SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - Many people have sent an email while angry, exhausted, inebriated or just by mistake that they later regretted. Now, Google has a way to help protect you (and others) from such a faux pas.

As part of its quest to attract users to its Gmail service, the Internet search company has introduced dozens of features, including one that, after a certain time, makes a user solve a math problem before sending an email, giving them time to rethink it.

Because Google makes money every time email users click on ads, it is enhancing its email service to increase advertising and take market share away from Yahoo.

Unique visitors to Google’s sites increased 32 percent worldwide to more than 775 million last year, according to comScore, which tracks such data.

Yahoo had a 16 percent gain to 562.6 million visitors and Microsoft had a 20 percent increase to about 647 million visitors.

Analysts have attributed part of Google’s visitor growth to email features that are being turned out at a dizzying rate by the company’s Gmail Labs.

This month, Google introduced a feature to automatically download mail so users can read Gmail offline in a Web browser. That matches an existing feature in the client version of Microsoft’s Outlook but when Outlook is accessed from the Internet it does not have that feature.

The off-line mail feature was announced in a press statement, but most other features to Gmail have been introduced more quietly. Engineers created and posted 34 experimental features in the seven months since Gmail Labs launched in June.

“They’re able to improve the products much faster than anyone else,” said Forrester Research analyst Ted Schadler.

Google said those features are for adventurous Gmail users because the rapid addition of them means they may not work smoothly or that they will last.

TESTS, REMINDERS

“Mail Goggles” helps users avoid sending regrettable email or Gchat messages, an instant messaging system, by making them pass a simple math test before sending.

Another feature alerts users who forget to upload promised attachments. And another lets users send free SMS (short message service) messages to friends via Gchat.

The new features can be found in “Labs” on the main Gmail account page in the upper right corner under “Settings”.

Google engineer Dave Cohen took half a day to code an experiment that lets users add a photo next to a friend’s conversation in a chat window. It was available for users to try out a few weeks later.

Cohen said it used to be “hard to take an idea you had and get it out there.” Now, he said, Gmail Labs “has increased our freedom and flexibility, and we can do more at a whim when there’s something you really want to add.”

Analysts said the quick roll out of experimental features puts pressure on Yahoo, Time Warner and Microsoft.

Helping to speed development is a “Send Feedback” link in each experimental feature that allows users to make suggestions directly to the developer on how to improve it.

“We didn’t … have that kind of direct feedback between engineers and users,” said Keith Coleman, product manager. “Now, we have engineers looking at the raw feedback that they are getting.”

(Reporting by Jennifer Martinez and David Lawsky; Editing by Edwin Chan)

Even before an expected “Obama bounce” from a new President who has vowed to boost clean energy, U.S. wind power capacity surged 50 percent last year to 25 gigwatts (GW) — enough to power more than five million homes.

Political and business leaders worldwide have urged “green growth” spending on clean energy to fight both recession and climate change.

German wind power capacity reached nearly 24 GW, placing it second ahead of Spain and fourth-placed China, which doubled its installed wind power for the forth year running, said the Brussels-based Global Wind Energy Council.

“Governments must send a strong and unequivocal signal that the age of fossil fuels is over,” said Steve Sawyer, secretary general of GWEC.

Global wind power production reached 121 GW at the end of 2008, growing by about 29 percent. New U.S. wind projects accounted for about 42 percent of the country’s total new power-producing capacity added last year, GWEC said, underlining its challenge to more traditional forms of power generation, including coal and natural gas.

The wind sector is now suffering from a financial crisis which has dried up project finance and a sharp fall in oil prices which has weakened its competitiveness compared to gas, but it is aided by subsidies such as a guaranteed price premium in Germany and Spain.

Spanish wind power business group AEE said on Monday that it expected similar growth in 2009 as last year.

The U.S. Senate Finance Committee last week approved some $31 billion in tax breaks and other incentives to boost alternative energy supplies and efficiency as part of the Obama administration’s much bigger U.S. economic stimulus plan.

Obama wants to double U.S. alternative energy output over three years.

