The Associated Press
AP Top Science News At 2:47 p.m. EST

Grand Canyon to change 'unfair' permit system
FLAGSTAFF, Ariz. (AP) -- Getting one of the roughly 11,500 permits granted each year to backpack overnight in the Grand Canyon has become so competitive and "unfair" that managers at the national park have decided to change the system....

Big Bang atom smasher sends beams in 2 directions

AP Photo
GENEVA (AP) -- The world's largest atom smasher made another leap forward Monday by circulating beams of protons in opposite directions at the same time in the $10 billion machine after more than a year of repairs, organizers said....

Warming's impacts sped up, worsened since Kyoto
WASHINGTON (AP) -- Since the 1997 international accord to fight global warming, climate change has worsened and accelerated - beyond some of the grimmest of warnings made back then....





Astronauts take spacewalk No. 3 after suit snag
CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (AP) -- A pair of astronauts zipped through the third and final spacewalk of their mission Monday, installing an enormous oxygen tank at the International Space Station and accomplishing everything else on their list....

Denmark: 65 world leaders for UN climate summit
COPENHAGEN (AP) -- Sixty-five world leaders have said they will attend the Copenhagen climate summit in December, and several more have responded positively to invitations, Danish officials said Sunday....

Rare Charles Darwin book found on toilet bookshelf
LONDON (AP) -- An auction house says it is selling a rare first edition of Charles Darwin's "On the Origin of Species" found in a family's guest lavatory in southern England....

Ukraine's `hot air' bedevils global climate deal
KONSTANTINOVKA, Ukraine (AP) -- Vladimir Gapor is a plumber by trade, but now he's a scavenger, prying bits of scrap steel from the ruins of his old factory and selling them for a pittance....

Researcher: Faint writing seen on Shroud of Turin
ROME (AP) -- A Vatican researcher has rekindled the age-old debate over the Shroud of Turin, saying that faint writing on the linen proves it was the burial cloth of Jesus. Experts say the historian may be reading too much into the markings, and they stand by carbon-dating that points to the shroud being a medieval forgery....

Thousands of strange creatures found deep in ocean
NEW ORLEANS (AP) -- The creatures living in the depths of the ocean are as weird and outlandish as the creations in a Dr. Seuss book: tentacled transparent sea cucumbers, primitive "dumbos" that flap ear-like fins, and tubeworms that feed on oil deposits....

Hackers leak e-mails, stoke climate debate
LONDON (AP) -- Computer hackers have broken into a server at a well-respected climate change research center in Britain and posted hundreds of private e-mails and documents online - stoking debate over whether some scientists have overstated the case for man-made climate change....