Pope Thanks Crowd in Final Address

On his final full day as the leader of the Roman Catholic Church, Pope Benedict XVI thanked a huge crowd for respecting his historic decision to step down and told them that God will continue to guide the church.

"The decision I have made, after much prayer, is the fruit of a serene trust in God's will and a deep love of Christ's Church," Benedict said to cheers in his last public words as pope.

Benedict, 85, is the first pope to resign in 600 years. He told the crowd today that he was "deeply grateful for the understanding, support and prayers of so many of you, not only here in Rome, but also throughout the world."

Pope Benedict's Last Sunday Prayer Service

Under sunny skies on this late February day, hundreds of thousands of people, some waving flags, some banners, flocked to Vatican City to see Benedict make a final lap around St. Peter's Square. Throughout his eight-year papacy, Benedict has conducted a weekly audience from St. Peter's. Before delivering his last papal address today, Benedict waved to the festive group of supporters as he toured the square in his glass-encased popemobile.

The city of Rome planned for more than 200,000 people to head to the Vatican for today's event. Streets around St. Peter's were blocked off to cars as pedestrians from around the world headed to the square.

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The conclave to elect Benedict's replacement will start next month at a date yet to be determined. Benedict issued a decree known as a "motu poprio" that will allow cardinals to convene the conclave sooner than the March 15 date that would have been mandated under the old rules.

Benedict today asked the faithful to pray for him and for the new pope.

"My heart is filled with thanksgiving to God who ever watches over his church," Benedict said.

The German-born Benedict, who had appeared frail at times in recent months, seemed more energized in his remarks today. He has said he will devote more time to prayer and meditation after he leaves the papacy.

Benedict will meet Thursday with his cardinals in the morning and then flies by helicopter at 5 p.m. to Castel Gandolfo, the papal residence south of Rome. Benedict will greet parishioners there from the palazzo's balcony, his final public act as pope.

Then, at 8 p.m., the exact time at which his retirement becomes official, the Swiss Guards standing outside the doors of the palazzo at Castel Gandolfo will go off duty, their service protecting the head of the Catholic Church finished.

In retirement, Benedict will continue to wear white and will be called "Pope Emeritus," or the "Supreme Roman Pontiff Emeritus" or "Your Holiness," the Vatican announced Tuesday. Benedict will ditch his trademark red shoes, opting for a pair of brown shoes given to him on a trip to Mexico. But he will still reside on Vatican grounds in a former nunnery.

Benedict's final days as pope have been marked by controversy. For nearly a week now Italian newspapers speculated that Benedict really resigned because of a dossier he was given detailing a sex and blackmail scandal in the Catholic Church. The Italian media news reports do not state any attribution.

It turns out a dossier does exist. The Vatican spokesman Monday underscored that the contents of the dossier are known only to the pope and his investigators, three elderly prelates whom the Italian papers have nicknamed "the 007 cardinals."

But the dossier itself will remain "For the Pope's Eyes Only."

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China takes steps to clean up 'cancer villages'

The Chinese government has acknowledged the existence of "cancer villages": areas where rates of cancer are unusually high, probably because of industrial and agricultural contamination of drinking and irrigation water.

The reference to the cancer clusters was in China's first ever five-year plan for environmental management of chemicals, released on 20 February. The Chinese media, translating parts of the report, said it links water pollution to "serious cases of health and social problems like the emergence of cancer villages in individual regions".

The term has caught on over the past few years as the media in China and elsewhere reported on apparent cancer hotspots. It gained prominence in 2009 when a journalist plotted 40 of them on a Google Map. Some reports have suggested there might be more than 450 such clusters.

According to recent data, deaths from cancer in China increased by 80 per cent between 1970 and 2004. The disease now accounts for 25 per cent of deaths in cities and 21 per cent in rural areas. However, people in China have an 18.9 per cent risk of getting cancer before the age of 75, compared with 29.9 per cent for people in the US and 26.3 per cent in the UK.

One "typical cancer village", as it was called by researchers from Dezhou University in Shandong province who studied it in 2008, had between 80 and 100 deaths from cancer over five years in a population of only 1200.

