NEW YORK -- scientists say they've found a big reason why treatment for chronic hepatitis C infection works better for white patients than for African-Americans. It's a tiny variation in a gene.

When US Airways Flight 1549 made an emergency landing in the Hudson River in January after hitting geese, it turned the spotlight on so-called bird strikes — a longstanding problem of aircraft colliding with birds in flight. Airports try a lot of tricks to keep birds away, but now some researchers are shining light on a possible solution.

ORICK, Calif. (AP) -- The tribes of the lower Klamath River have since ancient times decorated themselves with condor feathers when they performed the dances designed to heal a world gone wrong....

Astrobiologist Dr Lewis Dartnell from university College London joins us in the studio to speculate about what form life might take elsewhere in the Solar System and beyond. What is life anyway? Are we all Martians? Lewis will deliver one of a series of public lectures about cosmology at UCL this week as part of the Your Universe festival. On the panel we have the Guardian's Nell Boase and environment correspondent David Adam. In the newsjam, we look at why mountains closer to the equator are bigger, how the humble leaf could provide the answer to the planet's energy problems, how the "love hormone" oxytocin may determine how sociable we are, and research suggesting that having a sunny outlook on life is good for your health.Steven Cowley, director of the UK fusion lab, tells the Guardian's Kevin Anderson what obstacles lie in the way of clean, plentiful energy from nuclear fusion. The panel also discusses an article on the Guardian's website by Chris French, editor of the Skeptic mag

WASHINGTON -- The government is urging parents to have a backup plan for caring for their kids in case they are hit by swine flu once the new school year begins.