The enormoussailed past our planet at a distance of 3.6 million miles (5.8 million kilometers) on May 31, making its closest approach for at least the next two centuries.

Scientists have been tracking 1998 QE2 using two different radar instruments NASA's 230-foot-wide (70 meters) Deep Space Network antenna at Goldstone, Calif., and the 1,000-foot (305 m) Arecibo Observatory in Puerto Rico. []

And now, two new studies, out of the  and , could be confusing matters even more: After tracking children for five to seven years, the researchers found no developmental problems associated with women who drank up to six drinks in a weekno more than one drink a day, broken up over time.

Dont get me wrong, the link between binge drinkingwhich is defined as five drinks in a single bout of drinkingduring pregnancy and developmental delay in children is universally accepted as a bad idea. Fetal alcohol syndrome (FAS), in which a fetus is exposed to excessive alcohol, can cause stunted growth and is known to cause mental retardation. But while FAS is associated with heavy drinking during pregnancy, theres less data about low- and moderate-alcohol use. Thats because this is information thats hard to come byyou cant exactly randomly assign pregnant women to drink different amounts and then see how their kids turn out.

But this new research is starting to fill the gap. Which is not to say that light drinking during pregnancy is conclusively safe, and its definitely not an endorsement of it as a habit. Authors from one of these most recent studies made clear the possibility that their results could be due to other factors, and in all research there is potential for confounding factors. For example, the authors suggest that its possible that the different socioeconomic status (SES) between groups of women could play a role. More women who binge-drink during pregnancy are low-SES; and low-SES women are more likely to have riskier pregnancies, less prenatal care, and less-healthy infants than their high-SES counterparts. This is just one potential reason its so difficult to offer conclusive dataand clear advice for women to follow.

The official position in the U.S., which comes from the National Institutes of Health, is strict and clear: Women who are pregnant or who are trying to get pregnant should avoid drinking any amount of alcohol. The only way to prevent fetal alcohol syndrome is to not drink alcohol during pregnancy. Thats true, just as abstinence is the only certain way to prevent and pregnancy. The position offered by the National Health Service in the U.K. is a bit more lenient: [To] minimise the risk to the baby, we recommend [that women] should not drink more than 1-2 units once or twice a week and should not get drunk.

This creates an interesting question: In the age of Big Datawith Millennials turning to Google for every question, no matter how smallwhat sort of messages should be sent about the relative safety of alcohol consumption during pregnancy? We could move toward more evidence-based advice, and tell women that not drinking is ideal but that a drink or two a week probably wont hurt their child. There might be concern that this would change the prevailing attitude about alcohol during pregnancy; there is still evidence that daily consumption can be bad for fetal development. Would women use looser guidelines as an excuse to drink more than is safe? Moreover, there are individual characteristics that studies like this cant account for; each person processes alcohol differently, so safe levels of consumption will vary.

The new research from abroad might be most reassuring to women who become pregnant accidentally and arent able to change their drinking habits until after they find out. After all, according to the , some 37 percent of pregnancies are unintended. At least with this research, women dont have to stress as much over having enjoyed happy hour a few times a week before they knew they were pregnant. The bottom line is that a majority of experts are still likely to tell you not to drink while pregnant, and its still definitely the safest course of action.

Do you think this new information should do anything to change the conversation about alcohol during pregnancy? Or should all women forgo all drinking during pregnancy to be safe?

Karl, who had a year left on his contract, joined Denver in January 2005 and guided the team to nine consecutive playoff appearances and an overall record of 423-257.

"George has been an instrumental part of our success over the past decade, and we appreciate everything he did to keep us among the top teams in the Western Conference," Nuggets President Josh Kroenke said in a statement.

"He is a Hall of Fame coach whose legacy in Denver will last for years to come. George is a legend in the game of basketball and I could not have more respect for him as a person and coach," he said.

Some media reports suggested Karl had been pushing for a contract extension which the team was not willing to grant him.

Karl, 62, led the Nuggets to a team-record 57 wins in the 2012-13 season and the third seed in the Western Conference, but Denver fell to the Golden State Warriors in the first round of the playoffs.

The Nuggets advanced past the first round once under Karl, reaching the Western Conference finals in 2009.

(Reporting by Simon Evans in Miami; Editing by Frank Pingue)

The 24-hour virtual concert is set to kick off at 7 p.m. EDT on June 19 and will feature performances by more than 50 bands and artists spanning rock, indie, pop, R&B and folk. Acts include Hanson, Atlas Genius, Labrinth, Langhorne Slim and Kate Nash.

The performances, accompanied by the fan-picked O Music Awards, will be streamed live from Viacom's offices in New York, Nashville and Los Angeles. The Roots drummer Questlove will provide beats during the festival in a 24-hour "drum-a-thon."

