Nazar Sarani's village in southeast Iran was once an island. It is now a desert, a casualty of the country's worsening water crisis.

"We live in the dust," said the 54-year-old cattle herder of his home in the once exceptional biosphere of Lake Hamoun, a wetland of varied flora and fauna, which is now nothing but sand-baked earth.

Australia released its long-term blueprint to save the Great Barrier Reef Saturday, with Prime Minister Tony Abbott saying protecting the World Heritage site was a priority.

The 35-year plan for the major tourist attraction off the Queensland coast includes a complete and permanent ban on the dumping of capital dredge material in the area and sets targets to improve water quality and marine life populations.

A huge two-tonne haul of scales from the endangered pangolin anteater have been seized by Hong Kong Customs in a bust worth more than U.S.$1 million, authorities said Friday.

The scales of the protected animal, also known as the "scaly anteater", are in demand for traditional Chinese medicine, especially on the mainland, where they are used to boost virility and treat allergies.

Solar Impulse 2 was met by dancers dressed in an elephant costume as it landed in Myanmar's second largest city Mandalay, completing the fourth leg of its landmark circumnavigation of the globe powered solely by the sun.

The single-seater aircraft touched down at 7:51 pm (1321 GMT) Thursday, several hours earlier than expected, after a 13-hour journey from the Indian holy city Varanasi, cut short thanks to strong tail winds.

All eyes will be on the skies Friday for a total solar eclipse expected to offer spectacular views, if only in the far northern Svalbard archipelago and Faroe Islands.

A partial eclipse of varying degrees should also be visible, weather permitting, across most of Europe, northern Africa, central Asia and the Middle East.

For months, even years, accommodation on the remote Faeroe Islands has been booked out by fans who don't want to miss an almost three-minute-long astronomical sensation. Now they just have to hope the clouds will blow away so they can fully experience Friday's brief total solar eclipse.

Scores of eclipse chasers and scientists have invaded the archipelago armed with telescopes, cameras and glasses for safe direct solar viewing ahead of the big event.

Three local politicians in China raised at least 11 endangered Siberian tigers, state media has reported, after one of the animals jumped to its death from a high-rise building

Three local politicians in China raised at least 11 endangered Siberian tigers, state media reported Thursday after one of the animals jumped to its death from a high-rise building.

Neuroscientist David Eagleman hopes that one day a special piece of clothing he has designed will let the deaf "hear" and allow wearers to sense what is happening online without looking at a computer.

Eagleman's so-called VEST, whose name comes from the futuristic-sounding "variable extra-sensory transducer," is a sleeveless top equipped with vibrating nodes that buzz information onto the wearer's back, essentially giving the wearer a new source of information.

A solar-powered airplane on a round-the-world journey has taken off from the northern Indian town of Varanasi and is headed for its next stop in Myanmar.

The fuel-free aircraft, called the Solar Impulse 2, is powered by more than 17,000 solar cells on its wings that recharge the plane's batteries, enabling it to fly during the day or night. The plane was expected to land in Mandalay in Myanmar later Thursday.

Die-hard eclipse junkies from around the world are expected to brave polar bears and frostbite in the Arctic on Friday to savor three minutes of total darkness when the moon totally blocks the sun.

The Norwegian archipelago of Svalbard, located 1,300 kilometers (800 miles) from the North Pole, is along with the Faroe Islands the only place the total eclipse will be visible.