The Korea Herald

Ex-Shinhan executives receive suspended terms for embezzlement

Jan 16, 2013

Two former executives of the Shinhan Financial Group Co. received suspended prison terms on Wednesday for embezzling a massive amount of company funds, according to court officials.The Seoul Central District Court sentenced Shin Sang-hoon, former president of the country’s No.4 banking group, to 18 months in prison, suspended for two years, for pocketing 261 million won ($246,458) of company money and illegally taking 200 million won worth of stocks from one of the group’s shareholders, they sai
Mars rover readies first rock drilling

Jan 16, 2013

The Mars rover Curiosity will soon begin to drill into the Red Planet for the first time, mission officials said, ahead of the highly anticipated endeavor.Scientists behind the $2.5 billion mission also explained the nature of the small “Martian flower,” which had caused a lot of buzz online because it was strikingly different from the surrounding rock.Aileen Yingst, of the Planetary Science Institute, said that what could have passed as a flower was in fact a relatively large mineral grain or p
Facebook posts more memorable than book quotes: study

Jan 16, 2013

A study has found that people are more able to remember Facebook posts from their friends than random book quotes or human faces. 　The study “Major memory for microblogs,” conducted by academics at the University of Warwick and UC San Diego, asked undergraduate students to read posts from their Facebook feeds. They were also given sentences from random books and human faces to memorize. The researchers then asked them to recall the online posts, book quotes and human faces.The result showed stud
New ‘flying’ frog discovered in Vietnam

Jan 16, 2013

An Australian biologist has described the discovery of a large green “flying” frog in Vietnam that uses its big webbed feet to glide through forests.Writing in the Journal of Herpetology, Jodi Rowley, an amphibian biologist at the Australian Museum in Sydney, told how she and other researchers “came across a huge green frog, sitting on a log,” not far from the capital, Ho Chi Minh City.She later determined the 3.5-inch creature is a relatively large new type of flying frog, a group known for its
Japanese salmon bred with ‘surrogate’ fish

Jan 16, 2013

Japanese scientists say they‘ve successfully bred a type of salmon indigenous to the country through the use of surrogate parents of a different species.Researchers at the Tokyo University of Marine Science and Technology reported they extracted spermatogonia, or primordial germ cells, from endangered yamame salmon, a Japanese species that lives the entirety of its life in rivers.The germ cells were implanted into sterile rainbow trout hatchlings, where the cells developed into fully functioning
Apes have a sense of fairness: report

Jan 15, 2013

A study has found that Chimpanzees have a sense of fairness, which had long been regarded as unique to humans.Researchers at the Yerks National Primate Research Center in Emory University conducted research to find out if chimpanzees have a human-like sense of equality. The researchers tested six apes on the Ultimate Game. In the game, two players are rewarded with a small prize only if one individual agrees to split the prize. Adult humans most often offer a suggestion that equally benefits bot
Scientists find new properties in physical transition

Jan 14, 2013

A group of South Korean scientists, together with German researchers, have discovered new properties of transition from quantum to classical physics that may help build an entirely different kind of quantum computers, the government said Monday.In their paper, titled “Non-monotonic quantum-to-classical transition in multiparticle interference,” the scientists claimed to have theoretically and experimentally proved that the long-believed monotonicity of the quantum-to-classical transition is, in
Prosecutors seek fines for 4 owners of retail giants

Jan 14, 2013

Prosecutors said Monday they have asked for summary judgments and sought fines against four heads of the country’s major retail conglomerates on charges of not attending parliamentary audits.The four are Chung Yong-jin, vice chairman of Shinsegae Group; Shin Dong-bin, chairman of Lotte Group; Chong Ji-sun, chairman of Hyundai Department Store Co.; and Chung Yu-kyung, vice president of Shinsegae Department Store, according to prosecutors.They are accused of not responding to the government’s call
Urgent CO2 cuts may spare millions hardship: report

Jan 14, 2013

Tens of millions of people may be spared droughts and floods by 2050 if Earth-warming carbon emissions peak in 2016 rather than 2030, scientists said on Sunday.Climate researchers in Britain and Germany said emission cuts now would delay some crippling impacts by decades and prevent some altogether.By 2050, an Earth heading for warming of 2-2.5 degrees Celsius (3.6-4.5 degrees Fahrenheit) by 2100 could have two very different faces, depending on the route taken to get there, said their study pub
MUFON investigating flying saucer in Texas

Jan 14, 2013

A photograph of an alleged flying saucer hovering over a Texas oil field that surfaced on the Internet may be authentic, a UFO investigator says.The photo, which has a July 5 time stamp, appeared on the Mutual UFO (Unidentified Flying Object) Network website last week and was allegedly taken by a security camera at an oil drilling site in Eagle Ford, the San Antonio (Texas) Express-News reported.Charles Stansburge, a veteran MUFON investigator, said the photo has passed two authenticity tests."I
S. Korea expected to launch space rocket on Jan. 25

Jan 13, 2013

South Korea is expected to try again to launch its space rocket later this month after successfully conducting experiments to check if all systems are working properly, a government source said Sunday. The official said South Korean and Russian researchers are expected to discuss results of repairs made to the rocket late last year and touch on the present state of the Naro-1 rocket. He added Seoul successfully carried out combustion tests on the kick motor on the locally built second stage
Gov't to conduct detailed safety tests on Gori, Wolsong reactors

Jan 13, 2013

The government plans to conduct detailed safety tests on two nuclear reactors that have exceeded their original operating life cycles to ensure no problems occur, an official said Sunday. The official, who declined to be identified, said the Nuclear Safety Commission will include plans to conduct so-called stress tests on the Gori 1 and Wolsong 1 reactors in a report to President-elect Park Geun-hye's transition committee. A stress test refers to a series of experiments that push the reactors
Moons outside the solar system may have habitable zones

Jan 11, 2013

Even exoplanets, where living creatures cannot exist, still have possibility to host exomoons with habitable zones, U.S. scientists said. An exoplanet is one that orbits a star other than the sun.Astronomers have long researched exoplanets to discover an environment that can support life. However, most of them are of gaseous form and only a few have a solid surface on which living creatures can survive.Rory Barnes of the University of Washington and the NASA Astrobiology Institute said in a stat
Antarctic lake reached after millennia

Jan 11, 2013

Russian researchers say they've obtained the first sample of transparent ice from the water of a unique sub-glacial lake in Antarctica.The scientists have drilled into Lake Vostok, sealed for the last 20 million years beneath Antarctica's ice sheet at a depth of 2.3 miles, RIA Novosti reported Thursday.Vostok, the largest of Antarctica's buried network of icebound lakes, may reveal new forms of life and show how life evolved before the ice age, the scientists said."The first core of transparent
Space telescope snaps asteroid photos

Jan 10, 2013

A European spacecraft has captured images of an asteroid heading for a close fly-by of Earth that shows it's bigger than previously thought, astronomers say.The European Space Agency's Herschel space telescope took the photographs of the asteroid Apophis, dubbed the "doomsday asteroid" by the media when initial observations in 2004 yielded a 2.7 percent chance of it striking the Earth in 2029.Subsequent analysis has ruled out a collision, though the asteroid will pass within 22,000 miles of Eart