Features

SANTA MONICA, California — “Call of Duty: Black Ops 3” is enlisting a few new recruits.

The third instalment in Treyarch’s popular military shooter saga is adding the option to play cooperatively with other gamers in the plot-driven campaign. The developer is also ditching traditional avatar customisation in its multiplayer mode, instead opting for players to pick among nine distinct characters, each with their own unique weapon and ability.

“We wanted it to have a little more soul to it,” said game director Dan Bunting after a recent demonstration. “We were talking about voices and giving them personalities. It was kind of a leap of faith to say, ‘You’re going to pick this character who is this guy or girl, and that is the character you’re gonna be.’ That was the direction we started to explore.”

Other additions planned for the futuristic “Black Ops 3”, which is scheduled for release November 6 for PlayStation 4, Xbox One and PC, include the ability to swim and shoot at opponents underwater in the multiplayer mode, as well as analyse the campaign’s more expansive battlefields with high-tech perspectives culled from teammates’ intel.

“With co-op players, they can be in multiple places,” said campaign director Jason Blundell. “In these larger environments, they can be at different heights and positions in the battlefield, so to ensure those engagements are just as riveting and just as cinematic, we had to create a brand-new, goal-oriented animation system.”

Here’s a look at five of the biggest changes coming to Activision’s blockbuster shooter franchise:

Fantastic four

The campaign mode has been overhauled to encourage re-playability with up to four available co-op players. The levels will be more open than past “Call of Duty” titles, and players will be able to customise their weapons, loadout, gender, outfit and enhancements. That creativity can be shown off between levels inside a new virtual safe house.

Staying power

The new entry follows the events of “Black Ops II”, when drones hijacked by a terrorist in 2025 crippled the world. In the campaign, which begins five years later, soldiers can be upgraded with about 40 cybernetic modifications, which allow players to accomplish such high-tech feats as remotely hacking enemy robots or chaining together melee strikes.

Jump around

Following the injection of rocket-thrusting soldiers in last year’s “Call of Duty: Advance Warfare”, the troops in “Black Ops 3” have similarly been granted wings. The game’s 360-degree, momentum-based movement system allows multiplayer combatants to quickly grapple environmental surfaces, power slide across landscapes and cling to walls.

Special someone

Treyarch has dubbed its new multiplayer characters “specialists”. That’s because each operative comes equipped with their own personal weapon and ability outside the tried-and-true create-a-class system. For example, bow-wielding Brazilian Special Forces agent Outrider is outfitted with explosive bolts and the power to detect nearby enemies.

Open arms

While the developers have done away with multiplayer character customisation, they’ve greatly expanded weapon personalisation, providing players with more tools to trick out munitions. The game’s guns can be equipped with an optic and up to five attachments, camouflage and user-designed paint jobs with up to 64 different layers on three sides.

CHICAGO — Three highly pathogenic avian flu viruses that have infected poultry and wild birds in the US Midwest appear unlikely to present a significant risk to humans. But the presence of the viruses in North America has scientists scrambling to understand their potential long-term threat.

One of the viruses, H5N2, has already led to the slaughter of millions of turkeys and chickens, as commercial farms try to control the spread of the virus.

No humans have yet become infected, but scientists say it is possible that someone in direct contact with sick birds might catch the virus, though it is extremely unlikely that an infected human could pass the disease on to another human.

“Most of the time, these viruses don’t have human disease potential, but obviously you need to be very careful,” said Dr Stephen Morse, an expert in emerging infections at Columbia University. “Nowadays, you can’t say anything about flu with certainty.”

Avian flu, which infects poultry, is caused by an influenza A type virus and is often spread by free-flying waterfowl, such as ducks, geese and shorebirds.

The viruses are classified by two types of proteins. Hemagglutinin or “H” proteins, of which there are 16, and neuraminidase or “N” proteins, of which there are 9. Avian flu viruses are also classified as low pathogenicity or high pathogenicity based on their ability to infect and kill poultry.

The highly pathogenic avian flu viruses currently killing US poultry first originated as a single H5N8 virus in Asia, and quickly spread among wild birds along migratory pathways in the Pacific flyway.

Once the virus reached North America, it mutated, mixing with North American avian influenza strains to create the new viruses now being seen. The H parts, which are highly pathogenic in poultry, originated in Asia, and the N parts come from North American, low pathogenic, avian flu viruses, said Dr Rubin Donis, an associate director for policy and preparedness in the Centres for Disease Control and Prevention’s influenza division.

The US Department of Agriculture is still seeing the original H5N8 virus, but it has also identified two strains of mixed-origin viruses, both of them highly pathogenic. One is the deadly H5N2 virus. The other is an entyrely new H5N1 virus that has so far been found in only a handful of the recent cases.

Because much is still unknown about these new viruses, the USDA and the CDC are conducting detailed analyses that include sequencing the viruses’ genomes. A key question they hope to answer is whether the viruses might mutate and become human viruses.

