We've just got word via the main news stream that a massive earthquake has hit China, and it's epicenter was located in a county of a western Chinese province. Right now, the death toll as approximated from details streaming out of the crippled town is now over 12,000, but if a quake registering 7.9 in the Richter scale is anything to bear, then it's likely that more have fallen victim to its wrath. The full story unfolds at the extended version.

China is quite literally pulling out the heavy artillery to ensure that this year's Beijing Olympics go off without a hitch.

The event's official had unveiled their plans to seed any incoming clouds in the city with a combination of rockets, cannons, and even aircraft. More details on Beijing's war on clouds are available in the full article.

Let's get our daily dose of scientific news before the day ends, shall we? Yesterday, the US Navy fired a single missile against a failing spy satellite, and contrary to many naysayers' claims, the plan was claimed to be very effective. Officials made it clear that the satellite generously exploded into bits - football-sized bits, they say - over the Pacific Ocean. More at the full story.

Here's a logic statement to chew on: all birds are dinosaurs, all pterodactyls are dinosaurs, but birds aren't pterodactyls. The discovery of a fossil in China reveals a sparrow-sized pterodactyl - the smallest pterosaur ever discovered - could give scientists a clearer picture of how flying creatures evolved since the age of the dinosaurs. Details, and a picture of the tiny dino, lies in the full article.

It was recently revealed that an almost complete fossilized human skull estimated to be around 80,000 to 100,000 years old has been unearthed in Xuchang. The skull was dug up last month after over two years of excavation.

Interestingly enough, the significance of the find is still being debated on. For more information on this find and the issues surrounding it, head on over to the full article.

It may be a while before they breed real life Kung Fu Pandas, but this may be the next best thing: scientists in China may use dogs to train pandas how to fight in the wild. The program was brainstormed after the first artificially bred panda, Xiang Xiang, died earlier this year after less than a year of being released into the wild. More in the full article.

New evidence suggests that pandas may actually be an older species of bear than we had originally believed them to be. According to one Huang Wanbo, professor from the Chinese Academy of Sciences, archaeologists were able to unearth fossils of  pandas alongside those of apes in South China's Hainan province.

More bear necessities after the jump!

Is America recycling e-waste properly, or do the electronic muck actually end up in other countries' backyards? An article in The News Times reveals the darker, grittier side of e-waste recycling. Read on to find out more.

A recent finding from China-based Qingdao Institute of Marine Geology stated that despite some inaccuracies in the movie Jurassic Park, the film was right in some aspects especially when it comes to raptors. It should be remembered that the film depicted these dinosaurs as big, bad, and that they smartly roamed in packs.

Aside from already mentioned, Jurassic Park also showed these raptors as cunning and nearly as tall as humans. Related studies have already proved that those accounts were correct. Quindao Institute, now, had found evidence that the raptors did in fact hunt in packs.

Study head Rihui Li shared that their team found a fossilized raptor trackway (dating around 120 to 100 million years ago) in Shandong Province. This showed footprints of six raptors, or what is more formally known as Dromeosaurs. Li added that their tracks didn't overlap, suggesting that they walked alongside a river or a stream.

Furthermore, the track is measured to be 28 centimeters long and 12 centimeters wide. What's more striking about this find is that the footprints indicate that the animal held the claw off the ground while walking. Scientists added that these tracks came from raptors around 1.2 meters tall at the hip with a weight equal to a full-size jaguar.

To prove that the land of the rising sun has the technology to reach for the moon, Japan recently launched the Selenological and Engineering Explorer (SELENE), the biggest lunar mission since the Apollo landings. An orbiter named after the moon princess in a fairy tale, Kaguya, which weighs three metric tons was sent from Tanegashima island to explore uncharted polar areas of the moon.

The princess stripped 45 minutes into the flight, separating from its rocket near Chile's airspace. Japan's Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) planned for two successful orbits around the Earth before Kaguya reaches the moon to release two satellites equipped with high-definition cameras.

It took quite an effort before SELENE successfully took off, after previous failed attempts of rocket H-2 and H-2A which lost its path in 2003. Around US$ 479 million went to making the mission possible, but the Japanese scientists are quite proud with what they achieved.

Other countries are expected to follow suit in what seems to be a space race. China will launch its own craft later this year to do their own exploration, while India plans to join the scene by launching another rocket into space. The US has ideas for its own ventures, with a launch expected to kick off in 2008.