by Jonathan Skillings
May 25, 2008 5:15 PM PDT

NASA said Sunday evening that radio signals have been received from the Phoenix spacecraft on the surface of Mars. The Phoenix Mars Lander is the latest embodiment of humankind's quest to learn whether life might once have been sustainable on the Red Planet and to prepare for eventual human exploration there.

But before it can dig into the surface, Phoenix first had to traverse the Martian atmosphere. Those seven minutes of descent, the very last leg of the months-long journey, are what could have been the killer: the lander, its developers say, faced "seven minutes of terror" before touching down. Of 11 total previous attempts by several nations to put a spacecraft on Mars, according to NASA, only five had been successful.

In entering the thin Martian atmosphere and heading to the surface, Phoenix faced these tribulations: "aeroshell braking" via friction with the atmosphere that would heat it to thousands of degrees, a parachute opening that would give the lander a hard jerk to slow it further, and pulsing retrorockets tasked with making a soft touchdown. Because it takes 15 minutes for signals to travel between Mars and Earth, Phoenix was designed to land autonomously.

The confirming signal came shortly before 5:00 p.m. PDT Sunday. "We've passed the hardest part and we're breathing again, but we still need to see that Phoenix has opened its solar arrays and begun generating power," Barry Goldstein, Phoenix project manager at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, said in a statement Sunday. Batteries are providing power at the moment.

May 20, 2008

BOSTON — Sen. Ted Kennedy has been diagnosed with a malignant brain tumor, doctors at Massachusetts General Hospital announced Tuesday, four days after the Democratic senator was rushed to the hospital following seizures.

Kennedy, 76, was diagnosed with the tumor Tuesday morning after he underwent a biopsy. "Preliminary results from a biopsy of the brain identified the cause of the seizure as a malignant glioma in the left parietal lobe," his doctors said in a statement, adding that treatment would likely include "combinations of various forms of radiation and chemotherapy."

The senator has been hospitalized in Boston since Saturday, when he was airlifted from Cape Cod after a seizure at his home. He suffered another one en route to the hospital, sources told FOX News. His wife and children have been with him each day. In an e-mail sent to friends, Kennedy's wife, Vicki, acknowledged the family had been "pitched a real curveball," but said "this is only the first inning."

She said the family was consulting with experts and seeking multiple opinions. "Teddy is leading us all, as usual, with his calm approach to getting the best information possible. He's also making me crazy (and making me laugh) by pushing to race in the Figawi this weekend," she said, referring to the annual sailing race from Cape Cod to Nantucket.

May 19, 2008

SELMA, Ind. — It's just a drop in the global oil bucket, but an eastern Indiana man is operating an oil well in his backyard in an effort to capitalize on soaring crude prices. Greg Losh's rig produces three barrels of crude oil a day, though he told FOX News that he hasn't started selling it yet.

For now, he and his partners are keeping it in storage containers. He declined to say how much oil they've collected in the two weeks they've been pumping. But as oil is going for about $127 a barrel on the international market, three daily would yield just under $400 a day for Losh on the global spot market — or 1/100,000 of the daily production increase the Saudis agreed to earlier this month.

Still, in spite of those returns and the $100,000 it costs to drill a well, it's worth it to Losh considering the current price of oil, he told WISH-TV in Indianapolis. The oil his well produces comes from the Trenton field that fueled the growth of east-central Indiana cities more than a century ago, he told the station.

He expects to drill four more wells soon on his property in the town of Selma about 55 miles northeast of Indianapolis. "It's a money maker. It is paying off," Losh told FOX. The oil is stored in a tank and transported to Ohio for sale, he said. His oil well also produces natural gas to heat his home and several others.

By Matthew Lasar
May 16, 2008 - 02:41PM CT

She was thirteen years old and thought that she was having a MySpace online romance with a sixteen-year-old boy named "Josh Evans." Four weeks later, "Josh" broke off correspondence, allegedly telling the girl that the world would be a better place without her. In response, she hung herself and died a day later.

Now the Department of Justice says that "Josh" was really Lori Drew, 49, of O'Fallon, Missouri. Drew will stand trial in Los Angeles, accused of providing false information to get a MySpace account and violating MySpace terms to harass and harm other people—specifically, a girl the DOJ will only identify as "M.T.M." The accused faces a maximum of 20 years in prison.

"Whether we characterize this tragic case as 'cyber-bullying,' cyber abuse or illegal computer access, it should serve as a reminder that our children use the Internet for social interaction and that technology has altered the way they conduct their daily activities," said LA FBI Assistant Director Salvador Hernandez. "As adults, we must be sensitive to the potential dangers posed by the use of the Internet by our children."

But the latest research suggests that this awful exchange is not typical of the troubling encounters that take place between adults and kids on the 'Net. Most of those interactions also don't end very well, but they are neither deceitful nor fatal.

