T. Rex Leech & Titanic Bacteria Make Top 10 New Species List

News – Bioluminescent Mushroom (Mycena luxaeterna) Common name: Eternal light mushroom. Lighting up the top …

A pancake-shaped batfish, a leech with titanic teeth found inside a human's nose and an iron-eating bacterium snagged spots on the Top 10 New Species list, announced Monday (May 23) by the International Institute for Species Exploration at Arizona State University and a committee of taxonomists.

This year's top 10 come from around the world, including Brazil, the Gulf of Mexico, the Mascarene Islands in the Indian Ocean, Madagascar, the North Atlantic Ocean, Oregon, Peru, the Philippines, South Africa and West Africa. [See a Gallery of Top 10 New Species]

The top 10, in no specific order, include:

• T.-rex leech: The Tyrannobdella rex leech, which sports gigantic teeth, was found in the nostril of a 9-year-old girl by Peruvian physician Renzo Arauco-Brown.
• Titanic bacterium: Found at the bottom of the ocean, at the site of the RMS Titanic shipwreck, this iron-eating bacterium named Halomonas titanicae. The bacterium sticks to steel surfaces, creating knob-like mounds of corrosion products, called "rusticles."
• Pancake batfish: The odd fish seems to hop on its thick, arm-like fins as it moves awkwardly in the water, resembling a walking bat. It was discovered in the Gulf of Mexico.
• Glowing fungus: Lighting up the top 10 is a luminescent fungus collected in São Paulo, Brazil, which have gel-coated stems that emit a bright, yellowish-green light constantly.
• Jumping cockroaches: As if cockroaches weren't creepy enough on the ground, one discovered last year has legs that are highly modified for jumping, putting its ability on par with grasshoppers. Named Saltoblattella montistabularis, the cockroach was discovered in the Mountain National Park in South Africa.
• Monitor lizard: At more than 6 feet (1.8 meters) in length, a fruit-eating monitor lizard discovered in the Philippines is the lengthiest species to make this year's top 10. The blue, black, green and gold lizard, named Varanus bitatawa, weighs in at 22 pounds and spends most of its time in trees.
• Dead antelope: A new antelope, named Philantomba walteri, was discovered in West Africa, but sadly it was already dead: it was discovered at a bushmeat market.
• Raspy cricket: Glomeremus orchidophilus made the list for its distinction of being the only pollinator of the rare and endangered orchid Angraecum cadetii in the Mascarene Archipelago in the Indian Ocean.
• Gilled mushroom: Called Psathyrella aquatica, this gilled mushroom was found in the northwestern United States submerged in the clear, cold, flowing waters of the upper Rogue River in Oregon.
• Giant orb-weaver: A giant orb-weaving spider discovered in Madagascar makes webs that can span rivers, streams and lakes. Its silk is more than two times stronger than any other known spider silk. [Gallery: Spooky Spiders]

This annual top 10 new species announcement commemorates the anniversary of the birth of Carolus Linnaeus, who initiated the modern system of plant and animal names and classifications. The list is issued annually by ASU's International Institute for Species Exploration to shine attention on biodiversity. Nominations were invited through the ASU website and also generated by institute staff and an international committee of experts.

"We can only realistically aspire to sustainable biodiversity if we first learn what species exist to begin with. Our best guess is that all species discovered since 1758 represent less than 20 percent of the kinds of plants and animals inhabiting planet Earth," Quentin Wheeler, an entomologist who directs the International Institute for Species Exploration, said in a statement.

Mike Picker (University of Cape Town, South Africa)

"A reasonable estimate is that 10 million species remain to be described, named, and classified before the diversity and complexity of the biosphere is understood," he said.

'Austerity,' 2010 Word of the Year

AP – In this Tuesday, Dec. 14, 2010 photo, the word 'austerity' is shown on an index card file at dictionary …

SPRINGFIELD, Mass. – As Greece faced a debt crisis, the government passed a series of strict austerity measures, including taxes hikes and cutting public sector pay.

The move sparked angry protests, strikes and riots across the country as unemployment skyrocketed and the crisis spread to other European nations. The move also incited a rush to online dictionaries from those searching for a definition.

Austerity, the 14th century noun defined as "the quality or state of being austere" and "enforced or extreme economy," set off enough searches that Merriam-Webster named it as its Word of the Year for 2010, the dictionary's editors announced Monday.

John Morse, president and publisher of the Springfield, Mass.-based dictionary, said "austerity" saw more than 250,000 searches on the dictionary's free online tool and came with more coverage of the debt crisis.

"What we look for ... what are the words that have had spikes that strike us very much as an anomaly for their regular behavior," Morse said. "The word that really qualifies this year for that is 'austerity'."

Runners-up also announced Monday included "pragmatic," "moratorium," "socialism," and "bigot" — the last word resulted from public uses by former British Prime Minister Gordon Brown, former CNN host Rick Sanchez and former NPR senior analyst Juan Williams.