But proving a link between pollution and cancer requires more detailed evidence, says Tim Driscoll, an epidemiologist at the University of Sydney and science adviser to Cancer Council Australia. However, Driscoll also says it doesn't really matter – if there is dangerous pollution anywhere, it should be cleaned up.

And that is the plan. China's Ministry for Environmental Protection has drawn up a list of 58 chemicals that will be tracked with a registry, including known and suspected carcinogens and endocrine disrupters. Before the end of the 2015, they will subdivide the list into chemicals to be eliminated and those to be reduced.

Big shift

Creating a plan to eliminate some chemicals is a big shift, says Yixiu Wu, a Greenpeace East Asia campaigner based in Beijing, who says even committing to controlling these chemicals would have been a step forward.

The ministry's acknowledgement of the problem is "really important and it is another reflection of the government's shift towards more transparency in pollution information," says Sabrina Orlins from the Institute of Public and Environmental Affairs, a non-profit body in Beijing.

"Increased environmental information leads to increased public awareness where people can have the chance to exert pressure on big water polluters to adopt clean-up measures and be more accountable," she says.

That accountability is where the five-year plan is lacking, says Wu. "It is still a question whether the government is willing to release all the information about the factory locations and their environmental risk," she says. "It is very important for people who are living nearby."

Wu says the motivation to develop the plan comes from an increasing awareness of the human cost of pollution as well as the country signing up to several international conventions designed to curb pollution.

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Impact of China's demand for iron ore on shipping industry

SINGAPORE : China's appetite for iron ore may be among the few bright spots for the shipping industry this year, although there are still many empty vessels plying the waterways.

Analysts have said that those unable to wait out the recovery are likely to go under.

After years of low freight rates, overcapacity and few cargoes, dry bulk shipping firms are finally seeing the light on the horizon.

Credit Suisse predicts China's appetite for iron ore will grow 11 per cent this year, fuelling a pick-up for shippers.

Credit Suisse expects this to spur global commodity demand to 5.3 per cent, from 4.8 per cent last year.

Mercator Lines (Singapore) believes 2013 may be a turning point.

During its third quarter, the dry bulk shipping company was forced to lower its debt by selling one vessel, and terminating settlement agreements with two of its chartered vessels in advance.

Shalabh Mittal, CEO of Mercator Lines (Singapore), said: "We have seen the worst in 2012. 2013 will be more of consolidation...We have already seen the current freight rates are better than 2012's average. So even though it is a very small increase from a very small base, the sentiments reflect that the growth in trade is happening."

But that does not mean a quick turnaround for the global market.

Industry watchers expect overcapacity rates to remain high.

ICAP Shipping said there is still an oversupply of about 16 per cent in the dry cargo market.

Christopher Jones, director of Sale & Purchase at ICAP Shipping, said: "This year, we do not see too much of an improvement. One of the key factors is the oversupply of tonnage in all sectors.

"Freight rates are still lolloping and we seize on any kind of upturn, but analysing ore trades into China for example, they are very slack at the moment because of the high price of iron ore."

ICAP Shipping added that unless more older vessels exit the market by 'scrapping', or the demolition of old ships, market fundamentals are not going to return to equilibrium anytime soon.

Meanwhile, others unable to hold out will either have to fold or find a more profitable business to operate in, like oil and gas.

Patrik Wheater, editor of Shipping World & Shipbuilder, said: "We are seeing a lot of diversification in the shipbuilding side. Shipyards, either building bulk carriers, tankers, that market is not as good as it once was, so they need to diversify and look at other segments and the oil and gas segment is a saving grace for some yards.

"Although last year 900 Chinese shipyards closed, more shipyards are likely to close in China this year."

So far in 2013, the Baltic Dry Index (BDI), the key benchmark for international freight rates, has risen 6.4 per cent, a minor recovery at least, from last year's near 60 per cent slump.

- CNA/ms

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Windows 8 $15 upgrade registration ends Thursday

Registration for the Windows 8 $15 upgrade offer expires this Thursday.

(Credit:
Screenshot by Lance Whitney/CNET)

Those of you who recently bought a Windows 7 PC can score Windows 8 for just $15 but you'll have to register before Thursday.

To drum up interest in its latest OS, Microsoft cooked up a couple of upgrade deals last year.

