Smart houses which are able to recognise when someone falls ill or has forgotten to take their medication, or even restock their fridge, are set to be commonplace across the UK in the near future, scientists said.
Jim Briggs, of the University of Portsmouth's Faculty of Technology, is helping to design the next generation of homes which are aimed at helping vulnerable people live more independently.
His team is developing sensors which will be able to evaluate if everything is normal in a house. (PA)
Marathon short cut
A runner believed to have recorded the fastest ever London Marathon time for the over-65s took a 10-mile short cut, it was revealed.
Anthony Gaskell crossed the finishing line in a stunning three hours and five minutes during April's event.
The 69-year-old grandfather, from Wirral, Merseyside, was set to receive a plaque for his achievement until question marks hung over his super-fast time. He was reported as saying he dropped out through injury and cut a chunk from the course. (PA)
Weedkiller attack
Villagers were "devastated" after floral displays were sabotaged by a vandal just months before they were due to take part in a national competition.
The village of Cayton, near Scarborough, North Yorkshire, which is renowned for its displays, is a regular in the Royal Horticultural Society's Britain in Bloom final and is due to take part in the competition in August.
But organisers' hopes of success have been dashed after a banned toxic weedkiller was spread among gardens in what police have described as a "calculating and malicious act". (PA)
Born winners
A couple engaged to be married were born on the same day in the same hospital - and their mothers even shared a room in the maternity ward.
Amy Singley and Steven Smith were born at St Luke's Hospital in Fountain Hill, Pennsylvania on April 17, 1986.
After the mothers were hospital roommates, the two families continued to meet through their church. Steven asked Amy on a date when they were in high school. (PA)
Bright prospects
Convicts in Oklahoma have been told to swap their orange jump-suits for bright pink shirts and yellow-and-white striped trousers.
Prisoners in Cleveland County are complaining they make them look more like clowns than criminals.
But sheriff's officials say the uniforms are meant to make it easy to find escapees. (PA)
'Racist' couples barred
An Italian couple's adoption bid went awry when they said in their application that they did not want "dark-skinned" children, news reports said yesterday.
An appeal court in Sicily ruled that the couple were unfit to adopt children of any description, the reports said.
A child protection agency took the couple to court after they submitted an application in Catania, eastern Sicily, saying they were "prepared to take in up to two children... regardless of sex or religion, but... not with dark skin."
The court ordered a magistrate who reviews adoption requests to ignore such specifications, then took things a step further, ruling that any such "racist" couple should not be allowed to adopt at all. (AFP)
Austria pays for books looted
The Austrian National Library said yesterday it would pay €135,000 for thousands of books in its possession that were looted by the Nazis from Jews during World War II.
In a symbolic gesture, library director Johanna Rachinger handed over the books to the Austrian National Fund for the Victims of National Socialism at a special ceremony in Vienna. The objects, some 8,363 in all, included children's books, scientific reference works and theological treatises dating back to the 17th century, whose owners the library had not been able to trace.
But the library has agreed to buy them back immediately at their market value, so that proceeds can go to Nazi victims who had not so far received any form of compensation, "such as Jews who arrived in Austria in the 1930s," said the head of the fund, Hannah Lessing. (AFP)
Open-air loo protest
South African police yesterday arrested 26 protesters who burned tyres, threw stones and blocked roads over the removal of open-air toilets which have caused a stink for Cape Town officials.
Police reacted to three separate uprisings in Khayelitsha, a poor area of shacks in the east of the city, firing rubber bullets at some of the crowds.
The groups, ranging from 100 to 300 people, took to the streets over the city's tearing down of the controversial toilets after temporary enclosures were vandalised by youth members of the ruling African National Congress. (AFP)
Kills his sister over love affair
A Jordanian man was charged yesterday with premeditated murder for allegedly stabbing to death his younger sister over a love affair, police said.
"The 22-year-old man has confessed to killing his 20-year-old sister on Monday, with the help of his cousin, after learning that she was in love with a man," in Marka, eastern Amman, police said.
"His 19-year-old cousin was charged with being an accessory to murder."
The two face the death penalty if convicted. (AFP)