Woman swept to her death by floodwaters

The Age.com.au | November 20, 2008 - 3:02PM

The aftermath of south-east Queensland's latest storms. Photo: brisbanetimes.com.au

- Woman dies in Queensland storm

- 1200 calls for emergency help

- Like a 'wall of water through city'

Christine Kellett reporting
A woman has been swept to her death in a car carried away by floodwaters near Brisbane this morning. The elderly woman and a man, believed to be her husband, were driving along Old Laidley-Forest Hill Road at Forest Hill, west of Ipswich, about 7:40 am when their car was swept off a crossing. The man managed to escape, but the woman vanished along with the car, which has not been seen since. On a tour of Ipswich this morning, Premier Anna Bligh said the woman had died. A police media spokesman said police divers were searching but it is uncertain whether the woman's body had been recovered.

Scientists Complete Mammoth DNA Project

Woolly Mammoth's DNA Mapped; First Time Genetic Code Of Extinct Animal Unraveled

This undated handout provided by ExhibitEase LLC shows a 3D computer generated Image of woolly mammoth emerging from ice block. A DNA molecule extending from hair symbolizes the fact that genetic analysis can be carried out from long extinct species. (AP Photo/Mammoth Genome Project, Steven W. Marcus)

CBS NEWS | Wednesday, November 19, 2008

WASHINGTON - (AP) Scientists for the first time have unraveled much of the genetic code of an extinct animal, the ice age's woolly mammoth, and with it they are thawing Jurassic Park dreams. Their groundbreaking achievement has them contemplating a once unimaginable future when certain prehistoric species might one day be resurrected. "It could be done. The question is, just because we might be able to do it one day, should we do it?" asked Stephan Schuster, the Penn State University biochemistry professor and co-author of the new research. "I would be surprised to see if it would take more than 10 or 20 years to do it." The million-dollar project is a first rough draft, detailing the more than 3 billion DNA building blocks of the mammoth, according to the study published in Thursday's journal Nature. It's about 80 percent finished. But that's enough to give scientists new clues on the timing of evolution and the deadly intricacies of extinction.

The project relied on mammoth hair found frozen in the Siberian permafrost, instead of bone, giving biologists a new method to dig into ancient DNA. Think of it as CSI Siberia, said Schuster. That different technique - along with soaring improvements in genome sequencing and the still embryonic field of synthetic biology - are inspiring scientists to envision a science-fiction-like future. Crucial to the mammoth mapping are about 20 hairballs. Past efforts to use ancient DNA were hampered because bacteria, viruses and parasites crept into the bone fossils during the millenia-old degradation process, making much of the found genetic material something other than what scientists study. For example, current efforts to study Neanderthal DNA have been complicated because only about 6 percent of the recovered genetic material actually belonged to our ancient cousins.

Schuster says that it should be possible to someday recreate any extinct creature "within the last 100,000 years" as long as it got trapped in permafrost and had hair. But that leaves out the Jurassic Period, the time of dinosaurs. So Earth's real-life sequel to extinction is far more likely to be Ice Age 3 than Jurassic Park IV. Three years ago, Japanese scientists said they planned to find frozen mammoth sperm and impregnate an elephant and raise the offspring in a safari park in Siberia. But using genetics to engineer a mammoth makes more sense, Schuster said. Anthropology professor Hendrik Poinar of McMaster University in Hamilton, Ontario, said he no longer considers such ideas impossible. Poinar, who wasn't part of Schuster's study but consulted on the movie Jurassic Park, said director Steven Spielberg may have had it right when he told skeptical scientists: "This is the science of eventuality."

Tanker capture raises alarm over Somali piracy

This undated picture made at an unknown location shows the the MV Sirius Star a Saudi oil supertanker which has been hijacked by Somali pirates. The owner of a Saudi oil supertanker hijacked by Somali pirates over the weekend said the 25 crew members are safe and the ship is fully loaded with crude _ a cargo worth about US$100 million at current prices. Dubai-based Vela International Marine Ltd., a subsidiary of Saudi oil company Aramco, said in a statement Monday, Nov. 17, 2008, that company response teams have been set up and are working to ensure the release of the crew and the vessel. (AP Photo/Christian Duys)

The Associated Press | Tuesday, November 18, 2008

By LEE KEATH and JENNIFER QUINN – 3 hours ago
CAIRO, Egypt (AP) — It seems inconceivable: Somali pirates in speedboats foil warships from the world's most powerful navies to prey on shipping lanes crucial to the oil supply. How do they do it? Basically, it's a big ocean and no one wants to be top cop. NATO and the U.S. Navy say they can't be everywhere, and American officials are urging ships to hire private security. Warships patrolling off Somalia have succeeded in stopping some pirate attacks. But military assaults to wrest back a ship are highly risky and, to this point, uncommon. Yet when pirates took their biggest prize to date over the weekend — a Saudi supertanker carrying $100 million worth of crude oil — it raised the stakes dramatically. The pirates struck hundreds of miles off the coast of East Africa, far out to sea where ships were presumed to be safe.

