Hausner, 40, was found unresponsive in his cell just after 12 p.m. local time at Arizona State Prison Complex – Eyman in Florence, about 45 miles (72 kilometers) southeast of Phoenix. Prison staff and medical responders administered CPR before he was transported to Florence Hospital at Anthem, where he was pronounced dead at 1:15 p.m.

Bill Lamoreaux, a spokesman for the Arizona Department of Corrections (ADC), said Hausner’s cause of death was not immediately known. “An investigation is being led by the Department’s Criminal Investigation Unit in consultation with the county medical examiner’s office,” he said.

Known in Arizona as the “Serial Shooter,” Hausner was convicted in March 2009 of 80 crimes, including six counts of first-degree murder, attempted murder, aggravated assault, drive-by shooting, firearms charges, cruelty to animals and arson. He received six death sentences for the killings.

Hausner and his accomplice Samuel Dieteman were both convicted for carrying out their series of nighttime shootings that randomly targeted pedestrians, bicyclists and animals in the Phoenix-area in 2005 and 2006. Hausner was convicted of killing six people and wounding 18 while Dieteman pleaded guilty to two murders.

Phoenix police attributed at least 36 shooting incidents to Hausner and Dieteman, but some believe the duo may have been responsible for other incidents as well during their crime spree that spanned more than a year. Dieteman testified against Hausner at trial and was sentenced to life without the possibility of parole.

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Walter Lee Williams, 64, was arrested on Tuesday evening at an undisclosed location in Mexico, said Laura Eimiller, a spokeswoman for the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI). It came only a day after Williams became the 500th addition to the FBI’s Ten Most Wanted Fugitives list.

“The FBI received information about a possible location for Williams within Mexico and, through the FBI’s Legal Attache in Mexico City, requested assistance from Mexican authorities to locate and apprehend Williams,” Eimiller said. “With respect to our Mexican partners and necessary legal arrangements being made to return Williams to U.S. custody, no further details are being made available at this time.”

Williams was charged in an indictment unsealed in California last week that charges the former USC university professor with one count of producing child pornography, one count of traveling for the purpose of engaging in illicit sexual conduct with a minor and two counts of engaging in illicit sexual conduct in foreign places.

According to prosecutors, Williams met two 14-year-old boys from the Philippines on the Internet in 2010 and engaged in sexual activity with them during webcam sessions. He later expressed a desire to visit them in the Philippines to have sex, and he traveled from Los Angeles to the Philippines in January 2011.

While in the Philippines, prosecutors allege Williams engaged in sex acts with both boys and produced sexually explicit photos of one of them. He fled the Los Angeles area approximately one week after returning from the Philippines, and he had remained on the run ever since.

Prosecutors, who believed Williams had fled to either Mexico or Peru, previously said he has an extensive history of travel throughout the Southeast Asia region, which is notorious for child sex tourism. Besides repeated travels to the Philippines, he is also believed to have resided in Indonesia, Polynesia and Thailand.

“The FBI’s Ten Most Wanted List reaches consumers of news and Internet users globally and we believe that Williams inclusion on this list of notorious fugitives will lead to the tip that breaks this case,” Bill Lewis, the Assistant Director in Charge of the FBI’s Los Angeles Field Office, said on Monday. “The allegations Williams faces are serious and we hope to catch him quickly before more children are abused.”

The FBI had offered a reward of up to $ 100,000 for information leading directly to the arrest of Williams, but it was not immediately known if anyone would be eligible for the reward.

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Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid said the attack happened early Wednesday morning when its fighters fired several missiles at Bagram Air Base, which is a large U.S. military base that is located in Parwan province, just north of Kabul. U.S. officials confirmed the base had been attacked.

“Mujahideen of the Islamic Emirate (Taliban) yesterday night fired missiles into the Bagram airbase, the largest base in the country,” Mujahid said. “Two of the missiles stormed into the residential part of the base, leaving as many as 11 American terrorist troops dead and 7 others wounded. The strikes also caused severe damages.”

The insurgent group is known to exaggerate casualty numbers. The NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) confirmed four of its service members were killed in the attack, and a military official in Washington, D.C. said all four casualties were American service members.

The attack came less than a day after the Taliban opened a political office in the Qatari capital Doha with the aim of achieving peace and ending the war in Afghanistan. A senior U.S. official said the U.S. is expected to hold its first formal meeting with the Taliban ‘within days’, followed by a meeting between the Taliban and Afghanistan’s High Peace Council.

Wednesday’s deaths raise the number of coalition troops killed in Afghanistan so far this year to 91, according to official figures. A total of 402 ISAF troops were killed in Afghanistan in 2012, down from 566 fatalities in 2011 and 711 in 2010. A majority of the fallen troops were American and were killed in the country’s south, which is plagued by IED attacks on troops and civilians.

There are currently more than 100,000 foreign troops in Afghanistan, including some 68,000 U.S. troops and 9,000 British soldiers. Approximately 3,800 British soldiers are expected to withdraw from Afghanistan by the end of 2013, with all foreign combat troops due to leave by the end of 2014.