“This is something we need to avoid: it is something that could happen and which we have to look for,” said Dr Jurgen Richt, an expert in avian influenza at Kansas State University.

Richt said scientists also need to find out whether the viruses are mutating when they come from a wild host into domesticated poultry.

Although infections with H5N1 viruses have been rare, past strains have sometimes caused severe disease and death in people who became infected through close contact with infected birds or prolonged contact with infected people. Since flu viruses evolve and often swap genes, the concern is that they could gain the ability to transmit easily among people, which could trigger a global pandemic.

Donis said the CDC is currently conducting studies in ferrets, which are used as surrogate models for humans, to see how the viruses behave in mammals and whether they can spread easily to animals in nearby cages.

One good sign already is that the H5N2 virus does not appear to be able to replicate readily at lower temperatures, which is required for transmission from person to person.

Donis said human transmission of flu viruses occurs in the upper respiratory tract, where body temperatures are lower.

“You will not have a pandemic without a virus that replicates well in the upper respiratory tract and is easily transmitted by droplets,” Donis said.

The CDC has already studied a lab-developed version of the avian hemagglutinin, the “H” portion of the viruses, to see if it contains receptors that could easily attach to human cells. In these experiments, the “H” has bound strictly to avian receptors, and not human receptors, another good sign that the virus may not be easily transmissible in people.

“So far, what we see is a typical avian virus that is not expected to be transmissible in ferrets,” Donis said. Results of the ferret studies should be available in a few weeks.

A spreading threat

The mere fact that an H5N1 avian influenza virus has arrived in North America, however, represents a significant evolution.

Before 1996, none of the highly pathogenic viruses survived very long in nature. H5N1 viruses had largely been confined to Southeast Asia.

“They always burned out and they were never transmitted long distances repeatedly by wild birds,” Donis said.

Things began to change in 2004/2005 when an H5N1 virus began infecting birds in Qinghai Lake, China, and then spread to parts of Europe and Africa.

Scientists in North America began collecting millions of samples looking for the virus in North American birds.

“There wasn’t a single H5N1,” Donis said, until this past January, when a new, mixed origin H5N1 virus was isolated in a wild duck in the United States.

The question now is what has changed that makes this virus more capable of spreading in both Eastern and Western directions.

The concern is if the virus becomes established in the breeding grounds in Alaska and Northern Canada, there is a potential for these viruses to become an annual burden each time the birds migrate south.

Well-received for its driving dynamic and design when launched, the new second generation Peugeot 308 debuted it’s new 1.2 PureTech engine family last year.  Smooth and efficient, the PureTech engine is a petrol-powered counterpoint to more complex and costly and less hard-wearing or refined turbo-diesel and hybrid efficiency models. 

Available in naturally-aspirated and turbocharged versions, the most powerful of these high efficiency three-cylinder engines is the PureTech 130, and while the 308 PureTech version is no hot hatch, it nevertheless boasts a combination of light weight and generous mid-range torque. Fun, agile, practical and economical, the 308 PureTech is a sensible yet elegant family hatchback.

Classy compact

A handsomely stylish family hatchback pitched competing in the same family hatchback C-segment as the Ford Focus and Volkswagen Golf, the Peugeot 308 has a distinctly classy air and premium feel to it. 

Part of a brand-wide design renaissance at Peugeot, the 308 is a more tightly penned and elegantly flowing car than its predecessor, and well reconciles its’ refined and elegant face and chrome details with an assertively athletic posture and sculpted surfacing.

Replacing its predecessor’s snout grille and bonnet, the new 308 features a classy and uncomplicated two-slat chrome-ringed trapezoidal grille, while its’ lion emblem now sits in a concave groove atop the bonnet.

Similarly, the 308’s flanks feature strong ridged upper and lower character lines with a concave groove running along the sides.

Assertive and moody headlights feature slight lower indentations and LED strips that flow into the waistline. Meanwhile, the headlights are reflected by scalloped clamshell bonnet edges.

A smooth and flowing roofline ends with an upright tailgate, while subtly pronounced rear wheel-arches, large 18-inch alloy wheels, tailgate-top spoiler and black lower rear lip lend the 308 a wide, eager and confidently planted presence in how it sits on the ground. From rear views, the 308’s twin-toothed wraparound rear lights flow right into its convex and concave side molding.

Fulsome and frugal

Available in three guises including 81BHP naturally-aspirated and 109BHP and 129BHP turbo-charged versions, Peugeot’s 1.2-litre 3-cylinder PureTech engine, is in most powerful version – as driven – more efficient and powerful than its predecessor’s 1.6-litre naturally-aspirated 4-cylinder engine.

Developing 129BHP at 5500rpm, the 308 PureTech 130 is a prodigious small displacement engine, and with 253kg/m torque throughout 1750-3,500rpm, falls just 10kg/m behind Peugeot’s larger 1.6-litre turbocharged THP 165 engine.

