Florida

Until recently, very few people had ever heard of raspberry ketones, the aromatic compounds that give the berries their distinctive smell. Today, health food stores have trouble keeping the capsules or drops of the stuff on their shelves. Almost overnight, an obscure plant compound became the next big thing in weight loss - and all it took was a few words from Dr. Oz. In a February episode of "The Dr. Oz Show," Mehmet Oz told viewers that raspberry ketones were "the No. 1 miracle in a bottle to burn your fat. " Once Oz calls something a "miracle," it doesn't remain obscure for long.

HealthCare Partners, the Torrance owner of physician groups in Southern California, Nevada and Florida, agreed to be acquired in a $4.42-billion deal by dialysis chain DaVita Inc., as large healthcare companies continue snapping up doctor groups and clinics. HealthCare Partners, a privately held company led by founding physician and Chief Executive Robert Margolis, is becoming the latest big medical group swept up in a consolidation wave triggered by federal government efforts to tame rising healthcare costs.

Brian Price, once a wrecking ball on UCLA's defensive line, has beaten long odds to return to the NFL after two off-season surgeries aimed at keeping his hamstrings attached to his pelvis, rather than breaking loose and coiling down the backs of his thighs. For Price, who will start at defensive tackle Sunday for the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, his excruciating recovery was a 10-step process. Meaning just two months ago, he could run only 10 steps. "You have these doubts in your head at times," said Price, a second-round pick of the Buccaneers in 2010 who, because of his congenitally malformed pelvis, spent the last half of his rookie season on injured reserve.

Handsome, youthful, Cuban American and Republican, U.S. Sen. Marco Rubio of Florida has been mentioned repeatedly as a potential running mate for Mitt Romney - in part because of hopes that the presence of the first Latino on a major national ticket would draw that key voting group Romney's way. But outside of his enormously important home state, the prospect for that sort of boost seems less than likely. Some voters would probably be attracted by the idea of a Latino, any Latino, being that close to the White House.

Hard-core Harry Potter fans who devoured the books, camped out for the movies and trekked through the theme park now have a new way to relive the boy wizard's adventures. PHOTOS: Making of Harry Potter studio tour Debuting Saturday, the Making of Harry Potter behind-the-scenes tour at theWarner Bros.studios in England will let wizards, mudbloods and muggles pull back the curtain on the movie-making secrets of the most successful film series of all time. Located 20 miles outside of London, the three-hour self-guided tour will take visitors past sets, props, costumes, models and special effects exhibits from the eight "Harry Potter" movies.

First of three parts Tiffany Lee wanted a car. She was weary of the two-hour bus ride to her job at a UCLA Health System clinic. She hated having to ask friends to drive her 7-year-old son to his asthma treatments. But as a single mother with three children, bad credit and a $27,000-a-year salary, she couldn't find a bank or dealership willing to give her a loan. Then a friend steered her to Repossess Auto Sales in Hawthorne. Another buyer might have balked at the deal she was offered.

CINCINNATI - The Rev. Chris Beard is a theological conservative, make no mistake about it. He believes the Bible is the word of God. He believes the Holy Spirit speaks to him directly. He believes, as an article of faith, that abortion and same-sex marriage are wrong. Still, when a group of religious leaders in Ohio held two days of meetings in Cincinnati recently to talk about economic and racial justice, issues usually associated with the political left, there was Beard, a fourth-generation Pentecostal preacher with a disarming smile, a shaved head and a set of convictions that knock holes in the stereotypes about white evangelical Protestants.

Not everything is bigger in Texas. The new Aquatica water park at SeaWorld San Antonio will be one-third the size and cost half as much as the innovative Aquatica water park at SeaWorld Orlando . PHOTOS: Aquatica water park at SeaWorld San Antonio Debuting May 19, the Aquatica park in Texas will feature 18 water slides on 20 acres at a cost of more than $24 million. That's considerably smaller than Florida's $50-million-plus Aquatica which debuted in 2008 with 36 slides on 60 acres as the new high-water mark for water parks.

J. Paul Reddam might not be the type of businessman for whom people suffering through the recession can bring themselves to root. Reddam, 56, is president of Anaheim-based CashCall, the mortgage refinancing and high-interest personal loan company who critics say has unfairly capitalized upon people's financial woes during the country's economic and employment crisis. But the Sunset Beach resident is also owner of Kentucky Derby winner I'll Have Another, who could provide horse racing with a huge shot in the arm Saturday with a victory in the Preakness Stakes at Pimlico.

With frosty mugs of Butterbeer raised in a toast, Universal Studios Hollywood officials announced plans Tuesday to bring the wildly popular Wizarding World of Harry Potter to the California theme park. Details were limited but officials did say the California park would see a Hogwarts Castle and visitors would ride Harry Potter and the Forbidden Journey, the marquee attraction at the Florida park. Wizarding World will be built within the existing California theme park, but it was unclear if the new land might be located at least partially on the studio's back lot. > Photos: Top 10 Wizarding World of Harry Potter rides and attractions Wizarding World proved an instant hit when it opened in June 2010 at Universal Orlando's Islands of Adventure theme park.