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Among the SUV’s involved in the recall are 2006 model year Chevrolet Trailblazer EXT and GMC Envoy XL SUVs, as well as 2006 and 2007 Chevrolet Trailblazer, GMC Envoy, Buick Rainier, SAAB 9-7x, and Isuzu Ascender SUVs. The recall involves 193,652 vehicles.

According to the U.S. National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA), a short in the circuit board could lead to a fire, increasing the risk of personal injury, detailing that a fire could occur even while the vehicle is not in use.

Furthermore, the NHTSA advised owners, as a precaution, to park outside until the remedy has been made. GM said an inspection of such vehicles is to take place, and in the case of a faulty vehicle, the driver’s door module would be replaced.

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The North’s invitation was accompanied by strong criticism of the U.S. government, but invited Washington to hold high-level talks to defuse tensions and to ensure peace and security in the region. It comes just days after North Korea abruptly canceled government-level talks with South Korea.

“If the U.S. has true intent on defusing tensions on the Korean Peninsula and ensuring peace and security in the U.S. mainland and the region, it should not raise precondition for dialogue and contact,” an unnamed spokesman for the North’s National Defense Commission (NDC) said.

The spokesman indicated the talks could cover a wide range of subjects and said the North would allow the U.S. to choose the date and venue to its convenience. “The talks can have broad and in-depth discussions on defusing military tensions, replacing the armistice system with peace mechanism and other issues of mutual concern, including the building of a ‘world without nuclear weapons’ proposed by the U.S.,” he said.

It was not immediately clear if Washington would agree to hold talks, but U.S. National Security Council spokeswoman Caitlin Hayden said the United States is willing to have credible negotiations with North Korea. “But those talks must involve North Korea living up to its obligations to the world, including compliance with U.N. Security Council resolutions, and ultimately result in denuclearization,” she said.

But the North urged the United States to accept, describing their invitation as a “bold decision” with “good intention.”

“If the U.S. truly wants to realize a ‘world without nuclear weapons’ and bring detente, it should positively respond to the DPRK’s bold decision and good intention, not missing the opportunity,” the NDC’s spokesman said. “All the future developments entirely depend on the responsible option of the U.S., which has strained the situation on the Korean Peninsula.”

The spokesman said the North is seeking to abandon its nuclear program, but emphasized it depends on South Korea and the United States. “The denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula does not only mean ‘dismantling the nuclear weapons of the North,’” he said. “It is the complete one that calls for denuclearizing the whole peninsula including South Korea and aims at totally ending the U.S. nuclear threats to the DPRK.”

South Korea does not have nuclear weapons, but the U.S. government has maintained a so-called ‘nuclear umbrella’ over the South since the Korean War. The U.S. first deployed nuclear weapons to South Korea in January 1958 and kept them there until December 1991, but the nuclear umbrella of protection remains.

“It is the strategic option taken by the DPRK for self-defense to [nuclearize] the Korean Peninsula,” the NDC spokesman explained. “The legitimate status of the DPRK as a nuclear weapons state will go on and on without vacillation whether others recognize it or not until the whole Korean Peninsula is denuclearized and the nuclear threats from outside are put to a final end.”

In March, North Korea declared the Korean War Armistice Agreement nullified and threatened to launch a preemptive nuclear strike against the United States in response to massive military exercises in the region. The U.S. responded by placing 14 additional ground-based interceptors at Fort Greely, Alaska, and Vandenberg Air Force Base, California, to counter any North Korean attack.

And on March 7, the United Nations (UN) Security Council voted in favor of tough new sanctions to punish the reclusive country for its third nuclear test. The sanctions aim to significantly impede North Korea’s ability to further develop nuclear and ballistic missile programs, as well as its proliferation activities.

Sanctions were first imposed on North Korea by the UN Security Council following nuclear tests in 2006 and 2009, including a ban on the import of nuclear and missile technology. The sanctions were further tightened in January 2013 after the country launched a long-range Unha-3 rocket which North Korea claimed to be a weather satellite, but other countries have described it as a long-range missile test in disguise.

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Protesters began their march in Charter Garden, located in the region’s Central District, and went to the U.S. Consulate before proceeding to the Hong Kong government’s headquarters. Authorities estimated at least 300 people participated in the march, but organizers put the number at around 900.

Some protesters were carrying Snowden masks while others carried signs such as “Betray Snowden, Betray Freedom,” “Let Snowden Stay,” and “No big brother state.” Petitions and letters were handed over to representatives of the U.S. Consulate and the Hong Kong government, while rights advocates and political activists held speeches.

Hours after the protests, Hong Kong leader CY Leung broke his silence on the matter by releasing a brief statement. “When the relevant mechanism is activated, the Hong Kong SAR Government will handle the case of Mr Snowden in accordance with the laws and established procedures of Hong Kong,” he said.

He also addressed allegations that U.S. intelligence agencies have been hacking into computers in Hong Kong and mainland China for years. “The Government will follow up on any incidents related to the privacy or other rights of the institutions or people in Hong Kong being violated,” Leung added in his statement, giving no other details.

Snowden, a 29-year-old American who worked for defense contractor Booz Allen Hamilton as an infrastructure analyst for the National Security Agency (NSA), identified himself last week as the source behind recent newspaper articles that revealed previously unknown details about the U.S. government’s secret surveillance programs.

