Damp squibs
Torrential rain last year flooded missile silos in Fort Greely, Alaska, significantly damaging the US missile defence system, says the independent watchdog Project on Government Oversight. The silos house interceptor missiles to shoot down any missiles heading for the US, but the interceptors themselves were not damaged, says POGO.
Demon drink
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Alcohol is responsible for nearly a third of all deaths of men aged 15 to 29 in the developed world. So warn addiction specialists in The Lancet (DOI: 10.1016/S0140-6736(07)60369-9). Increasing the price of alcohol, restricting hours for its sale and raising the legal drinking age would reduce its toll, say the researchers.
Darwin no coward
Charles Darwin was not afraid to publish his theory of evolution, according to his diaries and correspondence. It has long been thought that Darwin held back On the Origin of Species for fear of the reaction to his ideas, but in fact he was simply too busy writing other books, then ill (Notes and Records of the Royal Society, DOI: 10.1098/rsnr.2006.0171).
Schoolgirls rumble Ribena
Lab tests carried out by two New Zealand schoolgirls on the blackcurrant drink Ribena have led to a fine of NZ$217,000 (US$156,000) for the drink鈥檚 manufacturer, GlaxoSmithKline. Contrary to advertisements, Anna Devathasan and Jenny Suo of Auckland found that some versions of Ribena contained hardly any detectable vitamin C.
What鈥檚 the beef?
The sons of US women who ate a lot of beef while pregnant between 1949 and 1983 have grown into men with low sperm counts. Anabolic steroids used as growth promoters in beef cattle in the US, though not in Europe, may have played a role (Human Reproduction, DOI: 10.1093/humrep/dem068).