US Seeks to Confirm Report of Terror Leader's Death

American military and intelligence officials said today they are attempting to confirm a report from the Chadian military of the death of al Qaeda leader Mokhtar Belmokhtar, the alleged mastermind of the deadly attack on an Algerian natural gas facility in January.

If the new report is confirmed, Belmokhtar's death would be a significant victory against a growing al Qaeda threat in northern Africa.

Belmokhtar's killing was announced on Chadian national television by armed forces spokesperson Gen. Zacharia Gobongue, who said Chadian troops "operating in northern Mali completely destroyed a terrorist base."

"The [death] toll included several dead terrorists, including their leader, Mokhtar Belmokhtar," he said.

However, an unidentified elected official in Mali told The Associated Press he doubted Belmokhtar had actually been killed and said he suspected the Chadian government of pushing the story to ease the loss of dozens of Chadian troops in operations in northern Africa.

SITE Intel Group/AP Photo

Belmokhtar is known as Mr. Marlboro because of the millions he made smuggling cigarettes across the Sahara, but in the last few months the one-eyed terrorist leader has become one of the most sought after terrorists in the world. The attack on the plant near In Amenas in eastern Algeria left dozens of Westerns and at least three Americans dead.

Belmokhtar had formed his own al Qaeda splinter group and announced he would use his wealth to finance more attacks against American and Western interests in the region and beyond.

The U.S. has badly wanted Belmokhtar stopped and actively helped in the search by French and African military units to find him, as well as another top al Qaeda leader who was reported killed yesterday.

After the Chadian announcement, House Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Rep. Ed Royce (R-Calif.) said Belmokhtar's death, if confirmed, "would be a hard blow to the collection of jihadists operating across the region that are targeting American diplomats and energy workers."

Steve Wysocki, a plant worker who survived the attack in In Amenas thanked "military forces from around the world," especially the Chadian military, for bringing "this terrorist to an expedient justice."

"My family and I continue to mourn for our friends and colleagues who didn't make it home and pray for their families," Wysocki told ABC News.

The CIA has been after Belmokhtar since the early 1990s, Royce's statement said.

ABC News' Clayton Sandell contributed to this report.

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Herbal Viagra actually contains the real thing

IF IT looks too good to be true, it probably is. Several "herbal remedies" for erectile dysfunction sold online actually contain the active ingredient from Viagra.

Michael Lamb at Arcadia University in Glenside, Pennsylvania, and colleagues purchased 10 popular "natural" uplifting remedies on the internet and tested them for the presence of sildenafil, the active ingredient in Viagra. They found the compound, or a similar synthetic drug, in seven of the 10 products – cause for concern because it can be dangerous for people with some medical conditions.

Lamb's work was presented last week at the American Academy of Forensic Sciences meeting in Washington DC.

This article appeared in print under the headline "Herbal Viagra gets a synthetic boost"

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Obama to visit Russia in September

WASHINGTON: US President Barack Obama will visit Saint Petersburg for September's G20 summit and will also hold a meeting with President Vladimir Putin at the G8 summit in Northern Ireland in June.

The White House made the announcement Friday after the leaders spoke by phone to discuss the Syria crisis amid testy relations between Russia and the United States, which have deteriorated since Obama's first term.

Russia had hoped that Obama would pay an official visit to the country last year, his first since Putin returned to the presidency, but Washington's ties with Moscow have been uneasy, and the visit never took place.

Obama's announcement means that he will also not travel to Russia before the G20 summit, in another disappointment to the Kremlin.

Washington and Moscow have been especially at odds over Syria, and Russia's role in vetoing UN Security Council action to censure President Bashar al-Assad for his crackdown on an opposition revolt that has killed 70,000 people.

"The two presidents agreed on the need to advance a political transition to end the violence as soon as possible," said a White House statement, referring to Syria.

US Secretary of State John Kerry and Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov will continue to work together on the issue following their meeting in Berlin on Tuesday, the White House said.

A statement issued earlier from the Kremlin said that Putin noted the need to end "military activities" in Syria as soon as possible.

Russia also denounced a new US pledge to provide direct aid, but no arms, to Syrian rebel fighters, saying it will fuel more violence in the nearly two-year war.

Despite the tensions, Obama vowed in his State of the Union address in February to work with the Kremlin to reduce both Russian and American stockpiles of nuclear weapons.