According to recent disclosures by The Guardian and the Washington Post, U.S. intelligence agencies have direct access to the servers of nine Internet companies for a wide range of digital data. A slideshow, marked “TOP SECRET”, identifies current data providers as Microsoft, Google, Yahoo!, Facebook, PalTalk, YouTube, Skype, AOL and Apple.

The slideshow explains that much of the world’s communications flow through the United States, and that the communications of foreign targets could easily flow through the U.S. It says the nine current providers supply information on a massive scale, including e-mails, chats, videos, photos, stored data, voice communications (VoIP), file transfers, video conferences, online social networking details and details about when accounts are accessed.

Snowden, speaking from a hotel room in Hong Kong during an interview last week, said he came forward publicly to authenticate his recent disclosures and because his concerns about ‘abuses’ in the intelligence community agencies had not been taken seriously. “The more you talk about the (wrongdoing), the more you’re ignored,” he said.

The contract employee said he is not against the U.S. government but wants the public to be able to decide whether the intelligence agencies should have the authority to carry out controversial and secretive surveillance programs. “This is something that’s not our place to decide, the public needs to decide whether these programs and policies are right or wrong,” he said.

Snowden said the intelligence community originally focused on foreign targets but is now increasingly targeting all communications in the U.S. “It ingests them by default. It collects them in its system and it filters them and it analyses them and it measures them and it stores them for periods of time simply because that’s the easiest, most efficient, and most valuable way to achieve these ends,” he said.

The contractor said analysts with proper clearance could target anyone at will, ranging from ordinary citizens to federal judges and up to President Barack Obama if they have his personal contact details. He said the public should be concerned because citizens are being “watched and recorded,” whether they did something wrong or not.

“You simply have to eventually fall under suspicion from somebody even by a wrong call. And then they can use this system to go back in time and scrutinize every decision you’ve ever made, every friend you’ve ever discussed something with,” he said. “And [they'll] attack you on that basis to sort of derive suspicion from an innocent life and paint anyone in the context of a wrongdoer.”

Snowden, who lived with his girlfriend in Hawaii, flew to Hong Kong last month after telling his NSA supervisor that he needed several weeks off to receive treatment for epilepsy. His whereabouts are currently unknown after he checked out of the Mira hotel in Tsimshatsui on Monday morning, but he is believed to remain in Hong Kong.

Snowden said he came to Hong Kong because it has a strong tradition of free speech and because he believes the Hong Kong government is more likely to resist the dictates of the U.S. government, which has launched a criminal investigation. But under an extradition treaty that came into force in 1998, the U.S. government is able to request Hong Kong to detain a U.S. citizen for up to two months while it prepares an extradition request.

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The Attorney General’s Office of the state of Jalisco informed that the seven foreigners, whose nationalities and identities remained undisclosed, were arrested in Puerto Vallarta, a popular beach resort, on suspicion of sexual exploitation of minors and child pornography.

Jalisco’s government secretary, Arturo Zamora Jimenez, said the arrests were carried in the past two weeks, adding that the suspects were being sought by international authorities.

Jimenez gave few details regarding the arrests and crimes, but he said at least four of the suspects were American nationals. He said two of them were extradited, as authorities from the states of Texas and Wisconsin, among others, had placed orders for their arrests.

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The incident occurred at around 8:37 a.m. local time on Thursday at the Williams Olefins chemical plant in Geismar, a community about 58 miles (93 kilometers) northwest of New Orleans. More than 300 people were working at the plant at the time of explosion, which caused a fire that created towering flames.

Christina Stephens, a spokeswoman for the Louisiana Department of Health and Hospitals, said 77 people were treated at area hospitals and 26 of them remained hospitalized by Friday morning. Rescue workers recovered one body at the site of the blast, and plant owner Williams Companies, Inc. identified the victim as 29-year-old Zachary Green.

The company said Green, an operator at the plant, had started working at the plant in October 2012. “We are grieving for the loss of Zack who was part of our Williams community,” said Williams’ president and CEO Alan Armstrong. “Our thoughts and prayers are with the family at this time of sorrow.”

The Ascension Parish Sheriff’s Office initially ordered a shelter-in-place in a two-mile (3.2 kilometer) radius of the plant, but it was lifted when authorities determined there was no health risk to nearby residents. “We have zero concerns for off-site impact,” the office said. “Hazardous materials units are on the scene and every effort is being made to assess the situation.”

Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal quickly went to the scene to assess the situation, and praised the work of first responders. “There were over 300 people evacuated from the plant site. Of the evacuees, eight people were taken by helicopter,” he said. “There are 10 people in a safe room in the plant. This is part of emergency protocol for shutting down the plant.”

The governor’s office said the plant was in the process of emergency flaring, and air monitoring is being carried out as a precaution. “There have been no detections above normal levels, but the Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ) is doing additional monitoring out of an abundance of caution,” the office said in a statement.

It was not immediately clear what caused Thursday’s explosion, but federal authorities said terrorism was not suspected.

“The fire has been extinguished and Williams is cooperating with federal, state and local agencies in assessing the situation and determining the cause of the explosion,” Williams said in a statement on late Thursday evening. “The extent of damage is unknown at this time.”

