American Stefani, seeking his first victory on the U.S. circuit, piled up eight birdies on the way to a four-under-par 66 on a warm, mainly overcast day at the TPC Southwind, finishing at 12-under 198.

Compatriot English, who had been two strokes in front overnight in pursuit of his maiden PGA Tour title, rolled in a 14-footer to birdie the last for a 69 to secure outright second place.

PGA Tour rookie Patrick Reed fired the day's lowest score, a six-birdie 64 lifting him into a tie for third at eight under with fellow Americans Nicholas Thompson (66) and Scott Stallings (67).

Four-times major champion Phil Mickelson also mounted a charge on what is traditionally known as 'Moving Day' at golf tournaments, a 65 putting him at seven under alongside rookie Eric Meierdierks (66).

Several other big names were also in contention with triple major winner Padraig Harrington of Ireland (65) at six under, a stroke better than Englishman Ian Poulter and defending champion Dustin Johnson of the U.S. who returned matching 68s. (Reporting by Mark Lamport-Stokes in Los Angeles; Editing by Gene Cherry)

NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - Kids who are short for their age but otherwise healthy probably don't need extensive blood tests to determine if a disease is stunting their growth, researchers said in a new study.

Of 235 short kids without symptoms who were referred for specialty testing, just three had a possible diagnosis picked up on those labs, and only one diagnosis - for celiac disease - was confirmed, researchers found.

"Most of the screening tests are for diseases you really wouldn't want to miss, but it's rare that any of those diseases (would only) present with short stature," said by Dr. Stephanie Sisley, who led the study.

Guidelines on short stature from endocrinology groups recommend lab screening for very short children, including those who don't have any problems picked up on a physical exam. That screening includes blood tests for thyroid and growth hormones as well as calcium and other nutrients.

But one of the authors of those guidelines agreed that based on the new findings, kids who are short but have no other symptoms probably don't need extensive screening.

Sisley and her colleagues reviewed the medical charts of 1,373 short children who were referred to the endocrinology clinic at Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center between 2008 and 2011. Of them, 235 were below the third percentile for height and had a normal check-up and no record of having stopped growing.

A 10-year-old girl who is four feet, one inch tall would fall just below the third percentile, for example, as would a six-year-old boy who is three feet, five inches.

Few of those children underwent all tests recommended by the guidelines; the average kid had about two-thirds of them. One was diagnosed with celiac disease - when the body can't process certain grains - and two others had signs of underlying conditions but didn't finish follow-up tests.

There were 10 false-positive lab results that didn't pan out on further testing.

Altogether, the tests cost $315,321 - or $105,107 per possible diagnosis, the study team reported in The Journal of Pediatrics.

Sisley and her colleagues said their findings show many children are inappropriately referred to specialists for short stature. Rather than looking at a child's height at one point, it's more important to track it over time to see if a kid has stopped growing, they wrote.

"Any patient who really isn't growing should be checked out," Sisley, now at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston, told Reuters Health.

Dr. Alan Rogol, a professor emeritus at the University of Virginia in Charlottesville, agreed the new findings only apply to those kids who are short but have no record of growth delay.

The kids in this study "had nothing that pointed to difficulty in any system, and many of them were short kids of shorter parents," Rogol, who reviewed the study for the journal, told Reuters Health.

He and Sisley both said those kids should be followed by their pediatrician for at least six months - then referred to a specialist if they really aren't growing, or any time new symptoms show up.

"In this idealized set of kids, the things that pediatricians do best are probably more worthwhile than sending them over to see an endocrinologist or somebody else," Rogol said.

"I think parents are most worried that they're missing something in the kid. It's actually okay to follow the growth of a patient for six months or 12 months to see if something's going on before you do specialized testing," Sisley said.

"Much of the time, if their child is otherwise healthy the bottom line is they're probably going to be fine in the long run."

SOURCE: http://bit.ly/16vQeM9 The Journal of Pediatrics, online May 23, 2013.

LONDON/MOSCOW (Reuters) - Banks that helped Russian oil company Rosneftfinance its $55 billion buyout of rival TNK-BP have been left waiting for their payback - a share in $15 billion in asset sales expected to follow the deal, sources familiar with matter said.

State oil company Rosneft's takeover of TNK-BP this year aimed to create a major oil group producing more oil than Exxon Mobil , but it also tightened the Russian government's grip on the country's energy sector.