With unexpectedly generous mid-range torque allowing for effortless load carrying, flexible mid-range responses and relaxed motorway cruising, the 308 PureTech however also returns frugal 4.8l/100km fuel efficiency and 110g/km CO2 emissions, even the largest optional 225/40R18 tyres, as tested.

Quick-spooling, with little low-end turbo lag, generous mid-range and eager revvy character, the turbocharged PureTech 130’s three-pots confidently drives the 308’s restrained 1090kg mass. Crossing the 0-100km/h benchmark in 10.3-seconds, when fitted with largest tyre option, the 308 PureTech 130’s versatility allows 11-second 80-120km/h acceleration in fourth gear, and a 201km/h top speed. 

As smooth and refined as three-cylinders get, the 1.2 PureTech’s balancer shaft reduces its’ three-cylinder configuration’s vibrations, its surprisingly quiet but is underplayed by a muted but distinctive. Three-cylinder growl welling up from 2,000rpm on the 308 PureTech 130 is well in its stride by 2,500rpm, brisk by 3,000rpm and ever-willing to its redline.

Svelte and supple

Driving the front wheels through either 6-speed manual or automatic gearboxes, the 308 PureTech 130 self shifter tested had a satisfyingly mechanical-feeling lever, smoothly, which with a light hand smoothly and succinctly snicks through rations, while its clutch pedal was light and intuitive. 

Brisk and fun in real world daily driving, the 308 revs and shifts eagerly, and aside from obvious efficiency gains, its compact three-pot engine is light over the steered front wheels. Light and eager, the 308 PureTech turns crisp into and tidy through corners, and was manoeuvrable and agile along sprawling country lanes and through towns and narrow winding hill climbs during test drive in Majorca, Spain. 

With its tidy cornering and light quick electric steering providing accuracy and decent road feel, the 308 PureTech is fun and easy to drive. Through corners, its light front-end meant there was little proclivity for under-steer and thick 225/40R18 tyres provided sticky road-holding, while its suspension provided good secondary tautness to keep body control tidy and prevent excessive roll.

Though riding on firm low profile tyres for control, the 308 PureTech’s initial suspension response is supple and comfortable, which allowed for a smooth, forgiving ride over broken roads, cracks, lumps and bumps, and through such paved corners felt settled and confident as imperfections were absorbed in its stride.

Classy quarters

A light, eager and agile drive that is nonetheless settled and supple through switchbacks, the 308 felt buttoned down on rebound from sudden crests and dips, while its cabin had a well-constructed refined and well-insulated quality.

Classier than many rivals, the 308’s uncluttered cabin design feels stylishly minimalist ambiance, with most functions accessed through an intuitive infotainment touchscreen.

Tastefully appointed with good quality fit, finish textures and colours, the 308 has an up-market ambiance. With supportive, comfortable and well-adjustable seats, low bonnet and low-set steering wheel through which one peers at the instrument binnacle, the 308 offers excellent unobstructed forward road visibility.

Well-spaced inside, the 308’s optional panoramic sunroof provides an airy and welcoming ambiance, but for tall and large drivers its absence provides yet better headroom, while a lower seating position would suit the low-set steering wheel for a sportier driving position when driving briskly through winding switchbacks.

A practical and fun daily driver, the 5-door 308’s generous 370-litre boot expands to 855-litres with rear seats folded down. 

Well-equipped with convenience and safety features including 9.7-inch infotainments screen, Isofix childseat latches and front and side curtain airbags, the 308’s long options list notably includes high quality leathers and Alcantara, dual zone air conditioning and even front massaging seats. 

TECHNICAL SPECIFICATIONS

Engine: 1.2-litre, turbocharged, transverse 3 cylinders

Bore x stroke: 75 x 90.5mm

Valve-train: 12-valve, DOHC, direct injection

Gearbox: 6-speed manual, front-wheel-drive

Power, BHP (PS) [kW]: 128 (130) [96] @ 5,500rpm

Specific power: 106.7BHP/litre

Power-to-weight: 117.4BHP/tonne

Torque, lb/ft (Nm): 170 (230) @ 1,750-3,500rpm

Specific torque: 191.8Nm/litre

Torque-to-weight: 211Nm/tonne

0-100km/h: 10.3-seconds

80-120kmh, 5th/6th gear: 11-/13.4-seconds

Maximum speed: 201km/h

Fuel consumption, urban/extra-urban/combined: 6-/4.1-/4.8-litres/100km

CO2 emissions, combined: 110g/km

Fuel tank: 53-litres

Length: 4,253mm

Width: 1,804mm

Height: 1,457mm

Wheelbase: 2,620mm

Track, F/R: 1,559/1,553mm

Overhang, F/R: 863/770mm

Headroom, F/R: 895/874mm

Boot capacity, min/max: 470-/855-litres

Kerb weight: 1,090kg

Steering: Electric-assisted rack and pinion

Suspension, F/R: MacPherson struts/torsion bar

Brakes, F/R: Ventilated discs/discs

Tyres: 225/40R18 

By Karen Kaplan
Los Angeles Times (TNS)

Are you a mosquito magnet? If so, your genes may be to blame.

