The giant tortoise Lonesome George, whose failed efforts to produce offspring made him a symbol of disappearing species, was found dead on Sunday, officials at the Galapagos National Park announced.Lonesome George was believed to be the last living member of the Pinta island subspecies and had become an ambassador of sorts for the islands off Ecuador's coast whose unique flora and fauna helped ins

Men who smoke before conception can damage the DNA of their offspring in the womb that may give him or her a higher risk of disease, British researchers say.Diana Anderson of the School of Life Sciences at the University of Bradford in England, and colleagues found evidence showing why men should be urged to stop smoking before trying to conceive in the same way women have been urged to quit tobacco. A fertile sperm cell takes about three months to fully develop; therefore men would ultimately n

Men who drink several cups of tea a day for decades have a higher risk of prostate cancer, researchers in Scotland say. Dr. Kashif Shafique of the Institute of Health & Wellbeing at the University of Glasgow and colleagues found those who drank more than seven cups of tea per day for years had a 50 percent higher risk of developing prostate cancer compared with non-tea drinkers or those drinking less than four cups per day.“Most previous research has shown either no relationship with prostate ca

Scientists succeeded in producing molecular-scale materials capable of carrying two or more substances that could function as carriers of biological species and diagnostic agents. A team led by professor Lee Eun-seong of the Catholic University of Korea produced particles comprised of two or more micelles by forming them on a silicate surface. A micelle is an aggregate of molecules whose poles have opposing affinity to water. The team then removed the micelles from the surface and succeeded in c

A mysterious object at the bottom of the Baltic Sea isn't a UFO, Swedish researches say, but they add they don't have a sure idea of what it is, either.The object, located on the sea floor between Sweden and Finland, is some sort of "natural, geological formation," Peter Lindberg, the leader of the Ocean Explorer team, told FoxNews.com.Lindberg and other scientists and divers spent 12 day explorin

Ancient global warming allowed the greening of Antarctica and substantial vegetation sprouted on the frozen continent 15 million years ago, researchers say.Ancient Antarctica was warmer and wetter than previously suspected -- enough to support vegetation, including stunted trees, along its edges -- researchers from the University of Southern California, Louisiana State University and NASA‘s Jet Propulsion Laboratory reported Sunday.Summer temperatures along the Antarctic coast 15 million to 20 m

A 6.4-magnitude undersea earthquake on Monday jolted the sea area off the east coast of Honshu, the main island of Japan, US seismologists said, but no tsunami alert was issued.The US Geological Survey said the quake had a depth of 31 kilometers (20 miles) and hit at 5:32am (2032 GMT Sunday) some 140 kilometers east of the city of Sendai.In March last year a 9.0-magnitude undersea earthquake off J

A group of Korean scientists said they have succeeded in temporarily suppressing autistic behavior in mice in experiments, which may raise hopes for treating the developmental brain disorder.Researchers from the Seoul National University, Yonsei University and the Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology studied mice with human genes.They deleted some parts of a gene called SHANK2, and found that the mice carrying the gene show autism-like behavior such as difficulty in interacting wit