May 13, 2008

DUJIANGYAN, China — Rescue workers are digging through flattened homes and schools in a desperate search for victims of China's worst earthquake in three decades. Authorities say nearly 12,000 people were killed and more than 18,000 are missing. The official Xinhua News Agency says Chinese rescue workers report that 18,645 people remain buried under debris in Mianyang city.

Mianyang neighbors the epicenter of Monday's massive, 7.9-magnitude quake. Xinhua said that 3,629 people have been confirmed dead in Mianyang. The death toll in Sichuan province alone now exceeds 12,000. But rain was impeding efforts and a group of paratroopers called off a mission to the area due to heavy storms, Xinhua reported. The casualty figures were expected to rise and remained uncertain due to the remote areas affected by the quake and difficulty in finding buried victims.

The tremors caused a wide swath of damage across central China, sending people fleeing with their few salvaged belongings. Earthquake rescue experts in orange jumpsuits extricated bloody survivors on stretchers from demolished buildings, and some 34,000 troops swarmed into the region to help. But hope was fleeting as bodies covered with sheets lined streets and filled schoolyards. Only 58 people were extricated from collapsed buildings across the quake area, China Seismological Bureau spokesman Zhang Hongwei told Xinhua, as rescuers raced to save more.

"Time is of the essence," said disaster relief director Wang, adding that rescue efforts could take a week. "Survivors can hold on for some time. Now it's not time to give up," Wang told reporters in Beijing. Aftershocks rattled the region for a second day, sending people running into the streets in the city of Chengdu. The U.S. Geological Survey measured the shocks between magnitude 4 and 6, some of the strongest since Monday's quake.

May 07, 2008

New details have emerged in the search for missing 19-year-old Middlebury College freshman Nicholas Garza that could link him to the so-called "Smiley Face Gang," which a group of retired detectives believes is responsible for the apparent drowning deaths of dozens of young men across the country.

Searchers have found smiley-face graffiti near Garza's campus like that painted near some of the locations where about 40 bodies have been discovered across 11 states, FOX 44 News reported. Garza’s mother thinks that discovery could link her son's disappearance to the deaths of the other mostly college-age victims. Volunteer searchers have come forward with pictures of the smiley face, found on a utility shed door a short distance from downtown Middlebury, Vt.

The photos were taken a week-and-a-half ago, when the group was scouring a river bank for clues. When the volunteers saw New York detectives describing the alleged gang of serial killers on national TV and saw pictures of the graffiti discovered in some of the other cases, they realized the striking similarity to the drawings they had photographed, FOX 44 reported.

The graffiti on the shed was almost identical to that painted near some of the spots where the young men's bodies have been found, typically in rivers. "When you're walking around, you notice there's graffiti but you're not paying attention to what's out there," Nicholas' mother, Natalie Garza, told FOX 44. Garza was last seen walking out of a dormitory Feb. 5.

May 07, 2008

WASHINGTON — The top U.S. diplomat in Myanmar says the death toll may reach 100,000 from a cyclone and its aftermath. She said the country's military junta is "paranoid," about the United States but is not blocking American aid in retaliation for past criticism. U.S. charge d'affaires Shari Villarosa estimates show 95 percent of buildings in the affected area are demolished, bridges are washed out.

She called the situation outside the former capital Yangon "increasingly horrendous," citing relief agency reports of shortages of food and drinking water. "There is a very real risk of disease outbreaks as long as this continues," Villarosa told reporters in a telephone call from Yangon. The death toll could hit or exceed 100,000 as humanitarian conditions worsen, she said.

She said that almost all the deaths are in the delta area. In Yangon, some 600-700 people may have died, she said. The U.S. military has put people and airplanes into position to work on any relief effort, as officials awaited word on whether the Asian nation would accept American help. Condoleezza Rice said Wednesday that Myanmar must let the international community in to help.

She said the aid is to meet the needs of a humanitarian crisis, and not a matter of politics, Reuters reported. Villarosa did not sound optimistic. "It's a very paranoid regime," she said. "They are very paranoid about the United States." She said lower reaches of the Myanmar regime appear to recognize the magnitude of the problem, but the senior leadership is isolated and has not yet announced a final decision on how to handle outside aid.

By Jacqui Cheng
April 30, 2008 - 03:05PM CT

Japanese police are apparently trying some desperate measures in order to stop a string of suicides by asking ISPs to remove information on how to carry them out. Almost 50 suicides have been attempted within the last month using a newly-popular method of extracting hydrogen sulphide out of bath salts and detergent, the instructions for which are easily found on the Internet.

"Generating hydrogen sulphide is not illegal under current laws, but the risk is high for third parties to inhale the gas and, in worst case scenarios, die," the National Police Agency said in its statement, according to the AFP. The organization apparently sent the request to not only ISPs, but cable providers and other telecommunications companies as well. However, the request is only that: a request. Internal Affairs Minister Hiroya Masuda told the press that the government was not interested in blocking the questionable content, as it would mean "excessive restrictions on freedom of expression."