New research shows that if mosquitoes are attracted to the scent of a particular person, they are likely to be attracted to her twin’s scent as well. On the flip side, if they are repelled by someone’s odour, they’re likely to find her twin repellent, too.

Scientists tested 37 sets of twins who were willing to place their hands in a Y-shaped glass tube. Groups of 20 mosquitoes were released into the tube and given 30 seconds to assess the scents inside. Then a gate was opened, allowing them to fly towards the hands they preferred and away from the hands they disliked. (Although the mosquitoes could smell the volunteers’ hands, they couldn’t actually reach them.)

After running versions of the experiment 40 times with each set of twins, they found that the overlap in mosquito preference was about twice as high for identical twins (who share virtually all their DNA) as it was for fraternal twins (who share only half). That allowed them to calculate that 62 per cent to 83 per cent of a person’s degree of mosquito attractiveness is determined by DNA, according to a study published Wednesday in the journal PLOS One.

To put that into perspective, other studies have found that genes are about 80 per cent responsible for a person’s height and 50 per cent to 80 per cent responsible for a person’s IQ.

Scientists have suspected for some time that those who find themselves playing the role of pincushion at barbecues and other outdoor gatherings have an unfortunate genetic inheritance.

They knew that biology played a role in either attracting or repelling mosquitoes. For instance, women who are pregnant are a much bigger draw than women who aren’t. They also know that people who are infected with the malaria parasite are more attractive to mosquitoes during the window when the infection can be spread.

Previous studies have shown that mosquitoes are drawn to people (or not) on the basis of their odour. Bacteria that live on skin play a role in producing body odour, but skin cells probably play a role too. If so, that might be controlled by genes.

So the researchers recruited 18 pairs of identical twins and 19 pairs of fraternal twins. All of them were women (so that the gender of the volunteers wouldn’t skew the trial results) and all of them were post-menopausal (so that changes in their menstrual cycle wouldn’t be a factor).

They also collected dozens of female Aedes aegypti mosquitoes, the species that spreads dengue fever. The mosquitoes were five to seven days old, and in their short lives all they had been able to eat was a glucose solution.

In some tests, the researchers compared the odour of one twin’s hand against clean air. In other tests, they tested twin-versus-twin. And in others, both ends of the Y-shaped tube were pumped with clean air.

The experimental results leave no doubt that some people are genetically programmed to be attractive to mosquitoes, and other lucky individuals have DNA that functions as a natural mosquito repellent. The researchers hope to use this knowledge to trick mosquitoes into thinking that everyone is in that second category.

“We could possibly develop a drug, a pill that you might take when you go on holiday that would cause your body to produce natural repellents and would minimise the need to actually put repellents on your skin,” said James Logan, a medical entomologist at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine and the study’s senior author.

The next step for Logan and his team is to figure out which genes are responsible for mosquito magnetism, he said in a video released by his university. Genes involved in the major histocompatibility complex are believed to be involved in body odour, so that’s one place to look, according to the study.

Once the genes are found, public health experts might be able to use that information to control mosquito-borne diseases, such as dengue and malaria, Logan said.

AMMAN — “During times of violence and conflict where death surrounds us, does one lose the innocence of the child within him?” 

Through art and painting, that is a question Syrian artist Nizar Sabour has been trying to answer ever since the conflict in Syria arose. 

“I found it difficult to paint when the conflict back home started because I felt that amidst what we were living in, there was no place for creativity and art,” he said. 

Sabour, who resides in Damascus, opened his solo exhibition ‘Damascene Memoirs’ at Orient Gallery last Tuesday. 

The artist documented his feelings, thoughts and situations that he has been encountering on a daily basis in the war-torn country which is why he wanted the pieces in his exhibition to represent an open diary, journaling life in war. 

“I have added phrases to some paintings because they relate to situations that I have lived through ever since the conflict arose. These are my memoirs on a canvas. 

“When I write ‘we nurture our children to make them escape this country’ I think about how we have hopes for our children to grow and contribute to the future of their country, but then we realise that we have to take them and flee the country, escape from the death that surrounds them and us. That is very painful,” he told The Jordan Times.

The exhibition comprised of different collections that the artist worked on between 2012 and 2014. The first collection, ‘Syrian Obituaries’ represents the blend of different cultures and religious sects in the country, and the different types of obituaries they have for their dead.

The second collection was ‘The Siege’, where Sabour worked on circle-shaped panels symbolising the never-ending blockade that cannot be escaped. “This siege shows how war not only affects the human physically and geographically, but also psychologically,” Sabour said. 

