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University of Seville professor José María Martín-Olalla has published a new solution to a 120-year-old problem regarding matter states at absolute zero that disproves a previous solution offered by famed scientist Albert Einstein. The controversy originally arose in 1905 when Walther Nernst proposed a new approach to the properties of matter as entropy causes them to approach absolute zero (minus 273 degrees Celsius). Dubbed Nerst’s theorem, the concept argued that absolute zero must be inaccessible, or one could theoretically construct an engine that uses absolute zero as a coolant to convert all heat energy into work. This idea goes directly...

T​ropical Storm Alberto will track into Mexico through Thursday, while also spreading heavy rain, coastal flooding, rip currents, high surf and isolated tornado impacts into parts of Texas. Here's where this system is located now and where it's headed: Alberto formed a few hundred miles south-southeast of Brownsville, Texas, late Wednesday morning. It won't stay over water much longer and is expected to track into Mexico by Thursday morning with little strengthening anticipated. Alberto is centered just under 300 miles south-southeast of Brownsville, Texas, and is moving to the west.

MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — The owner of a bar in Albert Lea was found guilty Thursday of six criminal misdemeanor charges and sentenced to 90 days in jail for defying Gov. Tim Walz’s executive orders to close her business last winter. The jury found Lisa Hanson, 57, guilty after deliberating for an hour, the Minneapolis Star-Tribune reported. Prosecutors had asked that Hanson be fined $500 and jailed for several days, but Judge Joseph Bueltel gave her a 90-day jail sentence and a $1,000 fine, saying he wanted to send a message to people who violate executive orders. “You wanted to make...

Much we take for granted today – from Christmas trees to birthday gifts – comes from the domestic traditions of the royal couple. When Queen Victoria inherited the British throne just a few weeks after her 18th birthday, there was immediate speculation about who she would marry. Few had foreseen that this little-known princess would become their monarch. But when the country found itself with a young queen after so many dissolute Hanoverian kings, it seemed that exciting new era was dawning.

Perhaps no Prince of Wales in history has been less trusted — or more spied upon — than the boy everyone knew as Bertie. When he attended a military summer camp, at age 19, the future King Edward VII was surrounded by minders: two stern Grenadier officers, a colonel and a general. He even had to share a general’s quarters. Happily, however, they had not thought to lock Bertie’s bedroom window. So, one night, the heir to the throne wriggled out, made a beeline for the camp prostitute — one Nellie Clifden — and triumphantly lost his virginity.

A judge weighing whether state officials overstepped their bounds by restricting protesters' access to the state Capitol nearly ordered all the demonstrators out on moments' notice Wednesday evening before state and union attorneys talked him out of it. Dane County Circuit Judge John Albert has been listening to two days of testimony on whether he should make a temporary court order ensuring full public access to the building permanent. He is expected to rule on the matter Thursday. He told the packed courtroom shortly after 6 p.m. that he wanted to test the state Department of Administration's contention that building...

Twas the night before Kwanzaa, and throughout the White House,Not a Kenyan was stirring, not even his spouse.No stockings were hung from the chimney with care,Because greenhouse emissions would heat up the air.The children were each tucked away in their beds,No nightmares of Public School troubling their heads.

HP-1353 "Treasury Designates Additional FARC International Commission Members" SNIPPET: "Washington, DC--The U.S. Department of the Treasury's Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) today designated three international representatives of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), a narco-terrorist organization. The OFAC action was taken pursuant to the Foreign Narcotics Kingpin Designation Act (Kingpin Act), which applies financial sanctions against significant foreign narcotics traffickers and organizations, like the FARC. "Today's action exposes three additional members of the FARC's International Commission," said Adam J. Szubin, Director of OFAC. "The FARC is one of the world's largest suppliers of cocaine and continues to be...

