● CHICAGO. Orchids likely decorated dinosaur stomping grounds . Fossilized orchid pollen on the back of a bee preserved in amber has offered the first evidence that these delicate flowers existed around the time of the dinosaurs, US researchers said yesterday. Biologists at Harvard University said the ancient pollen, found in a clump on a now-extinct worker bee, means orchids are much older than previously thought.

● WASHINGTON. Water-soaked planet-forming region near star seen . Scientists looking at a fledgling solar system have observed for the first time how water, considered a necessary ingredient for life, begins to make its way to newly forming planets. They peered at an embryonic star called IRAS 4B located in our Milky Way galaxy about 1,000 light years from Earth in the constellation Perseus. A light year is about 6 trillion miles , the distance light travels in a year.

● Texas. Museum to show Lucy fossil amid criticism. Lucy, the world?s most famous human ancestor, will go on public display for the first time in the United States this week amid criticism that her 3.2 million year old bones are too fragile to withstand an 11-city tour. Lucy?s remains were unveiled to reporters during a news conference recently at the Houston Museum of Natural Science. Under an undisclosed financial deal with Ethiopia, Houston is the first stop on what is expected to be a six-year tour.

● MADRID. Virus threatens Mediterranean dolphins. Dozens of dead dolphins washing up along the Mediterranean coast have alerted environmentalists to a virus they fear will become an epidemic, El Mundo newspaper reported yesterday. The region?s striped dolphins, a protected species, are being infected with a virus which has not been identified and has so far killed several dozen animals along the coast and may spread, the report said, quoting environmental experts.

● BEIJING. China reports sighting of ?extinct? dolphin. A Chinese man has videotaped a large white animal swimming in the Yangtze river, which experts say is a dolphin species unique to China and feared extinct, the official Xinhua agency reported yesterday. The last confirmed sighting of the long-beaked, nearly blind baiji was in 2004. After an international team failed to find a single dolphin on a six-week expedition last year the species was classified as critically endangered and possibly extinct.

● BEIJING. French lesson in China staff relations off target. A bad-tempered French manager of a factory in China overshot the mark at a meeting when he pulled out a pistol and shot the ceiling, state media said on Wednesday. The manager, referred to only as Pierre by the China Daily, became enraged over a Chinese woman colleague?s refusal to approve an overtime payment for an assistant, the newspaper said. It said he ?fired at the ceiling in rage? at the factory in the booming southern Pearl River Delta. ?Several employees said the French manager was overbearing and moody and had a very bad temper,? the newspaper said, quoting a reporter for the South Metropolis Daily, who said this was not the first time Pierre had drawn his pistol and fired.

● BEIJING. ?Twins? split by 21-year-old bungle. Chinese ?twins? have sued a hospital over an apparent mix up of babies 21 years ago until they were reunited by chance and neighbors? complaints. With the same deep-set eyes and broad mouths, Xiang Nan and Wang Yiwen went to court in Beijing wearing identical jeans and check shirts, demanding redress from a hospital they said 21 years ago mixed up Xiang with another baby, the Beijing Times reported yesterday. That baby grew up as Wang Yiwu, believing he was Wang Yiwen?s twin brother. The two families lived in the same semi-rural district of Beijing and Xiang and Wang Yiwen met briefly two years ago when mutual friends brought them together, struck by their similarity. They dismissed the likeness as coincidence until late last year, when neighbors complained that a young man they thought was Wang Yiwen often ignored them.