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How About Some Tasty Woolly Rhinoceros for Dinner?

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Ancient DNA from dental plaque is revealing intriguing new information about Neanderthals, including specific menu items in their diet such as woolly rhinoceros and wild mushrooms, as well as their use of plant-based medicine to cope with pain and illness. Scientists said on Wednesday they genetically analyzed plaque from 48,000-year-old Neanderthal remains from Spain and 36,000-year-old remains from Belgium. The plaque, material that forms on and between teeth, contained food particles as well as microbes from the mouth and the respiratory and gastrointestinal tracts. At Belgium’s Spy Cave site, which at the time was a hilly grassy environment home to big game, the Neanderthal diet was meat-based with woolly rhinoceros and wild sheep, along with wild mushrooms. Some 12,000 years earlier, at Spain’s El Sidron Cave site, which was a densely forested environment likely lacking large animals, the diet was wild mushrooms, pine nuts, moss and tree bark, with no …

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U.S. Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross said on Wednesday that substantial negotiations to revamp the North American Free Trade Agreement likely will not get started until the latter part of this year and could take a year to complete. Ross, speaking to Bloomberg Television, said U.S. legal notification requirements with partners Mexico and Canada create some built-in delays to the start of substantial discussions. “You’re talking probably the latter part of this year before the real negotiations get underway,” Ross said. NAFTA renegotiation ‘complex’ The 79-year-old billionaire investor, who was sworn into his job just last week, said he hoped the renegotiations could be completed within a year, but it was unclear how long it would take to see benefits like a smaller U.S. trade deficit with Mexico. He said the NAFTA renegotiation would be “complex,” with more than 20 chapters in the 23-year-old agreement that needed to be modernized, along …

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Baldness is inevitable in many aging men, but it may be of particular concern to men who are short. A new study has found that males of short stature are at increased risk of losing their hair prematurely, in addition to a number of other health conditions. The study analyzed the genomes of more than 20,000 men, about half of whom had gone bald well before they turned 50. The other half of participants had no hair loss and were used for comparison. The study included men from the United States, Switzerland, the Netherlands, Germany, the United Kingdom, Greece and Australia. The researchers identified 63 alterations in the human genome that increase the risk of premature baldness. And in many instances, the DNA regions overlapped with genes for short stature. The investigators at the University of Bonn in Germany also found overlaps in bald men for a number of …

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A freakishly balmy February broke more than 11,700 local daily records for warmth in the United States, but it didn’t quite beat 1954 for the warmest February on record, climate scientists said. The average temperature last month was 41.2 degrees – 7.3 degrees warmer than normal but three-tenths a degree behind the record, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) reported Wednesday. It was unseasonably toasty for most of the country east of the Rockies, but a cool Pacific Northwest kept the national record from falling, said NOAA climate scientist Jake Crouch. Chicago had no snow. Oklahoma hit 99 degrees. Texas and Louisiana had their hottest February. NOAA said local weather stations broke or tied warm temperature records 11,743 times but set cold records only 418 times. An international science team’s computer analysis of causes of extreme weather calculated that man-made global warming tripled the …

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U.S. lawmakers are moving quickly to learn more about Russian meddling in last year’s presidential election and to try to determine whether there is any substance to President Donald Trump’s so-far unfounded claim that former President Barack Obama wiretapped his Trump Tower headquarters in the weeks before the voting. Senators and congressmen on intelligence panels have been visiting the Central Intelligence Agency outside Washington in recent days to look at raw intelligence reports about Russian cybersecurity attacks aimed at helping Trump defeat his Democratic challenger, former U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. The lawmakers say they have been looking at binders of classified information the CIA collected, with more visits planned to the highly secure facility. Both the Senate and House intelligence committees plan public hearings in the coming weeks. The U.S. intelligence community already has concluded that Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered the hacking into the computer of Clinton’s …

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Ernestine Shepherd is the world’s oldest competitive female body builder. VOA’s Shahzad Khokhar caught up with her in Baltimore, Maryland. This is Ernestine’s story, in her own words. …

