How clean is your keyboard?

Computer keyboards can host more harmful bacteria than an average toilet seat.

Kerina Fitzgerald from Duston in Northampton works in a call centre. She feels ill after catching an ear infection from shared use of a telephone head set. She understands the seriousness of cleaning your work station effectively to protect yourself at work.

"I've been working for my company for over five years and never caught an infection before. I would eat my lunch at my desk not knowing the risk I was opening myself to. Then after catching an ear infection we are now issued with individual head sets to prevent this from happening again."

"I now make sure I always wipe down my keyboard before I use it and am a lot more careful."

Jimoh sitting at computer desk

A computing magazine 'Which' turned the microscope on over 30 keyboards in a typical office and found some had harmful bacteria that could put their users at high risk of becoming ill. In one case, a microbiologist recommended the removal of a keyboard as it had 150 times the pass limit of bacteria, and was five times filthier than a toilet seat that was swabbed.

The germs found could cause food poisoning symptoms such as diarrhoea and other stomach upsets. The main cause of a bug-infested keyboard is eating lunch at desks and poor personal hygiene, such as dodging the hand washing basin after going to the toilet.

Despite the obvious health hazard of a dirty keyboard, how often people clean their computers varies widely. One in ten people say they never clean their keyboard with a further 20 per cent admitting to never cleaning their mouse.

What can you do to prevent your computer from becoming a health hazard?

• Before you start cleaning, shut down the computer and unplug it.
• Gently wipe surfaces with a soft, lint-free cloth. Lightly dampen (not wet) the cloth with a small amount of water or an approved computer cleaning fluid.
• Unplug your keyboard, turn it upside down and shake out any loose dust and food crumbs inside. Disinfect the surface with alcohol wipes.
• Use a vacuum cleaner with a rubber or brush nozzle on exterior surfaces and vents.
• Headphones can be used by multiple people and can spread germs or even head lice. Wipe them with a damp cloth.

Space debris' orbits Earth

Between the launch of Sputnik in 1957 and 2008, around 6,000 satellites have been launched into orbit. These computer-generated photos show all the junk orbiting Earth.

It's estimated that only 800 satellites are working. The debris also includes hundreds of bits of space shuttles that have exploded, broken off or been abandoned.

Eighty per cent of all space junk is around 1,200 miles above Earth or in low-Earth orbit (LEO). Spacecraft have to orbit at low altitude to avoid all the debris.

The view over the North Pole. Dead or inactive spacecraft and other objects range in size from the big (or about the size of a car) to the tiny (about the size of microscopic dust).

A view of the equator seen through a computer-animated image of space rubbish. The European Space Agency uses this database to get satellites in orbit undamaged

Tiny magnets used in anti-cancer gene therapy

LONDON (Reuters) - Tiny magnets have been used to deliver anti-cancer gene therapy in mice in a development that could make the treatment much more effective, scientists said on Thursday.

The idea behind gene therapy is to replace faulty genes. But the approach has had mixed success because of the difficulty of getting genes to the right part of the body.

One option has been to use viruses to carry genes but this risks triggering an immune system reaction.

Now British researchers think they may have cracked the problem.

By inserting magnetic nanoparticles into monocytes -- a type of white blood cell -- and injecting them into the bloodstream, they have been able to guide them around the body using an external magnet.

Using this technique, many more cells armed with anti-cancer genes reached and invaded malignant tumors, Claire Lewis of the University of Sheffield and colleagues reported in the journal Gene Therapy.

"The use of nanoparticles to enhance the uptake of therapeutically armed cells by tumors could herald a new era in gene therapy -- one in which delivery of the gene therapy vector to the diseased site is much more effective," Lewis said.

The new approach could also be used to deliver therapeutic genes to treat other conditions like arthritic joints or heart disease, she believes.

Clinical trials on humans, however, are still some way off.

Tests so far have involved treating tumors just under the skin of mice. The real goal is to attack tumors deep inside the body, which are normally the most serious.

"We're going to have to extend existing magnetic resonance, or MRI, technology to create a magnetic gradient over a deep tissue like the liver," Lewis said in a telephone interview.

Her team is also looking at the ability of magnetic targeting to deliver a variety of different cancer-fighting genes, including ones which could stop the spread of tumors to other parts of the body.

Gene therapy has been much hyped over the years as a treatment for cancer and other diseases where DNA is known to play a central role but scientists have run into a series of technical and safety problems.

In one trial in 1999 a patient died and in other cases children have developed leukemia as a result of such treatment.

"We would hope that this will be safer because we are using a natural mechanism in the body and patients' own white blood cells to deliver the gene therapy," Lewis said. "We're simply amplifying that with this magnetic approach."

Angler catches heavyweight carp

After taking a photograph, Mr Bird released Two Tone back into the la

An angler in east Kent has landed a 67lb carp after trying to catch it for eight years.

John Bird, 26, hauled in the huge fish at Connington Lake in his hometown of Ashford, at 0200 BST on Sunday.

If the British Record Fish Committee verify the catch, it will break its current record for the biggest freshwater fish landed in the UK.

Mr Bird released the gigantic carp, affectionately known to anglers as Two Tone, after taking a photograph.

He described catching Two Tone as a very emotional moment.

'Even larger'

"It was 2.30am when the bite alarm went off. Some 15 minutes later the fish was safely in the net. I only realised it was the record fish when I saw the colouring of its fins.

"I have had so many calls I had to turn my phone off at work, but it has been really great and I have been touched by all the messages of congratulations, " he added.

Two Tone, who was brought to Connington Lake in the late 80s by Mid Kent Fisheries, has been caught before at a slightly lighter weight.

Chris Logsdon, manager of Mid Kent Fisheries, said they expected him to grow even larger.

"This carp has been growing and growing over the last 20 years, and we hope to be the first water to get a 70lb carp."

Graphene Could Be the New Silicon

Graphene is a one-atom-thick planar sheet of sp2-bonded carbon atoms that are densely packed in a honeycomb crystal lattice. It can be viewed as an atomic-scale chicken wire made of carbon atoms and their bonds. The name comes from GRAPHITE + -ENE; graphite itself consists of many graphene sheets stacked together.

The carbon-carbon bond length in graphene is approximately 1.42 Å. Graphene is the basic structural element of all other graphitic materials including graphite, carbon nanotubes and fullerenes. It is a large aromatic molecule, an extension of a family of flat polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons called graphenes.

Recent investigations by physicists at the University of Maryland indicate that graphene—one-atom-thick sheets of carbon—could one day supplant silicon as the material of choice for important applications such as high-speed computer chips and biochemical sensors.

The research team, led by Michael Fuhrer, found that in graphene the intrinsic limit to the charge mobility, a measure of how well a material conducts electricity when subjected to an electric field, is higher than any other known material at room temperature. Graphene’s high mobility thus makes it promising for use in transistors that must switch extremely rapidly. If other factors that limit mobility in graphene, such as impurities, can be eliminated, its intrinsic mobility would be more than 100 times higher than that of silicon. The work was published online in the journal Nature Nanotechnology.

