A NASA robotic geologist named Spirit began its seven-month journey to Mars at 1:58:47 p.m. Eastern Daylight Time (10:58:47 a.m. Pacific Daylight Time) today when its Delta II launch vehicle thundered aloft from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, Fla.

The spacecraft, first of a twin pair in NASA’s Mars Exploration Rover project, separated successfully from the Delta’s third stage about 36 minutes after launch, while over the Indian Ocean. Flight controllers at NASA’s Jet Propul

Pregnant women carrying boys have a 10% higher energy intake than those carrying girls, finds a study in this week’s BMJ.

Researchers analysed the dietary intake of 244 pregnant women attending a large hospital in Boston, United States.

They found that women who were carrying a male embryo had an 8% higher intake of protein, a 9% higher intake of carbohydrates, an 11% higher intake of animal fats, and a 15% higher intake of vegetable fats than women who were carrying a female embryo

A review article in this week’s BMJ dispels some of the myths about treating head lice, using the most up-to-date medical research. For example, it shows that:

Head lice are harmless
Head lice on clothing or furniture cannot infect a person
Cutting hair, or tying it back, is not helpful
Banning children with nits from school is ineffective

Head lice are parasites that usually infest the scalps of school age children. Lice attach their eggs to hair shafts near the scalp

Research from Sri Lanka in this week’s issue of THE LANCET highlights how repeated doses of charcoal could reduce deaths from oleander-seed poisoning by up to 70%. The authors of the study suggest that charcoal could also be effective in treating poisoning from drugs used in Western populations with similar effects to oleander-seed poisoning, such as digoxin and digitoxin, or with drugs that are eliminated from the body in a similar fashion.

Deliberate self-poisoning with yellow oleander see

All gardeners know that their plants have to compete against insects and weeds. We apply insecticides to protect plants from the munching hordes, and we apply herbicides, or hoe, to protect plants from weeds. But, according to Stan Finch and Rosemary Collier of Horticulture Research International, Wellesbourne, the latter is a bad move that actually helps insects to find our crop plants.

Writing in the June issue of Biologist, Finch and Collier provide evidence that specialist insects, those

New glow-in the-dark plastic technology has enabled researchers to develop a torch that glows in the dark, so you can find it in the dark. Collaboration between DualGlo Ltd, a Hereford technology company and Innovation-Direct, a free consultancy service for SME companies delivered by the Universities of Warwick and Wolverhampton, has developed a unique product that is now entering markets all around the world.

After turning to the Innovation Direct advice centre DualGlo Ltd, a small techno