A Vaccine To Prevent Every Strain Of Flu

British scientists are on the verge of producing a revolutionary flu vaccine that works against all major types of the disease. Described as the 'holy grail' of flu vaccines, it would protect against all strains of influenza A - the virus behind both bird flu and the nastiest outbreaks of winter flu. Just a couple of injections could give long-lasting immunity - unlike the current vaccine which has to be given every year. The brainchild of scientists at Cambridge biotech firm Acambis, working with Belgian researchers, the vaccine will be tested on humans for the first time in the next few months. A similar universal flu vaccine, being developed by Swiss vaccine firm Cytos Biotechnology, could also be tested on people in 2007 - and the vaccines on the market in around five years. Importantly, the vaccines would also be quicker and easier to make than the traditional jabs, meaning vast quantities could be stockpiled against a global outbreak of bird flu. Martin Bachmann, of Cytos, said: "You could really stockpile it. In the case of a pandemic, that would be a huge advantage.

FBI, FEMA Move Some Jobs Outside 'Blast Zone'

The FBI and the Federal Emergency Management Agency are moving jobs to the Shenandoah Valley - a picturesque locale that happens to be just outside Washington's "blast zone." In the event of a nuclear explosion in the capital, Winchester's location about 70 miles from Washington would put it outside the fallout zone, often estimated at 50 miles. At the same time, employees could easily travel to Washington when they need to. The FBI chose Winchester, a city of 26,000, over other places of similar distance from Washington for a big centralized archive that by 2009 will employ at least 1,200 people, many of them now working in Washington and Baltimore. Some employees already are working in a temporary center outside Winchester. Meanwhile, FEMA has chosen a farm just outside town for an operations center that will employ 700 people. Local officials say it will include positions moved from Mount Weather, the government's hilltop emergency center on the border of Loudoun and Clarke counties. The trend is happening elsewhere in the region as well. Outside Martinsburg, W.Va., the Coast Guard is building a National Maritime Center, a 200-person office currently in Arlington County. In Washington County, Md., near Hagerstown, the government is redeveloping the vacant Fort Ritchie to house national-security jobs.
Federal officials defended the moves, "For any government agency looking at a new facility in this day and age, of course, security is going to be a priority," FBI spokeswoman Cathy Milhoan said.

Kids Interested In The Occult

Researcher George Barna narrowed his yearly religious surveys to the top 12 most significant or surprising findings and highlighted religious faith to be a hot issue in people's lives still today. And the future of America's faith looks more diverse than ever. The 12 most noteworthy outcomes... Three out of every four teenagers have engaged in at least one type of psychic or witchcraft-related activity. Among the most common of those endeavors are using a Ouija board, reading books about witchcraft or Wicca, playing games involving sorcery or witchcraft, having a “professional” read their palm or having their fortune told. Conversely, during the past year fewer than three out of every ten churched teenagers had received any teaching from their church about elements of the supernatural.

Orwell Was Right: Spy Cameras See Britons' Every Move

It's Saturday night in Middlesbrough, England, and drunken university students are celebrating the start of the school year, known as Freshers' Week. One picks up a traffic cone and runs down the street. Suddenly, a disembodied voice booms out from above: ``You in the black jacket! Yes, you! Put it back!'' The confused student obeys as his friends look bewildered. ``People are shocked when they hear the cameras talk, but when they see everyone else looking at them, they feel a twinge of conscience and comply,'' said Mike Clark, a spokesman for Middlesbrough Council who recounted the incident. The city has placed speakers in its cameras, allowing operators to chastise miscreants who drop coffee cups, ride bicycles too fast or fight outside bars. Almost 70 years after George Orwell created the all-seeing dictator Big Brother in the novel ``1984,'' Britons are being watched as never before. About 4.2 million spy cameras film each citizen 300 times a day, and police have built the world's largest DNA database. Prime Minister Tony Blair said all Britons should carry biometric identification cards to help fight the war on terror. At a single road junction in the London borough of Hammersmith, there are 29 cameras run by police, government, private companies and transport agencies. Police officers are even trying out video cameras mounted on their heads. ``We've got to stand back and see where technology is taking us,'' said Thomas, whose job is to protect people's privacy. ``Humans must dictate our future, not machines.'' Blair said citizens have to sacrifice some freedoms to fight terrorism, illegal immigration and identity fraud.

Eight Nations Now Building ICBM Nuclear Missiles

Ballistic missile defense programs around the world are going to have their work cut out for them: At least eight nations went all out in developing their own offensive ballistic missile programs in 2006, a new survey says. ‘According to a preliminary count, eight countries launched more than 26 ballistic missiles of 23 types in 24 different events,’ the Strategic Security Blog of the Federation of American Scientists recently reported. North Korea was not on the only ballistic missile-developing nation to experience test failures in its 2006 missile testing, the SSB report noted. Russia and India did too. However, ‘the United States demonstrated a very reliable capability including the 117th consecutive successful launch of the Trident II D5 sea-launched ballistic missile,’ the SSB said. The SSB noted the extensive ballistic missile testing activities of the United States, Russia, France and India, and dryly noted that they reflected ‘yet another double standard in international security.’ It recommended ‘that initiatives are needed to limit not only proliferating countries from developing ballistic missiles but also find ways to curtail the programs of the existing nuclear powers.’