Viewers will be able to watch the entire show via computers, laptops, tablets and smartphones. They also have the option of selecting only the acts and awards they want to see.

"We've created the first-of-its-kind music festival that's both connecting artists and fans and allowing them to participate in the awards and festival in new ways," Dermot McCormack, head of connected content for Viacom Music, said in a statement.

Categories in the third annual O Music Awards include Best Web-Born Artist, Fan Army FTW (For The Win) and Must-Follow Artist on Twitter. R&B singer Frank Ocean and rocker Beck lead the awards with two nominations each.

At the first O Music awards in Las Vegas in 2011, rapper Chiddy of rap duo Chiddy Bang set a Guinness World Record for the "longest freestyle rap" and "longest marathon rap" after performing for more than nine consecutive hours.

MTV and its sister music channels VH1 and CMT are part of Viacom Inc.

(Reporting by Piya Sinha-Roy; Editing by Xavier Briand)

White House international economic affairs adviser Mike Froman, at hearing on his nomination to be U.S. trade representative, told the Senate Finance Committee he supported a global agreement to resolve the trade spats.

(Reporting by Doug Palmer; Editing by Vicki Allen)

ACCRA, Ghana (AP) -- A spokesman for Ghana's immigration service said that 161 Chinese nationals, who were arrested for illegal gold mining this week, will be deported to China.

Francis Palm-Deti, spokesman for Ghana's Immigration Service, said the miners were arrested between Saturday and Wednesday. It brings to 181 the total number of Chinese that the country's immigration office has arrested within the past month in this African nation.

The Chinese gold-diggers are accused of forcibly taking over people's land in farming areas near artisanal mines. Farmer Nana Kwame Yeboah, whose crops were destroyed, said that they arrived at night. When he woke up, he found the Chinese had taken over his farm. He said they waved a gun at him when he tried to approach.

NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - Doctors should regularly screen babies and young children for delays in motor skill development - including trouble sitting, standing and speaking - at well-child visits, pediatricians said today.

In a clinical report, an American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) panel said diagnosing and treating those problems early on may ultimately improve kids' outlook and help families gain additional support.

"Identifying children with delays and motor abnormalities, theoretically or hopefully would set them on a better trajectory," said Meghann Lloyd, who studies motor development at the University of Ontario Institute of Technology in Oshawa, Canada.

Lloyd, who was not involved in the new report, called it "a really big step forward for the field."

Dr. Garey Noritz and colleagues on the AAP's neuromotor screening expert panel lay out the skills that a child should have developed by office visits at ages 9, 18, 30 and 48 months.

For example, a 9-month-old baby should be able to roll to both sides, sit well without support and grasp objects. At 18 months, that child should be able to walk, sit and stand on its own.

Pediatricians should also ask parents open-ended questions about their child's development and watch the child play for signs of delays or loss of motor skills at well-child visits, the panel said.

On a general exam, it recommended that doctors measure head size and look at children's muscle tone, reflexes and eye movements.

The U.S. Preventive Services Task Force, a government-backed expert panel, said in 2006 there wasn't enough evidence to recommend for or against screening instruments designed to detect speech and language delays in young kids. The task force does not have screening recommendations for motor delays in general.

"The AAP recognized that we as a profession weren't necessarily doing a good job screening for motor problems," Noritz, from Nationwide Children's Hospital in Columbus, Ohio, told Reuters Health.

Cerebral palsy and muscular dystrophy are two of the most common motor-related diseases and could both be picked up and treated earlier than they typically are now, according to Noritz.

He said families often refer to the "diagnostic odyssey" involved in getting a definitive diagnosis for a sick child.

"We're hoping that people can get to a specialist more quickly and thus get diagnosed more quickly, but that primary care clinicians at the same time as they're looking for a diagnosis, will refer (kids) to therapy," he said.

PROMOTING MOVEMENT

There is normal variation in how kids develop, Lloyd said - so if a child is a couple of months late to walk, for example, parents shouldn't be overly concerned.

But longer delays, or combinations of multiple motor problems, are a good reason for a visit to the pediatrician, she told Reuters Health.

"Other types of movements that don't seem right, like a tremor or a rigidity or some sort of repetitive motor movement would be another red flag for me," Lloyd added.

Typical motor delays that aren't a result of more serious underlying conditions are treated with physical or occupational therapy.

Parents can bring their children to an early movement program such as Kindergym to promote development of motor skills, Lloyd said, regardless of other treatments and whether or not they are delayed.

Having poor motor skills in general "sets you on a trajectory for low levels of physical activity, which of course is related to obesity," she said.

"The prevention of these delays or the promotion of motor ability can actually impact your health for your lifespan."

SOURCE: http://bit.ly/cxXOG Pediatrics, online May 27, 2013.

