COLU @ CONCEPTS

Artist's impression of Jupiter's Great Red Spot heating the upper atmosphere. Karen Teramura with James O'Donoghue and Luke Moore/NASA Scientists are about to get an up-close and personal look at Jupiter's most famous landmark, the Great Red Spot. NASA's Juno spacecraft will be directly over the spot shortly after 10 p.m. ET on Monday,  July 10, about 5,600 miles above the gas giant's cloud tops. That's closer than any spacecraft has been before. The spot is actually a giant storm that has been blowing on Jupiter for centuries. It's huge, larger than the Earth in diameter. "It's lasted a really long time," says Scott Bolton of the Southwest Research Institute in San Antonio and principal scientist for NASA's Juno mission to Jupiter. "No scientists really understand exactly how that storm is created or why it could last so long." Not only will Juno's camera be able to capture detailed images of the...

Police in the Philippines are investigating the death of Ogbe Micah, a student of the Nigerian Maritime Administration and Safety Agency, NIMASA, who was allegedly stabbed to death by his room-mate, another Nigerian, following a heated argument. Colleagues of the deceased told PREMIUM TIMES that they still do not know what led to the fight on Friday. “I don’t know much about his roommate who stabbed him because he is not our student. He has been arrested by the police in Las Pinas and the incident is being investigated,” a student said.  This paper understands that Mr. Ogbeh was among 2,500 Nigerians who underwent a seafarers’ training organised by NIMASA in Philippines between 2011 and 2015. The training is a component of the Nigerian Seafarers Development Programme, an intervention programme designed to address the manpower requirements in the country’s maritime sector. It involves a three-year academic work and a one year compulsory training on board a ship. Mr....

The Nigerians in the Diaspora in America (NIDOA) have applauded Acting President Yemi Osinbajo for signing the Nigerians in Diaspora Commission Establishment Bill 2017 into law. Some of the Nigerians told the Correspondent of the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) that they were elated that its hallmark bill that had been in the works for years had finally been signed into law by Osinbajo. Osinbajo had assented to the Bill on June 30, according to a statement issued by Sen. Ita Enang, Senior Special Assistant to the President on National Assembly Matters (Senate) on July 3. Ms Bukola Shonuga, Public Relations Director of the NIDOA, said “the enactment of the bill is further testament of the recognition of the critical role of Nigerians in Diaspora in Nigeria’s development. “Over 15 million Nigerians reside in the Diaspora and Nigerians have been cited as the most educated immigrant group in the West and they are represented in every professional field. “The average Niger...

WASHINGTON (AP) — Donald Trump’s eldest son said Sunday he met with a Kremlin-linked lawyer shortly after his father clinched the Republican nomination, hoping to get information helpful to the campaign. A New York Times report Sunday citing advisers to the White House briefed on the encounter said Donald Trump Jr. agreed to the meeting after being promised information damaging to Hillary Clinton. The June meeting at Trump Tower with attorney Natalia Veselnitskaya involved Trump Jr., his brother-in-law Jared Kushner and Paul Manafort, who was then the campaign chairman. The existence of the meeting was disclosed only recently to government officials and confirmed on Saturday by representatives of Trump Jr. and Kushner following a separate Times report. In a statement Sunday, Trump Jr. did not confirm that the information he was promised would be damaging to Clinton. But he said he was asked by an acquaintance he knew from the 2013 Miss Universe pageant to have a mee...

KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) — Six female students from war-torn Afghanistan who had hoped to participate in an international robotics competition in the U.S. this month will have to watch via video link after their visa applications were denied — not once, but twice. The girls wanted to show the world that Afghans can also construct a hand-made robot. But of 162 teams who planned to participate, the Afghan girls are the only nation’s team to be denied visas by the U.S. and must participate from afar, watching from their hometown in western Afghanistan. “When we heard that we were rejected we lost hope,” said 14-year-old Sumaya Farooqi. “We applied again for the U.S. visa and we were rejected again.” Farooqi and her teammates had already faced seemingly insurmountable obstacles to even get to a point where they could seek permission to attend. It took them six months to prepare, often working seven days a week, as they constructed a robot that sorts balls, has the ability to reco...

NEW YORK (AP) — Pillows that track your snoozing patterns? A bed that adjusts based on how much you twist and turn? Companies are adding more technology into their products, hoping to lure customers craving a better night’s sleep. Some specialized businesses are making gadgets that promise to measure and improve the quality of slumber, while mass-market retailers like Best Buy are offering simpler ideas like the effect different lighting can have on falling sleep. But with ever-growing options, people may find items that are getting more sophisticated — but may still not be accurate. The interest in sleep has intensified. The number of sleep centers accredited by the American Academy of Sleep Medicine nearly tripled from 2000 to 2015, the group says. People are more likely to brag about how much they spent for a mattress than on their clothes, says Marian Salzman, CEO of Havas PR North America. “Sleep is the new status symbol,” she says. It’s a big business. One of the mo...

