Voters in the United States are presented with a number of so-called "purchase decisions" in the course of the presidential election process. Look at how campaigns mold and package their candidates for their White House bid.

U.S. presidential candidates market to the public their personal integrity and their policy positions, much the same as selling a consumer product such as pizza or a car. It's political marketing.

On February 10, 2007, Senator Barack Obama announces his bid to be the Democratic Party's presidential nominee this way: "This campaign has to be about the reclaiming of the meaning of citizenship."

The event in Springfield, Illinois has been turned into a campaign video. Everything seen in that video -- smiling faces of many colors, cheering crowds, the Senator speaking stirring words -- is deliberately put there to build enthusiasm and support for his candidacy.

One Obama supporter says, "I will walk to [the state of] Iowa, if I have to, to help this man [Obama]." Another supporter says, "We need this guy. Our nation needs this guy."

The process of persuading voters is outlined by analyst Brian Darling at the independent research group The Heritage Foundation in Washington.

"One [level] is making the candidate likeable -- making the candidate someone the voters would want to vote for because they like the candidate. But also, it is very important that these candidates voice principles that are very interesting and acceptable to the voters," Darling said.

And package those positions in straightforward ways voters can easily remember, says Democratic media strategist Peter Fenn. "It should be clear, it should be concise, it should connect with voters, it should contrast with your opponent -- your strengths over your opponent's weaknesses. It should be continual. It should be repeated and repeated and repeated." he said.

In order to generate excitement for a candidate, strategists fashion slogans that are catchy and convey the candidate's positions -- and can fit on a car bumper sticker.

Brian Darling cites examples from present and past elections, "You look at President Bill Clinton, [and the phrase was] 'It's the economy, stupid.' You look at President George [H.W.] Bush the first, and it was 'Read my lips - no new taxes.' So, you have all these catchy phrases. And, Barack Obama is using a phrase now -- 'Change," he said.

Political marketing has to create and carefully manage that wave of excitement to crest at the moment when voters make their purchase decision. "Timing is everything in politics. It is true with the giving of speeches. It is true of the rallies [for the candidate]. It is true of your 'get out the vote' operation. It's like a graph. You just want to build, build, build, build, build, and then hit your peak on Election Day," Fenn said.

But to win the White House, both the Democratic and Republican parties have to do more than march their own motivated members to the polls. The parties must also reach out to people who are independent and vote for whomever they see as the best candidate. Ultimately, it is the people in the middle, not the left or the right, who will determine the next president.

The convention could not agree on a plan. So it created a special committee to develop a compromise. The convention suspended its meetings for the July Fourth Independence Day holiday. But the special committee continued its work. When the convention re-opened, the delegates heard the committee's report. This was its proposal:

The national legislature would have two houses. Representation in one house would be decided by population. Each state would have one representative for every forty thousand people in that state. Representation in the second house would be equal. Each state would have the same number of representatives as the other states.

It was called "The Great Compromise." Delegates knew that the success or failure of the convention depended on this agreement.

The debate between large states and small states lasted for weeks.

The small states truly believed they would lose power to the large states in a national government. Several times, they threatened to leave the convention in protest.

William Paterson of New Jersey, a small state, spoke. "Some of the assembled gentlemen have made it known that if the small states do not agree to a plan, the large states will form a union among themselves. Well, let them unite if they please! They cannot force others to unite."

Benjamin Franklin of Pennsylvania, old and in poor health, sat writing quietly during the debate. Now he asked that his words be heard. Franklin asked James Wilson, also of Pennsylvania, to read his statement.

"Why," he asked, "do the small states think they will be swallowed if the big states have more representatives in the national legislature? There is no reason for this fear. The big states will gain nothing if they swallow up the small states. They know this. And so, I believe, they will not try."

For a long time, the delegates could not agree on representation in the legislature. So they debated other parts of the proposal.

One involved the names of the two houses of the legislature. The delegates used several names. Most, however, spoke of them simply as the First Branch and the Second Branch. We will speak of them by the names used today: the House of Representatives and the Senate.
Next came the questions: Who could be elected to the House and Senate? Who would elect them?

Delegates did not take long to decide the first question. Members of the House, they agreed, must be at least twenty-five years old. They must be a citizen of the United States for seven years. And, at the time of election, they must live in the state in which they are chosen.

Members of the Senate must be at least thirty years old. They must be a citizen of the United States for nine years. And, at the time of election, they must live in the state in which they are chosen.

How long would lawmakers serve? Roger Sherman of Connecticut thought representatives to the House should be elected every year. Elbridge Gerry of Massachusetts agreed. He thought a longer term would lead to a dictatorship.

James Madison of Virginia protested. "It will take almost one year," he said, "just for lawmakers to travel to and from the seat of government!" Madison proposed a three-year term. But the delegates finally agreed on two years.

There were many ideas about the term for senators. A few delegates thought they should be elected for life. In the end, the convention agreed on a Senate term of six years.

Next came a debate about the lawmakers' pay. How much should they get? Or should they be paid at all?

Some delegates thought the states should pay their representatives to the national legislature. Others said the national legislature should decide its own pay and take it from the national treasury.

That idea, James Madison argued, was shameful. He thought the amount should be set by the Constitution. Again, Madison lost the argument. The Constitution says that lawmakers will be paid for their services and that the money will come from the national treasury.

The question of who should elect the lawmakers raised an interesting issue. It concerned democracy. In seventeen eighty-seven, the word "democracy" meant something very different from what it means today. To many of the men meeting in Philadelphia, it meant mob rule. To give power to the people was an invitation to anarchy.

"The people," Roger Sherman declared, "should have as little to do as possible with the government." Elbridge Gerry said, "The evils we have seen around us flow from too much democracy."

From such statements, one can see why the delegates sharply debated any proposal calling for the people to elect the national lawmakers.

Sherman, Gerry, and others wanted the state legislatures to choose national lawmakers.

George Mason of Virginia argued for popular elections. "The people will be represented," Mason said, "so they should choose their representatives." James Wilson agreed. "I wish to see the power of the government flow immediately from the lawful source of that power. . .the people."

James Madison stated firmly that the people must elect at least one branch of the national legislature. That, he said, was a basic condition for free government. The majority of the convention agreed with Mason, Wilson, and Madison. The delegates agreed that members of the House of Representatives should be elected directly by the people.

