Health & Science

• Friday, March 19th 2010 - 00:07 UTC

  Inventor of the Web says WWW is a fundamental right for a democracy

  

  The World Wide Web is becoming as important to the future of mankind as free speech, the inventor of the Web Sir Tim Berners-Lee has said. Because the network is neutral and access to data open, the Web is becoming a vital tool to ensure open government, and as such it should be considered a right.

• Wednesday, March 17th 2010 - 22:52 UTC

  Astronomers detect outer solar system planet with “moderate” temperatures

  

  European astronomers have found a planet outside our solar system with a relatively moderate temperature, far cooler than other “exoplanets” discovered to date. The planet Corot-9b has an estimated surface temperature between 160 C and -20 C. It has about 80% of the mass of Jupiter and its orbit is similar to that of Mercury.

• Wednesday, March 17th 2010 - 22:30 UTC

  Facebook beats Google as the most visited website in the US

  

  Facebook has beaten Google to become the most visited website in the US for the first time. The social networking website knocked the search engine off the top spot for the week ending March 13, according to industry analysts Experian Hitwise.

• Wednesday, March 17th 2010 - 00:50 UTC

  “Shrimp surprise” for NASA 200 metres below Antarctica ice

  

  At nearly 200 meters below the ice, there is no light, the temperature is way below zero degrees, and scientists were expecting to find nothing more than a handful of microbes - and for good reason. So it’s easy to understand why they were so surprised to find not a single (evolved) life form, but actually two such creatures.

• Monday, March 15th 2010 - 21:49 UTC

  Canada suffers 17th case of mad cow and is categorized as “controlled risk”

  

  The president of Canada Beef Export Federation says the country's 17th case of mad cow disease has not affected markets. The beef cow was born in 2004 in Alberta, and the fatal degenerative brain disease was confirmed on Feb. 25, the Canadian Food Inspection Agency reported on its website.

• Monday, March 15th 2010 - 19:58 UTC

  Internet celebrates 25th anniversary of dotcom domain name

  

  It was not until the late 1990s that it really took off but today the internet celebrates the 25th birthday of the dotcom domain name. On 15 March 1985, the first company to add dotcom to its name was a computer maker named Symbolics.

• Saturday, March 13th 2010 - 00:41 UTC

  Norovirus again attacks “Vision of the Seas” cruise in Brazil

  

  Royal Caribbean’s cruise vessel “Vision of the Seas” which last week was struck with an outbreak of gastrointestinal illness has again suffered a similar bout while sailing along the Atlantic coast of South America, according to a Brazilian health officials.

• Friday, March 12th 2010 - 23:30 UTC

  Environment degradation threatens Haiti’s recovery process warns UN

  

  The United Nations Environment Program warns Haiti's recovery process will be greatly constrained if the environmental degradation suffered during the catastrophic earthquake is not adequately taken care of.

• Thursday, March 11th 2010 - 23:33 UTC

  Many governments use internet “to curtail freedom of expression”

  

  Many governments have used the internet to curtail freedom of expression at home, the US state department says in its latest annual human rights report.

• Wednesday, March 10th 2010 - 06:26 UTC

  China looks into developing vast resources of “combustible ice”

  

  China's western Qinghai Province, containing major deposits of the country's “combustible ice,” will see increased explorations for this emerging clean energy, Provincial Governor Luo Huining said on Saturday quoted by Xinhua news agency.