. UFO enthusiasts are hoping there might be more sightings during the night. Brenda Butler, a local resident who has written about the events of 1980, believes the sightings of 25 years ago were real. "People who were coming up the Butley Road and who were in Woodbridge, Melton, Leiston and all around the area saw structured craft," she said. "And that's not the first time - we can go way back to the 1600s and we've had lights in the sky and in the forest." In 2003, Kevin Conde, a former US security policeman said he had been responsible for the lights in the forest. He said he and another airman shined patrol car lights through the trees and made noises on a loudspeaker as a prank."We just drove through the forest flashing the lights through the fog," he said. Despite Mr Conde's claim, some witnesses do not believe they saw patrol car lights in Rendlesham Forest. US Air Force Sergeant John Burroughs said: "The blue lights coming down from the sky...I still have never heard of any technology capable of doing what I saw happening."

Scientists Create Zombie Dogs

U.S. Scientists have succeeded in reviving the dogs after three hours of clinical death, paving the way for trials on humans within years. Pittsburgh's Safar Centre for Resuscitation Research has developed a technique in which subject's veins are drained of blood and filled with an ice-cold salt solution. The animals are considered scientifically dead, as they stop breathing and have no heartbeat or brain activity. But three hours later, their blood is replaced and the zombie dogs are brought back to life with an electric shock. Plans to test the technique on humans should be realised within a year, according to the Safar Centre. However rather than sending people to sleep for years, then bringing them back to life to benefit from medical advances, the boffins would be happy to keep people in this state for just a few hours. But even a this should be enough to save lives such as battlefield casualties and victims of stabbings or gunshot wounds, who have suffered huge blood loss. During the procedure blood is replaced with saline solution at a few degrees above zero. The dogs' body temperature drops to only 7C, compared with the usual 37C, inducing a state of hypothermia before death. Although the animals are clinically dead, their tissues and organs are perfectly preserved. Damaged blood vessels and tissues can then be repaired via surgery. The dogs are brought back to life by returning the blood to their bodies,giving them 100 per cent oxygen and applying electric shocks to restart their hearts. Tests show they are perfectly normal, with no brain damage. "The results are stunning. I think in 10 years we will be able to prevent death in a certain segment of those using this technology," said one US battlefield doctor.

Bigfoot Sighted In Johor?

Does Bigfoot exist in the jungles of Johor? Well, Vincent Chow believes so. Chow is adviser to the Malaysian Nature Society (MNS) Johor. He claims that he is certain Bigfoot exists in Johor, saying that many people had seen the creature. "Bigfoot exists. We have received reports from many people who said they had seen the creature in the forests of Tanjung Piai, Mersing, Kahang, the Endau Rompin National Park and Kota Tinggi," he said.Johor is located at the southern extremity of the Malay Peninsula, Malaysia, opposite Singapore. It is largely covered with rain forests and swamps."They (the sightings) are not a new phenomenon. In fact, I regard this as a unique feature of the Johor's treasures and we must take steps to safeguard it," he told Bernama. Chow said the latest sighting occurred last month in Kampung Mawai, Kota Tinggi, when three workers building a fish pond in the village claimed to have seen a Bigfoot family of two adults and a child. The workers returned to the area and saw several footprints, some large and others small, including one 45cm long, he said. "The footprints were proof of what the workers said they saw -- a family of Bigfoot. Their claim is credible," Chow said. He estimated that the creatures were between eight and 10 feet high, judging from the height of the branch of a tree that had been broken at the place. The creatures were believed to have brown-coloured fur, judging from some fur recovered there, and which had the smell of a human armpit. Chow said that according to the sightings at Endau Rompin, the creatures were not only tall but large too. Those who claimed to have seen the creatures said the Bigfoot family was walking near the Kincin River, probably in search of fish. Chow said that even the Orang Asli in Johor claimed to have seen the large creatures whom they called "Hantu Jarang Gigi". An Orang Asli from the Jakun tribe, Awang Jaafar, 48, from Kampung Puyut, Kahang, said his brother-in-law had seen the creatures, who were about 10 feet tall, while driving along a logging track at the Lenggor National Park last month. An Orang Asli girl, Empan a/p Melai, five, who was lost for six days in the Lenggor National Park while searching for rattan with her family early this month, said she had seen a large "King Kong" with huge arms and covered with black fur. She ran away from the creature, said her brother Awin a/l Sentok who narrated the story. Chow said MNS Johor was prepared to carry out a scientific study of the creatures, and urged other interested parties to do the same.

Stalin's Ape Man Super Warriors

The Soviet dictator Josef Stalin ordered the creation of Planet of the Apes-style warriors by crossing humans with apes, according to recently uncovered secret documents. Moscow archives show that in the mid-1920s Russia's top animal breeding scientist, Ilya Ivanov, was ordered to turn his skills from horse and animal work to the quest for a super-warrior.According to Moscow newspapers, Stalin told the scientist: "I want a new invincible human being, insensitive to pain, resistant and indifferent about the quality of food they eat." In 1926 the Politburo in Moscow passed the request to the Academy of Science with the order to build a "living war machine". The order came at a time when the Soviet Union was embarked on a crusade to turn the world upside down, with social engineering seen as a partner to industrialisation: new cities, architecture, and a new egalitarian society were being created. The Soviet authorities were struggling to rebuild the Red Army after bruising wars. And there was intense pressure to find a new labour force, particularly one that would not complain, with Russia about to embark on its first Five-Year Plan for fast-track industrialisation. Mr Ivanov was highly regarded. He had established his reputation under the Tsar when in 1901 he established the world's first centre for the artificial insemination of racehorses. Mr Ivanov's ideas were music to the ears of Soviet planners and in 1926 he was dispatched to West Africa with $200,000 to conduct his first experiment in impregnating chimpanzees. Meanwhile, a centre for the experiments was set up in Georgia - Stalin's birthplace - for the apes to be raised. Mr Ivanov's experiments, unsurprisingly from what we now know, were a total failure. He returned to the Soviet Union, only to see experiments in Georgia to use monkey sperm in human volunteers similarly fail. A final attempt to persuade a Cuban heiress to lend some of her monkeys for further experiments reached American ears, with the New York Times reporting on the story, and she dropped the idea amid the uproar. Mr Ivanov was now in disgrace. His were not the only experiments going wrong: the plan to collectivise farms ended in the 1932 famine in which at least four million died. For his expensive failure, he was sentenced to five years' jail, which was later commuted to five years' exile in the Central Asian republic of Kazakhstan in 1931. A year later he died, reportedly after falling sick while standing on a freezing railway platform.