Sabour also worked on a collection of make-believe books, which he titled ‘The book is keeper of life and death’. “These books tackled a variety of subjects such as death, bullets and hope,” he said. 

The exhibition also included ‘Syrian Shreds’ and ‘Qalamoun’, which focused on bigger-scale canvases. 

Qalamoun Mountain is located in the northeast of Damascus and has a cultural heritage that dates back to 10 thousand years. “I wanted to focus on Qalamoun because it has an important Christian heritage. From Ma’alula to Deir Atiyah to Al Nabek, these locations were all affected by the war and were shred to pieces and their churches were robbed and burned to ashes,” the Syrian artist said. 

The Fine Arts professor at the University of Damascus wanted to reflect the attitude of art towards war, hope, love and the human being’s yearning for peace and life.

He said: “Between peace and war and life and death, when one lives in these circumstances his feelings towards life become stronger. The human being is born on this earth to live and build, not to die and ruin.” 

The exhibition runs until May 14 at Orient Gallery.

BALTIMORE — The Hubble Space Telescope survived decades of delays, glitches and blunders to fulfil predictions that it would rewrite science textbooks. But as it moves into the final years of its life, scientists say some of its best work still could be ahead of it.

Hubble’s past and future discoveries will guide the new James Webb Space Telescope, scheduled to launch in 2018, as the next-generation observatory focuses more closely on the Big Bang and helps paint a fuller picture of the properties of distant planets and galaxies.

As Hubble marks the silver anniversary of its April 24, 1990, launch, scientists are celebrating what has been a turbulent yet rewarding history, answering long-held questions about the age and expansion of the universe. But they also expect a bright future with more surprise discoveries as they peer into the cosmos in new ways.

“The combination of these two observatories will be very powerful scientifically,” said Ken Sembach, head of the Hubble mission at Baltimore’s Space Telescope Science Institute. “They’ll be able to follow up on each other’s discoveries.”

The Hubble mission got off to a rocky start. Originally planned to launch in 1983, it was delayed first by hiccups in its assembly and then by the space shuttle Challenger’s explosion in 1986. Once it got into space in 1990, all was still not well — a major error in construction of the telescope’s primary mirror meant images came back to Earth blurry.

The mistake nearly cost scientists future discoveries, inviting “withering criticism” from federal lawmakers wary of a repair mission that would end up adding more than $1 billion to a price tag that was already up to nearly $5 billion through the launch. Maryland Sen. Barbara A. Mikulski, who served as chairwoman of the subcommittee that provided NASA with funding and oversight, was among those who pushed for a fix.

“NASA’s credibility was hanging in the balance,” said Kevin Kelly, chief clerk of the subcommittee, who worked closely with Mikulski. “Had they not fixed this, I would say with much of what they’ve accomplished and done over the last 20 years, they wouldn’t have gotten very far.”

Since the 1993 mission to repair Hubble’s eye, the orbiting telescope has delivered on its promise, shedding new light on how planets form and corroborating the theory behind black holes.

With Hubble, astronomers used measurements of the distance to 18 galaxies to calculate the rate at which the universe is expanding, dubbed the Hubble constant, also named in honour of the astronomer Edwin P. Hubble. From that, they learned that the Big Bang occurred about 13.8 billion years ago.

In recent years, astronomers shifted their focus farther in space, using new instruments to stretch the telescope’s view to just 500 million years after the Big Bang. The telescope’s cumulative cost is estimated at more than $10 billion.

There are more ideas for ways to use Hubble than time to do them. The latest call for proposals for what the telescope should observe next drew 1,100 applications, only about a fifth of which will go forward, said Padi Boyd, the telescope’s deputy project scientist for operations at NASA Goddard Space Flight Centre in Greenbelt, Md., which also manages the telescope.

But Hubble is up for the challenge, she said. After so many years circling 547 kilometres above Earth at a speed of 8km each second, Hubble is at what she called “the peak of its capability”. The telescope underwent five servicing missions, starting with the critical repair in 1993 and ending with a final makeover in 2009 that added two key new instruments and fixed two others.

Officials aim to keep Hubble operating for at least another five years, depending on how long engineers can keep its gyroscopes working. The devices help Hubble navigate and pinpoint objects in space, and one of six on board already has failed. But project scientists are working to preserve the remaining five, and to extend Hubble’s ability to target distant objects even after more of the gyroscopes inevitably fail, Boyd said.

Barring unexpected problems with Hubble or delays for the James Webb telescope, astronomers will be able to use the observatories in tandem for at least a couple of years.

While Hubble sees the universe in a range from ultraviolet to near-infrared light, including visible light, Webb will look in the infrared. Using both to look at the same objects will offer a fuller picture of their composition and behaviour, astronomers said.

For example, Hubble has found distant planets of interest, and scientists have learned much about the characteristics of any atmosphere surrounding them using techniques that analyse how their appearance changes as they pass in front of stars. But a spectrometer aboard the Webb telescope will reveal more about what elements are present, said Pascal Oesch, a postdoctoral fellow at Yale University studying galaxy structure, formation and evolution.