The asset sales promised by Rosneft Chief Executive Igor Sechin would offload less-profitable businesses to turn the company into the major oil player the CEO has said he wants it to be. The delay shows Rosneft has a lot on its plate integrating TNK-BP and that the sales are on the back burner.

Rosneft had dangled the juicy divestment mandates at the banks in exchange for a $29.8 billion loan - the largest in Russia's history - on good terms, three out of four sources with direct knowledge of the loan talks said.

"All the lending banks are waiting," said one of the bankers who asked not to be named because the talks are private.

"We thought (refinancing) bonds and asset sales would kick start straight after the closing (of TNK-BP deal). We are now in the dark."

Rosneft declined to comment.

Rosneft's slow motion is frustrating the banks as they would earn fat fees from advising the oil giant on the asset sales this year, which would help boost M&A revenues in an otherwise arid deal making landscape.

M&A activity across all sectors is down 7 percent in Europe, Middle East and Africa since January according to Thomson Reuters data, partly due to the impact of the euro zone crisis on business confidence.

M&A PAY-OFF

Banks that maintained big balance sheets throughout the financial crisis have been hoping to use this muscle to win lucrative M&A advisory business from rivals which had to shrink partly to meet tough European capital rules.

Banks often use their balance sheets to offer cheap loans to corporate clients to secure higher-margin business such as share or bond issues or M&A work.

Big balance sheets helped Barclaysand Deutsche Bank , for example, to achieve number 2 and 3 rankings in M&A league tables last year, challenging U.S. rival Goldman Sachs, which had the top slot, Thomson Reuters data showed.

Rosneft's jumbo loan raised $16.8 billion in 2012 and $13 billion earlier this year to finance the TNK-BP deal with banks including Bank of America Merrill Lynch , Barclays , BNP Paribas , Citi , Credit Agricole , JP Morgan , Mizuho, Societe Generaleand UniCredit .

Soon after deal closed, Rosneft planned a bond issue to refinance part of the loan. But the company turned instead to Russia's domestic bond market where big Russian banks such as Sberbankand VTBdominate.

Rosneft is also doing an M&A deal, but plans to buy a local gas firm rather than sell off some of its own assets.

NO HURRY TO SELL

As a result, the banks' hopes of getting their hands on the asset sales business quickly could be disappointed.

The timing and extent of any disposals were never discussed in depth with the banks and have yet to be approved by the Kremlin, all of the sources said.

"These assets are producing on-shore fields, they are big cash cows. The pressure to sell is not there", said the first banker.

"They (Rosneft) have never sold anything, ever. It's not in their genes." said a second banker, who said Moscow was currently reviewing which assets were no longer strategic and could be sold.

One of the sources, on the Rosneft side, confirmed the parties to the loan talks touched on possible asset sales after the closure of the deal but without reference to particular assets or mandates. "It was never discussed in such specifics."

The asset sales are also considered a test of CEO Sechin's ability to get to grips with the Rosneft empire, and re-fashion it into a modern, efficient corporation.

But Sechin, ally of President Vladimir Putin for more than 20 years, also is under pressure to ensure that the oil which underpins the Russian economy remains safe in trusted hands.

Rosneft's main non-core assets are in Western Siberia, where the company pumps most of its crude. Some of these are mature and the company struggles to squeeze out a margin.

A sale of these fields would also mark a reversal in the Kremlin's decade-long drive for control of Russia's oil riches.

Western Siberia's fields make up 70 percent of Rosneft's market capitalization, according to one analyst estimate. They also host, deep underground, some of Russia's biggest potential unconventional resources which are seen as key to mid-term production growth.

Potential buyers are therefore expected to be mainly Russian companies Lukoiland Gazprombut also some resource-hungry Asian players, the bankers said.

(Reporting by Sophie Sassard and Melissa Akin; additional reporting by Tessa Walsh; Editing by Andrew Callus and Jane Merriman)

The tech companies have responded to questions about the story with statements that may leave out as much as they say.

All the major technology companies named in thehave adamantly denied that they gave the government full access to their servers in similar prepared statements.

that members of Congress have repeatedly been informed of the programs.

