PARIS (Reuters) - Sloane Stephens says she does not live in the real world and that apart from Miley Cyrus there are few 20-year-olds quite like her.

The latest poster girl of American tennis reached the fourth round of the French Open for the second year running on Saturday and is reveling in the happy-go-lucky attitude that comes with not worrying about anything except tennis and shopping.

"I don't live in the real world," Stephens, who beat New Zealand's Marina Erakovic in three sets, said, comparing herself with Disney show actress and singer Cyrus.

"Hopefully it never stops. I mean, there are no other 20-year-olds like me. There might be a few, like Miley Cyrus, but other than that I'm pretty much riding solo on this train."

After reaching the semi-finals of the Australian Open in January, Stephens was catapulted up the rankings and into the celebrity world.

She hails from a country that is hungry for a new hope, as Serena Williams, still the game's dominant force, edges towards the end of a trophy-laden career.

If there is pressure that comes with that, Stephens, now 17th in the world rankings, is doing a good job of keeping it under wraps.

In Paris, her trick to coping with the stress of a grand-slam tournament is to hit the city's chic shopping districts.

"I think it's just I'm really enjoying myself off the court. I mean, more shopping like every day I'm buying stuff. People don't understand, at 20 years old I can do whatever I want."

If she should need advice on how to cope with being a rising star, Stephens would do well to have a word with her next opponent at Roland Garros.

Stephens will now face Maria Sharapova, a player who has laid out the blueprint for treading the tightrope of being a top athlete and a celebrity.

"There is no doubt that I have a tough one ahead of me," last year's Roland Garros champion said of the American.

While Stephens might not live in the real world, she shares one thing in common with many young women of her age who do.

Asked if there was anything she would change in her life since the Australian Open, she replied: "That boys weren't so stupid."

(Editing by Clare Fallon)

TORONTO (Reuters) - Canada's main stock index dipped on Thursday as fears the U.S. Federal Reserve will dial back its bond-buying program and pessimism following sluggish economic data from China and Europe fueled declines in all major sectors.

Weakness in Toronto-Dominion Bank further weighed on the market after the country's No. 2 lender reported earnings slightly below expectations.

Investors were nervous after Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke told Congress on Wednesday that a decision to scale back massive bond buying each month could come at one of the U.S. central bank's "next few meetings" if the economy looked set to maintain momentum.

The benchmark Canadian index, which tracked weak global markets, eased from gains made in the previous four sessions.

"It's the fallout of Ben Bernanke's testimony," said Gavin Graham, chief strategy officer at Integris Pension Management. "That's the first concrete suggestion that maybe they'll reduce the bond buying program."

The Toronto Stock Exchange's S&P/TSX composite indexclosed down 94.41 points, or 0.74 percent, at 12,658.09.

"We all know that at some point, the Fed's going to have to do something to withdraw some of that liquidity they put in the marketplace," said Irwin Michael, portfolio manager at ABC Funds.

"It's a game of chicken," he added. "People are waiting to find out when, and they will probably react in the short run."

Other negative market factors included surveys showing China's factory activity shrank for the first time in seven months in May and that the euro zone economy was likely to contract again in the second quarter.

All of the 10 main sectors in the index were in the red.

Shares of energy producers fell 0.6 percent. Suncor Energy Inc , Canada's largest energy company, was down 0.6 percent at C$32.32.

Financials, the index's most heavily weighted sector, lost 0.4 percent. TD Bank

The materials sector, which includes mining stocks, was down 0.9 percent despite a rise in shares of gold companies.

Miner Teck Resources Ltdfell 4.3 percent to C$28.20, and fertilizer giant Potash Corpslipped 2.1 percent to C$43.01.

Among other active stocks, Nordion Incjumped 11.6 percent to C$8.16 after the major provider of isotopes used in medical imaging said it will sell its targeted therapies division.

(Editing by Jeffrey Hodgson, Jeffrey Benkoe and James Dalgleish)

Evidence from these ancient periods suggests humans produced new tools, and used symbolism in wall engravings. The findings suggest a tight link between abrupt climate changes and the emergence of modern human traits, researchers say.

"We provide for the first time really good evidence that the occurrence and disappearance of these first finds of human innovation are linked to climate change," said study author Martin Ziegler, an earth science researcher at Cardiff University in Wales.

Before these periods of innovation, , with the most impressive technology being hand axes, Ziegler said. But during these wet periods, more advanced stone and bone tools appear in the fossil record, as well as painted symbols on cave walls that suggest the development of language.

Archaeologists have also found some of the first evidence of constructed plant beds during these periods, and shells thought to be worn as adornments or jewelry, Ziegler said. Among the most important periods analyzed in the study date to 71,000, and a period between 64,000 and 59,000 years ago. []

In the study, Ziegler's team reconstructed South Africa's climate over the last 100,000 years. They pieced together the record by analyzing sediment cores taken from the offshore region near the southeastern tip of Africa.