That’s not all that has emerged lately about this new "wonder" material. SciAm author Andre K. Geim and several co-workers report that by looking at the optical reflectivity of graphene they were able to find a way to measure the fine structure constant, alpha, the parameter that describes coupling between light and relativistic electrons.

Alpha is traditionally associated with quantum electrodynamics rather than condensed matter physics, which speaks to one of the truly unusual (even bizarre) aspects of graphene. The abstract of the paper was just posted on cond-mat.

Anyway you slice it, graphene is really hot right now.

Legend of the Crystal Skulls

Along with superstars like Harrison Ford, Cate Blanchett, and Shia LaBeouf, the newest Indiana Jones movie promises to showcase one of the most enigmatic classes of artifacts known to archaeologists, crystal skulls that first surfaced in the 19th century and that specialists attributed to various "ancient Mesoamerican" cultures. In this article, Smithsonian anthropologist Jane MacLaren Walsh shares her own adventures analyzing the artifacts that inspired Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull (in theaters May 22), and details her efforts tracking down a mysterious "obtainer of rare antiquities" who may have held the key to the origin of these exotic objects.

In 1992, this hollow rock-crystal skull was sent to the Smithsonian anonymously. A letter accompanying the 30-pound, 10-inch-high artifact suggested it was of Aztec origin. (James Di Loreto & Donald Hurlburt/Courtesy Smithsonian Institution)

Sixteen years ago, a heavy package addressed to the nonexistent "Smithsonian Inst. Curator, MezoAmerican Museum, Washington, D.C." was delivered to the National Museum of American History. It was accompanied by an unsigned letter stating: "This Aztec crystal skull, purported to be part of the Porfirio Díaz collection, was purchased in Mexico in 1960.... I am offering it to the Smithsonian without consideration." Richard Ahlborn, then curator of the Hispanic-American collections, knew of my expertise in Mexican archaeology and called me to ask whether I knew anything about the object--an eerie, milky-white crystal skull considerably larger than a human head.

I told him I knew of a life-sized crystal skull on display at the British Museum, and had seen a smaller version the Smithsonian had once exhibited as a fake. After we spent a few minutes puzzling over the meaning and significance of this unusual artifact, he asked whether the department of anthropology would be interested in accepting it for the national collections. I said yes without hesitation. If the skull turned out to be a genuine pre-Columbian Mesoamerican artifact, such a rare object should definitely become part of the national collections.

I couldn't have imagined then that this unsolicited donation would open an entirely new avenue of research for me. In the years since the package arrived, my investigation of this single skull has led me to research the history of pre-Columbian collections in museums around the world, and I have collaborated with a broad range of international scientists and museum curators who have also crossed paths with crystal skulls. Studying these artifacts has prompted new research into pre-Columbian lapidary (or stone-working) technology, particularly the carving of hard stones like jadeite and quartz.

Crystal skulls have undergone serious scholarly scrutiny, but they also excite the popular imagination because they seem so mysterious. Theories about their origins abound. Some believe the skulls are the handiwork of the Maya or Aztecs, but they have also become the subject of constant discussion on occult websites. Some insist that they originated on a sunken continent or in a far-away galaxy. And now they are poised to become archaeological superstars thanks to our celluloid colleague Indiana Jones, who will tackle the subject of our research in Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. Details about the movie's plot are being closely guarded by the film's producers as I write this, but the Internet rumor mill has it that the crystal skull of the title is the creation of aliens.

The author and Scott Whittaker, director of the Smithsonian's Scanning Electron Microscope (SEM) Facility, examine the "Mitchell-Hedges Skull." Silicone molds of the skull's carved features were analyzed by SEM for evidence of tool marks. (James Di Loreto/Courtesy Smithsonian Institution)

These exotic carvings are usually attributed to pre-Columbian Mesoamerican cultures, but not a single crystal skull in a museum collection comes from a documented excavation, and they have little stylistic or technical relationship with any genuine pre-Columbian depictions of skulls, which are an important motif in Mesoamerican iconography.

They are intensely loved today by a large coterie of aging hippies and New Age devotees, but what is the truth behind the crystal skulls? Where did they come from, and why were they made?

Museums began collecting rock-crystal skulls during the second half of the nineteenth century, when no scientific archaeological excavations had been undertaken in Mexico and knowledge of real pre-Columbian artifacts was scarce. It was also a period that saw a burgeoning industry in faking pre-Columbian objects. When Smithsonian archaeologist W. H. Holmes visited Mexico City in 1884, he saw "relic shops" on every corner filled with fake ceramic vessels, whistles, and figurines. Two years later, Holmes warned about the abundance of fake pre-Columbian artifacts in museum collections in an article for the journal Science titled "The Trade in Spurious Mexican Antiquities."

French antiquarian Eugène Boban with his collection of Mesoamerican artifacts at an 1867 Paris exposition. Among the objects on display were two crystal skulls. At his feet rest a pot and a battleaxe Boban exhibited as Aztec. Both are fakes. (Courtesy Jane Walsh/Museo Nacional de Historia, Mexico City)

The first Mexican crystal skulls made their debut just before the 1863 French intervention, when Louis Napoleon's army invaded the country and installed Maximilian von Hapsburg of Austria as emperor. Usually they are small, not taller than 1.5 inches. The earliest specimen seems to be a British Museum crystal skull about an inch high that may have been acquired in 1856 by British banker Henry Christy.

Two other examples were exhibited in 1867 at the Exposition Universelle in Paris as part of the collection of Eugène Boban, perhaps the most mysterious figure in the history of the crystal skulls. A Frenchman who served as the official "archaeologist" of the Mexican court of Maximilian, Boban was also a member of the French Scientific Commission in Mexico, whose work the Paris Exposition was designed to highlight. (The exhibition was not entirely successful in showcasing Louis Napoleon's second empire, since its opening coincided with the execution of Maximilian by the forces of Mexican president Benito Juárez.)

One small crystal skull was purchased in 1874 for 28 pesos by Mexico City's national museum from the Mexican collector Luis Costantino, and another for 30 pesos in 1880. In 1886, the Smithsonian bought a small crystal skull, this one from the collection of Augustin Fischer, who had been Emperor Maximilian's secretary in Mexico. But it disappeared mysteriously from the collection some time after 1973. It had been on display in an exhibit of archaeological fakes after William Foshag, a Smithsonian mineralogist, realized in the 1950s that it had been carved with a modern lapidary wheel.

In 1886, the Smithsonian acquired a crystal skull that may have been a pre-Columbian bead re-carved in the 19th century. This catalogue entry shows the object at close to its actual size, and with a vertical drill hole through its center. (Courtesy of Paula Fleming Collection)

These small objects represent the "first generation" of crystal skulls, and they are all drilled through from top to bottom. The drill holes may in fact be pre-Columbian in origin, and the skulls may have been simple Mesoamerican quartz crystal beads, later re-carved for the European market as little mementos mori, or objects meant to remind their owners of the eventuality of death.