Giant ice shelf breaks off in Canadian Arctic, Global Warming Sign ?

An enormous ice shelf broke away from Ellesmere Island in the Canadian Arctic, researchers said, warning it could be another symptom of global warming. The 66-square-kilometer (25.5-square-mile) ice island tore away from Ellesmere, a huge strip of land in the Canadian Arctic close to Greenland. The break was so violent that it caused tremors that were detected by Canadian seismographs 250 kilometers (155 miles) away, but at the time no one was able to pinpoint what had happened. The Canadian Ice Service contacted geographer Luke Copland of the University of Ottawa, who reconstructed the chain of events by piecing together data from the seismic readings and satellite images provided by Canada and the United States. "This loss is the biggest in 25 years, but it continues the loss that occurred within the last century," Copland told AFP, saying 90 percent of the the ice cover had been lost since the area was discovered in 1906. "What is important and interesting is that it is sudden, quite large even," he said. "In the past, we looked to climate change (and) thought perhaps ice shelves ... would just melt apart by losing a little piece day by day, but it now seems that when you reach some kind of threshold, when you reach that level, the whole thing just breaks apart." Following the discovery, biologist Warwick Vincent of Laval University in Quebec, visited the icy waters of the Arctic to view the "new island." Vincent said he had seen nothing like it in the past decade. "It really is incredible," Vincent was quoted as saying by the newspaper National Post.

Majority Of Americans Believe In Angels

An overwhelming majority, almost regardless of backgrounds and religious convictions, think angels are real, according to an AP-AOL News poll exploring attitudes about Santa Claus, angels and more. Belief in angels, however people define them, is highest — almost universal — among white evangelical Christians, 97 percent of whom trust in their existence, the poll indicates. But even among people with no religious affiliation, well more than half said angels are for real. Protestants, women, Southerners, Midwesterners and Republicans were the most likely to believe in angels, although strong majorities in other groups also shared that faith. Belief in angels declined slightly with advanced education, from 87 percent of those with high school education or less to 73 percent of those with college degrees. Overall, 81 percent believed in angels.

Using Global Positioning System to Take Command

Global Positioning Satellite System (GPS) technology offers solutions to these challenges. GPS enables an individual to determine his precise location on the Earth via devices that receive signals from a constellation of 24 satellites. Imagine establishing a command post with computer screens that graphically depict the locations of resources and display a real-time image of the scene from a satellite, albeit with a slight delay. Commanders at distant locations could view the same picture, communicate and develop strategies. In addition, if personnel are properly equipped, the incident commander can transmit information such as a picture of a wanted suspect, logistical plans of a building or an overhead view of a disaster to personnel through a Personal Digital Assistant (PDA). GPS can increase efficiency, promote officer safety, augment plan development, and enhance communications between headquarters and field command posts.

FDA Approves Food From Clones Without Warning Labels

A long-awaited study by federal scientists concludes that meat and milk from cloned animals and their offspring is safe to eat and should be allowed to enter the food supply without any special labeling. The finding is a strong signal that the Food and Drug Administration will endorse the use of cloning technology for cattle, goats and pigs when it publishes a key safety assessment intended to clear the way for formal approval of the products.

No Matter Where Patients Go, Chip Lets Hospital Know

It's the stuff of futuristic novels: Everyone is issued a bracelet that emits radio waves to track their location. Where they are and how long they've been there is displayed on a computer screen that's continuously monitored. This technology is no longer just fiction. It's being used now at hospitals across the country, including Middle Tennessee.
Becky Morris, a patient at Middle Tennessee Medical Center, says the bracelet gives her a sense of security. "I think it's great," said Morris, who recently underwent knee-replacement surgery. "I like everybody to know where I'm at." Advocates of the technology, called radio frequency identification, say it will lead to faster patient treatment and better health outcomes. The transmitters will also be attached to medical equipment, to help keep track of it. "This is a time-saving measure that allows us to quickly locate patients and equipment," said Emily Gardner, who works in MTMC's "mission control," a room with eight computer screens that show the location of every patient and 1,600 pieces of hospital equipment. "This gives us an overall view of what's going on in the hospital." Not everyone is a fan of the technology. Liz McIntyre, communications director for CASPIAN, a group that seeks to educate consumers about marketing strategies that invade their privacy, says the group is opposed to using the technology to track people. She says the concern is that one day it will be used to constantly monitor people as they go about their daily lives. To some extent, McIntrye says, that's already happening. She pointed to toll tags that allow people to quickly get through tollbooths on the interstate. Like it or not, some health experts predict it's only a matter of time before the transmitters become commonplace in hospitals. Locally, patients and equipment at Middle Tennessee Medical Center are being tracked via the technology. Hospital Corporation of America, which owns several hospitals in the Nashville area, is testing it to monitor equipment in some of its Florida and Texas facilities. And a Vanderbilt University Medical Center official says it's not a question of if, but when they will purchase the equipment to track patients, equipment, and perhaps employees.

