Kenyan elephant numbers plummet by 1000 in four years

IT'S a case of up then down for Kenya's second largest population of elephants. After a promising growth spurt, the elephants are now dying faster than they are being born. The decline is being blamed on illegal poaching, driven by Asia's demand for ivory. ...

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Storm Bopha returns to Philippines

MANILA: Heavy rain brought flooding fears in the north of the storm-battered Philippines as Typhoon Bopha returned Sunday, days after slamming into the south of the country and leaving almost 1,400 dead or missing.While the powerful typhoon had weakened to a tropical storm, it was still causing downpours in the north even as hundreds in the south struggled to recover from its fury, said...

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Handcuffs that give you an electric shock?

Progress?(Credit:Patent Bolt)Sometimes an invention comes along that makes you excited about the future.For a long time, it seems that handcuffs have been stuck in the movies of old. They restrain you, but, odd for our interactive world, that's all they seem to do.Might I tempt you toward futuristic handcuffs that will offer you a small involuntary judder?I am grateful to Gizmodo for discovering that...

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Plants Grow Fine Without Gravity

When researchers sent plants to the International Space Station in 2010, the flora wasn't meant to be decorative. Instead, the seeds of these small, white flowers—called Arabidopsis thaliana—were the subject of an experiment to study how plant roots developed in a weightless environment.Gravity is an important influence on root growth, but the scientists found that their space plants didn't...

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Gay Marriage: Will Justices Follow Popular Opinion?

The Supreme Court's announcement that it would hear two cases challenging laws prohibiting same-sex marriage has reinvigorated one of the most hotly contentious social debates in American history, a debate that has been fueled by a dramatic change in attitudes.With some states taking significant steps towards legalizing gay marriage, the hearings come at a critical moment.This...

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Today on New Scientist: 9 December 2012

Climate talks stumbling towards a deal As the Qatar climate summit looks set to run into the weekend, we look at some key issues, such as compensation for poor countries harmed by climate changeTwin spacecraft map the mass of the man in the moon Two satellites called Ebb and Flow have revealed the fine variations in the moon's surface with the most detailed gravity map everJust cut down on...

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Psy apologises for past anti-US performances

SEOUL: South Korean megastar singer Psy, famed for his runaway hit "Gangnam Style", apologised Saturday for anti-American performances a decade ago, ahead of a planned show before US President Barack Obama.In 2002 the singer smashed a model US tank at a protest over the American military presence in South Korea and the death of two South Korean teenagers who were struck by a US military...

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Apple and Google making joint bid for Kodak patents, report says

Apple and Google might be opponents competing for smartphone andtablet customers, but according to a Bloomberg report they have joined forces to acquire Eastman Kodak's 1,000 imaging patents for more than $500 million. The Wall Street Journal first reported on the possible alliance in August. Previously, the Journal reported that Apple and Google were each leading separate consortiums...

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Federal Agencies Brace for Deep Cuts Post-'Cliff'

Dec 7, 2012 4:22pm Toby Jorrin/AFP/Getty ImagesWith the “fiscal cliff” quickly approaching, federal agencies are stepping up preparations for deep automatic budget cuts that will kick in Jan. 2 unless the White House and Congress can reach a deal.The Office of Management and Budget told ABC News that a memo went out to federal agencies earlier this week seeking “additional...

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Space bigwigs offer billion-dollar private moon trips

Robots aren't the only ones heading to the moon. The first private company offering regular trips to the lunar surface plans to start flights in 2020, shuttling people two at a time on exploratory missions. However, with an expected price tag of $1.4 billion per flight, or around $750 million per person, the trek...

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S. Korea urges North to spend on debt, not missiles

SEOUL: South Korea on Friday urged North Korea to repay millions of dollars in debt related to past food aid, and slammed the regime in Pyongyang for squandering scant resources on long-range missile tests.The South provided the North with some 2.6 million tonnes of food worth US$720 million in six installments between 2000 and 2007.The food aid was provided in the form of a cheap loan,...

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Here comes 'Az' -- one iPad news app closes, another goes live

Screengrab of "AZ" a new iPad magazine launched by Arizona Republic, AZCentral.com and KPNX-TV. This morning, I had a meeting with a former student who is now the U.S. correspondent for one of the biggest dailies in Europe. He is on a listening tour, helping his newspaper look for innovative ideas that will stave off some of the troubles that American newspapers have had.Like many places overseas,...

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Space Pictures This Week: Lunar Gravity, Venusian Volcano

Cassiopeia’s BubbleImage courtesy T.A. Rector, UAA/WIYN/NOAO/NSFA new camera called the One Degree Imager, located at Kitt Peak National Observatory in Arizona, is responsible...

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John McAfee Out of Hospital, Back in Cell

Software millionaire John McAfee has been returned to an immigration detention cell in Guatemala after being rushed to a Guatemala City hospital via ambulance.McAfee, 67 -- who soon may be deported back to Belize, where authorities want to question him about the shooting death of his neighbor -- was reportedly found prostrate on the floor of his cell and unresponsive.He was...

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Chemical key to cell division revealed

In each of our cells, most of the genetic material is packaged safely within the nucleus, which is protected by a double membrane. The biochemistry behind how this membrane transforms when cells divide has finally been unravelled, offering insights that could provide new ways of fighting cancer and some rare genetic disorders. ...

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Beijing to allow visa-free transit trips

BEIJING: China will allow transit passengers from 45 countries including the US, Canada and all members of the EU to spend up to 72 hours in Beijing without a visa from next month, city authorities said.The move would "strongly spur the development of the tourism industry, speed up building of an international city (and) expand contacts with the rest of the world," the Beijing Tourism...

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Plaintiff in $2.7B judgment against Yahoo willing to take less

After winning a $2.7 billion preliminary judgment against Yahoo, a plaintiff in the Mexico City civil court case said the matter can be settled for less than the court's judgment.The judgment handed down Friday by the 49th Civil Court of the Federal District of Mexico City involved allegations that Yahoo was in breach of contract related to a yellow-pages listing service. The lawsuit was brought by...

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A 2020 Rover Return to Mars?

NASA is so delighted with Curiosity's Mars mission that the agency wants to do it all again in 2020, with the possibility of identifying and storing some rocks for a future sample return to Earth.The formal announcement, made at the American Geophysical Union's annual fall meeting, represents a triumph for the NASA Mars program, which had fallen on hard times due to steep budget cuts....

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McAfee Arrested for Entering Guatemala Illegally

Eccentric software tycoon John McAfee, wanted in Belize for questioning in the shooting death of his neighbor, has been arrested in Guatemala for entering the country illegally, his Guatemala attorney told ABC News. Before McAfee's arrest, he told ABC News in an exclusive interview he would be seeking asylum in Guatemala. McAfee was arrested by the Central American country's...

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When is a baby too premature to save?

It was never easy, but trying to decide whether to save extremely premature babies just got harder. A study called EPICure compared the fates of babies born 22 to 26 weeks into pregnancy in the UK in 1995 with similar babies born in 2006. In...

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PSYprise for 'Gangnam Style' fans

SINGAPORE: Tired of 'Gangnam Style'? Certainly not the more than 4000 people who turned up to catch PSY at the free Marina Bay Sands "Give back to Singapore" concert over the weekend.As for those who can't get enough of the South Korean sensation and weren't fast enough to be among the lucky few to dance with the 'Gangnam Style' star, the good news is that it will take more than just...

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