The Christian Science Monitor / By Rowena Lindsay What are the essential ingredients for life? You might be tempted to list things like liquid water, oxygen, and nucleotides. But are these chemicals truly essential, or are you just thinking like a… more »

Christian Science Moniter By Peter Grier WASHINGTON Missouri State Fair officials have banned for life the rodeo clown who wore a President Obama mask while facing bulls at the event over the weekend.The clown in question engaged in an “unconscionable… more »

Refocus Notes: Looks like Michelle Obama can feel better about her own weight, but worse with regard to her cardboard food, weight-loss mandate. Which, by the way, makes pretty much everyone miserable (including her husband) ______________ UK… more »

NewScientist by Andy Coghlan It is seven times as salty as the sea, pitch dark and 13 degrees below freezing. Lake Vida in East Antarctica has been buried for 2800 years under 20 metres of ice, but teems with life. The discovery of… more »

By Martin Fletcher, NBC News Although police said nobody tried to intervene to stop the attack, the first person to help the beaten Arab boy, according to the newspaper Yedioth Ahronoth, was a 23-year-old Israeli medical student called Amit.  As soon… more »