The convention now considered the method of choosing senators. Four ideas were proposed. Senators could be elected by the House, by the president, by the state legislatures, or by the people. Arguments for and against were similar to those for choosing representatives for the House.

In the end, a majority of the delegates agreed that the state legislatures would choose the senators. And that is what the Constitution says. It remained that way for more than one hundred years. In nineteen thirteen, the states approved the Seventeenth Amendment to the Constitution. This amendment permits the people to vote directly to elect the senators.

Finally, the time came for the convention to face the issue of representation in the House and Senate. The large states wanted representation based on population. The small states wanted equal representation.

The delegates had voted on the issue several times since the convention began. But both sides stood firm. Yet they knew they could not continue to vote forever, day after day.

On July fifth, the Grand Committee presented a two-part compromise based on Roger Sherman's ideas. The compromise provided something for large states and something for small states. It called for representation based on population in the House and equal representation in the Senate.

The committee said both parts of the compromise must be accepted or both rejected. On July sixteenth, the convention voted on the issue for the last time. It accepted the Great Compromise.

Children who forget easily and never seem to finish tasks or pay attention might be found to have A.D.D. If, in addition, they seem overly active and unable to control their behavior, a doctor might say it is A.D.H.D.

Experts say the cause involves a chemical imbalance in the brain. It can affect not only school, but also personal relationships and the ability to keep a job later in life. Many of those affected also have learning disabilities or suffer from depression.

Medicines can produce calmer, clearer thinking for periods of time. But the drugs can also have side effects like weight loss and sleep problems. And there is debate about the morality of medicating children.

Susan Smalley is a psychiatry professor at the University of California, Los Angeles. She just led a study of A.D.H.D. in northern Finland.

The study found that rates and signs of A.D.H.D. are about the same in children there as in the United States. The Finnish children are rarely treated with medicine, while medication is widely used in the United States. Yet the study found that the two populations have few differences with A.D.H.D. among older children and teenagers.

Professor Smalley says medication is very effective in the short term. But she says the study raises important questions about the long-term effectiveness of current treatments.

The study also found that only about half the Finnish children diagnosed with A.D.H.D. had deficits in short-term memory and self-control. These cognitive deficits are generally considered part of the definition of A.D.H.D.

The study also found more evidence that A.D.H.D. symptoms change with age. Hyperactivity and lack of self-control decrease. But about two-thirds of children continue to show high levels of inattention as teenagers.

The Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry published the study.

Even if drugs are used, experts say children with A.D.H.D. also need other help. For example, they need to learn organizational skills, and they need supportive adults.

Many stories have been told about the old American West. Some are true. Many more are just interesting stories. Today we will try to tell the true story of one of the most famous and dangerous American gun fighters. His name was John Henry Holliday. He was better known as “Doc”.

The little city of Glenwood Springs is deep in the Rocky Mountains in the western state of Colorado. The mountains here rise sharply out of the ground and surround Glenwood Springs.

A small burial area in Glenwood Springs is called the Pioneer Cemetery. You have to walk up a steep hill on an old dirt road to reach it. The walk takes about twenty minutes. Visitors can stop at several places along this walk to look at the city far blow.

In the cemetery, large stones mark most of the burial places. Some of the stones look new. Many are more than one hundred years old.

A dirt path leads to the back of the cemetery and one, lone, burial place. This one is the reason most people come to the Pioneer Cemetery. The stone over the burial place is colored red, and larger than most of the others. A small black metal fence surrounds the grave.

The name on the stone says “Doc Holliday… He died in bed.” This man’s real name was John Henry Holliday. He was called “Doc” because he was a doctor of dental surgery, a dentist. But he was best known as a gunfighter and gambler, a person who plays games of chance for money. Many people who knew him considered him the most dangerous man in the Old West.

It is extremely difficult to separate truth from the false stories that were spread about some of the more famous people in the Old West. Many of these famous stories are very interesting and exciting. But they are not true. Many of these made-up stories tell about the man who was Doc Holliday.

History experts say he was a very dangerous man because he was already dying when he came to the West. He knew he had the lung disease tuberculosis that causes a slow death. Many experts said he was not afraid of a gunfight. He thought a quick death from a bullet might be better than waiting to die a very slow, painful death from the disease.

Another interesting fact about Doc Holliday is that many history experts now believe he may have spread several of the stories that were told about him. He may have done this because it caused people to fear him. If they feared him, they would not cause him trouble. It was not difficult to find trouble in many towns in the American West. And disputes about who had won a game of chance were always a possibility for a professional gambler like Doc Holliday.

John Henry Holliday was born in the southern state of Georgia in eighteen fifty-one. He was born into a family that included several medical doctors and dentists. Like most young men of the American South at that time, John Henry Holliday learned to ride a horse well. He learned to shoot several kinds of weapons.

He also was well educated. He learned math and science. He learned to read, write and speak Greek, Latin and French.

A young black women who worked for his family taught him to play card games. John Holliday became a very good card player. He could easily remember which cards had been played in a game. This was very difficult to do. It helped him much later in life when he became a professional gambler.

In eighteen seventy, John became a student at the Pennsylvania College of Dental Surgery in Philadelphia. He graduated in eighteen seventy-two.
John Holliday was a tall man. He was thin and always dressed well. He was a quiet, friendly man who always smiled. People liked him. Doctor Holliday began working as a dentist in the southern city of Atlanta, Georgia. He soon began to show the signs of tuberculosis, the same disease that had killed his mother. His doctor said he would live longer if he went to a warm, very dry place -- perhaps the American West.

In eighteen seventy-three, John Holliday said goodbye to his family and left Georgia on a train. He began his new life in the western city of Dallas, Texas.

Doctor Holliday tried to work as a dentist for about four years. He was not very successful. Many people did not want to be treated by a dentist they knew had tuberculosis. He spent a great deal of time drinking alcohol in a saloon. It was here that be became known as “Doc” Holliday.

Holliday traveled in Texas and Colorado for the next several years. He became a professional gambler. In eighteen seventy-seven, he was living in the small town of Fort Griffin, Texas. Here he met a man who was to become one of his best friends. That man was a former law officer, gunfighter and gambler. His name was Wyatt Earp. Soon after meeting Wyatt Earp, Doc Holliday killed a man during a card game.

The man had reached for a gun. Doc Holliday was much quicker using a long knife. He had to leave Fort Griffin and Texas very quickly.

The friendship continued between Doc Holliday and Wyatt Earp. In Dodge City, Kansas, Holliday saved Earp’s life late one night. A man drew his gun behind Wyatt Earp. Doc Holliday yelled a warning, drew his gun and shot the man.