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The shooting occurred just before 1:30 p.m. local time at the Cherokee Place Business Incubator in St. Louis., which houses a number of businesses within its complex. Officers responded to the scene after others inside the building heard gunshots coming from A K Home Health Care, L.L.C. on the building’s first floor.

Responding officers located four bodies, two adult males and two adult females, inside the home health care business. “Investigation revealed there were no witnesses to the incident, but others inside of the businesses within the building heard gunshots,” a St. Louis police spokesperson said.

Investigators recovered a surveillance video which shows a male in an apparent verbal dispute, after which gunshots are seen penetrating a wall inside of the business. It is believed the owner of the business opened fire, killing three of his employees before turning the gun on himself.

“The surveillance video also shows that no one had entered or exited the business other than the four deceased, which led investigators to determine this incident to be a murder/suicide. The weapon was recovered at the scene next to the suspect,” the spokesperson said, giving no details about a possible motive.

St. Louis Today reported that a woman, dressed in traditional Muslim garments, later arrived at the scene and mourned the deaths after officers did not allow her to access the crime scene. She claimed the victims were all related family members and immigrants from Somalia, but authorities have not yet released the identities of the victims.

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According to a new ILO report titled ‘Ending Child Labour in Domestic Work,’ an estimated 10.5 million children worldwide – most of them under age – are working as domestic workers in people’s homes, in hazardous and sometimes slavery-like conditions. Six and a half million of these child laborers are aged between five and 14 years-old, and more than 71 percent are girls.

The report revealed that these children work in the homes of a third party or employer, carrying out tasks such as cleaning, ironing, cooking, gardening, collecting water, looking after other children and caring for the elderly.

In addition, they are often isolated from their families, hidden from the public eye and become highly dependent on their employers, becoming vulnerable to physical, psychological and sexual violence and abusive working conditions as well. Furthermore, the report said many might end up being commercially sexually exploited.

Constance Thomas, Director of the ILO’s International Programme on the Elimination of Child Labour (IPEC), stated that the situation “not only constitutes a serious violation of child rights, but remains an obstacle to the achievement of many national and international development objectives.”

While the report called for concerted and joint action at national and international levels to eliminate child labor in domestic work, Thomas stressed on the need of a “robust legal framework to clearly identify, prevent and eliminate child labor in domestic work, and to provide decent working conditions to adolescents when they can legally work.”

Child domestic work is not recognized as a form of child labor in many countries because of the blurred relationship with the employing family, the report says. The child is “working, but is not considered as a worker and although the child lives in a family setting, she or he is not treated like a family member.”

This familial and legal “care vacuum” disguises an “exploitative arrangement,” often characterized by long working hours, lack of personal freedom and sometimes hazardous working conditions. The hidden nature of their situation makes them difficult to protect, the report warned.

ILO Director-General Guy Ryder added that “there is no place and no excuse for child labor in domestic or any other form of work.”

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The Southwest Airlines 2675 flight made the emergency landing at the Sky Harbor International Airport in Phoenix, Arizona due to a possible bomb threat after takin off from Los Angeles at around 2 p.m. local time.

The passenger airplane was traveling from Los Angeles to Austin when officials warned Phoenix police of the possible threat, forcing the pilot to make the landing, Sky Harbor spokeswoman Julie Rodriguez told the Phoenix Business Journal.

Rodriguez added that the aircraft was then isolated far from the airport’s terminals and on its west side for safety percautions. As police carried out investigations, traffic in and out of the airport was diverted to the east side.

Reports indicate that a phone call specifically threatened that flight as it was on in the middle of its route. Over 140 passengers on board were evacuated safely, although authorities were carrying out interviews to gather information.

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Kami Ring, of Charlestown, was staying at her grandparents’ home in Port Deposit on Sunday when she disappeared during the night. She was last seen during the evening when it was assumed that she had gone to bed, but she was reported missing shortly after 11 a.m. local time on Monday when a resident of the home called 9-1-1.

“Ring was found deceased yesterday evening in a field near a home where she had been staying,” Maryland State Police spokeswoman Elena Russo said. “The child’s body has been transported to the Office of the Chief Medical Examiner in Baltimore for an autopsy. The cause of death has not yet been determined.”

Ring’s body was discovered at approximately 6:20 p.m. local time on Monday when State Troopers, K-9 Units from the Maryland State Police and Natural Resources Police, along with Chesapeake Search and Rescue, conducted a thorough search of the area. Her body was found in a field near a shed, only 60 yards (55 meters) from the residence from which she went missing.

“Crime scene technicians from the Maryland State Police Forensic Sciences Division responded to gather evidence,” Russo said. “Assistance was provided by the Maryland State Police Child Recovery Unit, the MSP Gang Unit, the Maryland State Apprehension Team, and criminal investigators from the North East Barrack.”

Investigators said the window screen of the bedroom where Ring was staying had been pushed out, and added that they have several leads and persons of interest. It was not immediately clear whether anyone at the home – the girl’s grandparents and one person related to the grandmother – was among those persons of interest.