Relations between Moscow and Washington have been especially harmed by the Obama administration's criticism of Moscow's deteriorating human rights record under Putin.

There has also been tension over adoptions of Russian orphans by US nationals in recent weeks.

The spat started after the US Congress passed a bill last year targeting Russian officials with sanctions over the prison death of Russian lawyer Sergei Magnitsky.

Russia retaliated with a ban on all US adoptions, saying Russian children in the United States were abused and even murdered by their adoptive parents.

One of Obama's major foreign policy achievements of his first term was a "reset" of relations with Russia engineered with former president Dmitry Medvedev, but the return of Putin has soured the mood.

-AFP/ac

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Tips for increasing the longevity of your Mac

Regardless of whether you purchase it new, refurbished, or used, your Mac is likely a sizable investment that you might wish to keep running for as long as possible, not only because of the cost factor but also because of the time and effort it would take to migrate your data and workflow to a new system (even though Apple has made the latter quite easy if you have proper backups).

There are many ways your
Mac can get damaged, become outdated, or otherwise experience greater wear and tear from use that can shorten its lifespan. In most cases these will only have a little (if any) effect on the system but may help keep the system running longer and without problems or capacity limitations.

The physical

The first part of your Mac is the physical machine, which includes the logic boards and controllers, screen, keyboard, mouse, and other similar components. While peripherals like the keyboard and mouse can be replaced, it may be harder to do so for the components in the machine.

The machine itself
Of the considerations for ensuring a long-lasting Mac, the first begins before you even purchase it where you are offered options to configure your system. Apple offers a number of configure-to-order details including RAM capacity, processor speeds and types, and hard-drive size.

Apple periodically updates its maximum RAM offerings.

(Credit:
CNET)

While for the most part these should be relatively comparable, the faster you go and the more capacity you give the system the longer you will be able to use it before you need to upgrade. For RAM considerations I've usually recommended people get the minimal from Apple and then upgrade at a later date to save money; however, for some of Apple's systems such as the
MacBook Air and Retina
MacBook Pro this is not possible, so purchasing the ones with the most built-in RAM is recommended.

These same recommendations extend to hard drives and processors, especially for systems like the iMac that cannot be easily serviced (if at all in some cases). If you are offered the option to get a Core i5 versus a Core i7 processor for your system, then if you can afford it I would recommend the upgrade (which sometimes comes with the benefit of a faster graphics processor as well). Likewise, consider an SSD over Apple's Fusion Drive, and a Fusion Drive over a conventional hard drive for increased speed.

For hard drives, capacity is not so much an issue as you can always use an external storage device if needed, but the speed of your internal drive that holds your OS and applications is one of the biggest data bottlenecks in the whole system so buying the fastest one will keep your system running in top gear.

Power source care
Of the remaining details, perhaps one of the more common items to be damaged is the system's power supply, which being subject to relatively harsh and noisy wall power circuits can potentially break down over time. In addition, the external power supply for laptops may experience a greater degree of physical abuse that can eventually lead to a failure.

Apple's power adapters may be subject to wear with use, or be replaced with newer options.

(Credit:
Apple)

For power supplies, continued use is not too much of an issue, but surges and sudden power failures may disrupt the system and result in data corruption or broken components (hard drives or the power supply itself), so be sure to help protect your system by either turning it off when not in use, at least using a surge protected power strip, or better yet use a Uninterrupable Power Supply (UPS).

For laptop users, consider purchasing a second power supply for your system, especially since as new technologies become available the older ones may be phased out. For example, Apple recently released new Lightning connectors for iOS devices and a new MagSafe connection for its laptops. While the older MagSafe connections should be available for a while, over time they will be harder to find.

In addition to the power supply for laptops, be sure to take proper care of its batteries. For the health of the batteries, the best practice is to use them regularly (often enough to run through a full charge cycle about once per month) to help prevent dead spots that can reduce their overall capacity. Additionally, do not use them in extreme temperatures, and if you store system for a long period of time, be sure to charge the battery until it is half-full before doing so.

Battery calibration is not a necessary step for its health; however, it can be done regularly as a way to ensure the battery is regularly used.