Wyatt Earp had several brothers. They were a close family. Many experts believe that the Earp brothers were a replacement for the family Doc Holliday had left in Georgia. Wyatt and his brothers Morgan and Virgil remained close friends with Doc Holliday for the rest of their lives.

Doc Holliday had become well known in the West. He became even more famous after he followed the Earp brothers to the town of Tombstone, Arizona. In Tombstone he took part in the most famous shooting incident in western history.

That shooting incident in Tombstone is known as “The Gunfight at the OK Corral.” It took place on October twenty-sixth, eighteen eighty-one. It involved Wyatt, Morgan and Virgil Earp and Doc Holliday. Virgil Earp was an officer of the law. He was on his way to arrest several men. Wyatt and Morgan went with him to help.

Doc Holliday joined them as they walked down the street. The men they were going to arrest were also brothers -- Ike and Billy Clanton and Frank and Tom McLaury.

As the two groups came together, Virgil Earp demanded that the Clantons and McLaurys raise their hands and surrender. They refused. No one knows who fired the first shot. All the men began shooting at once.

When it was over, Billy Clanton, Frank McLaury and Tom McLaury were dead. Ike Clanton had run away. Morgan and Virgil Earp were wounded, but they survived. Neither Doc Holliday nor Wyatt Earp was hurt.

Political enemies of the Earp Brothers wanted a trial. The Earp Brothers and Doc Holliday were arrested and tried. The jury found them innocent. It said they were trying to disarm a group of men who wanted a fight.

A few months later, an unknown gunman killed Morgan Earp. Wyatt Earp and Doc Holiday began to hunt the killers. They killed several men known to have been involved in the murder of Morgan Earp.

No one really knows how many gunfights Doc Holliday took part in. No one knows just how many people died as a result. Some books say he was responsible for the deaths of as many as thirty men. But most experts say the number is closer to eight.

History books will tell you Doc Holliday was arrested several times. Most of the time he was arrested for playing illegal games of chance. He was also arrested after several shootings. Often the charges were dismissed because he was only defending himself. The few times he faced a criminal trial he was found to be innocent.

In the last years of Doc Holliday’s life, the West had changed a great deal. The people there no longer wanted gunfighters or gamblers.

Doc Holliday may have won in games of chance and in several gunfights. However, he could not use his guns against tuberculosis. He died in his bed, in the little city of Glenwood Springs, Colorado on November eighth, eighteen eighty-seven. He was thirty-six years old.

A study says most people live a U-shaped life -- happiest when they are young and old, but middle age is emotionally low.

A new study shows that unhappiness in middle age, also known as midlife crisis, is a universal experience.

Two economists did the study: Andrew Oswald of the University of Warwick in England and David Blanchflower at Dartmouth College in New Hampshire. They used information collected earlier on two million people from eighty nations.

They found that people around the world seem to share an emotional design in life. That design, they say, is shaped like the letter U. Levels of happiness are highest when people are young and when they are old. In the middle, however, most people's happiness and life satisfaction levels drop.

Professor Oswald says some people suffer from midlife depression more than others. But, he says, it happens to men and women, to single and married people, to rich and poor and to those with and without children.

Generally speaking, people reach their lowest levels between the ages of about forty and fifty-five. But then, as they continue into old age, their happiness starts to climb back up.

What the research does not show is why all this happens. Professor Oswald says one possibility is that people recognize their limitations in middle age and give up on some long-held dreams.

Or perhaps people who are happier live longer, and this is responsible for a growing percentage of happy older people. Or, he says, maybe people have seen others their age die and they value more their own remaining years.

The report is to be published in the journal Social Science and Medicine.

Last December, government researchers reported a big increase in suicides among middle-aged people in the United States. They looked at injury-related death rates by age group from nineteen ninety-nine to two thousand four. They found that suicide increased almost twenty percent among people ages forty-five to fifty-four. No one is sure why.

By comparison, rates generally fell for those sixty-five and older. And for people twenty to twenty-nine the suicide rate was nearly unchanged.

The report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention noted that the findings are subject to some limitations. For example, accidental drug poisonings might sometimes be mistaken for suicides.

Over all, suicides in the United States increased four percent from nineteen ninety-nine to two thousand four. That year thirty-two thousand four hundred people took their own lives.

Have you had a headache recently? If your answer is yes, you are like many millions of people worldwide who experience pain in the head. The pain can be temporary, mild and cured by a simple painkiller like aspirin. Or, it can be severe.

The National Headache Foundation says more than forty five million people in the United States suffer chronic headaches. Such headaches cause severe pain that goes away but returns later.

Some headaches may prove difficult and require time to treat. But many experts today are working toward cures or major help for chronic headaches.

The US Headache Consortium is a group with seven member organizations. They are attempting to improve treatment of one kind of headache -- the migraine. Some people experience this kind of pain as often as two weeks every month. The National Headache Foundation says about seventy percent of migraine sufferers are women.

Some people describe the pain as similar to a repeated beat. Others compare it to someone driving a sharp object into the head. Migraine headaches cause Americans to miss more than one hundred fifty million workdays each year. A migraine can be mild. But it also can be so severe that a person cannot live a normal life.
One migraine sufferer lives in Ellicott City, Maryland. Video producer Curtis Croley had head pain as a child. He does not know what kind of headaches they were. But when he suffered severe headaches as an adult, doctors identified the problem as migraine.

Today, Mister Croley says months can pass without a headache. But then he will have three migraines within a month. If he takes the medicine his doctor ordered early in his headache, it controls the pain. If not, the pain in his head becomes extremely bad. Sometimes he has had to be treated with a combination of drugs in a hospital.

Some people take medicine every day to prevent or ease migraine headaches. Others use medicine to control pain already developed. Doctors treating migraine sufferers often order medicines from a group of drugs known as triptans.

Most migraines react at least partly to existing medicine. And most people can use existing medicine without experiencing bad effects. Doctors sometimes use caffeine to treat migraine headaches. Interestingly, caffeine also can cause some migraines.

Medical experts have long recognized the work of the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota. The Mayo Clinic says several foods are suspected of causing migraines. Cheese and alcoholic drinks are among them. Food additives like nitrates and monosodium glutamate also are suspected causes.

The Mayo Clinic tells patients to avoid strong smells that have seemingly started migraines in the past. Some people react badly to products like perfume, even if they have a pleasant smell.