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A senior U.S. diplomat said Tuesday that China’s objections to deployment of a controversial U.S. missile defense system in South Korea were “unwarranted,” and he urged China to redirect its response to “a better use.” The United States has deployed the first elements of its Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) missile defense system in South Korea, following North Korea’s launch of at least four ballistic missiles Monday. Beijing strongly opposed deployment of the advanced U.S. weapons system as an unnecessary and provocative military escalation, and it said the powerful radar the system uses to track incoming missiles also posed a potential threat to China. State media called for a boycott of South Korean goods and sanctions after the Korean conglomerate Lotte Group approved a land swap that paved the way for the THAAD deployment. “We think China’s objections, if in fact they are based on China’s security concerns, …

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Amid reports that the White House is reviewing its policy toward North Korea, the former head of the U.S. Pacific Command says it’s crucial to consider a full range of options — including the use of military force, if necessary — to deter the growing nuclear threat from Pyongyang. In an interview with VOA Tuesday, Admiral Samuel Locklear, who led the U.S. Pacific Command from 2012 to 2015, said “dealing across the spectrum of options of how to deal with North Korea is becoming more urgent,” given the communist state’s apparent eagerness to demonstrate its nuclear capability. “Certainly there are many elements of national and coalition power that range from diplomatic to economic,” Locklear said, “but at the base of all of those would be military power that the U.S. and its allies must continue to consider, particularly when there remains a significant threat such as from what we see …

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A day after President Donald Trump signed a revised travel ban, attorneys for Hawaii said the state plans to challenge that order as well. The state wants to amend its existing lawsuit challenging Trump’s previous order to contest the revised one, according to a motion filed Tuesday in federal court in Honolulu. The new order bars new visas for people from six Muslim-majority countries and temporarily shuts down America’s refugee program, affecting would-be visitors and immigrants from Iran, Syria, Somalia, Sudan, Yemen and Libya. Hawaii’s lawsuit had been on hold while a nationwide injunction on the initial ban remained in place. This is the second time Hawaii has asked a judge to lift the stay in order to file an amended lawsuit. Last month, U.S. District Court Judge Derrick Watson in Honolulu allowed the state to file an amended lawsuit adding the Muslim Association of Hawaii’s imam as a plaintiff. …

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The latest alleged bombshell meant to send shockwaves through the U.S. intelligence community is stoking renewed fears about the ability to secure classified information. But former intelligence officials say, at least for now, it is unlikely the apparent leak will do significant damage to U.S. cyber capabilities. The online whistleblower organization WikiLeaks Tuesday published thousands of pages of what it described as “the entire hacking capacity” of the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency. VOA was unable to independently verify the authenticity of the 8,771 documents published on the WikiLeaks website, but cybersecurity experts and former intelligence officials said many of the documents appeared to be real. In a statement, WikiLeaks said the CIA “lost control of the majority of its hacking arsenal.” The group added the spy agency’s cybertools had been disseminated among some former U.S. government hackers and that one then shared them with WikiLeaks. A U.S. intelligence official, speaking …

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Researchers are developing a blood test that can tell not only whether someone has cancer, but in what organ the tumors are lurking. The test could mean more prompt, potentially life-saving treatment for patients. Researchers describe their blood test as a kind of dual authentication process. It is able to detect the presence of dying tumor cells in blood as well as tissue signatures, to signal to clinicians which organ is affected by the cancer. There already are tests that screen for traces of DNA released by dying cancer cells. Such blood tests show promise in the treatment of patients to see how well anti-cancer therapies are working. But researchers at the University of California, San Diego discovered a new clue, using organ-specific DNA signatures, that leads them to the particular organ that is affected. The finding makes the new blood test potentially useful as a screening tool in people …

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Gorging on bacon, skimping on nuts? These are among food habits that new research links with deaths from heart disease, strokes and diabetes. Overeating or not eating enough of 10 specific foods and nutrients contributes to nearly half of U.S. deaths from these causes, the study suggests. ”Good” foods that were undereaten are nuts and seeds; seafood rich in omega-3 fats, including salmon and sardines; fruits and vegetables; and whole grains. ”Bad” foods or nutrients that were overeaten include salt and salty foods; processed meats including bacon, bologna and hot dogs; red meat including steaks and hamburgers; and sugary drinks. The research is based on U.S. government data showing there were about 700,000 deaths in 2012 from heart disease, strokes and diabetes, and on an analysis of national health surveys that asked participants about their eating habits. Most didn’t eat the recommended amounts of the foods studied. The 10 ingredients …