Chemicals within the sediment suggest how much rainfall fell nearby, Ziegler said, as well as other indicators of climate.

The climate reconstruction agrees with records from elsewhere in the world. During these lush periods in South Africa, much of the rest of Sub-Saharan Africa was experiencing a drought, while much of the Northern Hemisphere was very cold, Ziegler said. The study suggests that cold conditions in the north reoriented Atlantic Ocean currents, shifting the global monsoon belt with its torrential rains to the south, he said.

The study shows an association, but not a cause-and-effect relationship between wetter conditions and human innovation. But it may be that during these periods, drought farther north forcedinto South African refuges, leading to a "bottleneck" of competition, and cross-cultural fertilization, Ziegler said.

Future work may look at the connection between human populations elsewhere, and local climate shifts.

But insights from these locations in South Africa are vital, because they are thought to "re?ect the emergence of modern behaviors of innovation, language and cultural identity," the authors wrote in the study, published today (May 21) in the journal Nature Communications.

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(Reuters) - Canadian house prices will fall 5 percent in the next few years, with Vancouver and Toronto leading the drop, but the government has done enough to cool the once-hot housing market and Canada will not see a U.S.-style crash, according to a Reuters poll.

The survey of 21 forecasters showed about half have some level of concern that Canadian house prices are at risk of a sharp fall, but none believe the correction will result in the devastation seen in the United States five years ago.

A housing slowdown is already well underway in Canada, but a soft landing is widely expected by both private economists and policymakers. Home sales fell 3.1 percent in April from a year earlier, but they edged up from the prior month as spring buyers breathed life back into the market that had been cooling all winter.

"Government policies have been largely successful in slowing real estate activity, in conjunction with a notable change in sentiment. House prices are clearly vulnerable to a correction in nominal terms, but we believe a more gradual adjustment in real home prices is more likely," said Moody's Analytics senior economist Mark Hopkins.

The prospect of a soft landing has been helped by Canada's more conservative approach to home ownership and mortgage lending, including government moves to tighten lending rules in recent years.

In addition, mortgage interest is not deductible, lenders are less likely to securitize mortgages, and there is little subprime lending. Canadians also have more equity in their homes than Americans did.

"Tighter mortgage rules have slowed credit growth, helping to cool the housing market in an orderly fashion - hat tip to policymakers," BMO Capital Markets senior economist Sal Guatieri said in a recent housing report.

Canada is now experiencing a slowdown in housing activity just as the U.S. housing market is showing clear signs of recovery, making the comparison between the two markets more stark.

U.S. house prices crashed as a mortgage crisis unraveled in 2008, triggering a financial crisis and leaving a trail of foreclosures, negative equity and financial hardship for millions of people. But U.S. housing prices and construction are showing renewed strength, just as Canada's post-financial-crisis boom ends.

HOME PRICES, CONSTRUCTION TO FALL

On a national basis, Canadian house prices are expected to drop 5 percent over the next several years, according to the median result of the poll, which was conducted over the past week.

Prices, which rose some 88 percent in the last 10 years, according to the Teranet-National Bank Housing Index, are still rising on a national basis, but the appreciation has slowed to a crawl and some markets have seen outright declines.

House prices will fall 0.2 percent in 2013 and rise 0.5 percent in 2014, according to the median of forecasts in the Reuters poll, putting most of the losses at least two years away and making the downward path very gradual.

Economists have long debated whether moves by the government to tighten lending standards have helped the housing sector manage a soft landing or pushed it into a crash. Only two of 21 surveyed said they expect the government to intervene in a similar fashion in the next 12 months.

"Further macroprudential 'tightening' measures may be undertaken by the federal government, albeit more likely through (banking regulator) OSFI or other channels rather than further changes to insured mortgage rules," Altus Group chief economist Peter Norman said.

Mindful of the U.S. boom and bust, Canada's federal government tightened mortgage lending rules four times in the last five years to make it harder for home buyers to take on too much debt in their quest for a home.

The rule changes gradually shortened the maximum length for an insured mortgage from 40 years to 25 and put limits on how much people can borrow against their homes, among other measures.

Median forecasts saw Toronto prices rising 1.2 percent in 2013 before falling 1.2 percent in 2014. Respondents expect an eventual 7.5 percent fall from current levels. Vancouver prices were forecast to fall 3.1 percent in 2013 and 3.4 percent in 2014, with an eventual decline of 10 percent from current levels.

As sales decline and prices fall, homebuilders will cut back on construction starts, the poll showed.

Housing starts, which notched a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 214,827 in 2012, will drop to an annual rate of 175,500 in the second quarter of 2013 and drift gradually lower to 170,500 by the first quarter of 2014, the poll found.

