Blinking neurons give thoughts away

Scientists have used a genetic light source to measure brain signals. Electrical currents are invisible to the naked eye -- at least they are when they flow through metal cables. In nerve cells, however, scientists are able to make electrical signals visible. Scientists have now successfully used a specialized fluorescent protein to visualize electrical activity in neurons of living mice. In a milestone study, scientists are able to apply the method to watch activity in nerve cells during animal behavior.
Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 10 May 2010 | 12:00 pm

Drug now used to treat erectile dysfuncton may enhance delivery of herceptin to certain brain tumors

New research suggests that a drug currently approved to treat erectile dysfunction may significantly enhance the delivery of the anti-cancer drug herceptin to certain hard-to-treat brain tumors. The research could help doctors improve treatments for lung and breast cancers that have metastasized to the brain.
Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 10 May 2010 | 12:00 pm

Agents that keep insulin working longer developed

More than half a century after researchers identified a promising way to treat diabetes based on blocking the breakdown of insulin in the body, a research team has developed potent molecules that can do just that.
Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 10 May 2010 | 12:00 pm

Molecular data and images from space used to study imperiled coastal dolphins

Using DNA samples and images from Earth-orbiting satellites, conservationists are gathering new insights about the franciscana -- a poorly known coastal dolphin species of eastern South America -- in an effort to understand populations and conserve them.
Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 10 May 2010 | 12:00 pm

Return home from war not always peaceful for young vets

When young servicemen and women return home from a tour of duty, their family and friends breathe a sigh of relief, knowing their loved ones finally are safe and sound. New research, however, shows that is not always the case. Young veterans are at risk for violent deaths at home, especially suicide.
Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 10 May 2010 | 12:00 pm

Common mosquito repellent no longer repels certain mosquitoes

Mosquitoes can develop a resistance to substances used to repel them. The yellow fever mosquito has developed a resistance to the mosquito repellent DEET.
Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 10 May 2010 | 12:00 pm

H1N1 influenza hits older children

Children hospitalized with pandemic H1N1 influenza in 2009 were older and more likely to have underlying medical conditions than children hospitalized with seasonal influenza during prior flu seasons.
Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 10 May 2010 | 9:00 am

'Mouse grimace scale' to help identify pain in humans and animals

A new study by psychologists in Canada shows that mice, like humans, express pain through facial expressions. The researchers have discovered that when subjected to moderate pain stimuli, mice showed discomfort through facial expressions in the same way humans do.
Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 10 May 2010 | 9:00 am

How Darwin's little-known work impacts current schizophrenia and autism treatment

Historical research reveals more of Charles Darwin's thinking when he completed what may be the first example of a prospective "single-blind" study of human perception of emotional expression. Through scrutiny of Darwin's work, including previously unpublished handwritten notes on his experiments, a scholar explains how this early experiment has direct implications to current work today in the areas of schizophrenia, autism spectrum disorders and other neuropsychiatric conditions.
Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 10 May 2010 | 9:00 am

Scientists solve mystery of fragile stem cells; New findings to speed research on potential therapies

Scientists have solved the decade-old mystery of why human embryonic stem cells are so difficult to culture in the laboratory, providing scientists with useful new techniques and moving the field closer to the day when stem cells can be used for therapeutic purposes.
Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 10 May 2010 | 9:00 am

Whipping up a little natural selection

Manipulated islands reveal secrets of lizard adaptation.<img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/news/rss/today/~4/X7BXBFX5lHs" height="1" width="1"/>
Source: NatureNews - All articles published today - nature.com science feeds | 10 May 2010 | 7:00 am

Nature loss 'to damage economies'

Earth's ongoing loss of biodiversity and ecosystems losses may soon begin to hit economies, a major UN report warns.
Source: BBC News | Science & Environment | UK Edition | 10 May 2010 | 4:00 am

BP, US search for new fix to Gulf oil spill (AFP)

AFP - BP officials desperately searched Monday for a new fix to the enormous Gulf of Mexico oil spill after efforts to cap a gushing leak with a containment dome hit a perilous snag.

Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 10 May 2010 | 3:56 am

No end in sight to spill as BP costs mount (Reuters)

Reuters - BP Plc said on Monday it had incurred $350 million in costs so far from the huge oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico as fears mounted of a prolonged and growing environmental and economic disaster.

Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 10 May 2010 | 3:14 am

Barcoding life and pricing nature proposed to tackle biodiversity crisis

Time is almost up for 2010's biodiversity targets, and by most accounts governments have failed to meet them. Now that climate change is emerging as one of biodiversity's greatest threats, scientists are proposing new ways to tackle the crisis

In 2002, the world's governments agreed to significantly slow the rate of biodiversity loss by 2010. Time is almost up, and by most accounts they've failed. Now that climate change is emerging as one of biodiversity's greatest threats, scientists are proposing new ways to tackle the crisis. In the latest, and last, issue of Nature Reports Climate Change, Hannah Hoag reports on some of the most promising efforts underway to protect biodiversity against rising temperature and other impacts of climate change.

In short, they are:

1. Barcoding life

Paul Hebert, an evolutionary biologist at the University of Guelph in Canada, devised a method for DNA barcoding in 2003, thus speeding up the process of taxonomy. Before barcoding, biological specimens were identified on the basis of morphology, behaviour and genetics. The technique, which allows for rapid species identification, offers a "quantum jump" in the rate that species are registered, says Hebert. It also gives biodiversity a boost: barcoding has repeatedly shown that one species is, in fact, three, or ten. The hope is that as the technology evolves, scientists will be able to use hand held barcoders to identify changes in a region's biodiversity.

2. Backing up biodiversity

The Svalbard Global Seed Vault in Norway, opened in 2008, is the ultimate insurance policy against the loss of the world's crop genetic diversity. More than 522,000 seed samples from around the world are stored at −18 °C within the subterranean facility, like safety-deposit boxes in a bank. Most of today's crops have been carefully bred for traits that fit the present climate, so as temperatures rise, crop production is likely to be negatively affected in many of the world's most agricultural regions. One study concluded, for example, that with a 2 °C temperature rise, more than 80 per cent of the land area over most African nations would be climatically unsuitable for the crops now growing there. If such projections become reality, the seeds contained in the Svalbard Vault could be used to breed new varieties of crop containing traits for drought tolerance and such like.

3. Putting a price on nature

The Cauca Valley, a region in the southwest of Colombia sandwiched between two Andean mountain chains, is the site of a major water fund project involving of reforestation, water protection, soil improvements, education and training. By investing in the region's ecosystem services, the project aims to lessen climate change impacts and threats to biodiversity.

Although water funds exist globally to conserve watersheds, this is one of the first to include climate change modelling to help direct investments. Climate change projections are fed into a computer-based decision-making tool called InVEST, which has been developed by the Natural Capital Project, a partnership between TNC, Stanford University and the World Wildlife Fund. InVEST identifies the areas where climate change is unlikely to threaten activities the water fund has been invested in — such as promoting the reforestation of a hillside or teaching eco-friendly cattle-ranching practices — and their returns. By directing investments wisely, the region can benefit financially as well as adapt to climate change.

4. Shifting species

Efforts are already underway to relocate species that simply can't keep pace with climate change. These have been few so far, but they may become more common if biologist Camille Parmesan of the University of Texas at Austin has her way. Parmesan is suggesting the US Fish and Wildlife Service use managed relocation to save the Laguna mountain skipper, a small, black-and-white endangered butterfly found on only two or three mountaintops in southern California. Though assisted relocation could help species adapt to climate change, some fear that the risks – such as introducing invasive species to a region – outweigh the benefits, and others warn that it's a short term solution at best. But, says Parmesan, "there is no no-risk option."

5. A moveable park

Traditional conservation approaches assume that species ranges will always stay in the same place: if you protect the geographic region, the species within it will be protected forever. But species don't stay put when temperatures move outside their comfort range. To deal with this dilemma, Lee Hannah of Conservation International has recently suggested using moveable conservation parks within the ocean. Such mobile protective areas could help to conserve species such as the loggerhead turtle, says Hannah.

6. An IPCC for biodiversity

Come June, biologists and policymakers will gather in South Korea to discuss the future of a proposed scientific panel to monitor biodiversity and offer advice on its protection. Like the IPCC, the Intergovernmental Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES) would improve the links between science and policy, and ensure policy decisions are based on the best available science. It would oversee global and regional biodiversity assessments, identify and analyse trends, and explore future changes. It would also invest in training.

