An international team of scientists have created a new state of matter when they made aluminum transparent or invisible by beaming a very powerful x-ray laser to it.

The new state of matter existed only for 40 femtoseconds or a fraction of a nanosecond after being blasted by a FLASH laser in Hamburg, Germany. With the energy equivalent to the amount of electricity that powers a city, the pulse of soft x-ray light from the laser knocked down an electron in each ion of an aluminum foil making it transparent.

Britain's Queen Elizabeth joined over 140 children at a giant birthday party in Scotland Wednesday. The monarch joined a group of 10-year-olds at the Scottish Parliament building of Holyrood after all 163 youngsters born in Scotland on July 1, 1999 -the day of devolution, when Scotland got its own government - were invited to join festivities.

Accompanied by her husband, the Duke of Edinburgh, the queen toured parliament's main hall, which was filled with children creating "Happy Birthday" posters from cut-up photographs.

A bone flute found in southern Germany cave has become the oldest instrument discovered after carbon dating counted its age as 35,000 years.

The flute with five holes and made from the hollowed out wing-bone of a giant vulture was found in the Ach Valley, according to a study of the instrument, published Thursday in the British journal Nature.

Five people in their 60s and 60s have been arrested in Germany and charged with kidnapping and beating an American investment adviser.

The suspects aged 60, 63, 66, 74 and 79 were arrested during a police raid of a house in Chieming near the Austrian border on Saturday. The 56-year-old kidnap victim was found in the cellar of the property.

Katy Perry is obsessed with her cat. The "Waking Up in Vegas" singer - who recently reconciled with her boyfriend, Gym Class Heroes rocker Travis McCoy after a four-month split - prefers her cat Kitty Purry to men because their relationship will never make the cover of gossip magazines.

The 24-year-old star said: "I'm a bit obsessed with my cat. She's my substitute boyfriend. It's pretty funny that I can't go for dinner with someone and not be sleeping with them. That's one of the unfair things. I have iChat dates, those are fun."