LOS ANGELES (AP) — Young children know that name-calling is wrong. Tweens are taught the perils of online bullying and revenge porn: It’s unacceptable and potentially illegal. But celebrities who engage in flagrant attacks on social media are rewarded with worldwide attention. President Donald Trump’s most popular tweet to date is a video that shows him fake-pummeling a personification of CNN. Reality TV star Rob Kardashian was trending last week after attacking his former fiancée on Instagram in a flurry of posts so explicit his account was shut down. He continued the attacks on Twitter, where he has more than 7.6 million followers. While public interest in bad behavior is nothing new, social media has created a vast new venue for incivility to be expressed, witnessed and shared. And experts say it’s affecting social interactions in real life. “Over time, the attitudes and behaviors that we are concerned with right now in social media will bleed out into the physical wo...

SYDNEY (AP) — The most senior Vatican cleric to ever be charged in the Roman Catholic Church sex abuse scandal returned to Australia on Monday to stand trial in his home state on charges alleging he sexually assaulted multiple people years ago. Cardinal George Pell, Pope Francis’ top financial adviser, avoided waiting media when he arrived at Sydney Airport on a flight from Singapore. He had declined to comment in Singapore over the weekend as he made his way home from Rome. The 76-year-old cleric is due to appear in a court in the Victoria state capital Melbourne on July 26 on what Victoria Police described as multiple counts of “historical sexual assault offenses” — meaning crimes that generally occurred years ago. There is no statute of limitations on such crimes in Australia. Police said there were multiple complainants, but have released no other details. Pell is free ahead of his court hearing, during which he can formally apply for bail. When police announced the ch...

WASHINGTON (AP) — The attorney selected to replace James Comey as FBI director is described by those close to him as admirably low-key, yet he’d be taking over the law enforcement agency at a moment that’s anything but tranquil. Christopher Wray would inherit an FBI that lost its popular leader in an unceremonious firing in May and that has spent the last year investigating whether the Trump campaign coordinated with Russia to win the presidency. During this most consequential probe in decades, he’d be serving under a president who is said to have demanded loyalty from Comey and has appeared insensitive to the traditionally bright boundary between the White House and the FBI. Wray’s hearing Wednesday before the Senate Judiciary Committee may dive into his legal background but will almost certainly focus on the political maelstrom surrounding the nomination, with Democrats and perhaps some Republicans seeking assurances of his independence from President Donald Trump. Lawyers...

WASHINGTON (AP) — Congress is still trying to send President Donald Trump his first unqualified legislative triumph, nearly six months after Republicans grabbed full control of Washington. Now, lawmakers are returning from their July 4 recess with an added objective — averting some full-blown political disasters. The GOP campaign to repeal Democrat Barack Obama’s health care law is bogged down in the Senate and flirting with collapse. Efforts to pass a budget are stuck, there’s no tax code overhaul package, spending bills are in limbo and it’s unclear how leaders will find the votes to avert a federal default. The difficulties flow from Republican divisions. Collectively, the problems are threatening to sink top GOP priorities and undermine the party’s ability to show it can govern effectively. Lawmakers have three weeks of work before an August recess. Some Republicans are making noise about shortening that respite, but doing so would be a step shy of sacrilege on Capitol H...

OROVILLE, Calif. (AP) — Wildfires barreled across the baking landscape of the western U.S. and Canada, destroying homes and forcing thousands of residents to flee. Here’s a look at the wildfires blackening the West. CALIFORNIA Two major wildfires in California have forced nearly 8,000 people out of their homes. About 4,000 people evacuated and another 7,400 were told to prepare to leave their homes as fire swept through grassy foothills in the Sierra Nevada, about 60 miles north of Sacramento, the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection said Sunday. The fire has burned nearly 4 square miles (11 sq. kilometers), injured four firefighters and destroyed at least 10 structures, but that number is expected to rise, fire spokeswoman Mary Ann Aldrich said. The area burning was southeast of Oroville, where spillways in the nation’s tallest dam began crumbling from heavy rains this winter and led to temporary evacuation orders for 200,000 residents downstream. “...

MOSUL, Iraq (AP) — Iraqi forces are pushing to retake the last patch of ground in Mosul where Islamic State militants are holding on to a tiny sliver of the Old City, west of the Tigris River, a day after the prime minister visited soldiers to congratulate his troops on the hard-fought battle. Brig. Gen. Haider Fadhil of the Iraqi special forces says his men, closely backed by U.S.-led coalition airstrikes, are continuing to advance and clear territory in the Old City on Monday. Iraqi commanders say they believe hundreds of IS fighters remain inside the neighborhood and are using their families — including women and children — as human shields. Iraqi forces launched the operation to retake Mosul last October and began the weeks-long push through the Old City district in June. Source: www.apnews.com 

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump said Sunday that “it is time to move forward in working constructively with Russia” after his lengthy meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Germany. But he is still avoiding the question of whether he accepts Putin’s denial that Russia was responsible for meddling in the 2016 election. Speaking in a series of tweets the morning after returning from a world leaders’ summit in Germany, Trump said he “strongly pressed” Putin twice over Russian meddling during their meeting Friday. Trump said that Putin “vehemently denied” the conclusions of American intelligence agencies that Russian hackers and propagandists tried to sway the election in Trump’s favor. But Trump would not say whether he believed Putin, tweeting only that he’s “already given my opinion.” Trump has said he thinks Russia probably hacked the emails of the Democratic National Committee and Hillary Clinton staffers, but that “other people and/or countries” were lik...