Meanwhile, Hubble’s observations are helping inform scientists’ priorities and wish lists for the Webb. The Webb telescope mission is expected to last five-and-a-half years, though it could be extended to 10 years or more, so the more Hubble can guide its precious time, the better.

“We don’t want to spend time doing things we can do right now,” Oesch said.

Bill Ochs, the Webb telescope’s project manager at NASA Goddard, said recent accomplishments in its development include a successful unfolding of the telescope’s massive sun shield and final assembly of the plane to which its 18 mirrors will be mounted.

Many hurdles remain, though. The telescope’s makers at Goddard must replace faulty wiring manufactured for the back of that mirror plane, potentially delaying assembly of key optical components of the telescope. Ochs said he doesn’t expect the problem to affect the telescope’s larger timeline.

So far, Webb has escaped some of the pressure that Hubble faced.

“I think Congress is still pleased with the progress we’re making,” Ochs said. “They ask questions and they’re obviously concerned about risk, but overall, I think they’re pleased.”

Getting it into orbit before Hubble’s demise also could make a difference in inspiring the next generation of astronomers. Hubble kept many tenured astronomers busy for most of their careers, but for some, the observatory’s launch is at best a childhood memory.

Adam Kowalski was a six-year-old when the telescope began its orbit, and remembers seeing its images in astronomy magazines and newspapers as a young boy.

But within those very images, depicted on posters that still hang on the wall of his childhood bedroom in Ohio, could be the same stars the 31-year-old now uses Hubble to study as a research scientist at NASA Goddard: “Those were my inspiration in my early teens.”

LOS ANGELES — Scientists are now more certain than ever that oil and gas drilling is causing hundreds upon hundreds of earthquakes across the US, with the evidence coming in from one study after another.

So far, the quakes have been mostly small and have done little damage beyond cracking plaster, toppling bricks and rattling nerves. But seismologists warn that the shaking can dramatically increase the chances of bigger, more dangerous quakes.

Up to now, the oil and gas industry has generally argued that any such link requires further study. But the rapidly mounting evidence could bring heavier regulation down on drillers and make it more difficult for them to get projects approved.

The potential for man-made quakes “is an important and legitimate concern that must be taken very seriously by regulators and industry”, said Jason Bordoff, founding director of the Centre on Global Energy Policy at Columbia University.

He said companies and states can reduce the risk by taking such steps as monitoring operations more closely, imposing tighter standards and recycling wastewater from drilling instead of injecting it underground.

A series of government and academic studies over the past few years — including at least two reports released this week alone — has added to the body of evidence implicating the US drilling boom that has created a bounty of jobs and tax revenue over the past decade or so.

On Thursday, the US Geological Survey released the first comprehensive maps pinpointing more than a dozen areas in the central and eastern US that have been jolted by quakes that the researchers said were triggered by drilling. The report said man-made quakes tied to industry operations have been on the rise.

Scientists have mainly attributed the spike to the injection of wastewater deep underground, a practice they say can activate dormant faults. Only a few cases of shaking have been blamed on fracking, in which large volumes of water, sand and chemicals are pumped into rock formations to crack them open and free oil or gas.

“The picture is very clear” that wastewater injection can cause faults to move, said USGS geophysicist William Ellsworth.

Until recently, Oklahoma — one of the biggest energy-producing states — had been cautious about linking the spate of quakes to drilling. But the Oklahoma Geological Survey acknowledged earlier this week that it is “very likely” that recent seismic activity was caused by the injection of wastewater into disposal wells.

Earthquake activity in Oklahoma in 2013 was 70 times greater than it was before 2008, state geologists reported. Oklahoma historically recorded an average of 1.5 quakes of magnitude 3 or greater each year. It is now seeing an average of 2.5 such quakes each day, according to geologists.

Yet another study, this one published Tuesday in the journal Nature Communications, connected a swarm of small quakes west of Fort Worth, Texas, to nearby natural gas wells and wastewater disposal.

The American Petroleum Institute said the industry is working with scientists and regulators “to better understand the issue and work toward collaborative solutions”.

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA)said there are no plans for new regulations as a result of the USGS study.

“We knew there would be challenges there, but they can be overcome,” EPA administrator Gina McCarthy said Thursday at an energy conference in Houston.

For decades, earthquakes were an afterthought in the central and eastern US, which worried more about tornadoes, floods and hurricanes. Since 2009, quakes have sharply increased, and in some surprising places.

The ground has been trembling in regions that were once seismically stable, including parts of Alabama, Arkansas, Colorado, Kansas, New Mexico, Ohio, Oklahoma and Texas.

You do not need to feel bad if you still use passwords.