We'll All Be Cyborgs Someday, Scientist Says

In "Casino Royale," the latest James Bond movie, Bond is implanted with a microchip that allows headquarters to track his whereabouts and monitor his vital signs. If a British cybernetics expert is right, the day will come when most people are implanted with chips — and the real-life chips will do a lot more than Bond's does. Kevin Warwick, a professor of cybernetics at the University of Reading, has firsthand knowledge. In 1998, he had a chip surgically inserted into his left arm, becoming, he thinks, the first human ever implanted with a computer chip. Since then, he's had a more sophisticated chip connected directly to his nervous system. He is still working toward his grandest experiment: having a chip implanted in his brain.

Wiccans Witches Going Mainstream

With an estimated 400,000 members nationwide, and a high-profile fight with the federal government over veterans' grave markers, Wiccans are moving into a more prominent place in the religious landscape. And Selena Fox is leading the way. A Wiccan priestess and founder of Circle Sanctuary, a 200-acre nature center in the Wisconsin woods about 30 miles west of Madison, Fox battles for acceptance of the so-called neo-pagan religion. Fox, whose graying hair flows midway down her purple dress and matching cape, exudes more hippie-esque charm than any kind of Hollywood-conjured witchery. She embraces the task of fighting discrimination against Wiccans. "Spirituality should be something that lifts the spirit," she said. Fox, a 57-year-old psychotherapist, wants to make clear that Wiccans do not worship the devil or engage in Satanism. She doesn't cast spells, ride a broomstick or wear a pointy black hat. The golden rule for Wiccans is, "And it harm none, do what you will." A nature-based religion, the Wiccan faith is founded on respect for the earth, nature and the cycle of the seasons.

Electronic Tagging Of Humans

The electronic tagging of humans may provide immense applications from security and national identity management to the offender tagging. The uses of this technology are endless. It would provide a more permanent form of identification than a smart card. In the future, a silicon chip implant could provide a unique and permanent source of identification of a person, containing vast amount of data on an individual such as nationality, medical record and citizen data. This data would be retrieved easily and could be transmitted instantly to any place via internet. In the financial sector, it would offer new ways in personal verification technology. It would help in curbing identity theft and prevent fraudulent access to banking and credit card accounts because for meeting any such transaction, the physical presence would be required. In the fast changing world of information technology, the security is of paramount importance. In this field, the chip implant could integrate with advanced biometric devices such as retina scanners so as to enable the security managements safe access to buildings and government establishments. Its use could be extended to consumer products such as cars, homes, ACs and mobile telephones. Another important area of its use, would be in the countries where kidnapping for ransom is prevalent. The chip implant technology may provide an ideal solution. Soon you can have a tracking chip implanted in your body. If you have lost your little baby on way to school or at the mall, the Babysitter will track his location from a jellybean-sized microchip implant discretely tucked under the collarbone. The Constant Companion lets you keep a watchful eye on grandpa or grandma, even when you can’t be by their sides.

Building The Hal-Like Laptop That Will Know How You Feel

Rosalind Picard is a contagious bundle of excitement when she talks about "Mind Reader," a system developed by her team in the Affective Computing Group at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge, Mass. "Mind Reader" uses input from a video camera to perform real-time analysis of facial expressions. Using color-coded graphics, it reports whether you seem "interested" or "agreeing" or if you're "confused" about what you've just heard.

More new babies named Mohammed than George in Britain

Mohammed or Muhammad has overtaken George near the top of the list of most popular names for newborn babies in Britain, according to statistics, reflecting the ethnic mix of the population. The Office for National Statistics said Thursday there were 2,833 baby boys called Mohammed in 2006, with a further 1,422 Muhammads making a total of 4,255, exceeding the number of Georges (3,386) and Josephs (3,755). Mohammed is the 22nd most popular name for a newborn baby, while the spelling Muhammad is 44th and enters the top 50 for the first time.

Samsung CEO Predicts ‘Pseudo Human Brain’ by 2020

One day, electronic memory speed, logic speed and processing capability may match the levels of the human brain. Chang-Gyu Hwang, president and CEO of Samsung Electronics' Semiconductor Business, thinks this capability will come soon. During a keynote speech at this week’s IEDM conference in San Francisco, Hwang said, “The pseudo human brain will be available in 2020.” Hwang inspired the 1500-plus audience members with bold predictions as well as interesting specifics about the direction for perhaps today’s most aggressive semiconductor company. Among the technologies he highlighted were the imminent replacement of hard drives with NAND flash, which will allow boot times on PCs to shorten from ~50 seconds to only 10 seconds. The company will roll out more stacked memories, including an interesting new 3-D stack for SRAMs that minimizes litho steps and enables blazing processing speeds. He also talked about an end to industry cycles. Hwang’s overall theme was that we are entering the fusion era where individual technologies (memory, logic, MEMS, image sensors, biochips, and even software) will be combined to meet the needs of a multimedia, wireless society. We have gone through the PC-centric era, and are now in the mobile consumer era. Around 2010, developments will be predominantly in the information technology and media communications arenas. Going into 2020, the emphasis will be more on humanoid and bioscience capabilities to enhance the quality of life.

