Israel stunned by Hawking snub

It is an event "of cosmic proportions", said one Palestinian academic, a befitting description of Stephen Hawking's decision to boycott an Israeli academic conference slated for next June. It was also a decisive moral call which was communicated by the Cambridge University, where Hawking is a professor, on May 8. Hawking is a world-renowned cosmologist and physicist. His scientific work had ...

Earliest light in universe since Big Bang measured for 1st time

The evolution of the extragalactic background light (EBL) over the past 5 billion years has been measured for the first time. That bath of ancient and young photons suffusing the Universe today is called the extragalactic background light (EBL). An accurate measurement of the EBL is as fundamental to cosmology as measuring the heat radiation left over from the Big Bang (the cosmic microwave ...

Russia plans four spacecraft launches in 2014

Russia's Energia Rocket and Space Corporation will make four launches next year from the Pacific Ocean-based Odyssey platform under the Sea Launch programme, an official said. Corporation president Vitaly Lopota said that after 2014, Energia will be able to make five or more launches a year. Next year's launches will be the first since one of Sea Launch's Zenit vehicles carrying an Intelsat-27 ...

Rebuilding rules as rain soaks Jersey shore on Memorial Day weekend

MANASQUAN, N.J. (AP) -- Saws and sledgehammers joined beer and barbecues -- under covered porches -- as a fixture of the first Memorial Day weekend at ...

Protesters in over 400 cities march vs Monsanto

Organizers say two million people marched in protest against seed giant Monsanto in hundreds of rallies across the U.S. and in over 50 other countries on Saturday."March Against Monsanto" protesters say they wanted to call attention to the dangers posed by genetically modified food and the food giants that produce it. Founder and organizer Tami Canal said protests were held in 436 ...