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Scientists have developed a quick and simple way to diagnose endometriosis, without requiring surgery. All that is needed is a small sample of womb lining, taken in a similar way to a smear test, that can be checked for the presence of nerve fibres. According to the Human Reproduction journal, this can predict with nearly 100% accuracy the condition's presence. Endometriosis is a common problem where cells that usually line the womb are found elsewhere in the body. It affects about two million women in the UK, most of whom are diagnosed between the ages of 25 and 40. As well as causing pain and discomfort, it can also lead to infertility. If other doctors can confirm this test, this might become the standard way of diagnosing endometriosis Professor David HealyPresident-elect of the International Federation of Fertility Societies Conventionally, doctors use laparoscopy to diagnose endometriosis.
This involves the woman being booked into hospital for the invasive "keyhole" surgical procedure carried out under general anaesthetic. Laparoscopy itself can be associated with complications and can harm a woman's fertility. source: bbc.com

Authorities in the western Indian state of Gujarat state have banned a controversial book on Pakistan's founder Mohammed Ali Jinnah.
The book has been written by Jaswant Singh, an expelled leader of the Hindu nationalist main opposition party BJP. The BJP government in Gujarat said it banned the book for its "defamatory references" to Vallabhbhai Patel, India's first home minister. The late Mr Patel is a political icon in his home state of Gujarat. Described often as the "Iron Man of India", Mr Patel played an important role in the country's independence and the integration of the different states in the Indian Union.
"The book has been banned because it contains defamatory references regarding Vallabhai Patel who is considered as the architect of the modern India," a statement by the Gujarat government says.
Jaswant Singh's book is a serious academic exercise, one long overdue. A serious political party should have space for that Pratap Bhanu Mehta, analyst
"It is a bid to defame Patel by distorting historical facts. So, the state government has decided to ban the book with immediate effect for wider public interest." Jaswant Singh said he was "saddened" by the banning of the book in Gujarat. "The day we start banning books, we are banning thinking," he said. Jaswant Singh book examines the role of Congress party leader and the country's first Prime Minister, Jawaharlal Nehru, and Mr Patel in the partition of India in 1947. He writes that Mr Patel was "far off the mark" in many ways with his projections about the division and future of India. The book was released earlier this week and immediately created a controversy. source: bbc.com

MySpace will acquire the popular music discovery service iLike that allows users listen to and share music across social networks.
iLike reportedly turned down an offer from rival Facebook, where it is the top music application. The company has 55 million registered users and has been prominent on most social networks apart from MySpace.
"The iLike acquisition advances our relentless pursuit of innovation," said MySpace CEO Owen Van Natta. "Music entertainment is an important piece of people's lives," he told reporters in a conference call.
In a statement, iLike president Hadi Partovi said: "I'm enthusiastic about what this combination will mean for our users, artists, advertisers, and our staff. "We are beginning an exciting new journey together." The terms of the deal were not disclosed but the blogosphere has reported that iLike was sold "fairly cheaply" at about $20m (£12.4m). MySpace has been working to overhaul its business into one more focused on global music and entertainment. source: bbc.com

A reality TV contestant is wanted for questioning in connection with the death of his ex-wife, a former swimsuit model whose nude body was found stuffed into a suitcase. Jasmine Fiore's nude body was found in a suitcase near a trash bin behind an apartment complex. 1 of 2 According to police, 28-year-old Jasmine Fiore, who lived in Los Angeles, California, was last seen alive Friday in San Diego at a poker game with Ryan Alexander Jenkins. ''We believe that perhaps he might have information that would be beneficial to the investigation,'' Lt. Gary Worrall of the Buena Park Police Department said Wednesday on HLN's Nancy Grace. Authorities said Jenkins reported Fiore missing Saturday night to the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department. Earlier that same day, a body was found in a large suitcase inside a trash bin behind an apartment complex in Buena Park, just outside Anaheim in Orange County. Watch why police want to talk to model's ex-husband »
On Monday, the body was identified as Fiore. While the cause of death has not been confirmed, a preliminary coroner's report indicates she was strangled.
Jenkins, who appeared in two VH1 reality TV shows, "Megan Wants a Millionaire" and "I Love Money 3," may have headed back to his native Calgary, Alberta, police say.
He and Fiore reportedly had been married a few weeks before getting the union annulled.
"Given the fact that he has some celebrity status, we're quite certain that he has been made aware of the media frenzy regarding this case,'' Worrall said.
''And we have made some attempts to get in touch with him.''