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The incident began just before noon local time on Friday when 23-year-old John Zawahri, armed with a .223 semi-automatic rifle, a .44-caliber revolver, and 1,300 rounds, went on a shooting rampage in the coastal city of Santa Monica, killing five people and injuring four others during an attack that lasted 13 minutes as he cut a violent path nearly a mile (1.5 kilometer) long that ended at Santa Monica College.

Zawahri, who apparently carried out the attack over an undisclosed family dispute, was killed at a library on the campus of Santa Monica College (SMC) during an exchange of gunfire with police officers. His father and brother were the first victims before he killed three others, apparently at random.

“As may be assumed, I am in mourning for my family and for those who were also affected by this horrific tragedy over the past few days,” Randa Abdou, the alleged gunman’s mother, said in a statement on late Monday. “I cannot express my great sadness for the families who are also suffering at this terrible time.”

Abdou, who returned to Southern California from the Middle East after last week’s shooting, also called on the media to respect her privacy. “I do ask the media to please give me time to grieve and to come to grips with the overwhelming sorrow that has befallen all of us,” she said.

On Sunday, officials confirmed that 26-year-old Marcela Franco had become the shooting’s fifth fatal victim after she died of her injuries while surrounded by her family at Ronald UCLA Medical Center. “Marcela had registered to attend classes this summer at SMC and was with her father Carlos when Friday’s tragedy struck,” Chui Tsang, the president of Santa Monica College, said on Sunday.

The woman’s father, 68-year-old Carlos Navarro Franco, died Friday at the scene of the shooting. The father and daughter had gone to Santa Monica College to buy books for the woman’s summer classes, but they came under fire while in an SUV, causing the vehicle to crash into a wall.

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The incident began just before noon local time on Friday when 23-year-old John Zawahri, armed with a .223 semi-automatic rifle, a .44-caliber revolver, and 1,300 rounds, went on a shooting rampage in the coastal city of Santa Monica, killing five people and injuring four others during an attack that lasted 13 minutes as he cut a violent path nearly a mile (1.5 kilometer) long that ended at Santa Monica College.

Zawahri, who apparently carried out the attack over an undisclosed family dispute, was killed at a library on the campus of Santa Monica College (SMC) during an exchange of gunfire with police officers. His father and brother were the first victims before he killed three others, apparently at random.

“As may be assumed, I am in mourning for my family and for those who were also affected by this horrific tragedy over the past few days,” Randa Abdou, the alleged gunman’s mother, said in a statement on late Monday. “I cannot express my great sadness for the families who are also suffering at this terrible time.”

Abdou, who returned to Southern California from the Middle East after last week’s shooting, also called on the media to respect her privacy. “I do ask the media to please give me time to grieve and to come to grips with the overwhelming sorrow that has befallen all of us,” she said.

On Sunday, officials confirmed that 26-year-old Marcela Franco had become the shooting’s fifth fatal victim after she died of her injuries while surrounded by her family at Ronald UCLA Medical Center. “Marcela had registered to attend classes this summer at SMC and was with her father Carlos when Friday’s tragedy struck,” Chui Tsang, the president of Santa Monica College, said on Sunday.

The woman’s father, 68-year-old Carlos Navarro Franco, died Friday at the scene of the shooting. The father and daughter had gone to Santa Monica College to buy books for the woman’s summer classes, but they came under fire while in an SUV, causing the vehicle to crash into a wall.

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The research, led by a team of scientists at the Buck Institute for Research on Aging in California, showed how the drug rapamycin impacts mammalian tissues, providing functional insights and possible benefits for a drug that has been shown to extend the lifespan of mice by as much as 14 percent.

Rapamycin is an immunosuppressant drug which can be used to help prevent organ rejection after transplantation, but it is also included in treatment regimes for some cancers. In the study, rapamycin was added to the diets of mice that were 24 months old – the human equivalent of 70 to 75 years of age.

Similar to humans, the aged mice in the study exhibited enlarged hearts, a general thickening of the heart wall and a reduced efficiency in the heart’s ability to pump blood. The mice were examined with ultrasound echocardiography before and after the three-month treatment period, using metrics closely paralleling those used in humans.

Buck Institute faculty Simon Melov, PhD, the senior author of the study, said age-related cardiac dysfunction was either slowed or reversed in the treated mice. “When we measured the efficiency of how the heart pumps blood, the treated mice showed a remarkable improvement from where they started,” he said. “In contrast, the untreated mice saw a general decline in pumping efficiency at the end of the same three month period.”

Adding that the treated mice saw a reduction in heart size, reduced stress signaling in heart tissues and a reduction in inflammation, Melov said the study provides the first evidence that age-related heart dysfunction can be improved even in late life via appropriate drug treatment.

Buck researchers, utilizing genome analysis tools, uncovered suites of related genes which rapamycin modulates in the heart. “Rapamycin affected the expression of genes involved in calcium regulation, mitochondrial metabolism, hypertrophy and inflammation,” said Melov. “We also carried out behavioral assessments which showed the treated mice spent more time on running wheels than the mice who aged without intervention.”

The findings are significant for human health as heart disease is the leading cause of death in the United States, claiming nearly 600,000 lives per year. “Little has been known about the functional ramifications of rapamycin in mammalian tissues,” explained Buck Institute President and CEO Brian Kennedy, co-author of the paper.