It's no secret that Japan has one of the highest suicide rates in the world. The country had 48.4 suicides per 100,000 people in 2004, according to the World Health Organization (that number is second only to Russia's, with a surprising 72.3 per 100,000 in 2004). It's a problem that Japanese officials have taken seriously for some time now, but are still trying to figure out ways to fix. Unfortunately, suicide is one of those issues that cannot simply be fought by blocking information from a single source, like the Internet. People have been killing themselves for thousands of years. If there's a will, there's a way—Internet or no.

In fact, research recently published in the British Medical Journal even noted that, while suicide information is plentiful online, suicide rates of those between the ages of 15 and 34 in England have dropped over the last decade, right alongside the blossoming of the Internet age. If England can somehow find a way to reverse the trend, there's hope for Japan, too. Education and outreach are much more productive methods of reducing the suicide rate than simply blocking or removing online information.

by Jennifer Guevin
April 27, 2008 7:49 PM PDT

The European Union launched Giove-B, the second (and last) test satellite in its $5.3 billion Galileo project, on Sunday, according to Reuters. The first test satellite, Giove-A was launched in December 2005. Giove-B will test the program's high-precision atomic clock and signal transmission, said Reuters.

Galileo is Europe's upcoming satellite radio navigation system, and it's the EU's largest space program. Galileo will eventually become an ultra-precise system of 30 satellites, but it has hit a few bumps along the way. First off, the project's launch date has been pushed back several times from the original goal of 2008 to the current goal of 2013. And unlike the United States' Global Positioning System, which was designed primarily as a military system with a free public side to it, Galileo was initially conceived of as a largely commercial venture.

But the project proved too ambitious to be sustained by the original public-private partnership. After some companies pulled out of the project, the EU voted to put more public funding toward it. Now, even that support isn't guaranteed. Fears that the project might spiral out of financial control prompted some U.K. lawmakers last November to call for a complete review of the U.K.'s involvement in the program.

Uncertainty about when Galileo will actually be up and running and how effective it will be compared to GPS has reportedly caused confusion among some companies in the mobile industry, who have been unsure which technology to support in their products (or whether they should support both). And while Galileo is still getting off the ground, demand for phones with GPS services is skyrocketing.

by Carl-Gustav Linden
April 22, 2008 6:20 PM PDT

High price and a strange color. No, we're not talking about a hairdo. Those are the two factors that have kept light-emitting diodes, or LEDs, from becoming a mainstream light source.

But that might change soon, said Zach Gibler, chief business development officer of Lighting Science Group, which plans to announce distribution deals with major retailers for its LED bulbs that screw into a regular socket. LED bulbs for household use have already been around for some time, but their success has been limited.

The main obstacles have been that they cost more than incandescent lightbulbs and emit a sometimes unnerving color of light. Lighting Science Group this week plans to introduce a portfolio of LED replacement white lightbulbs that it hopes will attract more consumer interest. The product line uses the same sockets as Edison bulbs.

According to Gibler, the bulbs perform well on a warmth and color rendering index--blue looks blue, yellow looks yellow, etc.--they have a long life cycle, and consume 80 percent less energy than incandescent bulbs. Gibler believes 2008 could be "the year of LED" for residential use and lighting in general.

by Martin LaMonica
April 16, 2008 12:40 PM PDT

President Bush on Wednesday set a goal of halting the growth of greenhouse gases by 2025, calling for elimination of clean-energy international trade barriers but stopping short of specific proposals to mandate carbon emissions caps. Delivering a speech at the White House Rose Garden, Bush said national greenhouse gas emissions growth should peak within 10 to 15 years, stop in 2025, and then decline.

He said the nationwide strategy would build on existing policies to accelerate development of energy-efficiency technologies, cellulosic ethanol, nuclear power, and renewable energy like wind and solar. Bush said the U.S.--which has been accused of foot-dragging in global climate change talks--will agree to a binding international regime to limit emissions if other countries adhere to their own goals.

"This approach will require commitments by all major economies to slow, stop, and reduce (greenhouse gas) growth," he said. In addition to weighing in on global climate regulations, which are set to expire in 2012, Bush also sought to influence the direction of various forms of climate change legislation now going through Congress. Most of those focus on mandatory carbon emissions caps to restrain heavy polluters and a market-based mechanism of trading carbon allowances, called a cap and trade.

He also warned against attempts to force federal agencies to take action on regulating global warming emissions in place of the legislative process. In a landmark decision, the Supreme Court last year said that the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) must regulate carbon dioxide pollution from vehicles, although it has still resisted any action.