The countless biometrics means of personal identification have not yet completely killed the time-honoured password system. Eye iris scan, fingerprints, palm print, face and voice recognition have found their way in many applications, but passwords still have a long life to live.

Tech heads find passwords antiquated, unsecure and prone to being forgotten. It’s all true, but one has to admit that the simplicity of the concept often outweighs every argument against it. Not to mention that passwords are free and don’t need the additional electronics that biometrics require, that you have to pay for and that can fail anytime just like any equipment or device.

Beside, over the years users have learnt that by creating passwords that have 10 characters and more, and by using a combination of capital and small alphabet letters, numbers and special characters, they generate this way complex passwords that are relatively secure and are harder to crack by ill-intentioned third parties. 

The Central Bank of Jordan has instructed banks to ensure that all credit cards have a PIN code assigned to them and that has to be entered manually to validate each transaction, so as to provide better protection to the card owner in case of card theft. A PIN (Personal Identification Number) is nothing but a password.

So it’s understood, while personal identification methods based on biometrics keep making progress, the most widely used system to date remains passwords.

Perhaps the main weakness of the concept is not the less-than-perfect security it provides as much as it is the difficulty one has to memorise a large number of passwords. How do you do that now that we all have to create, maintain and remember tens if not hundreds of passwords? 

Everything today requires a password (or access code): online banking, computers, smartphones, credit cards, social networks, e-mail, online government services (tax, municipality, etc.), and virtually every account you create on the web, whether for shopping, playing online games or other. You easily reach or exceed 100 passwords. Some users admit to maintaining a list of 200 passwords and more.

Remembering every password you use is almost impossible once you exceed say 20 or 30, especially if you made sure to create complex passwords, not to mention that some sensitive sites, online banking more particularly, ask you to change your access code at regular intervals.

There is only one way to properly manage a large number of codes. It consists of storing them in a secure database or Excel sheet and to assign one very strong and complex password that lets you open this database or Excel sheet where you can search and retrieve the other passwords. Naturally the code for the database or Excel is the one to memorise and never to forget, or else it is doomsday and the usual nervous breakdown.

Whereas an Excel sheet will do, a good database is a better solution. It provides more flexibility and easier search. Ideally it should be a database that you would keep on your smartphone, for understandable, practical reasons. By definition, a password is information you may need anytime, anywhere, not just at home or at work. Therefore a smartphone makes the best device since you always have it at hand.

There are countless database applications on the web to manage passwords, for Android and iOS, and that can do the trick perfectly. Most are free and some cost anything from one to five dinars. Software developers have been making them for years now, ever since the “pocket computer” or PDA (Personal Digital Assistant) phenomenon started more than 15 years ago. However, with the recent surge of fancy smartphones, this type of application has been greatly perfected now. It is well designed, safe and easy to use.

When searching AppStore or Google play, just enter “password database” as search key and you’ll be presented with several apps. Then you’ll have to choose one. It is not always an easy task but reading users reviews would certainly help.

LOS ANGELES — Carolin Wood, an artist and graduate student from Brooklyn’s trendy Greenpoint neighbourhood, has a secret that she keeps from her husband and some foodie friends. Once a month, she takes her two young children to McDonald’s for inexpensive breakfasts or ice cream.

“We call it our ‘sneaky meal’ because my husband thinks it’s absolutely disgusting,” said Wood, 35. “He doesn’t want to know anything about it.”

Even though Wood has fond memories of her own childhood visits to McDonald’s, that doesn’t mean she thinks the food is healthy. At home, she buys organic milk and meat as often as a tight family budget allows.

The fact that young mothers like Wood are teaching their children not to tell their dads that they’ve been to McDonald’s may underscore how hard it may be for the world’s largest restaurant chain to remake its image and revive US sales. To lure back consumers, McDonald’s Corp’s new Chief Executive Steve Easterbrook recently pledged to eliminate chickens fed human antibiotics at its US restaurants.

That won’t make a difference for Wood, who said she’s never eaten a Chicken McNugget and has no plans to try one, even after the antibiotic change.

McDonald’s didn’t comment for this story. The company doesn’t break out what percentage of its customers are young adults and/or mothers.

“There is still a negative health connotation,” said Morningstar restaurant analyst R.J. Hottovy. “It can be fixed, but it isn’t an easy fix.”

Hottovy said he expects McDonald’s to eventually turn around its business, but not within the next couple of years. 

Sixty per cent of American adults would like more restaurants to serve antibiotic-free meat, according to a recent Reuters/Ipsos survey of 1,364 participants. Among parents with children under the age of 18, 40 per cent said they would be more likely to take the kids to McDonald’s if it had antibiotic-free chicken on the menu. The Reuters/Ipsos online poll was conducted between March 27 and 30, roughly two weeks after McDonald’s announced its plan for antibiotics in chicken.

According to another poll by Morgan Stanley of 3,000 US adults, the cohort known as Millennials, generally defined as being 18 to 34 years old, care more about all-natural and organic ingredients than older generations.

