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University of Arizona Mon 19-Feb-2007, 17:00 ET The Mysterious Case of Columbus's Silver Ore Libraries What was thought to be the first evidence of successful prospecting for precious metals in the New World turns out to be something completely different. Silver-bearing ore found at the settlement founded by Christopher Columbus's second expedition was not mined in the Americas. Copyright 1998. James Quine, Florida Museum of Natural History, University of Florida. Co-authors Kathleen Deagan and Jose M. Cruxent standing by the foundations of La Isabela's royal storehouse, where metallurgical activities took place. Newswise — Silver-bearing ore found at the settlement founded...

Khadijah Ghafur sat silently in hijab and correctional jumpsuit, facing a judge, a lengthy prison term and the complete collapse of her elaborate plans. With a boundless determination that opened eyes and pockets, Sister Khadijah had built a chain of state-funded charter schools that stretched from Sunnyvale to Southern California. Now they were closed, and the self-styled civil rights activist from Selma, Ala., was convicted of stealing tens of thousands of dollars of public money meant for kids. Superior Court Judge R.L. Putnam got right to the point. He sentenced her to 14 years. But even after Ghafur's monthlong trial,...

Tattoos - The Ancient and Mysterious History By Cate Lineberry Humans have marked their bodies with tattoos for thousands of years. These permanent designs—sometimes plain, sometimes elaborate, always personal—have served as amulets, status symbols, declarations of love, signs of religious beliefs, adornments and even forms of punishment. Joann Fletcher, research fellow in the department of archaeology at the University of York in Britain, describes the history of tattoos and their cultural significance to people around the world, from the famous " Iceman," a 5,200-year-old frozen mummy, to today’s Maori. What is the earliest evidence of tattoos? In terms of tattoos...

LAFAYETTE, La. - Two little girls, who apparently couldn't sleep, got out of the bed they shared less than a half-hour before a tractor-trailer plowed through their bedroom. Cori Morgan, 7, and her sister, Shadia, 3, had left their bedroom for the living room just before the 4:30 a.m. crash, said Cerrisa Moore, whose mother owns the house.

Mayan ruins said center of mysterious civilization Fri Sep 8, 2006 11:43pm ET TEGUCIGALPA, Honduras (Reuters) - Experts are examining the ruins of a pre-Columbian culture in an area of Honduras where there had been no previous evidence of major indigenous civilization. The site, discovered earlier this year, consists of 14 mounds that form part of what are believed to be ceremonial grounds, the Honduran Institute of Anthropology said. "They are part of a very important site, a governing center of a pre-Columbian civilization," Oscar Neils, the institute's head of research, told Reuters. "We had no idea that there was...

Hybrid comet-asteroid in mysterious break-up 09:30 11 April 2006 NewScientist.com news service Jeff HechtThe large, diffuse breakaway object is centred at the 2 o'clock position relative to the nucleus. The image is a negative, with the darkest areas representing the brightest objects. Something substantial has broken off an icy 50-kilometre object beyond the orbit of Saturn, leaving puzzled astronomers trying to figure out why. Comets have been seen breaking up before, but only after heating when passing close to the Sun or a gravitational disturbance following a close encounter with a planet. However, at 1.9 billion kilometres, this object is...

Mysterious Fish 'Party' Near N.C. Shore By The Associated Press posted: 27 February 2006 11:38 am ET JACKSONVILLE, N.C. (AP)—State and local wildlife experts are trying to figure out what led more than a thousand flounder, spot and pin fish to beach themselves at the Marine Corps' New River air base—and then swim away. They believe it may be related to a popular phenomenon known in coastal Alabama as "jubilee.''The fish surfaced in shallow water Friday morning. They were lethargic, but alive. "It's kind of strange,'' said Mike Sanderford, New River Riverkeeper. "It's a bunch of fish up here, but...

Flying saucers and strange beings who have visited Earth aren't the typical topics reported by Peter Jennings, anchor of ABC's "World News Tonight." Jennings, whose new two-hour special tackles the subject of UFOs, admits he and his production team began the project with doubts and a dose of curiosity. "We have a lot of skeptics -- I am very skeptical -- but we seriously investigated something a lot of people are serious about," he said. "And when we come to the end, this is wonderfully interesting. "More than 80 million Americans believe intelligent beings from somewhere else have come here,"...

On Thursday,02/17/05,a postal courier delivered 4 boxes to the British Embassy in Moscow. The packages were addressed to the British Ambassador-no return address. When opened,the packages were found to contain medical syringes-filled with an unknown liquid - now being tested by the police lab. Theories,anyone ??

The mysterious end of Essex man Archaeologists now believe two groups of early humans fought for dominance in ancient Britain - and the axe-wielders won Robin McKie, science editor Sunday January 23, 2005 The Observer Divisions in British culture may be deeper than we thought. Scientists have discovered startling evidence that suggests different species of early humans may have fought to settle within our shores almost half a million years ago. They have found that two different groups - one wielding hand-axes, the other using Stone Age Stanley knives to slash and kill - could have been rivals for control...

