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The US space agency NASA has again postponed the launch of the space shuttle Discovery, saying it will not occur before February 27. The launch, initially scheduled for February 12, had already been delayed until February 19.

NASA said Friday it will hold a news conference on February 20, following a review of space shuttle Discovery’s readiness for flight and an assessment of shuttle flow control valve testing.

The shuttle Endeavour had its flow control valve damaged during its mission in November.

Space dust interferes with the observation of distant stars and annoys astronomers just as much as the household variety does.’We not only do not know what the stuff is, but we do not know where it is made or how it gets into space,’ said Donald York, professor in astronomy at the University of Chicago.

But now York and University of Toledo’s Adolf Witt and their collaborators have observed a double-star system that displays all the characteristics that astronomers suspect are associated with dust production.

The double star system, designated HD 44179, sits within what astronomers call the Red Rectangle, an interstellar cloud of gas and dust (nebula) located approximately 2,300 light years from earth, said a Chicago release.

One of the double stars is of a type that astronomers regard as a likely source of dust. These stars, unlike the sun, have already burned all the hydrogen in their cores. Labelled post-AGB (post-asymptotic giant branch) stars, these objects collapsed after burning their initial hydrogen, until they could generate enough heat to burn a new fuel, helium.

The Astrophysical Journal will publish a paper reporting their discovery in March.

Spiking and sinking levels of a hormone that prepares a pregnant woman for the strain of childbirth may hold the key to why some women suffer postpartum depression, researchers said on Monday.In a study of 100 women, researchers at the University of California, Irvine, found 12 out of 16 women who had postpartum depression also had high levels of a hormone circulating in the placenta midway through pregnancy.

Corticotropin-releasing hormone, or CRH, is normally produced in tiny amounts by the hypothalamus near the brain in response to stress.

In pregnant women, the placenta pumps out 100 times more CRH than is normally produced by the hypothalamus. The hormone has been nicknamed the “placental clock” because it is thought to prepare the woman’s body for childbirth, said psychologist Ilona Yim, who worked on the study.

Levels of CRH and other hormones drop after the mother gives birth, which Yim said causes hormone “withdrawal” that can create havoc with the endocrine system.

“It puts the whole system out of whack,” she said in a telephone interview.

CRH triggers a cascade of reactions in the pituitary and adrenal glands that culminates in increased output of stress hormones like cortisol.

Previous research suggested an overactive stress response plays a role in heart disease, Alzheimer’s disease and autoimmune disorders. Stress hormones produced by a dysfunctional endocrine system may also trigger mental disorders like depression.

“When they look at the brains of suicide victims, they have elevated levels” of these stress hormones, Yim said.

Postpartum depression strikes those who experience the biggest change in the hormone levels, Yim found. Women who had high levels of CRH 25 weeks into their pregnancy were more likely to experience postpartum depression.

“This is the first study that implicates CRH in postpartum depression. That has implications for understanding this disorder,” she said, adding the results needed to be replicated on a larger scale.

Postpartum depression affects as many as 1 in 5 women four to six weeks after childbirth, and 7 percent of new mothers suffer a major depression. If not addressed, women can become so despondent they attempt suicide, and some harm or neglect their newborns.

Previous bouts of depression, a lack of social support, low self-esteem and a stressful pregnancy all increase the likelihood of postpartum depression, according to the study, which appeared in the Archives of General Psychiatry.

The report suggested that a routine blood screening, which would coincide with a commonly performed prenatal diabetes test, could determine levels of the hormone at around 25 weeks to identify women at risk.

While antidepressant drugs can sometimes relieve postpartum depression, Yim urged a preventive approach, such as having at-risk women learn relaxation techniques common in prenatal yoga classes, and bolstering the emotional ties they may need.

