Google is escalating its rivalry with Microsoft with the purchase of Quickoffice, the maker of a widely used mobile application for working on documents created in Microsoft's programs for word processing, spreadsheets and presentations.The deal announced Tuesday gives Google Inc. a new weapon to foil Microsoft Corp. as more people get work done on smartphones and tablet computers. Quickoffice mak

The United States is in the process of selling hundreds of cutting-edge weapons to South Korea, a deal expected to be worth $325 million, according to a defense agency here.The Defense Security Cooperation Agency said it has notified Congress of possible sales to South Korea of 367 cluster bombs and associated parts, equipment, logistical support and training. The bombs, formally the sensor-fuzed

Venus moves in front of the sun on Wednesday. (Yonhap News)None of us will likely see Venus pass, like a moving beauty spot, across the face of the sun again.From the U.S. to South Korea, people around the world turned their attention to the daytime sky on Tuesday and early Wednesday in Asia to make sure they caught the rare sight of the transit of Venus. The next one won't be for another 105 year

(AFP)British scientists say their new technique to accurately measure the weight and size of dinosaurs shows they were not as heavy as previously thought.University of Manchester biologists used lasers to determine the minimum amount of skin required to wrap around the skeletons of modern-day mammals, then applied the technique to a giant Brachiosaur skeleton in a Berlin museum.While previous esti

A U.S. drone strike in northwest Pakistan has killed al-Qaida's second-in-command, officials from both countries confirmed Tuesday, the most significant victory so far in the controversial bombing campaign and the biggest setback to the terror network since the death of Osama bin Laden.Abu Yahya al-Libi was considered a media-savvy, charismatic leader with religious credentials who was helping pre

A young mother was arrested in Phoenix Saturday after allegedly leaving her baby strapped in a car seat on the roof of her car and driving off, police said.(MCT)The 5-week-old baby was found in the car seat in the middle of a road about 1 a.m. by city fire department officials, who took the infant to a hospital, The Arizona Republic reported. The child was "perfectly OK," police Officer James Holm

The chairman of the troubled Korea Savings Bank was arrested Tuesday on charges of embezzlement and stealing bank funds as part of a probe into alleged irregularities by suspended savings banks, prosecutors said. Yoon Hyun-soo, 59, was accused of issuing some 150 billion won ($127.6 million) in illegal loans to a subsidiary of Taihan Electric Wire Co. and embezzling an unspecified amount of bank f

A Pennsylvania family who obtained a locket believed to have belonged to a Titanic survivor said they may have identified the original owner.Betty and Buz Carbone of Hempfield said their son bought the locket, which bears the letters "AMA" or "AWA" in intricate script, from an antiques dealer about 15 years ago and they now believe the item originally belonged to Annie Moore Ward of Philadelphia,

Libya's government has retaken control of the country's main airport from disgruntled militiamen who stormed the Tripoli site with heavy machine guns and armored vehicles on Monday, Libya's interim leader said.In an interview with the Arabic satellite channel Al-Jazeera, the head of the country's National Transitional Council, Mustafa Abdul-Jalil, said the airport was attacked and held for several

A Canadian porn actor suspected of murdering and dismembering a Chinese student and mailing his body parts to Canada's top political parties was reading about himself on the Internet when he was arrested Monday at a cafe in Berlin. Canadian investigators say 29-year-old Luka Magnotta's obsessions led him to post Internet videos of his killing kittens, then a man, and finally to his arrest at the c

First came Miami: the case of a naked man eating most of another man's face. Then Maryland, a college student telling police he killed a man, then ate his heart and part of his brain.It was different in New Jersey, where a man stabbed himself 50 times and threw bits of his own intestines at police. They pepper-sprayed him, but he was not easily subdued.He was, people started saying, acting like a

Police said a worker at a Florida business sparked an evacuation of 300 employees when she called in a bomb threat because she "needed a break" from work.Investigators said they responded to Metra Electronics in Holly Hill, Fla., around 4:30 a.m. Wednesday when human resources workers said they received a voicemail saying there was a bomb on the property, the Orlando Sentinel reported Friday.Offic