"The relevant intelligence committees are fully briefed on these programs," he said. "These are programs that have been authorized by broad, bipartisan majorities repeatedly since 2006. And so, I think, at the outset, it's important to understand that your duly elected representatives have been consistently informed on exactly what we're doing."

Obama added that data being collected on emails and Internet activity targeted foreign nationals and not U.S. citizens.

The tech companies released the following prepared statements to the media denying involvement in the program.

The Statements

Apple: "We have never heard of PRISM. We do not provide any government agency with direct access to our servers, and any government agency requesting customer data must get a court order."

Microsoft: "We provide customer data only when we receive a legally binding order or subpoena to do so, and never on a voluntary basis. In addition we only ever comply with orders for requests about specific accounts or identifiers. If the government has a broader voluntary national security program to gather customer data we don't participate in it."

Google: "Google cares deeply about the security of our users' data. We disclose user data to government in accordance with the law, and we review all such requests carefully. From time to time, people allege that we have created a government 'back door' into our systems, but Google does not have a 'back door' for the government to access private user data."

Google's CEO again denying knowledge of the program.

"We provide user data to governments only in accordance with the law," said Page.

Facebook: "Protecting the privacy of our users and their data is a top priority for Facebook. We do not provide any government organization with direct access to Facebook servers. When Facebook is asked for data or information about specific individuals, we carefully scrutinize any such request for compliance with all applicable laws, and provide information only to the extent required by law."

Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg released , saying Facebook "hadn't even heard of PRISM before yesterday."

Yahoo: "Yahoo takes users' privacy very seriously. We do not provide the government with direct access to our servers, systems, or network."

Paltalk: "We have not heard of PRISM. Paltalk exercises extreme care to protect and secure users' data, only responding to court orders as required to by law. Paltalk does not provide any government agency with direct access to its servers."

AOL: "We do not have any knowledge of the Prism program. We do not disclose user information to government agencies without a court order, subpoena or formal legal process, nor do we provide any government agency with access to our servers."

Dissecting The Wording and What They Can't Say

The similarity in all the statements was clear. All mentioned that they would only comply with orders for requests to access information if forced to do so under the law and that they did not provide "back door" or "direct" access to their servers and to user account information.

Experts believe that commonality in statements could mean a few things. The first is that the companies simply can't talk about it.

"If these companies received an order under the FISA amendments act, they are forbidden by law from disclosing having received the order and disclosing any information about the order at all," Mark Rumold, staff attorney at the Electronic Frontier Foundation, told ABC News.

Rumold is involved with lawsuits with the NSA and the Department of Justice about other wiretapping cases.

John Black, an assistant professor of Computer Science at the University of Colorado, shared a similar opinion.

"Many times these laws say they have to comply and they can't disclose their compliance," Black said.

However, the companies are talking about it, not simply saying "no comment." Apple, Facebook and Paltalk even specifically said they had never heard of PRISM.

Rumold said that could be a technicality.

"Apple might have had no idea of the government's code name for the program, which was PRISM," Rumold said. "What Apple didn't say is that, 'We have never given the NSA access to our data.'"

Google, on the other hand, said there was no back door to its servers.

"Back door at Google might have one meaning, but what they didn't say is they aren't giving the NSA widespread access to data, which they could potentially say if they had not received an order and given the NSA access to their data," Rumold said.

Black echoed a similar thought about the wording "direct access" and the "back door" phrase.

"They seem consistently careful in saying we don't give back-door access to the government servers," Black said. "That's not the same thing as saying the government has no way to access any of our data."

Black suggested that maybe the NSA doesn't have far-reaching or direct access to the servers, but the companies don't deny that the government can get information through some sort of shared servers when they have a court order.

Marc Ambinder, author of "Deep State: Inside the Government Secrecy Industry," told ABC News something similar.

PRISM is, in part, a software system that allows the government to sift through large amounts of data in different formats, he said. When the Internet companies came on board, as the leaked document showed, it required them to make their data compatible with the system.

That doesn't mean all data coming from, say, Apple or Google would be readable through the PRISM system. It just means that when a court order was granted, there was a system already in existence that allowed the government to intake and immediately use the data Apple or Google provided in compliance with a FISA court order.

James R. Clapper, the director of national intelligence, said in a written statement that the Post report and another on phone surveillance by The Guardian contained "numerous inaccuracies," and that the data collection only targeted non-Americans outside the United States.

