Briefing

HEFEI, CHINA Millions travel for Lunar New Year season

WUHAN, CHINA Yangtze River suffers from a severe drought

STAVROPOL, RUSSIA 65th anniversary of the city's liberation

KISUMU, KENYA Hundreds of youths protest in street protests

HARARE, ZIMBABWE Hyperinflation results in the $10 million banknote

GAZA CITY Palestinians flood across the Egyptian border The Map

Child Mortality Reaches Record Low

For the first time ever, UNICEF has reported that the number of child deaths for the year has fallen below 10 million. Fifteen of the least developed countries have reduced the under-5 mortality rate 40% or more since 1990, thanks to vaccines, health education, mosquito nets and a little vitamin A. Global progress at a glance:

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Lexicon

cell-phone novel

Definition sel-fohn nov-uhl n. A novel written using the characters on a cell-phone keypad. A mostly Japanese phenomenon, cell-phone novels are primarily composed of brief, text-message-like sentences.

Context Cell-phone novels have existed since 2000, when users of Japanese cell-phone websites started to upload their writings to the tiny devices. An initial hit, Deep Love (since turned into a TV show), has been followed by such concise titles as If You and Love Sky.

Usage Now written in reverse--from cell phone to page--the often melodramatic stories accounted for half of Japan's Top 10 novels in 2007. Composed primarily for and by young women, the books have stirred debate about whether they are a legitimate genre or are simply diverting young people from real literature.

Demographics

A Second Baby Boom

Nearly 4.3 million children were born in 2006, the largest number in the U.S. in any year since the post-World War II baby boom some 50 years ago. The recent spike, dubbed a baby boomlet, has been attributed to a number of circumstances, including the influx of Hispanic immigrants, who have higher fertility rates than whites or African Americans, and a decline in the use of contraception. Also, 35 years after Roe v. Wade was decided, the abortion rate has dropped; from 1990 to 2005, abortions fell 25%.

The Numbers The fertility rate of 2.1 children per woman in 2006 is the highest it has been since 1971 and higher than it was during the baby boomlet of the early 1990s, when 4.1 million children were born each year for two years.

Artifact

A Kite Ship's Maiden Voyage

Wind-powered A commercial cargo ship that set sail Jan. 22 from Germany to Venezuela became the first to use computer-controlled kite technology. A 1,722-sq.-ft. (160 sq m) kite helps propel it.

Smooth sailing? Ships account for 4% of global emissions, twice as much as airplanes. The new kite could cut 20%--or $1,600--from the cargo ships' daily fuel bill. Similar kites could even be used on cruise liners. But slowing down ships could also be an effective solution. Cutting speed 10% could lead to an estimated 25% reduction in fuel use.

Explainer

Old Stars Make New Planets

Two stars thought to be at least hundreds of millions of years old could soon generate new planets--a phenomenon astronomers have never seen. Scientists say BP Piscium in the PISCES constellation and TYCHO 4144 329 2 in URSA MAJOR display conditions that suggest they could form new planets. A closer look at the big news from astronomy:

The discovery Both stars probably created planets far in the past. Planet formation was thought to occur only when stars are young and enshrouded in dusty and gaseous disks.

Why it's unlikely The gases necessary to form planets are used up after just a few million years and are not replenished during a star's lifetime. Our solar system, for example, is all out.

The puzzle Both these old stars show signs of youth. BP Piscium ejects jets of gas into space, which can create planetesimals that merge and form planets.

The hypothesis Astronomers speculate, though, that both stars could have engulfed nearby stars and might then use the assimilated material to make new planets.