“These findings are significant because we have no interest in simply extending lifespan without an accompanying improvement in the health and quality of life,” Kennedy added. “It is particularly encouraging that, in this case, an already-approved drug that extends lifespan also improved function late in life.”

However, chronic treatment with rapamycin has been problematic in both humans and mice as the drug has the potential to cause deleterious metabolic side effects, including weight gain and glucose insensitivity. Melov said the drug had only mild transient metabolic effects during the study.

Researchers at the Mayo Clinic are currently recruiting seniors with cardiac artery disease for a clinical trial involving low dose treatment with rapamycin. Future studies will focus on better understanding the molecular targets that drive age-related heart dysfunction, and why rapamycin treatment is so beneficial to the aging hearts.

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Edward Snowden revealed his identity during an interview with the British newspaper The Guardian. He said he currently works for defense contractor Booz Allen Hamilton as an infrastructure analyst for the NSA in Hawaii, although he previously held a number of other positions in the intelligence community.

Snowden, speaking from a hotel room in Hong Kong, said he came forward publicly to authenticate his recent disclosures and because his concerns about ‘abuses’ in the intelligence community agencies had not been taken seriously. “The more you talk about the (wrongdoing), the more you’re ignored,” he said.

The contract employee said he is not against the U.S. government but wants the public to be able to decide whether the intelligence agencies should have the authority to carry out controversial and secretive surveillance programs. “This is something that’s not our place to decide, the public needs to decide whether these programs and policies are right or wrong,” he said.

According to recent disclosures by The Guardian and the Washington Post, U.S. intelligence agencies have direct access to the servers of nine Internet companies for a wide range of digital data. A slideshow, marked “TOP SECRET”, identifies current data providers as Microsoft, Google, Yahoo!, Facebook, PalTalk, YouTube, Skype, AOL and Apple.

The slideshow explains that much of the world’s communications flow through the United States, and that the communications of foreign targets could easily flow through the U.S. It says the nine current providers supply information on a massive scale, including e-mails, chats, videos, photos, stored data, voice communications (VoIP), file transfers, video conferences, online social networking details and details about when accounts are accessed.

Snowden, during Sunday’s interview, said the intelligence community originally focused on foreign targets but is now increasingly targeting all communications in the U.S. “It ingests them by default. It collects them in its system and it filters them and it analyses them and it measures them and it stores them for periods of time simply because that’s the easiest, most efficient, and most valuable way to achieve these ends,” he said.

The contractor said analysts with proper clearance could target anyone at will, ranging from ordinary citizens to federal judges and up to President Barack Obama if they have his personal contact details. He said the public should be concerned because citizens are being “watched and recorded,” whether they did something wrong or not.

“You simply have to eventually fall under suspicion from somebody even by a wrong call. And then they can use this system to go back in time and scrutinize every decision you’ve ever made, every friend you’ve ever discussed something with,” he said. “And [they'll] attack you on that basis to sort of derive suspicion from an innocent life and paint anyone in the context of a wrongdoer.”

Snowden, who lives with his girlfriend in Hawaii, flew to Hong Kong last month after telling his NSA supervisor that he needed several weeks off to receive treatment for epilepsy. His whereabouts are currently unknown after Radio Television Hong Kong (RTHK) reported that Snowden checked out of the Mira hotel in Tsimshatsui on Monday morning.

Following the publication of Sunday’s interview, Booz Allen confirmed Snowden had been an employee at its firm and assigned to a team in Hawaii for less than three months. “News reports that this individual has claimed to have leaked classified information are shocking, and if accurate, this action represents a grave violation of the code of conduct and core values of our firm,” a statement said, adding that it will work closely with authorities to assist in their investigation.

Shawn Turner, a spokesman for the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, said the matter had been referred to the Justice Department for investigation. “The Intelligence Community is currently reviewing the damage that has been done by these recent disclosures,” he said. “Any person who has a security clearance knows that he or she has an obligation to protect classified information and abide by the law.”

Justice Department spokeswoman Nanda Chitre confirmed the department is in the initial stages of an investigation into the unauthorized disclosure of classified information by an individual with authorized access. “Consistent with long standing Department policy and procedure and in order to protect the integrity of the investigation, we must decline further comment,” she said.

Snowden said he came to Hong Kong because it has a strong tradition of free speech and because he believes the Hong Kong government is more likely to resist the dictates of the U.S. government. But under an extradition treaty that came into force in 1998, the U.S. government is able to request Hong Kong to detain a U.S. citizen for up to two months while it prepares an extradition request.

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Marcela Franco, 26, was critically injured on Friday when 23-year-old John Zawahri went on a shooting spree in the coastal city of Santa Monica, targeting nearly a dozen people during an attack that lasted approximately 13 minutes as he cut a violent path nearly a mile (1.6 kilometer) long that ended at Santa Monica College (SMC).

Chui Tsang, the president of Santa Monica College, said Marcela Franco died of her injuries on Sunday morning while surrounded by her family at Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center. “Marcela had registered to attend classes this summer at SMC and was with her father Carlos when Friday’s tragedy struck,” he said.