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, whose disputed re-election triggered a political crisis in the country, has unveiled his list of cabinet ministers. For the first time in the 30-year history of the Islamic republic it includes three women. Mr Ahmadinejad was sworn in for a second term on 5 August after a disputed poll in June. Lawmakers are expected to begin voting on the proposed 21-member list at the end of the month. Under the proposed list, women would head up the country's health, social welfare and education ministries. The nominees for the respective posts are Marzieh Vahid Dastjerdi, Fatemeh Ajorlou and Sousan Keshavarz. source: bbc.com

The veteran Israeli entertainer Dudu Topaz has hanged himself in his prison cell, officials say. He was arrested in June and accused of plotting attacks on TV executives who had reportedly turned down his ideas. He denied any involvement.
The 62-year-old Topaz was a household name in Israel, but in recent years his career had been on the wane. A statement from the prison services said Topaz was found hanging in the shower of his cell. Paramedics were unable to revive him. Three other people were arrested in connection with the alleged attacks on TV executives earlier this year. It was not the first time Topaz had courted controversy. In 2003, on a TV show, he bit the arm of a Latin American soap opera star. And in 1995 he broke the glasses of a TV critic who had given his show a bad review. source: bbc.com

A 14-year-old boy allegedly beaten at a boot camp in China for young Internet addicts was in critical condition Thursday, less than three weeks after a youth at a different camp died, Chinese state media reported.
People sit at a wireless cafe in Beijing, using their laptop computers.
Internet use has skyrocketed in China, especially among teens. And Chinese parents have turned to hundreds of training camps that offer to wean their children -- mostly teenagers -- from excessive Internet use.
There are at least 400 private rehabilitation clinics or camps in the country, according to a recent survey by the China Youth Internet Association, adding that China has 10 million teenage Web addicts. But the Chinese Ministry of Health says none of the private rehab clinics are legally registered. The parents of Pu Liang, the injured teen, had sent him to a camp called the Anti-traditional Education Training Center on August 4 near Chengdu, capital of the southwestern province of Sichuan, Chinese media reported.
Pu allegedly was beaten three times between August 4 and August 11. Police discovered the boy in solitary confinement last week and he was taken to a hospital, according to media reports.
His parents accused a counselor at the camp and Pu's peers of repeatedly hitting him, Chinese media said, adding that particular camp has been closed. "He is suffering from water on the lungs and kidney failure," Pu's father, Pu Shiwei, told the publication China View on Wednesday. "All injuries were done by the people at the camp." The training center denied that a counselor beat the youth, contending Pu was hit by other campers because he couldn't get along with them, China View reported.
Authorities in Zhongjiang county, where the camp is located, said they detained the counselor after a report of alleged abuse from the parents of another child. The man who established the military-style camp, Wu Yongjing, admitted to the BBC that youngsters were sometimes subjected to "physical punishment." "Physical punishment is an effective way to educate children -- as long as it can be controlled," he said in an online story Wednesday.
The injured youth's mother told Chinese media that her son "got addicted to online games and frequented Internet cafes ... at the end of last semester, my son said he didn't want to go to school." The mother, Li Shubing, saw an ad for the training camp and hoped her son could be helped, she told China Daily. The parents signed a contract with the center and paid 5,000 yuan (about $730), she said. In a separate incident, 15-year-old Deng Senshan died after his parents sent him to a summer training camp for his Internet addiction, according to Chinese news agency Xinhua. That camp was in south China's Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region. source: cnn.com

The first-ever video advertisement will be published in a traditional paper magazine in September.
The video-in-print ads will appear in select copies of the US show business title Entertainment Weekly.
The slim-line screens - around the size of a mobile phone display - also have rechargeable batteries. The chip technology used to store the video - described as similar to that used in singing greeting cards - is activated when the page is turned. Each chip can hold up to 40 minutes of video.
The first clips will preview programmes from US TV network CBS and show adverts by the drinks company Pepsi. VIDEO TECHNOLOGY
Screen uses liquid crystal display (LCD) technology Each is 2.7mm thick with 320x240 resolution Can store 40mins of video Battery can be recharged via mini-USB
Rechargeable battery lasts up to 70 mins Developed by LA-firm Americhip
They will appear in 18 September editions of the magazine distributed in Los Angeles and New York. It's believed the new technology will cost much more than normal print ads.
However, BBC correspondent Rajesh Mirchandani said that in an increasingly competitive market, advertisers have realised that it is more important than ever to create attention for their product. He likened the technology to the Daily Prophet - a newspaper with moving pictures described in the Harry Potter books. It is not the first time that publishers have experimented with digital technology in magazines.
Last year, for example, men's lifestyle magazine Esquire published the first using e-ink technology, with a cover that flashed in alternating patterns. E-ink is the technology used in the Sony Reader and Amazon Kindle electronic books. Americhip, the developer of video-in-print, has also created magazine technology that appeals to various senses, including smell.
source: bbc.com