In some parts of rural Kentucky, they’re getting water the old-fashioned way — with pails from a creek. There’s not room for one more sleeping bag on the shelter floor. The creative are flushing their toilets with melted snow.At least 42 people have died, including 11 in Kentucky, and conditions are worsening in many places days after an ice storm knocked out power to 1.3 million customers from the Plains to the East Coast. About a million people were still without electric Friday, and with no hope that the lights will come back on soon, small communities are frantically struggling to help their residents.

One county put it bluntly: It can’t.

“We’re asking people to pack a suitcase and head south and find a motel if they have the means, because we can’t service everybody in our shelter,” said Crittenden County Judge-Executive Fred Brown, who oversees about 9,000 people, many of whom are sleeping in the town’s elementary school.

Local officials were growing angry with what they said was a lack of help from the state and the Federal Emergency Management Agency. In Grayson County, about 80 miles southwest of Louisville, Emergency Management Director Randell Smith said the 25 National Guardsmen who have responded have no chain saws to clear fallen trees.

“We’ve got people out in some areas we haven’t even visited yet,” Smith said. “We don’t even know that they’re alive.”

Smith said FEMA has been a no-show so far.

“I’m not saying we can’t handle it; we’ll handle it,” Smith said. “But it would have made life a lot easier” if FEMA had reached the county sooner, he said.

FEMA spokeswoman Mary Hudak said some FEMA personnel already are in Kentucky working in the state’s emergency operations center and that more will be arriving in coming days. Hudak said FEMA also has shipped to 50 to 100 generators to the state to supply electricity to facilities like hospitals, nursing homes, and water treatment plants.

Hudak said travel is still dangerous in some areas and communications are limited.

“We have plenty of folks ready to go, but there are some limitations with roads closed and icy conditions,” she said.

From Missouri to Ohio, thousands were bunked down in shelters, waiting for the power to return. Others are trying to tough out the power outage at home, using any means they can to get basics like drinking water, heat and food.

Lori Clarke was stuck at home in the western Kentucky town of Marion with trees blocking the road out. She trudged more than half a mile through snow and ice carrying 5-gallon buckets to bring drinking water for her horses and dogs and to flush her toilet.

“When you live out in the country, you just shift into survival mode,” she said.

Even for those who wanted to leave, it wasn’t possible. The one gas station in Marion that was up and running was able to supply gasoline to emergency vehicles only until another delivery of gasoline arrived Friday. Only half of that gas was made available to the public, and there was a $10 limit.

Linda Young, who is staying the town’s shelter, said her car only had enough gas in it to get around Marion. Even if she had gas, there was nowhere to go — all of her relatives in other parts of Kentucky also were hit by the ice storm.

“For right now, this is the best we can do, so this is where we’re at,” said Young, as she sat on a mattress with her 9-year-old son and 11-year-old daughter.

By midafternoon water service had been restored to the city of Marion thanks to a generator, while efforts continued to restore service to the outlying county, Police Chief Ray O’Neal said. Residents were being told to boil the water before drinking it.

Meanwhile, the death toll was rising: Since the storm began Monday, the weather is suspected in at least 11 deaths in Kentucky, nine more in Arkansas, six each in Texas and Missouri, three in Virginia, two each in Oklahoma, Indiana and West Virginia and one in Ohio, with most of them blamed on hypothermia, traffic accidents and carbon monoxide poisoning from generators.

Among the latest deaths reported were those of a man in his 60s, a woman in her 50s and a woman in her 40s who were found in a southwestern Louisville home Friday. The younger woman was found in bed; the other two were found in the garage, along with a generator, police spokesman Phil Russell said.

The fight to return power to Kentucky and other areas affected by the ice storm is difficult because of the sheer number of outages, but also because of the ice itself. Crews have joined the effort from around the country, but more than a half-million homes and businesses were still out in Kentucky on Friday, along with roughly 78,000 in Missouri and 284,000 in Arkansas. Thousands more were still in the dark in Ohio, Tennessee and West Virginia.

