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TUCSON, Ariz. - Scientists for the Phoenix Mars Lander are wrestling with an intermittent short circuit on the spacecraft. The problem is in a device that will analyze ice and soil dug from the planet's surface, the scientists said Friday. The short circuit was found during testing done before the mission's experiments get under way. The short circuit isn't considered critical, said William Boyton of the University of Arizona's Lunar and Planetary Laboratory. Boynton is in charge of the device that will heat and analyze samples scooped up by the lander's robotic arm. He said scientists know what is triggering...

You know that guy on the freeway? The one who cut you off in traffic the other day, and flashed a vulgar salute as he zoomed by? We used to think of this as "road rage" - reckless rudeness, plain and simple. Silly us. Now, thanks to a new study, we understand that the poor man may simply be the victim of a medical condition: intermittent explosive disorder (IED). The study, paid for in part by the National Institute of Mental Health, gives us the lowdown on this "seldom-studied mental illness." IED, it informs us, is characterized by "recurrent episodes...

DETROIT -- Robert Kearns, the inventor of intermittent windshield wipers, has died of cancer, according to family members. He was 77. Kearns died Feb. 9 at his home in suburban Baltimore and was buried in Michigan on a misty Valentine's Day. "It was going just enough to have the wipers going on intermittent. I thought, `How appropriate,'" Kearns' daughter, Maureen Kearns, told the Detroit Free Press for a story published Friday. Kearns was born in Gary, Ind., and grew up in suburban Detroit. He was a member of the Office of Strategic Services, the forerunner of the Central Intelligence Agency,...