Science - AP

BAIKONUR, Kazakhstan - An American computer game designer reached space Sunday, fulfilling a long-deferred childhood dream that began with the flight of his astronaut father.

LOS ANGELES - NASA said Friday it will press ahead with plans to launch a supersized rover to Mars next year despite spiraling costs and schedule pressures.

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. - A tortoise, a hare, a mouse and a half-dozen mussels are some of the creatures that a conservation group hopes to save through a "Western Ark" project aimed at petitioning the government for federal protection.

NEW ORLEANS - Pick up a Mississippi gopher frog and it covers its eyes with its forefeet, like someone afraid to see what's coming next. And for at least a decade, it's had a good reason not to look.

DENNIS, Mass. - A wayward manatee is headed home to Florida after being pulled from frigid Cape Cod waters in an early morning rescue.

SAN DIEGO - Dr. George Palade, who won a Nobel Prize in 1974 for his work isolating and identifying cell structure and helped create one of the leading cell biology programs in the nation at the University of California, San Diego, has died. He was 95.

RICHMOND, Va. - Scientists have confirmed the second case of a "virgin birth" in a shark. In a study reported Friday in the Journal of Fish Biology, scientists said DNA testing proved that a pup carried by a female Atlantic blacktip shark in the Virginia Aquarium & Marine Science Center contained no genetic material from a male.

WASHINGTON - If you can't stand global warming, get out of the tropics. While the most significant harm from climate change so far has been in the polar regions, tropical plants and animals may face an even greater threat, say scientists who studied conditions in Costa Rica.

WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. - Satellites are helping scientists expand a virtual network to watch for increases in ocean temperatures that can damage or kill the fragile ecosystems of coral reefs worldwide.

LITTLE ROCK, Ark. - Famed scientist Richard Leakey warned that the worldwide credit crisis will be "just devastating" to scientific research in coming years, as endowment interest income drops and companies cut donations.

SAN FRANCISCO - A Silicon Valley gene-testing startup is responding to criticism that the tests could spur bad health-care choices by teaming up for a broad study of how the results affect behavior.

Three U.S.-based scientists won a Nobel Prize on Wednesday for turning a glowing green protein from jellyfish into a revolutionary way to watch the tiniest details of life within cells and living creatures.

WASHINGTON - Cells taken from men's testicles seem as versatile as the stem cells derived from embryos, researchers reported Wednesday in what may be yet another new approach in a burgeoning scientific field.

WASHINGTON - The Supreme Court appeared divided Wednesday over how to resolve a long-running dispute over whether environmental laws may be used to limit the Navy's use of sonar to protect whales.

BRIGANTINE, N.J. - A second dead dolphin has been found in a New Jersey river that has been home lately to a wayward pod of the animals.

MINNEAPOLIS - The University of Minnesota has concluded that falsified data were used in a 2001 article published by one of its researchers on adult stem cells. The school is asking that the article be retracted.

LOS ANGELES - Will NASA's flagship mission to Mars fly next year? The space agency could decide as early as Friday whether to cancel, delay or proceed with plans to launch a nuclear-powered, SUV-size rover to the red planet.

Two Japanese scientists and an American won the 2008 Nobel Prize in physics on Tuesday for theoretical advances that help explain the behavior of the smallest particles of matter.

SAO PAULO, Brazil - More than 370 penguins that mysteriously washed up on Brazil's equatorial beaches were flown south on a huge air force cargo plane and released closer to the frigid waters they call home, animal advocates said Monday.

ANCHORAGE, Alaska - The federal government will designate "critical habitat" for polar bears off Alaska's coast, a decision that could add restrictions to future offshore petroleum exploration or drilling.

WASHINGTON - A small asteroid was headed for a fiery but harmless dive into Earth's atmosphere early Tuesday morning over Africa, astronomers said in a first of its kind advance warning.

WASHINGTON - Conservationists have taken the first detailed look at the world's mammals in more than a decade, and the news isn't good.

SALT LAKE CITY - Rattlesnakes aren't to be trifled with, but if you're trying to collect the sound of every creature in the West that slithers, hops, flies or flops, distance isn't a luxury you can afford.

GREEN SWAMP PRESERVE, N.C. - Laura Gadd pauses at the edge of a pristine savanna, delicately lifting her feet to avoid trampling any venus flytraps hidden underfoot.

SUZHOU, China - She's around 80 years old. He's 100. Breathless scientists watched as the world's most endangered turtles successfully mated.

GILCHRIST, Texas - One of North America's renowned bird migration and bird watching areas is strangely silent.

BOSTON - Deborah Anderson had heard the urban legends about the contraceptive effectiveness of Coca-Cola products for years. So she and her colleagues decided to put the soft drink to the test. In the lab, that is.

The 2008 Ig Nobel winners, awarded Thursday at Harvard University by the Annals of Improbable Research magazine: