AP - A scandal involving sex, drugs and — uh, offshore oil drilling. It's a strange mix, and it couldn't have come at a worse time for those in Congress pressing to expand oil and gas development off America's beaches while trying to stave off an election-year rush by Democrats to impose new taxes and royalties on the oil industry.

AP - Gleaming skyscrapers, the nation's biggest refinery and NASA's Johnson Space Center lie in areas that could be vulnerable to wind and damaging floodwaters if Hurricane Ike crashes ashore as a major hurricane.

AP - After a deadly and destructive trip across the Caribbean, Hurricane Ike began to move across the Gulf of Mexico, where it was expected to strengthen before plowing into Texas.

AP - A tiny frog species thought by many experts to be extinct has been rediscovered alive and well in a remote area of Australia's tropical north, researchers said Thursday.

AP - A small blip on a computer screen sent champagne corks popping among physicists in Switzerland. Near Chicago, researchers at a "pajama party" who watched via satellite let out an early morning cheer.

AFP - Pioneering stem-cell scientist Shinya Yamanaka, whose work could help transform medicine and find cures for a range of debilitating diseases, says he was a pretty awful doctor.

Reuters - A couple have been reunited with their missing cat after nine years, the RSPCA said Wednesday.

AFP - President George W. Bush declared an emergency in Texas Wednesday and state authorities began ordering evacuations as deadly Hurricane Ike churned in the Gulf of Mexico toward the US state.