“As ice is melting, power lines and tree limbs are springing upward and hitting other power lines,” said Rita Alexander, spokeswoman for Gibson Electric Membership Corp. in Tennessee. “It is just an unpleasant part of the process.”

While generators were able to bring some water pumping stations back to life Friday, thousands still didn’t have access to running water, and thousands more were under boil advisories. Roughly 200,000 people across Kentucky still don’t have water. In Hayti, Mo., alderwoman Lisa Green said a temporary generator was in use to run the water plant, and power was being moved around to pump wastewater through the sewage system, she said.

That wasn’t enough. “Our water plant is up and running, but people are inundating it,” Green said. The community has received some bottled water, she said, but needs more.

A precious few had enough supplies to tough it out alone. Stephen Cates said his home was being warmed by kerosene heaters and an electric furnace powered by a generator that he waited 4 1/2 hours in line to purchase in Evansville, Ind.

He was flushing his toilet with melted snow, and could even watch TV.

“I’m living just like I have electricity, just about, eating hot food,” Cates said.

Arctic wind chills and blizzard conditions plowed into the Midwest and Northern Plains on Monday. The remainder of the country will have a more benign start to the work week.

The northern storm system will produce heavy snow showers and blustery winds as it races east across the Plains and mid-Mississippi Valley. Strong winds, with high gusts will create periods of blowing and drifting snow, dropping visibility.

The Northeast will see dry conditions as high pressure builds over the Ohio Valley. The system will push across the Northeast throughout the day and will move offshore into the Atlantic by the evening.

To the South, long periods of low relative humidity will create dry conditions across the Florida Panhandle. The majority of the West also was to stay dry, with mostly sunny skies and milder temperatures.

Temperatures in the Lower 48 states on Sunday ranged from a low of minus 20 degrees at Presque Isle, Maine, to a high of 88 degrees at Lake Forest, Calif.

If you are among those women who want to stay slim and sharp as they age, then get those sneakers out, for according to an expert, physical activity benefits blood flow in the brain.Marc Poulin, PhD, DPhil, an Alberta Heritage Foundation for Medical Research Senior Scholar has found that being physically fit helps the brain function at the top of its game.

“Being sedentary is now considered a risk factor for stroke and dementia. This study proves for the first time that people who are fit have better blood flow to their brain. Our findings also show that better blood flow translates into improved cognition,” said Poulin.

The study, titled ‘Effects of Cardiorespiratory Fitness and Cerebral Blood Flow on Cognitive Outcomes in Older Women’, compares two groups of women whose average age was 65 years old.

In the study, the researchers took into account a random sample of 42 women living in Calgary and observed women who took part in regular aerobic activity, and another group of women who were inactive.

Poulin’s team, which included scientists, doctors and graduate students, recorded and measured the women’s cardiovascular health, resting brain blood flow and the reserve capacity of blood vessels in the brain, as well as cognitive functions.

It was found that as compared to the inactive group, the active group had lower (10 per cent) resting and exercising arterial blood pressure, higher (5 per cent) vascular responses in the brain during submaximal exercise and when the levels of carbon dioxide in the blood were elevated.

The active group was also found to have higher (10 per cent) cognitive function scores.

“The take home message from our research is that basic fitness - something as simple as getting out for a walk every day - is critical to staying mentally sharp and remaining healthy as we age,” said Poulin.

The study was published in the international journal Neurobiology of Aging.

Take that, Andromeda! For decades, astronomers thought when it came to the major galaxies in Earth’s cosmic neighborhood, our Milky Way was a weak sister to the larger Andromeda. Not anymore. The Milky Way is considerably larger, bulkier and spinning faster than astronomers once thought, Andromeda’s equal.Scientists mapped the Milky Way in a more detailed, three-dimensional way and found that it’s 15 percent larger in breadth. More important, it’s denser, with 50 percent more mass, which is like weight. The new findings were presented Monday at the American Astronomical Society’s convention in Long Beach, Calif.