Preparing The Biggest Multi-Dimension Experiment Ever Conducted

An international team of over 2,000 scientists, led by Professor Tejinder Virdee from Imperial College London's Department of Physics is stepping up preparations for the world's largest ever physics experiment, starting next year at CERN near Geneva, Switzerland. Professor Virdee is the lead scientist on the Compact Muon Solenoid (CMS) particle detector experiment, which will aim to find new particles, detect mini black holes and solve some of the mysteries of the universe such as where mass comes from, how many dimensions there are and what constitutes dark matter. Particles are the building blocks of matter and are even smaller than atoms. Scientists hope the CMS experiment may also help them progress towards a unified theory to explain all physical phenomena – a theory that has eluded scientists up until now.

Druids - and a Wizard - Celebrate Solstice at Stonehenge

Pagans and druids assembled in the early morning mist for a celebration of the winter solstice at Stonehenge yesterday. Many were dressed in flowing robes in white or earth colours while one man came dressed as a wizard. A pagan wedding ceremony was conducted amid the stones. Experts are divided as to whether the prehistoric stone monument was put up to mark the winter solstice or or the summer solstice, which usually draws a bigger crowd.

Some See 666 In Mandatory National Animal Identification

Initial plans for a national livestock identification program were unveiled in 20002 and almost immediately opposition to the program started to mount. In fact, some said the proposed ID program is a new threat to rural freedom. The voices against instituting the USDA National Animal Identification System (NAIS) continue to grow louder as more elements of the plan are being put in place by USDA. Opponents base their stand on a smorgasbord of issues ranging from the plan being unconstitutional to not fulfilling the initial goal of the program, and from an unfair economic burden on livestock producers to the infringement of their personal and religious rights. Even though the NAIS process has advanced to the stage of voluntarily obtaining premise ID numbers, those opposed to the program hope to stop it dead in its tracks, before January 2008, when they claim USDA will make premise and animal identification mandatory. To better understand the opposition to the plan, a little background information is first needed. The NAIS plan is basically made up of two registration components and an additional animal tracking capability. First, every person who owns even one cow, pig, horse, sheep, bison, chicken, turkey, or virtually any livestock animal, would be required to register their location, including name, address, telephone number, GPS coordinates, in a federal database under a 7-digit “premise ID number.” The second part would require these owners to obtain a 15-digit ID number for any animal that ever leaves the premises of its birth. This number would also be kept in a federal database. Even though these registrations are now voluntary, opponents to NAIS say it's only a matter of time until they become required and they point to recent statements by political and commodity leaders to prove that point. Finally, once the two ID parts are in place, animal tracking will be easily accomplished. “We want to see it mandatory,” Philippi said. “We believe the best thing that can happen is that if it's a mandatory law people have to register their premises, because if we can have that 48-hour trace-back, we protect our herd.” The voices against instituting the USDA National Animal Identification System (NAIS) continue to grow louder as more some are claiming that the proposed ID system directly conflicts with the Bible's book of Revelation, where chapter 13 warns, “The Beast also forced everyone, small and great, rich and poor, free and slave, to receive a mark on his right hand or on his forehead, so that no one could buy or sell unless he had the mark, which is the name of the beast or the number of his name.” William Jud, writing in Maine's Magic City Morning Star, said “The convergence of NAIS and Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) tags enables the Beast Computer to place its mark on every item of commerce. If the Beast Computer does not, will not, or is instructed not to recognize its identifying mark the Beast will not let you buy or sell.”

A Gag on Free Speech

The Bush administration is trampling on the First Amendment and well-established criminal law by trying to use a subpoena to force the American Civil Liberties Union to hand over a classified document in its possession. The dispute is shrouded in secrecy, and very little has been made public about the document, but we do not need to know what's in it to know what's at stake: if the government prevails, it will have engaged in prior restraint - almost always a serious infringement on free speech - and it could start using subpoenas to block reporting on matters of vital public concern.

The Blasphemy Challenge

Would you trade your soul for a DVD? Well, over one hundred young people (and counting) have. A group calling itself the "Rational Response Squad" is inviting people (mainly teens) to blaspheme the Holy Spirit and thereby commit the "unpardonable sin." If you are among the first 1001 people to declare "I deny the Holy Spirit" and post your denial on YouTube, you, too, will receive the free DVD, "The God Who Wasn't There." The RRS reports that the Blasphemy Challenge is targeting 25 websites geared to teens including Xanga, Friendster, Boy Scout Trail, Tiger Beat, Teen Magazine, YM, CosmoGirl! and Seventeen. Their aim: to de-program kids who have been indoctrinated from birth to believe in God, in general, and Christianity in particular. In the words of RRS, "If we talked about religion the same way we talk about science, history or other fields involving truth claims, dogma would wither in the light."

Human Thoughts Control New Robot

Scientists have created a way to control a robot with signals from a human brain. By generating the proper brainwaves—picked up by a cap with electrodes that sense the signals and reflect a person's instructions—scientists can instruct a humanoid robot to moves to specific locations and pick us certain objects. The commands are limited to moving forward, picking up one of two objects and bringing it to one of two locations. The researchers have achieved 94 percent accuracy between the thought commands and the robot's movements. "This is really a proof-of-concept demonstration," said Rajesh Rao, a researcher from the University of Washington who leads the project. "It suggests that one day we might be able to use semi-autonomous robots for such jobs as helping disabled people or performing routine tasks in a person's home."

