Bette Ghidotti had hoped to spend some time on the beach while at her Sarasota, Fla., vacation home, but fatigue from her cancer treatment was keeping her indoors.

HACKENSACK, N.J. — Rose Mattus, who launched Haagen-Dazs ice cream with her husband, peddling the super-premium treat in grocery stores, has died. She was 90.

PALO ALTO — Esther Lederberg, a pioneering Stanford University microbiologist whose research helped her first husband win a Nobel Prize, died Nov. 11 of pneumonia and congestive heart failure, the school said. She was 83.

GRANTS PASS, Ore. — Researchers have found soils in an old-growth forest in southern China are storing carbon at a rapid rate.

LONDON — Circumcision, microbicides and microfinance. These are some of the most promising options being examined as potential ways to prevent AIDS.

CAPE TOWN, South Africa — Fewer than half of South Africa’s 15-year-olds will live to see their 60th birthday because of HIV/AIDS, according to a new report.

WASHINGTON — Alicia Bowers, a Panamanian immigrant, can easily recall that George Washington was the first U.S. president. She knows the three branches of government are legislative, executive and judicial.

WEST SACRAMENTO — A UC Davis bus carrying medical students and health workers overturned on a busy freeway interchange Thursday morning, injuring 20 people and snarling rush-hour traffic around the state capital.

CASPER, Wyo. — Sixteen-year-old Kaytie Christopherson was getting ready to do her homework on a Friday when she got a call that made a big improvement in her life: She had won a brand-new pickup truck for near-perfect school attendance.

Some examples of draft questions and acceptable answers to be tried out in 10 cities on volunteers seeking American citizenship:

LOS ANGELES — An extremely rare and well-preserved dinosaur nest containing fossil eggs with the embryos exposed goes up for auction this weekend, but at least one scientist is demanding the artifact be returned to a museum.

BAGHDAD, Iraq — Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki faced a widening revolt within his divided government as two senior Sunni politicians joined prominent Shiite lawmakers and Cabinet members in criticizing his policies.

WASHINGTON — The Bush administration, looking at the prospect of stronger oversight from a Democratic-led Congress, is withdrawing a proposal to let big polluters report less often on what they spew from their smokestacks.

CAIRO, Egypt — Iraq’s Shiite leader was firm, his aides say — he would not talk to President Bush with Jordan’s Sunni king listening in.