'Shrek' donkeys being neglected
The 'Shrek effect' has been blamed for the increase in donkey imports
Hundreds of donkeys bought because of the film Shrek's popularity are being seriously neglected, vets have warned.
Peter Jinman, a former president of the British Veterinary Association, has likened the donkey craze to previous fads for llamas and ostriches.
He says owners often do not know how to look after them properly - or even realise donkeys now require passports.
Animal charity the Donkey Sanctuary has stressed that the animals need a lot of attention and can be expensive to keep.
Both the original Shrek film and the sequel, charting the adventures of a green ogre and his donkey friend, have proved extremely popular with children.
Practising vet Mr Jinman says he has been receiving an increasing amount of calls about donkeys over the past three years.
Peter Jinman
"It has certainly become apparent that there are a lot more donkeys appearing," he told BBC Radio 4's Farming Today.
He suggested this was due to people moving from the city to the country and buying houses with land attached.
He also said the "Shrek effect" could not be ignored.
Mr Jinman added that many of the animals are being imported when they are too young to be moved around.
"I would have a certain amount of concern as to what is going on with the trade and how it's being regulated," he said.
Eddie Murphy played Donkey
Tina Court, of the Devon-based Donkey Sanctuary, said the donkey "is quite a character" and makes a good pet.
But she warned potential owners need "a minimum of one acre grazing land, a farm or shelter, a good equine farrier, a vet, straw for bedding and a lot of time - because donkeys love attention".
For parents of Shrek-obsessed children who can't fulfil these requirements, there is an option to sponsor a donkey.
Claire Belton runs the New European Distressed Donkey Initiative (Neddi) in France and offers her animals for sponsorship.
She says: "It is slightly less tangible than keeping the animals as pets, but you can come and visit your donkey and pat it."
Both donkey groups and vets agree the biggest problem with keeping the animals is that they live for such a long time - upwards of 30 years.
(http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/4291069.stm)
Glue removed from Thai monk's eye
An elderly Thai monk who mistook a tube of superglue for eye drops can see again after doctors unglued one eye. Phra Kru Prapatworakhun, 81, had been unable to see for nearly a week after applying the superglue, which he found in his temple's medicine cabinet.
Doctors used acetone solvent to remove the glue from one eye and said it was unharmed, the Nation newspaper reports.
An operation on the second eye, which is still tightly sealed, is scheduled for Thursday.
Phra Kru Prapatworakhun, the abbot of a temple in Muang Angthong district, north of Bangkok, said he had a severe itch in his eyes on 17 February.
"I squeezed several drops on the floor and saw a clear liquid, so I put four drops into each eye. In about a minute, my eyes felt cold and then sealed closed," the monk told the Nation.
Another monk suggested he use thinners to get rid of the glue. But that only caused a searing pain, he said.
(http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/asi...ic/4289777.stm)
India finds more 'tsunami gifts'
Divers have been scouring the site for three years
Indian divers have found more evidence of an ancient port city, apparently revealed by December's tsunami. Stone structures that are "clearly man-made" were seen on the seabed off the south coast, archaeologists say.
They could be part of the mythical city of Mahabalipuram, which legend says was so beautiful that the gods sent a flood that engulfed six of its seven temples.
Other relics were revealed when the powerful waves washed away sand as they smashed into the Tamil Nadu coast.
'Clear pattern'
The Archaeological Survey of India launched the diving expedition after residents reported seeing a temple and other structures as the sea pulled back just before the tsunami hit.
The new finds were made close to the 7th Century beachfront Mahabalipuram temple, which some say is the structure that survived the wrath of the gods.
"We've found some stone structures which are clearly man-made," expedition leader Alok Tripathi told the AFP news agency.
"They're perfect rectangular blocks, arranged in a clear pattern."
The ancient "gifts" of the tsunami are expected to be presented to an international seminar on maritime archaeology in Delhi next month.
Other discoveries made at Mahabalipuram earlier this month include a granite lion of a similar age to the temple that experts believe had been buried for centuries before the tsunami shifted the sand.
Archaeologists have been working at the site for the last three years, since another diving expedition discovered what appeared to be a submerged city, including at least one temple.
The myths of Mahabalipuram were first written down by British traveller J Goldingham who was told of the "Seven Pagodas" when he visited in 1798.