Avoid abuse
While it might be needless to say, avoiding physical abuse of the systems is another easy way to increase the longevity of Apple's systems. The aluminum Apple uses in its systems is durable and quite protective, but is not indestructible. If you travel with your system then consider using a case or cover that will help protect it, and also consider using a properly padded bag even if you use a case.

In addition to transport security, consider a keyboard slip cover for laptops to help protect the keys from wear. The keys on a MacBook keyboard have a slightly matte finish to them out the factory door, but over time with you pressing them the keys will become shiny as you wear down the top surface. In some cases the wear can be great enough so the symbol disappears making it difficult to type. One option instead of a slip cover is to get a set of transparent stickers to place on the keys that are showing any wear.

Lastly, be kind to the ports on your Mac. When peripherals are attached, the ports can be subject to torquing that in extreme conditions or over time may result in it no longer working, not being able to hold the inserted connection firmly, becoming mangled, or even being subject to shorting out and frying a component of the motherboard. This is easily done by inserting the incorrect plug into a port, so avoid fishing around blindly to insert a connection by feel.

Be aware of your touch
I've often noticed people hammering on keys when typing, or mashing a key or two in frustration, and while the keyboard ought to be able to take such treatment, it can only lead to faster wear. If your system is not working properly then clicking or tapping harder or faster will not fix the situation, and will only increase the chance of damaging the system. In some cases multiple presses during a frustrating hangup can even confuse the system more and make the matter worse.

In addition to using a gentle touch on the keyboard, avoid touching your display, especially if you have one with a matte finish. Apple's glossy glass displays are decently protected from touching, but matte displays can easily be poked and damaged.

Ensuring you have clean hands when using your system is another way to help increase its longevity. Grime and oils on hands can help wear down the surface of keys or simply contribute to dirt that gets into the keyboard and can potentially block a key or two from working.

Clean your system
Dirt and grime on a system will not necessarily hurt it, but over time it can become unsightly and may build up enough to cause a problem or two, so be sure to gently wipe away any grime in keyboards or around the edges of your display, but more importantly be sure the ports and vents are clear of dust or obstructions. It is very easy for dirt to get into these ports, and if you press a connection into them then you only jam the dust in farther, so be sure to check your data ports and clean them out.

For the vents on the system, use canned air or a vacuum cleaner to remove any dust that you see in them, as any reduction in the efficiency of these vents may lead to a system that more easily overheats. For Mac Pro systems, you can easily remove the cover and use canned air to blow around the fans and heat sinks to clear any dust accumulation (do this outside, as billowing clouds of dust can be irritating to live with).

Avoid hard shutoffs
Finally, unless your system is experiencing a crash or severe hangup, then avoid holding the power key to shut it off or unplugging it as this sudden interruption can be damaging to the system's logic boards and components. If you are finding the system is regularly crashing then try addressing this problem instead of resorting to always shutting your system down by yanking the plug or pressing the power key. There are numerous resources for helping find the source of hangs and crashes in OS X, including Apple's retail stores and its online discussion forum.

The logical

Besides taking care of your system's physical condition, consider lengthening its usefulness by maintaining its capabilities, security, and stability. Doing this not only involves the operating system and software that you use, but also considers any components and upgrades that are available for your system.

Software Update is available in the Apple menu.

(Credit:
Screenshot by Topher Kessler/CNET)

Upgrade software
While it can be argued that the features and details in the latest release of OS X may not suit your needs, at least be sure to update your current OS installation to its latest version, as this will ensure the best security and fixes to problems that people have been experiencing. Updating a system can easily be done by going to the Apple menu and choosing Software Update, where the system will check for and then install new versions of operating system software or Apple's supplied programs like iTunes, iPhoto, or iWork.

In addition to Apple's software, be sure to update any third-party software you have installed and keep those at their latest versions, not only to help maintain security but also to ensure compatibility with OS X. Most programs offer built-in updating features similar to Apple's software-update, and can be configured to check for updates on launch or on a regular schedule, so consider setting these up along with doing so for Apple's Software Update to ensure you are running the latest versions of all of your software.

Upgrade hardware
As you use your system and install new releases of OS X and upgrades to your software, you may find that the new software demands more out of your system and can result in a slower system. Therefore, as mentioned above for new systems consider the faster upgrades at purchase, but for older and used systems you can still consider similar upgrades to breathe new life into it and get you up and running faster without needing to purchase a new computer.