The woman’s father, 68-year-old Carlos Navarro Franco, died Friday at the scene of the shooting. The father and daughter had gone to Santa Monica College to buy books for the woman’s summer classes, but they came under fire while in an SUV, causing the vehicle to crash into a wall.

“Our deepest sympathies go to the Franco family. At the appropriate time, the College will convene a campus-wide memorial,” Chui said. “Yesterday, the Santa Monica College Foundation established a memorial fund honoring Carlos Franco and his family. Donations can be made to The Carlos Franco Family Memorial Fund.”

The death of Marcela Franco raises the number of people killed by the gunman to five, apparently over an undisclosed family dispute although most of the victims are believed to have been unknown to him. Zawahri was killed at a library on the campus of Santa Monica College during an exchange of fire with police officers.

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The accident happened at around 11:15 p.m. local time on Thursday when the helicopter went down in the parking lot at Paces Creek Elementary School in Manchester, about 75 miles (120 kilometers) southeast of Lexington. The aircraft was carrying a pilot and two medical personnel, but no patient.

Air Evac Lifeteam, which is based in Missouri but operates from more than 110 air medical bases across 15 states, confirmed three of its Manchester-based crew were killed in the accident. “We are devastated at the loss of these crew members who we consider family,” a company statement said.

The Laurel County Sheriff’s Department identified the pilot as Eddy Sizemore, who had recently left the office after serving as its chief deputy for more than two years. “He had left to pursue another one of his passions – that of flying helicopters – after a job offer with a medical helicopter based in Manchester,” Sheriff John Root said.

Root, who said the helicopter was en-route back to its base in Clay County, extended his condolences to the family of Sizemore. “There is a special place in God’s kingdom for Eddy. Rest well, Brother,” he said. “You will be greatly missed by the staff of the Laurel County Sheriff’s Office.”

It was not immediately known what caused Thursday’s accident, which will be investigated by both the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) and the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB). “We have no details regarding the cause of the accident but will be working with the NTSB in coming days as they conduct their investigation,” Air Evac Lifeteam said in its statement.

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The accident happened at around 5 a.m. local time on Thursday when a car and a tractor-trailer were traveling westbound on Georgia State Route 32 near the small town of Ocilla in Irwin County, some 190 miles (305 kilometers) southeast of Atlanta. An ambulance from neighboring Coffee County was traveling eastbound with its lights and siren activated.

Franka Young, a spokeswoman for the Georgia State Patrol, said the car had pulled off the roadway to yield for the approaching ambulance, but the truck ended up colliding with the emergency vehicle. “The tractor-trailer jackknifed across the centerline and into the path of the ambulance,” she said.

The ambulance struck the left side of the tractor and trailer, killing the two emergency medical technicians (EMTs) and their patient who was being transferred from Coffee Regional Medical Center in Coffee County to Tift Regional Medical Center in Tift County. The truck driver was not injured.

Young identified the driver of the ambulance as 44-year-old Teresa Ann Davis of Axson and the second EMT as 56-year-old Randall Whiddon of Ashburn. The patient in the ambulance was identified as 65-year-old Charles Arvin Smith of Fitzgerald, but the nature of his injuries or illness prior to the accident were not released.

The Specialized Collision Reconstruction Team (SCRT) of the Georgia State Patrol is investigating the accident, and Young said charges against the truck driver were pending. She identified the driver of the truck as Rockwell Lott of Tifton.

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A four-story building collapsed downtown Philadelphia, the state capital, and onto a two-story building where a Salvation Army Thrift Store is located on the Center City’s busy Market Street. The incident occurred on Wednesday morning at around 10:45 a.m. local time.

The vacant building was being demolished when the operation, which was being supervised by architect Plato Marinakos, Jr., went terribly wrong and ended up crushing the neighboring building.

Philadelphia Mayor Michael Nutter during a late Wednesday night press conference confirmed the deaths of five women and one man. Shortly after his statement, a 61-year-old woman identified as Myra Plekam was pulled out from the debris alive.

Deputy Fire Chief Robert Coyne told local media outlets early Thursday morning that Plekam was taken to a hospital where she was reported in critical condition. However, rescuers said she was conscious and talking to them at the time she was pulled out, despite being trapped over 12 hours.

At least thirteen others were also reported injured. Search-and-rescue crews are continuing their operations as there are still reports of missing people, and authorities believe they could be trapped under the rubble.

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Obama was about 12 minutes into a 20-minute speech at a private residence in Washington when she was interrupted by a heckler, calling for an executive order to bar discrimination by federal contractors based on sexual orientation or gender identity. “One of the things that I don’t do well is this,” she told the audience in response to the interruption.

Amanda Terkel, a senior political reporter for the Huffington Post who attended the event as a pool reporter, said the first lady left the lectern and confronted the protester face-to-face. “Listen to me or you can take the mic, but I’m leaving,” Obama told the heckler. “You all decide. You have one choice.”

Many of those attending the event began shouting for Obama to stay, and some of them turned against the protester by telling her to go. The protester was then escorted from the event as she shouted, describing herself as a lesbian who is “looking for federal equality before I die.”