Mystery surrounds costly spy programWASHINGTON (AP) -- Congress' new blueprint for U.S. intelligence spending includes a mysterious and expensive spy program that drew extraordinary criticism from leading Democrats, with one saying the highly classified project is a threat to national security.In an unusual rebuke, Sen. Jay Rockefeller, the senior Democrat on the Senate Intelligence Committee, complained Wednesday that the spy project was "totally unjustified and very, very wasteful and dangerous to the national security." He called the program "stunningly expensive."Rockefeller and three other Democratic senators -- Richard Durbin, Carl Levin and Ron Wyden -- refused to sign the congressional compromise...

Mysterious pottery shows true face of first Pacific settlers Staring out from an ancient piece of pottery, the mysterious face of a bearded man has given scientists a unique glimpse of what the first settlers of Fiji may have looked like. Researchers say the "extraordinary discovery" is a vital clue in mapping out how the South Pacific came to be inhabited some 3,000 years ago, suggesting the first direct link to islands some thousands of kilometres away. Thought to be the work of the Lapita people - a long-lost race which originated near modern-day Taiwan then migrated to Polynesia -...

Government and industry experts are reporting a mysterious, large-scale Internet attack against thousands of popular Web sites. The virus-like infection tries to implant hacker software onto the computers of all Web site visitors. Industry experts and the Homeland Security Department are studying the infection to determine how it spreads across Web sites and find adequate defenses against it. A government warning says even Web sites trusted by users may contain the potentially malicious code. The infection appears to target at least one recent version of Microsoft's Internet Information Server, which is popular among businesses and organizations. The United States Computer...

Curtain raised on mysterious ancient ethnic regime in NW China www.chinaview.cn 2004-04-20 14:48:08 YINCHUAN, April 20 (Xinhuanet) -- The mystery of the ancient ethnic Xixia regime that once reigned over part of northwest China will be revealed as some 100,000 pages of historical documents of the regime collected in Russia become accessible to Chinese experts for the first time. "We will get the complete copy of the Heishuicheng manuscripts collected in the St. Petersburg Branch of the Institute of Oriental Studies (IOS) of the Russian Academy of Sciences, all precious firsthand historical materials for the research on the history of...

Dispute: A heralded linguistic deciphering of an extinct hieroglyphic script accomplished in the 1990s is under attack by two researchers. FOR LINGUISTS, it's like hitting a home run in the bottom of the ninth to win the World Series. Terrence Kaufman and John Justeson struck that blast in 1993 when they cracked one of the planet's few remaining undeciphered writing systems - a hieroglyphic script from the mysterious Isthmian civilization, which occupied southern Mexico 2,000 years ago.

Pluto, the most distant of the nine planets in our solar system, has piqued the curiosity of astronomers once again. It seems the planet's atmosphere is expanding as it travels away from the sun, rather than contracting as expected. The only planet yet to have been visited by spacecraft, Pluto is relatively poorly known. But when it is aligned with the stars just so, observations from Earth are possible. Analyses of data collected last year during one of these rare configurations revealed the surprising atmospheric findings, which were published today in the journal Nature. Because Pluto is currently journeying swiftly...

SAO PAULO, Brazil (CP) - Authorities in Brazil's northeastern state of Alagoas on Thursday ruled out SARS in the death of a Bulgarian seaman aboard a cargo vessel. Todor Andrev Petrov, 48, died Wednesday, hours after the Cypriot-flagged ship Mike M. left the port of Suape in neighbouring Pernambuco state en route to Argentina. After discovering Petrov had died, the captain headed to Maceio, 2,000 kilometres northeast of Sao Paulo. "Preliminary results of the tests . . . have ruled out the possibility of SARS as the cause of death," said Ronaldo Lima, spokesman for the Alagoas health department. Lima...

Mysterious Scribe Writes Baghdad Web Log Fri Mar 28, 5:58 PM ET By RACHEL KONRAD, Associated Press Writer SAN JOSE, Calif. - Every day, tens of thousands of people turn to the Web seeking updates from a mysterious scribe whose detailed accounts of life in besieged Baghdad have made him a cyberspace celebrity. Little is known for sure about Salam Pax, whose nom de plume means "peace" in Arabic and Latin. But his Web journal — ostensibly written from his Baghdad home — vividly criticizes the authoritarian rule of Saddam Hussein (news - web sites) and the U.S.-British war on...

<p>ATLANTA — Federal health officials said Sunday they are analyzing samples from a mysterious pneumonia-like illness that has afflicted more than 150 people in seven countries and caused nine deaths.</p> <p>They are also handing out information cards to travelers from countries where the disease has appeared, asking them to see a doctor if they experience symptoms such as high fever or respiratory problems.</p>

Downfall of the Yarri, or Will the real Thylacoleo please stand up? Darren Naish In 1926 A. S. le Souef and Harry Burrell included the ‘Striped marsupial cat’ in their influential popular volume The Wild Animals of Australasia. Concerning a cryptid reported from Australia and usually termed the Queensland tiger, their decision was significant as few cryptids have been regarded so sympathetically by non-cryptozoologists. This near-acceptance reflected both the apparent quality and consistency of eyewitness accounts as well as the long-standing academic interest there had been in the creature. First brought to attention by European Australians in the 1870s,...