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Scientist Shearer brings odd bedfellows together to save the Earth

Introducing a CEO to an environmentalist at the post-Burning Man street festival in San Francisco is the perfect illustration of how David Shearer - epidemiologist, eco-filmmaker, hybrid car consultant, green public art advocate and grown-up hippie kid - brings together folks who would never otherwise meet.   » Full Story

Bringing Spice To a Hot Land
A Brazilian engineer uses solar power to make the desert bloom.

Baixas is the poorest zone of São José da Tapera, one of the most desperate municipalities on the continent. So when José Roberto Fonseca—an engineer, environmentalist and inveterate tinkerer—told the farmers of Baixas they could use solar energy to grow their way out of poverty, most thought he was crazy.
» Full Story

Sufism may be powerful antidote to Islamic extremism
With its spiritual tradition, 'the Sufi way' is an age-old alternative for radicals and modernists alike.

Images of Islam have pervaded the news media in recent years, but one aspect of the faith has gotten little attention – Islamic spirituality. Yet thousands in America and millions in the Muslim world have embarked on the spiritual path called Sufism, or the Sufi way. » Full Story

The Golden Age of Travel?

This holiday season we’re going to hear endless stories of travel nightmares from our families, friends and the press. So blogger Pico Iyer starts his editorial with a contrarian statement: "Air travel is in fact as comfortable and reasonable today as it’s ever been."  » Full Story

Mandela shines brightly at all-star AIDS concert
South Africa's beloved elder statesman has turned his energies to combating an epidemic that is robbing the country of hoped for prosperity.

The 89-year-old man walked slowly onto a stage crowded with rock stars and broke into a smile. He still has it, the charisma that held his people together on the Long Walk to Freedom. In recent years, Nelson Mandela has turned his energy from one enemy – the racist system of government called apartheid – to another – HIV and AIDS. » Full Story

Light activated cancer drug hope
Scientists say they may be able to make cancer-fighting drugs target tumours far more effectively by using ultra-violet light to activate them.

To get antibodies to specifically target a tumour, Professor Colin Self and his his team have devised a way of "cloaking" the antibodies with a light-sensitive organic oil which stops them from working until they come into contact with light.
  » Full Story

In exile, a former gang member finds a reason to dance
Deported to Cambodia for criminal convictions, Tuy Sobil saves street kids –
and himself –
with break dance.

Born in a refugee camp in Thailand in 1977 to escapees from the Khmer Rouge killing fields and taken to the US only to end up as a convicted gang member, Tuy's difficult transition in exile became life-transforming as he developed the Tiny Toones dance troupe.
  » Full Story

Is Great Happiness Too Much of a Good Thing?

Psychologists are studying ways to help people retain their sensitivity to positive experiences. Individuals and couples who attend to everyday accomplishments, celebrate the positive and cultivate a sense of gratitude for what they have seem to have the best odds of getting off the happiness treadmill.  » Full Story

Gore and UN panel win Nobel prize
Climate change campaigner Al Gore and the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change have been jointly awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.

The Norwegian Nobel Committee said it wanted to bring into sharper focus the "increased danger of violent conflicts and wars, within and between states" posed by climate change.
  » Full Story

As an energy-saver, the clothesline makes a comeback 

As a national clothesline – or "Right to Dry" – movement escalates, Vermont is the latest state to introduce a bill that would override clothesline bans, which are often instituted by community associations loath to air laundry even when it's clean. This movement is about people making a little (affordable) change to help the environment.  » Full Story

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