In my research into the provenance of crystal skulls, I kept encountering Boban's name. He arrived in Mexico in his teens and spent an idyllic youth conducting his own archaeological expeditions and collecting exotic birds. Boban fell in love with Mexican culture--becoming fluent in Spanish and Nahuatl, the Aztec language--and began to make his living selling archaeological artifacts and natural history specimens through a family business in Mexico City.

After returning to France, he opened an antiquities shop in Paris in the 1870s and sold a large part of his original Mexican archaeological collection to Alphonse Pinart, a French explorer and ethnographer. In 1878, Pinart donated the collection, which included three crystal skulls, to the Trocadero, the precursor of the Musée de l'Homme. Boban had acquired the third skull in the Pinart collection sometime after his return to Paris; it is several times larger than any of the others from this early period, measuring about 4 inches high. This skull, now in the Musée du Quai Branly, has a large hole drilled vertically through its center. There is a comparable, though smaller, skull (about 2.5 inches high) in a private collection. It serves as the base for a crucifix; the somewhat larger Quai Branly skull may have had a similar use.

Macabre Obsession
The 19th century was a period of keen fascination with skulls and skeletons in Europe. During the reign of Louis Napoleon (1852-1870), French artists created stereoscopic photographs, called Diableries, of miniature dioramas of skeletons at dress balls, libraries (below), conferences with the devil, and in amorous trysts. Wicked lampoons of corruption at Napoleon's court, they illustrate how popular skeletal imagery was when the first crystal skulls made their appearance. (Courtesy of Paula Fleming Collection)

A second-generation skull--life-size and without a vertical hole--first appeared in 1881 in the Paris shop of none other than Boban. This skull is just under 6 inches high. The description in the catalogue he published provided no findspot for the object and it is listed separately from his Mexican antiquities. Boban called it a "masterpiece" of lapidary technology, and noted that it was "unique in the world."

Despite being one of a kind, the skull failed to sell, so when Boban returned to Mexico City in 1885, after a 16-year absence, he took it with him. He exhibited it alongside a collection of actual human skulls in his shop, which he dubbed the "Museo Cientifico." According to local gossip, Boban tried to sell it to Mexico's national museum as an Aztec artifact, in partnership with Leopoldo Batres, whose official government title was protector of pre-Hispanic monuments. But the museum's curator assumed the skull was a glass fake and refused to purchase it. Then Batres denounced Boban as a fraud and accused him of smuggling antiquities.

In July 1886, the French antiquarian moved his museum business and collection to New York City and later held an auction of several thousand archaeological artifacts, colonial Mexican manuscripts, and a large library of books. Tiffany & Co. bought the crystal skull at this auction for $950. A decade later, Tiffany's sold it to the British Museum for the original purchase price. Interestingly, Boban's 1886 catalogue for the New York auction lists yet another crystal skull. Of the smaller variety, it is described as being from the "Valley of Mexico" and is listed with a crystal hand, which is described as Aztec. Neither of these objects can now be accounted for.

A third generation of skulls appeared some time before 1934, when Sidney Burney, a London art dealer, purchased a crystal skull of proportions almost identical to the specimen the British Museum bought from Tiffany's. There is no information about where he got it, but it is very nearly a replica of the British Museum skull--almost exactly the same shape, but with more detailed modeling of the eyes and the teeth. It also has a separate mandible, which puts it in a class by itself. In 1943, it was sold at Sotheby's in London to Frederick Arthur (Mike) Mitchell-Hedges, a well-to-do English deep-sea fisherman, explorer, and yarn-spinner extraordinaire.

Since the 1954 publication of Mitchell-Hedges's memoir, Danger My Ally, this third-generation, twentieth-century skull has acquired a Maya origin, as well as a number of fantastic, Indiana Jones-like tall tales. His adopted daughter, Anna Mitchell-Hedges, who died last year at the age of 100, cared for it for 60 years, occasionally exhibiting the skull privately for a fee. It is currently in the possession of her widower, but 10 nieces and nephews have also laid claim to it. Known as the Skull of Doom, the Skull of Love, or simply the Mitchell-Hedges Skull, it is said to emit blue lights from its eyes, and has reputedly crashed computer hard drives.

The Mitchell-Hedges skull, top, and the British Museum skull were the subject of a series of 1936 articles in which British Museum curator Adrian Digby and physical anthropologist G. M. Morant debated whether the two were based on the same original skull, which Digby posited was perhaps revered as a Mesoamerican "death god."

Although nearly all of the crystal skulls have at times been identified as Aztec, Toltec, Mixtec, or occasionally Maya, they do not reflect the artistic or stylistic characteristics of any of these cultures. The Aztec and Toltec versions of death heads were nearly always carved in basalt, occasionally were covered with stucco, and were probably all painted. They were usually either attached to walls or altars, or depicted in bas reliefs of deities as ornaments worn on belts. They are comparatively crudely carved, but are more naturalistic than the crystal skulls, particularly in the depiction of the teeth. The Mixtec occasionally fabricated skulls in gold, but these representations are more precisely described as skull-like faces with intact eyes, noses, and ears. The Maya also carved skulls, but in relief on limestone. Often these skulls, depicted in profile, represent days of their calendars.

French and other European buyers imagined they were buying skillful pre-Columbian carvings, partially convinced perhaps by their own fascinated horror with Aztec human sacrifice. But the Aztecs didn't hang crystal skulls around their necks. Instead, they displayed the skulls of sacrificial victims on racks, impaling them horizontally through the sides (the parietal-temporal region), not vertically.

I believe that all of the smaller crystal skulls that constitute the first generation of fakes were made in Mexico around the time they were sold, between 1856 and 1880. This 24-year period may represent the output of a single artisan, or perhaps a single workshop. The larger 1878 Paris skull seems to be some sort of transitional piece, as it follows the vertical drilling of the smaller pieces, but its size precludes it being a bead, or being worn in any way. This skull now resides in the basement laboratories of the Louvre, and the Musée du Quai Branly has begun a program of scientific testing on the piece that will include advanced elemental analysis techniques like particle induced X-ray emission and Raman spectroscopy, so we may know more about its material and age in the near future.

South American Idol?

In the opening scenes of Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981), Indiana Jones is hot on the trail of an extremely valuable golden idol created by an unidentified ancient South American culture. The goddess's image, which Jones deftly snatches from an altar (setting off a series of booby traps that culminate with an enormous boulder nearly crushing our hero), is of a woman in the act of giving birth. The golden figure was modeled on a purportedly Aztec greenstone carving called Tlazolteotl, considered to be a masterpiece by the Dumbarton Oaks Museum in Washington, D.C.

In my research into the object's acquisition history, I discovered that a Chinese dealer in Paris sold the figure in 1883 to a famous French mineralogist, Augustin Damour. His friend, Eugene Boban, advised Damour on the purchase. In examining the artifact's iconography, I found that the birthing position is unknown in documented pre-Columbian artifacts or depictions in codices. I have also used scanning electron microscopy to analyze the manufacture of the idol and have found there is ample evidence of the use of modern rotary cutting tools on the object's surface. In my opinion, the Tlazolteotl idol, like the crystal skulls, is a nineteenth-century fake.