(http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/south_asia/4302115.stm)
Many politicians sleep deprived
Politicians are among the most sleep deprived people in society, a survey suggests. Research by the Sleep Council, which compared eight groups, found the average politician gets by on just over five hours sleep a night.
Only hospital doctors on-call averaged less shut eye - just 4.5 hours a night.
Topping the sleep league were solicitors who clocked up close to eight hours on a regular basis. One in five slept for an average of ten hours.
Hours slept a night
Solicitors: 7.8
Architects: 7.5
Mothers of young children: 7.1
Social workers: 6.9
Dustmen: 6.5
Teachers: 6.0
Politicians: 5.2
Hospital doctors (on call): 4.5
Jessica Alexander, of the Sleep Council, said: "Time and again research has shown us that lack of sleep affects our ability to think clearly and rationally.
"So the results of this study are of concern in that they demonstrate that our politicians, the people responsible for making decisions that affect all of our lives, may not be in the best mental or physical shape to do so."
Dr David Lewis, who analysed the findings, said there were wide variations across all the occupations.
For instance, some politicians claimed to enjoy the full eight hours while others reported five hours or less each night.
The survey found found hours spent in bed bore little relation to the number of hours actually asleep.
Dr Lewis said: "On average, the length of time between the sheets was nine hours whereas the average time asleep was just under eight.
"Since around half claimed to fall asleep within 15 minutes of their head hitting the pillow, this suggests that many people - especially politicians - find it much harder to drop off.
"One likely reason is that while mentally exhausted they are not sufficiently tired to fall asleep.
"As a result their heads are filled with circulating thoughts and worries which conspire to keep them wide awake."
Sleep problems
Four out of ten (43%) people who took part in the survey go to bed between 10pm and 10.59pm during the working week.
Sleep facts
Humans need around 8 hours sleep per night
Even a sleep debt of seven hours per week can result in burning eyes, blurred vision and waves of sleepiness
The last dream of the night is usually the most vivid and most easily recalled
A half (47%) wake up between 6am-6.59am during the working week, and seven out of ten (70%) get up within 15 minutes of waking.
Around a quarter (28%) reported problems falling asleep, while a similar number (24%) said they woke early.
Frequent waking was a serious problem for around seven out of 10.
One in five (20%) said they woke up between three and six times each night.
Dr Lewis said: "This may not seem all that serious until we realise that even a momentary wakening can result in up to 10 minutes loss of sleep.
"This means that someone who wakes up six times during the night will have lost around one hour's sleep.
"Quite sufficient to build up a serious sleep debt over a week."
While short term sleep loss is nothing to worry about, in the long term it can damage both mental and physical health.
(http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/4307331.stm)
New view on DH Lawrence's legacy
Seventy-five years on from his death, DH Lawrence remains one of the literary world's most contentious and divisive figures. A new biography re-examines the legacy of the famous novelist.
Lawrence was born in Eastwood in Nottinghamshire in 1885
For some, David Herbert Lawrence - author of The Rainbow, Women In Love and Sons and Lovers - is an artistic giant of visionary genius.
To others he is "Dirty Bertie" - a prurient pedlar of obscene smut who compromised his legacy with the infamous Lady Chatterley's Lover.
DH Lawrence's works are the most widely taught English texts throughout the world, but their author's reputation has been severely blighted by charges of racism, sexism and fascism.
A major new biography, however, reappraises the life and work of the Nottinghamshire-born writer.
"Up till now, Lawrence has been perceived as a rough, tough, vitalist figure - an emotional, barely-educated genius whose works poured out of him," says John Worthen, author of DH Lawrence: The Life of an Outsider.
'Introspective'
"But in reality he was a highly intellectual, introspective man and a very careful writer and craftsman."
Worthen, Emeritus Professor of DH Lawrence Studies at the University of Nottingham, argues that the novelist's astonishing productivity was more out of necessity than temperament.
"He wrote so much because his books didn't sell many copies.
"Most of the other great writers of the early part of the 20th century - Virginia Woolf for example - didn't have to earn their living by writing, but he did."
Lady Chatterley's Lover was filmed by the BBC in 1993
Worthen is also keen to stress the importance of Lawrence's wife Frieda, in spite of their volatile and sometimes violent relationship.
Six years older than the then 27-year-old author, Frieda Weekley (nee von Richthofen) was married and had three children when they met.
She and Lawrence eloped and married in 1914, although their stormy union was tested by financial worries and her affair with Italian soldier Angelo Ravagli.