Obama then returned to the lectern and continued her speech to loud applause.

Heather Cronk, co-director of the pro-LGBT rights group GetEQUAL, identified the protester as one of their activists, Ellen Strutz. She said there were three other GetEQUAL activists at the event as well, including two college students. They were identified as activists from Ohio, North Carolina, and New Mexico.

Tuesday’s fundraiser was hosted at the Northwest D.C. home of Dr. Nan Schaffer and Karen Dixon, a lesbian couple whom were legally wed in the Canadian city of Vancouver in 2008. The event was attended by approximately 200 people and tickets for the fundraiser ranged between $ 500 and $ 10,000.

President Barack Obama came out in support of same-sex marriage in May 2012, an unprecedented step for a sitting U.S. president. Obama has raised millions of dollars from lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) donors as a result of his support for equal rights for same-sex couples, and his administration recently urged the U.S. Supreme Court to overturn a law that bans federal recognition of same-sex marriages.

Support for same-sex marriage has increased across the United States in recent years. A Gallup poll in 1996 found that only 27 percent of Americans were in favor of same-sex marriage, but the latest survey conducted last year found that 50 percent of Americans are now in favor of allowing marriages between people of the same gender.

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The incident occurred at around 1 a.m. local time when the woman decided to hitchhike her way back to Manali, the popular tourist site in the state of Himachal Pradesh, after visiting the Vashisht village on Monday afternoon and failing to find transportation.

According to the Hindustian Times, the 31-year-old woman was able to flag down a truck, but soon after, the driver pulled over at a secluded area where he and two of his friends allegedly raped the woman for around an hour.

The men then robbed her camera, cellular phone, tablet, and cash, before dropping her off at Beas bridge at around 3 a.m. The woman walked toward the nearest police station, and authorities later confirmed the sexual assault after conducting medical tests at a civil hospital in Manali.

The U.S. Embassay was informed and in contact with the victim, as the media outlet said authorities later detained three youths, although the victim was unable to identify them. The woman’s identity was not immediately disclosed.

The number of sexual assaults in India has dramatically increased in recent months, as the number of female tourists has also dropped. One of the most alarming incidents occurred in New Delhi earlier in the year when six men gang-raped a 23-year-old Indian student who would eventually lose her life.

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The attack took place on Monday at noon in front of a school in the Chamkani district bazaar, located in the southeastern province of Paktia when a explosive-rigged motorcycle detonated.

The NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) said two service members were killed, although their identities were not immediately disclosed. In the statement, it said one ISAF civilian was also killed.

While Afghan security officials also confirmed the deaths of the two American soldiers, Brigadier General Zalmai Oryakhel told Pajhwok Afghan News that ten students were also killed, while fifteen others were injured.

No group has claimed responsibility of the attack, but such attacks are commonly blamed on Taliban forces.

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A tractor trailer and a minivan crashed on Wednesday night at around 6 p.m. local time on Route 13 between Crains Mills and West Keeney roads in the town of Truxton in upstate New York.

According to Cortland County Sheriff’s Department, the tractor-trailer was traveling southbound when the trailer apparently detatched, slid across to the other lane, and struck the minivan, which was traveling north, WXHC radio reported.

Emergency teams responded to the accident, and the coroner’s office later confirmed that seven of the eight people on board the minivan lost their lives. Among those killed were three adults in their 20s and four children, all under ten years old. One person survived the accident and was transferred to the University Hospital in Syracuse.

The powerful impact ripped the minivan apart. The driver and passenger of the tractor trailer, which is owned by Newton Salvage from Georgetown in Madison County, survived the accident. Both vehicles ended up on the east side of the road where the driver was clearly shaken by the incident. The trailer was carrying crushed vehicles.

The victims’ identities were not immediately revealed.

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The increasing violence in the Middle Eastern country may re-ignite widespread sectarian strife unless the country’s leaders take immediate action, the top UN envoy warned amid the latest wave of deadly attacks.

Anbar province governor reportedly escaped an assassination attempt when twin bombs exploded near his convoy, injuring four of his bodyguards, as a fresh wave of deadly bombings struck the Iraqi capital of Baghdad. Over 100 people have died since Monday, when a number of bombings in Baghdad killed more than 50 people. In May alone, estimates of over 500 deaths have been reported in such attacks.

Martin Kobler, the UN Secretary-General’s Special Representative and head of the UN Assistance Mission for Iraq (UNAMI), condemned the attack against the governor’s convoy In a news release issued in Baghdad in which he voiced his dismay at the horrific toll of lives lost following the “new criminal wave of attacks against innocent civilians,” particularly targeting the capital.

“Systemic violence is ready to explode at any moment if all Iraqi leaders do not engage immediately to pull the country out of this mayhem,” Kobler stated, reiterating the call he made on the country’s leaders earlier this week.

On Wednesday, in an exchange of views with European parliamentarians, Kobler voiced serious concerns over the heightened level of violence in Iraq and the dangers of the country falling back into sectarian strife, if decisive action is not taken by its political leaders.

“The country stands at a crossroads,” he stated, calling for a stronger European Union role in dealing with the developments unfolding in the country, and for increased interaction with the Iraqi Council of Representatives.

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