Secret Societies: They Are Not Just at Yale - They Are Running a University Near You

The world over has heard of Skull and Bones of Yale University. This elite secret society holds within its membership at least four U.S. Presidents. George W. Bush and Senator John Kerry are both members of Skull and Bones. This made the 2004 presidential election the first known election where two secret society members ran against each other. However, names like the Order of the Bull's Blood, Mystical Seven Society, The Order of Gimghoul , Burning Spear, and Machine are less familiar. Make no mistake these too are powerful societies. The clear pronounceable difference between these organizations and Skull and Bones is that these secret societies were founded and continue to wield power at universities where ivy does not grow. Just how these societies impact the physical landscapes and traditions of school are probably the easiest thing to observe about them. For instance, The Seven Society writes 7s on school property at the University of Virginia. Members of Burning Spear begin the beating of a large drum in the FSU's Student Union when the university plays a rival like UM or UF. The Noze has painted school bridges pink , dyed the water in school fountains pink, and made false announcements declaring Homecoming canceled. Michigamu, unlike any other group on campus, is given a free office space on campus.
Some may see these acts as mysterious or cool, foolish or petty vandalism, or simply harmless but they have been mistakenly viewed as part of these Universities' distinctions and traditions. These organizations are physically making a clear statement: This university and everything you think is yours belongs to us. They are given the power to take up space and "decorate" the university as they see fit without question, without revealing their motives or membership, and without campus reprisal and without being subjected to following standard university rules.

Inventing Our Evolution

The surge of innovation that has given the world everything from iPods to talking cars is now turning inward, to our own minds and bodies.... We are transforming our minds, our memories, our metabolisms, our personalities and our progeny. Serious people, including some at the National Science Foundation in Arlington, consider such modification of what it means to be human to be a radical evolution -- one that we direct ourselves. They expect it to be in full flower in the next 10 to 20 years.

Young People Buying Conspiracies About Jesus

Some Americans give credence to suggestions that Jesus of Nazareth married Mary Magdalene and had children, the central ideas in the novel "The Da Vinci Code."
But a much larger number - 40 percent of the 1,031 adults interviewed in a Scripps Howard/Ohio University poll - say it's possible that early church leaders withheld important details about Jesus' life. Dan Brown's book suggests that the Christian church's hierarchy for nearly 2,000 years has suppressed the complete story of Jesus' life, including the fact that he raised a family whose offspring exist into the present day. One of the novel's central characters discovers she is a direct descendent of Jesus and Mary Magdalene. "The power of this story had more to do with the conspiracy theory than with the actual data concerning the life of Jesus," said the Rev. Albert Mohler, president of Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, Ky. "The book gave people who are looking for a conspiracy theory and people who are interested in an imaginative reconstruction of Jesus some new material to work on." The survey tested whether Brown's theories have resonated with the public. Participants in the poll were asked, "Do you think it is likely that Jesus was married or do you think Jesus never married?" Eighteen percent said they think it is likely that Jesus married, 58 percent consider it unlikely and 24 percent are undecided. The survey also asked, "Do you think it is likely that Jesus fathered a child or do you think Jesus did not father a child?" Twenty-three percent said they think this is likely, 56 percent said it's unlikely and 21 percent were uncertain. Even though people who believe the major claims of "The Da Vinci Code" are in the minority, religious scholars said they are still surprised by the figures. "I'm stunned that there are this many," said theology professor Eric Plumer of the University of Scranton, a Catholic school. "With regard to 'The Da Vinci Code,' the Roman Catholic Church and the Vatican have adopted a philosophy of just ignoring the subject. That was a mistake, especially in a time when there is so much ignorance. This could have been an opportunity for teaching, but the church hasn't taken it."
The poll found young people 18 to 24 are especially likely to be open to new interpretations of Jesus' life. Nearly a third say they think it's likely that Jesus had children, compared to only one in eight of Americans 65 or older.

The Wild Weapons of DARPA

DARPA now embraces the imagery of the natural environment in its "Organic Air Vehicles in the Trees" project, which sounds downright "green," though it's actually a tiny UAV that will fly in the forests, over hills and through cities searching for enemies.... its "Bio-Revolution" program which seeks to "harness the insights and power of biology to make U.S. warfighters and their equipment… more effective.".... to "help researchers in various disciplines self-assemble into teams capable of developing plant inspired actuation systems that will ultimately have application in military adaptive or morphing structures."

FDA to Discuss Using Cow-Human Blood Substitute On Trauma Victims Without Their Consent

The Navy's latest proposal to test a blood substitute on 1,100 trauma victims appears more likely to earn a go-ahead from regulators who had blocked the experiment over safety concerns. The Navy wants to test the product, derived from cow blood, on civilian trauma victims in emergency situations. It proposes doing so without obtaining their consent in advance, as is customary in clinical trials. The substitute blood, called Hemopure, would be given on the way to the hospital to patients ages 18 to 69 who have lost dangerous amounts of blood. It would substitute the saline fluids typically given in ambulances when donated blood is unavailable for transfusion. Three times since June 2005, the Food and Drug Administration has blocked Hemopure trials from starting. Each time, it has cited safety concerns. Its manufacturer, Biopure Corp., based in Cambridge, Mass., contends that the benefits of Hemopure outweigh its risks. The Navy, which is overseeing the government-funded study, has since revised its design. It now says the product won't be given to patients 70 or older, and it's limiting the amount of Hemopure that would be given to trauma victims. Those changes may persuade the FDA to allow the experiment to proceed.

