Peruvian police says gang killed people for their fat, allegedly for use in cosmetics

2 hours, 7 minutes ago

By Andrew Whalen, The Associated Press

LIMA, Peru - Police say a gang in the Peruvian jungle has been killing people and draining fat from the corpses to sell on the black market for use in cosmetics, although medical experts say they doubt a major market for fat exists.

Three suspects confessed to killing five people, but the gang may have been involved in dozens more, said Col. Jorge Mejia, chief of Peru's anti-kidnapping police. He said one suspect claimed the gang wasn't the only one doing such killings.

Mejia said two of the suspects were arrested carrying bottles of liquid human fat and told police it was worth $60,000 a gallon ($15,000 a litre). The fat was sold to intermediaries in Peru's capital, Lima, and police suspect it was then sold to cosmetic companies in Europe, Mejia said Thursday, but he could not confirm any sales.

Medical experts expressed doubt about an international black market for human fat, though it does have cosmetic applications. A dermatology professor at Yale University, Dr. Lisa Donofrio, speculated that a small market may exist for "human fat extracts" to keep skin supple, but she said that scientifically such treatments are "pure baloney."

At a news conference, police showed reporters two bottles of fat recovered from the suspects and a photo of the rotting head of a 27-year-old male victim. Suspect Elmer Segundo Castillejos, 29, led police to the head, recovered in a coca-growing valley last month, Mejia said.

Mejia said Castillejos recounted how the gang cut off its victims' heads, arms and legs, removed the organs, then suspended the torsos from hooks above candles that warmed the flesh as fat dripped into tubs below.

Six members of the gang remain at large, Mejia said. Among them was the band's alleged leader, Hilario Cudena, 56, who Castillejos told police has been killing people to extract human fat for more than three decades.

This year alone, at least 60 people are listed as missing in Huanuco province, where the gang allegedly operated, though the province is also home to drug-trafficking leftist rebels.

Mejia said police received a tip four months ago that human fat from the jungle was being sold in Lima. In August, he said, police infiltrated the band and later obtained some of the amber fluid, which a police lab confirmed as human fat.

On Nov. 3, police arrested Serapio Marcos Veramendi and Enedina Estela in a Lima bus station with a quart (a litre) of human fat in a soda bottle. Their testimony led to the arrest of Castillejos three days later at the same bus station.

The three are charged with homicide, criminal conspiracy, illegal firearms possession and drug trafficking, according to a statement from Lima Superior Court. Police said they were searching for the alleged buyer.

Police dubbed the gang the "Pishtacos" after a Peruvian myth dating to pre-Columbian times of men who killed to extract human fat, quartering their victims with machetes.

Medical authorities contacted by The Associated Press said human fat is used in anti-wrinkle treatments - but is always extracted from the patient who is being treated, usually from the stomach or buttocks.

"There would be a risk of immunological reaction that could lead to life-threatening consequences" if fat from someone else were used, said Dr. Neil Sadick, a professor of dermatology at Cornell Weill Medical College in New York.

Dr. Adam Katz, a professor of plastic surgery at the University of Virginia medical school, was incredulous when told about the Peruvian ring.

"I can't see why there would be a black market for fat," he said. "It doesn't make any sense at all, because in most countries we can get fat so readily and in such amounts from people who are willing and ready to donate that I don't see why there would ever be a black market for fat, of all tissues."

-

Associated Press writers Franklin Briceno in Lima and Frank Bajak in Bogota contributed to this report.

Doomed planet: Astronomers find planet so big and close to star it may be killing itself

Wed Aug 26, 2:31 PM

By Seth Borenstein, The Associated Press

WASHINGTON - Astronomers have found what appears to be a gigantic suicidal planet.

The odd, fiery planet is so close to its star and so large that it is triggering tremendous plasma tides on the star. Those powerful tides are in turn warping the planet's zippy less-than-a-day orbit around its star.

The result: an ever-closer tango of death, with the planet eventually spiraling into the star.

It is a slow death. The planet WASP-18b has maybe a million years to live, said planet discoverer Coel Hellier, a professor of astrophysics at Keele University in England. Hellier's report on the suicidal planet is in Thursday's issue of the journal Nature.

"It's causing its own destruction by creating these tides," Hellier said.

The star is called WASP-18 and the planet is WASP-18b because of the Wide Angle Search for Planets team that found them.

The planet circles a star that is in the constellation Phoenix and is about 325 light-years away from Earth, which means it is in Earth's galactic neighbourhood. A light-year is about 5.8 trillion miles.

The planet is 1.9 million miles (3 million kilometres) from its star, 1/50th of the distance between Earth and its star, the sun. And because of that the temperature is about 3,800 degrees (2,100 Celsius).

Its size - 10 times bigger than Jupiter - and its proximity to its star make it likely to die, Hellier said.

Think of how the distant moon pulls Earth's oceans to form twice-daily tides. The effect the odd planet has on its star is thousands of times stronger, Hellier said. The star's tidal bulge of plasma may extend hundreds of miles, he said.

Like most planets outside Earth's solar system, this planet was not seen directly by a telescope. Astronomers found it by seeing dips in light from the star every time the planet came between the star and Earth.

So far astronomers have found more than 370 planets outside the solar system. This one is "yet another weird one in the exoplanet menagerie," said planet specialist Alan Boss of the Carnegie Institution of Washington.

It is so unusual to find a suicidal planet that University of Maryland astronomer Douglas Hamilton questioned whether there was another explanation. While it is likely that this is a suicidal planet, Hamilton said it also is possible that some basic physics calculations that all astronomers rely on could be dead wrong.

The answer will become apparent in less than a decade if the planet seems to be further in a death spiral, he said.

-

On the Net

Nature: http://www.nature.com/nature

WASP group: http://www.superwasp.org

Men-only train cars sought in groping fears

Wed Jun 17, 12:53 PM

TOKYO (Reuters) - Many women taking the crowded train in Tokyo opt for women-only carriages during the rush hour to avoid gropers.

Now, for fear of being accused of groping, some are asking for carriages reserved for men as well.

Ten shareholders of Seibu Holdings, which runs trains in the Tokyo area, have petitioned for carriages reserved for men.

"There have been many cases of groping, as well as false charges of groping, on Seibu Railway," the shareholders said in a notice seeking a vote at the company's annual meeting next Wednesday.

"While measures against groping, such as setting women-only carriages, have been effective to a certain extent, no measures have been taken against false charges of groping... In the spirit of gender-equality, a male-only carriage must be introduced."

False accusations of groping were highlighted when Japan's Supreme Court overturned in April the conviction of a professor for groping a girl on a Tokyo train.