Father Jailed Over Possessed Baby

A school adviser who worked closely with police has been jailed for life for torturing and killing his baby because he thought she was possessed. Sitab Ullah left his three-month-old daughter Samira with injuries and bruising from head to foot after claiming spirits were inside her. Ullah had been a pillar of his community until the death of his father, which made him turn to drugs, Bob Marshall-Andrews QC, defending, told the Old Bailey.Ullah, 26, of Maida Vale, north-west London, was found guilty of murder on Wednesday. Jailing him for a minimum term of 20 years, Judge Stephen Kramer said: "You abused your role as a father." Ullah had made sure no-one from the outside world saw Samira soon after she returned home from hospital. "She was defenceless and particularly vulnerable. She could not articulate to anyone how she felt, except for crying," said the judge. "It appears from the evidence that you thought she was, or might have been, possessed by evil spirits as a consequence of your drug habit." Ullah's wife, Salma Begum, 25, has pleaded guilty to child neglect and is to be sentenced. Ullah was a community worker at North Westminster sixth-form college in Paddington, west London, where he liaised with police. He was trusted enough to be allowed to sit in on interviews as an "appropriate adult" chaperoning Bangladeshi youngsters at police stations. But while Ullah was well thought of by local police, he was a secret crack addict who made Samira's short life a living hell.

Life's Ingredients Circle Sun-Like Star

The first evidence that some of the basic organic building blocks of life can exist in an Earth-like orbit around a young Sun-like star has been provided by NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope. Spitzer took infrared spectrograms of 100 very young stars in a nearby stellar nursery, a huge cloud of dust and gas 375 light years away in the constellation Ophiuchus. And one of those stars showed signs of the organic molecules, acetylene and hydrogen cyanide.These gases, when combined with water, can form several different amino acids. These are needed to form proteins, as well as one of the four chemical letters, or bases, in DNA, called adenine. The organic molecules were detected in a ring of dust and gas circling a young star called IRS 46. Such dust rings, found around all of the young stars that were examined by the Spitzer telescope, are believed to be the raw material for planetary systems. The spectrographic data showed that the gases were so hot that they must be orbiting close to the star, approximately in its "habitable zone", the region where Earth orbits the Sun and where water is just at the borderline between liquid and gaseous states. The detection supports the widely held theory that many of the molecular building blocks of life were present in the solar system even before planets formed, thus assisting the initial formation of complex organic molecules and the start of life itself. Observations earlier in 2005 by a different team using Spitzer showed that simpler organic molecules, called polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, were present in galaxies as much as 10 billion years ago. The star IRS 46 and its emerging planetary system "might look a lot like ours did billions of years ago, before life arose on Earth", said Fred Lahuis of Leiden Observatory in the Netherlands, who led the research team. Acetylene and hydrogen cyanide have been detected before in places closer to home, such as the atmospheres of the giant planets Jupiter and Saturn, and in comets. Observations by the European Infrared Space Observatory have also shown the compounds to exist around massive stars. But the new findings are the first to show they can occur around other Sun-like stars, and in a region where planets are likely to form. Follow-up observations with the Keck Observatory in Hawaii suggest that a stellar wind is beginning to blow away the dust surrounding IRS 46. This may be the start of what is thought to be a final stage in the formation of planets.

Double-Mouthed Fish Pulled From Nebraska Lake

This fish didn't have a chance. A rainbow trout pulled out of Holmes Lake last weekend had double the chance to get hooked: It had two mouths.A rainbow trout fished out of Holmes Lake in Lincoln, Nebraska Clarence Olberding, 57, wasn't just telling a fisherman's fib when he called over another angler to look at the two-mouthed trout. It weighed in at about a pound. "I reached down and grabbed it to take the hook out, and that's when I noticed that the hook was in the upper mouth and there was another jaw protruding out below," said Olberding. He said in his 40 years of fishing, he's never seen anything like it. Don Gabelhouse, head of the fisheries division of the Nebraska Game and Parks Commission, said a two-mouthed fish was new to him, too. "It's probably a genetic deformity," he said. "I don't think there's anything wrong with it." The second mouth didn't appear to be functional, Olberding said. He has plans for the fish, which don't included mounting. "I'm going to smoke it up and eat it," he said

Marlie Casseus A-OK

Marlie Casseus, 14, a Haitian girl who has a 16-pound (7.26 kg) tumor-like growth on her face, lying down before surgery Marlie Casseus, after surgeons removed the growthDoctors say the operation went so smoothly they were able to remove the mass from both sides of Marlie's face and reconstruct much of her nose. They had expected to be able to do only one side. This is the first of many operations for Marlie. Doctors hope to reconstruct her jaw in about seven weeks when she is well enough to withstand more surgery.

Scientist May Have Found Mars Wreckage

The British scientist behind the failed Beagle 2 probe said Tuesday he believes he has located the craft's wreckage on the surface of Mars. Nothing has been heard from Beagle 2 — named for the ship that took naturalist Charles Darwin on his 19th-century voyage of discovery — since it separated from its mother ship Dec. 19, 2003. It had been due to land on Mars six days later.Colin Pillinger, the lead scientist on the mission, said the latest images from NASA's Mars Global Surveyor spacecraft suggested Beagle plunged into a crater near its planned landing site. While the 143-pound craft is too small to be seen in the pictures, Pillinger said the crater showed signs of a heavy impact. "There is a lot of disturbance in this crater, particularly a big patch on the north crater wall, which we think is the primary impact site," Pillinger told the British Broadcasting Corp. "There are then other features around the crater consistent with the airbags bouncing around and finally falling down into the middle. Then, when you cut the lace, the airbags fall apart giving three very symmetrical triangles." Scientists attempted to contact Beagle for months after it disappeared before admitting defeat. An internal report in 2004 gave no definitive reason for the loss of the craft but suggested Beagle may have hit the planet's surface too hard because Mars' atmosphere was not as dense as expected due to dust storms. The loss of the probe, which cost the government more than $40 million and the private sector another $80 million, prompted questions in Britain about Europe's ability to participate in the race to Mars. Pillinger is seeking funds and sponsorship for a fresh mission to Mars, possibly as early as 2007.

