NEWS FROM AROUND THE WORD

WORLD/ WILLIAM & KATE ADOPT ENDANGERED BABY PENGUIN: A baby penguin born at England's Chester Zoo has been adopted by the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge. The couple were given the 12 month adoption of Acorn, an endangered Humboldt penguin, as a wedding present from the zoo. It said it hoped the couple would visit Acorn, pictured above, and extend the adoption period when it ended next May. A zoo spokesman said: "We thought that as they're both fairly nearby now on Anglesey, then William and Kate might like to take advantage of the free tickets in the adoption pack and spend a day here. They would also be able to watch Acorn being fed and we'd be delighted if they chose to renew the adoption at the end of 12 months". Chester Zoo uses money raised through animal adoptions, which cost from £50 a year, to fund conservation projects. Humbolt penguins are an endangered South American species, which naturally live on the coastal areas of Peru and Chile.

WORLD/ SAMOA TO JUMP FORWARD A DAY: The South Pacific island nation of Samoa is to jump forward in time by 1 day in order to boost its economy. Samoa will do this by switching to the west side of the international date line, which it says will make it easier for it to do business with Australia and New Zealand. At present, Samoa is 21 hours behind Sydney. Starting December 29, it will be 3 hours ahead. The change comes 119 years after Samoa moved in the opposite direction. Then, it transferred to the east side of the international date line in an effort to aid trade with the US and Europe. However, Australia and New Zealand have increasingly become Samoa's biggest trading partners. Samoa is located approximately halfway between New Zealand and Hawaii and has a population of 180,000 people.

US/ STUDY SUGGESTS GAY MEN HAVE MORE CANCER: A large US study has suggested that gay men are more likely to have had cancer than straight men. The research, conducted in California, found that gay men were almost twice as likely as straight men to have been diagnosed with this disease. On average, diagnoses also happened a decade earlier for gay men. The study also found that lesbians and bisexual women are more likely than straight women to report poorer health after cancer. Researchers said they are unsure whether gay men may be more likely to have cancer, or whether they are more likely to survive the disease. A physician from the Boston University School of Public Health, said it was not possible to conclude "gay men have a higher risk of cancer" because the underlying reasons for the higher incidence could be more complicated. It is known that anal cancer is more likely to affect gay men and can be caused by HIV. The study, of 122,345 people, was carried out by using data from the 2001, 2003 and 2005 California Health Interview surveys. Out of 51,000 men, a total of 3690 said they had been diagnosed with cancer as an adult. Just over 8% of gay men said they had a history of the disease, compared to 5% of straight men. Researchers said the difference was not down to differences in race, age or income. Also, 7292 out of 71,000 women in the study had been diagnosed with cancer, but there was no difference between straight, lesbian or bisexual women. However, they were more likely to rate their health after treatment as "poor" or "fair".

US/ MEMPHIS PREPARES FOR MISSISSIPPI CREST TONIGHT: The Mississippi River crept toward the highest level ever in the river city of Memphis, Tennessee today, flooding pockets of low-lying neighborhoods and forcing hundreds from their homes, though the water was not threatening the music heartland's most recognizable landmarks, from Graceland to Beale Street. The river is expected to reach its peak of 48 feet as early as tonight, just short of the record mark of 48.7 set in 1937. Those downstream in Mississippi and Louisiana have evacuated prisoners and diverted water from the river in an attempt to stave off catastrophic flooding in the days ahead. The Army Corp is Louisiana partially opened a spillway that diverts the Mississippi into a lake to ease pressure on the levee system in greater New Orleans. Workers used cranes to remove some of the Bonnet Carre Spillway's wooden barriers, which serve as a dam against the high water  The spillway, which the Corps built about 30 miles upriver from New Orleans in response to the great flood of 1927, last opened during the spring 2008. Today marked the 10th time it has been opened since the structure was completed in 1931. The region is prone to such disasters in the Springtime after winter snows melt.