'Revelation'
Nevertheless, Worthen contends she had a "crucial" influence on his writing career.
"Meeting her was the biggest forward movement in his life," he says.
"Frieda was a revelation because she was so different from him - a natural, instinctive, straightforward person. She really changed the way he thought and felt."
Worthen's book contains hitherto unpublished letters from Frieda that offer a fresh take on her creative input.
"She was intensely involved in his writing, and when she wasn't his books got very strange.
"The Boy in the Bush, for example, was written entirely without Frieda's influence - and it shows."
In his biography, Worthen argues that Lawrence channelled his lifelong melancholy into his anger, using it as a spark for his writing.
"His melancholy came out of his peculiar self-containment and loneliness," explains the 62-year-old academic.
'Courageous'
"Lawrence was detached from almost every context you can imagine: background, family, the literary world.
"His self-containment was partly a defence against melancholy, and partly a consequence of it."
Worthen, whose career as a Lawrence biographer began in the 1980s, admits his subject's oeuvre has been overshadowed by the Lady Chatterley controversy.
But, he suggests, writing such a notorious cause celebre was, at heart, a "courageous" act.
"When Lawrence wrote it I don't think he'd seen another sexually explicit book in his life," he explains.
"He was entering a new field as a writer, which is an exciting thing for an established writer to be doing."
The author also hopes his book will rebut accusations that Lawrence flirted with fascism and harboured anti-Semitic views.
"I want to tell the story as it is, get the facts right and clear away some myths," he says.
"But what will rehabilitate Lawrence more than anything is people reading his books."
(http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertain...ts/4294379.stm)
Scientists unearth early skeleton
US and Ethiopian scientists say they have discovered the fossilised remains of one of the earliest human ancestors. The research team, working in the north-east of Ethiopia, believe the remains of the hominid, or primitive human, date back four million years.
They say initial study of the bones indicates the creature was bipedal - it walked around on two legs.
The fossils were found just 60km (40 miles) from the site where the famous hominid Lucy was discovered.
Lucy (Australopithecus afarensis), whose remains were unearthed in 1974, lived 3.2 million years ago and is thought to have given rise to the Homo line that ended in modern humans.
Like Lucy?
The as yet unnamed fossil creature, found in February at a new site called Mille in the Afar region of Ethiopia, looks to be even older than Lucy.
The remains include a complete tibia from the lower part of the leg, parts of the thighbone or femur, ribs, vertebrae, a collarbone, pelvis and a complete shoulder blade.
"The discovery of 12 early hominid fossil specimens estimated to be between 3.8 and 4 million years old will be important in terms of understanding the early phases of human evolution before Lucy," Yohannes Haile Selassie told a news conference.
Researchers are often happy to find isolated bones belonging to human ancestors of this age, so to find a partial skeleton is exceptional.
The team that found it says the discovery is also significant because, due to the structure of the ankle bone, the individual almost certainly walked upright like modern people.
The find, one of a series of hominid fossils which are still being unearthed, held many mysteries, said Bruce Latimer, of the Cleveland Museum of Natural History, US, who made the discovery with his Ethiopian colleague.
"It is already clear that the individual was larger than Lucy; it has longer legs than Lucy... but it is older which is strange," he said.
Early walkers
It is currently too early to say what sex or species the creature was, say the researchers.
"We have a pelvis which can tell us whether it was male or female. But the whole pelvis is embedded in a rock matrix. That's going to take a lot of time to clean up," Dr Haile Selassie told the BBC News website.
The team had to return home because they were nearing the end of their field season, leaving the excavation unfinished. But there are plans to return to the discovery site in December.
"If you want to look at the sex, stature and what species it is, you have to have all the elements that can be retrieved from the excavation," the Ethiopian researcher added.
Dr Haile Selassie plans to return to the discovery site later this year
The discovery of the remains of at least nine primitive hominids of similar age to the latest find was announced in January.
Those fossils, which were uncovered at As Duma in the north of Ethiopia, were mostly teeth and jaw fragments, but also include parts of hands and feet.
Bipedalism is a crucial aspect of the human form, palaeoanthropologists believe - but there is a great deal of debate about when exactly this ability first arose in our lineage.
There is some evidence that two, very much older hominids could walk upright.
Recent computed tomography (CT) scans of the thighbone of a six-million-year-old Kenyan creature known as Orrorin tugenensis suggest it might have had quite a human gait.