Riddle Of The "Corpse Bride"

Peering through the glass at a mannequin‘s veined hands, sparkling eyes and eerie smile, the small crowd gathered outside a store in northern Mexico tries to settle a macabre riddle beguiling many. Is the tall, slender bridal figure in the window a richly detailed shop‘s dummy or, as a local legend says, the decades-old embalmed corpse of the former store owner‘s daughter?.La Pascualita Peering through the glassThe haunting figure known as ‘La Pascualita,‘ or ‘Little Pascuala‘ first appeared 75 years ago in the window of the bridal gown store in the city of Chihuahua. Since then, the striking realism of the dummy has spawned supernatural tales and reports of a miracle, and even inspired a foot-stomping accordion ballad played on local radio. The figure has drawn a stream of people from across the desert state of Chihuahua over the past eight decades, and is now attracting curious visitors from South America, the United States and Europe, the owners of the La Popular store say. As cars and trucks rumble by the shop on a busy city street, the entranced visitors smudge their noses up against the store window and try to decide for themselves if it‘s a corpse. "She looks good for all the years that she‘s been here," Yolanda Robles, who trekked to the shop out of curiosity from Phoenix, Arizona, said as she studied the rosary-clutching figurine. "There are just so many details, like her hair and the nails on her hand, that it just has to be true," she added. Through the years the story has bloomed into a tale with all the rich characteristics of magic realist fiction. It all began on March 25, 1930, when the dummy was first placed in the store front window. Dressed in a spring-season bridal gown, the figure immediately gripped the attention of passers by with its disquieting, wide-set glass eyes, real hair and blushing skin tones. Pascualita is unique among other shop mannequins in the sleepy backwater state capital. Rapt locals soon began to notice a striking resemblance to the shop‘s then owner, Pascuala Esparza. A rumor quickly spread that the figure was not a dummy, but her daughter who, it was said, died from the bite of a Black Widow spider on her wedding day.A striking resemblance to the shop‘s then owner, Pascuala Esparza"She started to receive abusive phone calls from angry citizens who accused her of embalming her daughter," the store‘s present owner Mario Gonzalez said in his office above the wood-paneled shop floor. "She decided to issue a formal denial through a public notary in the city, but by then it was too late. Nobody believed her and the name ‘Pascualita‘ stuck," he added. The name of the daughter, if Esparza ever had one, became lost in time. Down the years, the tale has been embellished with claims of supernatural happenings, including visits by a love-sick French magician who is said to bring the dummy magically to life at night, and take her out on the town. Others say that her gaze follows them around the store, or that she shifts positions at night in the darkened shop window to the surprise of passers by. Spooked by the tales, several jittery shop workers say they dread being the last to leave the store in the evening, and some of them refuse to change the dummy‘s outfits. Indeed, twice a week her outfits are changed, always using the more classic bridal styles that Gonzalez and his staff consider more appropriate and dignified. The changing is done -- perhaps a bit theatrically -- behind curtains put up in the shop window to preserve the dummy‘s modesty. "Every time I go near Pascualita my hands break out in a sweat," shopworker Sonia Burciaga said."Her hands are very realistic and she even has varicose veins on her legs. I believe she‘s a real person." While Pascualita is more of a curio than a religious draw in devoutly Catholic Mexico, a few people have left votive candles outside the shop and even attribute a miracle to her. "One woman was having a violent argument with her boyfriend close to the store. As she turned to walk away from her lover, he pulled out a pistol and shot her," Gonzalez said. "As she fell she looked up and saw the figure in the shop window and said, ‘Save me Pascualita, save me!‘ And you know what? She survived," he adds. Other tributes to the mannequin have included an altar of sugar skulls, flowers and candles left by local school children each year on November 2 -- Mexico‘s Day of the Dead -- and a ballad by popular Tex-Mex combo ‘Los Archies.‘ Among those to visit the bride have been popular television figures such as Mario Kreutzberger, better known as ‘Don Francisco‘, whose syndicated show has stirred up interest in the figure throughout Latin America. As more visitors come to the shop each year, Gonzalez says he is thinking of getting a visitors‘ book and even opening a small museum to Pascualita. But asked to settle once and for all whether she is a dummy or a corpse, he just smiles and shakes his head. "Is it true? A lot of people believe it is, but I really couldn‘t say."

Mission To Pluto

NASA's New Horizons will be the first spacecraft to visit Pluto and its moon Charon. No spacecraft has ever visited the planet, and not even the Hubble Space Telescope can spot details on its rocky, icy surface. A NASA picture showing Technicians installing strips of the New Horizons mission decal on the spacecraft fairing in the Payload Hazardous Servicing Facility at the Kennedy Space CentreAddressing a press conference from the Johnson Space Centre, NASA scientist Dr Alan Stern said the study of Pluto would help scientists learn about the origin of the solar system. New Horizons is scheduled to liftoff in January 2006 from Launch Complex 41 at the Kennedy Space Centre. The journey to Pluto will take nine years. After launch aboard an Atlas V, New Horizons is expected to cross the entire span of the solar system in record time, and conduct flyby studies of Pluto and Charon in 2015. Scientists hope the seven science instruments on the piano-sized probe will shed light on the bodies' surface properties, geology, interior makeup and atmospheres.

Eight Sent To Asylum After Horror Exorcism Killings In Mexico

A judge ordered eight adults committed to a prison psychiatric facility for 40 years for the grisly exorcism slayings of a seven-month-old baby and a 13-year-old girl in a remote mountain community in western Mexico.The brutality of the Dec. 7 killings -- the baby was hacked to death and dismembered while the teenager killed with stones -- has shocked Mexico. Officials say the killers were the victims' own parents, grandparents, uncles and aunts, who had become convinced the girls were demons or possessed by the devil. They carried out the ritual slayings, accompanied by prayers, the lighting of candles and the sacrifice of farm animals. A ninth suspect -- an aunt described as the alleged instigator of the slayings -- remains at a psychiatric hospital in the state capital, reportedly in an even worse state of mental illness. Judge Ana Maria Raya Razo, who ordered the commitment, said that members of the extended family had acknowledged carrying out killings. They said they were convinced they had to save themselves from demons. "The psychiatric testimony showed that they were suffering from a delusional psychotic state, with paranoia and hallucinations," Razo said from Penjamo, the Guanajuato state township where the killings occurred. "For example, they said they saw animals, demons in the girls," Razo said, citing testimony from the case. "They said they had animal's faces, the faces of monkeys, that they had demons inside and had to be killed in order to for them [the adults] to save themselves," she added. According to Rodolfo Gonzalez, spokesman for the Guanajuato Attorney General's Office, police were tipped off to the killings by an anonymous phone call. They traveled on foot -- the only way into the remote, three-house hamlet where the family lived -- and found the baby girl mutilated, and the body of 13-year-old Juana Perez Frausto tied to a stake and battered to death. The baby, Maria Elena Perez Gutierrez, had had her arms and legs cut off, and her belly cut open. The suspects later claimed that they saw animal excrement instead of her intestines.About 10 children and adults -- members of the same extended family of about 30 -- were found locked into a house, where they had been confined for three days, apparently because they too were suspected of being possessed. According to police reports, goats, pigs and chickens had been sacrificed at the site. Ismael Gonzalez, private secretary to the mayor of Penjamo, located 290km west of Mexico City, said the suspects were known as "a normal family." "This is the first case like this here ... this is not what people in Penjamo do," Gonzalez said. He said that Amalia Perez Hernandez, who alleged started the hysteria after visiting a faith healer, had become catatonic and had been taken to a psychiatric hospital after she was detained. The suspects -- Reinaldo Perez Hernandez and Hermelinda Frausto Lopez, the parents of the 13-year-old -- and the parents of the baby, -- helped kill their daughters, but were found not responsible for murder due to insanity.