U.S. To Defend Space With Military Force

The United States will use military force in space to protect satellites and other space systems from attack by hostile states or terrorists, the Bush administration's senior arms-control official said yesterday. Robert Joseph, undersecretary of state for arms control and international security, said in a speech outlining a new White House space policy that free access to space is a "vital" U.S. interest and that the Bush administration opposes new agreements that would limit U.S. space defenses.

Scientists Busy Combining Human And Animal Cells To Create Hybrid Creatures

What happens when you cross a human and a mouse? Sounds like the beginning of a bad joke but, in fact, it's a serious high tech experiment recently carried out by a research team headed by a distinguished molecular biologist, Irving Weissman, at Stanford University's Institute of Cancer/Stem Cell Biology and Medicine. Scientists injected human brain cells into mouse fetuses, creating a strain of mice that were approximately 1 percent human. Dr. Weissman is actively considering a follow-up experiment that would produce mice whose brains are 100 percent human. What if the mice escaped the laboratory and began to proliferate in the outside environment? What might be the ecological consequences of mice who think like human beings, let loose in nature? Dr. Weissman says he would keep a tight rein on the mice and if they showed any signs of humanness he would kill them. Hardly reassuring. In a world where the bizarre has become all too commonplace, few things any longer shock the human psyche. But, experiments like the one that produced a partially humanized mouse at Stanford University stretches the limits of human tinkering with nature to the realm of the pathological. Some researchers are speculating about human-chimpanzee chimeras-creating a humanzee. A humanzee would be the ideal laboratory research animal because chimpanzees are so closely related to human beings. Chimps share 98 percent of the human genome and a fully mature chimp has the equivalent mental abilities and consciousness of a four-year-old human child. Fusing a human and chimpanzee embryo-a feat researchers say is quite feasible-could produce a creature so human that questions regarding its moral and legal status would throw 4,000 years of human ethics into utter chaos.

General Foresees 100 Year War Against Terrorism

The American people need to prepare for a long-duration war against radical Muslims who are set to fight for 50 to 100 years to create an Islamist state in the region, a top Pentagon strategist in the war on terror says. Air Force Brig. Gen. Mark O. Schissler said in an interview that the current strategy for fighting Islamists includes both military and ideological components that make it similar to the 40-year Cold War against communism. "We're in a generational war. You can try and fight the enemy where they are and where they're attacking you, or prevent them and defend your own homeland," said Gen. Schissler, deputy director for the war on terrorism within the strategic plans office of the Pentagon's Joint Staff. "But that's not enough to stop it. We've got to break the chain, and that's ... the ideology. We really need to show the errors in Islamist extremist thinking." Gen. Schissler said he is concerned that Washington politics is weakening the will of the nation. "I don't care about the politics. I care about people understanding the facts of what's our enemy is thinking about, what's our strategy to defeat them, and for [Americans] to understand that it will take a long fight, mostly because our enemy is committed to the long fight," he said. "They're absolutely committed to the 50-, 100-year plan."
"One of my concerns is how to maintain the American will, the public will over that duration," he said.

N.J. Gov to Make Gay Unions Official

New Jersey's gay couples are gaining all the rights and responsibilities of marriage as the state moves to become the fifth in the nation to institute civil unions. New Jersey will join Connecticut and Vermont as states that allow civil unions for gay couples. Massachusetts allows gay couples to marry, while California has domestic partnerships that bring full marriage rights.

Artificial Intelligence To Move Video Surveillance to New Level

Surveillance cameras are sprouting up in more and more places, forming an ever more powerful tool for solving crimes after they happen. But what about using them to prevent or stop criminal and terrorist acts? This requires that someone, or something, watch these rapidly multiplying video feeds 24-7. And that’s the problem. Paying people to adequately monitor dozens, or even hundreds, of surveillance cameras can be highly expensive. Plus, humans tend to get bored and lose focus staring at security TV monitors hour after hour, day after day. Computerized monitoring would seem to be the obvious answer, but creating software programs that can recognize suspicious activities or suspect individuals has proven highly difficult. However, Rama Chellappa, a professor in the department of electrical and computer engineering of the University of Maryland’s A. James Clark School of Engineering, is developing a real-time computer monitoring system that provides some answers to this problem. Chellappa’s artificial intelligence system can reliably monitor surveillance images to detect certain suspicious movements or suspect individuals and alert human security personnel.