And a seven-million-year-old hominid from Chad, known as Sahelanthropus tchadensis and nicknamed Toumai, may also have been bipedal. The assessment is based on an analysis of where the animal's spine would have entered the skull and the position of muscle attachments on its head.
(http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/4322687.stm)
Larks and midnight oil for Asians
More people go to bed later and wake up earlier in Asia than in any other region, a sleep study has found. The poll of 14,100 people in 28 countries and regions found 40% of people in Asia go to sleep after midnight.
Half of the 10 places with the most early-risers were also in Asia, with Indonesia, the world's most populous Muslim nation, in premier position.
But Australians sleep the longest - 31% average more than nine hours a night. Taiwan is Asia's most nocturnal country, according to the poll conducted by AC Nielsen, where 69% of people said they go to sleep after midnight.
In Indonesia, on the other hand, 91% of people said they got out of bed by 0700. In Japan, a nation famed for its long working hours, people appeared to get the least sleep - 41% saying they got six hours or less a night.
Letter sparks Aussie murder probe
Police in South Australia have reopened a century-old murder investigation after a written confession was discovered. In the letter, written in 1932 before his own death, local undertaker Gustav Maerschel admits to stabbing a wealthy British man during a heated argument.
The letter was found during renovations to a historic house in Birdwood, 50km (31 miles) from Adelaide.
On Monday, police dug up a bone after searching the house for human remains.
In the letter, Maerschel confesses to stabbing an unnamed Englishman in the 1800s and then burying him under a pear tree in the backyard.
"That incident has always been on my conscience but I have told no one," Maerschel wrote in the letter, read out by Det Sr Con Bob Sharpe.
The confession was found hidden behind a mantelpiece during refurbishment work to the house.
Mr Sharpe said: "The letter says that shortly after the gentleman moved here to Birdwood, he had several arguments with an English gentleman, as he calls him, a gentleman from London.
"During one of these arguments, the man from London has taken out a knife and there has been a bit of struggle.
"The fellow writing the letter has taken possession of the knife and stabbed the victim, one stab wound as we believe."
Mr Sharpe said Maerschel wrote that he had not been a suspect in the murder inquiry at the time.
Police cut down the pear tree and dug 1.2 metres (4ft), and found a bone which will be examined by pathologists to determine if it is human.
(http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/asi...ic/4326421.stm)
Mexican officers brought to book
Police in Mexico City, one of the most crime-ridden capitals in the world, have been told they must read at least one book a month or forfeit promotion.
The mayor of the district where the scheme is being implemented believes that it will improve their work.
There is a popular conception that Mexican police are corrupt, incompetent and lazy.
Mayor Luis Sanchez believes he can fight low standards in the force by encouraging higher levels of literacy.
Along with guns, bullet-proof vests and handcuffs, police in the district of Nezahualcoyotl will now have to take a book with them.
Regular tests
If they do not read at least one a month, they lose their chance of being promoted.
Mayor Sanchez says the reading scheme for his 1,100-strong municipal police force will make them better officers and better people.
The list of recommended titles includes such literary classics as Don Quixote, The Labyrinth of Solitude by Octavio Paz, and, on a lighter note, The Little Prince.
One hindrance is that a substantial proportion of the police are semi-literate.
About 20% were not educated beyond primary level.
However, according to the mayor, classes will be given to those with reading difficulties.
There is no chance of anyone getting away without doing the reading.
The policemen will be regularly tested to make sure they have read the books they name.
(http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/4332183.stm)
Cash offer to one-girl families
Families having a single girl child in the Indian state of Andhra Pradesh will be given 100,000 rupees ($2,300) in an attempt to boost the female population.
The money will be given to the child when she turns 20 and both parents would have to undergo verified birth control operations.
The state government says it is concerned at the falling female-to-male ratio - in 2001 it was 943 to 1,000. The rise in sex determination tests to abort female foetuses is also a worry.
Publicity campaign
State Chief Minister YS Rajashekhar Reddy said there would be several other benefits for families having a single girl child.
They include an annual grant of 1,250 rupees for education for the girl in classes nine to 12 (ages 14-17). In case of the death of either parent, the family would get up to 50,000 rupees immediately.
Dr Reddy said both parents would have to undergo operations certified and verified by government hospitals to qualify for the scheme.
The Andhra Pradesh government says it is also planning a major publicity campaign to promote female children.