Dead Filipino Maid’s Heart Missing

A Philippine Embassy official claimed that the heart of a dead maid was missing when an autopsy was conducted in her homeland, news reports said. First Secretary and Consul Crescente R. Relacion told a Singapore coroner’s court about the missing organ.State Coroner Earnest Lau had come to a ruling of suicide in the death of Emely Maguddayao Batoon, 22, found lying with a knife in her chest on the toilet floor of her employer’s parents flat on January 5, 2004. There was no evidence of abuse, but the young woman had problems adjusting and had told her Singapore employer two days earlier that she wanted to return home, an inquest revealed. Relacion said that forensic pathologist Gilbert Lau had assured all parties concerned that the heart, together with other internal organs, were returned to the body at the end of his autopsy in Singapore. The National Bureau of Investigation in the Philippines submitted a report following another autopsy stating that the heart was missing, Relacion said. Lau said Friday that it was not the court’s role to ascertain the whereabout of the allegedly missing organ. He suggested that Batoon’s family could institute a civil claim if ”something was taken”.

Girl's Surgery A Success

A Haitian girl gave a thumbs up to doctors a day after they finished removing much of a 16-pound tumor-like mass that had engulfed her face. Doctors at Jackson Memorial Medical Center in Miami called the 17-hour procedure a success. They said it went so well they were able to remove the growth from both sides of 14-year-old Marlie Casseus' face, rather than just one side as planned.Marlie Casseus: Before the Tumor / And with the TumorMarlie was breathing on her own and was in stable condition at the center's Holtz Children's Hospital, said Dr. Jesus Gomez of the University of Miami School of Medicine, one of the surgeons involved in the operation. "She's doing extremely well. She's healing according to plan. She's extremely happy. We're extremely excited," an exhausted Gomez told reporters. Gomez said doctors are still concerned about the risk of infection. He called Marlie a brave girl. "I asked her in my broken Creole, `Marlie, if you're OK, give me thumbs up,' and she raised her thumb up," he said. Casseus suffers from a rare form of polyostotic fibrous dysplasia, a nonhereditary, genetic disease that causes bone to become swollen and jelly-like. Doctors said the pressure of the growth on her eye socket would have caused her to go blind if they hadn't operated.

Male Cat Breast-Feeds Kittens

In the village of Novopokrovka of the Tumen region of Russia, a strange phenomenon has been discovered. A tom-cat called Barsik has been looking after kittens on his own. But that's not all. The strangest thing is that the heroic father "breast-feeds" them. When Barsik's "girlfriend" died, his owners decided to take the kittens. When the kittens were brought, Barsick accepted them and began to feed them right away. And the cat’s masters are totally sure that Barsik has milk.Veterinarians have read of these kinds of cases in special literature but they have never seen anything like that in real life. So it's great luck for them to come across a nursing tom-cat. According to Svetlana Beletskaya, the assistant at the local surgery department, the tom-cat might, genetically, have female signs. Both the pet's masters and the professionals have decided that since he has "adopted" the babies, it would be wiser to let him nurse them.

Dog Heads' Mystery Solved

An 82-year-old butcher has admitted to dumping 30 dog heads in a moat near the main detention centre of the Tokyo police department. Most of the severed heads were decomposed, some of them skeletal.
The moat where the dog's heads were found in Tokyo's Katsushika-ku.On Friday, Japanese public broadcaster NHK and Kyodo News agency reported police were questioning the man, who runs a neighbourhood meat shop. He has apparently told the police he imported the dogs - frozen and already separated into heads and bodies - from China to sell as food. Reports quote the butcher as saying all the torsos had been sold and, as there was little interest in the heads, he dumped them into the moat, hoping they would be eaten by the fish. An official at the nearby Kameari police department said Toyko police are investigating the bizarre incident, suspecting the violation of animal protection law and vandalism. Toyko police say the shape and size of the heads suggests they were of adult dogs. Investigators believe no human heads are included in the discovery. Police plan to remove the heads from the water.

Mother Squids Nurse Eggs

Researchers said they have uncovered evidence that some mother squids nurse their eggs for months after laying them, helping to disprove a long-held theory that all female squids simply abandoned new offspring on the ocean floor.In this undated photo provided by the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute a squid is shown carrying pouches of eggs in its tentacles disproving a long-held theory that all female squids simply abandoned new offspring on the ocean floor.Mother squids of the Gonatus onyx species were found to lug around pouches of new eggs in their tentacles for up to six to nine months at a time, even though the load can weigh a quarter of their own weight and makes the mother slower and more vulnerable to predators, according to a study published in the Dec. 15 issue of the journal Nature. Physiologist Brad A. Seibel, of the University of Rhode Island, and two researchers from the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute made the discovery while patrolling the deep waters of a submerged canyon off Monterey Bay with a robotic submarine. "Our finding is unexpected because this behavior differs from the reproductive habits of all other known squid species," Seibel said. The findings suggest that similar maternal behavior might exist in other squid-like creatures, said Steven H.D. Haddock, one of the Monterey Bay researchers. There are between 700 and 1,000 known types of squids and octopi.

Doctors Removing 16-Pound Face Tumor

A 14-year-old Haitian girl was undergoing a groundbreaking operation Wednesday to remove a 16-pound tumor-like mass from her face. The operation, which began around 8:30 a.m., is the first of many Marlie Casseus must undergo.This photo provided by Holtz Children's Hospital in Miami shows Marlie Casseus, 16, of Haiti, after she was admitted.The teen suffers from a rare form of Polyostotic Fibrous Dysplasia, a nonhereditary, genetic disease that causes bone to become "like a big a bowl of jelly with some bone inside," according to University of Miami School of Medicine's Dr. Jesus Gomez, one of a team of nearly a dozen specialists performing the 14-hour procedure. Gomez said about 150,000 people worldwide are diagnosed with the disease, but only 3 percent suffer such an extreme condition. He added that Marlie's growth was the largest he had ever seen and that every bone in her body was affected by the disease. Her liver and spleen were already altered because of it. He said Marlie is in constant pain and must be medicated but should have a normal life span after the operations. Back home in her native Port-au-Prince, Marlie faced not only physical suffering, but rejection by her neighbors as well. "She was treated like an animal. If she was walking on a sidewalk, people would cross the street," Gomez said. "If they tried to stop a taxi, it would keep going." Marlie's mother Maleine Antoine said she had lost hope in Haiti. "I don't know how to thank you for this," she told doctors through a translator during a hospital press conference Tuesday. "I cannot express my emotions." The nonprofit Good Samaritan for a Better Life brought the 14-year-old Marlie to the United States for treatment in September after the tumor grew so big it began to crush her breathing passage. At that time, doctors inserted a breathing tube down her throat. Gomez said doctors at Holtz Children's Hospital would start with the left side of Marlie's skull and carve away the ballooning fibrous mass that has stretched and distorted her face, spreading apart her teeth and all but obliterating her features. If the operation is successful, they will try to reconstruct the right side of her face and then later her swollen jaw. Doctors said the tumor could continue to grow through Marlie's adolescence but it was necessary to operate immediately or she would go blind. The initial operation, paid for with donations from around the world, will cost $95,000 because the doctors waived their fees. The hospital and Good Samaritan said they have yet to raise the funds to fully restore Marlie's features.

