Free Republic

Don't get the idea that we've found every kind of astronomical object there is in the universe. In a paper to appear in the Astrophysical Journal, astronomers working on the Supernova Cosmology Project report finding a new kind of something that they cannot make any sense of. Now you don't see it, now you do. Something in Bootes truly in the middle of nowhere — apparently not even in a galaxy — brightened by at least 120 times during more than three months and then faded away. Its spectrum was like nothing ever seen, write the discoverers, with "five broad...

Contact: Michael Seldin mfseldin@ucdavis.edu 530-754-6016 University of California, Davis - Health System UC Davis study finds distinct genetic profiles Results promise to improve genetic studies of human disease (SACRAMENTO, Calif.) --An international team of scientists lead by researchers at UC Davis Health System has found that, with respect to genetics, modern Europeans fall into two groups: a Northern group and a Southern, or Mediterranean one. The findings, published in the Sept. 14 edition of Public Library of Science Genetics (www.plos.org), are important because they provide a method for scientists to take into account European ancestry when looking for genes involved...

(Sept. 19) - Adopted two days after her first birthday, Sarah Culberson grew up the youngest daughter in a close-knit family from Morgantown, W.Va. She was surrounded by love in her home, but always wondered about her roots. Searching to unlock the secrets of her past, at age 22, Culberson began searching for her birth parents. She quickly learned that her mom had died a dozen years earlier from cancer. Culberson was crushed. A few years later, a private investigator helped her locate her birth father, along with an unbelievable surprise. Culberson wasn't an average suburban girl -- she was...

WASHINGTON, Sept. 11, 2006 -- A group of American seamstresses is working to apply an old-fashioned skill -- sewing -- to help today’s wounded veterans. The nonprofit group “Sew Much Comfort” includes more than 2,000 people who sew specially made clothing for wounded servicemembers, who often find clothing off the rack doesn’t accommodate a variety of medical devices. Sew Much Comfort is a member of the Defense Department’s America Supports You program, which highlights grassroots and corporate efforts to support U.S. troops and their families. Several of the groups set up tables at the end of the America Supports...

U.S. finds low-risk H5N1 bird flu strain in ducks Fri Sep 1, 2006 5:43pm ET By Charles Abbott WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Mallard ducks in Maryland have tested positive for bird flu, apparently a common, less pathogenic strain that poses no risk to humans, the U.S. Agriculture and Interior departments said on Friday. The H5N1 avian influenza virus was found in fecal samples from "resident wild" mallards in Queen Anne's County in Maryland, on the U.S. central Atlantic coast. "Testing has ruled out the possibility of this being the highly pathogenic H5N1 strain that has spread through birds in Asia, Europe...

Gout forced Charles V abdication, study finds By Gene Emery BOSTON (Reuters) - Tests of a 500-year-old pinky finger confirm that Holy Roman Emperor Charles V was debilitated by gout and the painful joints it produces, Spanish researchers reported on Wednesday. Jaume Ordi of the University of Barcelona and colleagues used a microscope to examine the tip of one of Charles' pinkie fingers, which was preserved separately from his body in a small red velvet box. After rehydrating and slicing the mummified fingertip, the Ordi team found telltale signs of gout, including the buildup of uric acid crystals. At the...

Scientists said Monday they have found the first widespread evidence of giant hydrocarbon lakes on the surface of Saturn's planet-size moon Titan. The cluster of hydrocarbon lakes was spotted near Titan's frigid north pole during a weekend flyby by the international Cassini spacecraft, which flew within 590 miles of the moon. Researchers counted about a dozen lakes ranging from 6 miles to 62 miles wide. Some lakes, which appeared as dark patches in radar images, were connected by channels while others had tributaries flowing into them. Several were dried up, but the ones that contained liquid were most likely a...

WASHINGTON - Sens. Rick Santorum and Arlen Specter, both Pennsylvania Republicans, couldn't be further apart on the issue of embryonic stem cell research. Santorum, a conservative struggling to win re-election, is against it, equating the process to abortion. He says harvesting the master cells from embryos less than a week old and killing the embryos in the process "destroys human life." Specter, a cancer survivor, is leading the fight to expand federal funding of embryonic stem cell research, taking on President Bush and siding with medical researchers who say it could someday produce cures for cancer, diabetes, Alzheimer's disease and...