The full article is freely accessible here.

Source: Science news, comment and analysis | guardian.co.uk | 10 May 2010 | 3:14 am

The nation's weather (AP)

AP - The first of two Pacific storms were forecast to move out of the West and into the Plains with more unsettling weather activity Monday.

Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 10 May 2010 | 2:50 am

Will BP's Washington connections help it now? (AP)

AP - With millions of dollars invested in campaign donations and an all-star lobbying team, BP executives could give an advanced class in how to build influence in Washington. But with millions of gallons of leaking oil bearing down Gulf Coast beaches and bayous, they could also teach how to lose it.

Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 10 May 2010 | 2:23 am

Scientists find new gene links to breast cancer

LONDON (Reuters) - British scientists have found five common genetic factors linked to the risk of developing breast cancer, giving researchers a better understanding of its causes and clues for developing more treatments.
Source: Reuters: Science News | 9 May 2010 | 11:34 pm

Sample of Newton's apple tree to 'defy' gravity by going into space

A piece of Sir Isaac Newton's apple tree will experience the weightlessness of being in orbit when it rides on the next Nasa shuttle mission.
Source: BBC News | Science & Environment | UK Edition | 9 May 2010 | 8:14 pm

Some oil spill events from Sunday, May 9, 2010 (AP)

AP - Events May 9, Day 20 of a Gulf of Mexico oil spill that began with an explosion and fire on April 20 on the drilling rig Deepwater Horizon, owned by Transocean Ltd. and leased by BP PLC, which is in charge of cleanup and containment. The blast killed 11 workers. Since then, oil has been pouring into the Gulf from a blown-out undersea well at about 210,000 gallons per day.
Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 9 May 2010 | 5:49 pm

BP wrestles with oil spill hitch

Oil company BP scrambles to find a way to contain oil gushing from a blown-out well on the seafloor of the Gulf of Mexico.
Source: BBC News | Science & Environment | UK Edition | 9 May 2010 | 5:33 pm

Podcast: At the edge of physics

Anil Ananthaswamy discusses some of the extreme locations where scientists are carrying out incredible experiments. His new book The Edge of Physics is out now.

We dial up researcher and science policy expert Martin Robbins to look at some of the science casualties in last week's UK general election, notably the defeat of Liberal Democrats science spokesman Evan Harris. We also ask whether Britain's first Green Party MP will be good for the environment.

In the newsjam, the panel discusses how a lack of sleep might lead to early death; why antifreeze stopped mammoth blood running cold; whether wildlife documentaries should turn a blind eye to the birds and the bees; and why there's a little Neanderthal in nearly all of us.

The Guardian's Nell Boase and science correspondent Ian Sample are in the studio.

WARNING: contains strong language.

If you want a hint about the live recording of the podcast on Wednesday 26 May in London, this might help.

Feel free to post your thoughts below.

Join our Facebook group.

Listen back through our archive.

Follow the podcast on our Science Weekly Twitter feed and receive updates on all breaking science news stories from Guardian Science.

Subscribe free via iTunes to ensure every episode gets delivered. (Here is the non-iTunes URL feed).

Source: Science news, comment and analysis | guardian.co.uk | 9 May 2010 | 5:01 pm

Mice pull pained expressions

Animal and human faces display similar responses to suffering.
Source: NatureNews - All articles published today - nature.com science feeds | 9 May 2010 | 3:00 pm

Breast cancer genetic risk factors found

Study finds that women who had five newly discovered genetic variants were 16% more likely to develop disease

Scientists came a step closer today to identifying women more likely to develop breast cancer after the discovery of five genetic variants that increase the risk of the disease.

The study conducted by the Institute of Cancer Research (ICR) found that women who had the variants were 16% more likely to develop the cancer. Comparing the genetic codes of more than 16,500 women with breast cancer and a family history of the disease with about 12,000 women without either, it identified areas of DNA known to influence the risk of cancer.

The ICR research – which was funded by Cancer Research UK and the Wellcome Trust, and was published in the journal Nature Genetics – brings the total number of common, "low-risk" DNA areas associated with breast cancer to 18.