The Clinic's experts say aerobic exercise can help migraine sufferers. Aerobic exercise increases a person's heart rate. It can include walking, swimming or riding a bicycle. But a sudden start to hard exercise can cause headaches.

The experts advise that people should plan to exercise, eat and sleep at the same times each day.

The Mayo Clinic has advice about estrogen for women who suffer from migraines. The female body makes estrogen. Drugs like birth control pills contain a version of this chemical.

Such medicines may produce headaches or cause them to worsen, the Clinic says. The same is true for estrogen replacement drugs for women. Doctors sometimes order estrogen replacement for women who no longer able to have children.

The Clinic also says hypnotherapy might help suppress headaches. It says the method could reduce the number and severity of a patient’s headaches. In hypnotherapy, willing people are placed in a condition that lets them receive suggestions. They look like they are sleeping. The suggestions they receive may be able to direct their whole mental energy against pain.

The Mayo Clinic says the hypnotizer can never control the person under hypnosis. It also says the hypnotized person will remember what happened during the treatment.

More people suffer tension headaches than migraines. But most tension headaches are not as powerful.

Events that start tension headaches may include emotional pressure and the deeper than normal sadness called depression. Other tension headaches can start from something as simple as tiredness. Common changes in atmospheric conditions also can be responsible.

The Mayo Clinic says you may feel a tension headache as tightness in the skin around your eyes. Or, you may feel pressure around your head. Episodic tension headaches strike from time to time. Chronic tension headaches happen more often. A tension headache can last from a half hour to a whole week.

The Mayo Clinic says the pain may come very early in the day. Other signs can include pain in the neck or the lower part of the head. Scientists are not sure what causes tension headaches. For years, researchers blamed muscle tension from tightening in the face, neck and the skin on top of the head. They believed emotional tension caused these movements.

But that belief has been disputed. A test called an electromyogram shows that muscle tension does not increase in people with a tension headache. The test records electrical currents caused by muscle activity. Such research has caused the International Headache Society to re-name the tension headache. The group now calls it a tension-type headache.

Some scientists now believe that tension headaches may result from changes among brain chemicals such as serotonin. The changes may start sending pain messages to the brain. These changes may interfere with brain activity that suppresses pain.

Medicines for tension headache can be as simple as aspirin or other painkillers. But if your pain is too severe, you will need a doctor's advice.

A web site called Family Doctor dot org provides information from the American Academy of Family Physicians. The group suggests steps to ease or end a tension headache.

For example, it says putting heat or ice on your head or neck can help. So can standing under hot water while you are getting washed. The group also advises exercising often. Another idea is taking a holiday from work. But you had better ask your employer first.

Ask anyone with a cluster headache, and they will tell you that the pain is terrible. The Cleveland Clinic Headache Center in Ohio says the cluster headache can be many times more intense than a migraine.

Cluster headaches usually strike young people. Smokers and persons who drink alcohol often get these headaches. Men are about six times more likely than women to have them. The Cleveland Clinic says this is especially true of younger men. Doctors say cluster headaches often strike during changes of season.

Cluster headache patients describe the pain as burning. The pain is almost always felt on one side of the face. It can last for up to ninety minutes. Then it stops. But it often starts again later the same day. Eighty to ninety percent of cluster headache patients have pain over a number of days to a whole year. Pain-free periods separate these periods.

The Cleveland Clinic says the cause of cluster headaches is in a brain area known as a trigeminal-autonomic reflex pathway. When the nerve is made active, it starts pain linked to cluster headaches. The nerve starts a process that makes one eye watery and red.

Studies have shown that activation of the trigeminal nerve may come from a part of the brain called the hypothalamus. The Cleveland Clinic says injections of the drug sumatriptan can help. Many other drugs also could be used. For example, doctors say breathing oxygen also can help.

Thankfully, modern medicine has ways to treat almost all of our headaches.

Wheat supplies around the world are at their lowest level in thirty years. Wheat supplies in the United States are at their lowest in sixty years.

But the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization in Rome has some good news. It says a big increase in winter wheat plantings in northern countries is likely to result in much higher production this year. The F.A.O. points out, though, that these predictions are based on normal weather conditions.

Wheat production last year is now estimated at just over six hundred million tons. That was up one percent from two thousand six -- not as much as had been hoped. Almost all of the increase was among large producers in Asia.

Prices are up sharply for wheat but also for most other cereal crops. The F.A.O. says big production increases may be required for more than one season for prices to fall much below their recent highs.

The United States Department of Agriculture has come out with its own agricultural predictions, to the year two thousand seventeen. Wheat plantings in the United States are expected to rise sharply this year in reaction to high prices. But wheat hectarage is expected to fall back for the longer term as a result of competition from other crops.

The United States is the leading exporter of wheat. The government says that by summer, American farmers will export one-fifth more than earlier predicted. But demand is also up at home. More wheat is needed for animal feed to replace corn being grown to make fuel.

World wheat supplies are also down because in some countries, including the United States, bad weather has reduced production.

Something else that can reduce wheat production is the wheat curl mite. In nineteen ninety-five, it caused about thirty-five million dollars in damage in the American Midwest. It causes an infection called wheat streak mosaic virus.

Government experts say pesticides are not especially effective against the wheat curl mite. But this year, the Agricultural Research Service at the Department of Agriculture is making a new winter wheat available to resist the virus.

Robert Graybosch developed it with scientists from the University of Nebraska at Lincoln and Kansas State University. The new wheat is called Mace. The scientists say in tests, two to three times more Mace was harvested from virus-infected fields than other kinds of wheat.

Snow sports are a big business. Ski areas help support local economies. One hundred sixty-five thousand people work in the mountain resort industry. It earns five billion dollars a year.

The president of the National Ski Areas Association provided these numbers to a Senate committee last May. Michael Berry wanted lawmakers in Congress to know that his members are concerned about an issue: global warming.

Snow sports, after all, are not just a business, but a business that depends on the weather.

The ski season in the United States generally extends from late November until the middle of April. But this season, areas in the West have experienced record amounts of snowfall. Some ski resorts are planning to stay open longer.

Last season, thirty-seven of the fifty states had operating ski areas. Nationally, close to five hundred ski areas were open for business. The five states with the most ski areas were New York, Michigan, Wisconsin, California and Pennsylvania.