It has named the rising Indian tennis star and local girl, Sania Mirza, as the "ambassador of the girl child of Andhra Pradesh".
The authorities are planning to erect hoardings featuring Mirza and espousing the cause of the female child.
"Your daughter may be the next champion", one of the hoardings says.
This year Mirza became first Indian woman to get to the third round of a tennis Grand Slam, with her performance in Australia.
(http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/south_asia/4333159.stm)
Women urged to soften image
The South African women's team will be coached in etiquette and given tighter T-shirts in a drive to soften their image and attract sponsorship.
A top official said on Wednesday that female players who dressed and acted like men were giving women's football a bad name and needed to nurture their feminine side.
"They need to learn how to be ladies," said Ria Ledwaba, head of the women's committee at the South African Football Association (Safa).
"At the moment you sometimes can't tell if they're men or women."
The national team would be given a more shapely kit to emphasise their femininity on the pitch and would swap dowdy track suits for skirts and jackets when travelling.
"Obviously they can't wear skirts on pitch... but they will be given outfits made for women, with female shirts that are shaped for breasts," Ledwaba said.
Safa would also hold etiquette workshops to turn the players - often plucked from the streets of South Africa's sprawling townships with no schooling - into national assets.
"We need to teach them etiquette and the importance of being a role model," said Ledwaba.
"There are mothers out there who won't let their daughters play football because they think they'll start acting like boys."
The new outlook is part of a drive to attract untapped talent into the squad, which has never competed in a world tournament, and to lure sponsors.
The women's team is currently funded by mobile phone operator Vodacom, which also sponsors the men's team.
But Ledwaba said she was hoping to attract extra sponsorship from companies making products for women, such as toiletries.
Fifa president Sepp Blatter last year courted controversy when he urged women players to wear tighter shorts to distinguish them from men.
(http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/foot...ca/4332715.stm)
Poor show by Einstein look-alikes
A New York university planned to mark the 127th birthday of genius physicist Albert Einstein by bringing dozens of his look-alikes together in a room.
But when the City University of New York placed an advert in an actors' newspaper, only one person turned up - a man originally from Afghanistan.
However, as luck would have it, Latif Rashidzada bore a striking similarity to the scientist who discovered the theory of relativity.
The university is holding a party on Monday evening with two of Einstein's former associates who are now in their 90s.
But he was the only entrant
Physicist Brian Schwartz said they had hopes of bringing lots of Einstein look-alikes along as well.
"Imagine a picture of 100 Einsteins all in one place at one time," he was quoted as saying on the WNYC radio station website.
"But actually it seems like actors are doing better than I thought because not many showed up - although we have one gorgeous Einstein who is actually from Afghanistan."
Mr Rashidzada was born in the Afghan capital Kabul but now lives in New York.
A year of events is being held globally to mark 100 years of Einstein's work.
(http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/4343725.stm)
Hitachi unveils 'fastest robot'
Japanese electronics firm Hitachi has unveiled its first humanoid robot, called Emiew, to challenge Honda's Asimo and Sony's Qrio robots. Hitachi said the 1.3m (4.2ft) Emiew was the world's quickest-moving robot yet at 6km/h (3.7 miles per hour).
Two wheel-based Emiews, Pal and Chum, introduced themselves to reporters at a press conference in Japan.
They will be guests at this month's World Expo. Sony and Honda have both built robots to showcase engineering.
Explaining why Hitachi's Emiew used wheels instead of feet, Toshihiko Horiuchi, from Hitachi's Mechanical Engineering Research Laboratory, said: "We aimed to create a robot that could live and co-exist with people."
"We want to make the robots useful for people ... If the robots moved slower than people, users would be frustrated."
Emiew - Excellent Mobility and Interactive Existence as Workmate - can move at 6km/h (3.7 miles per hour) on its "wheel feet", which resemble the bottom half of a Segway scooter.
With sensors on the head, waist, and near the wheels, Pal and Chum demonstrated how they could react to commands.
"I want to be able to walk about in places like Shinjuku and Shibuya [shopping districts] in the future without bumping into people and cars," Pal told reporters.
Hitachi said Pal and Chum, which have a vocabulary of about 100 words, could be "trained" for practical office and factory use in as little as five to six years.
Big bot battle
Robotics researchers have long been challenged by developing robots that walk in the gait of a human.
At the recent AAAS (American Association for the Advancement of Science) annual meeting in Washington DC, researchers showed off bipedal designs.
