Tech
Hunting for clues about Google's mystery barge
Chris O'Brien Google isn't talking about its vessel with a huge stack of shipping containers. A reporter's sleuthing turns up more questions than answers: is it a teleportation device or a time travel machine?
Tech
US military wants to create 'Iron Man suit'
David S. Cloud The US military wants to produce a prototype of a protective "Iron Man suit" packed with the latest communications gear.
Sci-tech
Norwegian town Rjukan installs giant mirrors to reflect light into valley
A town in Norway has placed giant mirrors on top of the hills surrounding it, to beam light into the valley in the dark winter months.
Sci-tech
Scientists now the man with the golden gum
BRIDIE SMITH Money may not grow on trees but researchers have found that the next best thing does. Gold.
Science
Wild things get fish tongue-tied
NICKY PHILLIPS If you're a fish, it's not a cat but more likely a bloodsucking parasite that's got your tongue.
Security
Indian High Commission to use typewriters for sensitive information
The Indian High Commission in London has reverted to using typewriters to compose sensitive documents following the NSA spying scandal.
Tech
Control-alt-delete was a mistake, says Bill Gates
Will Oremus Bill Gates has admitted the control-alt-delete command used to log on to PCs was a mistake.
The BIG idea
It's academic, but erotica misses bodice-ripping cut
Catherine Armitage There was a predictable sneer when E.L. James topped Forbes' annual list of highest-earning authors.
US woman turns up alive after her own funeral
A Philadelphia woman has turned up alive nearly two weeks after her family held a funeral and burial.
40 pythons found in Canadian motel room
Forty pythons up to four and half feet long have been found in a motel room in Canada.
Mobiles
20 injured at LG promotion gone wrong
JAMES W MANNING LG might want to consider making its next smartphone bulletproof after 20 people were reportedly injured by BB guns in a publicity stunt for its latest handset.
Sci-tech
Soylent pioneer thinks outside the lunch box
STEPHEN HUTCHEON A 25-year-old computer scientist invents a new foodstuff which he hopes will change the way we eat.
Return to offender: dog poop delivered to owners
Suzanne Daley A town in Spain is shaming owners who don't pick up after their dogs by mailing the poop back to them.
Sci-tech
Scientists serve up $373,000 test tube burger
Karl Mathiesen The world's first laboratory-grown burger has been cooked and tasted at an event in London.
Do your snails, ma'am? Japan's slimy new beauty treatment
Danielle Demetriou They have long been regarded as garden pests. But snails, it seems, have a use after all - crawling across faces as part of a new beauty treatment in Japan.
Woman miraculously survives platform fall
A Czech woman has beaten the odds in the Prague underground after falling under an oncoming train but then crawling out from between carriages unscathed, police say.
Sci-tech
Mutant roaches evolve to avoid sticky traps
Elizabeth Lopatto Roaches that have been hard to trap may be a variety that find sugar doesn't taste quite so sweet as bait anymore, a study suggests.
3D
The future of food is here, and it's pizza
Jason Bittel There's a lot of talk these days about making a manned run at Mars. But even if we learn to survive 30 years in a space ship, what will we eat along the way? The answer, of course, is pizza - long lasting, self-assembling, 3D-printed pizza.
Apple
Coffee with Apple chief sells for $621k
An anonymous bidder has paid $621,000 in a charity auction for coffee with Apple CEO Tim Cook.
Neighbour from hell brings the house down
Peter Foster A logging contractor in the US took neighbourly score-settling to a new level when he jumped into his bulldozer and demolished two houses, flattened a truck and snapped an electricity pole, causing power cuts across a 20-mile radius.
'Monstrous' creature of the deep is killer viewing
A video of a "sea monster" that washed up on a New Zealand beach has gone viral despite experts saying the mysterious creature is probably a killer whale.
Auction
Bidding tops $200,000 for coffee with Apple chief
A coffee date with Apple CEO Tim Cook heats up as bidding tops $200,000.
Apps
Iceland gets anti-incest app
Will Oremus In an island nation of just 300,000 people, sleeping with distant relatives may be inevitable. Now there's an app for that.
Courts
Judge holds himself in contempt after his phone disrupts court
A US judge whose smartphone disrupted a hearing in his own courtroom has held himself in contempt.
Scientists just hair's breadth from ending bite of bedbug
It's been frozen, baked, suffocated, sprayed with toxins … and each time the bedbug bounces back, leaving tiny bite marks on legs or arms where it takes a blood meal.
London's plague pits reveal toll of Black Death
Joe Shute Engineers have uncovered more secrets of the epidemics that devastated the city from the 14th to the mid-17th century.
It's all right, Fido, I know exactly how you're feeling
Adam Lusher Any dog owner will claim they can tell exactly what their pet is feeling just by looking at it. Scientists now say they may well be right.
Hoax
Fake fingers fool the boss in hospital scam
Doctors at a Brazilian hospital have been accused of using fake fingers to sign absent colleagues in to work.
Science
Neanderthal attitude to socialising may have caused downfall
Neanderthals' bigger eyes and bodies meant they had less brain space for social networking, which may explain why they died out and Homo sapiens conquered the planet, according to a new study.
Married couple to travel to Mars
Seth Borenstein In less than five years, a married couple could be on their way to Mars.
Chubby Checker sues over penis-measuring app
A lawyer acting for Chubby Checker has announced a lawsuit against Hewlett-Packard for using the singer's name for a penis-measuring app.
God save the prince running for presidency
Peter Laca PRAGUE: Karel Schwarzenberg, a bow-tied 75-year-old prince whose estate includes castles and forests, is channelling the Sex Pistols in a bid to be Czech president.
Lost cat baffles experts by finding way 320 kilometres home
NEW YORK: Nobody knows how it happened: an indoor house cat that got lost on a family excursion managing, after two months and about 320 kilometres, to return to her home town.
Darwin cops sent on a wild pig chase
It’s the tale of three little pigs, and it’s kept Darwin enthralled.
Brazil inmates train cat for prison break
A cat trained by prisoners to deliver cell phones and tools to dig tunnels has been caught at a jail in north-eastern Brazil after sneaking in with forbidden items strapped to its body.
Police sold a dummy - almost
Nick Squires in Rome Thieves who raided an expensive clothes shop in Rome stood still and pretended to be mannequins when the police arrived - and they nearly got away with it.
Great balls of China to defend against 'apocalypse'
Tom Hancock As people across the globe tremble in anticipation of next week's supposed Mayan-predicted apocalypse, one Chinese villager says he may have just what humanity needs: tsunami-proof survival pods.
Chinese farmer forced 100-year-old mother to live in pigsty
Tom Phillips in Shanghai A Chinese farmer has come under fire for keeping his 100-year-old mother in a pigsty, prompting a debate over how China cares for its elderly.
Husband makes a bad call with the iron
Matthew Day in Warsaw A Polish man has burnt the side of his head while doing housework after mistaking the iron for a phone.
