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ISRAELI SCIENTISTS UNVEIL LOW CALORIE WATERMELON

Israeli scientists unveil low calorie watermelon
Ha'aretz
By The Associated Press
August 6, 2003

Summertime dieters, rejoice. Israeli scientists said yesterday they had developed a low-calorie watermelon, with all the sweetness but significantly less sugar than common varieties of the juicy summer fruit.

"The problem with watermelon is that unlike other fruit, one tends to eat a lot and the calories accumulate," said Shmuel Wolf, chief researcher of the team from Hebrew University in Jerusalem.

The average watermelon contains 54 calories per 112 grams. The new variety had 20-40 percent less calories, Wolf said. The calories in a watermelon come from the sugar content, with each melon containing three separate types of sugars - sucrose, glucose and fructose. To create the diet melon, researchers isolated a variety whose sugar content is composed mostly of fructose.

Wolf said that his team had found natural varieties of wild melons growing in the Sinai desert and North Africa with the high fructose percentage.

"Fructose is the sweetest kind of sugar and so you need less sugar to make the melon sweet, hence less calories," he said.

"The problem with the natural melons is that they are very bitter. Our challenge was to make them sweet," Wolf said.

Wolf could not say when the diet melons would reach the markets.

 

ASTEROID NAMED FOR ISRAEL'S FIRST ASTRONAUT - COLONEL ILAN RAMON

Asteroid named for Israel's first astronaut - Col. Ilan Ramon
By The Associated Press
August 7, 2003

Seven asteroids circling the sun between the orbits of Mars and Jupiter are being named for the astronauts who died in the space shuttle Columbia accident, officials announced Wednesday.

Astronauts Rick Husband, William McCool, Michael Anderson, Kalpana Chawla, David Brown and Laurel Clark of NASA and Ilan Ramon of Israel died on Feb. 1 when Columbia broke up while returning to Earth from a 16-day orbital mission.

NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif. proposed naming the asteroids for the astronauts. The plan was approved by the International Astronomical Union and announced on Wednesday by the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory's Minor Planet Center, the officials clearinghouse for asteroid data.

The named asteroids were discovered by former JPL astronomer Eleanor F. Helin in 2001 using the Palomar Observatory near San Diego. The objects range in size from 3.1 to 4.3 miles in diameter.

"Asteroids have been around for billions of years and will remain for billions more," Raymond Bambery, head of the JPL Near-Earth Asteroid Tracing Project, said in a statement. "I like to think that in the years, decades and millennia ahead people will look to the heavens, locate these seven celestial sentinels and remember the sacrifice made by the Columbia astronauts."

There are more than 100,000 known asteroids, most of them orbiting the sun in a belt between the orbits of Mars and Jupiter. The largest, Ceres, is about 580 miles in diameter. Astronomers believe there may be millions of other asteroids, ranging from a half mile to many miles across.

Asteroids are thought to be rocky fragments left over from the formation of the solar system some 4.6 billion years ago.

The Columbia astronauts died when their spacecraft disintegrated during re-entry to the Earth's atmosphere. An investigation suggests that a hole was smashed through the heat shield on the craft's left wing when it was hit by foam insulation during launch. The extent of the damage was not discovered during the shuttle's mission. When the craft made its high-speed return to the atmosphere, the 3,000 degrees of heat from re-entry melted metal supports inside the wing and the whole craft broke apart, scattered debris over East Texas and western Louisiana.

The three remaining space shuttles were grounded while the Columbia Accident Investigation Board studied the incident and prepared a report. That report is expected late this month. NASA officials have said after safety changes are made in the space shuttle system, the craft may start flying again in March or April.

 

ATTORNEY GENERAL TELLS POLICE TO MOVE AGAINST EILAT FLOATING CASINOS

Attorney General tells police to move against Eilat floating casinos
Published by Globes [The Israeli Financial Times]
August 10, 2003
by Hadas Magen

Attorney General Elyakim Rubinstein opposes a legal casino: It will promote a criminal subculture and drive families into poverty and destitution.

Attorney General Elyakim Rubinstein has authorized the Israel Police to move against the casino ships operating out of Eilat. The police will use the Prohibition on Money Laundering Law (5760-2000) to prosecute offenders and seize the casinos' money.

Rubinstein's decision followed last week's report by Deputy State Prosecutor Nava Ben-Or on the floating casinos. The report discussed legal ways to deal with the problem.

Last week, Rubinstein held a meeting on the casino ships, at which it was decided to act energetically against them, giving the green light to the police.

Several weeks ago, the police raided a casino ship in Eilat, seizing money and launching a broad investigation against the ship's owners. The raid was part of a specific campaign. The police are now considering a general campaign against the casino ships.

In addition to the campaign against illegal casinos, Rubinstein opposes establishing legal casinos in Israel in any form: flying, floating, or fixed. Rubinstein says an Israeli casino would, "promote a criminal subculture and drive families into poverty and destitution."

Rubinstein says casinos were the focus for a variety of illegal acts, such as money laundering. He claims that law enforcement and security officials all agreed in the brainstorming session that a legal casino was morally undesirable. Rubinstein believes that a casino would lead to an increase in crime and a decline in morals.