Dr Helen George, head of science information at Cancer Research UK, said: "This is by far the largest study of its kind to explore the common genetic variations that contribute to breast cancer risk. This research takes us a step closer to developing a powerful genetic test for the disease. Such a test could help doctors identify women who have an increased risk so that they can make informed decisions about how to take steps to reduce their chance of developing the disease."

One of the newly discovered DNA sites contains CDK2NA, a gene which regulates cell division and is altered in many tumours. It has also been linked to an increased risk of developing melanoma skin cancer.

But while the findings pave the way for more reliable susceptibility tests, scientists have yet to discover which genes are causing the increased risk.

Professor Nazneen Rahman, from the ICR, said: "Our results now take the total number of gene regions linked to the risk of breast cancer to 18, but we still don't know which genes are causing this increased risk. Identifying the underlying genes and mechanisms behind breast cancer development is essential to increasing our understanding of the disease and ultimately finding new treatments."

Breast cancer is the most common cancer in women in the UK, with more than 45,500 new diagnoses a year. Around 300 men also develop the disease each year. While lifestyle influences the risk, inherited genetic factors also play a significant part.

The majority of the inherited risk is thought to be caused by a combination of common genetic factors, such as the variants, which each feed in a small amount of risk.

Most of the new variants appear to be associated with hormone-sensitive breast cancer – the most common form of the disease – which is stimulated by oestrogen.

Source: Science news, comment and analysis | guardian.co.uk | 9 May 2010 | 12:50 pm

New mutant genes linked to rheumatoid arthritis (Reuters)

Reuters - A large study of European populations has uncovered seven new clusters of defective genes which may be responsible for rheumatoid arthritis, a painful and disabling disease that affects mainly the joints.
Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 9 May 2010 | 11:17 am

Breast cancer gene clue discovery

Five new genetic clues to why some women have a family history of breast cancer are identified by UK researchers.
Source: BBC News | Science & Environment | UK Edition | 9 May 2010 | 11:09 am

Rats top invasive mammals table

Brown rats are among the most invasive mammals in Europe, according to a wide-ranging assessment.
Source: BBC News | Science & Environment | UK Edition | 9 May 2010 | 10:03 am

Garden ponds polluted by tap water

Survey of garden ponds finds many have high level of nitrates from tap water that can harm wildlife

British garden ponds are unwittingly being polluted by people topping them up with tap water, a survey has found.

Around half of 250 ponds examined are in "poorer" condition, three in 10 are "good" and only one in 10 was rated as "excellent", said the organisers of the Big Pond Dip, Pond Conservation.

Water boatmen, beetles, snails, alderflies and damselfly larvae are among the pond life affected by the problem, which occurred in more than half the garden ponds surveyed.

Tap water has much higher levels of nitrates than the level found in natural ponds. While not directly poisoning invertebrates and other wildlife, they can adversely affect their habitat. Nitrates cause excessive nutrients in the water, encouraging plants such as duck weed and blanket weed, which in turn make life a struggle for the submerged plants that are essential for healthy and diverse pond-life.

"This is mainly an issue with low-lying farming landscapes and is therefore widespread, affecting anywhere in the south of England, all of East Anglia and low-lying areas of Yorkshire," said Jeremy Biggs, policy and research director at Pond Conservation. "However, for people who get their tap water from Welsh hills, Scottish mountains or up on the moors, it's not a problem."

In addition to farms, nitrates enter pond water from treated sewage effluent and run-off from urban areas. While the levels of nitrates in drinking water are brought down to safe drinking levels for people, Biggs said, they can often be 10 times the level found in natural ponds.

Pond owners need to be better educated on how to create a healthy environment for species, Biggs added. "People worry about water levels going up and down, but freshwater creatures are perfectly adapted to ups and downs, and those ups and downs make good habitats." Instead of using tap water, he said, people worried about a pond's water level should top them up with rainwater.

Depth of ponds was another wildlife concern raised by the survey. The majority were deeper than 30cm (about 12in), which hinders a variety of species because many garden ponds are small in surface area and result in steeply shelving sides, the opposite of the gently sloping sides most pond-life needs.