South African teenager Caster Semenya won the women's 800 meters gold medal at the World Athletics Championships in Berlin, just hours after the sport's governing body asked for the 18-year-old's gender to be verified.
Semenya celebrates her gold, which came just hours after the IAAF called for a gender test on the athlete.
Semenya crushed her rivals by streaking away to secure victory in a time of one minute 55.45 seconds -- the best time in the world this year.
Defending champion Janeth Jepkosgei of Kenya took the silver with Briton Jennifer Meadows claiming bronze. However, the race was run amid controversy following the announcement by the International Amateur Athletics Federation (IAAF).
"The gender verification test is an extremely complex procedure," said IAAF spokesman Nick Davies -- who revealed the question of Semenya's gender was first raised after her astonishing African junior championship displays. "In the case of this athlete, following her breakthrough in the African junior championships, the rumors, the gossip were starting to build-up," Davies added to reporters. There have been precedents in such cases, the most famous being that of Polish athletics great Stella Walsh, who won Olympic gold in the 100 yards at the 1932 Olympics and silver in the same event in the 1936 Olympics in Berlin.source: cnn.com

KABUL, Afghanistan (CNN) -- Under the menacing threat of violence from the Taliban, Afghans headed to the polls on Thursday in the war-ravaged nation's second-ever national election. Burqa-clad women display ID cards as they queue to vote in Kandahar on Thursday.
1 of 4 more photos » In parts of the capital Kabul, where recent calm was shattered by a series of bloody attacks leading up to election day, the streets were eerily empty early in the day, save extra security checkpoints. At midday, NATO's International Security Assistance Force reported "Kabul is calm."
The Taliban has vowed to disrupt the voting, and the risk may have been too high for some Afghans to venture out to vote. The government ordered a ban on media coverage of incidents of violence in an effort to "ensure the wide participation of the Afghan people."
Thousands of NATO and Afghan soldiers provided security at the polls and more than 30 observer groups -- domestic and international -- were on hand to monitor the voting. Watch an election monitor in Kabul discuss what's being examined »
But in other parts of Afghanistan that have been largely spared the daily drumbeat of car bombs, assassinations and whizzing rockets, voters lined up to cast their ballots.
Pajhwok, an independent Afghan news agency, reported brisk turnout in western Herat province, which borders Iran. source: cnn.com

Lockerbie bomber Abdelbaset Ali al-Megrahi is set to learn whether he will be allowed to return to Libya.
Scottish Justice Secretary Kenny MacAskill is likely to announce his release on compassionate grounds, the BBC revealed last week.
Megrahi, 57, who has served eight years of a life sentence for killing 270 people in the 1988 bombing of Pan Am flight, has terminal prostate cancer.
Some 189 Americans were among those who died in the airliner explosion.
Mr MacAskill has been under intense pressure from the US government to keep Megrahi behind bars, with US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton saying his release would be "absolutely wrong".
Earlier, a letter from seven US senators including Edward Kennedy and John Kerry had urged the Scottish Government to block Megrahi's bid for release.
Brian Taylor BBC Scottish political editor Scottish ministers must hope discontent is primarily aimed at the option of prisoner transfer and not the more likely avenue of compassionate release. That, I would suggest, is likely to be a tough sell.
US opinion may simply find it difficult to understand why a man convicted of involvement in the death of 270 people, including US citizens, has been released. Read Brian Taylor's blog
Mr MacAskill said on Wednesday he had informed families and other interested parties that he had reached his decision on the applications for compassionate release and a prisoner transfer. He will announce his decision at 1300 BST at the Scottish Government's ministerial headquarters in Edinburgh.
A spokesman for the administration insisted the decision had been reached "on the basis of clear evidence and on no other factors".
BBC correspondent Peter Hunt said Megrahi was described as having only months left to live.
"Given this prognosis, it's thought that the perpetrator of Britain's biggest terrorist atrocity - who two days ago abandoned his appeal against his sentence - has now spent his last night in a Scottish jail. "It's expected he will be allowed to return home to die," he added.source: bbc.com