HOWARD LIPIN / Union-Tribune Dr. Aniruddh D. Patel (far left) of The Neurosciences Institute analyzed Snowball's ability to synchronize his movements to music with the help of (from left) John Iversen, Joanne Jao and Micah Bregman.

It didn't take long for Irena Schulz to realize she had something special. Schulz is the founder and president of Bird Lovers Only, a bird rescue sanctuary in Schererville, Ind. Last August, a sulphur-crested cockatoo by the name of Snowball was relinquished to her shelter.

The Antarctic Dry Valleys are among the most extreme environments anywhere, so dry and windswept and barren that they are thought to be the closest analog to the surface of Mars.

Mea culpa. I've shown how green I am. My story on sunsets July 17 had a sidebar on the green flash, that burst of color at sunrise or sunset that's over in an instant. The brief story wasn't intended to be the definitive piece on the atmospheric phenomenon, but several readers were upset that I failed to mention San Diego's own Andy Young.

Researchers have pinpointed a mechanism in mice that could explain why some human mothers become depressed following childbirth. Mice were genetically engineered to lack a protein critical for adapting to hormone fluctuations.