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A giant softshell turtle known as Cu Rua that has been living in Hoan Kiem Lake in Hanoi, Vietnam, for more than a century is one of the last four members of its critically endangered species, Rafetus swinhoei . The freshwater animal weighs about 200 kilograms and is worshiped as a deity that protects the city, but neither its size nor its stature has prevented it from being injured recently by fishermen and an aggressive invasive species.

Come 2013, the burliest rocket in the world may belong not to NASA, Boeing or any of the other traditional heavy-hitters in the aerospace field. It will belong to a relative newcomer, if start-up spaceflight firm SpaceX has its way

Environmental groups yesterday pressed U.S.

* Nitrogen pumped into reactor to prevent hydrogen explosion * Nuclear crisis far from under control [More]

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LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Virgin Group founder Richard Branson, known for such exploits as trying to balloon around the world, said on Tuesday he planned to explore the deepest parts of the world's oceans with a jet-like submarine. The 18-foot vessel is capable of descents more than 36,000 feet below the surface, said Branson at a news conference in Newport Beach, California.

By Adam Mann of Nature magazine NASA should be revitalized "not just with dollars, but with clear aims and a larger purpose," US President Barack Obama said last April, after cancelling the previous administration's under-resourced Constellation programme of rockets and capsules for human space flight. [More]

The 1.5-meter-long gash that opened up in the upper cabin of Friday's Southwest Airlines Flight 812 from Phoenix to Sacramento will have a deep impact on the nature and frequency of commercial aircraft maintenance. The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) issued a directive on Tuesday ordering about 175 Boeing 737 aircraft--80 of which are registered in the U.S., most of those operated by Southwest--to be inspected using an electromagnetic device that can identify metal fatigue. [More]

Quantum information science is a bit like classroom management--the larger the group, the harder it is to keep everything together. [More]

Whereas this August 23, 1919, Scientific American article acknowledged that there wasn’t anything particularly novel about a portable boat, the convenience offered by the one invented by Mr.

Psychologists have long known that many people are prejudiced towards others based on group affiliations, be they racial, ethnic, religious, or even political. However, we know far less about why people are prone to prejudice in the first place

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By Patricio Segura Ortiz of Nature magazine You might not expect bacteria living in Antarctic ice to be well suited to life in a boiling kettle, but that is what Chilean scientists discovered during an expedition last year. [More]

By Kathy Finn [More]

By Alison Abbott of Nature magazine Prader-Willi syndrome. [More]