Peter Sokolowski, Merriam-Webster's editor-at-large, said this year's top 10 words were associated with a news event or coverage, which editors believe resulted in prolonged jumps in searches.

"Sometimes it's hard to pinpoint the searches on one particular news event, but typically that is what sparks people's curiosity in a word," Sokolowski said.

For example, "socialism" was searched, editors believe, because of coverage around federal bailouts and Democratic-backed federal health care legislation. And editors noticed that "pragmatic" was looked-up a number of times after midterm elections.

According to Morse, the dictionary's online website sees more than 500 million searches a year — with most of those being usual suspects like "effect" and "affect." But he said words selected for the dictionary's top 10 were words that had searches hundreds of thousands of out-of-character hits.

Also making the top ten list was the word "doppelganger." Sokolowski said the word saw a jump in searches after George Stephanopoulos of ABC's "Good Morning America" called "Eat, Pray, Love" author Elizabeth Gilbert "Julia Roberts' doppelganger." Roberts played Gilbert in the book's film adaptation and resembles the writer.

"Doppelganger" was also used in the popular television show, "The Vampire Diaries."

"Sometimes, that all it takes," Sokolowski said.

Words "shellacking," "ebullient," "dissident," and "furtive" also made this year's top list.

Allan Metcalf, an English professor at MacMurray College in Jacksonville, Ill., and author of "OK: The Improbable Story of America's Greatest Word," said the list of words shows how the country is evolving because the public is looking up words that used to be very common.

"Around 20 to 30 years ago, everyone would know what 'socialism' was," said Metcalf, who is also executive secretary of the American Dialect Society. "Same with bigot. That fact that they have to be looked up says something about us."

That's true with some words like "shellacking," said Jenna Portier, an English instructor at Nicholls State University in Thibodaux, La. Although Merriam-Webster editors said searches for the word spiked after President Barack Obama said he and his party took "a shellacking" from voters in midterm election, Portier said the word is very common in southern Louisiana. "Where I'm from, it means to varnish something like wood," Portier said.

Shana Walton, a languages and literature professor also at Nicholls State University, said she understands how news events maybe influenced the dictionary's list.

"If 'moratorium' is one of the most looked-up words, that's clearly a reflection of how often the word was used in the wake of the BP oil spill," said Walton, a linguistic anthropologist who is doing research on oil and land in south Louisiana. "Many people in south Louisiana expressed much more outrage about the moratorium, frankly, than about the spill."

Metcalf said the American Dialect Society will release its "Word of the Year" winner in January, but it's selected by the group like Time's Person of the Year.

Miss Universe 2010: Miss Mexico Crowned

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MISS UNIVERSE 2010: Miss Mexico Jimena Navarrete (L) celebrates after being crowned Miss Universe by Miss Universe 2009 Stefania Fernandez (R) of Venezuela during the Miss Universe 2010 final at the Mandalay Bay Hotel in Las Vegas on Aug. 23. (Mark Ralston/AFP/Getty Images)

The Miss Universe 2010 Pageant has been decided with a 22-year-old Mexican woman taking home the crown on Monday night.

Miss Mexico Jimena Navarrete, of Guadalajara, beat out 88 other women from six continents at the 59th annual pageant held in Las Vegas, broadcast live on NBC.

Miss Jamaica Yendi Philipps took second place, Miss Australia Jenista Campbell took third, Miss Ukraine Anna Poslavska got fourth, and Miss Philippines Venus Raj—the projected favorite coming into the competition—took fifth place.

Navarrete was the top scoring competitor in the evening gown component of the competition, and was the second-highest scorer in the swimsuit portion.

Judges asked Navarrete about the effect that the Internet has on young people and she said it is an indispensable tool.

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Miss USA Rima Faikh, the first Muslim-American person to win the Miss USA competition, did not make it to the final round.

Miss Venezuela Stefania Fernandez won the Miss Universe 2009 contest.

South Africa's World Cup stadiums already proving useless

It's only been a little over a month since the World Cup ended and the stadiums that cost South Africa $1.5 billion to construct and renovate for the tournament are already proving to be a "massive problem." Despite government officials insisting that the stadiums wouldn't turn into white elephants as the World Cup drew to a close, it seems like some of them are already becoming just that.

The AP reports:

South African Rugby Union president Oregan Hoskins told members of parliament in Cape Town on Tuesday that there had been no discussions between Durban city officials and rugby representatives before the $400 million, 70,000-capacity Moses Mabhida Stadium was built, and now it did not have enough suites to accommodate the local suite holders for the Sharks rugby team.

Hoskins said that the Sharks, who compete in the annual Super Rugby competition and the domestic Currie Cup—and who could offer near year-round use of the stadium—would have a “massive problem” moving into it now.

Hoskins went on to say that discussions have also broken down between the Western Province rugby union and the operators of the Green Point Stadium in Cape Town, which would result in Western Province remaining in their current stadium (as independent financial advisors are recommending). This leaves the Green Point Stadium on track for rare use and a cost of more than $6 million a year just to maintain it.