Judges pointed out a need to be careful in such cases when the accuser was the only source of evidence, media said.

But the shareholder request for men's carriages may not be implemented, as Seibu's board of directors opposes the idea.

"The reality is that we have few requests from Seibu Railway users for setting up male-only carriages," the board said in its reply to the shareholder request.

In Tokyo, around 2,000 people were arrested for groping in 2007, data from the police showed. Many crowded train lines, including Seibu lines, designate a carriage just for women during the rush hour.

(Reporting by Yoko Kubota; Editing by Rodney Joyce)

German zoo says gay penguin pair raising chick

Thu Jun 4, 3:23 PM

By The Associated Press

BERLIN - A German zoo says a pair of gay male penguins are raising a chick from an egg abandoned by its parents.

Bremerhaven zoo veterinarian Joachim Schoene says the egg was placed in the male penguins' nest after its parents rejected it in late April.

The males incubated it for some 30 days before it hatched and have continued to care for it.

The chick's gender is not yet known.

Schoene said the male birds, named Z and Vielpunkt, are one of three same-sex pairs among the zoo's 20 Humboldt penguins that have attempted to mate.

Homosexual behavior has been documented in many animal species.

The zoo said in a statement on its website that "sex and coupling in our world don't always have something to do with reproduction."

Bureaucrats get training in stand-up comedy

Wed Jun 3, 10:21 AM

TOKYO (Reuters) - Japan's bureaucrats may have little to laugh about these days, given opposition charges of misspent tax money, but that has not stopped one ministry offering its officials a unique form of training -- as stand-up comics.

More than 100 transport ministry officials in their 20s got tips this week from professional comedians as part of training in communication skills.

"By experiencing comedy routines, we hope they can learn more about how to speak to clients and how to manage their staff as they begin to have more management responsibility," said Atsuya Kawada, deputy director of the ministry's personnel division.

The training coincides with attacks by the main opposition Democratic Party, eyeing victory in a looming election, on what the party calls wasteful public spending due to decades of policy collusion between bureaucrats and ruling party lawmakers.

Kawada said the approach was better than just listening to lectures for young officials, who are often tired from long working hours.

"We also hope this training will soften the stiff image of bureaucrats," he added.

(Reporting by Yoko Nishikawa, Editing by Linda Sieg)

'Bacterial census' finds a zoo full of critters on human skin

Thu May 28, 6:18 PM

By Lauran Neergaard, The Associated Press

WASHINGTON - Eeeww. There's a zoo full of critters living on your skin - a bacterial zoo, that is. Consider your underarm a rain forest.

Healthy skin is home to a much wider variety of bacteria than scientists ever knew, says the first big census of our co-inhabitants.

And that's not a bad thing, said genetics specialist Julia Segre of the National Institutes of Health, who led the research.

Sure they make your sneakers stinky, "but they also keep your skin moist and make sure if you get a wound that (dangerous) bacteria don't enter your bloodstream," she said. "We take a lot for granted in terms of how much they contribute to our health."

People's bodies are ecosystems, believed home to trillions of bacteria, fungi and other microbes that naturally coexist in the skin, the digestive tract and other spots. But scientists don't have a good grasp of which microbes live where, much less which are helpful, even indispensable, in maintaining health.

The NIH's "Human Microbiome Project" aims to change that, recruiting healthy volunteers to learn what microbes they harbour so scientists can compare the healthy with diseases of microbes gone awry - from acute infections to mysterious conditions like psoriasis or irritable bowel syndrome.

The skin research, published in Friday's edition of the journal Science, is part of that project. Scientists decoded the genes of 112,000 bacteria in samples taken from a mere 20 spots on the skin of 10 people. Those numbers translated into roughly 1,000 strains, or species, of bacteria, Segre said, hundreds more than ever have been found on skin largely because the project used newer genetic techniques to locate them.

Topography matters, a lot, the researchers reported. If a moist, hairy underarm is like a rain forest, the dry inside of the forearm is a desert. They harbour distinctly different bacteria suited to those distinctly different environments. In fact, the bacteria under two unrelated people's underarms are more similar than the bacteria that lives on one person's underarm and forearm.

Mom's advice to wash behind your ears notwithstanding, that spot contained the least diverse bacteria - 19 species on average. The most diverse spot: the forearm, which averaged 44 species.

How many are supposed to live there? That's not clear yet. Some certainly could be tourists, picked up as we go about our day. When researchers re-checked five of these volunteers a few months later, the bacteria in some spots - the moist nostril and groin, for example - proved pretty stable while other spots, including the forearm, had changed quite a bit.

Which are good bugs, and which bad? That depends. A common skin bacteria is Staph epidermidis, found all over the body. Segre said it helps protect us from its nasty cousin, Staph aureus, which about a third of people are thought to carry on the skin or in their nose even if they have no active infection.

But, back to topography, Staph epidermidis itself can harm if it gets under the skin; it's a common trigger of catheter-caused infections.

The research helps lay the groundwork for what doctors really want to know: What's different in the skin of people with diseases such as eczema or psoriasis? Those studies are about to begin, says Dr. Martin Blaser of New York University Langone Medical Center, who is leading one on psoriasis and performed some first-step studies of skin bacteria that helped lead to the NIH's census.

Then there's the scrubbing question, society's antibacterial obsession.

"There's an all-out assault on our normal skin organisms," Blaser noted. "In trying to get rid of the bad guys, are we getting rid of the good guys?"

Segre hopes knowing there are so many bacteria alters how people think about the relationship.

"I'm a mother of two small children; I believe very strongly in sanitation, washing your hands," Segre said. But, "we have to understand that we live in harmony with bacteria and they are part of us as super-organisms . . . and not just conceive of bacteria as bad and germs and smelly."

Lonely robots ignored by elderly luddites
8:51AM Friday Sep 21, 2007
By Emi Foulk


TOKYO - Ifbot, the resident robot at a Japanese nursing home, can converse, sing, express emotions and give trivia quizzes to seniors to help with their mental agility. Yet the pale-green gizmo has spent much of the past two years languishing in a corner alone.

"The residents liked ifbot for about a month before they lost interest," said Yasuko Sawada, director of the facility in Kyoto, western Japan, shaking her head as she contemplated the 495,000 yen ($NZ5860), 45-cm-tall (18-inch-tall) "communication robot".

"Stuffed animals are more popular," she remarked dryly.

High-tech gadgets and futuristic robots which Japan had hoped might lend a hand when the population turns grey haven't caught on with the elderly, who according to forecasts will make up around 40 per cent of the population by the middle of the century.