Mars rover Spirit finds metallic meteorites 13:00 13 June 2006 NewScientist.com news service Maggie McKee Allan Hills, one of the iron meteorites discovered by the Mars rover Spirit (right foreground), appears lighter and smoother than surrounding rocks (Image: NASA/JPL/Cornell) Two iron meteorites have been spotted by the Mars rover Spirit, mission scientists have announced. The finds are the first meteorites identified by Spirit, although its twin, Opportunity, discovered a similar space rock on the other side of the planet in January 2005. Spirit photographed the rocks in April 2006, just after it parked at Low Ridge Haven, a northern-tilting slope...

WASHINGTON, May 19, 2006 – Coalition forces confiscated weapons caches in five Afghanistan locations yesterday, and a U.S. Air Force B-1B bomber struck a terrorist stronghold May 17, military officials reported. Forces discovered seven mortar rounds, three rocket-propelled grenade rounds and three rockets near Bagram Air Base in Parwan province. A second cache consisting of 100 mortar rounds was discovered near Bagram after an Afghan citizen reported the cache to coalition forces. A coalition patrol sent to the location determined all the rounds were in working order. Afghan National Army soldiers took control of the rounds. "Recovering and disposing of...

AL ASAD, Iraq (May 17, 2006) -- Content in the solitude of a miniature half wood, half vinyl tent fortress and wrapped up in numerous '80s one hit wonders, a Marine deployed to Iraq finds peace in life working with lumber and power tools. Although riddled with an extensive workload, Lance Cpl. Thomas R. Hunter, a native of Tacoma, Wash., finds time to make it out to his 'Guru's' work shed to pass the time. This combat engineer by trade is augmented to Marine Wing Headquarters Squadron 3, 3rd Marine Aircraft Wing, from his home unit, Marine Wing Support Squadron...

WASHINGTON, May 8, 2006 – Afghan National Police found an improvised explosive device in Afghanistan's Khowst province May 6, and coalition forces discovered a weapons cache and detained terror suspects in Kunar province the same day, military officials reported. The police discovered the IED in the middle of a main road in the Matun Valley near Paturri Village. The Afghan police secured the site, and a coalition explosive ordnance disposal team responded to the scene to secure the bomb. The team rendered the device harmless and destroyed it in place. In other news, a coalition patrol discovered a weapons cache...

Dig finds long-term use at Hell's Half AcreSite was home to Indians at least 1,200 years ago By The Associated Press CASPER, Wyo. -- A preliminary report on an archaeological dig says Hell's Half Acre, west of Casper, was home to prehistoric American Indians at least 1,200 years ago, and perhaps as long as 8,000 years ago. John Albanese, chairman of the Natrona County Historic Preservation Society, told Natrona County commissioners on Thursday that archaeological evidence shows Indians were hunting bison at Hell's Half Acre between 1,200 and 3,000 years ago, and that some evidence appeared to be much older....

CHICAGO - Former Gov. George Ryan, who drew international praise when he commuted the sentences of everyone on Illinois' death row, was convicted of racketeering and fraud Monday in a corruption scandal that ended his political career in 2003. Ryan, 72, sat stone-faced as the verdict was read and afterward vowed to appeal. "I believe this decision today is not in accordance with the kind of public service that I provided to the people of Illinois over 40 years, and needless to say I am disappointed in the outcome," the former governor said. Ryan faces up to 20 years in...

Typhoid May Have Caused Fall of Athens, Study Finds Nicholas Bakalar for National Geographic News February 27, 2006 An ancient medical mystery—the cause of a plague that wracked Athens from 426 to 430 B.C. and eventually led to the city's fall—has been solved by DNA analysis, researchers say. The ancient Athenians died from typhoid fever, according to a new study. Scientists from the University of Athens drew this conclusion after studying dental pulp extracted from the teeth of three people found in a mass grave in Athens' Kerameikos cemetery. The mass grave was first discovered in 1994 and was dated...

CAMP LIBERTY, Iraq (ARMY NEWS SERVICE, March 23, 2006) – Soldiers from the 2nd Battalion, 22nd Infantry Regiment, 1st Brigade Combat Team, 10th Mountain Division, discovered four caches in Abu Ghraib during a five-day period beginning March 11. The caches contained 32,000 pounds of explosives. Officials believe the sites were possible cells of operation for improvised explosive devices due to their seemingly hasty placement. “Since we began exploiting these caches, the number of IEDs in our own area of operation has dropped to almost zero,” said Lt. Col. Kevin Brown, commander, 2-22 Inf. He added that finding the caches has...