A New Safer Alternative To Marijuana

A McGill University study suggests a new anti-depressant drug works by raising levels of endocannabinoids -- similar to a substance found in marijuana.The study suggests the new drug, called URB597, might represent a safer alternative to use of marijuana for treatment of pain and depression, and open the door to new and improved treatments for clinical depression. In pre-clinical laboratory tests researchers found URB597 increased the production of endocannabinoids by blocking their degradation, resulting in measurable antidepressant effects. "This is the first time it has been shown a drug that increases endocannabinoids in the brain can improve your mood," said lead investigator Dr. Gabriella Gobbi, a researcher at Montreal and McGill Universities. The researchers, including scientists from the University of California-Irvine, were able to measure serotonin and noradrenaline activity as a result of the increased endocannabinoids. "The results were similar to the effect we might expect from the use of commonly prescribed antidepressants, which are effective on only around 30 percent of the population," said Gobbi. "Our discovery strengthens the case for URB597 as a safer, non-addictive, non-psychotropic alternative to cannabis for the treatment of pain and depression."

Hu-Mice

By injecting human embryonic stem cells into the brains of fetal mice inside the womb, scientists in California have created living mice with working human brain cells inside their skulls.The research offers the first proof that human embryonic stem cells — vaunted for their potential to turn into every kind of human cell, at least in laboratory dishes — can become functional human brain cells inside a living animal, reaching out to make connections with surrounding brain cells. The human cells had no apparent impact on the animals' behavior. About 100,000 cells were injected into each animal; just a fraction survived in their new hosts. The animals' brains were still more than 99 percent mouse — a precaution that helped avoid ethical objections. The finding that the human cells are working in their new environment provides encouragement for those who hope to develop stem-cell-based therapies for neurodegenerative diseases such as Parkinson's. More immediately, mice with humanized brains could provide a living laboratory for scientists. "Let's say you're in the last stages of research before testing a new drug in humans," said lead researcher Fred Gage of the Salk Institute for Biological Sciences in La Jolla, Calif. "This could help tell you what effect it will have on human neurons inside a brain." The work, published in today's issue of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, started with human embryonic stem cells instead of cells that already had become brain cells. Those human cells developed into all the major kinds of cells normally found in mammalian brains.

World's Oldest Woman Reveals Taste For Donkey Milk

An Ecuadorean woman, at 116 believed to be the world's oldest person, has revealed she drank donkey's milk as a girl.Maria Esther Capovilla was born in western Ecuador on September 14, 1889.Maria Esther Capovilla was confirmed as the oldest living person after her family sent details of her birth and marriage certificates to Guinness World Records. "We only told her yesterday she was the new Guinness world record holder," Kate White, brand manager at the records publisher, said. "We hadn't heard of her before." "She's in very good health, she's got good sight, is able to read the papers and watch television, and doesn't walk with a stick." Ms Capovilla was born in Guayaqull in western Ecuador on September 14, 1889, and lives there today with her daughter-in-law and son. She had five children, and has four grandchildren, nine great-grandchildren and two great-great-grandchildren. Her husband died in 1949. Ms White said Ms Capovilla had been asked what she thought about the changes she had seen over her life. "She said she disliked the fact that presently it's acceptable for women to pursue men. And she said that every day she thanks God that she's alive," Ms White said. As a girl at the turn of the century, one of Ms Capovilla's favourite pastimes was going to parties, where she never drank alcohol. At the time it was the custom for women just to touch the rim of the glass with their lips without drinking, as a sign of accepting hospitality, her family told Guinness World Records. Elizabeth Bolden, from Memphis, Tennessee, born August 15, 1890, had previously been regarded as the oldest living person. Emiliano Mercado Del Toro, from Puerto Rico, born August 21, 1891, is the world's oldest living man, aged 114, says Guinness World Records.

Mayor Wants To Ban Death

The mayor of a Brazilian town is trying to bring in a law making it illegal for residents to die.Mayor Roberto Pereira da Silva, of Biritiba-Mirim, came up with the idea because the town's only cemetery is full. He wants to bring in a law that would see relatives of people who die before their time face fines or even jail. The law would make it an offence for the town's 28,000 citizens to not look after their health properly. Mayor Pereira da Silva said there was no way of expending the cemetery or building a new one, reports Agora Sao Paulo. He said: "Eighty nine per cent of the town is rivers, the rest is protected because it is tropical jungle." The state government had promised to help build a new vertical cemetery - but nothing had been done. Gym memberships have reportedly shot up since the mayor announced his plans, and more people are visiting doctors.

US Group Proposes Neptune Mission

Neptune and its largest moon, Triton, could be the targets of a major space mission in the decades ahead, if a group of US researchers gets its way. The team has put together a concept for a "mothership" and probes that would investigate the ice giant which orbits some 4.5bn km from the Sun. So far, only one spacecraft, Voyager 2, has visited Neptune - a flyby in 1989.The Neptune orbiter (top) would carry two probes that it would despatch to investigate the atmosphere of the planet (middle). The mothership would then manoeuvre into a position to drop a lander on the surface of Triton (bottom).A mission like the one being proposed could cost $3-4bn dollars and would probably need international partners. "It would also take up the careers of the mission team," said Bernie Bienstock, a robotic systems project manger with aerospace company Boeing. "It's probably like an 18-year mission but then there's all the lead time - another 10 years to do all the selling to Congress and Nasa, and do all the detailed engineering design. "You're looking at about 30 years from beginning to end." Neptune is the eighth planet from the Sun, beyond Uranus but nearer than Pluto. Voyager showed us a blue giant with an extremely dynamic atmosphere; its winds race around the planet at speeds of 300m/sec. Voyager also saw rings - much more tenuous than Saturn's - and pictured its "great dark spot", a storm system akin to those familiar in our images of Jupiter. But it is Neptune's largest moon, Triton, which may be the big pull for science. It has a surface of fascinating contrasts and geysers of nitrogen. It is probably not a natural satellite but a captured object which came in from the furthest reaches of the Solar System. "The moon is geologically active - we've seen that from Voyager 2's pictures of geysers," said David Atkinson, a University of Idaho professor. "It's just so different to all the other moons of Neptune, and the moons of Uranus and Jupiter, and it would make an excellent comparison with Kuiper Belt objects such as Pluto and its moon, Charon. "It would provide us with a wealth of information about the origin and evolution of the outer Solar System." Bienstock and Atkinson presented their team's concept of a Neptune mission here at the American Geophysical Union Fall Meeting. They propose it become one of the US space agency's big flagship missions, of the type Nasa can fly only once a decade because of the scale and cost involved. The concept envisions a 36-tonne spacecraft that would be powered by a nuclear fission reactor and ion propulsion system. Only this configuration would give the mission the power and flexibility to reach across the Solar System and complete its science goals. These would include sending two probes on a collision course with the planet, to take readings in the atmosphere before being crushed by its pressure. The mothership would then attempt to put a lander on the surface of 2,700km-wide Triton. Getting down safely would be a colossal engineering challenge, Bienstock concedes. "The probe would have a mass of about 500kg - 65% of that is a propulsion system to slow you down so you don't crash," he explained. "There is a very thin atmosphere on Triton but there's not enough for parachutes to slow you down. You've got a lot of engineering overhead just to deliver the science package." Once down, the lander could sample the chemical properties of surface materials and send back images of the alien landscape. The whole concept has been put together under a Nasa Vision Mission contract. This does not automatically mean, however, that such a mission will get to fly. Its purpose is to investigate possibilities, to help the agency understand the requirements of complex projects as it maps out future plans.