The two most common options are to upgrade your system's RAM capacity to give your processor and applications adequate "desk space" in which to perform computations. While 8GB to 16GB of RAM should be adequate these days for most uses, in general the more RAM the better so get as much as you can afford. Just be sure to fully test your RAM once you have installed it to ensure it is working correctly, as bad RAM can be a major source of crashes and data corruption.

Other World Computing's Data Doubler offers a convenient way to put two drives in an older MacBook system.

(Credit:
Topher Kessler/CNET)

Also consider a faster storage medium such as an SSD in place of a conventional hard drive. For laptop systems you can replace older and unused optical drives with a secondary internal drive, giving yourself the options for increased capacity, dual-drive redundancy, an internal backup, options for implementing Apple's "Fusion" drive, and more.

To give a rough estimate, an 8GB RAM upgrade, a 240GB SSD, and an optical drive conversion kit for an old 2008 MacBook Pro will cost about $300 to $400 and will at times more than double the speed of your old system.

Finally, for Mac Pro systems you can upgrade the graphics card for increased graphics performance. While the offerings for this are relatively limited and a touch expensive, if needed the option to do so is out there.

Take care of slowdowns and other problems
Over time and depending on how it's used a Mac can develop odd problems or two that can lead to slowdowns, crashes, hangs, and other odd behaviors that can be a real burden to deal with. Sometimes the issues can be quite difficult to track down, but in general if you are experiencing odd problems there are some approaches you can quickly take to clear them up or at least help identify where the root of the problem may be.

To do this, first try running a general maintenance routine on your system to clear caches and other temporary items that if corrupted may lead to odd problems. Additionally, you can run through a general troubleshooting routine to help identify if the problem is systemwide, because of a third-party program or two, or rooted in your user account, which can greatly help if you need to communicate the problem to others for help.

Lastly, Apple's hardware test suite should be available to most Mac systems and can be used to test the system's RAM and internal sensors to see if a problem is occurring.

Time Machine offers options to back up to more than one drive.

(Credit:
Screenshot by Topher Kessler/CNET)

Back up regularly
A final consideration for increasing your Mac's longevity is to make continual backups. Your Mac's hardware is only half of the story, and your Mac experience lies mainly in your documents, settings, installed applications, and the entirety of your system's software environment. With proper backups, should an irrecoverable problem happen to your system then you can easily restore or migrate your data from the backup to a new system and be up and running as if nothing ever happened (minus the cash for a new system, of course).

Anything missed?
Do you have any tips or suggestions on keeping your Mac running the longest? If so then let us know in the comments.

---

Questions? Comments? Have a fix? Post them below or !
Be sure to check us out on Twitter and the CNET Mac forums.

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Black Hole Spins at Nearly the Speed of Light

A superfast black hole nearly 60 million light-years away appears to be pushing the ultimate speed limit of the universe, a new study says.

For the first time, astronomers have managed to measure the rate of spin of a supermassive black hole—and it's been clocked at 84 percent of the speed of light, or the maximum allowed by the law of physics.

"The most exciting part of this finding is the ability to test the theory of general relativity in such an extreme regime, where the gravitational field is huge, and the properties of space-time around it are completely different from the standard Newtonian case," said lead author Guido Risaliti, of the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics (CfA) and INAF-Arcetri Observatory in Italy. (Related: "Speedy Star Found Near Black Hole May Test Einstein Theory.")

Notorious for ripping apart and swallowing stars, supermassive black holes live at the center of most galaxies, including our own Milky Way. (See black hole pictures.)

They can pack the gravitational punch of many million or even billions of suns—distorting space-time in the region around them, not even letting light to escape their clutches.

Galactic Monster

The predatory monster that lurks at the core of the relatively nearby spiral galaxy NGC 1365 is estimated to weigh in at about two million times the mass of the sun, and stretches some 2 million miles (3.2 million kilometers) across-more than eight times the distance between Earth and the moon, Risaliti said. (Also see "Black Hole Blast Biggest Ever Recorded.")

Risaliti and colleagues' unprecedented discovery was made possible thanks to the combined observations from NASA's high-energy x-ray detectors on its Nuclear Spectroscopic Telescope Array (NuSTAR) probe and the European Space Agency's low-energy, x-ray-detecting XMM-Newton space observatory.