The three designs, each built by a different research group, use the same principle to achieve a human-like gait.
Sony and Honda have both used humanoid robots, which are not commercially available, as a way of showing off computing power and engineering expertise.
Honda's Asimo was "born" five years ago. Since then, Honda and Sony's Qrio have tried to trump each other with what the robots can do at various technology events.
Asimo has visited the UK, Germany, the Czech Republic, France and Ireland as part of a world tour.
Sony's Qrio has been singing, jogging and dancing in formation around the world too and was, until last year, the fastest robot on two legs.
But its record was beaten by Asimo. It is capable of 3km/h, which its makers claim is almost four times as fast as Qrio.
Last year, car maker Toyota also stepped into the ring and unveiled its trumpet-playing humanoid robot.
By 2007, it is predicted that there will be almost 2.5 million "entertainment and leisure" robots in homes, compared to about 137,000 currently, according to the United Nations (UN).
By the end of that year, 4.1 million robots will be doing jobs in homes, said a report by the UN Economic Commission for Europe and the International Federation of Robotics.
Hitachi is one of the companies already with home cleaning robot machines on the market.
(http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/4351639.stm)
Adams patches up Sri Lanka's hurt
Dr Hunter "Patch" Adams, whose unconventional healing methods inspired a 1998 Robin Williams film, has visited Sri Lanka's tsunami-hit towns.
Dr Adams brought a troupe of 30 clowns performing juggling, unicycle riding and puppet shows to hospitals and relief camps in the country's south.
His Gesundheit Institute in the US is run according to his philosophy of using humour with healing.
Dr Adams has also taken his clowns to Bosnia, Africa and Afghanistan.
Encouragement
The first stop was the Karapitiya Hospital, near Galle.
"We do everything that makes people laugh," said Dr Adams, 59. "Laughter is the best medicine you know. I want to stop their suffering."
He told the Reuters news agency: "I decided to come to Sri Lanka as I have a great feeling of tragedy and desire to encourage people to rebuild after the tsunami."
As he bounded into children's wards, one doctor asked: "Is that man looking for the psychiatric ward?"
The troupe sprayed wards with soap bubbles and performed a puppet show for children suffering from cancer.
Train site
Dr Adams said one positive aspect of the tsunami was that it had "made people forget their greed for power and think of humanity".
He also visited the site of what is thought to be the world's worst train disaster, at Telwatta, 110km (75 miles) south of the capital, Colombo.
Tsunami waves struck the Queen of the Sea train, killing at least 800 and possibly twice that number.
"When the power of nature destroys, there is no one to blame. You have got to collect the pieces and move on your own, but the world did not forget these people," Dr Adams said.
"Giving and receiving love has become the world's currency after the tsunami."
In all, the tsunami killed more than 31,000 people in Sri Lanka.
Dr Adams graduated as a doctor in 1971 and over the past three decades has developed his philosophy that the health of an individual is intrinsically linked to the health of the family, community and the world.
His Gesundheit Institute, a free hospital and health-care "eco-community" in West Virginia, combines traditional medicine with alternative treatments and the performing arts.
The Robin Williams film, Patch Adams, tells of the doctor's own experience of receiving uncaring treatment in hospital, which inspires him to develop his unconventional humour-based healing.
(http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/south_asia/4374759.stm)
Lovelorn drake ducks new owners
A web-footed loving couple have been reunited in Devon after one of them escaped his captors on Valentine's Day.
Last month Jake the drake was moved out of the Kentisbury Grange Country Park, near Lynton, because he was getting too amorous with the female ducks.
He was becoming so rampant he had even begun chasing peacocks and turkeys on the farm.
But after being taken by new owners eight miles away he escaped and found his way home to his mate, Jemima.
Jake, who is too fat to fly, walked the eight miles back to the park after escaping from his new home at Burridge on 14 February.
'Escaped foxes'
Now the Shindler family hope they can manage Jake's philandering and have decided he can stay.
Charlotte Shindler from the park said: "He is obviously very good at looking after himself because he escaped the foxes throughout those four weeks.
"We can't re-home him again, not after that journey, he will have to stay here now."
(http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/devon/4380731.stm)
Scales tip with tiniest mass yet
US scientists have managed to measure the mass of a cluster of xenon atoms at just a few billionths of a trillionth of a gram - or a few zeptograms.
