Scientists are more confident than ever that pumping carbon dioxide into the air by burning fossil fuels is warming the planet. The question is, by how much?

It's something that officials and scientists meeting in Stockholm will try to pin down as precisely possible Friday in a seminal report on global warming.

The release of a huge cloud of chemical smoke from a fertilizer warehouse fire caused jitters in a southern Brazilian town Thursday amid fears that it might be toxic.

The blaze erupted late Tuesday at a fertilizer depot in the town of Sao Francisco do Sul, causing panic and forcing the evacuation of 800 people.

A portable radar device that can sense live victims beneath a collapsed structure was inspired by the same technology used to detect distant objects in space, NASA said Wednesday.

The prototype for the new tool was demonstrated for reporters by U.S. space agency experts who are collaborating with the Department of Homeland Security.

The number of suicides on Japanese railways increases after several days of bad weather, according to a study released Thursday, which urged train operators to increase patrols during rainy periods.

The study, which chimes with commonly held beliefs about mood and weather, was an attempt to find reasons behind some of the deaths that make up Japan's relatively high suicide rate.

A Soyuz capsule carrying three astronauts successfully docked with the International Space Station early Thursday, bringing the size of the crew at the orbiting outpost to six.

Michael Hopkins of the United States and Russians Oleg Kotov and Sergei Ryazansky traveled six hours in the capsule from the Russian-leased launch pad in Kazakhstan before linking up with the space station's Russian Poisk research module at 6.45 a.m. Moscow time (0245GMT).

U.N. experts are expected to warn on Friday that global warming will hoist sea levels higher than was projected six years ago, threatening millions of lives.

In a report touching on a high-stakes, contentious issue, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) will predict sea levels to rise by between 26 and 81 centimeters (10.4 and 32.4 inches) by 2100, according to a draft seen by AFP.

A small island of mud and rock created by the huge earthquake that hit southwest Pakistan has fascinated locals but experts -- who found methane gas rising from it -- say it is unlikely to last long.

The 7.7-magnitude quake struck on Tuesday in Baluchistan's remote Awaran district, killing at least 271 people and affecting hundreds of thousands.

Australian road safety researchers on Wednesday unveiled a pioneering "attention-powered car" which uses a headset to monitor brain activity and slow acceleration during periods of distraction.

The car, commissioned by the Royal Automobile Club of Western Australia, is about to depart on an awareness-raising road trip of Western Australia -- a sprawling west coast state accounting for about one-third of the Australian continent.

The African cuckoo finch is known for bamboozling other birds into raising its young, but new research has shown just how brazen the feathery rogue is in evading parental duty.

The yellow, streaked bird, about the size of a sparrow, is a notorious freeloader.

Mexico's former president Felipe Calderon said that climate action can boost both developed and emerging countries as he led a new commission bringing together government and business leaders.

In an initiative being launched Tuesday on the sidelines of the annual U.N. General Assembly, Calderon will chair a report that aims to make the business case for addressing climate change.