What's New

SCIENCE Most distant horizon NEW YORK - Astronomers have reported a new record for the farthest object ever observed. Using the Hubble Space Telescope, three researchers from the State University at Stony Brook, New York, found a galaxy that probably has a red shift - a measurement of how far an object is receding. This means that light from the galaxy reaching Earth began its journey when the universe was just 5 percent of its current age, about 13 billion years. So the light originated less than 700 million years after the so-called "big bang" of the universe's birth. The finding is key because it highlights astronomers' increasing abilities to study the earliest objects in the universe.

TECHNOLOGY Is it a really fast ball? Cincinnati - Kids will soon have a new way to answer one of life's most pressing questions: How fast can they throw a baseball? Albert Dilz, a retired baseball coach, created a tiny radar that attaches to the back of a baseball glove and measures the velocity of an incoming ball. Dilz says he created the $80 Glove Radar not to encourage players to throw hard, but to inspire good technique.

Web privacy seals may help Web sites that post privacy policies can significantly boost people's confidence in the security of information put on the Web, says an AT&T Labs study. But applying a universal "seal of approval" online is probably not the best approach because user preferences and data submitted varies.