The record measurement is in the mass range of individual protein molecules, and the detection was made using sensitive scales developed at Caltech.
Similar techniques could pave the way for sensitive devices for use in medical and environmental testing.
Details were presented at the annual American Physical Society convention.
The scales use a small blade that vibrates in a magnetic field that generates a voltage in an attached wire.
When atoms or molecules are placed on the blade's surface, they weigh it down. The atoms are added as a very fine "spray".
Because the device is cooled, the molecules condense on the bar and add their mass to it, lowering its frequency and changing the voltage of the wire.
But to get good measurements of sophisticated biomolecules like proteins, researchers say, the scales will have to become 1,000 times more precise, capable of weighing yoctograms. One yoctogram is about the same as an individual hydrogen atom.
Devices like this could be used to make early diagnoses of disease by detecting marker molecules in a drop of blood.
"We hope to transform this chip-based technology into systems that are useful for picking out and identifying specific molecules one by one - for example, certain types of proteins secreted in the very early stages of cancer," said Michael Roukes, from the California Institute of Technology.
(http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/4394947.stm)
US universities try going 'dry'
The University of Oklahoma became the latest US college to ban alcohol earlier this year, amid rising concern across America about binge-drinking students.
But the ban is having unintended consequences, driving drinking off campus and into the surrounding community.
It is also unclear whether it is really deterring students from drinking to excess.
In an Oklahoma bar, Jen has just turned 21, the state's legal drinking age, and is drinking shots of spirits to celebrate.
"I have to drink 21. It's kind of tradition" she says as she knocks back her fifth or sixth shot. She has already lost count.
But while drinking 21 shots remains a rite of passage, most students have started drinking long before.
Freshman Blake Hammontree was just 19 when he died of alcohol poisoning last September, at the University of Oklahoma.
His death sparked an all-out ban on drinking in residence halls, even for those over the legal age of 21.
It is not the first university campus to go dry, and some fraternities and sororities - once notorious for their alcohol-induced hazing - have already passed a drinking ban in their chapters across the country.
But the University of Oklahoma has gone one step further and started a "three strikes" policy for students who get into trouble with the police or are caught inebriated - even off campus.
The university's Dean of Students, Clarke Stroud, is in charge of implementing the new policy.
"It was designed on what we call the three e's - education, enforcement and environment," he explains.
All students are required to have alcohol education, and after three alcohol violations, they face suspension for at least a semester.
In Oklahoma, one of America's most conservative states, with a strong religious influence, banning alcohol was greeted as a positive step in the beginning.
But it is having some unintended consequences. The parties are moving off campus into residential areas.
Joyce Collard lives a few miles away from the campus in what was once a quiet neighbourhood.
She is outraged by the growing number of "nuisance houses" on her street, where students hold huge parties.
"We've had an influx of students into the neighbourhood because the university has been going dry and now it's completely dry," she said.
"It's been very detrimental - it's caused a lot of traffic jams and property damage."
As she laid out her grievances, a car sped round the corner.
"He's one of our major problems," she said.
Police overstretched
As we approach, Chip and his friends are draining the last few drops out of a bottle of vodka.
They have been drinking all day. Chip's not concerned that he's under-age and therefore running the risk of collecting a strike if he's caught.
"We like to have fun you know. Here's my beer collection," he says, gesturing towards a row of about 200 empty beer bottles.
"It's not like living on a dry campus is it?"
Pushing student parties off campus has also increased pressure on the already stretched police force, who have to deal with complaints from neighbours as well students driving home drunk.
Across America, up to 1,400 students die in alcohol related incidents - mainly because of drink driving.
Backlash against drinking
The Sigma Chi fraternity, where freshman student Blake Hammontree died last year, moved off campus the next day.
One of the members, Adam, says their parties are now a bit more restrained.
"We used to have 500, 600 people in a house at a time. It was just madness. You would have two, or four beers at the same time. Now it's a bit more chilled."
But Adam agrees that no level of prohibition can prevent students from binge drinking.
"Does it still happen? Probably yes," he says. "People are going to drink, no matter what. They'll find a way to drink."
The university realises the new policy is not perfect.
But the authorities felt something had to be done, both for the welfare of students and the university's image.
According to a Harvard University study, one in three American colleges has already banned alcohol on campus and many more are considering plans to restrict student access to booze.
It seems the backlash against student drunkenness is gathering pace across America.
(http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/4395857.stm)
