Science News

“They don't understand the position we're in”

WASHINGTON - Forced to pay for once-free sandwich toppings and twice as much for some steak cuts, shoppers are wondering whether higher grocery bills and restaurant tabs truly reflect the trickle down of a ... via Desert Sun

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“In terms of pushing the envelope, this really pushes the envelope.”

A free program launched today will effectively turn every computer that downloads it into a mini-planetarium capable of displaying high resolution images of millions of stars, planets and other celestial ... via The Age

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“None of us wants to make designer babies”

By MALCOLM RITTER Monday, May 12, 2008 News that scientists have for the first time genetically altered a human embryo is drawing fire from some watchdog groups that say it's a step toward creating "designer ... via WQXI-AM Atlanta

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“There are other products here -- yams, cassava, plantains. Let's eat them”

Liberia banned all food exports Monday, saying profiteers have been taking advantage of its cheap rice prices to truck the grain -- already in short supply in Liberia -- to neighboring countries to sell at ... via Newsday.com

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Rice prices in Myanmar's largest city have surged 50 percent since Cyclone Nargis, which killed tens of thousands of people and flooded entire rice-growing areas, a U.N. food agency said Monday.

The cyclone hit May 3 as farmers were harvesting the dry season crop that accounts for 20 percent of annual production, said the Rome-based Food and Agriculture Organization.

The destruction could reduce access to food and may force Myanmar to seek imports from neighboring countries, such as Thailand and Vietnam, putting further pressure on world prices, it said. Myanmar has previously been self-sufficient and an exporter of rice. Read more

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South Korean officials said Monday they have killed all poultry in Seoul, the capital, to curb the spread of bird flu following a new outbreak of the disease in the city.

Quarantine officials destroyed 15,000 chickens, ducks, pheasants and turkeys raised in farms, restaurants, schools and homes in the capital, said Kim Yoon-kyu, a Seoul Metropolitan Government official.

The Seoul government said the slaughter was necessary to contain the disease. It said it will now focus on preventing live poultry from being brought into the capital. Read more

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“We felt continuous shaking for about two or three minutes. All the people in our office are rushing downstairs. We're still feeling slight tremblings”

This article was first published on guardian.co.uk on Monday May 12 2008. It was last updated at 08:58 on May 12 2008. via Guardian Unlimited

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“When I am alone at night, at about 2 a.m., it starts to glow, it emits light, and it stays like that for about a minute”

There is a legend that the ancient Maya possessed 13 crystal skulls which, when united, hold the power of saving the Earth _ a tale so strange and fantastic that it inspired the latest Indiana Jones movie.

Experts dismiss the hundreds of existing crystal skulls as fakes that were probably made by colorful antiquities traders in the 19th century. But Mayan priests worship the skulls, even today, and real-life skull hunters still search for them.

The true story of the skulls stretches over continents and hundreds of years, and may be even more extraordinary than the tale portrayed in this fourth installment of the Harrison Ford franchise. Read more

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“This is probably the first year in a while that we'll do more than break even”

Dipping its left wing, a canary-yellow biplane makes a sharp turn and dives over a flooded field, showering rice on the shallow water 15 feet below. via StarTribune

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“NAFTA is one of the reasons prices are not higher”

Sitting in a Mexico City office, dressed in a pressed white shirt, Gerardo Sanchez seems a world away from his herds of goats and fields of beans.

But he's no poster boy for the new world agricultural order, in which peasants are supposed to leave their unproductive farms and strive for middle-class prosperity while food production is left to agribusiness in the countries that farm most cheaply and efficiently.

Sanchez works for the National Campesino Federation, a lobbying group for small farmers that has been active lately in protests against the rising price of food, notably a doubling of the price of tortillas. Here, NAFTA and globalization are dirty words. Read more

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