Variety of new uses for genetic testing

OSLO -- New genetic tests could help crack down on illegal food or timber trade, fight malaria or even give clues to how to stop bird strikes with planes, scientists said on Friday. Experts have identified DNA "barcodes" -- named after the black and white lines that identify products in a supermarket -- of more than 31,000 species of animals and plants against 12,700 species in 2005 in a fast-growing branch of science.

NFL'er's treatment debated:

WASHINGTON -- An experimental body cooling treatment used on an injured National Football League player offers promise for preventing paralysis in people who sustain severe spinal cord injuries, experts said on Thursday. But the value of "modest hypothermia," the treatment used on Kevin Everett of the Buffalo Bills after he was injured in a game on Sunday, remains controversial among some doctors who want to see more evidence it helps those patients.

Shooting for the moon

TOKYO -- Japan launched its first lunar probe on Friday, nicknamed Kaguya after a fairy-tale princess, in the latest move in a new race with China, India and the United States to explore the moon. The rocket carrying the three-metric ton orbiter took off into blue skies, leaving a huge trail of vapor over the tiny island of Tanegashima, about 620 miles south of Tokyo, at 8:31 a.m., as it headed out over the Pacific Ocean.

Genes tell the tale

WASHINGTON -- Lonely people are more likely to get sick and die young, and researchers said on Thursday they may have found out why -- their immune systems are haywire. They used a "gene chip" to look at the DNA of isolated people and found that people who described themselves as chronically lonely have distinct patterns of genetic activity, almost all of it involving the immune system.

Fixing tsunami warnings

JAKARTA -- Tsunami warning systems in the Indian Ocean have improved since the devastating 2004 Indonesian quake but still have many flaws and produce false alerts or miss potential threats, experts and officials said on Friday. Authorities in nations ringing the Indian Ocean issued a series of tsunami alerts this week after a powerful quake hit Indonesia's Sumatra Island on Wednesday, followed by more than 40 aftershocks of between magnitude 4.9 to 7.8.

The universe's dark heart

LONDON -- Dark matter may have played a key role in forming the earliest stars, according to researchers who suggest that the mysterious and invisible material may also have been responsible for creating black holes. Their experiment offer clues to the universe just after the big bang some 13 billion years ago and indicates that dark matter helped set the thermostat on the first stars, said Tom Theuns, an astronomer at Durham University, who led the study published in the journal Science on Thursday.

Cambodia sets up sanctuary for rare crane

PHNOM PENH (Reuters) - Cambodia has established an 8,000 hectare (20,000 acre) sanctuary in flood plains near the Mekong Delta to protect the rare Eastern Sarus Crane, Environment Minister Mok Mareth said on Friday. Nearly 300 of the red-headed, 1.3 meter (4 feet) tall birds have been found in two districts of Takeo province near the border with Vietnam. Conservationists said in 1999 there may be fewer than 1,000 of the birds left in the wild.