US computer graphics scientist wins Kyoto Prize

TOKYO (AP) — An American regarded as a father of computer graphics, an Indian literary critic and a Japanese molecular cell biologist have received the Kyoto Prize, Japan's highest private award for global achievement.The Inamori Foundation awarded its advanced technology prize on Saturday to U.S. computer scientist Ivan Sutherland, who developed the graphic interface program Sketchpad in 1963.Gayatri...

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AP source: Justin Bieber and Selena Gomez break up

NEW YORK (AP) — A source confirms to The Associated Press that Justin Bieber is no longer Selena Gomez's "Boyfriend."The source is not authorized to discuss the split with the press and spoke on condition of anonymity.The breakup apparently happened last week. Distance and their busy schedules were cited as factors.Eighteen-year-old Bieber is touring to promote his latest album, "Believe," which contains...

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Malaria vaccine a letdown for infants

LONDON (AP) — An experimental malaria vaccine once thought promising is turning out to be a disappointment, with a new study showing it is only about 30 percent effective at protecting infants from the killer disease.That is a significant drop from a study last year done in slightly older children, which suggested the vaccine cut the malaria risk by about half — though that is still far below the...

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Four days later, Obama wins Florida

ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. - President Barack Obama was declared the winner of Florida's 29 electoral votes Saturday, ending a four-day count with a razor-thin margin that narrowly avoided an automatic recount that would have brought back memories of 2000.No matter the outcome, Obama had already clinched re-election and now has 332 electoral votes to Romney's 206.The Florida Secretary of State's Office...

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Transgender Pakistanis face society's scorn

RAWALPINDI, Pakistan (AP) — Dressed up in elaborate, feminine outfits and artfully applied makeup, they are showered with money while dancing at all-male wedding parties. But the lives of transgender people in Pakistan are also marked by harassment, rejection and poverty.Transgender people live in a tenuous position in conservative Pakistan, where the roles of the sexes are traditionally starkly drawn....

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‘NBA 2K13′ tops video games titles in October

NEW YORK (AP) — U.S. retail sales of new video game hardware, software and accessories fell 25 percent in October, marking the 11th straight month of declining sales for physical game products, according to a report from NPD Group.Many gamers are waiting for big holiday releases such as Activision‘s “Call of Duty: Black Ops II.” NPD...

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Obama, Palin and Jobs join Bartlett's club

NEW YPRK (AP) — So much has changed since we last heard from "Bartlett's Familiar Quotations," a decade ago.Barack Obama was a state legislator. Sarah Palin was mayor of Wasilla. Steve Jobs had just introduced a portable music player called the iPod.And digital books were a relic from the dot-com bubble.The 18th edition of the venerable reference work has just been released, the first for the electronic...

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Malaria vaccine a letdown for infants

LONDON (AP) — An experimental malaria vaccine once thought promising is turning out to be a disappointment, with a new study showing it is only about 30 percent effective at protecting infants from the killer disease.That is a significant drop from a study last year done in slightly older children, which suggested the vaccine cut the malaria risk by about half — though that is still far below the...

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Boehner: GOP has 'some work to do'

House Speaker John Boehner (Brendan Hoffman/Getty Images)Reflecting on this week's election, in which Democratic President Barack Obama won re-election and Democrats made gains in Congress, House Speaker John Boehner said the GOP has "some work to do" in how it presents the party's ideas."It's clear that as a political party we've got some work to do," Boehner, an Ohio Republican, told reporters during...

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Myanmar says Obama to visit later this month

YANGON, Myanmar (AP) — President Barack Obama will make a groundbreaking visit later this month to Myanmar, an official said Thursday, following through with his policy of rapprochement to encourage democracy in the Southeast Asian nation.The Myanmar official speaking from the capital, Naypyitaw, said Thursday that security for a visit on Nov. 18 or 19 had been prepared, but the schedule was not final....

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Exclusive: Google Ventures beefs up fund size to $300 million a year

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - Google will increase the cash it allocates to its venture-capital arm to up to $300 million a year from $200 million, catapulting Google Ventures into the top echelon of corporate venture-capital funds. Access to that sizeable checkbook means Google Ventures will be able to invest in more later-stage financing rounds, which tend to be in the tens of millions...

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Man pleads no contest in 'Bling Ring' case

LOS ANGELES (AP) — A man who had been accused of burglarizing Paris Hilton's home pleaded no contest on Thursday to receiving jewelry stolen from the house during a rash of break-ins by a group dubbed the "Bling Ring."Roy Lopez Jr. was then sentenced to serve three years of supervised probation.Lopez, 30, was initially charged with felony residential burglary and conspiring with other members of the...