The United States is also expected to overtake Germany this year as the world’s biggest producer of solar power, aided by its far sunnier climate, Jefferies analyst Michael McNamara told Reuters on Monday.

European Union leaders agreed at the end of last year that the bloc should get a fifth of all its energy from renewable sources by 2020 compared with about 10 percent now.

(Reporting by Gerard Wynn, Editing by Marguerita Choy)

Panasonic, the world’s largest plasma TV maker ahead of Samsung Electronics Co Ltd, aims to boost its combined sales of LCD and plasma sets by 50 percent to 15.5 million units in the year starting in April.

A 50-inch screen model about an inch in depth that consumes an estimated 260 kilowatt hours of electricity a year is likely to sell for 600,000 yen ($6,685) and a 54-inch model for 700,000 yen, the company said on Tuesday.

Launches in North America are slated for this summer.

(Reporting by Kiyoshi Takenaka; Editing by Hugh Lawson)

Sam Lutfi, Spears’ constant companion in late 2007 at the height of her personal and professional meltdown, filed the lawsuit in Los Angeles Superior Court after a renewed flurry of legal moves against him.

His lawsuit names Britney Spears, her father and mother Jamie and Lynne Spears, and alleges libel, defamation, battery, intentional infliction of emotional distress and breach of contract.

Lufti claimed Jamie Spears punched him in the chest in January 2008 and says Lynne Spears damaged his reputation in her 2008 memoir “Through The Storm,” in which she claimed Lutfi had over-medicated her daughter.

He is seeking unspecified damages.

The lawsuit was filed four days after Jamie Spears obtained a restraining order against Lutfi and Spears’ former boyfriend, photographer Adnan Ghalib, ordering them to stay away from the singer and her family.

Britney Spears’ spokeswoman was not available to comment.

The legal sparring followed months of relative peace on the Spears front after a year of bizarre behavior including Britney shaving her head and bouncing in and out of rehab.

Spears, 27, has since staged a comeback with a new album in December and a U.S. and British tour due to start in March.

Jamie Spears was granted temporary control of his daughter’s personal affairs in February 2008. He obtained a restraining order against Lutfi but later dropped it when Lutfi agreed to voluntarily keep his distance.

Last week lawyers argued that Lutfi and Ghalib had tried to disrupt the agreement and a new order was granted.

(Reporting by Alex Dobuzinskis: editing by Jill Serjeant and Todd Eastham)

In Poland, alcohol dependence (AD) affects about four percent of the population, causing about 10,000 deaths per year. While a number of biological markers have been linked to a predisposition for developing AD, a new study has found a link between the Val66Met (rs6265) polymorphism in the brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF) gene and risk for post-treatment relapse among AD patients.

Results will be published in the April issue of Alcoholism: Clinical & Experimental Research and are currently available at Early View.

“Some people are simply more likely than others to become dependent on alcohol,” explained Marcin Wojnar, associate professor of psychiatry at the Medical University of Warsaw and adjunct researcher at the University of Michigan. “Clearly, cultural, social, and psychological factors are involved. AD also runs in families, so there is an inherited component to it. Once AD has developed, certain people are more likely to relapse after treatment than others. Some studies show that a family history of alcoholism can lead to a more severe illness that is harder to treat, which is why our group and others are looking at genetic factors.”

“Although some biological predictors of the re-emergence of AD have been described,” said Lance Bauer, professor of psychiatry at the University of Connecticut School of Medicine, “biological measures can be affected by many variables, such as the time of day; the patient’s gender, age, or medical background; or medications that have been prescribed. Most genetic differences are not complicated by these same variables. Accordingly, this study by Wojnar and colleagues points us toward a new and promising approach.”

“We selected genetic polymorphisms that were, one, related to serotonin or dopamine function; and two, associated with suicidality and/or impulsivity,” said Wojnar, who is the study’s first author. “Serotonin’s decreased functioning has consistently been reported to be associated with both impulsivity and suicidal behaviors. Regarding dopamine, most researchers agree that it plays an essential role in addiction, either by causing pleasure from taking drugs or by telling the brain to associate that pleasure with certain cues in the environment.”