The first one allowed any user of Windows 7, Vista, or XP to upgrade to Windows 8 for $39.99. That deal ended on January 31.

The second one lets people who bought a
Windows 7 PC between June 2 of last year and January 31 of this year get
Windows 8 Pro for just $14.99. Though that deal expired last month, you can still register for it, but you'll have to act before this Thursday, February 28.

The registration process prompts you for your contact information as well as the brand and model of your Windows 7 computer, the retailer, and the date on which you bought it. The process may also ask for your Windows 7 license key.

Assuming your PC checks out, you then receive an e-mail with a promo code and a link for the Windows 8 upgrade. The link downloads the Windows 8 Upgrade Assistant, which you run on your Windows 7 PC to pay for the product and install the software.

What if you want to take advantage of the $14.99 deal but don't want to upgrade to Windows 8 right now?

You can download the upgrade and simply store the installation files on a USB stick or burn them onto a DVD from an ISO file. You can then install the upgrade anytime you want and on any PC you want. One of my previous articles explains the entire process for creating the Windows 8 installation media.

Following Thursday's registration cutoff, Windows 8 jumps in price for virtually everyone -- $119.99 for the regular edition and $199.99 for the Pro version. Only students will still be able to score a discount.

So even if you're on the fence about the new OS, those of you who qualify for the $14.99 deal may want to register for it while you still have time.

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Sharks Warn Off Predators By Wielding Light Sabers

Diminutive deep-sea sharks illuminate spines on their backs like light sabers to warn potential predators that they could get a sharp mouthful, a new study suggests.

Paradoxically, the sharks seem to produce light both to hide and to be conspicuous—a first in the world of glowing sharks. (See photos of other sea creatures that glow.)

"Three years ago we showed that velvet belly lanternsharks [(Etmopterus spinax)] are using counter-illumination," said lead study author Julien Claes, a biologist from Belgium's Catholic University of Louvain, by email.

In counter-illumination, the lanternsharks, like many deep-sea animals, light up their undersides in order to disguise their silhouette when seen from below. Brighter bellies blend in with the light filtering down from the surface. (Related: "Glowing Pygmy Shark Lights Up to Fade Away.")

Fishing the 2-foot-long (60-centimeter-long) lanternsharks up from Norwegian fjords and placing them in darkened aquarium tanks, the researchers noticed that not only do the sharks' bellies glow, but they also had glowing regions on their backs.

The sharks have two rows of light-emitting cells, called photophores, on either side of a fearsome spine on the front edges of their two dorsal fins.

Study co-author Jérôme Mallefet explained how handling the sharks and encountering their aggressive behavior hinted at the role these radiant spines play.

"Sometimes they flip around and try to hit you with their spines," said Mallefet, also from Belgium's Catholic University of Louvain. "So we thought maybe they are showing their weapon in the dark depths."

To investigate this idea, the authors analyzed the structure of the lanternshark spines and found that they were more translucent than other shark spines.

This allowed the spines to transmit around 10 percent of the light from the glowing photophores, the study said.

For Predators' Eyes Only

Based on the eyesight of various deep-sea animals, the researchers estimated that the sharks' glowing spines were visible from several meters away to predators that include harbor seals (Phoca vitulina), harbor porpoises (Phocoena phocoena), and blackmouth catsharks (Galeus melastomus).

"The spine-associated bioluminescence has all the characteristics to play the right role as a warning sign," said Mallefet.

"It's a magnificent way to say 'hello, here I am, but beware I have spines,'" he added.

But these luminous warning signals wouldn't impede the sharks' pursuit of their favorite prey, Mueller's bristle-mouth fish (Maurolicus muelleri), the study suggested. These fish have poorer vision than the sharks' predators and may only spot the sharks' dorsal illuminations at much closer range.

For now, it remains a mystery how the sharks create and control the lights on their backs. The glowing dorsal fins could respond to the same hormones that control the belly lights, suggested Mallefet, but other factors may also be involved.

"MacGyver" of Bioluminescence

Several other species use bioluminescence as a warning signal, including marine snails (Hinea brasiliana), glowworms (Lampyris noctiluca) and millipedes (Motyxia spp.).

