United States News

Twister that hit Oklahoma caused $2 bn in damage

MOORE, Oklahoma - Rescue workers were combing through the battered remains of buildings left behind in the path of the gigantic tornado that killed two dozen people, including nine children, in Oklahoma on Monday. Officials say the search for survivors is nearly over as efforts turn towards recovery. Gary Bird, fire chief of the badly hit Moore suburb, said he was "98% sure" there were no ...
FBI kill Florida man known to Boston bombing suspects

MIAMI - A man known to the Boston Marathon bombers was shot and killed Wednesday by an Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) agent after he turned violent during questioning, the investigating agency said. The Orlando Sentinel newspaper identified the man as Ibragim Todashev, 27. He was killed in the early morning incident in Orlando, Florida. The FBI said the shooting occurred in Orlando, ...
US Senate panel clears key immigration reform bill

WASHINGTON - A US Senate panel has cleared a proposed legislation that relaxes restrictions on IT companies to hire foreign techies, thus clearing one of the major hurdles to ushering changes in American immigration law in a generation. The Senate Judiciary Committee approved the bill after its authors won a bipartisan support with three Republicans joining 10 Democrats in the 18-member ...
North Korean special envoy visits China to win confidence

PYONGYANG, North Korea - In an indication that North Korea may give diplomacy a chance to end regional tension, its leader Kim Jong Un Wednesday sent a special envoy to China to win the confidence of its most important ally. The trip by Vice Marshal Choe Ryong Hae, a senior Workers' Party official and the military's top political officer, comes after months of ignoring Chinese warnings to ...
Lydia Davis bags Man Booker Prize

American short story writer Lydia Davis was declared the winner of the fifth 60,000 pounds Man Booker International Prize at aceremony held at the Victoria and Albert Museum in London. Her inventive, carefully-crafted and hard to categorise works saw off the challenge from nine other contenders from around the world, a press release Wednesday evening said. India's U.R. Ananthamurthy was also ...

Movie Review

Clean, Shaven [DVD]

Lodge Kerrigan's directorial debut, Clean, Shaven, is a daring and disturbing cinematic experiment that takes us inside the mind of a struggling schizophrenic for an unrelenting 80-minute ride. Kerrigan mixes a shaky narrative filled with gaping holes begging to be filled by the ... ...

On Facebook

US tourist stabbed in Italy loses kidney

A 68-year-old American tourist underwent emergency surgery to remove a kidney after he was stabbed in Italy's Florence city. The tourist, who was not named, was attacked near the famous Duomo cathedral. Doctors at the Santa Maria Nuova hospital said the man suffered knife wounds to a kidney and a lung but was no longer critical, and was conscious and breathing unaided. Police arrested a ...
Belarus dismisses US report on religious freedom

The Belarusian foreign ministry has dismissed part of the Religious Freedom Report published by the US State Department about the country as "outdated" and failing to take into account the current situation in the country. "As for the State Department's report, it is permeated with trite phrases and usual abstract rubber stamps which the authors of the report rewrite every year, without even ...
Boston bombing probe Man shot dead by FBI

An FBI agent shot and killed a 27-year-old alleged friend of slain Boston Marathon bombing suspect Tamerlan Tsarnaev in Florida, a day after questioning him as part of the investigation into the April 15 attack, media reports said. The victim, identified as Ibragim Todashev, was shot at a condominium complex Wednesday in Orlando, Florida. The FBI confirmed a man died while one of its agents ...
Home Minister Shinde in Washington India seeks access to Rana Headley

India has sought access from the US to the 26/11 Mumbai terror attack convict David Headley and his accomplice Tahawwur Rana, both of undergoing sentence awarded by a Chicago court after being found guilty of terrorism charges. While there was no official word from either side on the issues discussed in particular those with reference to Headley and Rana, officials said it was prominently ...
Adam Scotts Open winning putt to be history from 2016

Golfer Adam Scott will need to modify his putting stroke following a confirmed ban on anchoring the club by the Ancient Golf Club and the U.S. Golf Association. The golf's governing bodies will implement the new rule 14-1b from January 2016 onwards, News.com.au reports. According to the report, the ban will not allow the golfers to anchor a club directly against any part of the body and will ...

More United States News

Making the news

Nothing will ever completely replace playing the game I love, however I feel like I'm starting a new adventure and I'm genuinely excited about what lies ahead. I'm fortunate to have been given many opportunities throughout my career and now I feel it's my time to give back.

David Beckham

The world's best known footballer was speaking after formally announcing his retirement.

Hotel Review

New York Marriott Financial Center Hotel

I arrived by taxi to the hotel which is just a block from the former World Trade Center site. The ...

Keep reading

Record Your Vote

Do you take the threat of North Korea seriously?

Michigan Sun

Michigan Sun | News about the state & key Michigan cities

Every minute of every day our news editors canvass the issues, and stories making the news to provide our readers with a broad and in-depth coverage of what's happening in the world.

Our first priority is the state. We specialise in Michigan news. From Grand Rapids to Detroit, we're on the lookout day and night to keep track of issues making the news. We also strive to keep abreast of national news.

Breaking stories out of the continental United States usually break first on the Michigan Sun. Neighbouring states and key cities too often feature on our news pages.

We also provide a whole lot of other content you'd expect from any newspaper including international sports coverage and local Michigan weather forecasts.

We also provide readers with an opportunity to engage in newsmaking by voting on major stories in the news, and following how other readers are viewing the issues. Our news polls are regularly updated, and attract thousands of voters over each week they're conducted.

Our business writers too work hard to keep you abreast of what's happening in the markets, not only in the U.S. but across the globe. We work around the clock to post stories from major financial centers like Tokyo, Paris, London, and of course New York, where we have extensive coverage of the major indices, particularly the Dow Jones, Nasdaq, S&P and Russell 2000.

Follow Michigan Sun on Facebook

News Releases

The Michigan Sun.com News Release Publishing Service provides a medium for circulating your organization's news.

U.S. Markets

Featured Story

Potential brain 'switch' responsible for our behavioural change identified

A new study by investigators at the University of Michigan and Eli Lilly may reveal the "switch" that helps our brains to make the shift from current behaviours to new ones.

They measured levels of a neurotransmitter called acetylcholine, which is involved in attention and memory, while rats monitored a screen for a signal. At the end of each trial, the rat had to indicate if a signal had occurred.

Researchers noticed that if a signal occurred after a long period of monitoring or "non-signal" processing, there was a spike in acetylcholine in the rat's right prefrontal cortex. No such spike occurred for another signal occurring shortly afterwards.

"In other words, the increase in acetylcholine seemed to activate or 'switch on' the response to the signal, and to be unnecessary if that response was already activated," said Cindy Lustig, one of the study's senior authors and an associate professor in the U-M Department of Psychology.

The researchers repeated the study in humans using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), which measures brain activity, and also found a short increase in right prefrontal cortex activity for the first signal in a series.

To connect the findings between rats and humans, they measured changes in oxygen levels, similar to the changes that produce the fMRI signal, in the brains of rats performing the task. ...