The researchers examined 154 patients (117 males, 37 females) from addiction-treatment programs in Poland who met Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders - Fourth Edition criteria for AD. All were assessed for demographics, severity of alcohol use, suicidality, impulsivity, depression, hopelessness, and severity of alcohol use at baseline; 123 patients were followed for approximately one year to evaluate treatment outcomes. In addition, patients were tested for genetic polymorphisms in several genes as predictors of relapse – defined as “any drinking during follow-up” – which were: rs1386483 in the tryptophan hydroxylase type 2 gene, C102T (rs6313) in the serotonin receptor 2A gene, 5-HTT gene-linked polymorphic region in locus SLC6A4, C(-1019)G (rs6295) in the serotonin receptor 1A gene, Val158Met (rs4680) in the catechol-O-methyl transferase gene, and the Val66Met (rs6265) in the BDNF gene.

“Our study indicated that some patients may have inherited a tendency to return to drinking even after intensive treatment,” said Wojnar, “and [may be] more treatment-resistant than other patients. Specifically, we found that a particular type or variant of the gene that codes for BDNF was associated with an increased risk for relapse in alcoholic patients, particularly those with a family history of AD.” BDNF is a protein found in the brain that helps nerve cells survive and connect to one another.

“These findings provide further support for the assertion that alcoholic patients are not all alike,” said Bauer. “Some possess genetic propensities which … may motivate or promote risk for alcoholism as well as risk for treatment failure.”

“These patients may have special difficulty in responding well to currently available treatments because of their biological makeup,” added Wojnar, “and therefore may need newly constructed intensive programs of therapy that are preferably individualized. This might be a step forward towards ‘personalized medicine.’”

Bauer agreed. “During the past 10 years, several new treatments have become available,” he said. “However, ‘how does one decide among the options?’ Genetic differences may eventually help us make the decision. For example, individuals possessing the high-risk-for-relapse variant of the BDNF gene might warrant assignment to the most intensive – and usually most expensive – treatment. Individuals with the low-risk variant might not require this level of treatment to have a good outcome.”

Alcoholism: Clinical & Experimental Research (ACER) is the official journal of the Research Society on Alcoholism and the International Society for Biomedical Research on Alcoholism. Co-authors of the ACER paper, “Association between Val66Met Brain-Derived Neurotrophic Factor (BDNF) Gene Polymorphism and Post-Treatment Relapse in Alcohol Dependence,” were: Kirk J. Brower and Stephen Strobbe of the Department of Psychiatry at the University of Michigan; Mark Ilgen of the Department of Psychiatry at the University of Michigan and Health Services Research & Development at the Department of Veterans Affairs; Halina Matsumoto and Izabela Nowosad of the Department of Psychiatry at the Medical University of Warsaw, Poland; Elzbieta Sliwerska of the Molecular & Behavioral Neuroscience Institute at the University of Michigan; and Margit Burmeister of the Department of Psychiatry, and the Molecular & Behavioral Neuroscience Institute, at the University of Michigan. The study was funded by the Fogarty International Center, the National Institute on Drug Abuse, the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism, and the Polish Ministry of Science and Higher Education.

(WASHINGTON, February 3, 2009) – Green tea products have become regarded as a valuable health supplement, as studies have shown evidence of its benefit against a variety of diseases, including cancer. However, a new study suggests that some components of green tea may counteract the anticancer effects of one cancer therapy, bortezomib (Velcade^®), and may be contraindicated for patients taking this medicine to ensure its maximum therapeutic benefit. This study is being prepublished online today in Blood, the official journal of the American Society of Hematology.

Because of its increasing popularity and availability to the public in many formulations, green tea has been increasingly studied to understand its effect on cancer, heart disease, and other conditions. In animal studies, an antioxidant compound in green tea called the EGCG polyphenol (epigallocatechin gallate) has been shown to be a potent anticancer agent, with effects demonstrated against leukemia, as well as lung, prostate, colon, and breast cancer. Among other properties, EGCG binds to a common protein in tumors called GRP78 (which is responsible for preventing cell death) and inhibits its function, thereby assisting in the death of tumor cells.