Edith Widder, a marinebiologist from the Ocean Research and Conservation Association who was not involved in the current study, previously discovered a jellyfish whose bioluminescence rubs off on attackers that get too close.

"It's like paint packages in money bags at banks," she explained.

"Any animal that was foolish enough to go after it," she added "gets smeared all over with glowing particles that make it easy prey for its predators."

Widder also points out that glowing deep-sea animals often put their abilities to diverse uses. (Watch: "Why Deep-Sea Creatures Glow.")

"There are many examples of animals using bioluminescence for a whole range of different functions," she said.

Mallefet agrees, joking that these sharks are the "MacGyver of bioluminescence."

"Just give light to this shark species and it will use it in any possible way."

And while Widder doesn't discount the warning signal theory, "another possibility would be that it could be to attract a mate."

Lead author Julien Claes added by email, "I also discovered during my PhD thesis that velvet belly lanternsharks have glowing organs on their sexual parts."

And that, he admits, "makes it very easy, even for a human, to distinguish male and female of this species in the dark!"

The glowing shark study appeared online in the February 21 edition of Scientific Reports.

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First Lady Sees 'Movement' in Childhood Obesity

As she celebrates the third anniversary of her Let's Move! initiative, first lady Michelle Obama told "Good Morning America" co-anchor Robin Roberts that the country is seeing real "movement" on the issue of childhood obesity.

"We've really changed the conversation in this country. When we started, there were a lot of people in this country who would have never thought that childhood obesity was a health crisis. But now we're starting to see some movement on this issue," the first lady told Roberts. "Our kids are eating better at school. They're moving more. And we're starting…to see a change in the trends. We're starting to see rates of obesity coming down like never before."

"What we're seeing is that there's hope, and when a nation comes together, and everyone is thinking about this issue and trying to figure out what role they can play, then we can see changes," she said.

Mrs. Obama is set to embark on a star studded national tour this week to promote and celebrate her Let's Move! initiative. Her first stop will be in Clinton, Miss. on Wednesday when she appears at an event highlighting healthy school lunches with Rachael Ray.

"I'm going back to Mississippi because when I first went there, Mississippi was considered one of the most unhealthy states in the nation," Mrs. Obama said.

Michelle Obama: Bangs Are Her Mid-Life Crisis Watch Video

"If we could fry water in Mississippi, we would, we would do that," Roberts, who grew up in Pass Christian, Mississippi, said. "Food is a culture."

"But the good news in Mississippi is that they've seen a decline in childhood obesity of 13 percent, so we're gonna go celebrate and highlight what has been going on there. There's still work to do," the first lady said.

On Thursday, the first lady will travel to her hometown of Chicago, where she will be joined by Olympic gymnasts and tennis star Serena Williams to promote more physical activity in schools. Later in the day, Mrs. Obama will discuss healthy food choices at a Wal-Mart store in Springfield, Mo.

Mrs. Obama said she will announce a new initiative called the "My Plate Recipe Partnership," which will provide families with online access to healthy recipes that meet the My Plate guidelines, the U.S. Department of Agriculture's replacement of the food pyramid.

"More and more chefs, more and more food companies are understanding that they have to find ways to help families do this in a way that's gonna taste good, that kids are gonna like it," she said.

The first lady, Roberts and Chef Marcus Robert Samuelsson, who owns Red Rooster Harlem in New York City, cooked a healthy meal of beef stir fry and broccolini together on the "Good Morning America" set. Mrs. Obama admitted "it's been a while" since she's cooked for her family, but said she looks forward to the day she can whip up meals for her husband and daughters.

"I walk in the kitchen every day, every day," she joked.

But cooking for her family isn't the only thing Mrs. Obama said she misses since becoming first lady.

"Going to Target for me is like a dream, you know? That one time I went, you noticed it created a stir. I'm gonna do it again, doggone it. Next four years, I'm going out. I'm breaking out. I'm gonna disguise Bo. I'm gonna put on a coat. I'm gonna take a walk, and my agents won't know a thing. Don't tell 'em," she joked.

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Armband adds a twitch to gesture control

And you thought depth-sensing cameras were cool: well, now there's a gesture control device that looks like a sweatband. It lets you control everything from computers to flying drones just by moving the muscles in your forearm.