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The Trump administration is moving to roll back federal fuel-economy requirements that would have forced automakers to increase significantly the efficiency of new cars and trucks, a key part of former President Barack Obama’s strategy to combat global warming. The Environmental Protection Agency is close to an announcement reversing a decision made in the waning days of the Obama administration to lock in strict gas mileage requirements for cars and light trucks through 2025. Automakers asked EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt to discard a January 13 decision that requires the fleet of new cars to average a real-world figure of 36 miles per gallon. Obama rules cost jobs? The automakers said the Obama rules could add thousands of dollars to the price of new cars and cost more than a million jobs. Lawmakers, industry groups and environmentalists say the administration has signaled it plans to take this step. An announcement could …

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Researchers at New York University’s School of Medicine found that diabetes increased the risk of cancer death among Asians by an average of 26 percent, a statistic similar in the West. Data for the new study drew on an analysis of 770,000 people with Type 2 diabetes throughout East and South Asia. Diabetics were followed for an average of 13 years to see if they developed cancer and what types. During that time more than 37,300 cancer deaths were identified. Yu Chen, an epidemiology professor at the NYU School of Medicine’s Department of Population Health who was the study’s lead author, says Asians with Type 2 diabetes are more likely to be diagnosed with rarer cancers than Westerners, including cancers of the liver, thyroid and kidney which was double the risk compared to non-diabetics in Asia. There was also a 2.7 percent increased risk of cancer of the endometrium and …

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Brazil’s federal environmental agency, Ibama, launched on Tuesday a centralized database to track timber from source to sale, a vital step in the fight against illegal logging in the Amazon. The system, known as Sinaflor, allows individual trees to be electronically tagged and monitored as they are cut down and pass through the supply chain, with regulators able to check the database via their cell phones while on patrol. With built-in satellite mapping, timber being sold as legal can be checked against the exact area of licensed commercial production it is claimed to originate from. The system marks a step change from the current system, which environmentalists criticize as being open to fraud and human error as databases are isolated, poorly managed and cannot be easily accessed to verify documentation attached to timber. “The new system offers a much more comprehensive process of control,” Suely Araújo, president of Ibama, said …

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The U.S. State Department held its first, much-anticipated briefing Tuesday since President Donald Trump’s inauguration in January, and faced a lot of reporters’ pent-up questions about the forging of American foreign policy in the new administration. Journalists and other long-time observers of the State Department have been asking when daily news briefings would resume, why they have heard so little from new Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, and why so many senior positions— including Tillerson’s deputy — have not been filled in the department. Acting Spokesman Mark Toner rejected suggestions that the State Department has been marginalized in the new Trump administration: “Secretary Tillerson is very engaged with the White House, very engaged with the president — speaks to him frequently, was over there just yesterday, I believe, for a meeting. And I can assure everyone that the secretary’s voice, the State Department’s voice, is heard loud and clear in …

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U.S. President Donald Trump’s administration pledged on Tuesday to show “great strictness” over restrictions on Iran’s nuclear activities imposed by a deal with major powers, but gave little indication of what that might mean for the agreement. The 2015 deal between Iran and six major powers restricts Tehran’s nuclear program in exchange for the lifting of international economic sanctions against the Islamic Republic. Trump has called the agreement “the worst deal ever negotiated.” His administration is now carrying out a review of the accord which could take months, but it has said little about where it stands on specific issues. The Trump administration also gave few clues about any potential policy shift on Tuesday in a statement to a quarterly meeting of the U.N. nuclear watchdog’s Board of Governors. “The United States will approach questions of JCPOA interpretation, implementation, and enforcement with great strictness indeed,” the statement to the International …

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All 100 U.S. senators have signed a letter to the nation’s top three law enforcement officials asking for more federal help for Jewish centers and schools dealing with numerous bomb threats. “These cowardly acts aim to create an atmosphere of fear and disrupt the important programs and services offered by JCCs [Jewish community centers] to everyone in the communities they serve,” the letter said. The letter was sent to the heads of the FBI and Department of Homeland Security and to Attorney General Jeff Sessions. The senators wrote that these law enforcement agencies can provide “crucial assistance” to JCCs and synagogues in providing security, deterring threats, and investigating and prosecuting those who make such threats. The senators also condemned vandalism at Jewish cemeteries in Philadelphia and St. Louis, calling it “completely unacceptable and un-American.” While House spokesman Sean Spicer said Tuesday that the Trump administration would continue to condemn the …