The 1878 Paris skull and the Boban-Tiffany-British Museum skull that appeared in 1881 are perhaps nineteenth-century European inventions. There is no direct tie to Mexico for either of these two larger skulls, except through Boban; they simply appear in Paris long after his initial return from Mexico in 1869. The Mitchell-Hedges skull, which appears after 1934, is a veritable copy of the British Museum skull, with stylistic and technical flourishes that only an accomplished faker would devise. In fact, in 1936 British Museum scholar Adrian Digby first raised the possibility that the Mitchell-Hedges skull could be a copy of the British Museum skull since it showed "a perverted ingenuity such as one would expect to find in a forger." However, Digby, then a young curator, did not suggest it was a modern forgery and also dismissed the possibility that his museum's own crystal skull was a fraud, as early twentieth-century microscopic examination did not reveal the presence of modern tool marks.

The skull that arrived at the Smithsonian 16 years ago represents yet another generation of these hoaxes. According to its anonymous donor, it was purchased in Mexico in 1960, and its size perhaps reflects the exuberance of the time. In comparison with the original nineteenth-century skulls, the Smithsonian skull is enormous; at 31 pounds and nearly 10 inches high, it dwarfs all others. I believe it was probably manufactured in Mexico shortly before it was sold. (The skull is now part of the Smithsonian's national collections and even has its own catalogue number: 409954. At the moment it is stored in a locked cabinet in my office.)

There are now fifth- and probably sixth-generation skulls, and I have been asked to examine quite a number of them. Collectors have brought me skulls purportedly from Mexico, Guatemala, Brazil, and even Tibet. Some of these "crystal" skulls have turned out to be glass; a few are made of resin.

British Museum scientist Margaret Sax and I examined the British Museum and Smithsonian skulls under light and scanning electron microscope and conclusively determined that they were carved with relatively modern lapidary equipment, which were unavailable to pre-Columbian Mesoamerican carvers. (A preliminary report on our research is on the British Museum website, www.britishmuseum.ac.uk/compass). So why have crystal skulls had such a long and successful run, and why do some museums continue to exhibit them, despite their lack of archaeological context and obvious iconographic, stylistic, and technical problems? Though the British Museum exhibits its skulls as examples of fakes, others still offer them up as the genuine article. Mexico's national museum, for example, identifies its skulls as the work of Aztec and Mixtec artisans. Perhaps it is because, like the Indiana Jones movies, these macabre objects are reliable crowd-pleasers.

Impressed by their technical excellence and gleaming polish, generations of museum curators and private collectors have been taken in by these objects. But they are too good to be true. If we consider that pre-Columbian lapidaries used stone, bone, wooden, and possibly copper tools with abrasive sand to carve stone, crystal skulls are much too perfectly carved and highly polished to be believed.

Ultimately, the truth behind the skulls may have gone to the grave with Boban, a masterful dealer of many thousands of pre-Columbian artifacts--including at least five different crystal skulls--now safely ensconced in museums worldwide. He managed to confound a great many people for a very long time and has left an intriguing legacy, one that continues to puzzle us a century after his death. Boban confidently sold museums and private collectors some of the most intriguing fakes known, and perhaps many more yet to be recognized. It sounds like a great premise for a movie.

Titan: Treasures of Earth's oily twin

If worlds have shadow twins elsewhere in the Universe, then Earth's would appear to lie just a block or two down the cosmic road, in orbit around Saturn.

"We have on Titan many of the geological features that we find on Earth," enthuses Rosaly Lopes.

"We find volcanism, we find tectonics, we find erosion and deposition, and wind activity forming dunes.

"It's very similar to the Earth."

But there is a crucial difference: Titan is so cold that most of the water is solid.

This combination of liquid water in the interior plus complex organic molecules composes two big ingredients for life Ralph Lorenz, Johns Hopkins University

The rivers flowing across these plains are formed of a hydrocarbon soup with methane as its main ingredient.

The true nature of this once mysterious world is now finally emerging, courtesy largely of the Cassini-Huygens mission, a joint US-European venture, which deposited a landing craft on Titan, and continues to send back data and pictures of Saturn, its rings and its 60-odd moons.

Dr Lopes, from Nasa's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in California, is one of the scientists reviewing the Titan findings at the European Geosciences Union (EGU) meeting in Vienna, Europe's largest annual gathering of scientists studying the Earth, its climate and its cosmic neighbourhood.

Four years after its arrival in the Saturnian system, Cassini is now showing researchers just how similar Titan is to our own planet.

Lake district

Last year, the craft's radar identified large areas close to the moon's north pole that are apparently lakes filled with the same methane-rich liquid. A few have subsequently turned up near the south pole, too.

The radar instrument has identified lakes on Titan's surface

"What you have is very much like the hydrological cycle on Earth," explains Sushil Atreya from the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor.

"We have methane lakes in the high latitude regions, and the lower part of the atmosphere is sub-saturated, so there's about 40% relative humidity [of methane].

"And from time to time, it will rain methane onto the surface, which then collects into lakes; and there are also equatorial storms in the tropical regions."

So alike do the lakes appear to those on Earth that the cosmological "nomenclature police", the International Astronomical Union (IAU), have decreed that they can be named after those on our planet.

Among others, Titan now features a Lake Abeya, a Lake Mackay and a Lake Ontario, named because their shapes resemble their terrestrial equivalents in Ethiopia, Australia and Canada.

Long trails

Perhaps the most spectacular example of Titan's mimicry of our terrestrial home lies in the river valleys, which are disturbingly Earth-like - long snaking structures with tributaries arranged like veins on a leaf.

Look at the images really hard, and you can almost imagine zooming in to find some Titanian vegetation growing along the banks, and a train of methane-guzzling animals heading down to drink.

"There are a lot of valley systems, and a few are very huge, in the order of 1,000km long," notes Ralf Jaumann from the German Aerospace Center (DLR).

Cassini has seen many valley systems on Titan's surface

"We tried to figure out what these systems are doing with erosion on the surface, and it's comparable with what we know on Earth; these rivers are doing erosion and sediment transport just as we know it from rivers like the Rhine, Elbe and probably the Mississippi. But the liquid in these rivers is not water, but methane."

Ask why methane plays the role here that water plays on Earth, and the answer is disturbingly simple: it is chance.

On Earth, water is warm enough that water is mobile, but not so warm that it evaporates into space, as would happen on Mercury. Titan is so cold - averaging about minus 180C - that water is largely frozen.

Here, it is methane that is able to flow, to evaporate, freeze, thaw and condense, without trailing away into the void.

Water bed

So if methane has usurped the role that water plays on Earth, what part is there on Titan for Earth's most important substance?