President Obama today stressed that members of Congress repeatedly have been informed of the programs.

"The programs that have been discussed over the last couple days in the press are secret in the sense that they're classified, but they're not secret in the sense that when it comes to telephone calls, every member of Congress has been briefed on this program," he said.

Still, both Black and Rumold said it was highly unlikely that the technology companies wouldn't have been informed of the programs.

"Google is probably the biggest collection of information on Earth. It would be shocking to me that the NSA wasn't attempting with all its power to get access to Google," Rumold said. "Google might have very well fought a valiant and difficult fight to keep the NSA away from it, but there is only so much it can do as an American company if you get a valid United States court order."

And that's where Google CEO Page makes the point about making these programs more transparent.

"Finally, this episode confirms what we have long believed -- there needs to be a more transparent approach," he said in the . "Google has worked hard, within the confines of the current laws, to be open about the data requests we receive."

ABC News' Abby Phillip contributed to this report.

Bolden spoke before scientists and industry members at theEnterprise Forum, which was held at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Auditorium and Science Center in Silver Spring, Md.

The daylong conference aimed to bring together researchers and policymakers to identify how the sun's activity impacts Earth, and the .

"This conference shines a spotlight on another naturally occurring phenomenon that can be just as punishing as a tornado space weather," Bolden said in his written remarks for the event, after mentioning his grief at the lives lost during the deadlyin recent weeks.

Strong solar storms can damage satellites in space and, if aimed at Earth, can interfere with communications infrastructure and power grids on the ground. Conference attendees discussed potential vulnerabilities in existing infrastructure, and how they can be made more robust. Space weather researchers also highlighted ongoing mitigation efforts, including improvements in technology and modeling that may help predict future storms. []

Developing a clearer picture of when these storms may strike, and their potential impacts, is crucial, Bolden said.

"Given the growing importance of space to our nation's economic well being and security, it is of increasing importance that NASA and its partner agencies continue to advance our nation's capability to understand and predict space weather events," he explained.

The radiation released by severe sun storms can also be risky for astronauts living aboard the International Space Station. Understanding the way humans in space are affected by space weather will help NASA plan future manned missions to the moon, Mars or beyond, Bolden said.

Last week, a new study found that astronauts on a mission to Mars could befrom both solar particles and cosmic rays from outside the solar system, even with shielding on the spacecraft. The research, which was published in the journal Science, determined that on a trip to Mars, spaceflyers would be subject to radiation doses between 100 and 1,000 times higher than on Earth.

"The findings will aid design of future human missions by reducing uncertainty about how much shielding from radiation astronauts need," Bolden said. "For these and other reasons this forum and our efforts to study, monitor, and mitigate radiation exposure are so very important."

The NASA administrator also spoke about the need for international cooperation in studying the effects of space weather.

"Space weather is a problem that crosses all borders and demands input from our international counterparts," Bolden said.

Next week, Bolden is scheduled to speak at the 56th session of the United Nations Committee on the Peaceful Uses of Outer Space in Vienna, Austria. This year, for the first time, the UN committee has added space weather as a topic for discussion, recognizing it to be as serious a threat asand near-Earth asteroids, Bolden said.

"With the United Nations now on our team, we are assured of even greater global coordination in the effort to increase our understanding of space weather and its impact on Earth and throughout the solar system," he added. "We have shown how, working as a team, we can save lives when hurricanes and tornadoes strike here on Earth. I am confident we can be just as effective working together to protect our people, our critical infrastructures, and our planet from the dangers of space weather."

Follow Denise Chow on Twitter. Follow us,or. Originally published on.

Democratic Sen. Frank Lautenberg's death Monday presents the state's popular Republican governor with a series of decisions that carry consequences beyond who will serve as New Jersey's next U.S. senator. While Republicans and Democrats alike will be watching Christie's next moves closely, there's no telling what the governor who has staked out a reputation for going his own way will do.

"I give him praise on a life well-lived," Christie said of the Democratic senator with whom he frequently tangled. The governor made the comment during an appearance at a women's conference and then canceled the rest of his public schedule Monday, clearly mindful of the high stakes involved in choosing Lautenberg's successor.

Christie said he would discuss the succession plan at a Tuesday afternoon news conference in Trenton. He didn't say he would be announcing a successor.