The industry recorded more than fifty-five million visits. That was close to the average for the past ten seasons, but down six percent from the season before. The National Ski Areas Association says the main reason was the weather.

The ski season was shortened in most of the United States because of warm temperatures and below-average snowfall. This was true everywhere except the Rocky Mountains, in the West. Resorts there reported a record twenty million visits last season. The Rocky Mountains extend through several states including Colorado, Wyoming, Utah and Idaho.

The largest ski resort in the United States is Vail, Colorado. The town of Vail and the nearby Vail Mountain make up the resort. The mountain is more than three thousand five hundred meters high.

A ski trip does not have to cost thousands of dollars. Many people go for a day or two and rent skis instead of buying them. But people with enough money to stay at a nice resort might also have enough for some special things. Like riding to the top of the mountain in a helicopter instead of on a ski lift.

And ski areas do not have to be outdoors or open only in winter. The first indoor ski dome in the United States is expected to open late this year in New Jersey.

The United States has three hundred million people. The National Sporting Goods Association says more than six million of them participate in downhill skiing. Two million are cross-country skiers. And more than five million snowboard.

Snowboarding gained popularity in the nineteen sixties and seventies. By the early eighties, less than ten percent of ski areas in the United States permitted snowboarding. Many skiers considered it a danger. But today only a few places still ban snowboarding.

Snowboarders are generally younger than skiers.

Alex Lebonitte is twenty-four years old and a personal trainer in Virginia. He finds that snowboarding is not that much more fun than skiing. He feels the speed more on a snowboard than on two skis, and he likes that.

But what he especially likes is that snowboarding is more comfortable than skiing, he says. The boots are softer, not as much equipment is needed -- and, he says, everything stays attached when you fall.

When a mountain has a lot of snow, there may be danger of an avalanche. Snow slides are powerful, and they can be deadly, burying anything in their path. To reduce the risk of an avalanche, ski areas might use artillery and other explosives to produce controlled slides.

Ski areas need a lot of snow. But what happens when there is not enough? In that case, they make their own.

Snow making machines are the reason many ski resorts can stay open more than a few months a year. These machines also make it possible to create better ski conditions than nature may provide.

Ski operators point out that their snow is really no different from the snow that falls from the sky.

Snow crystals are ice particles that usually form around a piece of dust in the atmosphere. All snow crystals have six sides, but they form different shapes. The shape depends mainly on the temperature and water levels in the air. Snow crystals produce snowflakes when they stick together.

Making snow requires water, cold temperatures and some dust particles. A machine called a snow gun mixes cooled water and compressed air. A pipe carries water into the gun from a lake or pond.

A second pipe pushes in high-pressure air from a compressor. The compressed air causes the water to divide into many tiny particles. It also blows the drops into the air and helps cool them at the same time.

The drops freeze before they hit the ground, producing snow. Some ski areas place the snow guns on towers high above the ground, giving the particles more time to freeze.

But there is more to making snow than just the equipment. Weather conditions must be correct. These conditions involve air temperature and humidity, the amount of water in the air. The drier the air, the easier it is to make snow.

Today many ski areas use computers to measure the conditions and start the snow making when the conditions are best. And ski areas want snow making machines to produce different kinds of snow, just like nature.

Dry snow contains only a small amount of water. This light, powdery snow is excellent for skiing. Ski resorts want the top layer of snow on a mountain to be dry. Under the dry snow, they want wet snow, to build up the levels for skiers.

Environmental groups are concerned about the use of large amounts of energy and water to make snow at ski areas. Many ski operators in the United States are trying to improve the situation with machines that need less energy and water. The Killington ski resort in the northeastern state of Vermont recently invested more than five million dollars to improve its snowmaking system.

Other resorts have reduced the amount of compressed air their machines use; producing it takes energy. Some resorts are using snow guns that can make snow without the need for any compressed air.

Another ski area in the Northeast, the Jiminy Peak Mountain Resort in Massachusetts, has built a wind turbine to produce energy. The turbine began operating in August of two thousand seven. Jiminy Peak says it is the only mountain resort in North America to produce its own power using wind energy.

Katie Fogel is the director of public relations. She says the wind turbine is producing fifty percent of the resort's energy needs, and thirty-five to forty percent of the energy needed to produce snow.

Snow making equipment is not the only technology found at ski areas. Skiers can use global positioning satellites to avoid getting lost. And, if there is wireless service, they can use their mobile phones to warn others of dangerous conditions, or to call for help.

Another modern safety device is the avalanche beacon. Avalanche beacons are devices that send out a signal to help in locating people buried under snow. There are also personal locator beacons which transmit an emergency signal to satellites.

Ski areas usually have programs to teach safety. Many have also increased their number of employees to supervise visitors. The National Ski Areas Association says accidents generally involve young men traveling at high speed.

An average of thirty-seven people a year have been killed skiing or snowboarding during the past ten years. The association reports that last season there were twenty-two deaths, most of them skiers. Forty other people were seriously injured; forty percent of them were snowboarders.

Amy Kemp is communications manager for Vail Resorts in Colorado. She says one of the most important technological improvements in skiing in the past ten years is the ski itself.

She says the changes in design and shape have made skiing easier, safer and more fun. For example, skis that turn up at both ends, instead of just the front, make it easier to do tricks.

And skiers do not have to work as hard as they used to, she says. Now they can change direction without any more effort than moving an ankle.

Starting a business is never easy. But an organization like TechnoServe can make it easier. A businessman in the American state of Connecticut, Ed Bullard, launched this nonprofit group forty years ago. The name comes from the idea of technology in the service of mankind.

TechnoServe looks for business solutions to rural poverty. Or, as it says on its Web site, "social change has a business plan." The group has helped create or improve more than two thousand businesses in about thirty countries.

Luba Vangelova works for TechnoServe in Washington, D.C. She tells us the group has an estimated budget this year of about forty-five million dollars. She says much of that will support business training and development programs in Latin America, Africa, Asia and Eastern Europe.

In parts of Central America, for example, TechnoServe is helping coffee producers become competitive in new and growing markets. In rural India the group is assisting farmers with crop production. And in Mozambique, TechnoServe is helping develop the travel and tourism industry.

One way it identifies promising entrepreneurs is through a business plan competition called Believe Begin Become. This is an intensive program that provides technical training and expert advice.

Winners receive money to bring their business plans to reality. TechnoServe has held nine national competitions in Central America since two thousand two. Five competitions have been held in Africa, including one in Tanzania last year.

