In the wake of reports that Apple plans to drop Google's Maps software by year-end in favor of a home grown solution, Google announced a slew of updates to its popular mapping software Wednesday. "We're trying to create magic here," the company said during a special event held in San Francisco, part of a "never ending quest for the perfect map." At the event, at which Google promised "the next dimension of Google maps," the search giant unveiled a revamped Google Earth mobile app, which now sports 3D models for entire cities, among other updates such as a new Street View Trekker -- a backpack-based system to allow the company to map on foot locations such as the Grand Canyon. In a few weeks, Android users will also have an ?offline? mode for Google Maps. Among the magical new features: an expanded Map Maker tool to allow residents of Finland, Luxembourg, Liechtenstein and more to report mapping errors. Will these changes be enough to keep Apple spellbound? Not everyone was convinced. "The message here is: There?s lots of effort, technical expertise and money behind Google?s mapping efforts ? this can?t be easily duplicated," wrote Greg Sterling on the SearchEngineLand website. "The company is trying to educate journalists who?ll probably be writing about Apple Maps next week." For Google, showing off the company's technical expertise in the field is key should Apple officially announce a decision to build a Maps replacement, banishing Google's service from the iPhone platform by the end of the year, as a recent report from the Wall Street Journal indicated. Since the launch of the iPhone in 2007, Google Maps has served as the default map app and is now used by more than 90 percent of U.S. iPhone users. The breakup could turn out to be an expensive one for Google as the ongoing war for mobile supremacy continues. By some estimates, ads associated with maps or locations accounted for 25 percent of all spending on mobile ads. "Apple is aiming squarely at Google on multiple dimensions," Rajeev Chand, a managing director at investment bank Rutberg & Co., told the WSJ citing mapping and Web search. "Google and Apple are in a battle over data, devices, services, and the future of computing. This is the historic battle of today." Beyond potential revenue streams, developing an in-house platform gives Apple more control over its product and ultimate user experience. With Apple expected to demonstrate its new software next week during its annual WWDC developer?s conference on June 11, this may have been Google?s last chance to make a statement.

Republicans in the U.S. House adopted a provision designed to save traditional incandescent light bulbs by blocking what one lawmaker called the "energy police" from enforcing an efficiency standard. Even if the House language approved last night survives in the Democratic-led Senate, the impact for consumers probably will be limited because manufacturers such as Royal Philips Electronics NV (PHIA) and General Electric Co. (GE) have revamped manufacturing to comply with the law, making bulbs that use less electricity to generate the same amount of light. The first phase of the federal efficiency standard, which was passed in 2007 during President George W. Bush's administration, went into effect this year. It has become a symbol of government excess to Tea Party-aligned lawmakers, who say consumers should be able to buy the bulbs they want. "People are sick of the government treading where it just doesn't belong," said Representative Michael Burgess, a Texas Republican who sponsored the light-bulb amendment, which was added to a broader energy-spending bill. Burgess' provision was adopted last night by voice vote. A similar provision was in the spending bill covering the fiscal year that ends Sept. 30, which was passed in the House in December. "The law couldn't be enforced," Burgess said of his amendment in an interview. "‘We don't need no stinkin' badges. We're the energy police.'" A vote on the overarching bill was expected as soon as today. Democrats, environmental groups and lighting manufacturers such as Fairfield, Connecticut-based GE support the efficiency law. ‘Politicizing Bulbs' Blocking the Energy Department from enforcement might let unscrupulous foreign manufacturers push non-compliant products, including to bulk buyers such as builders. Those sales are difficult to track. "Some in Congress are willing to put U.S. jobs at risk for political positioning," said Joseph Higbee, a spokesman for the National Electrical Manufacturers Association, a Rosslyn, Virginia-based group. "This is an example of a few politicizing light bulbs at the risk of American workers and the economy." Companies have retooled plants to make compact fluorescent lights, light-emitting diodes and a halogen version of the pear- shaped incandescent product that meets the efficiency standard. Some of the more efficient bulbs are made in the U.S. Burgess said consumers should be able to choose for themselves which bulbs they want to buy. "I'm smart enough to make my own decisions about the purchase of energy, and the government should not feel the need to do that for me," he said. $32.1 Billion The underlying bill would spend $32.1 billion on energy and water-development programs, about $965 million less than what President Barack Obama requested, according to the House Appropriations Committee. It would put more money into fossil- fuel programs than Obama's budget. The president's advisers said May 31 they would recommend the president veto the bill because of cuts to efficiency and clean-energy programs, including to the Advanced Research Projects Agency - Energy that funds innovative technologies, and language intended to keep Yucca Mountain in Nevada viable as a repository for the nation's nuclear waste.

Apparently all those dermatologists were right: in addition to bumping up your risk of skin cancer, tanning does make you look really old. Early glamour shots of Patricia Krentcil reportedly showing the so-called "tan mom" with nary a wrinkle have created a buzz this week, including drawing the attention of TODAY's Hoda and Kathie Lee Gifford. A representative from Splash Media, which has rights to the images, says they were taken when Krentcil was in her twenties. Juxtaposed against the 44-year-old's current pictures, it's easy to see why dermatologists have been trash-talking tanning salons all these years. Granted, we all age over the course of two decades, but it's hard to even recognize the features of the younger New Jersey woman within Krentcil's current lined and leathery face. The mother of five was charged with second-degree child endangerment for allegedly trying to introduce her 5-year-old red-haired daughter to the wonders of tanning salons. While Krentcil vehemently denies the charges (she says the young girl got sunburned while playing in a kiddie pool), she readily admits she loves to tan, something she does up to 20 times a month, according to reports. "I'm sorry I'm tan, I like to be tan, it just feels good," she said in an exclusive interview with TODAY. According to the American Academy of Dermatology, more than a million people in the U.S. use tanning beds every day, nearly 70 percent of them young girls and women aged 16 to 29 years old. In addition to being labeled a known carcinogen by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services and the World Health Organization, indoor tanning beds increase the risk of melanoma by 75 percent. Studies have also shown that the UV radiation in tanning beds damages the DNA in skin cells with excessive exposure causing premature skin aging, immune suppression and eye damage, including cataracts and ocular melanoma. Indoor tanning can also be addictive, the organization warns.