Astronomers detected x-ray particle remnants of stars circling in a pancake-shaped accretion disk surrounding the black hole, and used this data to help determine its rate of spin.

By getting a fix on this spin speed, astronomers now hope to better understand what happens inside giant black holes as they gravitationally warp space-time around themselves.

Even more intriguing to the research team is that this discovery will shed clues to black hole's past, and the evolution of its surrounding galaxy.

Tracking the Universe's Evolution

Supermassive black holes have a large impact in the evolution of their host galaxy, where a self-regulating process occurs between the two structures.

"When more stars are formed, they throw gas into the black hole, increasing its mass, but the radiation produced by this accretion warms up the gas in the galaxy, preventing more star formation," said Risaliti.

"So the two events—black hole accretion and formation of new stars—interact with each other."

Knowing how fast black holes spin may also help shed light how the entire universe evolved. (Learn more about the origin of the universe.)

"With a knowledge of the average spin of galaxies at different ages of the universe," Risaliti said, "we could track their evolution much more precisely than we can do today."

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Sequester Begins But Govt. Shutdown Looks Unlikely

Mar 1, 2013 4:13pm

Andrew Harrer/Bloomberg/Getty Imag

It may not be readily obvious from the blizzard of news out there today on the “sequester,” but a government shutdown became significantly less likely today, even as the automatic budget cuts barreled ahead toward reality.

What happened? Both sides – Republicans and Democrats – basically seem to have agreed that as they will continue to fight out the $85 billion in automatic budget cuts starting to take effect today, they will not allow that disagreement to jeopardize full funding for the federal government. That funding is now scheduled to expire March 27.

RELATED: President Obama, Congressional Leaders Fail to Avert Sequester Cuts

After the White House meeting this morning, House Speaker John Boehner said he would have the House vote next week to fund the full government – what’s known as a “continuing resolution.”

Boehner: “I did lay out that the House is going to move a continuing resolution next week to fund the government past March 27th, and I’m hopeful that we won’t have to deal with the threat of a government shutdown while we’re dealing with the sequester at the same time. The House will act next week, and I hope the Senate will follow suit.”

READ MORE: 6 Questions (and Answers) About the Sequester

Boehner’s office provided this read-out of the meeting: “The president and leaders agreed legislation should be enacted this month to prevent a government shutdown while we continue to work on a solution to replace the president’s sequester.”

The president was asked at his mini-news conference whether he would definitely sign such a bill, even if it keeps government going at the new, lower spending levels as this fight is resolved (or not).

RELATED: 57 Terrible Consequences of the Sequester

Obama’s response: “With respect to the budget and keeping the government open – I’ll try for our viewing audience to make sure that we’re not talking in Washington gobbledygook. What’s called the continuing resolution, which is essentially just an extension of last year’s budget into this year’s budget to make sure that basic government functions continue, I think it’s the right thing to do to make sure that we don’t have a government shutdown. And that’s preventable.”

So even as we moved toward the brink of sequester, the nation’s leaders took a step back from another, much larger cliff.

SHOWS: World News

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Mystery ring of radiation briefly encircled Earth

What were you doing last September? The charged particles that dance around Earth were busy. Unbeknown to most earthlings, a previously unseen ring of radiation encircled our planet for nearly the whole month – before being destroyed by a powerful interplanetary shock wave.

We already knew that two, persistent belts of charged particles, called the Van Allen radiation belts, encircle Earth. The discovery of a third, middle ring by NASA's twin Van Allen probes, launched in August 2012, suggests that these belts, which have puzzled scientists for over 50 years, are even stranger than we thought. Working out what caused the third ring to develop could help protect spacecraft from damaging doses of radiation.

Charged particles get trapped by Earth's magnetic field into two distinct regions, forming the belts. The inner belt, which extends from an altitude of 1600 to 12,900 kilometres, is fairly stable. But the outer belt, spanning altitudes ranging from 19,000 to 40,000 kilometres, can vary wildly. Over the course of minutes or hours, its electrons can be accelerated to close to the speed of light, and it can grow to 100 times its usual size.

Mystery acceleration

No one is sure what causes these "acceleration events", although it seems to have something to do with solar activity interacting with the Earths' magnetic field.

"That's one of the key things the probes are in place to understand," says Dan Baker of the University of Colorado, Boulder. "How does this cosmic accelerator, operating just a few thousand miles above our head, accelerate electrons to such extraordinarily high energies?"