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Experts raise concerns over superhuman workplace

LONDON (AP) — Performance-boosting drugs, powered prostheses and wearable computers are coming to an office near you — but experts warned in a new report Wednesday that too little thought has been given to the implications of a superhuman workplace.Academics from Britain's leading institutions say attention needs to be focused on the consequences of technology which may one day allow — or compel —...

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Giffords' husband faces shooter in court

TUCSON, Ariz. (AP) — Gabrielle Giffords came face to face Thursday with the man who tried to kill her last year, but chose not to speak.Her astronaut husband, Mark Kelly, did all the talking for her, as the couple told Jared Lee Loughner how the 24-year-old's deadly rampage at the former congresswoman's political meeting had upended her life."Her life has been forever changed. Plans she had for our...

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China's power transfer: infighting and spectacle

BEIJING (AP) — China's ruling Communist Party opens a congress Thursday to usher in a new group of younger leaders faced with the challenging tasks of righting a flagging economy and meeting public calls for better government.The weeklong congress is the start of a carefully choreographed but still fraught power transfer in which President Hu Jintao and most of the senior leadership will begin to...

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Apple's shares slide 4 percent to five-month low

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ABC's Diane Sawyer spurs jokes from Twitterverse

NEW YORK (AP) — Diane Sawyer's Election Night performance left some viewers asking if she had begun celebrating Tuesday's election a bit early.Co-anchoring ABC News' coverage, the veteran journalist struck a different manner from her practiced, straight-news-delivering style.Sawyer spoke more slowly than usual while seeming to prop herself on outstretched arms at the anchor desk she shared with George...

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Study: Stem cells from strangers can repair hearts

LOS ANGELES (AP) — Researchers are reporting a key advance in using stem cells to repair hearts damaged by heart attacks. In a study, stem cells donated by strangers proved as safe and effective as patients' own cells for helping restore heart tissue.The work involved just 30 patients in Miami and Baltimore, but it proves the concept that anyone's cells can be used to treat such cases. Doctors are...

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Election night was a good night for Calif., civility and statheads

By Jeff GreenfieldForgive me if I don’t offer thoughts on the impending Republican civil war, the brilliance of the Obama campaign team, the effect of Hurricane Sandy, the demographic nightmare confronting the GOP, or prospects for the 2016 Iowa caucuses, now just a short 1,100 days or so away.There’s plenty of that for your Wednesday pleasure. But Tuesday night produced other news that’s worth your...

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China hauls away activists in congress crackdown

BEIJING (AP) — During her 30-hour train journey to Beijing, Wang Xiulan ducked into bathrooms whenever the conductors checked IDs. Later, as she lay low in the outskirts of the capital, unidentified men caught her in a nighttime raid and hauled her to a police station. She assumed a fake identity to get away, and is now in hiding again.Wang's not a criminal. She's a petitioner.She's among many people...

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Exclusive: EU regulators to accept Apple, publishers e-book offer

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ABC raises nearly $17 million for hurricane relief

NEW YORK (AP) — ABC says its national "Day of Giving" raised nearly $17 million for Superstorm Sandy relief.

Throughout its programming Monday, the network urged viewers to contribute to the American Red Cross to help victims of the storm, which affected several Northeastern states, but hit New Jersey and the New York metropolitan area particularly hard.

Appeals were aired all day on ABC programming, on Disney's syndicated shows and across other Disney-owned networks.

Major contributors include ABC personalities Barbara Walters, George Stephanopoulos and Mark Cuban, the Dallas Mavericks owner and star of ABC's "Shark Tank." The Samsung Corp. also made a major gift.

In addition, the Walt Disney Co. made a $1 million contribution to local charities.

NBC held a telethon Friday for storm victims that raised nearly $23 million.

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Study: Stem cells from strangers can repair hearts

LOS ANGELES (AP) — Researchers are reporting a key advance in using stem cells to repair hearts damaged by heart attacks. In a study, stem cells donated by strangers proved as safe and effective as patients' own cells for helping restore heart tissue.

The work involved just 30 patients in Miami and Baltimore, but it proves the concept that anyone's cells can be used to treat such cases. Doctors are excited because this suggests that stem cells could be banked for off-the-shelf use after heart attacks, just as blood is kept on hand now.