However, some economists expect the national slowdown to be sharper and uglier.

"Though prices are elevated and in Sun Life Global Investment's opinion due to correct by 10 to 15 percent, this will depend on how other important factors play out," said Sadiq Adatia, Chief Investment Officer at Sun Life Global Investments.

"For instance, there remains high debt levels and if unemployment goes up (as we expect) then that will put further pressure on housing prices. What is keeping this in a soft landing state is that rates are not likely to increase over the next year or so."

While the Bank of Canada has maintained a tightening bias in its monetary policy statements, interest rates are not expected to rise until the fourth quarter of 2014.

(Polling by Deepti Govind in Bangalore; Editing by James Dalgleish)

1. Eulogio Fonseca Arreola, 26, a street vendor who sells cell-phone accessories with his sister and family. "They went out to have fun. They are not criminals," sister Isabel Fonseca said.

2. Jennifer Robles Gonzalez, 23, a single mother of a 6-year-old boy. Her family said she posted a message on Facebook after 8:30 a.m. Sunday saying she was dancing at the bar less than two hours before the kidnapping allegedly took place.

3. Josue Piedra Moreno, 29, street food vendor who told his mother, Leticia Moreno, he was going out to a club with his brother, Aaron Piedra Moreno.

4. Aaron Piedra Moreno, 20, street food vendor

5. Guadalupe Karen Morales Vargas, 24

6. Alan Omar Athiencia Barranco, 26

7. Said Sanchez Garcia, 19, who helped his mom sell purses and cleaning items in a street market. He was last seen late Saturday when he came home for a sweater before going out to another nightclub and then the bar.

8. Jerzy Ortiz Ponce, 16, went to the party with his friend, Said Sanchez.

9. Gabriela Tellez Zamudio, 34,

10. Rafael Rojas, no age available, married and a merchant in Tepito.

11. Victim unidentified

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Some people worry that Google might respond to Facebook Home by blocking this kind of approach in a future release.We want to be a very, very open platform, but we want a way by which end users are getting a good experience overall. We have to figure out a way to rationalize things, and do it so that it makes sense for users and developers. Theres always a balance there. Its no different from the kind of decisions that Facebook has to make about its own platform. But right now, we dont plan to make any changes we are excited theyve done good work.

Hold on. Youre saying that you like innovation like Homebut at some point in the future you might decide that an invasive software approach like this isnt good for users and cant be done in a future Android release?No. Let me clarify. Users get to decide what apps and what choices they want. Some users really want this. We dont want to get in the way of that. [But] in the end, we have to provide a consistent experience. As part of that, with every release of Android, we do go through changes. So we may make changes over time. But if this is what users want, I think Facebook will be able to do it. We want it to be possible for users to get what they want.

There is plenty of room for interpretation there. In the end though, it seems as if Google is leaving the door open but isnt afraid to close it slightly if the need should arise. What might make the need arise? Google is leaving that up to its discretion if it determines any particular Android app is standing in the way of users getting a good experience overall, it could definitely block the software from its mobile platform.

This article was

An international jury that included prominent German literary critic Marcel Reich-Ranicki selected Oz for the prize, which is awarded annually with a $10,000 prize.

Past winners have included the American novelist Philip Roth and Nobel laureates Elfriede Jelinek of Austria and Harold Pinter of Britain.

It is awarded by the Prague-based Franz Kafka Society to authors whose works "appeal to readers regardless of their origin, nationality and culture."

The society said in a statement Monday that Oz has agreed to travel to Prague with his wife for an October ceremony to receive the prize.

Oz has been said to be among the candidates for the Nobel Prize for literature in last several years.

In its sixth year, the Top 10 New Species list is compiled by the International Institute for Species Exploration at Arizona State University and is announced on the anniversary of the birth of Carolus Linnaeus. An 18th-century botanist, Linnaeus created the modern system for naming and classifying species.

The panel plucked thefrom more than 140 nominations; to be considered, the species had to have been officially named in 2012 and described with the appropriate code of nomenclature. []

"We look for organisms with unexpected features or size and those found in rare or difficult to reach habitats," Antonio Valdecasas, a biologist and research zoologist with Museo Nacional de Ciencias Naturales in Madrid, Spain, said in a statement. "We also look for organisms that are especially significant to humans those that play a certain role in human habitat or that are considered a close relative," added Valdecasas, who is committee chair for the top 10 species list.

Quirky species

One such creature with an odd feature is the glow-in-the-dark cockroach, named Lucihormetica luckae, whose luminescence may help the creepy-crawly mimic toxic click beetles and thereby avoid predators. In addition,also made the list. The sponge (Chondrocladia lyra), which lives nearly 2 miles (more than 3 kilometers) beneath the Pacific Ocean, sports 20 barbed vanes that resemble a harp's strings. Once it captures meaty prey, the sponge envelops it in a thin membrane and slowly begins to digest the animal.

