London, Aug 9 : Late Russian author Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn''s malevolent side has been exposed in a letter criticizing Russian historian Zhores Medvedev.

In the letter he sent to The Times, the year of his expulsion from the Soviet Union in 1974, Solzhenitsyn panned the 83-year-old historian branding him an apologist for the regime and making public statements that served the Soviet empire better than the “whole Soviet propaganda apparatus”.

However, Medvedev dismissed the accusations, insisting that the claims were “absolute rubbish”

London, August 9 : Scientists at the State University of New York in Stony Brook have discovered that the marine snail Nucella lamellose can adapt its shell to defend against predators.

Lead researcher Paul Bourdeau studied this phenotypic plasticity in the Nucella lamellose—whose two main predators are the shell-crushing rock crab, Cancer productus, and Pisaster ochraceous, a starfish—in the San Juan Islands, Washington.

He reared wild-caught baby snails in the presence of different predators at the University of Washington’s Friday Harbor Laboratories.

London, Aug. 9  A survey from a landmark conference on China held in London has opined that the Beijing Olympics could very well improve or have a positive impact on the way the West sees China in the near future.

Sixty-six percent of those who participated in the survey said there would be an improvement in Western perceptions after the Beijing Olympics, while 62 percent think China will become a democracy.

Seventy-one percent agreed that China''s rapid rise would not been seen as a threat to world peace, while an overwhelming 86 percent justified China being awarded the Olympic Games

London, Aug 9 : Girls in the UK should be taught feminism at school in a bid to stop them from being too negative about their own sexuality, says a leading academic.

According to Dr Jessica Ringrose, a lecturer in the sociology of gender at London''s Institute of Education, girls should learn about strong female role models and gender equality to stop from them being disrespectful to each other.

London, August 9 : Four members of the same family in England have been diagnosed with a rare heart condition called Long QT, which can claim their lives any moment.

Rob Griffiths, 44, and three of his four children—Rhys, 20, Rhiann, five, and Nelly, two—suffer from a genetic defect that can cause "sudden death syndrome".

Long QT, which is thought to affect just one in 5,000 people, is one condition in which otherwise fit and healthy people may suffer fatal heart failure.

According to reports, Rhys was the first member of the family to be diagnosed, at the age of 15, after he collapsed while on holiday.

London, Aug. 9 : Burma''s military junta have arrested 48 activists during a protest march marking 20 years since the army crushed a pro-democracy uprising, killing
3,000 people.

According to the police and the militia, a show of force was staged in Burma on the eve of the 20th anniversary of a major uprising that left 3,000 civilians dead.

The demonstrators, mainly young men in T-shirts bearing the numbers 8-8-88 - a reference to the August 8, 1988 nationwide revolt - staged a silent walk through the northwest town of Taunggok before being stopped by a police barricade.