"If you're interested in biodiversity, ponds should be no more than a foot deep. Most creatures – such as amphibians, tadpoles and newt larvae – live in just 2cm of water," said Biggs. He added it was a myth that ponds need to be deep to prevent them freezing in winter.

While half of ponds were classified as "poorer", the lowest possible rating in the survey for quality of wildlife habitat, Pond Conservation stressed even those "still provided a useful habitat". Over half of all ponds were visited by dragonflies and damselflies, three quarters had water snails, water beetles and pond skaters, and almost all were visited by amphibians, with common frogs accounting for most records.

The results of the survey, which was undertaken across the country between May and September 2009, comes ahead of a new mass participation water survey starting next week. The 'OPAL water survey' organised by Pond Conservation, the Natural History Museum and University College London, hopes to use public records to produce a better picture of how polluted British ponds, lakes and rivers are. A Environment Department-funded survey earlier this year said eight out of 10 public ponds in Britain are in a "terrible state".

"There are few careful observations of ponds," said Biggs. "Though they are the most familiar freshwater environments to us in one way, they are also the least well-known."

Source: Science news, comment and analysis | guardian.co.uk | 9 May 2010 | 9:48 am

Longevity Protein Discovered

Roundworms born without the longevity protein lived a third longer than normal, a finding with implications for human longevity.
Source: Livescience.com | 9 May 2010 | 9:34 am

'Hangover' Molecule in Brain Found

Scientists have found a hangover molecule in the brain that's responsible for withdrawal symptoms once alcohol drinking stops.
Source: Livescience.com | 9 May 2010 | 8:42 am

Can You Really Die in Your Nightmares? (LiveScience.com)

LiveScience.com - Wes Craven's horror movie "A Nightmare On Elm Street" (1984) remains one of the most popular horror movies of all time. But for all its outlandish content, a real disease called "sudden unexpected nocturnal death syndrome"(SUNDS) inspired the movie, Craven said in an interview with Cinemafantastique magazine in 2008. SUNDS strikes otherwise healthy young people dead in their sleep, not unlike a certain claw-handed villain in the Elm Street movies.
Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 9 May 2010 | 8:28 am

Live 'Star Trek' Show Launching Near NASA's Florida Spaceport (SPACE.com)

SPACE.com - A slice of "Star Trek's" final frontier will warp into the visitor's center for NASA's Kennedy Space Center spaceport in Florida this June with the world premiere of the interactive stage show STAR TREK LIVE.
Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 9 May 2010 | 8:15 am

Newton's apple tree to escape gravity

British-born Nasa astronaut to take piece of tree that aided scientist's discovery of gravity to international space station

A British astronaut is planning a unique test of Sir Isaac Newton's theory of gravity – by taking an original piece of the scientist's famous apple tree on a 5m-mile journey into space.

Sussex-born Piers Sellers plans to release the 10cm fragment in zero gravity during his 12-day mission at the international space station, as a tribute to Newton's discovery in 1666, when he watched an apple fall to the ground in his garden.

"I'll take it up and let it float around for a bit, which will confuse Isaac," said the 55-year-old Nasa astronaut, a veteran of two previous shuttle missions and a graduate of the University of Edinburgh.

"While it's up there, it will be experiencing no gravity, so if it had an apple on it, the apple wouldn't fall … Sir Isaac would have loved to see this, assuming he wasn't spacesick, as it would have proved his first law of motion to be correct."

The tree fragment, engraved with the scientist's name, is stowed aboard the shuttle Atlantis at Cape Canaveral, Florida, awaiting Friday's blast-off.

The stunt is part of the 350th anniversary celebrations of the Royal Society, of which Newton, who died in 1727, was a former president. The society hopes to display the fragment at its 10-day festival of science and arts at the Southbank Centre, London, next month, and later at its HQ in Carlton House Terrace, London, where it will join exhibits including Newton's first telescope and his death mask.

Several sections stripped from the tree, which still stands at Woolsthorpe Manor, the physicist's former home in Lincolnshire, are stored in the society's vaults as part of a huge collection of Newton memorabilia donated by the antiquarian Sir Charles Turner in the 1700s.