And then there's the . Discovered in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Cercopithecus lomamiensis is more easily heard than seen. Apparently the Old World monkey performs a booming song at dawn. Even so, it does sport some striking features, including bare blue patches of skin on its buttocks, testicles and perineum, along with humanlike eyes.

Other quirky creatures that made it to the top-10 list include a nocturnal snail-eating snake (Sibon noalamina) found in a mountain range in Panama; a teensy frog (Paedophryne amanuensis) as small as 7 millimeters (0.3 inches) long and now considered(an animal with a backbone).

Filling out the list is a black-hued fungus that threatens Paleolithic cave paintings, a tiny violet from the high Andes of Peru, an endangered shrub with emerald-green leaves and magenta flowers, and a new fossil species of hanging fly that mimics the leaves of a gingko-like tree.

Identifying biodiversity

The committee saysis critical, especially since many are threatened.

"For decades, we have averaged 18,000 species discoveries per year which seemed reasonable before the biodiversity crisis. Now, knowing that millions of species may not survive the 21st century, it is time to pick up the pace," Quentin Wheeler, founding director of the International Institute for Species Exploration at ASU, said in a statement.

"We are calling for a NASA-like mission to discover 10 million species in the next 50 years," Wheeler added.

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The prestigious Institute of Medicine is recommending that schools provide opportunities for at least 60 minutes of physical activity each day for students and that PE become a core subject.

The report, released Thursday, says only about half of the nation's youngsters are getting at least an hour of vigorous or moderate-intensity physical activity every day.

Another concern, the report says, is that 44 percent of school administrators report slashing big chunks of time from physical education, arts and recess since the passage of the No Child Left Behind law in 2001 in order to boost classroom time for reading and math.

With childhood obesity on the rise about 17 percent of children ages 2 through 19 are obese and kids spending much of the day in the classroom, the chairman of the committee that wrote the report said schools are the best place to help shape up the nation's children.

"Schools for years have been responsible for various health programs such as nutrition, breakfast and lunch, immunizations, screenings," Harold W. Kohl III, a professor of epidemiology at the University of Texas School of Public Health, said in an interview with The Associated Press.

"Physical activity should be placed alongside those programs to make it a priority for us as a society," he said.

The report calls on the Education Department to recommend that PE be adopted as a core subject.

It says physical education in school is the "only sure opportunity" for youngsters to have access to activity that will help keep them healthy.

The majority of states, about 75 percent, mandate PE, according to the American Alliance for Health, Physical Education, Recreation, and Dance. But most do not require a specific amount of time for PE in school, and more than half allow exemptions or substitutions, such as marching band, cheerleading and community sports.

Many kids also aren't going to gym class at school every single day. According to the CDC, only about 30 percent of students nationwide attend PE classes five days a week.

Specifically, the report recommends:

All elementary school students should spend an average of 30 minutes each day in PE class.

Middle and high school students should spend an average of 45 minutes each day in PE class.

State and local officials should find ways get children more physical activity in the school environment.

PE isn't the sole solution, though.

The report advocates a "whole-of-school" approach where recess and before-and-after-school activities including sports are made accessible to all students to help achieve the 60-minutes-a-day recommendation for physical activity. It could be as simple as having kids walk or bike to school, or finding ways to add a physical component to math and science class lessons.

The report also cautions against taking away recess as a form of punishment, and it urges schools to give students frequent classroom breaks.

Schools can do this if they make it a priority, said Paul Roetert, CEO of the American Alliance for Health, Physical Education, Recreation, and Dance.

"We have an obligation to keep kids active," Roetert said in an interview. "We have research to show that physical activity helps kids perform better in school. It helps them focus better in the classroom ... and they behave better in school. So there are all kinds of side benefits."

Kitty Porterfield, spokeswoman for The School Superintendents Association, said nobody is opposed to physical education.

"Everybody would love to see more of it in schools," said Porterfield. "Given the testing and academic pressures for excellence on schools, often physical education slides to the bottom of the barrel."

The idea of putting more of an emphasis on physical education in schools has support in Congress.

Rep. Marcia Fudge, D-Ohio, plans to introduce the PHYSICAL Act on Thursday. It would recognize health education and physical education as core subjects within elementary and secondary schools. Reps. John Lewis, D-Ga., and Jared Polis, D-Colo., will join Fudge as co-sponsors.

The official said Friday the men suspected the three women of having affairs, and killed them to protect the family's honor. The three bodies were found in the Nile River near the ancient city of Luxor. They were wrapped in blankets and weighted with stones.

The official spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to reporters.

"Honor killings" are common in Egypt, especially in the conservative southern region where women are often killed if caught in extramarital relations for bringing shame on their families.

The practice is against Egyptian law, and perpetrators are prosecuted if they are arrested.