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GLOBAL NEWS FRANCE BANS ADVERTISING OF MOBILE PHONES TO CHILDREN GOODBYE TO TAX HAVENS AND SECRET BANK ACCOUNTS? S and Chinese scientists have created a two-armed nano-robot that can manipulate molecules within a device built from DNA. The researchers, from New York University and China's Nanjing University, said the programmable unit allows researchers to capture and manoeuvre patterns on an unprecedented scale. New York University chemistry professor Nadrian Seeman, one of the study's co-authors, said that the two-armed nano-robotic device enables the creation of new DNA structures, thereby potentially serving as a factory for assembling the building blocks of new materials. With that capability, it has the potential to develop new synthetic fibres, advance the encryption of information and improve DNA- scaffolded computer assembly. The researchers said their device performs with 100 per cent accuracy, as confirmed by atomic force microscopy that permits features a few billionths of a metre in size to be visualised. The research, also conducted by Professor Shou-Jun Xiao and graduate students Hongzhou Gu and Jie Chao, is reported in the journal Nature Nanotechnology. (Source: UPI, via SpaceDaily.com, 16 February 2009, http://tinyurl.com/dkev91) NS laws cracking down on children's use of mobile phones are to be introduced in France amid growing fears that emissions from the phones may cause cancer and other diseases. All advertising of the devices to children under 12 is to be prohibited under the legislation, which will also ban the sale of any phone designed to be used by those under six. The French government will also introduce new limits for radiation from the phones and make it compulsory for handsets to be sold with earphones, so that users can avoid irradiating their heads and brains. These are the most comprehensive actions yet taken by any government worldwide. Ans of a G20 finance ministers meeting, starting on Friday 13 March, several European Union nations have agreed to make concessions to clamp down on banking secrecy and tax havens. Swiss bank accounts are now set for a shake-up, with the Swiss government agreeing to ease its strict banking-secrecy rules. The government has also agreed to co- operate with investigations into tax evasion. Switzerland is the world's biggest "offshore" financial centre, with an estimated USS3 trillion in global wealth held in its banks. Geneva-based journalist Andreas Zumach said that the decision will lead to a lot of money leaving Switzerland. "I think this is the end of the Swiss bank secrecy as we have known it," he said. Luxembourg has also agreed to relax its secrecy rules and to co- operate with foreign tax authorities in cases where fraud is suspected, the Treasury and Budget Minister Luc Frieden announced. Luxembourg, Belgium and Austria are the only European Union countries that currently do not share information about savings account- holders from other countries with their tax authorities. Belgium, which instead o exchanging information with other tax administrations applies a withholding tax on interest earned on foreign residents’ savings accounts, has now announced a similar move to Luxembourg's. Austria has insisted it will only lif its banking secrecy where there is "justified suspicion" of wrong-doing. Bowing to international pressure, Liechtenstein and Andorra also said they would ease their secrecy rules and swap information with foreign governments to combat tax fraud and evasion. (Sources: ABC News, 13 & 14 March 2009, http://www.abc.net.au) In Toronto, Ontario, Canada, the Department of Public Health has advised that children under eight should only use mobiles in emergencies and that teenagers should limit calls to less than 10 minutes. Russia's Ministry of Health has warned that young people under 18 should not use the devices, and Israel's Health Ministry has also advised caution. (Source: The Independent, UK, 11 January 2009, http:/Atinyurl.com/7zt8rf) NEW DAYS OF THE WEEK 8 * NEXUS SCIENTISTS BUILD NANO-ROBOT APRIL - MAY 2009 www.nexusmagazine.com