Beam Me Up! Quantum Teleportation A Reality?

The Pentagon says teleportation is not out of the realm of possibility. What Capt. Kirk and his "Star Trek" crew accomplished in virtually every show. Modern man vanishing in Washington and reappearing seconds later in Tora Bora, or wherever else he might need to go.Fueled by private research in Austria and Italy verifying quantum teleportation (transferring properties of one quantum particle to another, regardless of distance), Uncle Sam has been examining this previously unthinkable mode of transportation. And why stop with one being? Why not beam entire troop divisions and their tanks to distant places -- or even galaxies? Sound impossible? Not to the military minds at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base in Ohio, home of stealth and laser technology, and researchers at Edwards Air Force Base in California, which last year completed the Air Force Teleportation Physics Study - detailing theoretical methods leading to the physical teleportation of objects and people.The other day, Reporters reviewed the U.S. military's special report on the study, in which lead author Eric W. Davis praises Edwards Air Force Base Air Force Research Laboratory senior scientist Dr. Franklin B. Mead Jr. for his "professionalism and excellent rapport with 'out of the box' thinkers, (which) excites and motivates serious exploration into advanced concepts that push the envelope of knowledge and discovery." A press conference will be held this week to announce the results of the first private-sector analysis of the military's study, specifically examining post-Sept. 11 national security implications. Speakers will appear - arriving on foot, for now.

The Birth Of A New Ocean?

Ethiopian, American and European researchers have observed a fissure in a desert in the remote northeast that could be the "birth of a new ocean basin," scientists said Friday. Researchers from Britain, France, Italy and the U.S. have been observing the 37-mile long fissure since it split open in September in the Afar desert and estimate it will take a million years to fully form into an ocean, said Dereje Ayalew, who leads the team of 18 scientists studying the phenomenon. A 1999 satellite image shows the area around Ethiopia's Dabbahu volcano, also known as Boina. Researchers say a fissure is opening up in the desert near the volcano, and eventually may become a new ocean basin.The fissure, now 13 feet wide, formed in just three weeks after a Sept. 14 earthquake in a barren region called Boina, some 621 miles north east of the capital, Addis Ababa, said Dereje. "We believe we have seen the birth of a new ocean basin," said Dereje of Addis Ababa University. "This is unprecedented in scientific history because we usually see the split after it has happened. But here we are watching the phenomenon." The findings have been presented at a weeklong American Geophysical Union meeting taking place in San Francisco that ends Friday. "It's amazing," the BBC quoted one of the Afar researchers, Cindy Ebinger of the Royal Holloway University of London, as saying in San Francisco. "It's the first large event we've seen like this in a rift zone since the advent of some of the space-based techniques we're now using, and which give us a resolution and a detail to see what's really going on and how the earth processes work." The Ethiopian Afar Geophysical Lithospheric Experiment, involving scientists from Royal Holloway and the universities of Leicester, Leeds and Addis Ababa, is using sensitive instruments to study what is happening deep within the earth. Dereje said that the split is the beginning of a long process, which will eventually lead to Ethiopia's eastern part tearing off from the rest of Africa, a sea forming in the gap. The Afar desert is being torn off the continent by about 0.8 inches each year. "The crust under Afar is becoming like the crust found in the Red Sea," said Dereje, head of earth science at Addis Ababa University. "Once the crust is formed you will have water because it is a low area and the water will migrate from the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden. It becomes a basin."

Sony BMG Admits To New CD Bug

Sony BMG has admitted to a new security problem affecting nearly six million of its CDs, after the detection of vulnerability with the MediaMax patch it supplied on 6 December.According to watchdog group the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) the most recent CD software "could allow malicious third parties … to gain control over a consumer's computer running the Windows operating system". The EFF hired security firm Information Security Partners to analyse MediaMax. The company found a new vulnerability with the software that could allow unauthorised users to take full control of the computer's operations. Sony BMG issued a patch but this was also flawed and could actually cause the security problem it was supposed to block. Sony BMG stated that it is working on the problem and will release a modified patch if necessary. The problem only applies to CDs issued in the US and Canada. The problems began last month when Sony BMG began shipping many of its music discs with a program called XCP. The program had no effect on standard CD players, but installed itself on computers running Windows when a CD owner tries to play the disc on the computer. It also proved very difficult to remove and was flagged by antivirus vendors as a vulnerability. To compound the problem XCP secretly sent information about users' listening habits over the internet to Sony BMG. Sony began to withdraw about 4.7 million affected discs from stores, and set up an exchange programme for consumers who had bought about 2.1 million discs. Meanwhile Sony BMG kept on using a different anti-piracy program called MediaMax, produced by SunnComm. The EFF filed a lawsuit against Sony BMG's use of both XCP and MediaMax, claiming that the SunnComm program was also flawed. The EFF cited research by J Alex Halderman, a student at Princeton University, who claimed that MediaMax sends information about users over the internet without their permission. Halderman also claimed that MediaMax installs itself even if the user clicks a button that is supposed to stop the installation.