MADRID (AFP) - Spanish police said Saturday they had arrested a 57-year-old Spanish woman they claim is the leader of the Spanish cell of Colombian Marxist rebel group FARC. Maria Remedios Garcia Albert was arrested at her home in the town of San Lorenzo de El Escorial, northeast of Madrid, they said. The interior ministry said Garcia Albert had provided logistical support for FARC and had direct contacts with Raul Reyes, the FARC number two who was killed by Colombian troops inside Ecuador earlier this year. Analysis of Reyes' computer passed on to Spanish investigators by Colombian authorities had led...

PARIS - Monaco's Prince Albert II has acknowledged he is the father of a second illegitimate child, a 14-year-old girl living in California, his lawyer said in an interview published Thursday. Albert, ruler of the tiny Mediterranean principality, "officially recognizes a paternity that was legally established a few weeks ago," lawyer Thierry Lacoste was quoted as saying in France's Le Figaro newspaper. Albert had initially planned to keep his parentage of Jazmin Grace Rotolo secret until she reached adulthood, but "the situation had become untenable for her" in recent weeks amid increasing speculation about her father, Lacoste said.

The DVD and CD of Cream's summer stand at the Royal Albert Hall has just been released I guess to coincide with their multiple night gig at Madison Square later this month. Check out the multiple songs available for video streaming from AOL Music. For those Freepers under 40, this is the best rock band for muscial virtuoso, writing talent, power, innovation, etc. to come out of the 60's. Beatles for me were rock/pop; Stones were good, but their music was basic blues rips, the talent wasn't as high. The Who were in a different realm, more operatic. Cream was...

That Famous Equation and You By BRIAN GREENE Correction AppendedDURING the summer of 1905, while fulfilling his duties in the patent office in Bern, Switzerland, Albert Einstein was fiddling with a tantalizing outcome of the special theory of relativity he'd published in June. His new insight, at once simple and startling, led him to wonder whether "the Lord might be laughing ... and leading me around by the nose." But by September, confident in the result, Einstein wrote a three-page supplement to the June paper, publishing perhaps the most profound afterthought in the history of science. A hundred years...

GENEVA — A U.N. panel has awarded Bill Cosby an Internet domain name based on the Fat Albert character he created in the 1960s. Arbitrators for the World Intellectual Property Organization ordered Monday the transfer of fatalbert.org to Cosby, who had complained it was being used in bad faith to divert visitors to a commercial search engine and a Web site selling sexually explicit products.

MONACO - A former flight attendant from Togo claimed in an interview in a French magazine that Monaco's new ruler, Prince Albert II, is the father of her 20-month-old son. Nicole Coste is quoted in Paris Match as saying she met Albert on a flight in July 1997, leading to a relationship and the birth of a child in August 2003. The interview is illustrated with pictures of the prince holding and feeding a young boy with dark curly hair and eyes. Coste said she went public with the story because "I want Alexandre to grow up normally with a...

When a veteran cop bit into his dinner from a Bronx McDonald's, he realized he was given a decidedly un-Happy Meal - his Big Mac was stuffed with shards of glass. As the K-9 unit cop was rushed to the hospital with cuts to his mouth and throat and a broken tooth, a cop-hating fast-food cook was arrested, police said yesterday. "Tampering with food in a case like this is an assault as sure as an attack with a knife or a gun," said an outraged Patrick Lynch, head of the Patrolman's Benevolent Association. The 39-year-old cop, a 17-year veteran...

Imagine the sight of Albert Belle stepping up to the lectern in Cooperstown in 2006 and giving an impassioned speech about his love of baseball. Can't picture it? Neither can I. But that won't stop me from voting for Belle when his name appears on the Hall of Fame ballot next December, his first year of eligibility. The voting guidelines ask that eligible Baseball Writers Association of America voters consider a player's "record, playing ability, integrity, sportsmanship, character and contributions to the team(s) on which he played." Obviously, there are many who consider Belle's anti-social behavior to be a character...

<p>The magazine, devoted to providing facts and information in an entertaining setting, is putting out its first swimsuit issue.</p> <p>"Our goal from the beginning has been to blur the line between education and entertainment," said Will Pearson, publisher and co-founder of the magazine. With swimsuit issues so popular among periodicals, Pearson and his crew decided "why not have one with our goal of education?"</p>