For the most part, water here is solid, behaving in some ways as rock does on Earth; a surface to be eroded, a landscape to be sculpted. But in places it emerges violently in volcanoes.

A new analysis of the moon's rotation using Cassini's radar data indicates that large quantities of liquid water may lie under the icy surface.

The Huygens probe captured images of Titan's surface features as it parachuted through the atmosphere Enlarge Image

"By matching up surface features that we saw on successive flybys, we were able to plot their positions relative to where we would have expected them to be if Titan was rotating the way it had always been expected to," explains Ralph Lorenz from Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, US.

"In fact, on top of the expected rotation there is a little bit of a wobble back and forth that is driven by the atmosphere spinning up and spinning down with the seasons.

"Now this actually happens on Earth; the length of our day changes by about a millisecond over the course of a year. But on Titan the change is considerably more because the atmosphere is denser than ours, and Titan is a smaller body.

"The displacement of surface features that we observe is such as to require the ice crust of Titan to be comparatively thin, perhaps 100 or 200km thick, and decoupled from the core with an ocean of liquid water."

Mission life

The atmosphere of Titan has also turned out to be reminiscent of Earth's, possessing layers that mimic the troposphere, stratosphere and ionosphere above our heads.

There may be 1,000 times as much hydrocarbon as there is on Earth

In the higher levels, the interaction of solar radiation, nitrogen, and methane and other simple organic compounds leads to the formation of complex organic molecules such as benzene that later come down to the surface.

There may be 1,000 times more liquid hydrocarbons in Titan's lakes than in all the oil wells on Earth. Its dunes may hold hundreds of times the content of Earth's coal reserves.

It makes an enticing prospect for the would-be life-hunter in space.

"This combination of liquid water in the interior plus complex organic molecules composes two big ingredients for life - certainly life as we know it - and that makes Titan a very attractive body for future exploration," says Ralph Lorenz.

But Cassini is a busy craft. Its trajectory means it spends most of its time away from Titan, snapping strip-shaped radar images as it swings by the moon approximately once every month.

An ocean of liquid water may exist below Titan's surface

The first next step that scientists had been looking for was a two-year extension to Cassini's mission schedule, taking it past the original end date of July this year. As scientists were discussing the findings in Austria, Nasa officials back in Washington granted their wish.

In those two years, further flybys of Titan will mean that about 44% of the moon's surface gets mapped, as compared to 28% currently.

A further extension mission is also feasible, provided that Cassini continues to enjoy a healthy old age.

Beyond that, something dedicated to Titan is envisaged; or perhaps a "double-dip" mission taking in Titan and another of Saturn's enticing moons, Enceladus. Balloons and further landers may be deployed to sample Titan's extravagant hydrocarbon riches.

Let us hope that the craft does not navigate by vision alone. If it does, it is as likely to alight in the lake-strewn landscape of Finland or the valley of the Mississippi as on the plains of this strange and fascinating world.

Vitamin E linked to lung cancer

Vitamin E

High vitamin E doses were found to increase risk

Taking high doses of vitamin E supplements can increase the risk of lung cancer, research suggests.
The US study of 77,000 people found taking 400 milligrams per day long-term increased cancer risk by 28% - with smokers at particular risk.

It follows warnings about similar risks of excessive beta-carotene use.

Writing in the American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine, an expert said people should get their vitamins from fruit and veg.


The jury's still very much out on whether vitamin and mineral supplements can affect cancer risk
Henry Scowcroft, Cancer Research UK

Dr Tim Byers, from the University of Colorado, said a healthy, balanced diet meant people took in a whole range of beneficial nutrients and minerals, which might help to reduce cancer risk.

The researchers followed people aged between 50 and 76 for four years and looked at their average daily use of vitamin C and folic acid, and vitamin E supplements.

Over the course of the study, 521 people developed lung cancer.

Smoking, family history and age all had unsurprisingly strong links to cancer risk.

And while neither vitamin C or folic acid use had any effect on lung cancer risk, vitamin E use did.

The researchers extrapolated their findings, and concluded that over a decade, there was an additional 7% increase in risk for every 100 milligrams taken per day.

The vitamin E trend was most prominent among smokers, but was not confined to them.

Vitamin E is known to be an antioxidant - protecting cells from molecules called free radicals.

But the US researchers speculate that, in high doses, it may also act as a pro-oxidant - causing oxidation and therefore damage to cells.

'Toxic effects'
Dr Christopher Slatore of the University of Washington in Seattle, who led the study, said: "In contrast to the often assumed benefits or at least lack of harm, supplemental vitamin E was associated with a small increased risk of lung cancer.

"Future studies may focus on other components of fruits and vegetables that may explain the decreased risk of cancer that has been associated with fruit and vegetables.

"Meanwhile, our results should prompt clinicians to counsel patients that these supplements are unlikely to reduce the risk of lung cancer and may be detrimental."

But Henry Scowcroft, senior science information officer at Cancer Research UK, said: "The jury's still very much out on whether vitamin and mineral supplements can affect cancer risk.

"Some studies suggest a benefit, but many others show no effect and some, like this one, suggest they may even increase risk."

He added: "Research repeatedly shows that a healthy, balanced diet can reduce your risk of some cancers while giving you all the vitamins you need.

"Quitting smoking remains the most effective way to avoid many cancers. There's no diet, or vitamin supplement, that could ever counter the toxic effects of cigarette smoke."

In 2002 a Finnish study of 29,000 male smokers found taking beta-carotene - which is converted into vitamin A in the body - was linked to an 18% increased risk of developing lung cancer

Vitamins 'may shorten your life'

Could they be doing more harm than good?

Research has suggested certain vitamin supplements do not extend life and could even lead to a premature death.

A review of 67 studies found "no convincing evidence" that antioxidant supplements cut the risk of dying.

Scientists at Copenhagen University said vitamins A and E could interfere with the body's natural defences.

"Even more, beta-carotene, vitamin A, and vitamin E seem to increase mortality," according to the review by the respected Cochrane Collaboration.

The research involved selecting various studies from 817 on beta-carotene, vitamin A, vitamin C, vitamin E, and selenium which the team felt were the most likely to fairly reflect the impact of the supplements on reducing mortality.

It has been thought that these supplements may be able to prevent damage to the body's tissues called "oxidative stress" by eliminating the molecules called "free radicals" which are said to cause it.

This damage has been implicated in several major diseases including cancer and heart disease.

'Just eat well'

The trials involved 233,000 people who were either sick or were healthy and taking supplements for disease prevention.

VITAL VITAMIN FACTS Vitamin A: Found in: Oily fish, eggs and liver; Good for: Thought to boost immune system, and help skin, sight and sperm formation Vitamin C: Found in: Many fruit and vegetables; Good for: Helps heal wounds and assists the body in absorbing iron, may boost the immune system Vitamin E: Found in: Vegetable oils, seeds and nuts; Good for: May help boost circulation and keep elderly people active Beta-carotene: Found in: Vegetables that are reddish-orange in colour; Good for: May boost vision and keep the mind sharp Selenium: Found in: Butter, nuts, liver and fish; Good for: May boost the immune system How many take vitamins? Between 10-20% of people in the West How much is the global market worth? About $2.5bn (£1.3bn)

After various factors were taken into account and a further 20 studies excluded, the researchers linked vitamin A supplements to a 16% increased risk of dying, beta-carotene to a 7% increased risk and vitamin E to a 4% increased risk.