Israel finds al-Qa'eda at work in West Bank By Tim Butcher (Filed: 23/03/2006) Israel provided the first evidence of al-Qa'eda activity in the West Bank yesterday when two Palestinians were charged with receiving funds and training from the group for a double bombing in Jerusalem. While Israel has often connected its own struggle against Palestinian extremism with the international "war on terror", the case gives the most concrete proof yet of al-Qa'eda penetration of the country. However, Mahmoud Abbas, the Palestinian leader, recently announced he had evidence that it had tried to recruit in Gaza and the West Bank. According...

UD anthropologist finds signs of evolution in ancient skeleton Karen Rosenberg, chairperson and associate professor of anthropology at UD 10:03 a.m., March 2, 2006--Recent analysis of a Stone Age skeleton shows that human brain size relative to body size had increased dramatically from ancestors by the Middle Pleistocene, about 260,000 years ago, Karen Rosenberg, chairperson and associate professor of anthropology at the University of Delaware, said. Rosenberg, who analyzed the fossil with Lü Zuné of Peking University in Beijing and Chris B. Ruff, director of the Center for Functional Anatomy and Evolution at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine...

Week of March 4, 2006; Vol. 169, No. 9 , p. 132 Ancient Andean Maize Makers: Finds push back farming, trade in highland Peru Bruce Bower Nearly 4,000 years ago, large societies emerged in the Andes Mountains of southern Peru that would culminate 1,500 years later in the rise of the Inca civilization. Now, scientists have the first evidence that these Inca predecessors cultivated maize and imported plant foods from lowland tropical forests located 180 miles to the east. HIGH TIMES. Researchers excavate Waynuna, a site in Peru's Andes Mountains that has yielded evidence of early agriculture and food...

Peru, Mexico Finds Hint At Women's RolesBy CARL HARTMAN Associated Press Writer March 3, 2006, 2:33 PM EST (In a March 2 story about an archaeological exhibit on pre-Columbian women, The Associated Press erroneously reported where it's on view. The exhibit is at the National Museum of Women in the Arts, not the Smithsonian Institution's Arthur M. Sackler Gallery. A corrected version of the story appears below.) WASHINGTON (AP) -- Archaeological finds from Mexico and Peru show that, long before Europeans arrived, women served as warriors, governors and priestesses. An exhibit at the National Museum of Women in the Arts...

1/13/2006 - PETERSON AIR FORCE BASE, Colo. (AFPN) -- A 21st Security Forces Squadron Airman is the first military working dog handler allowed to adopt her K-9 partner from active duty. Tech. Sgt. Jamie Dana, a military working dog handler, has been waiting since August for the official word after she requested to adopt her K-9, Rex. The two were injured in an improvised explosive attack on their Humvee June 25 in Iraq. President George W. Bush signed the Defense Appropriations Bill Dec. 30 allowing military working dogs to retire early and be adopted by their handlers following traumatic events....

University Finds $275,000 in Office Sunday January 15, 2006 3:17 AM TAMPA, Fla. (AP) - Three University of South Florida officials were fired after the school discovered $275,000 in misplaced checks and cash scattered throughout an office. Nearly half the money at the school's English Language Institute - $133,647 - was in checks up to 10 years old and could not be deposited, said university spokeswoman Michelle Carlyon. The cash and checks Dec. 21 were found inside desks and underneath books and office machines, among other places, Carlyon said.

WASHINGTON, Dec. 20, 2005 – A Dallas-based band has looked to the Civil War to honor today's servicemembers fighting in the global war on terrorism. TrueHeart, an adult contemporary/urban folk band, was invited to perform at a Christmas benefit for a local hospital last year. But the band's trio of siblings disagreed on what carols to play. Ross Vick said that he and his brother, Patrick, and sister, Karen Vick Cavazos, couldn't settle on what Christmas songs to play. So he wrote three songs, including a new arrangement of the 19th century hymn, "I Heard the Bells on Christmas Day."...

Big brain means small testes, finds bat study 12:16 07 December 2005 NewScientist.com news service Gaia Vince Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences The brainier male bats are, the smaller their testicles, according to a new study. Researchers suggest the correlation exists because both organs require a lot of energy to grow and maintain, leading individual species to find the optimum balance. The analysis of 334 species of bat found that in species where the females were promiscuous, the males had evolved larger testes but had relatively small brains. In species, where the females were monogamous, the situation...

