Air

Scientists say that further tests will be needed to determine if air samples taken Friday from a 17th-Century sealed lead coffin are pre-Industrial Revolution quality. The seal of the coffin found buried under the site of Colonial America's first Roman Catholic chapel appeared to be intact, but preliminary tests of the air were inconclusive, said Benjamin C. Bradlee, the former Washington Post editor who is chairman of the Historic St. Mary's City Commission.

The Environmental Protection Agency will soon begin testing the air around schools for toxic contaminants. The $2.25-million program will be the first of its kind. Monitors will focus on chemicals known to cause cancer and respiratory and neurological problems. States and local governments will monitor the air at 50 to 100 schools near industrial facilities or in cities with high concentrations of pollution.

Microscopic air bubbles trapped in fossilized tree resin reveal that the Earth's atmosphere 80 million years ago was about 50% richer in oxygen than it is today, a finding that could have profound implications for the evolution of life, scientists reported Thursday. The discovery, if confirmed, reveals that the Earth's atmosphere is dramatically different today than it was during the Cretaceous period before the last of the dinosaurs died out more than 65 million years ago. Robert A.

Over the last 15 months, Sony Television President Steve Mosko has traveled to Russia, Tokyo, London, Holland and twice to India. He wasn't impersonating Ryan Bingham, the itinerant corporate hatchet man played by George Clooney in "Up in the Air." Mosko, president of Sony Pictures Television since 2000, added international markets to his duties and embarked on a cram course in Sony's overseas operations, which include 122 channels in more than 140 countries. Among the "vertically integrated" media giants, Sony is supposed to be at a disadvantage because it doesn't own a broadcast network or a bunch of cable channels through which it can funnel its shows.

Months before its final 10 episodes begin airing in January, we now know for certain that "Battlestar Galactica" will live on -- in the form of a two-hour special on the Sci Fi Channel to air in 2009 after the series concludes. The unnamed feature will be directed by the show's costar, Edward James Olmos, and written by "Battlestar" writer and former "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" brain Jane Espenson. The stand-alone will document the Cylons' attempts -- those of two agents in particular -- to grapple with human survivors, both those aboard ships and those left alive on planets, shortly after the Cylons' destruction of human worlds.

WASHINGTON - First came the letter-writing campaigns, then the protests at town hall meetings and now the television ads. The last several weeks in New Hampshire have had the feel of a heated electoral season - but the target of this siege, first-term Republican Sen. Kelly Ayotte, isn't on the ballot until 2016. Welcome to Round 2 in the battle over gun control. The first round ended last month, when a proposal to expand the background check system to cover most commercial gun sales fizzled in the Senate.

In the summer of 1968, events were roiling America and the world: the assassinations of Martin Luther King Jr. and Robert F. Kennedy; the escalation of the Vietnam War; the Soviet Union's invasion of Czechoslovakia; the radicalization of the civil rights movement. The tenor of the times consumed and overshadowed the competition at the Mexico City Olympics. Indeed, the '68 Games will forever be defined not by Bob Beamon's gravity-defying long jump, but by the black-gloved demonstration of sprinters Tommie Smith and John Carlos and the killing of protesting students by the Mexican police and army 10 days before the opening ceremonies.

Yep, it's true. There's no shame in America, only a rehab industry. Mark Foley, the Florida Republican who left Congress in 2006 amid accusations he sent lurid e-mails to male House pages, is credited with helping to sour the electorate's view of the Grand Old Party in a year when Nancy Pelosi and the Dems swept into power. In the years since, he's been in real estate investment, contemplating a return to politics. On Tuesday, he made his debut as a radio talk show host.

It may not be a household name, but 1,4-dichlorobenzene is a common household smell. It is the whiff of mothballs, the aroma masking a damp basement, the essence of an under-ventilated bathroom. It comes from a solid brick of insect-chasing, odor-covering, toilet-bowl cleaning power called paradichlorobenzene -- or "para" in the cleaning trade. A new study says the chemical could be damaging the lungs of people who inhale it regularly.

When her husband went missing in Haiti's earthquake, Elcie Dyess turned to Signal FM radio station. Like thousands of other desperate people, she used the radio to broadcast an appeal for help. Her husband, Jean Francois, was last seen at the bank where he works, she told the audience. Help me find him. Scores of fellow bank employees responded by returning to the collapsed building. After hours of searching and digging, they pulled Jean Francois to safety. As the days since the quake have stretched into weeks, Signal FM has served as the voice of, and lifeline to, a traumatized society.