LONDON (Reuters) - Erotic trilogy "Fifty Shades of Grey" helped drive print and e-book sales in Britain to record levels in 2012 with publishers hailing figures on Wednesday as proof that digital books are not killing the traditional market quite yet.

Print and e-book sales rose 4 percent to 3.3 billion pounds ($5 billion) after slipping 2 percent in 2011, top British trade organization The Publishers Association said, although printed book sales fell 1 percent and had dropped 5 percent in 2011.

Chief Executive Richard Mollet said the overall rise was driven by a 21-percent jump in fiction sales to 674 million pounds, fuelled by demand for E.L. James's trilogy, a sadomasochistic story of student and businessman Christian Grey.

The books, published by Bertelsmann-owned Random House, sold over 70 million copies globally and were lampooned by critics. They are set to be made into a film, and sparked other sales of a growing genre of fiction dubbed "mummy porn".

"You can see in the world around you the growth in e-readers," said Mollet, pointing to commuters engrossed in Amazon kindles, iPads and Barnes and Noble's Nook.

"But what is interesting is that the continued growth of digital books does not seem to be eating away (as much as expected) at physical sales."

Fiction sales buoyed the print market, which nevertheless dipped to 2.93 billion pounds, and helped to more than double e-book sales to 216 million, he said.

Digital books accounted for about 12 percent of 2012 sales, up from 8 percent in 2011 and 5 percent in 2010.

The global book industry that was estimated to be worth $121 billion in 2011 is forecast to grow to $172 billion by 2017, according to a report by market research firm Lucintel.

Mollet said digital sales, for e-books, audiobook downloads and online subscriptions, jumped 66 percent in 2012 to 411 million pounds with fiction sales up 149 percent.

Philip Jones, editor of industry magazine The Bookseller, said fiction was the trailblazer for the shift to digital and it was key to now watch how print sales were affected as more non-fiction and children's titles were sold in digital formats.

(Editing by Louise Ireland)

An Oregon man walked into a state office on Wednesday with a pressure cooker he claimed was a bomb and told employees he tried to blow up a sign outside the building because it was misspelled.

Leonard Burdek, a 50-year-old from Salem, Ore., arrived at the Teacher Standards and Practices Commission offices shortly after 9 a.m. Wednesday.

He walked quite confidently into our office as though he had a mission," Vickie Chamberlain, the commission's executive director, . "That was what alarmed me right off the bat."

Burdek allegedly placed the pressure cookerwires sticking out of iton the counter in front of the receptionist, informing her of his failed bomb plot. The man also allegedly complained that the instructions he downloaded to make the device also were misspelled.

The sign in the parking lot appears to be missing the letter "d," so it reads, Teacher Standards an Practices Commission. Chamberlain told the paper "its possible that someone scraped the letter off or it wore off over time." The opposite side of the two-sided sign is not misspelled.

After employees called 911, Burdek left the building with his pressure cooker. He was later arrested and charged with disorderly conduct after police determined it was not a bomb.

It looks like he was just trying to get attention, Salem Police Lt. Dave Okada said.

While the case appears to be little more than a prank, there's been heightened concern over the use of homemade bombs in the wake of last month's deadly Boston Marathon bombings.

Sanchez tweeted a photo of herself at the airport in Madrid, lugging a small blue suitcase emblazoned with the logo of her Generation Y blog. Her husband said she was booked on a Havana-bound plane scheduled to arrive in the evening.

"Ready to leave for Cuba," she tweeted, accompanied by a smiley-face emoticon matching her own expression in the picture.

Sanchez has been away since Feb. 17, when she took advantage of a new travel reform law ending a longtime requirement that all Cubans obtain official permission to travel abroad. Under the old rules, government critics who are officially branded as traitorous "counterrevolutionaries" were routinely denied such exit visas.

In the last three months Sanchez has traveled to more than a dozen countries in Europe and the Americas and given speeches criticizing President Raul Castro's Communist-led government. She has met with human rights activists and foreign lawmakers and cultivated relationships with journalists at leading Western newspapers.

In the process she picked up more than 100,000 Twitter followers to top the half-million mark.

A number of other dissidents have also tested authorities' patience by traveling abroad and bashing their government in public forums, and some have reported various levels of harassment upon their return.

Eliecer Avila said he was taken aside at the airport and subjected to an exhaustive search in which agents scrutinized every last item in his luggage and confiscated 26 books.

"They pulled me out of the line and had me in there for four hours and 15 minutes," Avila said. "They took pictures of everything."

Analysts have said Sanchez's rising international fame likely insulates her physically from arrest and some forms of harassment. Sanchez has told people close to her she expects to be the target of more propaganda attacks by the government and its allies, but less detention.