Word: soiled
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...Dayani is one of thousands of optimistic souls who believe a prosperous future can emerge from the stony soil of strife-torn Afghanistan. Since the brutal Taliban regime was toppled five years ago by Western coalition forces, the government of President Hamid Karzai, beset by warlords and Islamic militants, has struggled to maintain order and control. The country's primitive economy is dominated by illicit opium production, which by some estimates accounts for as much as one-third of GDP. About 40% of Afghans are unemployed. And last month, the World Food Program warned that millions of rural Afghans might...
Their company, Aresa, a Copenhagen-based biotech start-up, has genetically modified a common weed called thale-cress so that its leaves turn red when the plant comes in contact with nitrogen dioxide - a compound that naturally leaches into the soil from unexploded land mines made from plastic and held together by leaky rubber seals. Aresa is growing large patches of the stuff on old army shooting ranges that have been seeded with land mines...
...Sensors - devices that detect environmental changes - have been around forever in analog form. Traditional thermometers, for instance, use mercury that rises and falls as it responds to temperature changes. More recently, in the information-technology age, network-linked digital sensors are starting to take note of everything from soil conditions to water pollutants to electricity usage. Measurement equals management. The idea is to get optimal use of such resources as fertilizers and energy. But one restriction on modern sensors is that they are built with rigid materials like hard plastic and metal, which give them shape and volume, restricting where...
...Alexander Litvinenko’s agony ended in death on Nov. 26 [see correction below], the press’s imagination immediately came to life. Perfectly time-pegged to the revival of the James Bond franchise, the renegade KGB spy was silenced forever with an obscure poison on British soil: What more could a news or opinion writer ask for? All eyes are now on the dodgy Kremlin. Beyond a doubt, there are numerous criticisms to be made of Vladimir Putin’s Russia. But, considering this murder’s context, doesn’t it sound like...
...these spiritual journeys into worldwide media events, from his first return to his Polish homeland to the masses he conducted before millions in the Philippines and his Millennial-year arrival in the Holy Land. Though lacking some of the same flair, Benedict XVI's first four outings beyond Italian soil have largely followed similar pilgrimesque itineraries: warming up to a million young Catholics at World Youth Day in Cologne, paying homage to his predecessor in Poland, trying to turn back a wave of Spanish secularism in Valencia, and returning two months ago to his native German region of Bavaria...