That difference means a lot, said study author Mark Reid of the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics in Cambridge, Mass. The slight 5-foot-5, 140-pound astrophysicist said it’s the cosmic equivalent of him suddenly bulking up to the size of a 6-foot-3, 210-pound NFL linebacker.

“Previously we thought Andromeda was dominant, and that we were the little sister of Andromeda,” Reid said. “But now it’s more like we’re fraternal twins.”

That’s not necessarily good news. A bigger Milky Way means that it could be crashing violently into the neighboring Andromeda galaxy sooner than predicted — though still billions of years from now.

Reid and his colleagues used a large system of 10 radio telescope antennas to measure the brightest newborn stars in the galaxy at different times in Earth’s orbit around the sun. They made a map of those stars, not just in the locations where they were first seen, but in the third dimension of time — something Reid said hasn’t been done before.

With that, Reid was able to determine the speed at which the spiral-shaped Milky Way is spinning around its center. That speed — about 568,000 miles per hour — is faster than the 492,000 mph that scientists had been using for decades. That’s about a 15 percent jump in spiral speed. The old number was based on less accurate measurements and this is based on actual observations, Reid said.

Once the speed of the galaxy’s spin was determined, complex formulas that end up cubing the speed determined the mass of all the dark matter in the Milky Way. And the dark matter — the stuff we can’t see — is by far the heaviest stuff in the universe. So that means the Milky Way is about one-and-a-half times the mass had astronomers previously calculated.

The paper makes sense, but isn’t the final word on the size of the Milky Way, said Mark Morris, an astrophysicist at the University of California Los Angeles, who wasn’t part of the study.

Being bigger means the gravity between the Milky Way and Andromeda is stronger.

So the long-forecast collision between the neighboring galaxies is likely to happen sooner and less likely to be a glancing blow, Reid said.

But don’t worry. That’s at least 2 to 3 billion years away, he said.

Basic lessons in statistics and probability called “risk literacy” may help teach kids how to weigh the pros and cons and make sensible life decisions, claims one of Britain’s leading mathematicians.David Spiegelhalter, of the University of Cambridge, says that “risk literacy” is being ignored by the national curriculum, and has thus urged that pupils in every secondary school should be taught the statistical skills, critical to making choices about health, money and even education.

Spiegelhalter is UK’s only Professor of the Public Understanding of Risk, also said that just like the Internet transformed information access, there was a growing need to teach people how best to interpret data.

Understanding statistics and the principles of risk could help people to make sense of claims about health hazards and the merits of new drugs, to invest money more wisely, and to choose their children’s schools.

Spiegelhalter has even developed programmes for teaching risk literacy, based on familiar subjects such as the National Lottery and football league tables.

His colleagues are introducing these programmes to schools through a “Risk Roadshow”. They believe that something similar should be offered as a matter of course.

“I regard myself as part of a movement we call risk literacy. It should be a basic component of discussion about issues in media, politics and in schools,” Times Online quoted Spiegelhalter as saying.

“We should essentially be teaching the ability to deconstruct the latest media story about a cancer risk or a wonder drug, so people can work out what it means. Really, that should be part of everyone’s language,” he added.

Spiegelhalter further said that as an aspect of science, risk was “as important as learning about DNA, maybe even more important. The only problem is putting it on the curriculum: that can be the kiss of death. At the moment we can do it as part of maths outreach, maths inspiration, which is a real privilege because we can make it fun. It’s not teaching to an exam. But I actually think it should be in there, partly to make the curriculum more interesting.”

He suggested that risk literacy could be taught as part of maths, science, or civics and personal and social education.

He also claimed that by using simple examples, they could explain more complex statistical principles, such as recognising that apparently improbable occurrences are often in fact predictable in a population as large as Britain’s.

New evidence in the form of an inscribed limestone block in Egypt might have solved the mystery about the identity of boy pharaoh King Tutankhamun’s father.The best-known pharaoh of ancient Egypt, King Tut has been puzzling scientists ever since his mummy and treasure-packed tomb was discovered in 1922 in the Valley of the Kings by British archaeologist Howard Carter.

