An Indonesian volcano that was quiet for four centuries shot a new, powerful burst of hot ash more than 10,000 feet (three kilometers) in the air Friday, sending frightened residents fleeing to safety for the second time this week.

Pushed by an ill-timed trough of low pressure, Hurricane Earl is heading uncomfortably close to an area relatively few hurricanes tend to go: the Northeast coastline.

The recipient of a rare double hand transplant says he feels "fantastic" and can wiggle fingers on both his new hands.

India has widened its security crackdown, asking all companies that provide encrypted communications -- not just BlackBerry-maker Research In Motion -- to install servers in the country to make it easier for the government to obtain users' data. That would likely affect digital giants like Google and Skype.

The U.N.'s climate chief says poor countries are right to expect that any funding they receive to combat global warming be kept separate from development aid or poverty relief.

A Hawaiian plant species thought to be extinct has been found on the Big Island.

Sophisticated computer models that replaced instinct with cold, hard math have helped forecasters predict where a storm like Hurricane Earl is going about twice as accurately as 20 years ago.

Greenpeace said about 500,000 Facebook users have urged the world's largest online social network to abandon plans to buy electricity from a coal-based energy company for its new data center in the U.S.

A Tasmanian devil named Cedric, once thought to be immune to a contagious facial cancer threatening the iconic creatures with extinction, has been euthanized after succumbing to the disease, researchers said Wednesday.

India should protect its elephant population by securing its wildlife reserves, curbing poaching and restricting development in the corridors they use to travel between forested areas, a panel recommended.

Thousands of villagers returned to their homes along the ash-covered slopes of an Indonesian volcano that exploded after four centuries of dormancy, even though officials warned they could be putting their lives at risk.

The Obama administration on Tuesday asked a federal judge to lift a restraining order that it says could undercut federally funded embryonic stem cell research.

Grains futures dropped Tuesday on the Chicago Board of Trade.

A resurgence of bedbugs across the U.S. has homeowners and apartment dwellers taking desperate measures to eradicate the tenacious bloodsuckers, with some relying on dangerous outdoor pesticides and fly-by-night exterminators.

An emerald so large it's being compared with the crown jewels of Russian empress Catherine the Great was pulled from a pit near corn rows at a North Carolina farm.

Scientists reviewing the acclaimed but beleaguered international climate change panel called Monday for a major overhaul in the way it's run, but stopped short of calling for the ouster of the current leader.

Around 70 million years ago a stocky dragon stalked what is now Romania.

India said it withdrew a threat Monday to ban BlackBerry services for at least two more months after the device's maker, Research In Motion Ltd., agreed to give security officials "lawful access" to encrypted data.

NATO says seven American service members have died in two separate roadside bomb attacks in southern Afghanistan.