Governments, navies, oil companies and ship owners are scrambling for solutions, and finding few options are ideal. At least one private security company said it has been flooded with requests from shipping companies for protection, including from Saudis. Shippers and insurance companies that once minimized piracy's risks — at worse, pay a ransom, get your ship, crew and cargo back unharmed — have now awakened to the potential economic impact. The turmoil could force cargo ships and tankers to take longer routes around Africa, drive up costs and, though it hasn't happened yet, even raise oil prices. "For a long time I thought this piracy thing was complete nonsense ... isolated incidents being blown up," Giles Merritt, director of the Security & Defense Agenda, a Brussels, Belgium-based think tank on security issues. Not anymore, he said.

"It's unbelievable to me that we can run AWACS aircraft that can tell you anything that is moving," Merritt said. "But apparently we cannot spot small boats full of chaps with machine guns." Somali pirates, given free rein in a country with no stable government for two decades, have attacked more than 90 vessels this year and successfully seized 36, everything from ships carrying palm oil and chemicals to luxury yachts. They have raked in millions of dollars in ransoms and are negotiating for more than 14 vessels currently anchored at their strongholds along the coast. Pressure is on for more warships to patrol. Saudi Arabia's foreign minister, Prince Saud al-Faisal, said Tuesday his country was ready to join an international effort. The kingdom's navy has 18,000-20,000 personnel, but has never taken part in any high-seas fighting. Officials from Djibouti, Egypt, Jordan, Saudi Arabia and Sudan are to meet Thursday in Cairo to hammer out an anti-piracy strategy.

Israel renews Gaza crossings blockade

Canada.com / Reuters | Tuesday, November 18, 2008

An Israeli border police officer stands guard during a protest by left-wing activists in Tel Aviv calling for an end to cross-border violence. Israel resealed border crossings with the Gaza Strip on Tuesday citing continued rocket fire at its towns, despite warnings from world aid groups of looming shortages of food and fuel supplies in the coastal territory. Gil Cohen Magen / Reuters

Nidal al-Mughrabi, Reuters
Published: Tuesday, November 18, 2008
GAZA - Israel resealed border crossings with the Gaza Strip on Tuesday, blaming continued rocket fire at its towns, despite warnings from world aid groups of looming shortages of food and fuel in the coastal territory. Israel had allowed 33 truckloads of supplies into Gaza for the first time in two weeks on Monday, and Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert told Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas he would not permit a humanitarian crisis to develop there. "The crossings are shut because of ongoing rocket fire," said Peter Lerner, a defence ministry spokesman, referring to several barrages of rockets fired from Gaza on Monday that slammed into Israeli towns but caused no injury. A statement issued later on Tuesday said Defence Minister Ehud Barak had ordered the crossings to remain closed on Wednesday "following continued rocket fire towards Israel".

International aid groups said the supplies sent in on Monday were not enough to alleviate food shortages. Israel has also held up fuel shipments to Gaza's main power plant, leading to periodic electricity blackouts each day for many of the 1.5 million Palestinians living in the territory. Until Monday, Israel had not allowed UNRWA, a United Nations agency that aids some 750,000 refugees in Gaza, to bring in supplies since Nov. 4 during cross-border fighting in which more than a dozen Palestinian fighters were killed. Several Israelis have been lightly wounded by dozens of rockets fired by gunmen after Israeli raids. Hamas gunmen fired mortar bombs at Israeli soldiers searching for explosives near the Gaza border fence on Tuesday, the Israeli military and Hamas said. There were no reported casualties from that incident.

U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay called for an immediate end of the Israeli blockade of Gaza, which she said was "in direct contravention of international human rights and humanitarian law." "It must end now," she said in a statement released in Geneva on Tuesday. "Only a full lifting of the blockade followed by a strong humanitarian response will be adequate to relieve the massive humanitarian suffering evident in Gaza today." The Israeli Foreign Ministry said in a statement that Pillay's assessment of the humanitarian situation in the Gaza Strip was "one-sided" and based on "misinformation" provided by Hamas, which controls the territory. "Overall responsibility for the situation in the Gaza Strip lies with Hamas ... It is disappointing to see the High Commissioner fall victim to Hamas' cynical manipulation of the media," the statement said.

Bone marrow 'cures HIV patient'

About one in 1,000 Europeans and Americans have a resistance to HIV. BBC News.co.uk Media Images

Doctors in Germany say a patient appears to have been cured of HIV by a bone marrow transplant from a donor who had a genetic resistance to the virus.

BBC News | Health | Monday, November 17, 2008

Story originally posted Thursday, 13 November 2008
The researchers in Berlin said the man, who suffered from leukaemia and HIV, had shown no sign of either disease since the transplant two years ago. But they stressed it was an unusual case which needed further investigation. Experts said the result may boost interest in gene therapy for HIV. Berlin's Charite clinic said the 42-year-old patient was an American living in Berlin, but the man has not been identified.

Genetic mutation

He had been infected with the human immunodeficiency virus, that causes Aids, for more than a decade and also had leukaemia. The clinic said since the transplant was carried out 20 months ago, tests on the patient's bone marrow, blood and other organ tissues have all been clear. In a statement, Professor Rodolf Tauber from the Charite clinic said: "This is an interesting case for research. "But to promise to millions of people infected with HIV that there is hope of a cure would not be right." Roughly one in 1,000 Europeans and Americans have an inherited genetic mutation, which prevents HIV from attaching itself to cells.