"Most (elderly) people are not interested in robots. They see robots as overly-complicated and unpractical. They want to be able to get around their house, take a bath, get to the toilet and that's about it," said Ruth Campbell, a geriatric social worker at the University of Tokyo.

Japanese manufacturers have learned the hard way that the elderly want everyday products adapted to their needs - easy to read for those with poor eyesight, big buttons for people with trembling hands and clear audio for the hard of hearing.

Among the most high-profile failures was Hopis, a furry pink dog-like robot capable of monitoring blood sugar, blood pressure and body temperature.

Faced with poor sales, its manufacturer Sanyo stopped production of the robot dog and instead focused on utilitarian devices for the elderly such as height-adjustable countertops and phones with jumbo-sized keys.

Not all high-tech products aimed at seniors have disappeared, though many are hardly blockbusters.

Kitchenware maker Zojirushi Corp. offers the i-pot, an electric kettle equipped with a radio transmitter that sends email twice a day to relatives to let them know if Grandma has made tea. Some 3,300 of the devices are in use across Japan.

Secom Co.'s My Spoon, an automatic feeding device for those whose hands are too shaky to eat on their own, is available in Japan and the Netherlands. Two hundred have been sold, including 150 in Japan, since it first went on the market in 2002.

High production costs and difficulty of use make it hard to sell specialty electronics to seniors, according to Mieko Ohsuga, a biomedical engineer specialising in geriatrics at Osaka Institute of Technology.

"When talking about how to market more complex products, we keep coming up against the same problems," she said. "They are costly to create, require supervision to use, and in the end the manpower issue is not solved. We can see things work, but who is going to pay the expense?"

It won't be the elderly themselves, at least for now.

"They just want simpler phones and tools," said Dr. Kanao Tsuji, a geriatrician with Life Care System, a home visit health care provider.

- REUTERS

Dr. Webb Haymaker cutting into Benito Mussolini's brain. Published in Life magazine. Old MAMAS 518.

Via

Man cut off finger to protest overdue wages

2 hours, 17 minutes ago

BELGRADE (Reuters) - A Serbian union official who chopped off his finger and ate it in a protest over wages that in some cases have not been paid in years, said Monday he did it to show how desperate he and other workers were.

"We, the workers have nothing to eat, we had to seek some sort of alternative food and I gave them an example," Zoran Bulatovic told Reuters. "It hurt like hell."

Bulatovic, a union leader at the Raska Holding textile factory in Novi Pazar in southwest Serbia, used a hacksaw to cut off most of his left-hand little finger Friday.

Bulatovic said he decided to act after his deputy, "a single mother of three, was the first to say she would cut off her finger. I could not allow her to do that," he said.

State-owned Raska Holding was a major textile producer in the late 1980s with a workforce of 4,000. It suffered during the collapse of the former Yugoslavia in the 1990s and a loss of markets and mismanagement during a decade of wars and sanctions led to massive job cuts, leaving the company with just 100 workers.

Some employees have not been paid for years, only collecting social benefits, like free medical care.

About two dozen workers went on a 19-day hunger strike last year. They want the company's debt to be swapped for state-held equity and a welfare program for those nearing retirement.

Bulatovic said his comrades will not back down from their demands, but they will postpone planned self-mutilations at least until talks with government officials in Belgrade expected Tuesday.

(Reporting by Aleksandar Vasovic; Editing by Gordana Filipovic and Matthew Jones)

RIP JG Ballard

Writer JG Ballard dies age 78

35 minutes ago

LONDON (AFP) - Writer JG Ballard, famous for his book "Empire of the Sun" about his childhood struggle to survive in a Japanese internment camp, died Sunday after a long illness, his agent said. He was 78.

Margaret Hanbury announced his death with "great sadness", saying he had been ill "for several years".

Hanbury, who had been Ballard's agent for more than 25 years, described his "acute and visionary" observation of the world, which led him to produce disquieting novels and won him a cult following.

Despite regularly being referred to as a science fiction writer, Ballard said what he was really doing was "picturing the psychology of the future."

Although he began writing relatively conventional science fiction short stories, he moved to a more adventurous, "new wave" style, which focused less on the other-earthly and more on the society around him.

Ballard honed his experimental writing in stories published in the ground-breaking magazine "New Worlds" over more than a decade.

In a series of early apocalyptic novels written in the early 1960s -- "The Drowned World", "The Wind from Nowhere", "The Drought" -- he imagined the world after it had been hit by different kinds of disasters.

Ballard's imagination and the quality of his writing -- in a genre where ideas often triumph over style -- made him a commercial success.

But it was the autobiographical "Empire of the Sun", published in 1984, that brought him a wider audience.

It is a fictional account of his childhood in colonial Shanghai, where he was born to English parents on November 15, 1930, and where he was when Japanese forces swept in after the attack on Pearl Harbour in December 1941.

He was interned with his family in a prison camp, and the book is a tale of devastation and survival that catapaulted him to worldwide fame when it was adapted into a film by US director Steven Spielberg in 1987.

"I have -- I won't say happy -- not unpleasant memories of the camp," he once said of his childhood.

"I remember a lot of the casual brutality and beatings-up that went on, but at the same time we children were playing 101 games all the time!"

Ballard also won acclaim for "Crash" (1973), which described what he called "the perverse eroticism of the car crash" and which was brought to the big screen by Canadian film-maker David Cronenberg in 1996.

He questioned what would happen if people's desires or habits are taken to the limit, a theme he returned to in "Cocaine Nights" (1996) and "Super-Cannes" (2001) which describe ordinary people whose lives are liberated by violence.

"JG Ballard has been a giant on the world literary scene for more than 50 years," said Hanbury.

She added: "His acute and visionary observation of contemporary life was distilled into a number of brilliant, powerful novels which have been published all over the world and saw Ballard gain cult status."

James Graham Ballard returned to Britain from China in 1946 and remained here ever since, living in the same house in Shepperton, in the county of Surrey, southwest of London, for much of the past half a century.

Leaders cower from "shoe-cide" attacks

1 hour, 11 minutes ago

By Bappa Majumdar

NEW DELHI (Reuters) - India's politicians contesting in the general election, fearful of shoes hurled at them by disgruntled voters, have asked for more security and are erecting metal nets at rallies.

Lal Krishna Advani, the Bharatiya Janata Party's (BJP) prime ministerial candidate was the latest politician to be at the receiving end Thursday, as an angry party worker threw a slipper at him during an election meeting in a central state.