Results were discussed Monday at an American Heart Association conference in California and published in the Journal of the American Medical Association.

The study used a specific type of stem cells from bone marrow that researchers believed would not be rejected by recipients. Unlike other cells, these lack a key feature on their surface that makes the immune system see them as foreign tissue and attack them, explained the study's leader, Dr. Joshua Hare of the University of Miami.

The patients in the study had suffered heart attacks years earlier, some as long as 30 years ago. All had developed heart failure because the scar tissue from the heart attack had weakened their hearts so much that they grew large and flabby, unable to pump blood effectively.

Researchers advertised for people to supply marrow, which is removed using a needle into a hip bone. The cells were taken from the marrow and amplified for about a month in a lab at Baltimore's Johns Hopkins University, then returned to Miami to be used for treatment, which did not involve surgery.

The cells were delivered through a tube pushed through a groin artery into the heart near the scarred area. Fifteen patients were given cells from their own marrow and 15 others, cells from strangers.

About a year later, scar tissue had been reduced by about one-third. Both groups had improvements in how far they could walk and in quality of life. There was no significant difference in one measure of how well their hearts were able to pump blood, but doctors hope these patients will continue to improve over time, or that refinements in treatment will lead to better results.

The big attraction is being able to use cells supplied by others, with no blood or tissue matching needed.

"You could have the cells ready to go in the blood bank so when the patient comes in for a therapy — there's no delay," Hare said. "It's also cheaper to make the donor cells," and a single marrow donor can supply enough cells to treat as many as 10 people.

Dr. Elliott Antman of Harvard-affiliated Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston who heads the heart conference, praised the work.

"That opens up an entire new avenue for stem cell therapy, like a sophisticated version of a blood bank," he said. There's an advantage in not having to create a cell therapy for each patient, and it could spare them the pain and wait of having their own marrow harvested, he said.

The study was sponsored by the National Institutes of Health. Hare owns stock in a biotech company working on a treatment using a mixture of cells.

Juan Lopez received his own cells in the study, and said it improved his symptoms so much that at age 70, he was able to return to his job as an engineer and sales manager for a roofing manufacturer and ride an exercise bike.

"It has been a life-changing experience," said Lopez, who lives in Miami. "I can feel day by day, week by week, month by month, my improvement. I don't have any shortness of breath and my energy level is way up there. I don't have any fluid in my lungs."

And, he said happily, "My sex drive has improved!"

___

Marilynn Marchione can be followed at http://twitter.com/MMarchioneAP .

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Scenes from Election Day: America votes

A polling station in Los Angeles, California Tuesday. Kevork Djansezian/Getty Images)

The most expensive presidential race in American history—some $2.6 billion was spent—is finally coming to an end. The barrage of political ads is quieting, and voters now have the chance to speak.

Polls close in Virginia, Indiana, Georgia, Kentucky, South Carolina and Vermont at 7 PM ET, with other states following close behind. Alaska's polling stations, the last to close, finally shutter at 1 AM Wednesday. In the meantime, we'll be gathering all the latest news about the candidates, polling stations and swing states here.

1:45 PM: NBC has confirmed that an electronic voting machine in Pennsylvania changed a vote from Obama to Romney earlier today. The machine has been taken out of service.

1:20 PM: An estimated 50 million eligible Americans will not vote today. Here's why.

1:00 PM: Better late than never? Google searches for "who's running for president" spiked in November.

12:25 PM: You might want to think twice before posting your filled out ballot to Facebook, Flickr, or Instagram. Propublica reports that some states have laws that prohibit people from showing their ballots to anyone. Violating the rule can result in having your ballot thrown out. See if it's legal in your state at the Citizen Media Law Project site.

12:18 PM: In Washington D.C., There are reports that some lines are so long at polling sites that people are giving up on voting. How was your polling place? Let us know in the comments.

12 PM: Republican National Committee official Tim Miller is complaining on Twitter that a Philadelphia polling place has put up voting booths right next to a mural of Obama. The location of the polling site is 35th ward-D18 Franklin School, according to the Weekly Standard. Miller wrote that the Pennsylvania GOP has filed a complaint. Electioneering is not allowed within 10 feet of a polling place. The Philadelphia City Commissioners' office is looking into the complaints.