Christie has wide latitude to choose Lautenberg's successor but it would be unusual for him to select a Democrat. Four states require the governor to choose a member of the outgoing senator's political party but New Jersey is not among them. With Lautenberg's death, the Senate now has 52 Democrats, 45 Republicans and two independents who often side with the Democrats.

For Christie, who has enjoyed strong approval ratings, picking the wrong successor might reflect poorly on him as he looks to win by a large margin against Democratic state Sen. Barbara Buono, who is considered an underdog against the well-known governor. Choosing a conservative might help him with national Republicans but could undercut his moderate bona fides, which have helped him connect with independents and Democrats in his state.

In the longer term, the wrong person could irk Republican leaders in Washington and activists in early voting states like Iowa, New Hampshire and South Carolina. If Christie selects a Republican with views that are out of step with the GOP base someone who supports abortion rights or gun control, for instance it might hurt Christie with party stalwarts. The appointee's vote could tip the balance on issues like immigration reform, which the Senate is expected to begin debating in the weeks ahead.

Christie's appointee also could offer a window into the governor's own thinking on issues and thrust Christie into an ongoing fight between establishment Republicans and the GOP's tea party wing.

The governor, who has brought a blunt-speaking independent streak to the Republican Party, took flak from fellow Republicans when he appeared alongside President Barack Obama on the Jersey Shore in the aftermath of Hurricane Sandy, which struck the state about a week before the 2012 election. He appeared again with Obama last week to promote the Jersey Shore's recovery and repeatedly has spoken of the need for politics to be set aside for the good of his state.

Brad Dayspring, a spokesman for the U.S. Senate Republicans' campaign committee, said the governor has "demonstrated time and again that he will do what he believes is best" for his home state.

Picking a Democrat to carry the torch from Lautenberg however unlikely might win him bipartisan love in liberal-leaning New Jersey but would enrage Republicans already suspicious of Christie's chummy relations with Obama after Sandy. Christie has maintained good relations with Newark's Democratic mayor, Cory Booker, who decided to run for Senate instead of challenging Christie, but appointing the media-savvy Booker might be viewed as treasonous to Republicans.

"I don't envy the governor on his decision," said Julie Roginsky, a New Jersey-based Democratic strategist.

If Christie is looking for a well-regarded placeholder, he could turn to former Republican Gov. Tom Kean, who served two terms as governor from 1982 to 1990 and served as chairman of the 9/11 Commission.

Other Republican possibilities include Lt. Gov. Kim Guadagno, likely viewed as Christie's heir apparent if the governor runs for president; Kean's son, state Sen. Tom Kean Jr., who was defeated by Democratic Sen. Bob Menendez in 2006; state Sen. Joe Kyrillos, a Christie ally who was defeated by Menendez last year; former Gov. Christie Whitman; state Sen. Kevin O'Toole; or Bill Baroni, the deputy executive director of the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey. Rep. Chris Smith, R-N.J., has also been mentioned.

Roginsky said appointing a caretaker Republican like Kean, the moderate former governor, would not be viewed favorably by Republican leaders or party activists in early presidential voting states. But appointing a hard-core conservative "would definitely hurt him at home" as he runs for re-election.

While Christie appoints a senator to fill Lautenberg's seat, it's unclear when that new senator would face an election. Even that process carries risks for Christie.

He could decide to hold a special election in November, but the presence on the ballot of Booker, the likely Democratic Senate nominee, might drive more Democratic turnout and affect Christie's ability to win big against Buono. If Christie says the next Senate election should wait until 2014, the governor runs the risk of a hand-picked Republican getting trounced by Booker only months before launching a presidential bid.

Dayspring said a 2013 contest could mean a "potentially ugly and quick" primary between Booker, who already had announced a Senate bid, and potential challengers like Reps. Frank Pallone and Rob Andrews. A 2014 race, he said, would allow a Republican appointee to "build trust and name identification with voters."

The state's laws on choosing a successor appear to be contradictory. One provision says that if a vacancy occurs more than 70 days before a regularly scheduled statewide general election, the vacancy would be filled on the next statewide general election Nov. 5, 2013 when Christie will be on the ballot. But another law says the election would be held during the next general election only if the vacancy occurs 70 days before the state's primary, which was being held Tuesday. In that case, the Senate election would be held in November 2014, when Lautenberg's seat was scheduled to be considered by voters. The late senator had said he would not run for re-election.