WASHINGTON, Nov. 6, 2005 – A Task Force Band of Brothers patrol near Forward Operating Base Anaconda in Iraq found two weapons caches containing timers, watches and other items commonly used in constructing roadside bombs Nov. 5, officials said today. The seizure also yielded nearly 30 large-caliber artillery shells, more than a dozen rockets, five rocket-propelled grenade launchers, a mortar tube, a machine gun and small-arms ammunition, officials noted. An explosive ordnance disposal team collected the weapons and conducted a controlled detonation of the shells and rockets. In the air war over Iraq, coalition aircraft flew 56 close-air-support and armed-reconnaissance...

Teenager finds sperm donor dad on internet Ian Sample, science correspondent Thursday November 3, 2005 The Guardian (UK) Using nothing more than a swab of saliva and the internet, a 15-year-old boy has tracked down his anonymous sperm donor father, according to details released today. By sending a swab taken from the inside of his cheek for genetic testing, the teenager was able to use genealogy websites to trace his father by looking for men with a matching Y-chromosome, which is passed down the male line. The genetic detective work has major implications for men who have donated sperm under...

Christianity Today, October 2005 Raiders of the Lost PoolNew finds bolster the historicity of John's Gospel. by Gordon Govier | posted 10/26/2005 09:00 a.m. The Pool of Siloam, considered a metaphor in John's Gospel by some New Testament scholars, was in fact a huge basin at the lowest point in the city of Jerusalem. Recent excavations have uncovered two corners and one side of the pool that stretched for half the length of a football field. "It's very exciting," James Charlesworth, a professor of New Testament at Princeton Theological Seminary, told CT. "It's very important for the study of the...

In a report released Friday, the investigative arm of Congress found that fully electronic voting machines hold promise for U.S. elections but still have security and reliability problems. E-voting failures in elections have been a problem in California, and the state's experiences are mentioned several times in the latest report from the U.S. Government Accountability Office. Analysts for the GAO found that crucial vote-recording and tallying files could be altered, that voting software often had weak or nonexistent password protections and that manufacturers had installed unapproved software in several places, including California. Yet fixing those problems could be years away....

AR RAMADI, Iraq (Oct. 21, 2005) -- Some people need the guidance and direction the Marine Corps provides and Pfc. David Smush, a machine gunner with Weapons Platoon, Company L, 3rd Battalion, 7th Marine Regiment, was one of them. A Chicago native, Smush was working odd jobs and struggling to find direction when he stumbled into a Marine Corps recruiting office one day. “It was a spur of the moment thing,” the 19-year-old said. “I was tired of being at home all the time. I worked at a gas station and sometimes at a fire station. I needed something more.”...

PASADENA, Calif. - A NASA telescope has detected for the first time the building blocks of planets around brown dwarfs, suggesting that such failed stars probably undergo the same planet-building process. Until now, the microscopic crystal building blocks that eventually collide to form planets have only been seen around stars and comets - considered the remnants of the solar system. NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope recently spotted the tiny crystals and dust grains circling five brown dwarfs located 520 light years away in the Chamaeleon constellation. The crystals, composed of a green mineral commonly found on Earth known as olivine, are...

ROMAN FINDS RE-WRITE HISTORYBy Suzanne Pert AMAZING finds by archaeologists during recent excavations at Brading Roman Villa mean history will have to be re-written, not just there but at other important mosaic sites around the country.Archaeologist Kevin Trott with some of the pieces of pottery found at the Brading Roman Villa site. Picture by PETER BOAM Although his findings are still to be published, archaeologist Kevin Trott has compiled a 400-page report, which has dispelled some long-held myths and is set to take the archaeological world by storm. This week he gave the County Press an insight into the archaeologically-explosive...

MARINE CORPS BASE CAMP LEJEUNE, N.C. -- (Oct. 11, 2005) -- Not many people find a best friend in a paper sack half way around the world, in a country littered with war and terrorists. But, that is what happened when Marine Cpl. Jeffery A. Boskovitch, a Reserve Marine from Akron, Ohio, decided to befriend a tiny mutt. For some pocket change and little bit of candy, the pup became his. It would have been impossible to guess that this friendship would span half the globe, involve the Commandant of the Marine Corps, a couple of Army generals and a...

CAMP VIRGINIA, Kuwait — A square mile of Kuwaiti real estate is an American boomtown. In the American Old West there were a number of similar communities, such as the silver mining town of Tombstone. But while Tombstone depended on the precious metal for its economic well being, Camp Virginia’s source is the military. Surrounded by desert that has a few small bushes providing some glimpses of green the camp is an area where U.S. and some coalition forces come before going to or leaving Iraq. “Camp Virginia provides support for the troop units coming here,” Lt. Col. Matthew Hearon....