Vitamin C did not appear to have any effect one way or the other, and the team said more work was needed into this supplement - as well as into selenium.

In conclusion, "we found no evidence to support antioxidant supplements for primary or secondary prevention," they said.

It was unclear exactly why the supplements could have this effect, but the team speculated that they could interfere with how the body works: beta-carotene, for instance, is thought to change the way a body uses fats.

The Department of Health said people should try to get the vitamins they need from their diet, and avoid taking large doses of supplements - a market which is worth over £330m in the UK.

"There is a need to exercise caution in the use of high doses of purified supplements of vitamins, including antioxidant vitamins, and minerals," a spokesperson said.

"Their impact on long-term health may not have been fully established and they cannot be assumed to be without risk."

A 'stitch-up'

But the Health Supplements Information Service, which is funded by the association which represents those who sell supplements, said many people were simply not able to get everything they needed from their diet.

Dr Rosemary Leonard's advice on vitamins

"For the millions who are not able to do that, vitamins can be a useful supplement and they should not stop taking them," said spokeswoman Pamela Mason.

Another nutritionist who has formulated supplements described the review as a "stitch-up", arguing it only looked at studies which examined the effect they had on reducing mortality, rather than other advantages.

"Antioxidants are not meant to be magic bullets and should not be expected to undo a lifetime of unhealthy habits," said Patrick Holford.

"But when used properly, in combination with eating a healthy diet full of fruit and vegetables, getting plenty of exercise and not smoking, antioxidant supplements can play an important role in maintaining and promoting overall health."

Vitamin supplements help and are not a substitute -Joel Kosminsky, London

Rio's team-mate tales

United's performances on the pitch are, in part, born out of togetherness and camaraderie off it. Rio Ferdinand gives us the inside track on life in the first-team dressing room...

Best trainer: Scholesy. He’s such a good passer, and his team always wins in training.

Worst trainer: I’d say Wes or Wazza. They must be saving themselves for the games.

Fittest squad member: Wayne or Ronaldo. They’re both explosive players that could run at the same pace in the last minute of a game as they could in the first.

Most outrageous skill: Obvious… Ronaldo. Nani tries to compete, but to no avail!

Toughest tackler: Wayne, Vida and Scholesy. There are some big tackles that go in. Maybe they don’t like their team-mates.

Anyone play out of position? No, the manager doesn’t let us. Back in the day I used to play up front in training. But that was stopped, I think I was too much of a threat to the forwards.

Joker in the dressing room: The sly joker is Fletch. People don’t suspect him, but when something’s going on he is normally involved. Pique and Fletch are always at the centre of pranks with player’s clothes. Me? I don’t get involved. It’s not my game. I’m a very mature member of the squad now so I don’t get drawn into the young boys’ antics!

Most intelligent player: Edwin van der Sar would like to think that he’s the most intelligent. I’d probably put myself up there [laughs]. But seeing as Edwin thinks he’s the most intelligent, let’s let him believe it.

Person you'd least like on your quiz team: Got to be Ando (Anderson). Considering he joined the club at the same time as Nani, Ando’s English is shocking by comparison! Nani is holding television interviews in English and Anderson struggles to hold a conversation with the lads. He wouldn’t get us many answers.

Best dressed: I’d say the person that puts the most effort in is Ronaldo. He doesn’t just wake up, go into his wardrobe and throw something on. He tries really hard. Every day his clothes are a planned event.

Worst dressed: Tomasz Kuszczak! I say that purely for the electric blue shirt he wore one night out once. It was shocking. It was one of the worst colours that I’ve ever seen. The thing is, he’d saved it just for that occasion as well.

Best dressing room music: Mine. My iPod has by far the greatest variety of music; 80s pop, 80’s soul, R‘n’B, reggae, dance, old house music... there’s a mixture there. Unfortunately, some of the young European lads don’t appreciate old Hacienda house music. Patrice likes to get involved with selecting dressing room music. He tends to cater for the foreign lads a bit more with his Euro pop. To be fair to him he mixes it up with a bit of R‘n’B. But he doesn’t have the variety and depth of music knowledge that I have.

Cycling jacket wins design award

An American inventor based in the UK has won an international design competition.

Michael Chen, 28, won a £6,000 prize for his Reactiv cycle jacket, which changes colour as the cyclist brakes.

The inspiration for the jacket came from wanting to feel safer when cycling the streets of London.

Chen said: "I cycled round London in the dark wearing my first prototype. It was a £10 waterproof jacket with LEDs stuck on by gaffer tape."

He continued: "For the first time, I noticed that cars passed me more slowly, gave me more room, and that the drivers and passengers were even making eye contact."

How it works

The jacket uses an accelerometer to sense movement, changing the colour of LEDs on the back from green when accelerating, then to red when braking.

A tilt switch in the jacket also makes LEDs in the arm flash amber when the wearer lifts their arm to indicate a turn.

There were entries from 14 countries in the James Dyson international design awards in New York.

They included a tangle-proof sailing rope, underwear which can correct posture and a toilet which analyses waste.

Michael Chen will get a cash prize of £5,000 with the other £1,000 going to his former university in London.

Look! In the Sky. It’s a Rocket Racer.

It's a Bird, It's a Plane, It's a Rocket Racer!

Rocket Racing

A new sport that combines the sport of auto racing with the aerobatic displays of air shows will begin holding exhibition races in August. The sport is rocket racing, and it involves top-flight pilots maneuvering rocket-powered aircraft along a virtual racecourse at high speeds and varying altitudes.

Spectators will be able to watch the pilots’ progress on screens that show the racecourse as well as unique views from inside the cockpits and various cameras. The Rocket Racing League has been developing the sport since 2005, when it was cofounded by Ansari X Prize chairman Peter Diamandis and Granger Whitelaw, an Indianapolis 500 team owner

The planes the league will use are based on a small jet sold by Velocity Aircraft, a league-owned company in Florida.

The racers may finally be reaching the starting line.

The Rocket Racing League, a long-promised attempt to create a kind of Nascar of the skies, will hold its first exhibition races this year, its founders said.

The races are promised as a kind of living video game — but louder — with a virtual raceway laid out in the sky that will be visible on projection screens at the site of each event.

Racers in rocket-powered aircraft will fly four laps around a five-mile “track” at anywhere from 150 feet to 1,500 feet above the ground. The planes, designed to fly at 340 miles an hour, will start side by side, two at a time. The pilots include professional test pilots who received their training in the military and a former astronaut.

As pilots follow the course, spectators will be able to see alternate views from remote cameras and the cockpits. The league has signed up six teams so far.

