Washington, DC, USA. U.S. Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) endures a bruising charge from Illinois Treasurer Alexi Giannoulias (D). A new Utah law stirs Salt Lake City bartenders to create a new drink. The Ohio Attorney General must provide advice to himself on impeaching himself. A Pennsylvania state senator tries to solve the gay marriage dillemma by outlawing divorce. And Louisiana prison guards get outside help to prevent escapes. In case you missed those stories this week, Worth Noting fills you in.

You think just because he could be the next president of the United States that U.S. Sen. Barack Obama (D) would have an easy time on the basketball court? Not in Alexi Giannoulias’ neighborh...

Stanford, CA, USA. David Kingsley, PhD, strode from his office to his lab, pulled out a scale, and started in to weigh the pelvic bones from 114 pairs of manatee. The results of his efforts, published on 2006, were a highly suggestive discovery. He found that in almost every case, the left pelvic bone outweighed the right. This appeared to be trivial — the average left pelvic bone is 10 percent larger than its right-side partner — but it is a statistically significant variance that carries big weight in evolutionary significance.

Broadly stated, developmental biologists study how a single fertilized ovum can yield all the complexity of life, whether it be human or other animals, insects...

Washington, DC, USA. In the homestretch of an unprecedented presidential primary season, spinning with competing sound-bites and endless rhetoric, voters still heading to the polls in four states can’t look to their governors for any pre-election advice. These governors plan to wait until after their states vote to make their own endorsements.

Democratic governors in three of the five states yet to have their primaries are staying out of the fray and letting their voters decide on their own whether Barack Obama or Hillary Clinton should be the party’s nominee for the White House.

West Virginia Gov. Joe Manchin III, Kentucky Gov. Steve Beshear and Montana Gov. Brian Schweitzer all p...

Providence, RI, USA. Researchers have identified problems with applying the Structured Clinical Interview for DSM-IV (SCID), reporting that fewer than half the patients previously diagnosed with bipolar disorder received a diagnosis based on a comprehensive, psychiatric diagnostic interview — the SCID. The study in the Journal of Clinical Psychiatry concludes that while recent reports indicate that there is a problem with underdiagnosis of bipolar disorder, an equal if not greater problem exists with overdiagnosis.

Principal investigator Mark Zimmerman, M.D., presented the study team's findings at the annual meeting of the American Psychiatric Association (APA) (7 May 2008).