National Republicans say they want the Senate election to be held in 2014 and hope Christie appoints a GOP official who will run for the seat outright. The thinking: It would give the appointee more than a year to serve in the Senate and build a record that might help the person in the Democratic-tilting state.

New Jersey has not elected a Republican to the Senate since 1972. The last Republican to serve in the Senate was Nicholas Brady, who was appointed by Kean in 1982 to finish the term of Democrat Harrison Williams, who resigned amid scandal in the last year of his term. Lautenberg won the seat later that year and remained in the Senate until his death, except for a brief retirement in 2001 and 2002.

Many governors have taken the placeholder route in recent years: Ted Kaufman, a longtime aide to Joe Biden, was appointed to the Senate when Biden became Obama's vice president; Massachusetts Gov. Deval Patrick chose his former chief of staff, William "Mo" Cowan, to fill Secretary of State John Kerry's Senate seat on an interim basis until after a special election.

Other appointments have turned into political liabilities. Former Colorado Gov. Bill Ritter, a Democrat, withstood criticism from Latinos for appointing then-Denver Public Schools Superintendent Michael Bennet to a Senate seat in January 2009 to replace Ken Salazar, who became Obama's interior secretary.

___

Follow Ken Thomas on Twitter: http://twitter.com/AP_Ken_Thomas

Follow Geoff Mulvihill on Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/geoffmulvihill

___

Mulvihill reported from Haddonfield. Angela Delli Santi contributed from Trenton.

Two security guards were killed and a third was gravely wounded, said Niger government spokesman Marou Amadou. He said the attackers had been captured and the incident is being investigated.

"There are two versions of what happened, and right now we think it's more likely that they came from inside the jail," Amadou said by telephone. "These are people who are wanted for terrorism. We do not know how they were able to arm themselves inside the prison, and how they were able to get out to attack the guards. We have two dead guards already and one seriously wounded," he said.

Souleymane Magagi, whose house sits about 350 meters (yards) from the gates of the prison, says neighbors came running to tell him about the attack at around 3:30 p.m. When he approached the prison, he saw the bus normally used to transport prison workers parked with its doors open, near the entrance to the jail. What looked like two bodies were being loaded into the bus, though he said he was afraid of coming any closer than around 200 meters (yards) and could not be sure if the bodies were of the dead guards, or if they were people wounded in the incident.

Magagi, who is the secretary-general of the country's union for mine and petroleum workers, says he believes the attackers came from the outside.

"There is a specific hour at mealtime when relatives of the prisoners are allowed inside the prison with baskets of food for their relatives. They took advantage and entered at this moment," he said, saying he had spoken to relatives that were already in the prison complex waiting to bring food to their family members when the shooting erupted. He believes the attackers were trying to free fighters from the Islamic extremist group Boko Haram, based in Nigeria, Niger's larger neighbor to the south.

"Armed men came and attacked the central prison," said Magagi. "They shot at the guards and were able to penetrate the prison, probably to liberate their colleagues. They are likely elements of MUJAO and Boko Haram."

However, the government spokesman said that it is too early to say which group carried out the attack, describing them simply as "people with links to terrorism." Also reached by telephone on Saturday, Defense Minister Karidjo Mahamadou said that he was away from the capital, and did not have details on the identity of the attackers, adding: "The situation is under control."

An Associated Press reporter who rushed to the scene was unable to get close because the roads leading to the prison had been roped off. The prison attack comes a little over a week after after Islamic extremists carried out one of the boldest attacks in recent years when suicide bombers on May 23 infiltrated the Nigerien towns of Agadez and Arlit, succeeding in detonating explosives inside a military camp and a French-operated uranium mine, killing 35 people in all. Both those attacks were claimed by the Movement for Oneness and Jihad in West Africa, or MUJAO, as well as by "Those Who Sign in Blood," the six-month-old terror cell of Algerian jihadist Moktar Belmoktar, who also masterminded the attack on a BP-operated gas plant in Algeria in January.

___

Callimachi contributed to this report from Dakar, Senegal.

TAIPEI (Reuters) - Intel Corp is ramping up its efforts to have more of its chips used in mobile devices, a market it was initially slow to respond to, as officials said on Monday they expect more than 30 tablets using its processors hitting the market this year.