Whos To Blame For The Demise Of Easter Island

Rats and Europeans are likely to blame for the mysterious demise of Easter Island, a team of anthropologists suggests. The fate of the people who built hundreds of 10-ton stone statues on the South Pacific island and then vanished has long been seen as a cautionary environmental tale.Natives deforested the island paradise to transport the statues, the story goes, triggering erosion that damaged farmlands. And then they supposedly bumped themselves off in a cannibalistic civil war in about 1650. But anthropologist Terry Hunt of the University of Hawaii at Manoa first blames the Polynesian rat. The rats probably deforested the 66-square-mile island's 16 million palm trees. "Palm tree seeds are filet mignon to rats," Hunt says. Working with colleagues at the island's anthropology museum and elsewhere since 2001, Hunt's team has undertaken an extensive archaeological survey of the island:

• Charcoal remains show that Polynesians settled the island in 1200, much later than supposed from earlier, inaccurate dates of such deposits.

• Pollen and ash deposits show that the number of palm trees declined swiftly in the years before fires, the signature of human occupation, appeared on the island.

• Rat remains indicate that the rodent population spiked at 20 million from 1200 to 1300 and then dropped off to a mere 1 million after the trees were gone.

• Skeletal remains and digs of old homes show little or no evidence of early warfare.

Instead, the disappearance of Easter Islanders probably was caused by visiting Dutch traders in the 1700s, who brought diseases and, later, slave raiding, says Hunt, who presented his findings at an American Anthropological Association meeting last week. Older explanations essentially blamed the victims for their demise, says archaeologist Patricia McAnany of Boston University. The island still represents a cautionary tale, she says, but one of the dangers of invasive species. But New Zealand's John Flenley of Massey University calls the idea "most unlikely," saying rats didn't deforest other Polynesian islands. Hunt counters that deforestation of palm trees by Polynesian rats occurred on the Hawaiian islands. And the Easter Island palms were uniquely vulnerable because the rats had no predators and the trees didn't grow at elevations too high for them to reach. Hunt suggests that about 50 settlers first landed on the island and grew to a stable population of at least 3,000 people by 1650. That seems reasonable, says mathematician William Basener of the Rochester (N.Y.) Institute of Technology, an expert in population models.

Ghosts Of Pearl Harbor

"Oil droplets still bubble from the remains of the USS Arizona, the still-beating heart of the Japanese attack on American forces on the “day that will live in infamy” – December 7, 1941.2,390 brave American died on the USS Arizona alone and it is just one site of many reportedly haunted by the memory of that infamous day. A visit to the USS Arizona Memorial should include a visit to the nearby buildings, part of the military complex still maintained to this day, and source of numerous reports of paranormal activities including voices and footsteps in empty rooms, ghostly lights, and even the ghostly sounds of the actual bombing on that horrible day.

New Muscles: Faster, Lighter, Better

A new study has raised the potential for a new generation of robotic "artificial muscles" to be used to perform tasks currently impossible for humans, from carrying out dangerous repair work to assisting in complicated surgery.The development could improve robots used in surgery, among other areas.Similar devices are already being sent where it is too hot, cold, small or remote for humans, but at present their efficacy is hampered by their relatively low speed, inefficient design and limited control available to operators. Robotic artificial muscles currently in use move 100 times slower than human muscles. But research conducted by nuclear engineering and materials science and engineering Professor Sidney Yip and his team at MIT has raised the possibility that artificial muscles could be made that would work 1,000 times faster than their human counterparts. The term "artificial muscles", Yip explains, refers in this case to any device that can be activated to perform a task, such as a fire alarm lever that, when pulled, triggers a sprinkler. Yip's team add that the new devices would require virtually no extra energy to operate and would have a much simpler design, improving their ease of control. They say the new "muscles" could be used for any number of tasks, from fixing leaking water mains to stitching together blood vessels. The current generation of artificial muscles used to operate robotic devices are made from what are known as conjugated polymers. "Conjugated polymers are also called conducting polymers because they can carry an electric current, just like a metal wire," said Xi Lin, a postdoctoral associate in Yip's team. Rubber and plastic, which are conventional polymers, are insulators and do not conduct current. But conjugated polymers can be used to manipulate the robotic device they are contained in because operators can send electric charges to specific points in the polymer chains, forcing them to activate and therefore perform their designated task. The charge, called a soliton, is "like an ocean wave that can travel long distances without breaking up," Yip said. The problem until now, however, has been that conducting polymers have only been made by dousing polymers in ions to expand their volume. It was thought that this process made the polymers strong, but it also made them heavy and slow. Yip's research has shown that adding these ions is unnecessary. Instead, Yip and his team discovered that, theoretically, shining a light of particular frequency on the conjugating polymer can force the soliton to activate. Without all those added ions, the polymer is lighter and so can bend and flex much more quickly. That makes the artificial muscle itself much quicker to activate. And the reduction in weight would also make the polymers -- and therefore the muscle -- more responsive and easier to control. The research could see the technology improve to the point where scientists' hopes of a new generation of light, fast devices a reality. This research was funded by Honda R&D Company and the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency/Office of Naval Research. Yip and Lin's collaborators on the work are Professor Ju Li at Ohio State University and Professor Elisabeth Smela at the University of Maryland.

Mystery Mammal Discovered In Borneo’s Forests

A mysterious red furry creature, captured on film in the dense forests of Borneo, could be a new species of carnivore. The mammal, which is slightly larger than a domestic cat, has dark red fur and a long, bushy tail. It was snapped twice at night by a camera trap set up by researchers from the conservation group WWF.The new beast, with its dark red fur and long tail, could be a new species of marten or civet, or belong to a new group entirelyIts general shape – with a possibly pointed snout, small ears, and large powerful hind legs – suggests it is a meat-eater. It has some similarities with martens or civets and could belong to these groups, or it may belong to an entirely new group, says WWF. “New species are always exciting, and new species of cuddly things are exciting,” says Nick Isaac, a research fellow at the Zoological Society of London, UK. But he warns it may be difficult to establish whether the new find genuinely represents a new species, or just a variation on a known species. “My reservation is – is it a range extension, or a slightly different colour morph of something we know about?” he told New Scientist. “We showed the photos of the animal to locals who know the wildlife of the area, but nobody had ever seen this creature before,” says Stephan Wulffraat, a biologist coordinating WWF’s research on the new mystery mammal. “We also consulted several Bornean wildlife experts, s. Some thought it looked like a lemur, but most were convinced it was a carnivore.” He says the only way to know for certain whether the strange mammal is a new species is to capture one. The team is attempting to capture snare a live animal using cage traps. Isaac says that catching an animal is the ideal way to establish its true identity. However, in recent years taxonomists have been able to classify some new species, for example beetles, by using their DNA. “If you could get a hair from this thing or faeces then you could compare the DNA with close relatives,” he suggests. A fur trap next to the camera trap might be able to betray the creature’s identity if it could snatch a hair from the root so its DNA-containing follicle could be used. The use of camera traps has meant many new species are being discovered, says Isaac. Grids of cameras can be left on animal trails for weeks. And digital photography with good flashes means the technology has made it easier for modern scientists to make discoveries. “The Victorians didn’t have that luxury,” he adds.