“We know that cancer patients look to green tea extracts among other natural supplements to complement their therapeutic regimens. We wanted to better understand how the compounds in green tea interact with a cytotoxic chemical therapy and how that may affect patient outcomes,” said Axel Schönthal, PhD, of the University of Southern California Keck School of Medicine and senior study author.

In this study, researchers evaluated whether the combination of green tea and bortezomib would improve outcomes against multiple myeloma, a blood cancer, and glioblastoma, a malignant brain tumor. Bortezomib, an anticancer therapy approved to treat multiple myeloma and mantle cell lymphoma, normally fights disease by inhibiting proteasomes and inducing tumor cell death. However, in both in vitro and in vivo mouse experiments, the team was surprised to find that the EGCG compound seemed to prevent bortezomib from fighting the disease by blocking its proteasome inhibitory function – the two compounds effectively contradicted one another in the cell, leaving nearly 100 percent of the tumor cells intact.

Importantly, the team found that EGCG only reacted with proteasome inhibitors that have a boronic acid base (including bortezomib) but did not react with several non-boronic acid-based proteasome inhibitors (such as nelfinavir [Viracept^®], a treatment for HIV). The researchers determined that the boronic acid in bortezomib helped to bind the EGCG directly to the therapy molecule, thereby cancelling out the effects of both the green tea and the therapy on the tumor cells.

The study findings may have several important implications in the clinical setting. The EGCG blocked bortezomib’s antitumor effects at levels that are commonly achieved with the use of available concentrated green tea supplements (as low as 2.5 μM – which can be attained with two to three 250 mg capsules of green tea extract) suggesting the impact is very real for patients supplementing their therapy. The team also believes that as the EGCG inactivates bortezomib’s function in the tumor cell, it may also prevent some of the side effects that usually accompany the therapy. As a result, patients taking green tea products to supplement their therapy may experience improved well being and feel encouraged to increase their intake while unknowingly blunting or completely negating the efficacy of their bortezomib treatment.

“Our surprising results indicate that green tea polyphenols may have the potential to negate the therapeutic efficacy of bortezomib,” said Dr. Schönthal. “The current evidence is sufficient enough to strongly urge patients undergoing bortezomib therapy to abstain from consuming green tea products, in particular the widely available, highly concentrated green tea and EGCG products that are sold in liquid or capsule form.”

The findings of the study are considered specific for patients taking bortezomib as opposed to any other common cancer therapy. The analysis of the study offered a clear understanding of the boronic acid-related mechanisms that cause the negative outcome, offering the conclusion that green tea would counteract most, if not all, compounds that work with boronic acid. However, while there are many chemicals that contain boronic acid, few are being used with patients.

“Although the study has exposed detrimental effects of green tea in specific combination with Velcade, this should not minimize the previously reported potentially beneficial effect of this herb,” said Dr. Schönthal. “Related studies with other types of cancer therapies are promising and green tea extract may actually improve the anticancer effects of other drugs.”

Findings from the study will be published in the February 4th issue of The Journal of Neuroscience.

Neuroscience researchers studied the brain function of pre-adolescent mice that have a genetically-created defect in memory. When these young mice were given an enriched environment, which is exposure to stimulatory objects, enhanced social interaction and voluntary exercise for two weeks, the memory defect, caused by inhibiting the formation of Ras-GRF1 and Ras-GRF2 proteins, was reversed.

After a few months, the same mice were fertilized and they gave birth to offspring that had the same genetic mutation. However, the offspring had no indications of the memory defect even though the offspring were never exposed to an enriched environment like their mothers.

Previous research in mouse models has shown that early exposure to an enriched environment while pregnant can also positively affect offspring.

“What is so unique about this study is that we provided an enriched environment during pre-adolescence, months before the mice became pregnant, yet the beneficial effect reached into the next generation,” said Dean Hartley, PhD, neuroscience researcher at Rush University Medical Center and study co-investigator. “The offspring had improved memory even without an enriched environment.”