Stewardess banned from carrying Bible

A second airline is embroiled in a religious row after a stewardess decided to take bmi to an employment tribunal because it refused to allow her to carry a Bible on flights to Saudi Arabia. The stewardess, who has not been named, claims that she has been subject to discrimination because of her faith. She is understood to have deep religious convictions and carries a Bible with her at all times. But bmi, which is the only British scheduled carrier to fly to the country after British Airways pulled out of the route, insisted that it was only following Foreign Office advice. The dispute has erupted as British Airways seeks to settle its own dispute with Nadia Eweida, a Heathrow check-in worker, who has been banned from wearing a cross on a necklace while on duty. A spokesman for bmi said the airline was complying with Saudi law and added that the stewardess had been offered the opportunity to switch to working on its short-haul routes. It could not, however, alter its long-haul rosters to accommodate her.
The Foreign Office website informs travellers to Saudi Arabia: "The importation and use of narcotics, alcohol, pork products and religious books, apart from the Koran, and artifacts are forbidden." A spokesman said last night that the Saudi authorities would automatically confiscate a Bible from anybody trying to bring one into the country and it would not be returned.

Jesus, Mahdi both coming, says Iran's Ahmadinejad

In a greeting to the world's Christians for the coming new year, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said he expects both Jesus and the Shiite messianic figure, Imam Mahdi, to return and "wipe away oppression." "I wish all the Christians a very happy new year and I wish to ask them a question as well," said Ahmadinejad. "My one question from the Christians is: What would Jesus do if he were present in the world today? What would he do before some of the oppressive powers of the world who are in fact residing in Christian countries? Which powers would he revive and which of them would he destroy?" asked the Iranian leader. "If Jesus were present today, who would be facing him and who would be following him?"

Elementary & Middle School Kids Are Joining Gangs

A study was done by the Baltimore City Criminal Justice Coordinating Committee. It identified more than two-thousand gang members in Baltimore. What is more alarming is that roughly 500 of the City's 26,000 gangs members attend elementary and middle schools. Some officials have studied the gang symbols and they see them all over. Police say they can even pinpoint the areas with heavy gang activity, by looking at the amont of crime and type of grafitti in neighborshoods. WJZ's Gigi Barnett talked to Jim Green, from Baltimore City Police. He says, "We've seen a spike in certain times of the year....and robberies have been one of the traditional gang initiation rites of passages. We see increases in assaults." The study found 95 percent of the members are black. Police say they gather information about suspected gang members from informants and admissions.

Orwellian Total Recall By 2026

Computers 'could store our entire life by 2026'. A device the size of a sugar cube will be able to record and store high resolution video footage of every second of a human life within two decades, experts recently said. Researchers said governments and societies must urgently debate the implications of the huge increases in computing power and the growing mass of information being collected on individuals. Some fear that the advent of "human black boxes" combined with the extension of medical, financial and other digital records will lead to loss of privacy and a dramatic expansion of the nanny state. Others highlight positive advances in medicine, education, crime prevention and the way history will be recorded. Leading computer scientists, psychologists and neuroscientists gathered to debate these issues at Memories for Life, a conference held at the British Library yesterday. Prof Nigel Shadbolt, president of the British Computer Society and professor of artificial intelligence at the University of Southampton, said: "In 20 years' time it will be possible to record high quality digital video of an entire lifetime of human memories. It's not a question of whether it will happen; it's already happening."

Farewell to Pax Americana

With hindsight we may see 2006 as the end of Pax Americana. Ever since World War II, the United States has used its military and economic superiority to promote a stable world order that has, on the whole, kept the peace and spread prosperity. But the United States increasingly lacks both the power and the will to play this role. It isn't just Iraq, though Iraq has been profoundly destabilizing and demoralizing. Many other factors erode U.S. power: China's rise; probable nuclear proliferation; shrinking support for open trade; higher spending for Social Security and Medicare that squeezes the military; the weakness of traditional U.S. allies -- Europe and Japan.

Building The Hi-Tech Human Body Of Tomorrow

Science and technology is progressing with a great pace and thus revolutionising medical science in particular. We are entering a century in which medical science will go beyond treating disease to create enhancements that will make us “better than well”. The advances in medical science like brain chips that enable us to control machines with our thoughts; design the child of your dreams, kidneys and lungs built to order in the lab; pills to make you smarter and more creative and an implant that gives you a tan and protects against skin cancer may well lead to more-than-human abilities. Genetics, materials science, tissue engineering and nanotechnology are already yielding products to help the sick and injured, including a Band-Aid-like heart patch and the C-leg prosthesis for amputees. All these innovations are in development; some are already being tested on human subjects.

Creationists Told To End School Campaign

A group of Christian academics promoting the Biblical story of creation in school science lessons have been told to end their campaign. In a letter, officials at the Department for Education and Skills told the group that creationism and its more recent off-shoot, intelligent design, have no place in the national curriculum and schools should refuse to use their teaching materials. The move comes amid growing debate over the use of religion to debate Darwin's theory of evolution in GCSE and A-level science. Truth in Science, which is funded and supported by prominent academics, teachers and clergymen, sent lesson plans to 5,700 state and private schools in September as part of a £20,000 campaign to promote alternative interpretations of the origins of life. The teaching packs - a booklet and two DVDs - ask schools to consider that certain features of the universe cannot be explained by natural selection, but are best explained as the work of an "intelligent designer".