When the Van Allen probes started taking data on 1 September 2012, one of these mysterious events was already under way. "We came in the middle of the movie there," Baker says. But otherwise, he says, "What we expected was what we saw when we first turned on: two distinct belts, separated."

That changed a day later when, to the team's surprise, an extra ring developed between the inner and outer ones. "We watched it develop right before our eyes," Baker says. The new, middle ring was relatively narrow, and its electrons had energies between 4 and 7.5 megaelectronvolts - about the same as in the outer Van Allen belt during an acceleration event.

Although the outer ring displayed its characteristic inconstancy, the new middle ring barely budged for nearly four weeks. Then a shock wave, probably linked to a burst of solar activity, wiped it out in less than an hour on 1 October.

Spacecraft malfunctions

It's not clear where the middle ring came from, Baker says, although it was probably related to the acceleration event. The electrons could have been stripped from the outer Van Allen belt, funnelled back towards the Earth and got trapped in the middle on the way, or they could have been energised from closer to Earth and shot up to higher altitudes.

Figuring out what happened could be important to protecting spacecraft from radiation damage, says Yuri Shprits of the University of California in Los Angeles, who was not involved in the observations but is crafting a theoretical explanation that he hopes to publish soon. "It truly presents us with a very important question, and very important puzzles," he says.

There were no specific spacecraft malfunctions during September that can be directly linked to the new belt, says Shprits. However satellite operators will want to know if such belts are common and if they pose more of a risk.

With no other examples of a transient belt caught so far, it's too soon to answer all those questions, Baker says. "We only have one in captivity," he says. "We're still trying to figure out exactly how it works."

Journal reference: Science, DOI: 10.1126/science.1233518

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Facebook buys advertising firm from Microsoft

SAN FRANCISCO: Facebook agreed Thursday to buy Atlas Advertiser Suite from Microsoft as part of an effort to boost ad revenues at the massive social network.

Terms of the deal were not disclosed.

"Atlas is a leader in campaign management and measurement for marketers and agencies. We believe this acquisition will benefit both marketers and users," Facebook's Brian Boland said in a blog post.

Atlas was part of the aQuantive group acquired by Microsoft, which ended up in a writedown and loss for Microsoft last year.

Microsoft's Dave O'Hara said the deal "will strengthen our existing partnership" with Facebook "for the benefit of both companies and their respective long-term visions."

Facebook has become the world's biggest social network with more than one billion users, but its stock has been hit by concerns about its ability to boost revenues and profitability.

The California group has been working on a number of advertising initiatives for both desktop and mobile Facebook applications.

Facebook shares rose 1.4 percent to end Thursday at $27.25.

- AFP/ac

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Bigger, thicker, cheaper, plastic iPhone coming next year (rumor)

Apple's iPhone 5 makes use of aluminum and ceramics.

(Credit:
Josh Lowensohn/CNET)

Holdouts expecting a larger version of the iPhone this year will have to keep on waiting, a new report says.

Citing sources, Japanese Apple news site Macotakara says such a device is instead slated for next year, and will use plastic instead of aluminum for its body.

Macotakara says the device will sport a polycarbonate plastic enclosure much like the one found on the MacBook, and iBook before it -- a product line that was discontinued in mid-2011. Other rumored details include a 4.5-inch screen, which would be half an inch larger than the one found on the
iPhone 5 and
iPod Touch; Apple's usual home button; and a $330 price tag that would be a little less than half of the average selling price of the iPhone 5 (without carrier subsidy).

As MacRumors notes, Macotakara's had a mixed rumor scorecard, but had accurate information about Apple's latest batch of iPods, some two months before they were officially unveiled.

Wall Street analysts have, for months, opined about possibilities of a larger-screened device, and the potential financial windfall it could provide Apple. In a note earlier this month, Barclays Capital analyst Ben Reitzes said the firm believes the company is cooking up a 5-inch model for later this year or the first quarter of next year, and that it could boost the average amount Apple sells the iPhone for by about 5 percent during the 2014 calendar year.

The rumor is separate from those pointing to another "S" iteration from Apple later this year. The company has released both the
iPhone 3GS and 4S between major device generations, something that is expected to happen once again. Purported shots of the device's internal components surfaced in January alongside reports Apple was planning to double down with a second, cheaper model to gain ground in emerging markets.