The slipper missed Advani, but was enough for authorities to step up security for all leaders across the country.

The incident was the latest episode of shoe-throwing as a mark of protest against political leaders, including former U.S. President George W. Bush and Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao.

Throwing a shoe at someone is considered an insult in India.

Indian politicians have asked party workers to remove shoes at meetings and alerted police and their security staff to keep a tab on people, including journalists in news conferences.

"The security is extremely tight for politicians, and we are keeping a close watch on everyone," a Delhi Police spokesman said.

Last week, a Sikh journalist hurled a shoe at India's home minister during a news conference after getting angry with the minister's reply to a question about 1984 riots in which hundreds of Sikhs were killed.

Three days later, a retired school teacher threw a shoe at popular Congress lawmaker Naveen Jindal, during an election rally in Haryana state.

Authorities in Gujarat state built an iron safety net to keep flying shoes away, as Narendra Modi, the chief minister of the BJP-ruled state began his speech at a rally this week.

"These are acts of insanity, there is no scope for such acts in India's political system," Rajiv Pratap Rudy, the BJP's candidate in Bihar state where election was held Thursday said.

India's politicians have not taken the shoe attacks personally and not initiated legal action so far.

"Flying footwear are now the weapons of mass distraction," was the headline in one such report carried by the Mail Today newspaper Friday.

(Editing by Alistair Scrutton and Valerie Lee)

Buddhist Hell
Via

Skeleton found in tree 29 years after suicide

Mon Apr 6, 1:50 PM

BERLIN (Reuters) - The skeleton of a German retiree who tied himself to the top of a tree and shot himself to death nearly 30 years ago has been found by a hiker.

German police in the southern town of Landshut said on Monday the 69-year-old man disappeared in 1980 and had been classified as missing.

An 18-year-old hiker discovered a bone in the forest last week and brought it to police. They searched the area and spotted the skeleton hanging about 11 meters up, near the top of the spruce tree.

"After searching the area we found the skeleton up in the tree with the pistol hanging on a rope next to it," police spokesman Leonard Mayer said. Police were able to identify the man through DNA testing and an artificial hip.

(Reporting by Franziska Scheven; Editing by Farah Master)

Iraq plans to open Saddam museum

Sat Apr 4, 4:32 PM

BAGHDAD (AFP) - Iraq plans to open a museum filled with toppled dictator Saddam Hussein's weapons, statues, paintings, furniture and artefacts, officials told AFP on Saturday.

The items collected and catalogued in the six years since the US-led invasion are being handed back to the Iraqi government, which will consider a site for what would undoubtedly become a major attraction.

"These possessions are for the Iraqi people," said Abdul Zahraa al-Talqani, a tourism and antiquities ministry spokesman, adding that a committee would be formed to find a site for the museum.

"We will look for a big building. I think one of the presidential palaces in Baghdad probably will be the place of the museum," said Talqani, noting that clothes, documents and various gifts given to Saddam by foreign leaders were among the possessions.

"This is what was found after the invasion," he added.

Some undisplayed Saddam memorabilia are currently stored in the National Museum in Baghdad, which only reopened in February after having been looted in the days that followed the dictator's ouster.

The US military said on Saturday the return of "commemorative weapons, paintings, furniture and statues" once belonging to Saddam "signifies the improvement of the security of Iraq."

The possessions, including the weapons, had been stored at a depot in Taji, 35 kilometres (22 miles) north of Baghdad, but have been transferred to an Iraqi warehouse at Abu Ghraib, nearer the capital, the statement said.

"The final goal is for these weapons to be displayed at a special museum with Saddam Hussein's artefacts," said Major Franco Nieves.

"They will be displayed for all the people of Iraq, future generations and visitors from of all over the world to admire."

Miss Universe says had "lot of fun" in Guantanamo

Tue Mar 31, 1:07 PM

By Pascal Fletcher

MIAMI (Reuters) - A "relaxing, calm, beautiful place" may not be everyone's description of Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, where the United States holds about 240 prisoners in a detention center that has drawn condemnation from around the world.

But this was the opinion of reigning Miss Universe Dayana Mendoza of Venezuela, who visited the U.S. naval facility in eastern Cuba this month on a trip organized by the United Service Organizations (USO) which supports U.S. troops.

The Guantanamo Bay base, whose presence Cuba's government has contested as illegal for years, is used by U.S. authorities as a prison camp for foreign terrorism suspects. Critics have condemned it as a symbol of abuses in Washington's war on terrorism launched after the September 11, 2001, attacks.

Caracas-born Mendoza, 22, who visited the facility March 20-25 along with Miss USA Crystle Stewart, 27, enthused about her Guantanamo trip as an "incredible experience" in a blog entry posted on the Miss Universe website dated March 27, 2009 (http://www.missuniverse.com/missuniverse/blog.php).

"It was a loooot of fun!," Mendoza wrote, describing how she and Stewart met U.S. military personnel and took rides around the camp, which is encircled by a barbed-wire fenced, minefields and watchtowers. She said they also visited a bar on the base and the "unbelievable" beach there.

"We visited the Detainees camps and we saw the jails, where they shower, how the(y) recreate themselves with movies, classes of art, books. It was very interesting," she wrote.

"I didn't want to leave, it was such a relaxing place, so calm and beautiful," she added.

Former detainees and human rights groups have alleged the use of torture, including "waterboarding" (simulated drowning) and other physical abuses, at the Guantanamo prison.

Britain announced last week it would investigate whether members of its secret services were complicit in the torture of a British resident released from Guantanamo Bay last month.

Spanish prosecutors may decide this week whether to start an investigation of six former officials from George W. Bush's administration in connection with the torture of Guantanamo detainees.

In one of his first acts in office, U.S. President Barack Obama has set a one-year deadline for shutting the prison.

The Pentagon said last month it had received renewed reports of prisoner abuse during a recent review of conditions at Guantanamo, but had concluded that all prisoners were being kept in accordance with the Geneva Conventions.

Recounting her "memorable" trip, Mendoza, who was crowned Miss Universe 2008 in Vietnam, said: "We also met the Military dogs, and they did a very nice demonstration of their skills. All the guys from the Army were amazing with us."

Before the visit, USO had announced Mendoza and Stewart were being "deployed" to Guantanamo on an entertainment tour to visit U.S. troops abroad to "boost morale."

(Additional reporting by Jane Sutton, editing by Vicki Allen)

Oeconomic Suicide

Women vs. men: Handling economic stress
by Kiri Blakeley, Forbes.com
Wednesday, January 14, 2009provided byforbes

Last week's suicide of Chicago real estate auctions mogul Steven Good is the latest instance of what could be termed "econocide"—suicide due to the poor economy. While Good, who shot himself, did not leave a note indicating his motivation, his death comes a month after he made comments about the collapse of the real estate industry at a business conference.

