CAPE CANAVERAL, Florida — Boeing will attempt to return its problem-plagued capsule from the International Space Station later this week — with empty seats. NASA said Wednesday that everything is on track for the Starliner capsule to undock from the space station Friday evening. The fully automated capsule will aim for a touchdown in New Mexico’s White Sands Missile Range six hours later. NASA’s two stuck astronauts, who flew up on Starliner, will remain behind at the orbiting lab. They’ll ride home with SpaceX in February, eight months after launching on what should have been a weeklong test flight. Thruster trouble and helium leaks kept delaying their return until NASA decided that it was too risky for them to accompany Starliner back as originally planned. “It’s been a journey to get here, and we’re excited to have Starliner return,” said NASA’s commercial crew program manager Steve Stich. NASA’s Butch Wilmore and …

SYDNEY — Global concerns over plastic pollution and cuts to fossil fuel use are behind a new Australian-led initiative to develop a new generation of 100 percent compostable plastic. Experts estimate that more than 170 trillion pieces of plastic are floating in the world’s oceans. There are growing concerns about the impact of micro-plastics on health and the environment.     The Bioplastics Innovation Hub aims to “revolutionize” plastic packaging by making biologically-made plastic that can break down in compost, land or water.   The aim is to produce water bottles, for example, using bioplastics derived from waste products from the food industry.  The green plastic scheme brings together the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organization, the CSIRO – Australia’s national science agency – and Murdoch University in Perth in a multi-million dollar collaboration with industry partners.  Andrew Whiteley, a CSIRO research program director, told VOA the technology could be ground-breaking. “What we are …

LONDON — The growing mpox outbreaks in Africa that triggered the World Health Organization’s emergency declaration are largely the result of decades of neglect and the global community’s inability to stop sporadic epidemics among a population with little immunity against the smallpox-related disease, leading African scientists said Tuesday. According to Dr. Dimie Ogoina, who chaired WHO’s mpox emergency committee, negligence has led to a new, more transmissible version of the virus emerging in countries with few resources to stop outbreaks. Mpox, also known as monkeypox, had been spreading mostly undetected for years in Africa before the disease prompted the 2022 outbreak in more than 70 countries, Ogoina said at a virtual news conference. “What we are witnessing in Africa now is different from the global outbreak in 2022,” he said. While that outbreak was overwhelmingly focused in gay and bisexual men, mpox in Africa is now being spread via sexual transmission …

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DEIR AL-BALAH, Gaza Strip — Palestinian health authorities and United Nations agencies on Sunday began a large-scale campaign of vaccinations against polio in the Gaza Strip, hoping to prevent an outbreak in the territory that has been ravaged by the ongoing Israel-Hamas war. Authorities plan to vaccinate children in central Gaza until Wednesday before moving on to the more devastated northern and southern parts of the strip. The campaign began with a small number of vaccinations on Saturday and aims to reach about 640,000 children. The World Health Organization said Thursday that Israel has agreed to limited pauses in the fighting to facilitate the campaign. There were initial reports of Israeli strikes in central Gaza early Sunday, but it was not immediately known if anyone was killed or wounded. Hospitals in Deir al-Balah and Nuseirat confirmed that the campaign had begun early Sunday. Israel said Saturday that the vaccination program would …

PATERZELL, Germany — How do you teach a bird how, and where, to fly? The distinctive northern bald ibis, hunted essentially to extinction by the 17th century, was revived by breeding and rewilding efforts over the last two decades. But the birds — known for their distinctive black-and-iridescent green plumage, bald red head and long curved beak — don’t instinctively know which direction to fly to migrate without the guidance of wild-born elders. So a team of scientists and conservationists stepped in as foster parents and flight instructors. “We have to teach them the migration route,” said biologist Johannes Fritz. The northern bald ibis once soared over North Africa, the Arabian Peninsula and much of Europe, including southern Germany’s Bavaria. The migratory birds were also considered a delicacy, and the bird, known as the Waldrapp in German, disappeared from Europe, though a few colonies elsewhere survived. The efforts of Fritz and …

CHEYENNE, Wyoming — A “mega den” of hundreds of rattlesnakes in Colorado is getting even bigger now that late summer is here and babies are being born. Thanks to livestream video, scientists studying the den on a craggy hillside in Colorado are learning more about these enigmatic — and often misunderstood — reptiles. They’re observing as the youngsters, called pups, slither over and between adult females on lichen-encrusted rocks. The public can watch too on the Project RattleCam website and help with important work including how to tell the snakes apart. Since researchers put their remote camera online in May, several snakes have become known in a chat room and to scientists by names including “Woodstock,” “Thea” and “Agent 008.” The live feed, which draws as many as 500 people at a time online, on Thursday showed a tangle of baby snakes with tiny nubs for rattles. They have a lot …

MANILA, Philippines — A Vietnamese doctor who has helped seek justice for victims of the powerful defoliant dioxin “Agent Orange” used by U.S. forces during the Vietnam War is among this year’s winners of the Ramon Magsaysay Awards — regarded as Asia’s version of the Nobel Prizes.  Other winners announced on Saturday were a group of doctors who struggled to secure adequate health care for Thailand’s rural poor, an Indonesian environmental defender, a Japanese animator who tackles complex issues for children, and a Bhutanese academician promoting his country’s cultural heritage to help current predicaments.  First given in 1958, the annual awards are named after a Philippine president who died in a 1957 plane crash, and honor “greatness of spirit” in selfless service to people across Asia.  “The award has celebrated those who challenge the status quo with integrity by courageously confronting systemic injustices, transform critical sectors through groundbreaking solutions that drive …

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