Meteor Streaks Across Australian Sky

A huge ball of light and fire filled the night sky as a meteor streaked toward Earth.Perth, Australia has been treated to a meteor light show.Residents in Perth, Australia, saw the spectacular light show Saturday night. The meteor left a bright tail in its wake. Karun Cowper, who was enjoying a meal with his family at Halls Head, caught the meteor on his video camera. Karun Cowper: "We got a bit excited, turned around and there was this spectacular, absolutely amazing thing flying across the sky." Astronomer Rick Tonello said the meteor was probably no bigger than half the size of a Volkswagen car and may have been as small as a carton of beer. The bright light was followed by a thundering sonic boom that shook buildings as the meteor continued traveling through the atmosphere.CLICK HERE FOR THE VIDEO

44 Acres of Coastline Collapse In Hawaii

About 44 acres of coastline collapsed into the ocean this week, setting loose a glowing stream of lava that shot out from the newly exposed cliffside 45 feet above the water. The plume, 6 feet in diameter, sent up a tower of steam as it hit the water and began forming a ramp of new land.The collapse of solidified lava shelf and sea cliff Monday was the largest since Kilauea Volcano began its current eruption in 1983. Jim Kauahikaua, scientist-in-charge of the U.S. Geological Survey's Hawaiian Volcano Observatory, said a collapse warning was issued in June because the shelf had become large and had formed cracks. Large collapses had happened in the area before. Rumblings tipped scientists to Monday's collapse, which took about 4 1/2 hours. Even at that relatively slow pace, the effect was spectacular. "The cliff just caved away like a glacier," said park spokesman Jim Gale. "It just sheared off that old wall. There's this gigantic steam plume and you see the red just falling down _ an incredible fire hose display." The collapse sent out globs of lava and head-size boulders. Sheets of volcanic glass called limu o Pele, after the Hawaiian goddess of fire, and thin strands of volcanic glass known as Pele's hair were found 1,800 feet inland.

Squirrel Pack 'Kills Dog'

Squirrels have bitten to death a stray dog which was barking at them in a Russian park, local media report. Passers-by were reportedly too late to stop the attack by the black squirrels in a village in the far east, which reportedly lasted about a minute.They are said to have scampered off at the sight of humans, some carrying pieces of flesh. A pine cone shortage may have led the squirrels to seek other food sources, although scientists are sceptical. The attack was reported in parkland in the centre of Lazo, a village in the Maritime Territory, and was witnessed by three local people. A "big" stray dog was nosing about the trees and barking at squirrels hiding in branches overhead when a number of them suddenly descended and attacked, reports say."They literally gutted the dog," local journalist Anastasia Trubitsina told Komsomolskaya Pravda newspaper. "When they saw the men, they scattered in different directions, taking pieces of their kill away with them." Mikhail Tiyunov, a scientist in the region, said it was the first he had ever heard of such an attack. While squirrels without sources of protein might attack birds' nests, he said, the idea of them chewing at a dog to death was "absurd". "If it really happened, things must be pretty bad in our forests," he added.Komosmolskaya Pravda notes that in a previous incident this autumn chipmunks terrorised cats in a part of the territory. A Lazo man who called himself only Mikhalich said there had been "no pine cones at all" in the local forests this year. "The little beasts are agitated because they have nothing to eat," he said.

'Fossil Fuel' Theory Takes Hit With NASA Finding

New study shows methane on Saturn's moon Titan not biologicalNASA scientists are about to publish conclusive studies showing abundant methane of a non-biologic nature is found on Saturn's giant moon Titan, a finding that validates a new book's contention that oil is not a fossil fuel.Saturn's moon Titan"We have determined that Titan's methane is not of biologic origin," reports Hasso Niemann of the Goddard Space Flight Center, a principal NASA investigator responsible for the Gas Chromatograph Mass Spectrometer aboard the Cassini-Huygens probe that landed on Titan Jan. 14. Niemann concludes the methane "must be replenished by geologic processes on Titan, perhaps venting from a supply in the interior that could have been trapped there as the moon formed." The studies announced by NASA yesterday will be reported in the Dec. 8 issue of the scientific journal Nature. "This finding confirms one of the key arguments in 'Black Gold Stranglehold: The Myth of Scarcity and the Politics of Oil,'" claims co-author Jerome R. Corsi. "We argue that oil and natural gas are abiotic products, not 'fossil fuels' that are biologically created by the debris of dead dinosaurs and ancient forests." Methane has been synthetically created in the laboratory, Corsi points out, "and now NASA confirms that abiotic methane is abundantly found on Titan." The realization that hydrocarbons are produced inorganically throughout our solar system was a key insight that led Cornell University astronomer Thomas Gold to write his 1998 book, "The Deep Hot Biosphere: The Myth of Fossil Fuels." Gold wrote: It would be surprising indeed if the earth had obtained its hydrocarbons only from a source that biology had taken from another carbon-bearing gas – carbon dioxide – which would have been collected from the atmosphere by photo-synthesizing organisms for manufacture into carbohydrates and then somehow reworked by geology into hydrocarbons. All this, while the planetary bodies bereft of surface life would have received their hydrocarbon gifts by purely abiogenic causes. Gold wryly noted that he was sure there had not been any "big stagnant swamps on Titan" to produce the biological debris that conventionally trained geologists think was required on Earth to produce oil and natural gas as a "fossil fuel." "If petroleum and natural gas are abiotic as we maintain in 'Black Gold Stranglehold,'" Corsi commented, "then the 'peak oil' fear that we are going to run out of oil may have been based on a giant misconception." Paradigms in science change slowly and with great resistance, he noted, "But NASA has given us today incontrovertible evidence that Titan has abundant inorganic methane." "If the scientists have ruled out that biological processes created methane on Titan, why do petro-geologists still argue that natural gas on Earth is of biological origin?" Corsi asked.

Researchers Discover 'Singing' Iceberg

Sound waves from the iceberg had a frequency of around 0.5 hertz, too low to be heard by humans, but by playing them at higher speed the iceberg sounded like a swarm of bees or an orchestra warming up, the scientists said.A complex of tubes and crevices characterizes the internal structure of many icebergs.The German Alfred Wegener institute for polar and marine research publish the results of its study, In Science magazine. Researchers picked up acoustic signals of unprecedented clarity when recording seismic signals to measure earthquakes and tectonic movements on the Ekstroem ice shelf on Antarctica's South Atlantic coast. Tracking the signal, the scientists found a 50km by 20km iceberg that had collided with an underwater peninsula and was slowly scraping around it. "Once the iceberg stuck fast on the seabed it was like a rock in a river," said scientist Vera Schlindwein. "The water pushes through its crevasses and tunnels at high pressure and the iceberg starts singing." "The tune even goes up and down, just like a real song."