Samsung Electronics Co announced on Monday it will use Intel's processors to power a new version of one of its top-tier Android tablets, while Asustek Computer Inc also showcased tablet and phablet designs using Intel chips. Both moves are considered a breakthrough for the U.S. chipmaker.

"We're seeing some really great momentum in our customers. We got over 30 tablet designs already on, across Android and Windows, and we expect to have them for the holidays," Gregory Bryant, Intel's Asia Pacific vice president and general manager said in an interview on Tuesday at the Computex trade show in Taiwan.

The Santa Clara, California-based company for decades has called the shots in the personal computer industry, but it was slow to react to the explosion of smartphones and tablets, markets now dominated by competitors like Qualcomm Inc and Samsung Electronics, which have been using chip architecture licensed from ARM Holdings Plc.

Early last month, Intel unveiled the most extensive overhaul to date of its Atom mobile processors that underpin its push into smartphones and tablets.

Intel is also betting on other developments in the industry and its Intel Capital unit announced on Tuesday a $100 million fund to invest in gesture-control and "perceptual" computing companies.

"I'm very bullish on perceptual computing. Not just touch and voice, as you get things like 3D camera solutions...how you can interact with technology, how a child can interact with a book on a computer and on 3D gesture driven mode. I think it's going to be popular in time," he said.

Intel also unveiled its fourth generation processor on Tuesday, which is built to be used in 2-in-1 designs like those used for convertible computers that can go from a notebook to a tablet. Intel says the new processor, based on its flagship 22-nanometer Haswell microarchitecture, can provide a 50 percent improvement in battery life and provide twice the graphics capability.

Intel said in April its current-quarter revenue would decline as much as 8 percent and it trimmed its 2013 capital spending plans as personal computer sales drop due to the growing popularity of tablets and smartphones.

(Reporting by Clare Jim; Additional reporting by Jonathan Gordon; Editing by Matt Driskill)

The victims three girls and two boys were students at two high schools in the Irvine Unified School District, said Orange County Sheriff's spokesman Jim Amormino.

"There are simply no words to convey the sorrow felt by our students and staff, nor are there sufficient answers to explain the loss of five vibrant teenagers from our schools and this community," Irvine Unified School District Superintendent Terry Walker said in a statement.

The driver was identified as 17-year-old Abdulrahman Alyahyan, a senior at University High School.

The passengers included 17-year-old Robin Cabrera, a senior at Irvine High School, and her 16-year-old sister Aurora, a sophomore at the same school.

Also killed in the Monday crash were Cecilia Zamora and Nozad Al Hamawendi, both 17-year-old juniors at Irvine High School.

Friends who gathered Tuesday outside Irvine High said the five were headed to the beach for a fun Memorial Day when the accident happened.

The Infiniti sedan veered off a road about 5:20 p.m. and hit a tree, said Kathy Lowe, Newport Beach police spokeswoman. The impact split the car and it caught fire, she said.

The tree the car hit was stripped of its bark on Tuesday and bore huge gouge marks along the trunk.

"It was a horrific accident," Lowe said, adding that investigators were on scene for nearly 12 hours overnight.

Speed was believed to be a factor in the wreck, she said.

The posted speed limit on Jamboree Road, a major, six-lane street in south Orange County, is 55 mph. Lowe declined to say how fast the Infiniti was going, citing the ongoing investigation.

Four of the teens were thrown from the car and died immediately. The other was declared dead at a hospital.

No other vehicles were involved in the crash.

The coroner had to use fingerprints to identify two of the bodies in what officials were calling one of the worst car accidents in Newport Beach in recent memory.

There were no classes at the high schools on Tuesday because of a teacher development day, but students gathered at Irvine High late in the afternoon to console each other and remember their friends.

The Cabrera sisters were their parents' only two children and were both accomplished dancers in the school's dance program, friends said. They had performed in a three-day recital over Memorial Day weekend, said Brie Martinez, 15.

"(Aurora Cabrera) was kind of nervous for her dance but I heard she did really good," said Martinez, as she began to cry.

"I saw something about the crash on the news last night, but I never would have guessed it was them," she added.

Zamora was also in the dance program and performed over the weekend, said her friend, Paloma Douglas, a junior at the school.

Douglas last saw Zamora on Friday afternoon, when the two attended the same history class the last course of their day.

