In The News: Disabled US Spy Satellite May Plummet to Earth

In the News

Babies of Teen Fathers at Health Risk While it has long been established that advanced maternal age can have a negative impact on fetal health, little research has been done to establish the effect of paternal age on births and fetal health. New data from a Canadian study suggest that children born to teen fathers are more likely to suffer from a range of complications including pre-term birth and low birth weight regardless of the mother's age. Researchers suspect that sociological factors contribute significantly to the increased rate of adverse birth outcomes among children of young fathers. More on the subject...

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In the News

Disabled US Spy Satellite May Plummet to Earth Generally, when the US decommissions a spy satellite, it is disposed of through a controlled reentry and dumped in the ocean, where its secret data can remain hidden. Now, however, the US military is developing contingency plans in the event that an out of control spy satellite?designated by the military as US 193?comes crashing back to earth in late February or early March. After considering the size of the satellite, some experts have concluded that a few pieces of debris may not burn up upon reentry into Earth's atmosphere and could hit North America. The satellite was launched in December of 2006; it lost power shortly thereafter and has been orbiting the Earth ever since. More on the subject...

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In the News

One Joint is the Equivalent of Twenty Cigarettes Researchers have determined that smoking a single marijuana joint may be as carcinogenic to the lungs as 20 tobacco cigarettes. They found that the risk of lung cancer increased nearly sixfold among those who smoked the equivalent of one joint a day for 10 years. Cannabis smoke contains twice as many carcinogenic polyaromatic hydrocarbons as cigarette smoke; and the method by which cannabis is smoked, generally without a filter and while inhaling deeply, increases cancer risk. Past studies have shown that cannabis can cause cancer, but few established a strong link between cannabis use and the incidence of lung cancer. More on the subject...

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Today's Birthday

Oprah Winfrey (1954) Winfrey is an internationally-known celebrity noted for her highly influential talk show as well as for her philanthropy. She began her career as the host of AM Chicago, which, following its early success, was renamed The Oprah Winfrey Show and expanded to a full-hour format. In the mid-1990s, Winfrey adopted a less tabloid-orientated format and began covering important social issues like abuse, addiction, and depression. Why did Texas cattlemen sue Oprah in 1998? More...

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Article of the Day

The XYZ Affair The XYZ Affair was a 1797 diplomatic episode that worsened relations between France and the US and led to the undeclared Quasi-War of 1798. When the US signed a treaty with Great Britain in 1795, France perceived it as evidence of an Anglo-American alliance. The French responded by seizing hundreds of US ships bound for British ports. US President John Adams sent a delegation to negotiate peace, but communication stalled when the French agents demanded bribes. Who were X, Y, and Z? More...

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This Day in History

Edgar Allan Poe Publishes "The Raven" (1845) "The Raven," like Poe's other works, conveys the dreamlike and often macabre forces that pervaded the author's sensibility. Poe wrote the poem while his moribund wife was suffering from tuberculosis, and it became an instant sensation when it appeared in the Evening Mirror in 1845. In the poem, the speaker, who is mourning the death of his love, Lenore, is mysteriously visited by a talking raven and asks the bird a series of questions. What is the raven's one-word response to each query? More...

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In the News

Virgin Galactic Unveils Tourist Spaceplane Virgin Galactic has released the final design for its SpaceShipTwo (SS2), a commercial vehicle that will take passengers on a two-and-a-half hour journey 110 kilometers (68.35 miles) above the earth, allowing them to experience a few minutes of weightlessness. The rocket spaceliner will carry two pilot astronauts and six ticketed passengers. Seats are priced at $200,000, and Virgin Galactic claims that more than 200 passengers have already booked trips on the SS2. The sub-orbital spacecraft is currently under construction in the Mojave Desert and may be completed before the year's end. More on the subject...

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