SPEAKER: "B.B.B. has been a breakthrough for me. Finally I am going to own my own business. And I am going to employ people."

A TechnoServe channel on YouTube describes Believe Begin Become and some of the winning business plans. Luba Vangelova says TechnoServe also supports entrepreneurship programs for teenagers and young adults.

Charity Navigator, an independent group that rates American charities, has given TechnoServe its highest rating.

There are hundreds of stories about Annie Oakley. Many of the stories involve her adventures in the American Wild West. Others tell about her travels with Native American tribes. However, most of the stories are not true. She did not grow up in the Wild West, nor did she fight in any battles. Annie Oakley was a performer in a traveling Wild West show. She used her skill at shooting a gun to become one of the most famous sharp shooters in American history.

Annie Oakley was born in eighteen sixty in Darke County, Ohio. Her real name was Phoebe Ann Mosey. When she was six years old, her father died of pneumonia. Her family was very poor. She did not attend school. When she was nine years old, Annie went to live with another family on a farm. Then she became a servant for still another family. She later said that this new family abused her.

When Annie returned to live with her own family, she decided to help them earn money. She taught herself how to shoot her grandfather's gun and began hunting animals for food. She could shoot the animals without ruining the important parts of the meat.

She sold the animals to the people in her town. When she was fifteen years old, she had made enough money to pay for her family’s farm.

Soon her ability to shoot a gun became well known in her town. When she was sixteen years old, she was invited to a shooting contest with a famous marksman named Frank Butler. Frank Butler claimed that he could shoot better than anyone else. Annie surprised everyone when she won the competition. She shot all twenty-five targets, while Frank Butler was only able to shoot twenty-four of them. Perhaps their shooting abilities attracted them to one another, because Annie and Frank married in eighteen seventy-six.

Annie Oakley has been remembered in many ways. People have written movies, songs, plays, books and television shows about her. One of the most famous examples is the Broadway musical play called “Annie Get Your Gun.” Irving Berlin wrote it in nineteen forty-six. In one of the famous songs from the musical, Annie Oakley and Frank Butler sing "Anything You Can Do." The singers are Ethel Merman and Bruce Yarnell.

The musical is still being performed today to remember a woman with an unusual skill. She showed that women could be just as good, if not better, than men.

In eighteen eighty-two, Annie took the name Oakley. She and Frank Butler started putting on shows together, demonstrating their abilities to shoot a gun. Frank Butler was the star of the show and Annie Oakley was his assistant. However, sometimes she did her own shooting. Two years later, Annie Oakley met the famous Native American chief, Sitting Bull, at a performance. The chief liked her skill in shooting and also her personality. They became friends. He gave her the name “Little Sure Shot” because of her shooting ability and because she was only one and one-half meters tall.

In eighteen eighty-five, Annie Oakley and Frank Butler joined another traveling show. It was called “Buffalo Bill’s Wild West.” William Cody, better known as Buffalo Bill, ran the show. For sixteen years, Annie Oakley was the star of the show while Frank Butler was her assistant. Posters for the show called her a “Champion Markswoman.”

The Wild West show became very famous all over the United States. All of the performers demonstrated their skills. Many of the performers had fought in real gun battles while settling the western part of the United States. They wanted to bring the excitement and mystery of the Wild West to a show that people would like to watch.

Annie Oakley did tricks that showed off how good she was at aiming and shooting a gun. She could shoot a small metal coin thrown in the air from twenty-seven meters away. She could shoot the thin edge of a playing card and then shoot it six more times as it fell to the ground. She could shoot the ashes off of a cigarette her husband Frank Butler held in his mouth.

In eighteen eighty-seven, Buffalo Bill took the whole Wild West show to Europe. They traveled to many countries and gave many performances. They performed in England for Queen Victoria. Annie Oakley received a lot of attention. The newspapers wrote stories about her and she took part in many shooting contests.

The Wild West show returned to Europe two years later. By this time, Annie Oakley had become even more famous. The Wild West show performed in Paris, France, for six months. Then the performers traveled to Germany, Italy and Spain. In Germany, the Crown Prince asked Oakley to shoot the ashes off of a cigarette that he held in his mouth, as she famously had done with her husband. She asked the Prince to hold the cigarette in his hand instead and did the trick easily.

When the Wild West show returned to the United States, Buffalo Bill decided to change it to include scenes from the life and culture of the Wild West. These scenes included train robberies, gunfights and conflicts with Native American Indians.

In nineteen-oh-one, Annie Oakley was in a train crash that badly injured her back. She had five operations. Annie and Frank wanted to stop traveling so much and have their own home. So they left the Wild West show. They built a home in Cambridge, Maryland. They liked this area because it had a nice community and there were many places they could go hunting. Annie Oakley and Frank Butler took part in community activities. Oakley gave shooting lessons and demonstrations at the local county fair.
Annie Oakley wrote a book about her life that was published in nineteen fourteen. It was called “Powders I Have Used.” She also wrote many stories about hunting and fishing. Some of these articles tried to get other women to begin hunting. She also tried to get women to learn how to shoot a gun so that they could defend themselves.

During World War One, Annie Oakley offered to help the military. She proposed to train a group of women volunteers who would become solders in the war. However, the United States did not accept this offer. She also offered to give the American troops shooting lessons. She traveled across the country and visited many training camps. She gave shooting demonstrations and raised money for medicine and supplies.

In nineteen twenty-five, Annie Oakley and Frank Butler moved back to Ohio to be near her family. They continued to give performances. But Annie Oakley was sick. She died on November third, nineteen twenty-six. Her husband Frank Butler died eighteen days later.

One of the world's longest serving leaders announced this week that he is leaving office after just short of fifty eventful years. Fidel Castro of Cuba is eighty-one years old and in poor health. He named his brother Raul as acting president in two thousand six.

In a letter published Tuesday, Fidel Castro said he was not saying goodbye to the Cuban people. His only wish, he said, is to "fight as a soldier in the battle of ideas."

On Sunday the Cuban National Assembly is expected to name seventy-six-year-old Raul Castro as president. The two brothers appear to share very similar ideas about governing the communist-ruled island. Fidel Castro will apparently remain a member of Parliament and is widely expected to still have strong influence.

He came to power as a socialist revolutionary in nineteen fifty-nine. He overthrew the pro-American Fulgencio Batista, who himself had seized power. Fidel Castro soon won the support of the Soviet Union at the height of its cold war tensions with the United States.