Good's suicide follows that of Kirk Stephenson, a financier who jumped in front of a train in England after his private equity firm suffered losses; French financier Rene-Thierry Magnon de la Villehuchet, who slit his wrists after losing US$1 billion in the Bernard Madoff scheme; and German billionaire Adolf Merckle, who threw himself in front of a train after massive investment losses.

These tragic figures had something in common besides economic hard times: They were all men.

In 2005, the latest statistics offered by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 25,907 men killed themselves, versus 6,730 women. A big part of this discrepancy is that men use much more successful methods of suicide. Each of the four moguls who took their lives did so in a decisive fashion. "Men take far more permanent measures," says Manhattan psychotherapist Jonathan Alpert, who counsels many Wall Streeters and their families. "Women might make gestures that are not as strong, that are more a cry for help or attention."

The financial crisis offers serious and perhaps widespread motivations for male suicidal behaviour. "This is just the tip of the iceberg," says Dr. Leslie Seppinni, a Beverly Hills, Calif., clinical psychologist who counsels many millionaires, both male and female.

Seppinni notes this is the first time in her 18-year career that businessmen are calling her with suicidal impulses over their financial state. In the past three months, she has intervened in at least 14 cases of men seriously considering taking their lives. "There's been a rapid increase in the numbers," she says. Especially vulnerable are men over 50: "They've already built their empire one or two times, and they don't necessarily have the emotional energy to rebuild."

High net-worth individuals may be more susceptible to suicide in tough economic times, not only because they have more to lose from a financial standpoint but also because they tend to be haunted by the idea that they had a hand in their financial downfall. "They feel guilt and shame because they think they should have known what was coming with the market or they should have pulled out faster," says Seppinni.

Seppinni says her female clients, many of whom are chief executives, are more likely to "roll up their sleeves and become a cook somewhere or bake cookies and sell them—whatever needs to be done. She's not thinking her life is ruined; she just wants to put food on the table." Seppinni notes that not one female client has called her about feeling suicidal due to the downturn.

"Men traditionally are the breadwinners," says Alpert. "Particularly with big-name people, so much of their image, reputation and ego depend on financial success."

Which is why women, experts say, are more likely to take their lives when they've had long-term depression problems or suffer from mental illness, rather than over their financial condition. In Seppinni's opinion, "women do not kill themselves over finances."

For three million years, men have been the hunters and protectors, explains Dr. Helen Fisher, a biological anthropologist at Rutgers University. "Around the world, from the Zulus to Eskimos, women look for men who provide resources. When men lose that profoundly basic role and purpose, they get depressed."

Which isn't to say that women don't get stressed about the economy too. They are just more likely to manifest their stress in different ways.

Women, say experts, are more likely to take "healthy" approaches to dealing with stress. They work out, eat well, get plenty of sleep and look to family and friends for emotional support. Men, especially risk takers in the financial world, have a tendency to isolate themselves, clam up or "escape" through drugs, alcohol and sex.

Lynn Mayabb, senior adviser at Kansas City, Mo.-based BKD Wealth Advisors, which manages US$1.4 billion for wealthy individuals, has had her share of downturn-related stress—some clients have blamed her for their losses.

During times like these, Mayabb takes a deep breath, concentrates on what she can change rather than what she can't, and refocuses her clients on long-term financial goals. When one of her male clients broke down crying in her office, Mayabb chose to deal with his more cool-headed wife. "The men are a little too focused on 'What did I lose this quarter?' Women are more able to see the big picture," she says.

"I cannot picture one of the men I work with being able to handle the issues I've had to deal with," says Amy James, 41, CEO of sixThings, which monitors educational materials for compliance with federal regulations. Since September, James has personally fired 34 employees (70 per cent of her full-time workforce), relocated her company from New York City to Oklahoma City and been sued three times.

She notes that male friends suffering business malaise "disappear" from her social circle or refuse to talk about their travails, while James relies heavily on bonding sessions with her female friends. "They are the biggest stress relief I have."

Grief Media

Online social networks used in disasters to share information and grief
By Luann Lasalle, THE CANADIAN PRESS

Facebook and Twitter devotees often use the online networking tools to post gossip and idle details about their lives. But the sites have also become a crucial means of communication during disasters like the shooting that unfolded in a German town Wednesday morning.

Shortly after a teenage gunman killed 16 people including himself, users were sharing news of the tragedy and posting condolence messages.

One user of the micro-blogging website Twitter tapped out text messages saying his girlfriend who lived in the town, Winnenden, had just phoned to say there was rampage at a school and that she was afraid to leave her office. She was then tracked down by a French news agency to give an account of her experience.

Also in the immediate aftermath of the shooting, Twitter users from around the world began reaching out to the town.

"Prayers for the victims and families of the German school shooting," wrote one person.

It's a scenario that has been played out in other recent tragedies, such as last year's terrorist attacks in Mumbai and the US Airways crash in New York's Hudson River.

Social networking tools allow people to instantly share their grief, says Jeannette Sutton of the University of Colorado's Natural Hazards Center.

"What more can you do when there's this kind of destruction of human beings other than saying, 'I care and I am sad,"' said Sutton.

The sociologist has studied how social networking plays a role during disasters, beginning with the shooting at Virginia Polytechnic Institute two years ago when a student killed 32 other students and professors and then turned the gun on himself.

"What we've seen in disaster research for 60 years now is that people converge to a disaster, but we're seeing them converge now online," said Sutton.

She said her research shows that people are using social networks to share information, ask questions, organize donations and encourage each other.

Sutton and another colleague also studied online forums and news sites to see how people were communicating during the wildfires that ravaged Southern California in the fall of 2007.

Web developer Nate Ritter turned to Twitter, with its limit of 140 characters per message, to get out information more quickly than his blog posts.

"I was using Twitter but didn't understand what it could be used for until this happened," Ritter said from San Diego.

"I found it very powerful," he said, adding he had 350 followers on Twitter during the fires.

Toronto Mayor David Miller has been using Twitter since last December. He said his city will use social media to add to the ways it's already reaching citizens during emergencies.

"I think Twitter, Facebook and other social networking media significantly add to our capacity to get the facts out in a simple, calm, clear way," Miller said.

The American Red Cross, Homeland Security and Los Angeles Fire Department are among public organizations using Twitter in the United States.

Sutton will speak at the World Conference on Disaster Management in Toronto in June about the role social media networks play in disaster communications and how public officials can use them.

In hard times, more U.S. women try to sell their eggs

2 hours, 5 minutes ago

By Michelle Nichols and Angela Moore

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Drawn by payments of up to $10,000, an increasing number of women are offering to sell their eggs at U.S. fertility clinics as a way to make money amid the financial crisis.

Nicole Hodges, a 23-year-old actress in New York City who has been out of work since November, says she has decided to sell her eggs because she desperately needs cash.

"I'm still paying off college. I have credit card bills and, you know, rent in New York is so expensive," Hodges, who has been accepted as donor and is waiting to be chosen by a couple, told Reuters Television.

Hodges said there was also some satisfaction in helping an infertile couple have a child. "Yes, the money is very nice, but it's nice to be able to let a mother who wants to be a mother be a mother," she said.

Fertility organizations across the country said there had been a growing interest. The Center for Egg Options in Illinois has seen a 40 percent increase in egg donor inquiries since the start of 2008.

New York City's Northeast Assisted Fertility Group said interest had doubled and the Colorado Center for Reproductive Medicine said it had received 10 percent more inquiries.

The Reproductive Science Center of New England, which does not deal directly with egg donors, said it had gone from no inquiries to now receiving several a month.

The American Society for Reproductive Medicine recommends that total payments to donors be capped at $10,000.

A 2007 study by the society found the U.S. national average payment was $4,216. Payments by clinics in the Northeast were found to average just over $5,000, while those in the Northwest averaged just under $3,000.

WAYS TO MAKE MONEY

Katherine Bernardo, egg donor program manager at Northeast Assisted Fertility Group, said while some women saw donation as an easy way to make money, not everyone was accepted.

"There is an economic climate that encourages women to find creative ways to make money," she said. "That doesn't mean that anyone interested in egg donation actually goes on to donate because so few women are actually eligible."

Bernardo said only 5 percent to 7 percent of the applications she received resulted in the retrieval of eggs. An ideal candidate, she said, was in her twenties, healthy, attractive and well-educated.

Egg donors undergo medical, psychological and genetic testing as well as a background check. If selected, a donor must undergo hormone injections until her eggs are ready to be retrieved.

"And remember the economy puts strain on the recipients too, Bernardo said. "It's a very expensive undertaking to use a donor egg and an IVF (in vitro fertilization) cycle."

Eric Surrey, medical director of the Colorado Center for Reproductive Medicine, said women should not donate their eggs simply for the money.

"We understand that financial compensation is certainly one motivation, but should never be the sole motivation. These women are providing a great gift to others that should not be taken lightly," said Surrey, a past president of the Society for Assisted Reproductive Technology.

Not as much money is on offer for men looking to donate sperm. Several sperm banks in New York City, where men are paid about $60 each time they donate, said there had not been a rise in donors.

(Writing by Michele Nichols; Editing by David Storey).

The individual breaks the boundary of his skin and occupies the other side of his senses. He tries to look at himself from any point whatever in space. He feels himself becoming space... He is similar, not similar to something, but just similar. And he invents spaces of which he is 'the convulsive possession'.

Roger Caillois

Boy marries dog to ward off tiger attacks

Wed Feb 18, 12:55 PM

By Jatindra Dash

BHUBANESWAR, India (Reuters) - An infant boy was married off to his neighbors' dog in eastern India by villagers, who said it will stop the groom from being killed by wild animals, officials and witnesses said on Wednesday.

Around 150 tribespeople performed the ritual recently in a hamlet in the state of Orissa's Jajpur district after the boy, who is under two years old, grew a tooth on his upper gum.

The Munda tribe see such a growth in young children as a bad omen and believe it makes them prone to attacks by tigers and other animals. The tribal god will bless the child and ward off evil spirits after the marriage.

"We performed the marriage because it will overcome any curse that might fall on the child as well on us," the boy's father, Sanarumala Munda, was quoted as saying by a local newspaper.

The groom, Sagula, was carried by his family in a procession to the village temple, where a priest solemnized the marriage between Sagula and his bride, Jyoti, by chanting Sanskrit hymns, a witness said.

The dog belongs to the groom's neighbors and was set free to roam around the area after the ceremony. No dowry was exchanged, the witness said, and the boy will still be able to marry a human bride in the future without filing for divorce.

Indian law does not recognize weddings between people and animals, but the ritual survives in rural and tribal areas of the country.

(Editing by Matthias Williams, Leslie Gevirtz)

Credit crisis could crunch men's testosterone: doctor

Sun Feb 15, 7:15 PM

LONDON (AFP) - The stress caused by the global economic downturn could reduce men's testosterone levels, a British doctor warned Monday.

Chronic stress caused by redundancy, financial worries or working longer hours could make levels of the hormone drop, said Richard Petty, the medical director of a top London men's health clinic.

Testosterone, the hormone produced by the testicles, triggers the development of male sexual characteristics. It is linked to sexual function, circulation and muscle mass, as well as concentration, mood and memory.

"When a man becomes grumpy or irritable, it's easy to blame work or simply the effects of ageing," said Petty.

"In the short-term, stress can increase levels of testosterone and this is useful to help people respond quickly to pressures and new situations.

"But chronic stress, which is ongoing, is a major factor in the decline of testosterone.

"Chronic stress occurs all too frequently due to our modern lifestyles, when everything from high-pressured jobs to unemployment keeps the body in a state of perceived threat."

Lower testosterone levels of the hormone can cause lethargy, irritability, lack of concentration and a low sex drive.

Petty advised men to reduce their stress levels as much as possible by resting, eating healthily and exercising.

Idi Amin Dada

RIP Hans Beck

Hans Beck (6 May 1929 – 30 January 2009) was the German inventor of the toy Playmobil. He is thus often called "The Father of Playmobil."

Born in Thuringia, Beck grew up in the town of Zirndorf, beginning his toymaking career as a creator of little vehicles and figures for his younger siblings. Beck received training as a cabinetmaker but worked simultaneously on model airplanes, a product he pitched to the company Geobra Brandstätter. The owner of the company, Horst Brandstätter, asked him to develop toy figures for children instead.

Beck spent 3 years developing what became Playmobil. Beck conducted research that allowed him to develop a toy that would be flexible (unlike tin soldiers), not too complex, fit in an average child's hand and have a facial design based on child's drawing (e.g having a large head, smile and no nose). "I would put the little figures in their hands without saying anything about what they were," Beck remarked. “They accepted them right away....They invented little scenarios for them. They never grew tired of playing with them."[1] Horst Brandstätter was not initially convinced of the viability of Beck’s idea, but allowed the inventor to continue developing the product.