CAMPO – As the sun set, Roy Wood looked out of place patrolling a dirt road a few steps north of a rusty fence that separates the United States from Mexico. The clean-shaven English-as-a-second-language instructor wore a T-shirt tucked in clean blue jeans, a pistol strapped to a belt. Many of the hundreds who make up the self-appointed civilian patrols monitoring the border to deter smuggling of people and drugs are unemployed or underemployed ex-military men who have long resented Mexicans who come to the United States illegally and, in their view, compete for jobs, crowd hospitals and schools and...

Research team finds new evidence of Amazonian civilization (Kyodo) A joint Japanese-Bolivian research team has completed the first stage of a three-year investigation that aims to shed light on a little-known high culture that existed in the present-day Bolivian Amazon. The investigation, named "Project Mojos," is headed by Katsuyoshi Sanematsu, a professor of anthropology at Rikkyo University in Tokyo. In an interview Wednesday, Sanematsu, 56, told Kyodo News that the team, composed of four Japanese researchers and four Bolivian researchers, succeeded in finding hundreds of archaeological artifacts during a month long excavation that ended earlier this month. "It is very...

LONDON (AP) -- Aaron Balick expected to find a tiny mouse rustling behind the TV in his apartment. Instead, he found a venomous giant centipede that somehow hitched a ride from South America to Britain. "Thinking it was a mouse, I went to investigate the sound. The sound was coming from under some papers which I lifted, expecting to see the mouse scamper away," the 32-year-old psychotherapist said Wednesday. "Instead, when I lifted the papers, I saw this prehistoric looking animal skitter away behind a stack of books." He trapped the 9-inch-long creature between a stack of books and put...

SACRAMENTO (AP) - A state report paints a bleak portrait of California's public school finances, finding that as many as 79 districts may not be able to pay their bills in two years. One-third of the state's 982 public school districts have tapped reserves to make ends meet, with 14 expecting to run out of money in the next two years, according to a report released Thursday. Another 65 districts reported a possibility that their expenses would outpace revenues within that time. Ten of the 79 most financially troubled schools are in Los Angeles County. "For the first time in...

WASHINGTON, D.C., Jul 5 (OneWorld) - A vast majority of Americans disagree with President George W. Bush's stance on global warming, a new poll said Tuesday amid reports of a widening rift over climate change between the United States and its partners in the Group of Eight (G8) dominant countries. ''Going into the G8 Summit, nearly all Americans feel that the U.S. should not be a laggard, but should be ready to do as much as most other developed countries to reduce emissions that cause climate change,'' said Steven Kull, director of the University of Maryland's Program on International Policy...

Key finds in Temple Mount trash heap Jerusalem, Israel, Apr. 15 (UPI) -- Archaeologists sifting through piles of rubble discarded by Islamic officials from the Temple Mount have found rare artifacts dating to 3,000 years ago. The artifacts were found in the last five months in a city garbage dump used by Islamic officials six years ago when they built a mosque at an underground area of the Temple Mount, the Jerusalem Post said Friday.

Archaeologist finds 'oldest porn statue' Krysia Diver in Stuttgart Monday April 4, 2005 The Guardian (UK) Stone-age figurines depicting what could be the oldest pornographic scene in the world have been unearthed in Germany. Archaeologists have discovered what they believe to be the 7,200-year-old remnants of a man having intercourse with a woman. The extraordinary find, at an archaeological dig in Saxony, shatters the belief that sex was a taboo subject in that era. Until now, the oldest representations of sexual scenes were frescos from about 2,000 years ago. Harald Stäuble of the Archaeological Institute of Saxony, based in Dresden,...

Jailed and held without bond in the nation's largest alleged personal tax-evasion scheme, telecom investor Walter Anderson says the federal government has got it all wrong. He isn't a tax cheat, he said Wednesday night in a conference room at the D.C. jail. He was going to use the money to change the world. To fight for arms control and human rights. To promote family planning and space exploration. He was going to give the money away, starting next year. (snip) Yesterday, U.S. Magistrate Judge Alan Kay ordered Anderson held at the D.C. jail until a March 11 hearing. He...

A majority of Mexican migrants living and working in the United States would be willing to participate in a temporary-worker program, according to a recent nationwide survey, even many of those who say they would prefer to stay in the country indefinitely. The survey of 4,836 migrants was taken by the Pew Hispanic Center in Washington, D.C., with respondents surveyed as they applied at Mexican consulates in seven U.S. cities for consular identification cards, frequently used as ID by undocumented immigrants. While respondents were not asked about their immigration status, slightly more than half said they had no form of...