In nineteen sixty-one, a force of Cuban exiles trained by the American Central Intelligence Agency launched an invasion of the island. The Cuban government learned of the plan. Within days its troops defeated what became known as the Bay of Pigs invasion. The failure was a public relations disaster for the United States and its president, John F. Kennedy.

In February of nineteen sixty-two Kennedy used power approved by Congress to ban all trade with Cuba. The embargo of goods except food and medicine is still in effect.

In October of nineteen sixty-two, the United States found that the Soviets had missiles in Cuba. Cuba is one hundred forty-five kilometers from the Florida coast. President Kennedy warned of the risk of a nuclear strike on the United States. He ordered a naval blockade which soon forced the Soviets to remove the missiles.

But the Soviets remained Cuba’s top ally and trade partner for thirty years. The Cuban economy suffered after the Soviet Union collapsed in nineteen ninety-one. But in recent years the economy has improved. Venezuela, led by socialist President Hugo Chavez, has become an important ally.

Supporters of Fidel Castro praised a leader who provided free health care and education in Cuba. But others condemned a dictator with a repressive government that spread communist revolution in Latin America and Africa.

Cuba has one legal political party, the Communist Party. The media rights group Reporters Without Borders rates Cuba as the fifth worst nation for press freedoms. Human rights groups say Cuba's eleven million citizens are denied privacy, free speech and fair legal process.

The Bush administration says it has no plans to end economic restrictions against Cuba without changes like free elections. President Bush says he hopes the end of Fidel Castro’s rule can be the beginning of peaceful reform.

The eightieth Academy Awards ceremony takes place Sunday at the Kodak Theater in Los Angeles, California. Hundreds of millions of people in the United States and around the world will watch the show on television. It is the most exciting event of the year for people who make movies and for people who love to watch them.

On Sunday, actors, directors, writers, producers and others will gather in Hollywood, California, the center of the American film industry. They will receive Academy Awards for the best acting, directing, writing, editing, music and other work on movies released last year.

The winners will receive an award called an Oscar. This statue is shaped like a man. It is made of several metals covered with gold. The Oscar is only about thirty-four centimeters tall. It weighs less than four kilograms. But the award is extremely valuable for the people who receive it. People who win an Oscar become much more famous. They often get offers to work in the best movies. They can also earn much more money.

Five movies are competing for Best Picture of the year. Two tragic and violent movies

were nominated for eight Academy Awards. "No Country for Old Men" is about a man who finds two million dollars after several people are killed in an illegal drug deal. A killer chases him across Texas to get the money back. The movie is based on the book by Cormac McCarthy.

"There Will Be Blood" is about a man who becomes successful exploring for oil in the early nineteen hundreds. He is opposed by a young religious worker in a small town in California. The movie is based on the book "Oil!" by Upton Sinclair.

Two other movies earned seven nominations each, including Best Picture. "Atonement" is about what happens after a young girl accuses her sister's lover of a crime he did not commit. It takes place in England during World War Two. "Atonement" is based on the book by British writer Ian McEwan. "Michael Clayton" is about a lawyer dealing with personal and professional crises. His law firm is trying to settle a case against an agricultural chemical company.

The fifth Best Picture nominee is "Juno." It is about a smart and funny teenager who becomes pregnant and finds a husband and wife to adopt her baby.

WIFE: “Your parents are probably wondering where you are.”

JUNO: “Mmm, nah. I mean I’m already pregnant so what other kind of shenanigans could I get into?”

Ten actors and actresses were nominated for Academy Awards for their performances in leading roles.

Daniel Day-Lewis was nominated for Best Actor for playing the oilman in "There Will Be Blood." George Clooney for playing the lawyer in "Michael Clayton." Johnny Depp is the lead character in the musical "Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street." Tommy Lee Jones plays a man searching for the truth about his son who returns from the war in Iraq in the movie "In the Valley of Elah." And Viggo Mortensen plays a Russian criminal in London in "Eastern Promises."

These five women were nominated for Best Actress: Twenty-year-old Ellen Page for playing the pregnant teenager named "Juno." Julie Christie for her role as a woman with Alzheimer's disease in "Away From Her." Laura Linney for her role as a woman dealing with her aging and sick father in “The Savages.” Marion Cotillard portrays the great French singer Edith Piaf in "La Vie en Rose." And Cate Blanchett for her role as the British queen in "Elizabeth: The Golden Age." Blanchett was also nominated for Best Supporting Actress for playing a very different real person, Bob Dylan, in "I'm Not There."

The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences presents the Oscars each year. Almost six thousand people who work in the movie industry belong to the Academy. They nominate candidates for Academy Awards from their own professions. For example, actors nominate actors. Directors nominate directors. Designers nominate designers. All Academy members vote to choose the final winners. More than twenty Academy Awards will be presented Sunday night.

The people who wrote the best screenplays and did the best film and sound editing will receive awards. So will the people who designed the best costumes, makeup and special effects. The composers who wrote the best song and music from a movie will also be honored.

Mario Ritter plays some of the music nominated for an Oscar.

That was “Falling Slowly,” a Best Song nominee from the movie “Once.” Glen Hansard and Marketa Irglova wrote the song, perform it and star in the movie. “Once” is a musical about an Irish man and a Czech woman who meet and make music on the streets of Dublin.

The movie “Enchanted” makes gentle fun of fairy tales about princesses and true love. Amy Adams plays a cartoon princess, Giselle, who becomes a real princess in New York City. Her loving, joyful spirit incites the same feelings in the people she meets.

Three songs from "Enchanted" were nominated for Best Song. Alan Menken and Stephen Schwartz wrote the songs.

Usually we think about material qualities when we think about the pleasure we will get from a product. When something costs a lot, we might think about all the fine work that went into it. But can price alone influence the pleasure we experience?

Researchers from the California Institute of Technology and the Stanford Graduate School of Business say yes.

Hilke Plassmann, John O'Doherty and Antonio Rangel at Caltech and Baba Shiv at Stanford did a study. They had twenty people taste different wines. Wine was chosen because it comes in many different qualities and prices, and because a lot of people enjoy tasting it.

The people were told they were tasting five different Cabernet Sauvignons. The wines were identified only by price: five, ten, thirty-five, forty-five and ninety dollars.

But in truth there were only three different wines, and two of them were presented twice, at a high price and a low price. For example, the wine that in fact cost ninety dollars a bottle was presented half the time as a ten dollar wine.