By Julian Sanchez
April 14, 2008 - 07:50PM CT

Closing in on midnight yesterday, I nestled my earbuds into place and, with a glance at the larger-than-life bronze figure of birthday boy Thomas Jefferson towering over me, cued up Girl Talk's Night Ripper. There wasn't another soul in sight, and as I whirled silently to my private soundtrack in the still of the Jefferson Memorial, I took in the inscription encircling the rotunda overhead: "I have sworn upon the altar of God eternal hostility against every form of tyranny over the mind of man." A few minutes later, I left, unmolested.

A very different scene had played out there just 24 hours earlier, when a group of some 20 young Washington, D.C., libertarians had gathered for their own Thomas Jefferson Dance Party. The plan had been to celebrate the birth of the author of the Declaration of Independence by congregating, flashmob style, for ten minutes of quiet iPod-fueled dancing, then repair to a pub nearby. Instead, park police brought the party to an abrupt halt, arresting 28-year-old Brooke Oberwetter and leading her away in handcuffs, while chasing the rest of the group off.

By the time she was released five hours later, attendees armed with Blackberries and cell phone cameras had spread news of the incident to several local bloggers. By Sunday, the story had appeared on Fark, and Oberwetter's friends had set up a Web site and Facebook group on behalf of the "Jefferson One." And by Monday, video of the dancing and arrest had been posted to YouTube.

ason Talley, one of the organizers who filmed the event, says the group had no intention of provoking a confrontation, and had chosen the late hour precisely to avoid inconveniencing tourists. (The monument is open to the public 24-hours a day.) When park police began demanding that people leave shortly after boogying commenced, a few registered some libertarian indignation ("So the state is rejecting us?" and "Jefferson wouldn't have wanted this!"), but most shuffled out of the inner chamber-or, in the case of one young Americans for Tax Reform staffer, moonwalked out—and milled about the surrounding columns.

April 13, 2008

One of the girls charged in the vicious beating on a classmate was bailed out of a Florida jail by TV talk show host Dr. Phil McGraw, the show confirmed in a statement on Saturday. Mercades Nichols, one of eight teens charged in the brutal attack which was captured on a YouTube video, was bailed out by a representative of the show on Friday night, according to a report from MyFOXTampaBay.com.

A judge on Friday set bails ranging from $30,000 to $37,000 for the teenagers. The Dr. Phil representative was waiting by the jail's exit, and when Nichols walked out, he tried to block Tampa TV station camera people from getting video of Nichols and her family leaving jail. In the statement on Saturday, the Dr. Phil show said that bailing the girl out of jail was a violation of the show’s rules, and that the show would no longer go forward with the girl’s story.

"In this case, certain staff members went beyond our guidelines (re the bail being paid). These staff members have been spoken to and our policies reiterated. In addition, we have decided not to go forward with the story as our guidelines have been compromised," the statement read.

April 11, 2008

WASHINGTON — The Virgin Mary on a grilled cheese and the Illinois-shaped corn flake appear to have new competition for webbies' fascination: Dick Cheney's mysterious sunglasses. An undated photo of the vice president on the White House Web site has caused a stir on the Internet, causing some people to wonder if he's in eyeshot of an unclad female.

The White House says it's just someone holding an innocuous fishing rod (the veep -- allegedly -- is fly fishing in Idaho). Clearly the picture shows a hand casting a rod," Cheney spokeswoman Meagan Mitchell said, according to the McClatchy newspapers. By punching in "Cheney" and "sunglasses" into a Web browser, FOXNews.com viewed these headlines, among many: "Is the reflection in Dick Cheney's sunglasses a naked woman?" "Naked woman reflected in Dick Cheney's sunglasses." "Dick Cheney's shades reflect a strange being."

by Michael Kanellos
April 10, 2008 11:01 AM PDT

The U.S. does not recycle nuclear waste from power plants because it could be used for weapons, but that might change. Pete Domenici, the Republican Senator from New Mexico, said the country should start to examine the benefits of recycling fuel, according to the Las Vegas Sun. France and most other nuclear energy-producing countries recycle fuel.

Doing so cuts down the amount of fuel that needs to be mined, as well as the amount of nuclear waste that needs to get buried. Domenici also said he wants to introduce legislation that would create more nuclear depositories, possibly in New Mexico. The Department of Energy has invested billions of dollars over several years in trying to build a repository at Yucca Mountain in Nevada. The project, however, faces strong opposition. No nuclear plants have been built in the U.S. in decades, but global warming, as well as higher prices for coal and natural gas, have revived the industry.

An estimated 31 applications for building new nuclear plants in the United States are expected to be filed in the next few years. The applications, though, will likely draw strong opposition. A few start-ups are also tinkering with nuclear fusion, which produces much less waste than nuclear fission, the basis of nuclear plants today. (Nuclear plants basically create heat, which is used to create steam to crank a turbine.)