Gerald Pier, of Harvard Medical School in Boston and his colleagues studied the relationship between salmonella typhi, the bacterium that causes typhoid fever, and the protein which, when faulty,

Italy is ageing fast; and according to the country's chief statistical body, Italy has the lowest fertility rate in the world. At last count, in 1996, deaths had outpaced births for four years in a

The US government is regularly accused of encroaching on states rights and fingering their assets. In recent weeks, South Carolina and Oklahoma have joined Louisina in defying federal proposals to

According to the United Natons Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO), most of Iraq's farms are in bad state. The combination of international sanctions and government neglect has brought ruin to

Lawrence Carter, an electrical engineer at the University of Auckland in New Zealand, has developed a way of detecting land mines that depends not on what they contain, but on what they do not

John Sullivan of Purdue University, in Indiana and his colleagues have developed a paint that can sense temperature and pressure. The sensing is done by a luminescent molecule, such as ruthenium

Fifteen centimetres of rain fell in a week in Guyana. The rains came only days after Guyana had declared its six-month drought, due to El Nino, a national emergency. But its drought troubles are far

The floods of 1966 woke Venice to the realisation that the water that so famously fills the streets of this city could someday drown it. If the climate continues to warm up, the sea may invade Venice

The Muckleshoot Indians are building a $30m, 23,000 seat amphitheatre, south east of Seattle. So far, however, it has mostly earned enimity. Hundreds of non-Muckleshoots who live near the

Statisticians are trying to adjust measures of national wealth for pollution and depleted resources. This turns out be all but impossible : a report.

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