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Todd Schmitz from Boscobel, Wisconsin, discusses his feeling on immigration with VOA. “Just be a little more diligent about watching who comes in and out,” he said. “I mean, the majority of people aren’t here to kill me and my family, or Americans. But there are a few that make it bad for everybody that try to come into America just to visit or whatever the case may be. I think there could be more, not necessarily more stringent laws, just laws that we already have to be enforced.” …

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Ukrainian Foreign Minister Pavlo Klimkin says U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson has assured him that Washington will continue to support Kyiv in its standoff with Russia. Klimkin spoke to reporters after meeting at the State Department Tuesday with Tillerson, the former ExxonMobil CEO who now serves as President Donald Trump’s top diplomat. Their meeting came amid ongoing concerns in Ukraine, and among its supporters in the West, that Trump could soften the U.S. line on Russia, given his stated desire to repair relations with Moscow. Trump’s new administration, however, has so far publicly supported the continuation of sanctions imposed on Russia following its 2014 seizure of Ukraine’s Crimean Peninsula, and its support for separatists in the country’s east. Ukraine a ‘key partner’ of U.S. “[Tillerson] assured me that the United States would consistently continue to support Ukraine in its struggle against Russian aggression, that Ukraine is a key partner …

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Minor floods caused by rising sea levels may end up costing U.S. coastal communities as much money and resources as major hurricane disasters, U.S. scientists said. As climate change causes sea levels to rise, such “nuisance flooding” is expected to become more frequent and costly for cities like Washington, San Francisco, Boston and Miami, researchers said. Over the last 20 years, Washington has endured more than 94 hours a year of nuisance flooding. By 2050, the capital could see as many as 700 hours of flooding a year, the scientists estimated in a study published in the American Geophysical Union journal Earth’s Future. “Since these events are not extreme, they don’t get a lot of attention,” said Amir AghaKouchak, a professor of civil and environmental engineering at the University of California-Irvine and co-author of the study. Inconvenience to public The National Ocean Service defines nuisance flooding as “flooding that …

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The secret to better job satisfaction may be as easy as having a healthy sex life, a new study suggests. According to researchers at Oregon State University, married employees who “prioritized sex at home” were better workers and enjoyed work more. On the other hand, the research showed that people who bring work-related stress home “impinges on employees’ sex lives,” leading researchers to recommend leaving work at the office. The reason sex helps workers enjoy work more is that it releases dopamine and oxytocin, both of which are mood enhancers the effects of which can last into the next day. They added that the effects can last for at least 24 hours and worked equally among men and women. “We make jokes about people having a ‘spring in their step,’ but it turns out this is actually a real thing and we should pay attention to it,” said Keith Leavitt, …

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In a pediatric ward at Queen Elizabeth Central hospital, the largest referral health facility in Malawi, mothers look frustrated because of a long wait for a nurse to check on their children. A visit to other outpatient wards reveals more packed waiting rooms. Such is the situation in public hospitals across Malawi where 65 percent of nursing positions remain vacant. The shortages leave the country’s public health system in dire need of nurses, and recruiting trained staff remains difficult as many registered nurses prefer the higher pay and better working conditions they can find in private hospitals or abroad. Malawi’s National Association of Nurses and Midwifery president, Dorothy Ngoma, says it’s a matter of economics. “They quit on us because we cannot pay them well. Most of them are joining the NGOs or to private [hospitals]. So they go where they are paid a bit more money and also …

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Facebook has launched a tool it says will help flag so-called fake news. The tool adds a “disputed news” flag on stories that have been deemed fake by what Facebook says are third parties, including Snopes, Politifact and Factcheck.org. Facebook announced the disputed news flag in December, but it appears it only has gone live in the past day or so, according to news reports. If a story is flagged by some of Facebook’s 1.86 billion users, the company will determine which to send to the third parties. If the story is fake, it will still be on Facebook, but will carry a notice that it was disputed along with an explanation about why. Disputed stories can still be shared, but users will be warned they are sharing fake news. According to USA Today, one fake news story about how President Trump’s Android phone was the source of White House …

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