“We can now say that Tutankhamun was the child of Akhenaten,” Zahi Hawass, chief of Egypt’s Supreme Council of Antiquities, told Discovery News.

The finding offers evidence against another leading theory that King Tut was sired by the minor king Smenkhkare.

Hawass discovered the missing part of a broken limestone block a few months ago in a storeroom at el Ashmunein, a village on the west bank of the Nile some 150 miles south of Cairo.

Found among other sandstone slabs in the storeroom of El Ashmunein’s archaeological site, the block was used in the construction of the temple of Thoth during the reign of Ramesses II, who ruled around 1279-1213 B.C.

Once reassembled, the slab has become “an accurate piece of evidence that proves Tut lived in el Amarna with Akhenaten and he married his wife, Ankhesenamun,” while living in el Amarna, Hawass said.

According to Hawass, the block comes from the temple of Aton in Amarna and the forms of the inscribed names clearly date it to the reign of Akhenaten.

The text also suggests that the young Tutankhamun married his father’s daughter - his half sister.

“The block shows the young Tutankhamun and his wife, Ankhesenamun, seated together. The text identifies Tutankhamun as the ‘king’s son of his body, Tutankhaten,’ and his wife as the ‘king’s daughter of his body, Ankhesenaten’,” Hawass said.

“We know that the only king to whom the text could refer as the father of both children is Akhenaten, himself. We know from other sources that Ankhesenamun was the daughter of Akhenaten and Nefertiti. Now, because of this block, we can say that Tutankhamun was the child of Akhenaten as well,” he explained.

Doubts also remain about King Tut’s mother.

Scholars have long debated whether he is the son of Kiya, Akhenaten’s minor wife, or Queen Nefertiti, Akhenaten’s other wife.

Egyptian researchers are currently carrying out DNA testing on two mummified fetuses found in King Tut’s tomb, believed to be his offspring.

“If the fetus DNA matches King Tut’s DNA and Ankhesenamun’s DNA, then we would know that they shared the same mother,” Hawass said.

A pair of failed stars takes the record of being the dimmest bulbs ever detected, astronomers find.

Each of the substellar objects, called brown dwarfs, is one million times fainter than the sun in total light on the electromagnetic spectrum, and at least one billion times fainter in visible light alone.

A brown dwarf is a compact ball of gas floating freely in space that’s too cool and lightweight to generate the thermonuclear fusion that powers real stars, but too warm and massive to be considered a planet.

“These brown dwarfs are the lowest-power stellar light bulbs in the sky that we know of,” said lead researcher Adam Burgasser, a physicist at MIT.

The findings were published in the Astrophysical Journal Letters on Dec. 10.

Until now, astronomers thought this dim duo was a single, faint brown dwarf. Past research has shown the object is the fifth closest known brown dwarf to us, 17 light-years away toward the constellation Antlia. One light-year is the distance light will travel in a year, or about 6 trillion miles (10 trillion kilometers).

Here’s how the team found the singlet was actually twins: They observed the object in infrared light using NASA’s Spitzer Space Telescope. The data showed that what was still thought to be a single object had a warm atmospheric temperature of 560 to 680 degrees Fahrenheit (293 to 360 degrees Celsius). While this is hundreds of degrees hotter than Jupiter, it’s still downright cold as far as stars go.

In fact, the brown dwarfs, called 2MASS J09393548-2448279, or 2M 0939 for short, are among the coldest brown dwarfs measured so far.

They also estimated the brightness, which they found to be twice what would be expected for a brown dwarf with its particular temperature. The solution: The object must have twice the surface area. So each body shines only half as bright, and each has a mass of 30 to 40 times that of Jupiter.

Burgasser said that studying these objects could help astronomers understand details of brown dwarf structure and evolution.