“We’re taking the business of auto racing and the business of air shows and we’re combining them,” said Granger Whitelaw, the league’s chief executive and a partner in professional auto racing teams. The races will consist of four heats, each of which will take about 15 minutes, he said.

The announcements are to be made at a news conference planned for Monday at the Yale Club in Midtown Manhattan.

The planes the league will use are based on a small jet sold by Velocity Aircraft, a league-owned company in Florida. The planes will be modified to handle a rocket engine that burns liquid oxygen and kerosene.

The engines should be loud enough to satisfy the decibel-hungry fans of racing and air shows, Whitelaw said, and produce a bright 10-to-15-foot flame.

The engines will come from two companies, Whitelaw said: Xcor Aerospace of Mojave, Calif., and Armadillo Aerospace of Mesquite, Tex. Armadillo was founded by John Carmack, a high-tech businessman who created successful video games, including Doom and Quake.

The first public taste of rocket racing will take place Aug. 1 and Aug. 2 in Oshkosh, Wis., Whitelaw said, at the annual Experimental Aircraft Association air show. It will involve two of the sleek aircraft developed for the league. The racers will also perform at air shows in Nevada and New Mexico. (More information is available at rocketracingleague.com.)

Competition should begin in 2009, the founders said.

That is quite a bit later than the league planned. Rocket Racing was announced in 2005, and the company released animations showing what a race might look like, with plenty of swooping and blazing rockets. The founders said then that the first races would be held in 2006.

The league’s plans have faltered in the interim. A video game based on the races that the founders said would be produced has not emerged, and one of its original teams, Leading Edge Rocket Racing, dropped out last year, issuing a statement that suggested the league was in disarray.

“Some of the things took longer than we had anticipated,” Whitelaw said. He added, “We’re 15 months behind where I thought we would be, which is not too shabby.”

The league’s co-founder, Peter Diamandis, served as chairman of the X Prize Foundation, which awarded the $10 million Ansari X Prize in 2004 for the first privately financed human flight to space. Diamandis said in an e-mail interview that “most pioneers who enter this business are, typically, optimists, and tend to believe things can be accomplished faster than it really takes.”

The league, he said, fits into a broader goal of “making space a firsthand experience” for people, and driving down the cost of getting to space through commercial ventures.

Whitelaw stressed that the league was a business. It will patent technological innovations on its racers, like safety features, in hopes of making money off them should they make their way into general aviation, and it will try to build profits out of television and merchandising rights. The company will also sell conventional jet-engine versions of the Velocity racer, he said.

Diamandis said, “If we do our job right, many of these new technologies will end up in both space-related hardware and general aviation — just like technologies pioneered in Formula and Indy Racing end up in the cars we drive.”

He acknowledged that flying rockets involved the risk of accidents and death, an issue that has raised questions about the viability of space tourism. Racing, however, is a different arena, with a higher level of accepted risk, he said.

Man Utd are the best team in the country, says Alex Ferguson

Sir Alex Ferguson believes his Manchester United side have established themselves again as the country's dominant force as they close in on a 10th Premier League title.

United's victory over Arsenal at the weekend, and Chelsea's draw against Wigan last night, means Fergie's men will be champions with wins in their next two games against Blackburn and Chelsea.

From the start of the season Fergie claimed that results between the Big Four of United, Chelsea, Arsenal and Liverpool would determine the outcome of this season's title race.

And with United having twice beaten Liverpool, taken four points off Arsenal and looking to do the double over Chelsea to retain the title, Fergie said there can be no doubt his team are the best once more. "I said results between the top four would be the key this season and that's been proved right," he said. "Thank goodness we've performed well and got results against our main rivals, because we've dropped points elsewhere.

"The Premier League has become much tougher in recent seasons. For example, we lost six points to Manchester City this season, which is something we didn't expect.

"We also lost at West Ham and Bolton, but the key is keeping those setbacks to a minimum.

"We've managed to do that and if we can win our next two games, then we're champions again."

Assuming Chelsea beat Everton on Thursday and United overcome Blackburn Rovers on Saturday, Fergie's men will go to Stamford Bridge on April 26 five points clear and knowing a win there would clinch the title.

That would leave United eight points ahead with two games left. But defender Rio Ferdinand, outstanding against Arsenal, sounded a note of caution and argued: "There are still games we have to win to make sure of the title, so we need to get the right results.

"If we do that, hopefully we'll be the team picking up something.

"It's that stage of the season where it's crunch time.

"The trophies are being handed out soon and the three points against Arsenal gets us a step closer to being able to pick up one of those trophies.

"We'll keep our fingers crossed that we can keep motoring on and playing the way we are.

"Against Arsenal we were a bit more open than we'd have liked, but the most important thing was to win.

"Coming from a goal down to win, we showed the confidence and resilience that has been a trademark of ours for the last couple of years - and long may that continue."

United's 2-1 triumph over Arsenal at Old Trafford on Sunday completed a remarkable 14-point swing between the two sides in just a couple of months.

When Arsenal came to the Theatre of Dreams in the fifth round of the FA Cup on February 16, they were five points clear of United at the top of the table. But a 4-0 thrashing by United proved the beginning of the end for the Gunners.

In a nightmare sequence, Arsene Wenger's brittle young stars have managed just one win in the league since then and must face up to a third straight season without any silverware.

Yet Ferdinand insisted there could be no sympathy from United for their bitter rivals.

"This is no time for sentiment," said the England centre-half.

"That might sound harsh, given what's happened to Arsenal in recent weeks, but I'm sure they wouldn't be worrying about us if we weren't able to win a trophy.

We only care about ourselves. Arsenal are a great side and play fantastic football.

"But we just need to keep our eyes on ourselves and if we do that, we'll go a long way to being successful."

Owen Hargreaves, whose 72nd-minute free-kick sealed victory over Arsenal, said United's players now sensed the title was within reach.

"It was a big win over Arsenal," said Hargreaves.

"We knew how important it was and we've only got a few games left now.

"We'll go to Blackburn on Saturday in good spirits. We don't have a game this week, so we can get some rest ahead of what promises to be a fabulous end to the season."

HOW THE BIG FOUR FARED

At the start of the season Sir Alex Ferguson claimed results between the top four would decide the title. And he looks to be right as our stats below show.

1. Man Utd: Played 5: Won: 4 Drawn: 1 Lost: 0 Goals For: 10 Goals Against: 3 Points: 13

2. Arsenal: Played: 6 Won: 1 Drawn: 3 Lost: 2 Goals For: 7 Goals Against: 8 Points: 6

3. Chelsea: Played 5 Won 1 Drawn: 2 Lost: 2 Goals For: 3 Goals Against: 5 Points: 5

4. Liverpool: Played: 6 Won: 0 Drawn: 4 Lost: 2 Goals For: 3 Goals Against: 7 Points: 4

'Miracle baby' is feted in India

There's even talk of a temple being built in Lali's honour

They're calling her the miracle baby.

Barely a month old, baby Lali was born with a rare condition which has given her two faces.

