Li Gang, one of the co-authors of the paper, said existing mammals are classified into two groups -- viviparous therians which have fully evolved bones, such as kangaroos and elephants; and oviparous monotremes, which have rather primitive bones, like lizards.

The newly discovered fossil, however, has the characteristics of both, a trait that was never observed before, said the researcher with CAS Nanjing Institute of Geology and Paleontology.

An analysis of the fossil shows the mammal, which lived some 120 million years ago in the early Cretaceous period, was about 12 centimeters long and weighed between 15 and 20 grams. It looks very much like a gecko, but with the help of a microscope, experts saw it had straight front legs like a rat or dog, while its hind legs resemble those of a lizard, with a 90-degree angle between the thigh and calf.

Further observation also found many evolutionary discrepancies. For example, it has the teeth of a therian but shares the lumbar ribs found only in primitive mammals. It resembled a viviparous therian in the skull, upper limbs and shoulder bones but had the lumbar, pelvis and lower limbs of an ovipara.

"It's really unique," said Li. "We had never observed such traits in modern animals or any fossil we studied in the past."

Li and his colleagues have not been able to explain this peculiar phenomenon, though he guessed the mammal might have finished evolution to become a therian, but its hind legs reverted into a more primitive form in order to survive under certain circumstances.

With the right set-up, the theory suggested, the computer would sometimes get an answer out of the computer even though the program did not run. And now researchers from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign have improved on the original design and built a non-running quantum computer that really works.

They send a photon into a system of mirrors and other optical devices, which included a set of components that run a simple database search by changing the properties of the photon.

The new design includes a quantum trick called the Zeno effect. Repeated measurements stop the photon from entering the actual program, but allow its quantum nature to flirt with the program's components - so it can become gradually altered even though it never actually passes through.

"It is very bizarre that you know your computer has not run but you also know what the answer is," says team member Onur Hosten.

This scheme could have an advantage over straightforward quantum computing. "A non-running computer produces fewer errors," says Hosten. That sentiment should have technophobes nodding enthusiastically.

Cigar and pipe smoking, although linked to periodontal disease and tooth loss, was not significantly associated with root canal treatment, according to an online report to be published in the April issue of the Journal of Dental Research. The research was also presented today at a press briefing here sponsored by the American Medical Association and the American Dental Association.

The study included 811 dentate men in the VA Dental Longitudinal Study who were followed from two to 28 years. The men, ages 21 to 84 years, were not VA patients and received dental and medical care from the private sector. This may be the first longitudinal analysis of smoking as a risk factor for root canal treatment, said a team headed by Elizabeth Krall, Ph.D., M.P.H., of Boston University Goldman School of Dental Medicine here.

Incident root canal treatments occurred in 985 teeth among 385 subjects. The risks attributable to cigarette smoking remained statistically significant even after controlling for number of teeth affected, percentage with crowns, coronal caries, and 20% or greater alveolar bone loss. The results also held when education and brushing and flossing were included, the researchers reported.

Multivariate analyses of root canal risk at the individual tooth level yielded almost twice the risk (HR 1.9) for current cigarette use (95% CI 1.4 to 2.5). However, for current cigar and pipe smokers, the 1.3 risk was similar to that of never-smokers (95% CI 0.9 to 1.7).

Length of time spent smoking made a difference. For men who had quit smoking nine or fewer years before baseline, the risk was still almost twice as high as that for the never-smokers (HR 1.9; 95% CI=1.3 to 2.8). But among men who had quit more than nine years previously, the risks were similar to never smokers.

Among current cigarette smokers, the risks increased with length of smoking from 1.2 times greater (HR 1.2, CI=0.7 to 1.9) for smoking four or fewer years, to twice the risk (HR 2.0, CI 1.2 to 3.3) for smoking five to 12 years, and a 2.2 times greater risk (HR 2.2 CI 1.5 to 3.3) for those who smoked for more than 12 years, the researchers reported.

Smoking impairs the body's response to infection, exacerbates bone loss throughout the skeleton, induces a chronic systemic inflammatory response, and causes vascular problems, the researchers said. Any of these pathways can potentially affect the health of the tooth pulp and surrounding bone tissue. Once bacterial infection begins in the pulp and surrounding tissue, Dr. Krall said, smokers have difficulty limiting the destruction.

The study had certain limitations, she noted. Although cigar and pipe use were not related to root canal treatment in this study, periodontal disease and tooth loss were significant. It is possible that the small number of pipe/cigar smokers and the difficulty of quantifying the amount smoked may have accounted for the lack of root canal findings, she said. Risk estimates suggest a threshold effect for cigarette smokers around five years' exposure, but since cigar smokers tend to start the habit later, their tobacco exposure may be limited.

Another limitation of the study is the small (5%) number of minority subjects and the lack of women. We would expect to see the smoking and root-canal risk in women and other ethnic groups, Dr. Krall said, although absolute risk may differ and be more closely related to cigarette exposure than to demographic characteristics.

So Roberts set out to test her hypothesis, selecting five fast food restaurants, within a ten-mile radius of the University of South Florida.

Roberts says at each restaurant she flushed the toilet once, the used sterile gloves to gather samples.

Jasmine Roberts:
"Using the sterile beaker I scooped up some water and closed the lid."

Roberts also collected ice from soda fountains inside the five fast food restaurants. She also asked for cups of ice at the same restaurant's drive thru windows.

She tested the samples at a lab at the Moffitt Cancer Center where she volunteers with a USF professor. Roberts says the results did not surprise her.

Jasmine Roberts:
"I found that 70-percent of the time, the ice from the fast food restaurant's contain more bacteria than the fast food restaurant's toilet water."

First, a technical quibble: I think flushing might eliminate some of the bacteria in the bowl. A lot of bacteria will be living on the sides of the bowl in a layer known as a biofilm. That said, it's still pretty disgusting.