The 1973 oil crisis made it possible for Playmobil to be considered a viable product. Rising oil prices imposed on Geobra Brandstätter (whose headquarters are at Zirndorf), for whom Beck worked as Head of Development, demanded that the company turn to products that required less solid plastic material (during the 1960s, the company had been producing hoola-hoops and large plastic toys). More had to be done with the plastic the company bought.

The company commissioned Beck to develop an entire series. "Playmobil is a toy that doesn't impose specific play patterns on children," Beck has remarked, "but rather stimulates their imagination."[2] The system of customizable toys, with its interchangeable parts, offered unlimited possibilities for re-combination and expansion.

In 1974, the company put the series on show in its display rooms. Initial visitors were reluctant to accept the toy. Nevertheless, the toy was shown at the International Toy Fair in Nuremberg, which was taking place that same year. The toy remained popular with children. A Dutch firm subsequently agreed to buy a whole year's production. Playmobil began to be sold worldwide in 1975.

The first Playmobil sets were of Native Americans, construction workers and knights. Beck once mentioned in an interview that a jumbo jet, alien figures, and dinosaurs should never be introduced as Playmobil sets; all three have been introduced into the Playmobil universe since that time.

After training a group of product designers to take his place, Beck retired in 1998 [3], just prior to the 25th birthday of the introduction of Playmobil.

During the World Expo 2000 in Hannover, Beck was among the 100 German personalities who were honored with a statue within the German Pavilion.

He died at the age of 79 on January 30, 2009 after a serious illness.

Bus-sized boa slithers into record books

Wed Feb 4, 12:24 PM

PARIS (AFP) - Stunned scientists have found the fossilised remains of the world's greatest snake -- a record-busting serpent that was as long as a bus and snacked on crocodiles.

The boa-like behemoth ruled the tropical rainforests of what is now Colombia some 60 million years ago, at a time when the world was far hotter than now, they report in a study released on Wednesday.

The size of the snake's vertebrae suggest the beast weighed some 1.135 tonnes, in a range of 730 kilos (1,600 pounds) to 2.03 tonnes.

And it measured 13 metres (42.7 feet) from nose to tail, in a range of 10.64-15 metres (34.6-48.75 feet), they estimate.

"Truly enormous snakes really spark people's imagination, but reality has exceeded the fantasies of Hollywood," said Jonathan Block, a vertebrate palaeontologist at the University of Florida, who co-led the work.

"The snake that tried to eat Jennifer Lopez in the movie 'Anaconda' is not as big as the one we found."

"At its greatest width, the snake would have come up to about your hips," said David Polly, a geologist at the University of Indiana at Bloomington.

The investigators found the remains of the new species at an unlikely location -- at one of the world's biggest open-cast coalmines, in Cerrejon, Colombia, where giant machines had obligingly gnawed away surface layers of dirt.

Working as huge coal-laden trucks thundered by, the team sifted through the earth, laying bare the remains of supersized snakes and their likely prey -- extinct species of crocodiles and giant turtles -- and evidence that a massive rainforest once covered the ground.

"The giant Colombian snake is a truly exciting discovery. For years, herpetologists have argued about just how big snakes can get, with debatable estimates of the max somewhere less than 40 feet" (12.3 metres), said leading snake expert Harry Greene of Cornell University, New York.

Titanoboa cerrejonensis -- whose Latin name honours the coal mine -- is not only a source of jaw-dropping wonder.

It is also a useful indicator as to the world's climate after the dinosaurs were wiped out some 65 million years ago, the team say.

Unlike mammals, reptiles cannot regulate their own temperature.

As a result, they are limited in body size by the ambient temperature of where they live. For example, reptiles today are bigger in the tropics than they are in cooler latitudes.

Based on T. cerrejonensis, the scientists calculate that the mean annual temperature in equatorial South America 60 million years ago would have been 30-34 degrees Celsius, or 86-93 degrees Fahrenheit.

That makes it around 3-4 C (5.5-7.2 F) hotter than tropical rainforests today.

If so, this is a welcome piece of news about climate change.

Simulations about global warming suggest that, on present trends, the world's surface temperatures could rise by between 1.8-4.0 C (3.2-7.2 F) by 2100.

If the supersnakes are a guide, tropical rain forests could still exist at such temperatures, although a fast, massive rise in warming could well be devastating to many species.

The paper is published by the British-based weekly science journal Nature.

The world's longest snake today is the Asian reticulated python, specimens of which can grow around 10 metres (32.5 feet), and the biggest in terms of mass is the green anaconda, with some specimens weighing 227 kilos (550 pounds).

Sometimes there is nothing.

RIP Louis Seize

Louis was officially arrested on 13 August and sent to the Temple, an ancient Paris fortress used as a prison. On 21 September, the National Convention declared France to be a republic and abolished the monarchy.

The Girondins were partial to keeping the deposed king under arrest, both as a hostage and a guarantee for the future. The more radical members – mainly the Commune and Parisian deputies who would soon be known as the Mountain – argued for Louis's immediate execution. The legal background of many of the deputies made it difficult for a great number of them to accept an execution without due process of some sort, and it was voted that the deposed monarch should be tried before the National Convention, the organ that housed the representatives of the sovereign people.

On the 11 December, among crowded and silent streets, the deposed king was brought from the Temple to stand before the Convention and hear his indictment, an accusation of High Treason and Crimes against the State. On the 26th, his counsel, Raymond de Sèze, delivered Louis's response to the charges, with the assistance of François Tronchet and Malesherbes.

On 15 January 1793, the Convention, composed of 721 deputies, voted out the verdict, which was a foregone conclusion – 693 voted guilty, and none voted for acquittal. The next day, a voting roll-call was carried out in order to decide upon the fate of the king, and the result was, for such a dramatic decision, uncomfortably close. 288 deputies voted against death and for some other alternative, mainly some means of imprisonment or exile. 72 deputies voted for the death penalty, but subject to a number of delaying conditions and reservations. 361 deputies voted for Louis's immediate death.

The next day, a motion to grant Louis reprieve from the death sentence was voted down; 310 deputies requested mercy, 380 voted for the execution of the death penalty. This decision would be final. On Monday, 21 January 1793, stripped of all titles and honorifics by the republican government, Citoyen Louis Capet was guillotined in front of a cheering crowd in what today is the Place de la Concorde. The executioner, Charles Henri Sanson, testified that the former King had bravely met his fate.