Federal Court Finds DNC Chair Howard Dean’s Judicial Appointees Guilty (PRWEB) February 26, 2005 -- In a 1997 Vermont Press Bureau article, Howard Dean expressed his desire to appoint judges that were not so concerned about the Bill of Rights -- or in Howard Dean lingo “legal technicalities”. Howard kept his aim true. Within two months of his proclamation, he appointed Nancy Corsones and Patricia Zimmerman to the Vermont bench. Shortly afterward, Vermont prosecutors set their sites on a local activist. Judge Corsones chose to advance justice in Vermont by violating the activist’s rights against double jeopardy, his right to...

Polls finds majority believe country is ready for a women president February 22, 2005 2:55 PM The Associated Press ALBANY, N.Y. A clear majority of Americans believes the nation is ready for a woman in the Oval Office. A new poll finds more than six in ten believe the country is ready for a female president. The poll by the Siena College Research Institute, which was sponsored by Hearst newspapers, gives new ammunition to people who believe Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton should run for president. Eighty-one percent of those surveyed said they would vote for a woman for president and...

WASHINGTON (AP) - A federal appeals court on Friday rejected a government-approved program used by five Western states to improve their air quality and visibility in national parks and wilderness areas. Siding with an industry coalition, the court said the states' program was based on Environmental Protection Agency methods that the court, ruling in a case three years ago, had found to be "inconsistent with the Clean Air Act." Friday's decision deals with efforts by Arizona, New Mexico, Oregon, Utah and Wyoming to cut sulfur dioxide pollution that contributes to regional haze, particularly at the Grand Canyon. Mike Leavitt, now...

Wednesday, February 16, 2005 · Last updated 8:04 a.m. PT Tribes appeal Kennewick Man ruling, seek role in future finds THE ASSOCIATED PRESS KENNEWICK, Wash. -- Indian tribes that failed to block the scientific examination of the 9,400-year-old remains known as Kennewick Man are appealing a court ruling in hopes of gaining a role in future discoveries. The appeal of a ruling by the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals was brought Monday by the Nez Perce Tribe, Confederated Tribes of the Umatilla Indian Reservation and Yakama Indian Nation, which claim Kennewick Man as an aboriginal ancestor. "It's a fundamental...

SAN JOSE, Calif. (AP) - Silicon Valley men are likely to be fatter and less conscious of what they eat than their female counterparts, according to a survey to be released Friday. At least three out of five men in Santa Clara County are considered overweight or obese, compared with two out of five women, according to a telephone survey of 2,645 residents. Obesity rates were even greater for Hispanic and African-American men. Despite the extra pounds that men are packing, researchers found that they're much less likely to diet - or even to try to maintain their current weight...

LOS ANGELES - In a stroke of luck, the NASA (news - web sites) rover Opportunity has discovered a basketball-size metal meteorite sitting on the surface of Mars, the mission's main scientist said Tuesday. Opportunity came upon the meteorite last week while it was taking a look at a spacecraft shell that was jettisoned before landing after protecting the rover during its plunge through the martian atmosphere. Tests performed during the weekend confirm it is a nickel-iron meteorite, said Steve Squyres, a Cornell University scientist who is the principal investigator for NASA's Mars Exploration Rovers mission. "I didn't see this...

SACRAMENTO (AP) - The nonpartisan Legislative Analyst warned Wednesday that while Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's $111.7 billion budget plan solves next year's problem, the state still faces big deficits in the future because spending remains out of balance with tax income. But Analyst Elizabeth Hill also advised against Schwarzenegger's proposed long term solution to the problem - a constitutional amendment that would trigger accross-the-board cuts when revenues fail to meet spending obligations. Hill said the measure, which Schwarzenegger wants to put before voters in a special election this year, would put even more spending "on cruise control" while undermining the Legislature's...

2004: Top finds on Bolivian highlandsFinnish scientists discovered the most significant relics of antiquity in recent Bolivian history. In the excavations on Pariti Island in Lake Titicaca, in the highlands of Bolivia, the historical-archaeological research team of the University of Helsinki discovered a ritual offering site with well-preserved pieces of ceramics. The find adds substantially to what is known about the Tiwanaku culture, which flourished before the Incas and for which the island was probably an important religious site. “The dig contained approximately 300 kilograms of deliberately broken ritual ceramics, which, according to radiocarbon dating, have been buried sometime between...