“We were able to demonstrate that environmental enrichment during youth has dramatic additional powers,” said Hartley. “It can enhance the memory in future offspring of enriched juvenile mice.”

To prove that that improved memory of the offspring was not the result of better nurturing by mothers who were enriched when they were young, a number of offspring were raised by non-enriched foster mothers. Even in the offspring raised by non-enriched mothers, they still maintained an improved memory.

“This example of ‘inheritance of acquired characters’ was first proposed by Jean- Baptiste Lamarck in the early 1800s. However, it is incompatible with classical Mendelian genetics, which states that we inherit qualities from our parents through specific DNA sequences they inherited from their parents. We now refer to this type of inheritance as epigenetics, which involves environmentally-induced changes in the structure of DNA and the chromosomes in which DNA resides that are passed on to offspring,” said Larry Feig, PhD, professor of biochemistry at Tufts University School of Medicine.

Previous research has shown that a relatively brief exposure to an enriched environment in both normal and memory-deficient mice unlocks an otherwise latent biochemical control mechanism that enhances a cellular process in nerve cells called long-term potentiation (LTP). LTP is thought to be involved in learning and memory. This enhancement was detected in pre-adolescent mice but not in adult mice, reflecting the brain’s higher plasticity in the young.

“This is the first study to demonstrate an inheritance of a change in a signaling pathway that promotes LTP and enhancement of memory formation, and that defects caused by a genetic mutation can be reversed by what the mother is exposed to during her youth,” said Hartley.

The phenomenon described in this study indicates that juvenile enrichment affects LTP in the next generation. However, the study found that it does not in subsequent generations because the effect of the enriched environment wears off faster in the offspring.

Rush University Medical Center is an academic medical center that encompasses the more than 600 staffed-bed hospital (including Rush Children’s Hospital), the Johnston R. Bowman Health Center and Rush University. Rush University, with more than 1,730 students, is home to one of the first medical schools in the Midwest, and one of the nation’s top-ranked nursing colleges. Rush University also offers graduate programs in allied health and the basic sciences. Rush is noted for bringing together clinical care and research to address major health problems, including arthritis and orthopedic disorders, cancer, heart disease, mental illness, neurological disorders and diseases associated with aging.

CHICAGO (Reuters) - Citigroup Inc (C.N) might have difficulty escaping its $400 million marketing deal with the New York Mets, but the bank could reduce its obligation by finding another company to assume the most important part of the contract: sponsoring the new baseball stadium.

Growing public and political pressure may force Citigroup to try to get out of the 20-year marketing deal signed in 2006, analysts and bankers said on Tuesday. The agreement included naming rights for the Citi Field, where the Mets will start playing in April.

But the Major League Baseball team is unlikely to release Citigroup.

“Unless the Mets did a poor job of lawyering it, it’s ironclad; with the only exception being bankruptcy,” said Marc Ganis, president of Sportscorp Ltd, a Chicago sports consulting firm that helped several teams reach naming-rights deals.

Few analysts see bankruptcy as likely for Citigroup after the government injected $45 billion of capital into the bank.

The Mets said Citigroup told team executives Tuesday morning that the bank will honor its contract, but an official familiar with the situation said the Mets are “worried.” Citigroup said it signed a legally binding agreement, adding that no government funds will be used for the agreement or for marketing.

If Citigroup wants out, it would likely have to pay a breakup fee, as such deals typically do not include an escape clause, analysts said. It is not clear how big the fee would be, and whether Citigroup could afford to pay it.

“The hard part is the Citi name is a blue-chip name,” said Lou Imbriano, chief executive of TrinityOne Worldwide, a Boston sports and entertainment marketing firm.

A better option for Citigroup may be to find another company to assume most, if not all, of the deal, while the bank remains as a lesser sponsor, Ganis said. Citigroup would remove its name from the stadium but still pay for a lower-level sponsorship. Another company would assume a portion of the deal as well as the naming rights.

If done properly, the Mets could end up getting most if not all of the $400 million.

