By Leah Douglas WASHINGTON The U.S. Department of Agriculture will temporarily close a damaged laboratory building at its

Forensic scientist Henry Lee is defending his work after a court ruling found him liable for fabricating evidence in a Connecticut murder trial that sent two innocent men to prison for decades

Xavi Hernandez has insisted that Joao Felix fits his tactical plans "100%" after the forward joined the club on deadline day.

When he’s not making radical, controversial changes to Twitter/X, Elon Musk is eyeing up plans to colonise Mars in the coming years with his company SpaceX – and now a team of researchers at the Virginia-based George Mason University claims it has found out the minimum number of people needed to successfully takeover the red planet. In the study – the results of which were published to the research platform Arxiv in August - the academics established a model to find out the ‘initial population size’ required on Mars to produce a “stable colony size”. They ran the model five times for 28 Earth years, and increased the population by 10 people each time - from 10 to 170 individuals. “Given that there are four critical tasks that are needed continuously (air, water, food production and waste removal) in addition to handling disasters, and two skills needed for each task, we chose a population size of 10 as the minimum needed for a ‘stable’ colony size. “The population is allowed to dip below 10 as long as it bounces back within 1.5 years, or the amount of time between Earth resupply shuttles.” The test found all initial population sizes over 50 were able to sustain a population of at least 10 people across the time period, and that the bare minimum number to meet that criteria is at least 22 people. There you go, Elon. You’re welcome. It’s certainly a decrease in the minimum number previously suspected by French researcher Jean-Marc Salotti in June 2020 – that was the rather astronomical figure (sorry) of at least 110 people. And the Virginia researchers didn’t stop there, either, as they also took a look at the personality types best placed to handle the highly stressful environment that is living on a completely different planet. There’s four: “agreeables”: low competitiveness and aggressiveness, and not fixated on “stringent routine “socials”: medium competitiveness, extroverted, require social interaction but not fixated on stringent routines “reactives”: medium competitiveness and fixed on stringent routines “neurotics”: high competitiveness, highly aggressive and a “challenged ability to adapt to boredom or a change in routine” Perhaps unsurprisingly, the “agreeables” came out on top. The researchers added: “In all runs, the Agreeable personality type was the only one to survive the full duration of model runs. This is likely because it has the highest coping capability.” Their results found that while the “neurotic” was “most likely to fail”, and both “reactives” and “socials” fluctuated, the “agreeables” was the “most resilient”. “While this model assigns equal numbers of each personality type, future work could try adjusting the proportion of each to possibly lead to a lower required minimum initial population. For example, a crew of all Agreeable personalities may be more successful,” they suggest. Musk, meanwhile, said earlier this year that he was optimistic humans landing on Mars was "possible" in the next five years, and "highly likely" in a decade. Sign up to our free Indy100 weekly newsletter Have your say in our news democracy. Click the upvote icon at the top of the page to help raise this article through the indy100 rankings.

With the scars of past entanglements in the region still being felt, there are limits to US involvement.

Everton beat Crystal Palace 3-2 at Selhurst Park as Idrissa Gueye’s goal four minutes from time capped a superb away performance from Sean Dyche’s team. Palace twice came from behind, with Eberechi Eze’s penalty quickly cancelling out Vitalii Mykolenko’s early opener and Odsonne Edouard capitalising on a howler from James Tarkowski to level up after Abdoulaye Doucoure’s goal. But they had no answer a third time after Gueye kept his cool to seal victory and propel his side to consecutive away wins. It all came after an electric start. Palace failed to clear their lines as Mykolenko’s shot was blocked, and as the ball broke wide on the right the Ukrainian found space inside the box and climbed highest to nod Jack Harrison’s cross past Sam Johnstone after just 55 seconds. Palace fans may have been stunned but their team quickly hit back. Within three minutes they were level, and it was Eze, back in the side after a hamstring injury, who danced into Everton’s box and drew a foul from Jarrad Branthwaite. VAR checked and saw no reason to overturn referee Sam Barrott’s penalty award, leaving the Eze the task of calmly rolling the ball past Jordan Pickford. Selhurst Park howled for a second spot-kick when Eze again went down under apparent pressure inside the box. This time the referee deemed the forward had dived, and rather than a penalty, a yellow card was Eze’s reward. Edouard forced Pickford into a save low to his right in added time at the end of the half in what was a rare instance of attacking threat from the home team. Everton had won three of their previous six in the league, and after the frustration of failing to hold on to their early lead they began the second half in similarly urgent fashion. A corner from the visitors’ right was cleared only to the edge of the box, where Amadou Onana scooped the ball square to Mykolenko. For the second time in the game he was given too much time to line up an effort on goal, and as his volley cannoned back off a post there was Doucoure unmarked to tap home. The advantage looked fragile. On the hour mark, Mykolenko and Gueye almost produced a comical own-goal, getting in one another’s way as Jeffrey Schlupp’s cross dropped into the box and they required Pickford’s fingertips to keep them from bundling the ball over their own goal line. Edouard was growing as a threat and with 25 minutes to go he handed Jefferson Lerma a golden chance to level, coming inside from the left of the box and cutting the ball back, only for Lerma, free on the edge of the box, to fire wide. Michael Oliseh came off the bench for his first appearance of the season and drew a roar of anticipation from around Selhurst Park with a shot from 20 yards that deflected narrowly over. Palace were by now dominant, and their second equaliser came courtesy of a defensive calamity. A high, headed ball into the box looked an easy mop-up job for Tarkowski, but rather than nod it clear he left the ball for his goalkeeper, and in stole Edouard to tap home. Still Palace could not hold on to their point, and Everton roared back at them once more with four minutes to go, this time decisively. Doucoure received the ball in midfield and looked up to see Gueye racing through the centre. Doucoure’s pass was weighted expertly and Gueye needed barely to break stride as he evaded Tyrick Mitchell’s lunging challenge and guided it beyond Johnstone. Read More On this day in 2014: David Moyes appointed Real Sociedad head coach The inside story of Watford’s remarkable rise and football’s most unlikely bromance Brain injury charity Headway questions why Harry Maguire was allowed to play on Everton boss Sean Dyche and Brighton’s Roberto De Zerbi satisfied with a point Ashley Young’s own goal earns Brighton a point at Everton Everton vs Brighton & Hove Albion LIVE: Latest Premier League updates

Has xQc been removed from the directory? Did he manage to watch the entire series of Breaking Bad?

By Kanishka Singh Mass shootings in Philadelphia, Baltimore and Fort Worth claimed the lives of 10 people ahead

Google will face off in court Tuesday against government officials who accuse the company of antitrust violations in its massive search business, kicking off a long-anticipated showdown that could reshape one of the internet's most dominant platforms.

European leaders and Tunisia’s president have announced progress in the building of hoped-for closer economic and trade relations and on measures to combat the often lethal smuggling of migrants across the Mediterranean Sea

Clad in a pink T-shirt that reads "A girl and a gun," firearms instructor Charneta Samms shows a group of women how to get...

By Lucia Mutikani WASHINGTON U.S. job growth likely slowed in August, partly reflecting striking Hollywood actors and the