There were two important results from the study.

First, the individuals, on average, reported greater pleasure from drinking wine that they were told was higher in price. Brain images taken while the people tasted the wine supported this finding.

Activity, represented by blood-oxygen levels, increased in an area of the brain thought to process "experienced pleasantness." Experiments have shown that the medial orbitofrontal cortex processes the experience of enjoyment from smells, taste and music. The new findings will add to the limited knowledge of how marketing affects brain activity.

The second result has meaning for economists and marketers. The experiment appears to confirm that raising the price can increase how much a product is enjoyed. In other words, when it comes to expectations, it seems you really do get what you pay for.

The study is in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

Finally, we want to update our recent story on the fight over next-generation DVD technology for high definition televisions. This week, the Toshiba company in Japan announced the end of its HD DVD business, crushed by Sony's Blu-ray format.

A British study has shown a possible link between the length of a person's fingers and the joint disorder osteoarthritis. Osteoarthritis is the most common kind of arthritis. It affects more than twenty million people in the United States. The disorder is caused by a break down of cartilage, the rubbery tissue that protects bones and joints. Before age forty-five years, osteoarthritis is more common among men than women. After age fifty-five, it is more common among women.

Recently, researchers at the University of Nottingham studied finger lengths for clues about genetic qualities or physical conditions. The researchers compared the difference in lengths of the second and fourth fingers. The fourth finger is also known as the ring finger. The second finger is often called the index finger.

The study included more than two thousand men and women. Each person had osteoarthritis of the hip or knees. Doctors had urged all the patients to consider a possible joint replacement. The patients were then compared to more than one thousand people with no history or signs of osteoarthritis.

The study found that people whose index finger was shorter than their ring finger are two times as likely to suffer from osteoarthritis. The strongest evidence was among women who had osteoarthritis of the knee and whose ring fingers were longer than their index fingers.

The findings were reported in the publication Arthritis and Rheumatism.

Research on finger lengths is not new. Earlier studies have suggested their relation to several qualities, including musical and athletic ability. But the difference between the index finger and ring finger length is most widely known for differences between men and women. Men usually have shorter index fingers than ring fingers. In women, the two fingers are often the same length.

Scientists have found this index-ring finger ratio is also linked to hormone levels in unborn babies. It is believed that the longer the ring finger is to the index finger, the higher the level of the hormone testosterone in unborn babies.

The leader of the new study, Michael Doherty, says osteoarthritis is more common among men. He and his research group believe that increased physical activity and sports could be a partly to blame for the problem. The theory fits with the findings that the finger length ratio believed to be more common in men and athletes would be related to higher risk for osteoarthritis.

The findings do not confirm that people with these finger length differences will suffer from osteoarthritis. But it does provide clues about the human body.

Skin lightening has become a common activity across Africa, Asia and other areas. In such places, light skin often is more socially accepted than dark skin. It also is considered a mark of beauty, intelligence and success.

More and more people with dark skin are using skin-lightening products, even if it means they may face greater health risks. They believe that having whiter skin will improve their lives. Many people think they will have a better chance of getting a job or marrying into a better family. Or they want to look like what their society considers beautiful.

Some beauty care products and soaps contain chemicals that make skin lighter. This process is also called bleaching. However, some of the chemicals are extremely dangerous. One of the most dangerous is hydroquinone. Hydroquinone has been banned in several countries. The chemical has been linked to some kinds of cancer and kidney damage. It also causes low birth weight in babies when mothers use it during pregnancy.

At first, bleaching products make the skin color lighter. But after long-term use they can cause problems. They could even make some skin darker.

The chemicals in the products block and break down the natural process that gives skin color. The skin loses its natural barrier to protect against sunlight. Then the skin can become thick and discolored. Usually the person will use more of the product in an effort to correct the problem but this makes it worse.

Fatimata Ly treats skin conditions in the Senegalese capital, Dakar. Doctor Ly says skin bleaching has become a problem throughout Senegal. She says the chemicals are now more dangerous because they are stronger. And, she says, some cases have resulted in infections, permanent skin damage and blackened fingernails.

Some people suffer emotional problems because of the changes. They feel regret and sadness. They say instead of taking such health risks they should have learned to love and accept their skin color.

Last month, the American space agency returned to a planet it had not visited since nineteen seventy-five. A space vehicle called Messenger reached the planet Mercury on January fourteenth. Messenger passed only two hundred kilometers above the surface of Mercury. It was the first trip to the planet closest to the sun since the Mariner Ten spacecraft visited Mercury more than thirty years ago.

Mercury is named for the Roman god who served as a messenger to the gods. The name fits Mercury well because it orbits the sun faster than any planet, in only about eighty-eight days. Yet Mercury is also one of the least explored planets.

Mercury is a world of extremes. During the day, temperatures on the surface can reach four hundred fifty degrees Celsius. The sun on Mercury is eleven times brighter than it is on Earth. At night, temperatures can drop to one hundred eighty degrees below zero.

To survive these extremes, the Messenger spacecraft has been designed with a heat shield to protect its instruments from high temperatures. The spacecraft also has heaters for use when temperatures drop. Messenger is designed to keep its science instruments and its computer brain at nearly room temperature.

Messenger is taking a complex trip through the solar system. The spacecraft was launched in March two thousand four. It passed the Earth once and Venus two times, most recently in June of last year. Its recent visit to Mercury is one of three visits it will make to the planet this year and next. Then Messenger will enter orbit around Mercury in March of two thousand eleven. Its scientific work is expected to last more than seven years.

The space agency says it hopes to answer several questions about Mercury with Messenger. One question deals with the central part of the planet. Mercury's center is rich in iron. This metal center represents sixty percent of the planet's mass. That is two times as great as on Earth. Messenger is expected to provide information that will help scientists find why the planet is so dense.

Messenger will also help scientists learn more about Mercury's geologic history. Currently, scientists have only seen about forty-five percent of the planet. That is how much of the planet was seen by Mariner Ten. Making a map of the whole planet will increase knowledge of what forces shaped this rocky world.
The biggest mystery surrounding Mercury is found at its north and south poles. Radar images have shown bright areas in holes at the poles. Scientists think that the bright areas might be ice forever hidden from the heat of the sun.

Messenger stands for Mercury Surface, Space Environment, Geochemistry and Ranging. The spacecraft has seven instruments to measure the chemical qualities of Mercury and its magnetic field. Scientists are especially interested to lea