However, one sports banker familiar with the Mets who asked not to be named, said Citigroup, which has not reported a quarterly profit since 2007, wants out.

“I think Citi will try to negotiate their way all the way out so they don’t have any more headline risk,” he said. “It’s a big PR image problem.”

U.S. President Barack Obama or Congress could also pressure Mets owner Fred Wilpon to cut a deal with Citigroup, the banker said.

“It’s not impossible that President Obama could pick up the phone and call Fred Wilpon and tell him not to be like the shameless Wall Street investment bankers and do the right thing here,” he said.

Wilpon lost money after investing with financier Bernard Madoff, who allegedly ran a $50 billion Ponzi scheme. The loss of the Citigroup funds would only exacerbate Wilpon’s finances, analysts and bankers said.

Some bankers have speculated that Wilpon’s losses with Madoff could force the Mets owner to sell a piece of the team, though the team has repeatedly denied that’s under consideration.

Other bankers said selling a piece of the Mets cable TV channel, SportsNet New York, is more likely.

The Mets-Citigroup deal also represents the peak of the naming-rights market, analysts said.

While bigger deals had been expected for National football League stadiums owned by the New York Giants and New York Jets, and the Dallas Cowboys, as well as for the New York Yankees new baseball stadium, analysts said the current market makes that unlikely.

(Additional reporting by Dan Wilchins and Paul Thomasch in New York; editing by Jeffrey Benkoe)

SEOUL (Reuters) - North Korea may be preparing to use the site of its previous ballistic missile launches on the east coast to fire its longest range missile, possibly toward Japan, news reports said on Wednesday.

Reports of a possible missile launch follow threats directed at Seoul and Washington, which analysts said are meant to intimidate conservative South Korean President Lee Myung-bak and grab the attention of new U.S. President Barack Obama.

South Korea’s Chosun Ilbo newspaper quoted government sources as saying that a large object suspected to be part of a long-range Taepodong-2 missile is being transported to the missile site on North Korea’s east coast.

“The test site on the east coast means the missile will likely be fired over Japan and in the direction of the United States,” Chosun Ilbo quoted the source as saying.

The Taepodong-2 is supposed to have a range that could eventually take it as far as Alaska, but has never successfully flown.

South Korea’s Yonhap news agency quoted a government source as saying the object could be headed for an east coast test site in the town of Musudan-ri, or a newly built site on the west coast or to an unidentified third location.

Separate news reports on Tuesday said the object carried on a train may be headed to North Korea’s newly built launch pad on the west coast, near China.

BLUSTER AND BRINKSMANSHIP

North Korea fired a ballistic missile from Musudan-ri in 1998 that flew over Japan and landed in the Pacific Ocean. A Taepodong-2 launched from there in 2006 reportedly failed less than a minute into flight.

North Korea, which has a history of conducting diplomacy with bluster and brinksmanship, knows its missile facilities are monitored by spy satellites, and that it can put pressure on the United States and its allies simply by moving missile parts.

It takes North Korea about a month or two to prepare a Taepodong-2 for launch, which could be Pyongyang’s deadline for when it expects something positive from Seoul or Washington, analysts said.

“If North Korea were to successfully launch a Taepodong missile, it would significantly alter the threat environment to the U.S. and its Asian allies,” said Bruce Klingner, a Korea expert at the Heritage Foundation.

North Korea, which tested a small nuclear device in 2006, is seen as one of the greatest threats to regional security. In 2007, it started to disable a nuclear plant that makes arms-grade plutonium as a part of an international disarmament-for-aid deal.

But experts say they do not believe it has the technology to miniaturize an atomic weapon so it can be mounted on a missile as a warhead.

North Korea is directing much of its venom toward the conservative South Korean president, who ended this left-leaning predecessors’ policy of unconditional aid to the impoverished North when he took office last year.

“It is as clear as noonday that inter-Korean dialogue can never be resumed as long as the crafty political swindler remains in power as his deeds do not agree with his words,” North Korea’s state media said on Tuesday.

(Editing by Jon Herskovitz and Bill Tarrant)