Also known as carbamide, urea does not require expensive catalysts like platinum to operate, either. The team was able to develop a simple and relatively inexpensive method with which to convert urea into water, nitrogen, carbon dioxide and electricity -- all at the same time.
Scientists develop fuel cells powered by urine
Soros to Donate $100 Million to Rights Group
George Soros, the billionaire investor and philanthropist, plans to announce on Tuesday that he is giving $100 million to Human Rights Watch to expand the organization’s work globally. It is the largest gift he has made, the largest gift by far that Human Rights Watch has ever received, and only the second gift of $100 million or more made by an individual this year, according to the Center on Philanthropy at Indiana University.
“We’re seeing noticeably fewer charitable gifts at the $100 million level from individuals reported than we did just a few years ago,” said Patrick Rooney, the center’s executive director. “Between 2006 and 2008, an average of about 13 gifts a year of that size by individuals was reported. In 2009, it dropped to six, and this year, we know of only one other.”
U.S. judge upholds Guantánamo detention of Afghan shopkeeper
A federal judge has agreed with the government that it can indefinitely hold at Guantánamo an Afghan man whom military intelligence says belonged to an anti-American cell near Kandahar. Judge John Bates' ruling, his first on a Guantánamo habeas corpus petition, left the so-called government win-loss scorecard at 16-38 in the U.S. District Court in Washington, D.C.
That means that judges have ruled more than twice as often for the release of detainees at Guantánamo, rather than holding them. But in this case Bates rejected Shawali Khan's unlawful detention lawsuit in a one-page order released Friday afternoon. His opinion was not released but a court order said an unclassified version would be released ``at a later date.''
U.S. soldiers play 'video prank' on Iraqi motorist - by planting a LIVE grenade in his car
The description that runs next to the video reads: 'This is my partner and I working at a Traffic control point in Iraq.
'We decided to scare one of the locals a bit by placing a grenade in his trunk while he wasn't looking.
'This was all in fun and never in any intent to harm anyone.'
Israeli police accused of targeting Jerusalem's Arab residents
A report from the Association for Civil Rights in Israel (Acri) found that violent confrontations between Jewish residents and their Palestinian neighbours had risen rapidly, but that Israeli police have largely ignored Palestinian complaints.
Stay out of Washington, Rice told Bush after 9/11
Condoleezza Rice ordered George Bush not to return to Washington after the 9/11 attacks before hanging up the phone, the former national security adviser has revealed in a documentary interview.
In a heated exchange, Rice argued with the US president in Florida not to return to the White House because it was a potential terrorist target.
Manual on How to Molest Children Is Legal, Cops Say
A 170-page manual explaining step by step how to molest children which police in Orange County, Fla., believe has been circulating there for months, is not illegal. Investigators have stated that they still want to know where it came from.
The manual, which was apparently written by someone who calls himself "the mule," is a how-to of child molestation, even explaining where and how to find potential victims, the station reported.
Magic mushrooms used to treat terminal cancer patients
A team of researchers from Harbor-UCLA Medical Center
in Torrance, found that the drug psilocybin improved the mood of terminal cancer patients and cut their anxiety and depression. The research is believed a first step in repairing the drug’s respectability.
Psilocybin is the active ingredient in “magic mushrooms”, and is classified as an illegal drug in the U.S. In a small placebo-controlled randomized trial, Psilocybin was safe both physiologically and psychologically, according to Charles Grob, MD, of Harbor-UCLA Medical Center, who led the study.
US Expects to Subsidize Afghan Training for Years
The United States expects to spend about $6 billion a year training and supporting Afghan troops and police after it begins pulling out its own combat troops in 2011, The Associated Press has learned. The previously undisclosed estimates of U.S. spending through 2015, detailed in a NATO training mission document, are an acknowledgment that Afghanistan will remain largely dependent on the United States for its security.
That reality could become problematic for the Obama administration as it continues to seek money for Afghanistan from Congress at a time of increasingly tight budgets.
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