It's called Craniofacial Duplication and she has two sets of eyes, noses and lips.

In the village where she was born, close to the edge of Delhi, her condition has made her an object of fascination and reverence.

'Blessed'

"When I first saw her, I was scared. It's natural," her father, Vinod Singh, tells me.

"But now I feel I'm blessed."

Doctors have told him them that despite having two faces Lali is healthy and normal.

She is able to drink milk through either mouth and breathe normally.

Mr Singh is a poor farm worker. At his mud and brick house at the end of a narrow dusty lane, a neighbour applies a fresh coat of paint to his front door.

We just want to enjoy time with our first born child Vinod Singh

Inside, he stands surrounded by villagers, some sitting on sturdy hessian cots, others smoking pipes.

For the past few days, people have been lining up to see his daughter.

Many of them bring offerings of money, believing that Lali has special powers.

"When you see something unnatural, it can only be the miracle of God," says Jatinder Nagar, a neighbour who's taken on the self-appointed role of tour guide.

"It's something so magical that we believe that she's a goddess. We regard her as one."

Uncomfortable

Eighty-year-old Ballabh Saini is a grandmother and respected as a village elder.

But even she bows her head in reverence.

"She has brought us fame and she is blessed," she tells me.

"So many people have been coming to see her - travelling long distances on cars, motorbikes, horse-drawn carts."

But all this is making Vinod Singh increasingly uncomfortable and upset.

"She's my daughter. I don't want any more of this. I'm fed up," he says, throwing up his hands in despair.

But he's up against centuries of superstition.

Faced with something they're unable to comprehend, the villagers believe she is the reincarnation of a Hindu goddess.

There's even talk of a temple being built in her honour.

Her new found status is lost on Lali, as she lies cradled in her grandfather's arms.

Doctors in Delhi say there is no possibility of separating her head.

But they do want to carry out more medical tests to determine if her internal organs are normal.

But her parents won't allow them.

"What is the need? As far as we are concerned she's like any other child," says Vinod Singh.

"We just want to enjoy time with our first-born child."

Operation Beijing storm: rockets target rain

BEIJING (Reuters) - China is preparing an arsenal of rockets and aircraft to protect the Olympics opening ceremony from rain, hoping to disperse clouds before they can drench dignitaries at the roofless "bird's nest" stadium.

Officials believe there is a 47 percent probability of rain during the August 8 opening ceremony and a 6 percent chance of a heavy downpour and will try to drain humidity from clouds before they reach Beijing.

More than 100 staff at 21 stations surrounding the city will have 10 minutes' notice to fire rockets or cannons containing silver iodide at approaching clouds in the hope of making them rain before they reach the stadium. Three aircraft will also be on stand-by to drop catalysts to unleash rain from the clouds.

"We've worked with neighboring provinces on a contingency plan for rainstorm and other weather risks during the ceremonies," said Wang Yubin, the deputy chief of China's meteorological service assigned to the Olympics.

The government has spent $500,000 to build up Beijing's cloud seeding capacities over the last five years and authorities will conduct practice runs in June and July. It typically uses pellets of silver iodide, which is highly insoluble in water and can concentrate moisture to cause rain.

Zhang Qiang, head of Beijing's Weather Modification Office, believed her staff can fend off drizzle, but could be powerless in the face of a heavy downpour.

"I hope God will not send any storms to Beijing," she said.

Harvard Reconnects with Its Native American Past

Bruce Curliss, a direct descendant of one of the Native Americans who attended Harvard Indian College, discusses the excavation of Harvard Yard with students. (Jason Urbanus)

Pieces of lead type found in Harvard Yard that are likely from Harvard Indian College's 17th-century press. (Jason Urbanus)



An 18th- or 19th-century padlock is one of the artifacts that is helping fill gaps in the early history of Harvard Yard. (Courtesy Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology, Harvard)

On an unseasonably warm day last November, members of Massachusetts's Native American community, along with Harvard University students and professors, gathered in Harvard Yard to commemorate the school's Indian history. For two years, students have been digging on the famous university green as part of a course called "Archaeology of Harvard Yard." Their most astonishing finds so far are several pieces of lead print type, believed to have been part of the printing press that produced the first Bible in the New World--a translation into Wampanoag, a regional dialect of the Algonquin language.

Although Harvard University is one of the world's most famous academic institutions, little is known about its early relationship with local Native Americans. When English settlers arrived in the Boston area in the seventeenth century, Puritan leaders were determined to convert nearby tribes to Protestantism. Harvard's 1650 charter explicitly states its intention to promote the "education of English and Indian youth of this Country in knowledge and godliness." To this end, in 1655, the university finished construction of the two-story Harvard Indian College, the first brick edifice on a campus now noted for its rows of dark red brick buildings. The college was intended to house some 20 Native American students who would be educated according to a seventeenth-century English curriculum. Excavators believe that the pieces of print type discovered during the 2007 field season are part of the printing press set up in the college.

The "Archaeology of Harvard Yard" course has had several Native American participants, including freshman Tiffany Lee Smalley, the first undergraduate member of the Aquinnah Wampanoag tribe at Harvard since the 1660s. "In many important ways our class has revisited what took place on this very ground 300 years ago," said William Fash, director of the Peabody Museum at Harvard. "It's a great opportunity for dialogue between both Native and non-Native American students to communicate with each other and the past."

Jason Urbanus is a doctoral candidate at the Joukowsky Institute for Archaeology and the Ancient World at Brown University.

© 2008 by the Archaeological Institute of America
www.archaeology.org/0803/abstracts/harvard.html

Beware of Bottled water

Urgent Matter - all females (wives, daughters, girlfriends etc) must be warned about bottled water!!!

Bottled water in cars leads to Breast Cancer!!!!

This is how Sheryl Crow got breast cancer. She was on the Ellen show and said this same exact thing. This has been identified as the most common cause of the high levels in breast cancer, especially in Australia.

A friend whose mother was recently diagnosed with breast cancer, the Doctor told her: " Women should not drink bottled water that has been left in a car".

The doctor said that the heat and the plastic of the bottle have certain chemicals that lead to breast cancer. So please be careful and do not drink bottled water that has been left in a car, and pass this on to all women in your life.

This information is the kind we need to know and be aware and just might save us!! The heat causes toxins from the plastic to leak into the water and they have found these toxin in breast tissues.

So instead; Use a stainless steel Canteen or a glass bottle when you can!!!

PLEASE INFORM PEOPLE ABOUT THIS MATTER

- BP SUJEEWON M.D

Dangerous (Do not drink Coka-Cola and eat MENTOS together)

In Brazil, last week a little boy died when eating
Mentos and drinking Coca-Cola.

A similar case happened, in Brazil, a year before.
In order to see any reactions of these 2 products
which caused the death of the 2 Boys, a group
of people decided to do an experiment.

Now see what happens when adding Mentos to
Coca Cola!!! The pictures show the results.

So be careful with your Menthos and your Coke!!!

- BP SUJEEWON