Obama mural in Philadelphia. (Tim Miller)

11:40 AM: Elections officials in Pinellas county in Florida mistakenly sent hundreds of robocalls telling voters they had until 7:00 PM Wednesday to vote, the Tampa Bay Times reports. (The last polls close at 8 PM Tuesday in the state.) Elections officials sent a second message to alert voters who received the calls of the mistake. A majority of the county voted Democratic in 2008.

11 AM: A Chrysler official wrote on Twitter that the car company has given its entire workforce the day off to vote. Late last month the company had strongly denied the accuracy of an ad from Mitt Romney's campaign stating that the automaker was moving its Jeep production to China. The company, in fact, said it recently added 1,100 jobs in the swing state of Ohio, where one in eight jobs is connected to the auto industry.

10 AM: All four major candidates have cast their ballots. President Barack Obama voted weeks ago in Chicago as part of his campaign's push to get their supporters to vote early in states that allow it. Voting on Tuesday: Vice President Joe Biden, at a Wilmington, Del., high school; Gov. Mitt Romney and his wife, Ann, near their Belmont, Mass., home; and Paul Ryan cast his ballot in his hometown of Janesville, Wis.

9:40 AM: The first election results are in—and it's a tie. In New Hampshire, Dixville Notch's 10 registered votes split evenly 5-5 between Romney and Obama. The small village has cast its ballots at midnight since 1960, giving political junkies an early look at how candidates are faring in the Granite State. President Obama carried the small village in 2008, but Dixville Notch went to George W. Bush in both 2000 and 2004.

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Pakistan army chief issues warning in rare message

ISLAMABAD (AP) — Pakistan's army chief warned against efforts to undermine the military in a rare public statement Monday that analysts interpreted as a response to unprecedented pressure from the government, media and judiciary.

Gen. Ashfaq Parvez Kayani's cryptic message triggered some concern within Pakistan because of the army's history of seizing power in military coups. But experts saw the statement as less of a threat and more of a sign of the shifting power balance in Pakistani politics.

"Armed forces draw their strength from the bedrock of the public support," Kayani told a group of officers at army headquarters in the city of Rawalpindi. "Therefore, any effort which wittingly or unwittingly draws a wedge between the people and the armed forces of Pakistan undermines the larger national interest."

The army is still considered the strongest institution in the country, but the generals have slowly ceded power to Pakistan's civilian leaders and judges in recent years. The shift has occurred as the army has been bogged down in a bloody war against a domestic Taliban insurgency.

Several recent actions by the Supreme Court have brought home the end of the army's once inviolable status. In a landmark ruling, the judges recommended last month that the government launch legal proceedings against a former army chief and head of intelligence for allegedly bankrolling politicians in the 1990 election.

The court has also pressured the military for allegedly snatching scores of people off the street in southwest Baluchistan province, where the government faces a separatist insurgency, and holding them without charges.

Kayani appeared to be hitting back at the judiciary in his comments Monday.

"We all agree that strengthening the institutions, ensuring the rule of law and working within the well-defined bounds of the constitution is the right way forward," said Kayani. "Weakening of the institutions and trying to assume more than one's due role will set us back."

The chief justice of the Supreme Court, Iftikhar Chaudhry, showed no indication of backing down in a speech he made Monday after Kayani issued his statement. He cited the Supreme Court's constitutional "supremacy over all other institutions and authorities."

"Gone are the days when stability and security of the country was defined in terms of number of missiles and tanks as a manifestation of hard power available at the disposal of the state," Chaudhry told a group of civil servants. He said it means providing people with "social security and welfare nets and to protect their natural and civil rights at all costs."

The media has also become more critical of the army, especially after it was unable to stop the U.S. from staging a unilateral raid to kill al-Qaida chief Osama bin Laden last year. This scrutiny has made it more difficult for the generals to interfere openly in politics.

The government has applied some pressure by investigating retired army generals for alleged corruption.

"I think it is a turning point in the history of institutional balance in Pakistan," said Rasul Bakhsh Rais, a political science professor at Lahore University of Management Sciences. "I think the army feels a little bit isolated and somewhat powerless to manage the institutional balance the way it did for decades."

Cyril Almeida, a columnist for Dawn newspaper, said he thought Kayani's comments were likely driven by pressure from within the army.

"The army is facing a period of unprecedented public criticism of its handling of security affairs and the untouchable status of army officers, and that has created some unease among the rank and file and the leadership," Almeida said. "Kayani was probably trying to allay some of those concerns and reassert himself as the leader who will stand up for his institution."

____

Associated Press writers Zarar Khan and Rebecca Santana contributed to this report.

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