鈥楢lps鈥� under Antarctica
The existence of a mountain range the size of the Alps, 4 kilometres below the Antarctic ice sheet, was confirmed this week. Aircraft carrying ice-penetrating radar established that the Gamburtsev mountains are rugged, with deep valleys and steep peaks. This suggests that they formed relatively quickly as the vast East Antarctic ice sheet ploughed over them.
Shoot for the moon
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India has announced plans to send two astronauts into space by 2015. The low-orbit mission will cost 拢1.7 billion and would put India alongside the US, Russia and China as the only countries to have sent a human into space. Indian space officials say that their ultimate goal is to go further than the moon, which will require crewed as well as robotic missions.
China blames the west
A third of China鈥檚 carbon emissions come from making goods for export, especially to the US and UK. Such emissions are not its responsibility, says China鈥檚 government, which is under pressure to curb greenhouse gas emissions.
Fat, cigs and early death
Being obese at 18 is as dangerous as smoking. Each doubles the risk of an early grave, according to a study in the BMJ of 45,000 Swedish men (). Obese 18-year-olds who also smoked heavily are five times as likely to die early as their non-smoking peers of normal weight.
Cheaper sequences?
A tiny pore that detects electrical changes as a strand of DNA passes through it could provide cheaper DNA sequencing as it avoids using imaging tools. Pores made by UK firm Oxford Nanopore Technologies can distinguish between the four DNA bases, and bases with chemical 鈥渃aps鈥� (Nature Nanotechnology, ).