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| AP Top Science News At 3:53 a.m. EDT |
| 'Ring of Fire' eclipse visible from China to Texas Thu, 17 May 2012 07:53:46 GMT LOS ANGELES (AP) -- Sunrises and sunsets often dazzle, but they'll have a special ring to them in a few days for people in the western United States and eastern Asia: The moon will slide across the sun, blocking everything but a blazing halo of light.... |
| Soyuz capsule with 3 crew docks with space station Thu, 17 May 2012 05:48:03 GMT ALMATY, Kazakhstan (AP) -- A Russian-made Soyuz craft carrying three astronauts has docked with the International Space Station, putting the crew in place for the imminent arrival of the first ever privately owned cargo ship to the orbiting lab.... |
| CA museum gets big gift to build shuttle exhibit Thu, 17 May 2012 02:49:17 GMT LOS ANGELES (AP) -- The California Science Museum said it has raised nearly half of the $200 million needed to build a permanent exhibit for the space shuttle Endeavour.... |
| Paralyzed woman uses her mind to control robot arm Wed, 16 May 2012 18:17:55 GMT NEW YORK (AP) -- Using only her thoughts, a Massachusetts woman paralyzed for 15 years directed a robotic arm to pick up a bottle of coffee and bring it to her lips, researchers report in the latest advance in harnessing brain waves to help disabled people.... |
| AP IMPACT: Evacs and drills pared near nuke plants Wed, 16 May 2012 21:58:02 GMT Without fanfare, the nation's nuclear power regulators have overhauled community emergency planning for the first time in more than three decades, requiring fewer exercises for major accidents and recommending that fewer people be evacuated right away.... |
| Some attack plans bolstered, others eased at nukes Wed, 16 May 2012 12:40:42 GMT The U.S. government has adopted the first set of comprehensive changes in the emergency planning program for communities near nuclear power plants since its creation after the Three Mile Island accident in 1979.... |
| April 2012 heats up as 5th warmest month globally Tue, 15 May 2012 16:10:02 GMT WASHINGTON (AP) -- Unseasonable weather pushed last month to the fifth warmest April on record worldwide, federal weather statistics show.... |
| Three-man Soyuz crew departs for space station Tue, 15 May 2012 06:25:34 GMT ALMATY, Kazakhstan (AP) -- A three-man crew blasted off from a space center in southern Kazakhstan Tuesday morning on board a Russian-made Soyuz craft for a four-and-half-month stay at the International Space Station.... |
| AP Photos: Enterprise's final journey continues Sun, 13 May 2012 19:58:33 GMT The space shuttle Enterprise has been separated from the NASA 747 Shuttle Carrier at John F. Kennedy International Airport, just weeks after flying over New York City.... |
| Houston lawyer on quest to find missing moon rocks Sun, 13 May 2012 19:25:58 GMT BUFFALO, Texas (AP) -- The dark suit and tie Joe Gutheinz wore set him apart from other customers inside a Texas eatery where the usual attire is jeans and cowboy hats.... |
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| Word of the day |
Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for May 17, 2012 is:
maffick • \MAF-ik\ • verb
: to celebrate with boisterous rejoicing and hilarious behavior
Examples:
Fans mafficked for hours outside the stadium, celebrating the team's dramatic victory in the division championship.
"In half an hour, after the mildest of mafficking, the last visitors of the exhibition's last day had gone out of the gates and the staff began their final acts of closing up shop." — From an article in The Guardian (London), October 1, 2011
Did you know?
"Maffick" is an alteration of Mafeking Night, the British celebration of the lifting of the siege of a British military outpost during the South African War at the town of Mafikeng (also spelled Mafeking) on May 17, 1900. The South African War was fought between the British and the Afrikaners, who were Dutch and Huguenot settlers originally called Boers, over the right to govern frontier territories. Though the war did not end until 1902, the lifting of the siege of Mafikeng was a significant victory for the British because they held out against a larger Afrikaner force for 217 days until reinforcements could arrive. The rejoicing in British cities on news of the rescue produced "maffick," a word that was popular for a while, especially in journalistic writing, but is now relatively uncommon.