Sellers, who was born in Crowborough but assumed dual UK-US nationality in 1991 to join Nasa, invited the society to send an item to go into space. On a previous spaceflight, he took a commemorative medallion that the group presented to the physicist Stephen Hawking.

Source: Science news, comment and analysis | guardian.co.uk | 9 May 2010 | 7:32 am

Let's improve medical science, for free

Making ineffective treatments seem to work is bad for everyone's health but simple legislation offers a cheap solution

What will the election mean for British health, science and education? One thing everyone agrees on is that the next few years will be a time for belt-tightening, and the issue of funding and cuts has dominated debates so far. But there's one simple thing that the next government can do to improve our health, and ensure we get value for money from British medical research: a law requiring the registration of clinical trials.

Randomised, placebo-controlled trials are the foundation of modern medical science. They are how we know which treatments work. A drug must pass a certain number of trials before it's approved to be sold, and the National Institute of Clinical Excellence (Nice) uses trials to make its often controversial decisions about which drugs are worth the money. Clinical trials determine almost every aspect of the treatment we receive.

Yet there's a big problem with the current system of clinical trials: selective publication. Suppose a company runs a trial of a new drug it has just developed, but unfortunately, the results show that the drug doesn't work – people taking the drug did no better than people given placebo sugar pills.

If people found out about that data, it would be bad news for the company: drugs that don't work don't sell. So there would be a strong incentive not to release the findings. Instead, it could file the inconvenient results away and run another trial, and if necessary another, until, just by chance, the drug seems to work – and then publish those positive results. Even for drugs that do work, publishing only the most positive results makes them seem to work better than they really do.

This is called publication bias. It's bad for science, and bad for everyone's health. By making ineffective treatments seem to work, making expensive new drugs seem to be better than old, cheap ones, and concealing evidence of side effects, selective publication undermines the whole point of doing research in the first place.

By its nature, publication bias is difficult to detect. We'll probably never know the full extent of the problem, but studies have shown that it has happened, and continues to happen, on a large scale. Contrary to popular belief, drug companies are not the only culprits. One recent study found evidence that it occurs in trials of Cognitive Behavioural Therapy for clinical depression, and publication bias in trials of complementary and alternative medicine has also been reported. It's everywhere.

Yet it's legal, almost everywhere in the world. By contrast, if someone were to simply make up some positive results, or go through data fiddling the numbers to make them "better", that would be scientific fraud, an extremely serious matter. Doing several trials and only publishing the best ones is, in its effects, just as misleading – but it's allowed.

Fortunately, there's a simple, powerful, and cheap solution. In 2007, the US passed a pioneering law called the Food and Drug Administration Amendment Act (FDAAA). This requires anyone running a trial of an investigational drug or medical device, that includes any American patients, to register the details of the study in a public database before it starts.

Anyone can view the database online. No more disappearing trials. Trial sponsors are also required to release the results when they become available, whether they're positive or not. Failure to comply can be punished by fines, and/or withdrawal of funding.

The FDAAA is an important piece of legislation. However, neither Britain, nor the EU, has an equivalent system in place. There's already an EU clinical trial database, but unlike the American one, it's not open to the public. Government health authorities have access to it, but doctors, scientists and patients don't. This largely defeats the point.

There are also a number of international public databases, and since 2005 the editors of most of the world's top medical journals have refused to publish trials that weren't appropriately pre-registered. This was a good step, and a welcome sign that publication bias is being taken seriously. But it's not enough, because plenty of other journals still publish unregistered trials.

Ultimately, only governments can stop publication bias. The next parliament should follow the American example and require public registration and data reporting for all clinical trials involving British patients. It would hardly cost anything. It would, at a stroke, improve British science, and everyone's health.

Source: Science news, comment and analysis | guardian.co.uk | 9 May 2010 | 4:00 am

Where is Dark Matter Hiding?

According to a highly sensitive particle detector, dark matter particles don't appear to exist. However, dark matter detection reports from another, less sensitive instrument suggests otherwise. What is going on?
Source: Discovery News - Top Stories | 9 May 2010 | 3:45 am

Toll from China storms hits 70 (AFP)

AFP - The death toll from fierce storms and torrential rains battering southern China has risen to at least 70 people with tens of thousands left homeless, state media reported Sunday.

Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 9 May 2010 | 3:45 am