Millennials also are more likely than other groups to eat out on a weekly basis. And while they still eat more traditional fast food than other generations, they express more dissatisfaction with the category, according to the Morgan Stanley poll.

That helps explain why chains like Chick-fil-A and Chipotle Mexican Grill Inc., which have committed to sourcing 100 per cent antibiotic-free meats, have been taking a bite out of McDonald’s sales. More than one-third of parents who answered the Reuters/Ipsos poll said they take their children to McDonald’s at most a few times a year.

Multiple makeovers

A series of critical documentaries over roughly the last decade, including “Super Size Me” in 2004, amplified consumer concerns about the health effect of eating fast food.

McDonald’s has repeatedly tried to change that image. Among other things, it introduced salads to its menu and tweaked its Happy Meals for children by adding apple slices and cutting the french-fry portion by more than half.

Last year, McDonald’s sought direct feedback from its US diners with an online campaign called “Our food. Your questions”. Frequent queries included “Is ‘pink slime’ in a Chicken McNugget?” and “Why doesn’t your food rot?”

Food industry experts have said the move towards mostly antibiotic-free chicken will accelerate similar efforts by other fast-food chains and major supermarkets. It may also help curb the rise of antibiotic-resistant superbugs that contribute to thousands of US deaths every year.

Samantha Trujillo, 33, a stay-at-home mother of four from Yuma, Arizona, said McDonald’s vow to wean chickens off most antibiotics makes her feel a little bit better about the chain and its food.

“I probably would eat the chicken a little more often,” said Trujillo, who takes her kids out every month or two to get Happy Meals and visit the air-conditioned play area for a respite from Arizona’s sweltering heat.

Asked whether McDonald’s antibiotic move could move the needle for the company that saw 2014 revenue, profit and traffic fall, Mark Kalinowski, restaurant analyst for Janney Capital Markets, said: “My best guess is that it’ll help only a little bit at most.”

People who care about antibiotic-free meats want them to be completely antibiotic free, Kalinowski said. “If you’re going to do it, do it. Don’t be half pregnant.”

Amanda Libby, 46, a mom from Danvers, Massachusetts, agreed.

She used to take her two sons for Happy Meals fairly regularly during baseball season, something she now regrets after seeing films like 2011’s “Forks Over Knives”, which says that many common diseases can be prevented by avoiding processed foods. She now only occasionally allows her boys to eat McDonald’s hamburgers, and would like the chain to use 100 per cent antibiotic-free meats before making more frequent trips.

“Mostly [antibiotic-free] won’t cut it for me,” said Libby.

LONDON — A French chef who inspired a tough kitchen character in the hit animated film “Ratatouille” was named the world’s best female chef on Wednesday.

Helene Darroze, 48, has an eponymous restaurant in Paris and another in the Connaught hotel in London, which has two Michelin stars.

Darroze was named the world’s best female chef by Britain’s Restaurant magazine, and is to collect her prize at “The World’s 50 Best Restaurants” awards in London in June.

“It is an honour to win the award because there are talented female chefs all over the world and I imagine it’s hard to choose just one,” Darroze said in a statement.

“My hope is that the winners of this award inspire young women, including my daughters, to follow their passion and work hard to hone their skill regardless of their profession.”

Well known in the restaurant world, Darroze built her career as a single mum with two adopted daughters and inspired the character Colette in Disney Pixar’s 2007 “Ratatouille”, a tale of a rat who can cook and begins helping at a prestigious French restaurant.

“Haute cuisine is an antiquated hierarchy built upon rules written by stupid old men, rules designed to make it impossible for women to enter this world,” Colette says in the film.

“But still I am here. How did this happen? Because I am the toughest cook in this kitchen.”

Restaurant magazine said that Darroze was “loved and admired” across the industry and said the chef was far sweeter than her feisty cartoon counterpart.

“The character’s aggressive kitchen style is far from a reflection of Darroze,” the magazine said. “The big heart she reveals towards the end of the movie is more fitting.”

A fourth-generation chef who was cooking dessert for her parents’ dinner parties by age 12, Darroze trained under top chef Alain Ducasse, took over her father’s restaurant in 1995 and opened her own in 1999.

Darroze credits her grandfather with inspiring her seasonal and ingredient-led cooking style, which has infused British produce such as Cornish crab into classic French cuisine.

Her signature dishes include poached lobster in seaweed butter with white asparagus and bottarga breadcrumbs; and foie gras from her home region of Landes in southwestern France with cocoa, calamansi fruit and gingerbread.

The inspiration for her dishes comes from anything from her travels to her daughters, eight-year-old Charlotte and six-year-old Quiterie.

Darroze succeeds Brazilian-born Helena Rizzo of Mani restaurant in Sao Paulo, who was crowned in the 2014 edition of the awards, which also nominate the world’s best restaurant, an accolade currently held by Denmark’s Noma.