"She was sitting next to me, so it's going to be tough seeing that empty seat," said Douglas.

Alyahyan, the driver, was obsessed with his car and spent hours working on it and driving it around with his best friend, Al Hamawendi, said Zach Darwish, an 18-year-old senior at University High who was also close friends with both boys.

"Abdul loved cars. He took care of his car as if it was a human being," said Ibrahim Razzak, a junior.

The two were inseparable and were part of a larger group of about 10 close friends who were either first- or second-generation immigrants from various Middle Eastern countries, Darwish said. The teens all spoke Arabic together when they hung out, which was constantly, he said.

Alyahyan came to the Irvine from Saudi Arabia about three years ago, said Mohamad Abdul Razzak, a 16-year-old junior and close friend who also arrived in the U.S. last year from Lebanon.

He played excellent soccer, but wasn't on the school team, and planned to attend community college next fall.

Al Hamawendi came to Irvine two years ago with his family from Iraq, Abdul Razzak said.

He was obsessed with weight-lifting, worked out every day and had been on the wrestling team.

"We're all like one big group of friends. We all love each other, we're all like brothers. It seems like the circle has just broken apart," Darwish said.

"I still can't believe this actually happened to good friends of mine," he said. "It's the worst news you can possibly get."

_____

Follow Gillian Flaccus on Twitter at http://twitter.com/gflaccus

(Reuters) - The star-studded U.S. national basketball team cannot afford to get complacent about being the sport's superpower given the pace of emerging talent around the globe, head coach Mike Krzyzewski said on Thursday.

According to Krzyzewski, having the privilege of coaching teams that have boasted NBA All-Stars LeBron James, Kobe Bryant, Kevin Durant, Carmelo Anthony and Chris Paul does not come with a guarantee of beating competition.

"People think that because we have all these guys you just roll out a ball and you're going to win," Krzyzewski said at a news conference to announce he would return as coach of the U.S. national team through the 2016 Rio Olympics.

"If you do your program that way, you're going to get beat."

Respect for the competition is fundamental to Krzyzewski's approach and the lessons he has drilled into his U.S. teams have paid off with a 62-1 mark that includes two Olympic gold medals and a current 50-game winning streak.

Krzyzewski said all you have to do is look at the rosters of the National Basketball Association's (NBA) teams to appreciate the growth of the game globally.

"There are a lot of great teams out there and you see these guys playing in the NBA," Krzyzewski said at Duke University in Durham, North Carolina, where he has led the Blue Devils to four men's college basketball championships.

"Twenty-one percent of the NBA is international and these teams can have anywhere between 10 and 12 NBA players on them. And we have 12 NBA players.

"And we'll have five of them out there at one time and they'll have five. As long as it's five against five we could lose at any time.

"And that's the respect you have to give your opponent and that's what we do with our preparation."

INTERNATIONAL PASSION

Krzyzewski took over as national team coach in 2005 after Argentina beat the U.S. in the semi-finals of the 2004 Olympics. Two years earlier, the Americans failed to reach the medals round at the world championships.

The U.S. were humbled again in Krzyzewski's first major competition when Greece kept the Americans out of the 2006 world championship gold medal game with a semi-finals victory.

Krzyzewski, 66, said being with the U.S. team energized him.

"It's like a teacher learning new material," he said. "I've learned so much over these seven years, it's made me better, wanting to coach even more. Instead of reducing shelf life, so to speak, I think it's added to it.

"There are so many amazing coaches throughout the world, and they see the game sometimes in a different way, and still very effective way. If you can implement some of the things they do or try to defend or attack the things they do, it makes you better."

The coach noted the passion with which top international teams play.

"When you're playing Argentina or Spain, it's a hell of a game. Those guys are playing at a whole other level.

"If you watch San Antonio (Spurs) play, take about five minutes and just watch (Argentina's Manu) Ginobili, and you'll see one of the great, great players of the world play. We've seen that. We appreciate that.

"And we appreciate it enough to work our fannies off to develop a team that's worthy of winning against that type of feeling, that type of talent and that type of passion for the game.

"If you don't do that for the United States, you're going to lose. You're not going to win by showing up. And our guys know that. The guys that played know that, 100 percent."

(Reporting by Larry Fine in New York; Editing by Frank Pingue)