Threat Closes Newtown Elementary School

Local officials closed a Newtown, Conn., elementary school following a threat on what would have been the first day of classes since a shooting rampage at nearby Sandy Hook Elementary School.Classes at Head O'Meadow Elementary School were scheduled to begin at 11 a.m. ET, but as parents and students arrived at the school they encountered police who turned them away.Principal...

Read More..

EU urges quick trade talks after Japan vote

BRUSSELS: European Union president Herman Van Rompuy and European Commission Jose Manuel Barroso on Monday congratulated Japan's Shinzo Abe for his sweeping election win while urging the swift opening of trade talks."On behalf of the European Union please accept our congratulations on your success on the occasion of the recent parliamentary elections," the two said."We look forward to...

Read More..

DxO Labs tries making sense of camera lens sharpness

This chart shows the perceptive megapixel score for the Canon EF 70-200mm f/2.8L IS II USM mounted on the 21-megapixel Canon EOS 5D Mark II. At settings where the plot is green, the lens matches the camera's resolution. At f22 and smaller apertures, the lens-camera combination reduces the camera's effective performance to only about 4 megapixels or so.(Credit:screenshot by Stephen Shankland/CNET)Aiming...

Read More..

The Bloody Truth About Serbia's Vampire

Garlic sales are up. Wooden crosses are a hot commodity. That can only mean one thing: Vampire on the loose!But this isn't part of a movie script or book. It's a real-life event in the Serbian town of Zarozje (map), where last month the local council issued a public health warning that the resident vampire, Sava Savanovic, may be on the prowl. (See "Pictures: Toothless 'Vampire' Skeleton...

Read More..

Two Adult Shooting Survivors Will Be Key Witnesses

Two adult survivors who were shot and injured in the Newtown, Conn., school massacre will be integral parts of the investigation into the deadly rampage, police said today."Investigators will, in fact, speak with them when it's medically appropriate and they will shed a great deal of light on the facts and circumstances of this tragic investigation," Connecticut State Police...

Read More..

Zebrafish made to grow pre-hands instead of fins

PERHAPS the little fish embryo shown here is dancing a jig because it has just discovered that it has legs instead of fins. Fossils show that limbs evolved from fins, but a new study shows how it may have happened, live in the lab. ...

Read More..

Japan moves right as conservatives win big in polls

TOKYO: Japan's conservative opposition swept to victory in national polls on Sunday, giving former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe a second chance to push his hawkish security agenda and reflate the economy.Voters dumped Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda three years after his Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ) promised a change from more than half a century of almost unbroken rule by the Liberal Democratic...

Read More..

Netflix, RIM, others get boot from key Nasdaq stock index

With Facebook's entry, a handful of other tech companies exit key stock index.The shakeup that landed Facebook on Nasdaq's top 100 list is also leading to the departure of other prominent tech players.Facebook was added last week to the Nasdaq 100, the collection of the largest 100 nonfinancial companies trading on the stock exchange. Facebook's addition to the index came with the departure of IT...

Read More..

Space Pictures This Week: Frosty Mars, Mini Nile, More

Photograph by Mike Theiss, National GeographicThe aurora borealis, also known as the northern lights, illuminates the Arctic sky in a recent picture by National Geographic photographer Mike Theiss.A storm chaser by trade, Theiss is in the Arctic Circle on an expedition to photograph auroras, which result from collisions between charged particles released from the sun's atmosphere and gaseous particles...

Read More..

Conn. Shooting: Town Mourns as Police Seek Clues

Members of the shattered community of Newtown, Conn., struggling to come to grips with the loss of 20 children and six adults massacred by Adam Lanza, faced a new shock today when a threat was made against a church that many of the victims and their families attend.The St. Rose of Lima Catholic Church was evacuated during a noon service as armed police officers swarmed around...

Read More..