So if the stadiums can't be used for rugby, how about cricket? Well, failure to consult Cricket South Africa in the planning stage that also excluded rugby representatives has results in the fields being built too small for cricket matches.

As FIFA president Sepp Blatter said before the World Cup final, "There is not one single European country which has so many good and high level stadiums as the ones which are here in South Africa." And now that all those good and high level stadiums are proving unfit for other uses and financial drains on the cities that have too foot the annual bills, you have to wonder how much longer that will hold true.

Photo: Getty Images

World Cup boosts TV viewing figures

The World Cup and the economic downturn contributed to the boost, Thinkbox said

The World Cup contributed to a rise in the number of hours people spent watching TV in the first six months of the year, according to research.

Broadcasters' Audience Research Board (Barb) data suggests that, in the year to June, viewers watched an average of 28 hours and 15 minutes each week.

That is up 48 minutes on the same period last year.

Commercial TV marketing body Thinkbox said the rise could also be attributed to more Britons staying at home.

It suggested people were staying in because of the economic downturn - and were tempted to watch more TV because of the increased choice in channels as more households went digital.

The findings were reinforced by financial results from cinema chain Cineworld, which reported a 3% fall in admissions in the first half of the year.

Thinkbox chief executive Tess Alps said new ways of measuring viewing - which more accurately captured second TV sets and watching on-demand - had also been introduced.

"We know that technology is also making TV ever more attractive and we should never underestimate the fundamental importance of compelling content," she added.

'Lack of variety'

The figures, published in Thinkbox's half-year viewing review, only include shows watched on TV sets, which were viewed live or within seven days of broadcast.

The data suggests that commercial TV accounted for 62% of viewing.

Recorded programmes and on-demand services accounted for 7.1% of all TV watched in the UK while 80.4% of "time-shifted" viewing took place within a week of original broadcast.

Meanwhile, a report by media regulator Ofcom suggests that more than half of people aged 65 and over think TV programmes have become worse.

Ofcom interviewed 2,044 adults between April and October 2009.

Of those adults who thought TV had got worse in the past year, 65% cited an increase in the number of repeats as a reason.

A third of of those who thought it had deteriorated cited "lack of variety".

The report also suggest that people in the UK spend seven hours a day watching TV, surfing the net and using their mobile phones.

China landslide: More than 700 people confirmed dead

The BBC's Chris Hogg decribes the devastation in Gansu province

More than 700 people are now known to have died in a massive landslide in north-west China - making it one of the deadliest incidents so far in the country's worst flooding in a decade.

A frantic search is continuing for the more than 1,000 people still missing.

Buildings were hit by a wall of mud so mighty that buildings seven storeys high crumpled like paper, says the BBC's Chris Hogg, in Gansu province.

He says rescuers are searching by hand in the remote, mountainous region.

Continue reading the main story

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A 52-year-old man was pulled alive from the rubble more than 50 hours after the disaster, and other rescue teams say they have heard "very faint" signs of life elsewhere, state media reported.

Chinese premier Wen Jiabao has urged rescuers to keep looking until they find every last survivor.

But as the hours pass, hopes of finding survivors diminish.

"Around me are relatives of missing people sitting dazed, shocked. Each of them has stories," our correspondent says.

One woman has lost her husband and three teenage children. Until she saw their bodies with her own eyes she did not want to believe it, he adds.

The death toll was revised upwards on Tuesday from 337, and officials say that figure is expected to rise.

The weather forecast for the coming days is for heavy rain, which could hamper humanitarian work, and there is also the possibility of further landslides, says the BBC's Michael Bristow in Beijing.

Supplies running low

The landslides in remote Zhouqu county, Gansu, were triggered by torrential rains that hit the area late on Saturday.

The thick layer of mud levelled an area 5km (3 miles) by 500m, Xinhua said.

Continue reading the main story

Zhouqu landslide in figures

• 702 people confirmed dead and more than 1,000 missing
• 45,000 people in Zhouqu county evacuated
• 7,000 soldiers, firefighters and medical staff deployed
• 300 buildings buried under mud
• 66% of county without power

• Aerial view: Before and after

Landslide debris blocked a river which then burst its banks, sending water, rocks and mud down several hillsides and on to homes.

Soldiers have blasted through the blockage on the Bailong river, lowering the water level of an unstable lake created by the landslide.

Thousands of people have been evacuated from downstream villages that could be engulfed if the natural dam bursts.

The landslides came as China was struggling with its worst flooding in a decade, with more than 2,100 people reported dead or missing and millions more displaced nationwide.

President Hu Jintao led a meeting of senior ministers on Tuesday on plans to handle the crisis, Xinhua news agency said.

More than 7,000 soldiers, firefighters and medical staff are now at the scene of the landslide.

The Chinese premier has visited Zhouqu, urging rescue workers on in their efforts and comforting those affected.

Authorities have sent tents, food and water, but some supplies were reported to be running low because roads and bridges into the area have been destroyed.