Do you feel a lack of self-esteem because of the way your breath smells?

If so, you may have larger concerns than bad breath. Halitosis, the term given to persistent bad breath, is a common symptom of chronic periodontitis. An estimated 66 percent of young adults and 50 percent of adolescents are afflicted with chronic periodontitis, a serious periodontal condition whose symptoms include receding gumlines, loss of bone support and, eventually, loss of teeth.

There was no Cardinal red flag billowing behind Neil Armstrong during the moon landing of 1969. Stanford University may have missed out on that lunar landing, but Stanford researchers are not about to let it happen again; in 36 months, they hope to land a rover on the moon.

The venture is part of the Lunar X PRIZE, a Google-sponsored contest that will award $20 million to the first nongovernmental organization to get a robotic rover to the lunar surface.

Computers, from room-sized contraptions full of vacuum tubes and punch cards to the hip and portable Apple MacBook Pro, are all based on the same paradigm conceptualized by Alan Turing, the father of computer science. Like many other human technologies, computers have greatly improved in performance over time; the purely mechanical system was superseded by vacuum tubes which then gave way to our modern transistor-based systems.

It is not difficult to imagine why a fisherman community would be skeptical of legislation that protects areas of the California coast and promotes the restoration of marine ecosystems. After all, the livelihoods of commercial fishermen depend entirely on the fish they catch and thus free access to the ocean. Yet recent implementation of a piece of California legislation, through its emphasis on community participation, has helped narrow this infamous rift between fishermen and environmentalists in a novel effort of collaboration.