As Louis mounted the scaffold he appeared dignified and resigned. He attempted a speech in which he reasserted his innocence and pardoned those responsible for his death. He declared himself willing to die and prayed that the people of France would be spared a similar fate. He seemed about to say more when Antoine-Joseph Santerre, a general in the Garde Nationale, cut Louis off by ordering a drum roll. The former king was then quickly beheaded.

Accounts of Louis’s beheading indicate that the blade did not sever his neck entirely the first time. There are also accounts of a blood-curdling scream issuing from Louis after the blade fell but this is unlikely as the blade severed Louis’s spine. It is agreed however that, as Louis's blood dripped to the ground, many in the crowd ran forward to dip their handkerchiefs in it.

Man cuts off finger in court over debt

Fri Jan 16, 12:31 PM

LISBON (Reuters) - A Portuguese businessman said he cut off one of his fingers in court with a butcher's knife in an "act of despair" after a judge refused his offer to settle a 170,000 euro debt and said part of his farm must be sold.

"My intention was to tear up all the case papers and splatter them with blood so I could prevent the expropriation order for my land," Orico Silva was quoted as saying in local media after his drastic action in the court house.

Silva, who owns a 20 hectare (50 acre) farm in the central town of Figueira da Foz, was being sued by a company for holding onto a cash deposit on a land deal which had fallen through, the local newspaper said.

"I freaked out when the judge refused my offer to pay the debt and ordered the sale of part of my land. I told her I had a 1.2 million euro bank guarantee which would have allowed me to pay the debt," Silva said.

When he went to take the bank papers from his briefcase, he noticed the butcher's knife he had recently bought at a market and decided to cut off his index finger, using a court desk as a chopping board. He then cut the finger into three.

"I didn't feel anything, I could even have cut off all my fingers. It was an act of despair," he said.

(Reporting by Shrikesh Laxmidas; editing by Tim Pearce)

New Web site in Japan maps out smells

Tue Jan 13, 1:21 PM

By Mari Yamaguchi, Associated Press

TOKYO-Japanese are taking their noses global with a Web site that describes different odors around the world and pinpoints where they can be found on a map.

Launched in December, the "Nioi-bu," or Smell Club, has registered more than 160 scents around the world, ranging from "steam coming out of a rice cooker" to "used socks in the summer," and pinpointed their locations on a Google map.

Nearly 200 members, called "smellists," have joined the Japanese-language only site, said Kayo Matsubara, spokeswoman of its operator, KAYAC Inc.

Users can either click on a balloon on the world map on the Web site, or use an index to find each scent if they're not yet on the map.

Some of what they report: "A toasty odor of cow dung" in Fujisawa City, just southwest of Tokyo. In Kamakura, eastern Japan, "cats with halitosis" were suspected to be roaming about.

"All that is missing on the web is a smelling function," Matsubara said. "That's our next challenge."

Not all reports are of stenches, with others including mouth-watering dishes, fresh laundry, greenery and scented soap. From Paris, there is a "scent of verbena soap near a monastery," and from Thailand's ancient capital Ayuthaya, a mix of "incense, grass, dirt and wild dogs."

Tue Jan 13, 12:08 AM

WASHINGTON, (AFP) - A longer ring finger than an index finger denotes a more successful financial trader, British researchers said in a study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

Previous research found that the length ratio between the index finger and the ring finger, termed 2D:4D, is a measure of prenatal exposure to androgens (male hormones) that can affect the developing brain giving it increased confidence and reaction times.

University of Cambridge researcher and chief author of the study John Coates said androgens improve the concentration and reflexes needed in high-end financial trading.

In their study, researchers measured the fingers of 44 male traders in the City of London who were engaged in trading that involved rapid decision-making and quick physical reactions.

They then correlated finger length ratio to the traders' profits and losses during the preceding 20 months, concluding that a lower 2D:4D ratio predicted higher long-term profitability and longer careers in the business.

"The success and persistence of traders exposed to high levels of prenatal androgens suggests that financial markets may be influenced by traders' biological traits," the researchers said in the study.

Could we reduce love to a pill? Maybe, says expert

Wed Jan 7, 1:35 PM

By Maggie Fox, Health and Science Editor

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Could a pill or a squirt up your nose save your marriage? Maybe, according to a researcher who is studying the chemical basis of that most elusive of emotions -- love.

Larry Young says his ultimate quest is not a high-tech love potion but to shed light on serious conditions like autism, which affects the ability to form social attachments, by studying brain chemicals involved in emotional attachment.

"Biologists may soon be able to reduce certain mental states associated with love to a biochemical chain of events," Young, of the Yerkes National Primate Research Center at Emory University in Atlanta, wrote in the journal Nature.

His study of prairie voles has shown that a quick dose of the right hormone can drastically alter relationships.

The cute rodents are a good model for human relationships, Young said. Unlike many other animals, they form lifelong pairs and raise their young together.

But this behavior is easy to change, Young says.

"It's a chemical reaction. At least in voles we know that if you take a female and place her with a male and infuse her brain with oxytocin, she will quickly bond with that male," he said in a telephone interview.

Taking away her natural levels of oxytocin -- a hormone involved in labor, nursing and social bonding -- means she will reject a male as a mate no matter how many times she physically copulates with him.

"Experiments have shown that a nasal squirt of oxytocin enhances trust and tunes people into others' emotions," Young wrote in the Nature article.

IMPROVED DATING CHANCES

"Internet entrepreneurs are already marketing products such as Enhanced Liquid Trust, a cologne-like mixture of oxytocin and pheromones designed to boost the dating and relationship area of your life," he wrote.

Young sees a potential role in fixing damaged marriages.

"If we could maybe use a drug in combination with marital therapy, that may be desirable," he said.

Young is also convinced that love does not boil down to one single hormone. Other studies have shown that differences in a gene called major histocompatibility complex, which affects the immune system, may be involved in initial sexual attraction. For males, the hormone vasopressin appears to be more important.

But it is clearly biological. "I think love in humans evolved to draw us together," he said.

Which means feelings of love likely exist in other animals.

"Any mammal, when the mother has babies, they are bonded to those babies and would do anything to protect those babies. That is an ancient brain chemical that is ubiquitous, and stimulates the bond," he said.

Humans -- and perhaps prairie voles -- have evolved to use that mechanism to stimulate pair bonds, Young believes.

"Either way, recent advances in the biology of pair bonding mean it won't be long before an unscrupulous suitor could slip a pharmaceutical 'love potion' in our drink. And if they did, would we care? After all, love is insanity," he wrote.

(Reporting by Maggie Fox; Editing by Julie Steenhuysen and David Storey)