The Myo, built by Canadian startup firm Thalmic Labs, based in Kitchener, Ontario, aims to bring gestural interfaces right into the mainstream. Electrodes embedded in the band read electrical activity in a user's muscles as they contract or relax to make gestures with their hand and arm, and transmit it wirelessly to software that interprets the movements into commands.

"We really have this belief that technology can be used to enhance our abilities," says Stephen Lake, co-founder of Thalmic Labs. "This is a way of using natural actions that we've evolved to intuitively control the digital world."

Lake and his team built Myo using electrodes that work without making direct contact with the skin, unlike medical electrodes. The first generation can recognise around 20 gestures, some as subtle as the tap of a finger – and it is programmed to ignore random noise generated by other body movements.

Myo's creators envision it as an easy way to interact with everything from web browsers to video games to small drones. The first generation of the product, is expected to cost $149 and ship later this year. It will come with software that will allow any Windows or Apple Mac machine to recognise the gestures we use on touchscreens – like a vertical swipe to scroll down a page, or a pinch to zoom.

"It's not very often that a new, affordable and convenient interface technology comes along, so I think a lot of programmers are going to want to try it," says Trevor Blackwell, founder of robotics company Umbrella Research and a partner in Y Combinator. This startup incubator programme is based in Mountain View, California and has provided Thalmic Labs with funding in exchange for a 7 per cent stake in the company. "I think so far we've only thought of around 1 per cent of its potential applications."

Thalmic Labs is not the first firm to try making a device that recognises gestures by sensing muscle activity. In 2008, Microsoft created a prototype called MUCI that worked in a similar fashion to Myo, but needed medical electrodes, which are not feasible outside of a laboratory setting.

There are also devices that use cameras to precisely track users' hand motions, but they are either in early stages of development, or not portable. "Maybe this couldn't have been foreseen by early researchers working with cameras, but people don't like having cameras watching them all the time," Blackwell says. "Thalmic solves that problem nicely." Though the first generation of Myo is only just launching, the team is already imagining ways to integrate their rigs with augmented reality devices like the head-mounted display, Google Glass.

"If they combined with Google's Project Glass, I think it would be huge," says computer scientist Shahzad Malik, who co-founded the software company CognoVision of Toronto. "Something like Thalmic's technology is super-useful since you can do interactions in a subtle way, which is important when you're in a public venue."

"We're interested in seeing just how closely we can integrate technology into our daily lives and give people superpowers, if you like," says Lake.

Wear tech... look great?

Making wearable technology fashionable is tough – think belt-mounted cellphones, beepers, and bluetooth ear pieces. But iPod earbuds and headphones seem to work.

How do you get the mix right? Google is working hard to make Project Glass rigs look hip, even convincing clothing designer Diane von Fürstenberg and her models to wear prototypes of the head-mounted displays at Fashion Week in New York last year.

Myo bands (see main story) could be an easier sell , says computer scientist Shahzad Malik. "I could see these bands becoming smaller and smaller, or are made in different colours. Or there could be clothing with it built in," he says.

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Fidel Castro backs move to younger leadership: report

HAVANA: Fidel Castro and the Cuban communist party have given the green light for reforms paving the way for a new, younger generation of leaders in the single-party state, state media said Monday.

As expected, Sunday's session of Cuba's National Assembly re-elected Castro's 82-year-old brother Raul to serve a second and final five-year presidential term.

But the assembly also promoted Miguel Diaz-Canel, 52, already a member of the Council of State, to a senior vice presidency of that panel, making him the number two figure in the regime.

The official newspaper Granma said Monday that the changes were approved on Sunday at a meeting of the Communist Party central committee, whose members had not been told in advance of the changes.

Castro, 86, attended Sunday's meeting, in which the National Assembly that was elected February 3 with no opposition candidates took up its seats.

It chose a new 31-member council of state, Cuba's top executive body, with Raul Castro again as its president.

Diaz-Canel already had a post, but was promoted to first vice president, sweeping past some Castro revolutionary era veterans who are historic figures of the gerontocracy that now rules the country.