영화나 드라마, 소설 등에서 자주 등장하는 소재인 ‘미친 천재’들이 과학적 근거가 있다는 설이 제기되었다고 라이브사이언스닷컴이 보도했다.지난달 31일 뉴욕에서 열린 제5회 월드 사이언스 페스티발에 참가한 패널들은 지난 2010년 연구결과를 보면 지적능력이 더 뛰어난 사람들의 경우 조울증을 앓게 될 확률이 더 높다고 말했다. 이 세 명의 패널들은 모두 정신질환을 앓았던 것으로 알려졌다.홉킨스 의과대학의 심리학자이자 조울증을 앓고 있는 케이 레드필드 재미슨은 “연구결과 16세 때 지적능력이 뛰어났던 사람들은 조울증에 걸릴 확률이 (그렇지 않은 사람들보다) 네배나 높은 것으로 드러났다”라고 말했다. 이 연구는 스웨덴 10대 70만명을 대상으로 진행되었다. 또 다른 패널인 캘리포니아-어바인 대학의 신경 생리학자 제임스 펄른은 조울증 등 정신병을 앓고 있는 사람들은 더욱 창의적인 생각을 할 확률이 높다고 말했다.이 것은 우울증에서 벗어날 때 뇌의 활동이 창의력을 발휘할 때의 활동과 동일하기

A Cleveland waitress says she was surprised when she received a tax refund for nearly half of $1 million.Virginia Hopkins, who has been working at Johnny's Downtown Restaurant in Cleveland for 19 years, was expecting a refund of $754, but the check she received on Tuesday from the Internal Revenue Service was for $434,712, ABC News reported."I think I would have to work most of my life to earn tha

A Seoul man has been arrested on suspicion of colluding with a North Korean reconnaissance unit in China and distributing game programs infected with malignant codes to South Korea, police said Monday. The man, only identified by his family name Cho, was apprehended after allegedly meeting in September 2009 with several spies, including a man surnamed Kim, from the North's Reconnaissance General B

(MCT)Dark chocolate lowers blood pressure and cholesterol, making it a cheap and tasty way to lower cardiovascular disease risk, Australian researchers say.Professor Christopher Reid, Dr. Alice Owen, Dr. Dianna Magliano and Ella Zomer, a doctoral student at Monash University, and Danny Liew of the University of Melbourne predicted daily dark chocolate consumption could prevent 70 non-fatal and 15

The River Thames became a royal highway Sunday, as Queen Elizabeth II led a motley but majestic flotilla of more than 1,000 vessels in a waterborne pageant to mark her Diamond Jubilee. Britain`s Queen Elizabeth II, waves from the royal barge during the Diamond Jubilee Pageant on the River Thames in London Sunday. (AP-Yonhap News)In a colorful salute to the island nation's maritime past, an armada

The number of adults in their 30s and 40s living with their parents in the capital city of Seoul soared91.4 percent, led by rising house prices and childcare costs, a report showed Friday. The report released by the Seoul Metropolitan Government found that the number of adults aged 30 to 49 who live with their parents jumped to 484,663 in 2010, compared with 253,244 in 2000. The report was based o

A porn actor is wanted in a gruesome case of dismembered body parts that were mailed to different places including the headquarters of the Conservative Party of Canada, police said.Luka Rocco Magnotta, 29, is wanted for homicide, Montreal police said Wednesday at a news conference.According to an official close to the investigation Magnotta worked as a porn actor and there is video of the crime. T

U.S. astronomers are forecasting the Milky Way will have a violent collision with the neighboring Andromeda galaxy in about 4 billion years.The encounter will result in a major makeover for our galaxy, NASA astronomers said, that will see the sun flung into a new area of the Milky Way. However, Earth and the rest of the solar system will be in no danger of being destroyed, a NASA release said Thur