ATLANTA - On the night George Zimmerman fatally shot unarmed black teenager Trayvon Martin in Florida, a witness said he saw some of the scuffle - and described a black man in a dark hoodie on top of a white or Latino man, punching him repeatedly, "mixed martial arts style. " Then there was a pop, the witness told police, according to documents made public Thursday in Zimmerman's second-degree murder case. Soon, he said, the man in the hoodie was "laid out in the grass. " The detail, one of many in a trove of discovery records released by prosecutors, could bolster Zimmerman's contention that he acted in self-defense on the night of Feb. 26, after he called police and reported Martin as a suspicious character in his neighborhood.

YOUNGSTOWN, Ohio - Vice President Joe Biden and unofficial Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney skirmished over the economy and their ability to improve it in swing-state appearances Wednesday that underscored each side's positioning on the key issue in November's general election. Biden and other Democrats are seeking to disqualify Romney in the minds of voters as an alternative to President Obama. Polls consistently have found that voters give Romney better marks for his potential handling of the economy than they give Obama for dealing with it. Romney and other Republicans have long criticized the president's moves on the economy.

WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. - During the course of the presidential campaign, Mitt Romney has proudly claimed his roots as native Michigander, a Bostonian (who is unfailingly loyal to the Red Sox), a summer resident of New Hampshire, and of course, a part-time Californian when he escapes to his beachfront home in La Jolla.   But he surprised some members of his audience Thursday at a brewery in Jacksonville when he mentioned that they'd considered putting a new coastal destination on that list: the mighty swing state of Florida.

The U.S. foreign-born population has risen to its highest level since 1920, with 13% of all those living in the nation in 2010 having been born elsewhere, a new report from the Census Bureau shows. Forty million of those residing in the U.S. in 2010 were born in other countries, up from 31 million, or 11% of the total, a decade earlier. The foreign-born share of the population dropped between 1920 and 1970, hitting a low of 4.7% in 1970, before rising again for several decades. But that growth has slowed in recent years as immigration has dropped, census officials said Thursday.

Florida, the state that bequeathed Bush vs. Gore to the American political lexicon, is once again evenly divided in a presidential race, according to a new statewide poll. President Obama, who won Florida by 3 percentage points in 2008, holds a razor's-edge lead of 46%-45% over Republican Mitt Romney, well within the poll's margin of error. Florida promises to be one of the biggest battlegrounds of the coming campaign, with the third-largest prize of electoral college votes (tied with New York)

Metrolink Chief Executive John Fenton, who worked to improve the service and safety of the struggling commuter line following the deadly Chatsworth crash, announced his resignation Monday to head a Florida-based railroad company. Fenton's departure after not quite 25 months on the job leaves Metrolink with a leadership vacuum at a time when the operation is trying to bolster ridership, reduce costs and install cutting-edge safety measures, such as positive train control, a sophisticated collision-avoidance system.

Homeowners more deeply underwater on mortgages handled by five major U.S. banking firms are prime candidates for getting help from a $25-billion nationwide settlement over alleged foreclosure abuses. That's because the settlement gives the nation's largest mortgage servicers more incentives to help those who owe 40% to 75% more than the value of their homes, according to details of the settlement filed Monday in U.S. District Court in Washington. In a complex series of formulas designed to maximize the effect of the deal reached last month, banks will get more than six times the credit for reducing loans for severely underwater borrowers than they would for helping those who owe 5% to 15% more than the value of their homes.

SeaWorld San Diego will add a manta ray-themed family roller coaster on May 26 that marks the U.S. debut of a highly anticipated prototype ride. PHOTOS: Manta roller coaster at SeaWorld San Diego Paired with a 100,000-gallon aquarium and outdoor ray pool, the Manta coaster will twist and turn over low terrain in the relatively unused back corner of the marine park near the Skyride and Flamingo Cove, SeaWorld officials said....

Universal Orlando's salute to 100 years of filmmaking history replays more than 200 clips from the movie studio's vault on a watery canvas in the theme park's lagoon. PHOTOS: New attractions coming to Universal Orlando Creative Director Michael Aiello and his team at Universal Entertainment spent two years culling the studio's archives down to 18 minutes for " Universal's Cinematic Spectacular ," the new nighttime water show officially debuting Tuesday at the Florida theme park.

TAMPA, Fla. - No state is more crucial to Mitt Romney's chances of winning the White House than Florida, and no issue here is more important than the economy. That dynamic played out recently when Vice President Joe Biden came to the perennial electoral vote battleground to promote the Obama administration's environmental record by riding an airboat through the Everglades. The Romney camp responded with a stinging assault on President Obama's "failed" economic policies. The targets: a Florida jobless rate that exceeds the national average, painfully high gasoline prices, rising healthcare costs and one of the worst housing collapses in the country.