Diaz-Canel, as political heir, cuts a starkly different profile from the revolutionary leadership, whose members are mostly in their 80s.

If he comes to lead Cuba, he would be the first leader of the regime whose entire life has been under the Castro regime that started in January 1959.

Barring any changes, Diaz-Canel would succeed Raul Castro, who will be 82 in June, if the president serves out his term through 2018.

Fidel Castro stepped aside as president in 2006. Raul Castro took over as acting president and officially became leader in 2008.

-AFP/fl

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Android steals U.S. smartphone lead from iOS, says report

Samsung's Galaxy S3 helped Android win more sales in the U.S.

(Credit:
Josh Miller/CNET)

Android has pulled ahead of Apple's iOS in U.S. smartphone sales, according to data out today from Kantar Worldpanel ComTech.

During the three months ending January, Android scored 49.9 percent of all U.S. smartphone sales, a 6.4 percent gain from the same period last year. Over the same time, iOS took second place with a 45.9 percent cut of smartphone sales, a drop of 4.7 percent from a year ago.

Microsoft's Windows Phone eked out its own slice of growth, taking home 3.2 percent of U.S. smartphone sales.

For the three months ending December, the iPhone won 51.2 percent of all U.S. smartphone sales, leaving
Android with 44.8 percent and Windows Phone with 2.6 percent, Kantar said last month.

Android phone makers can thank Sprint for much of their sales gains, according to Kantar.

For the three months ending October 2012, smartphone sales through Sprint were divided almost equally between Android and iOS. But for the last three-month period, Android's share of Sprint sales jumped to 71.9 percent from 49.3 percent previously.

Sprint customers are also paying less money for their Android phones.

"The 50/50 split we saw in the period ending October 2012 was a result of both iOS and Android sharing similar levels of average price paid (iOS at $130 and Android at $127)," Kantar analyst Mary-Ann Parlato said in a statement. "Yet this latest period saw a significant price drop to $95 for Android, while iOS increased slightly to $146."

Samsung's Galaxy S3 proved a hot seller thanks in part to a more tempting price tag. In the October period, the S3 grabbed only 14 percent of all smartphone sales through Sprint. But after a subsequent price drop to $99 from $199, the S3 surged to win 39 percent of all Sprint smartphone sales.

Overall, Samsung accounted for 60.3 percent of all the smartphones sold by Sprint over the January period. And that number could rise this spring. Samsung is set to unveil the Galaxy S4 at a special launch event on March 14.

Kantar's stats come from its U.S. consumer panel, which interviews more than 240,000 people each year about mobile phone purchases, usage, and bills.

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Picture Archive: Dorothy Lamour and Jiggs, Circa 1938

Dorothy Lamour, most famous for her Road to ... series of movies with Bing Crosby and Bob Hope, never won an Oscar. In her 50-plus-year career as an actress, she never even got nominated.

Neither did Jiggs the chimpanzee, pictured here with Lamour on the set of Her Jungle Love in a photo published in the 1938 National Geographic story "Monkey Folk."

No animal has ever been nominated for an Oscar. According to Academy Award rules, only actors and actresses are eligible.

Uggie, the Jack Russell terrier from last year's best picture winner, The Artist, didn't rate a nod. The equines that portrayed Seabiscuit and War Horse, movies that were best picture contenders in their respective years, were also snubbed.

Even the seven piglets that played Babe, the eponymous star of the best picture nominee in 1998, didn't rate. And the outlook seems to be worsening for the animal kingdom's odds of ever getting its paws on that golden statuette.

This year, two movies nominated in the best picture category had creatures that were storyline drivers with significant on-screen time. Neither Beasts of the Southern Wild (which featured extinct aurochs) or Life of Pi (which featured a CGI Bengal tiger named Richard Parker) used real animals.

An Oscar's not the only way for animals to get ahead, though. Two years after this photo was published, the American Humane Association's Los Angeles Film & TV Unit was established to monitor and protect animals working on show business sets. The group's creation was spurred by the death of a horse during the filming of 1939's Jessie James.

Today, it's still the only organization that stamps "No Animals Were Harmed" onto a movie's closing credits.

Editor's note: This is part of a series of pieces that looks at the news through the lens of the National Geographic photo archives.

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