Nanotechnology Report Creates Urgency for Preparation

A congressionally-mandated review of US nanotechnology policy conducted by the National Materials Advisory Board (NMAB) includes a study of "the feasibility of manufacturing systems capable of building, with molecular precision, complex systems that consist of multiple components." The Center for Responsible Nanotechnology (CRN) expects that the NMAB report will accelerate research toward the development of molecularly-precise manufacturing. However, without adequate understanding and preparation, exponential atom-by-atom construction of advanced products could have catastrophic results. Conclusions published in this report should create a new level of urgency in preparing for molecular manufacturing.

Technology gives police instant ID info

With a quick imprint of a suspect's two fingers on a handheld device, Columbus police can get instant access to the person's identity without making a trip to the booking office. The department announced this week it is testing 40 RapID wireless units it purchased recently for about $3,000 each using a federal Homeland Security grant.
Police say the new technology saves time by eliminating a trip to a downtown booking station. It typically would be used to check the identity of someone without proper ID who uses a name police suspect is not real. A person might not necessarily be arrested as a result of the check, but could be issued a summons or citation depending on the reason he or she was questioned. The system checks the fingerprints against existing prints in a Columbus police database, which includes about 250,000 entries. If there's a match, the officer will receive the person's real name, date of birth, gender and race at the scene.

India Aborting 7,000 Girls Daily

India is losing almost 7,000 girls daily because of the traditional preference for sons which cause many people to abort female foetuses, the UNICEF said. "India is one of the few countries worldwide with an adverse child sex ratio in favor of boys," the United Nations children's agency said in its annual "State of the World's Children Report"

Military Super Soldier Objective: Less Sleep, More Fight

Driven by the U.S. military's quest for a super soldier who is stronger, faster and can fight for days, researchers across the nation are seeking to challenge the notion of a good night's sleep. One of those is Lexicon Genetics. The Woodlands-based company recently received a grant from the Department of Defense, which has funded studies looking for ways to allow humans to sleep less and perform better far longer. Lexicon's scientists have used genetic engineering techniques to create mice that are more alert and active than normal mice. These test mice outperformed standard mice, which needed time to wake up in the morning and got tired when their energy dipped during afternoon. "The ultimate goal of the research is to find targets for drugs that can improve sleep quality," said Brian Zambrowicz, Lexicon's executive vice president of research. "Insomnia is a huge problem, and it's crucial to find new ways to treat it." Lexicon's scientists say they are studying whether genetically modified mice are getting a different, more restorative, kind of sleep, which boosts their energy. These studies might lead to treatments that could, for example, prolong wakefulness or promote restorative sleep. The military has long been interested in performance-enhancing drugs that would enable soldiers to carry out 48 to 72 hours of continuous operations without jeopardizing their physical and mental health. By supporting long-term research projects, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, or DARPA, hopes to unshackle sleep from the limits imposed by nature. "The goal of the DARPA Preventing Sleep Deprivation Program is to research and develop technologies that will assist in maintaining the cognitive performance of war fighters despite short-term sleep deprivation."

Scientist Plan To Revive 'Killer' Alien Life Frozen On Mars

Killer Aliens are lying frozen beneath the surface of Mars, says a top UK space scientist — and he wants to WAKE them. Planets expert John Murray believes life-forms on the Red Planet could be trapped in suspended animation. He warns they could wipe out all human life if they are brought here and escape. But he still wants to crash a rocket into the vast frozen ocean where he believes the creatures lie dormant — and revive them by adding water. The prospects for life on Mars were boosted last week by Nasa’s discovery of running water on the planet. Now Dr Murray, UK lead scientist with Europe’s Mars Express mission, claims he has overwhelming evidence of the frozen ocean near its equator where simple life could have thrived as microbes. He wants the rocket to blast a crater into ice floes in the region — named Elysium — allowing access to the aliens. Then he would land a follow-up probe to scoop up the soil, put it under a microscope and add water. Both Nasa and the European Space Agency plan to bring samples of Mars 48million miles back to Earth in the next decade to be studied in a lab. That is where the danger lies. Dr Murray said: “It is going to be extremely primitive life. We are talking about bacteria. “The only danger is if we brought it back and it escaped, we could have a War Of The Worlds situation. “Earth bacteria killed the invading Martians in that. The Martians brought to us could kill off humans. “We’d best have a good look at things on Mars before bringing anything back.” Dr Murray’s “alien resurrection” plans may not be fiction like movie Mars Attack. He said: “On Earth they have brought microbes in the Arctic back to life after 30,000 years.”

Skipping Into Ubiquitous Auto-Surveillance

Machines rather than people could soon be running Britain because the country has sleepwalked into a surveillance society, the Government's privacy watchdog warned today. Information Commissioner Richard Thomas delivered the alarming warning as fears grow over the explosion in technology used to monitor individuals. "There are dangers to our privacy, our autonomy, the more the information is converged together," he said. Stressing the threat came from government as well as private companies, he added: "We have got to make sure there is full accountability and that people don't go too far and really undermine our fundamental rights and our integrity as individuals. Humans must dictate our future, not machines." He also raised the spectre of surveillance getting so bad in Britain that it would be similar to eastern European countries when they were under Communist regimes. The Information Commissioner stressed that while much of the current data collected on individuals was "fragmented", the real danger to individual freedoms would come if all this