Ann Coulter took to Twitter to condemn an MSNBC host who said over Memorial Day weekend that he’s “uncomfortable” calling American soldiers who died in battle heroes. And in doing so, the conservative commentator jokingly called the male host — Chris Hayes — a woman. “Chris Hayes ‘Uncomfortable’ Calling Fallen Military ‘Heroes’ – Marines respond by protecting his right to menstruate,” Coulter posted on her Twitter account Sunday night. Hayes — a liberal writer who hosts the weekend show “Up with Chris Hayes” — argued that he’s “uncomfortable about the word because it seems to me that it is so rhetorically proximate to justifications for more war.” “I don’t want to obviously desecrate or disrespect memory of anyone that’s fallen — and obviously there are individual circumstances in which there is genuine, tremendous heroism: hail of gunfire, rescuing fellow soldiers and things like that — but it seems to me that we marshal this word in a way that is problematic,” he said.

The Department of Homeland Security has been forced to release a list of keywords and phrases it uses to monitor social networking sites and online media for signs of terrorist or other threats against the U.S. The intriguing the list includes obvious choices such as 'attack', 'Al Qaeda', 'terrorism' and 'dirty bomb' alongside dozens of seemingly innocent words like 'pork', 'cloud', 'team' and 'Mexico'. Released under a freedom of information request, the information sheds new light on how government analysts are instructed to patrol the internet searching for domestic and external threats. The words are included in the department's 2011 'Analyst's Desktop Binder' used by workers at their National Operations Center which instructs workers to identify 'media reports that reflect adversely on DHS and response activities'. Department chiefs were forced to release the manual following a House hearing over documents obtained through a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit which revealed how analysts monitor social networks and media organisations for comments that 'reflect adversely' on the government. However they insisted the practice was aimed not at policing the internet for disparaging remarks about the government and signs of general dissent, but to provide awareness of any potential threats. As well as terrorism, analysts are instructed to search for evidence of unfolding natural disasters, public health threats and serious crimes such as mall/school shootings, major drug busts, illegal immigrant busts. The list has been posted online by the Electronic Privacy Information Center - a privacy watchdog group who filed a request under the Freedom of Information Act before suing to obtain the release of the documents. In a letter to the House Homeland Security Subcommittee on Counter-terrorism and Intelligence, the centre described the choice of words as 'broad, vague and ambiguous'.

The National Institutes of Health (NIH) spent $830 million funding obesity studies in fiscal year 2011. Between 2008 and 2011, NIH spent over $3.3 billion on obesity research. Spending on obesity research also overshadows many other areas of research funded by NIH, including research on Alzheimer’s disease, heart disease and breast cancer, which received $448 million, $437 million and $715 million in 2011, respectively. “Obesity is a very is a very significant cause of current illness in our country and becoming more significant all the time,” said Dr. Francis Collins, NIH director. Because of the rise in obesity, NIH established the Obesity Research Task Force in 2003 and came out with its first Strategic Plan for NIH Obesity Research in 2004. The plan aims “to serve as a guide to accelerate research that will lessen the personal and public health burdens of obesity” with the help of input of external experts, industry professionals, and health-focused organizations through a public comment period. It also “encompasses all levels of research, from basic biological and behavioral research through community and population research.” “The strategic plan is rather sweeping in its set of goals, going all the way from basic science understanding of what are those signals that actually trigger hunger and satiety,” Collins said. “It focuses quite heavily then on interventions. How do you design trials with creative new ideas about how to prevent or treat obesity, and then once you’ve identified possible strategies, how do you develop an approach to find out if they work in the real world.”

An Indian-born teenager has won a research award for solving a mathematical problem first posed by Sir Isaac Newton more than 300 years ago that has baffled mathematicians ever since. The solution devised by Shouryya Ray, 16, makes it possible to calculate exactly the path of a projectile under gravity and subject to air resistance. Shouryya, who lives in Dresden, eastern Germany, came up with the solutions to this and a second mathematical riddle while working on a school project. He is being hailed as a genius in the German press, but attributes his achievement to “curiosity and schoolboy naivety.” “When it was explained to us that the problems had no solutions, I thought to myself: well, there’s no harm in trying,” he said. The problems he resolved are from the field of dynamics. The first, dealing with the movement of projectiles through the air, was posed by Newton in the 17th century. The second, which relates to the collision of a body with a wall, was posed in the 19th century. Only partial solutions had been discovered up to now, requiring simplified assumptions or calculations by computer. Shouryya’s elegant solutions could contribute to greater precision in fields such as ballistics. Shouryya’s family moved to Germany when he was 12 after his father Subhashis Ray, an engineer, got a job at a technical college. Shouryya spoke no German when he arrived but has mastered the language and is due to take the German equivalent of A-levels this week, two years ahead of his peers. “Ray’s accomplishment is impressive and we are particularly proud of his background as it highlights the achievements of migrants across language and cultural barriers,” said the Youth Research Foundation, which gave him the award. A keen cricketer, Shouryya cites his father as his inspiration and says he instilled a “hunger for mathematics” after teaching him calculus at the age of six.