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Maybe you just want to wait until you can control television with your thoughts or even have it beamed directly into your brain but if you don't mind interim steps, and won't feel vaguely silly with two hands pointed at a screen, the iPoint 3D may be just what you want next.The iPoint 3D allows people to communicate with a 3-D display through simple gestures – without touching it and without 3-D glasses or a data glove. What until now has only been seen in science fiction will be presented at CeBIT from March 3-8 by experts from the Fraunhofer Institute for Telecommunications, Heinrich-Hertz-Institut, HHI (Hall 9, Stand B36).

Here are some quick facts about the Earth-orbiting satellite, scheduled to launch on Feb. 24, 2009. -- It will study carbon dioxide sources (where it comes from) and sinks (where it is pulled out of the atmosphere and stored). Carbon dioxide is a major contributor to global warming. The new data will help scientists more accurately forecast global climate change. -- Data collected by the OCO mission may help policymakers and leaders make more informed decisions to ensure climate stability and retain our quality of life. 

Anew study published in Conservation Biology says that more than 80 percent of the world's major armed conflicts from 1950-2000 occurred in regions identified as the most biologically diverse and threatened places on Earth.The study found that more than 90 percent of major armed conflicts – defined as those resulting in more than 1,000 deaths – occurred in countries that contain one of the 34 biodiversity hotspots, while 81 percent took place within specific hotspots. A total of 23 hotspots experienced warfare over the half-century studied.

It looks the Nintendo folks who came up with the name 'Wii' were onto something - apparently if they had named it 'Vaiveahtoishi' it wouldn't have been as successful.  'Whee' is a noise kids make when they're having fun and studies have suggested that we tend to perceive familiar products and activities as being less risky and hazardous than unfamiliar ones. If something is familiar, the thinking goes, it is comfortable and safe.

Researchers at Ben-Gurion University of the Negev (BGU) in Beer-Sheva have determined that the once prevalent custom of female genital mutilation (FGM) among the Bedouin population in the Negev has virtually disappeared. FGM, also known as "female circumcision" or "female cutting," is still practiced in many cultures around the world.  The World Health Organization has made the eradication of female genital mutilation a major goal in Africa, Asia and Australia, though why the UN doesn't care about men is subject to speculation.

Like sweet, tender romance?   Don't date a sand beetle.   Researchers at Uppsala University say what is good for one sex is not always good for the other sex and evolutionary conflicts between the two sexes cause characteristics and behaviors that are downright injurious to the opposite sex. In both males and females in the animal world it is common – much more common that one might like to think – for one sex to evince characteristics and properties that are injurious to individuals of the other sex.

Roman artefacts which are nearly two thousand years old with similarities to ancient remains found at Pompeii in Italy will be examined at the Science and Technology Facilities Council’s ISIS neutron source in Oxfordshire this weekend.    Researchers hope to learn more about English heritage by discovering whether the items were imported from southern Italy, or manufactured using similar techniques in Britain.

Astronomers using the NASA Swift Satellite are tracking a spectacular comet as it closes in on Earth and sheds gas and dust from its vaporized ice. A comet is a clump of frozen gases mixed with dust. These "dirty snowballs" cast off gas and dust whenever they venture near the sun. Comet Lulin, which is formally known as C/2007 N3, was discovered last year by astronomers at Taiwan's Lulin Observatory. The comet is now faintly visible from a dark site. Lulin will pass closest to Earth - 38 million miles, or about 160 times farther than the moon - on February 24.

Gamma-ray bursts are the universe's most luminous explosions. Astronomers believe most occur when exotic massive stars run out of nuclear fuel. As a star's core collapses into a black hole, jets of material -- powered by processes not yet fully understood -- blast outward at nearly the speed of light. The jets bore all the way through the collapsing star and continue into space, where they interact with gas previously shed by the star and generate bright afterglows that fade with time.

Make of it what you will but a study released today says that breastfeeding may reduce multiple sclerosis(MS) relapses.   Sorry guys, this only helps women MS sufferers and only after pregnancy.For the study, researchers followed 32 pregnant women with MS and 29 pregnant women without MS during each trimester and up to a year after they gave birth. The women were interviewed about their breastfeeding and menstrual period history. A total of 52 percent of the women with MS did not breastfeed or began supplemental formula feedings within two months of giving birth. Of those, 87 percent had a relapse after pregnancy compared to 36 percent of women with MS who breastfed exclusively for at least two months after pregnancy. 

A major mystery about the origins of life may be resolved if a new hypothesis holds up, says  a study published in Nature.   Two Université de Montréal scientists have proposed a new idea for how a 'universal molecular machine', the ribosome, might have managed to self-assemble as a critical step in the genesis of all life on Earth.

Want to get a lot of money thrown at immunology?   Show that sex can not only be exhausting, if you do it right, it can also cause drops in the immune system.According to a study in Journal of Evolutionary Biology, when fruit flies mate the females' genes are activated to roughly the same extent as when an immune reaction starts.   Using a combination of behavioral studies and genomic technology, so-called microarrays, researchers at Uppsala University can show how fruit fly females are affected by mating."We monitor how genetic expression is impacted by mating and show that the most common process that is affected is the immune defense system," says Ted Morrow at the Department of Ecology and Evolution, Uppsala University.