(via Apple Insider)

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Scarred Duckbill Dinosaur Escaped T. Rex Attack

A scar on the face of a duckbill dinosaur received after a close encounter with a Tyrannosaurus rex is the first clear case of a healed dinosaur wound, scientists say.

The finding, detailed in the current issue of the journal Cretaceous Research, also reveals that the healing properties of dinosaur skin were likely very similar to that of modern reptiles.

The lucky dinosaur was an adult Edmontosaurus annectens, a species of duckbill dinosaur that lived in what is today the Hell Creek region of South Dakota about 65 to 67 million years ago. (Explore a prehistoric time line.)

A teardrop-shaped patch of fossilized skin about 5 by 5 inches (12 by 14 centimeters) that was discovered with the creature's bones and is thought to have come from above its right eye, includes an oval-shaped section that is incongruous with the surrounding skin. (Related: "'Dinosaur Mummy' Found; Have Intact Skin, Tissue.")

Bruce Rothschild, a professor of medicine at the University of Kansas and Northeast Ohio Medical University, said the first time he laid eyes on it, it was "quite clear" to him that he was looking at an old wound.

"That was unequivocal," said Rothschild, who is a co-author of the new study.

A Terrible Attacker

The skull of the scarred Edmontosaurus also showed signs of trauma, and from the size and shape of the marks on the bone, Rothschild and fellow co-author Robert DePalma, a paleontologist at the Palm Beach Museum of Natural History in Florida, speculate the creature was attacked by a T. rex.

It's likely, though still unproven, that both the skin wound and the skull injury were sustained during the same attack, the scientists say. The wound "was large enough to have been a claw or a tooth," Rothschild said.

Rothschild and DePalma also compared the dinosaur wound to healed wounds on modern reptiles, including iguanas, and found the scar patterns to be nearly identical.

It isn't surprising that the wounds would be similar, said paleontologist David Burnham of the University of Kansas Biodiversity Institute, since dinosaurs and lizards are distant cousins.

"That's kind of what we would expect," said Burnham, who was not involved in the study. "It's what makes evolution work—that we can depend on this."

Dog-Eat-Dog

Phil Bell, a paleontologist with the Pipestone Creek Dinosaur Initiative in Canada who also was not involved in the research, called the Edmontosaurus fossil "a really nicely preserved animal with a very obvious scar."

He's not convinced, however, that it was caused by a predator attack. The size of the scar is relatively small, Bell said, and would also be consistent with the skin being pierced in some other accident such as a fall.

"But certainly the marks that you see on the skull, those are [more consistent] with Tyrannosaur-bitten bones," he added.

Prior to the discovery, scientists knew of one other case of a dinosaur wound. But in that instance, it was an unhealed wound that scientists think was inflicted by scavengers after the creature was already dead.

It's very likely that this particular Edmontosaurus wasn't the only dinosaur to sport scars, whether from battle wounds or accidents, Bell added.

"I would imagine just about every dinosaur walking around had similar scars," he said. (Read about "Extreme Dinosaurs" in National Geographic magazine.)

"Tigers and lions have scarred noses, and great white sharks have got dings on their noses and nips taken out of their fins. It's a dog-eat-dog world out there, and [Edmontosaurus was] unfortunately in the line of fire from some pretty big and nasty predators ... This one was just lucky to get away."

Mysterious Escape

Just how Edmontosaurus survived a T. rex attack is still unclear. "Escape from a T. rex is something that we wouldn't think would happen," Burnham said.

Duckbill dinosaurs, also known as Hadrosaurs, were not without defenses. Edmontosaurus, for example, grew up to 30 feet (9 meters) in length, and could swipe its hefty tail or kick its legs to fell predators.

Furthermore, they were fast. "Hadrosaurs like Edmontosaurus had very powerful [running] muscles, which would have made them difficult to catch once they'd taken flight," Bell said.

Duckbills were also herd animals, so maybe this one escaped with help from neighbors. Or perhaps the T. rex that attacked it was young. "There's something surrounding this case that we don't know yet," Burnham said.

Figuring out the details of the story is part of what makes paleontology exciting, he added. "We construct past lives. We can go back into a day in the life of this animal and talk about an attack and [about] it getting away. That's pretty cool."

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