The year 2008 has once again been a test of endurance and financial stability for the labor industry. The global financial crisis, set off by millions of unpaid employees that force the Big Computer Manufacturer AMD to reduce its staff in the administrative sector and production, to address the serious economic crisis in place this coming January.

According to DigiTimes, which contains some rumors circulated in the area, from next January AMD could start to cut its jobs. If this item was correct, the reduction would affect about 1,500 employees, 10% of the total labor force in AMD. This decision is the result of a little favor, with a general collapse in demand for computers, economic stagnation and financial crisis worldwide.

The posts affected by this wave of redundancies would be mainly linked to the production branch of Sunnyvale and administrative staff to a lesser extent. The planned redundancies as it would add to 1650 employees last April and 500 in November. AMD has not issued official statements on the subject, but confirms that its turnover has fallen by 25% in the fourth quarter of 2008 compared to the previous quarter, a bad result mainly influenced by the crisis eCom and demand reduction in professional and consumer.

WASHINGTON (AP) - Their research, appearing in Thursday’s issue of the journal Nature, adds to the growing push to explore further the moon Enceladus, as one of the solar system’s most compelling places for potential life.

Using images from NASA’s Cassini probe, astronomers had already figured that the mysterious plumes shooting from Enceladus’ icy terrain contain water vapor. New calculations suggesting the gas and dust spew at speeds faster-than-sound make the case for liquid, said study lead author Candice Hansen of NASA’s Jet Propulsion Lab in California. Her team calculated the plumes travel more than 1,360 mph.

Reaching that speed “is hard to do without liquids,” Hansen said. While her paper offers more evidence building on what others have found, she added that her research is not the final proof of liquid water on Enceladus (pronounced en-SELL-ah-dus).

Other planetary scientists, such as Andrew Ingersoll at the California Institute of Technology, said the research is good, but that it is possible to achieve such speeds with ice particles and at cooler temperatures. So Hansen hasn’t proven her case yet, he and other scientists said.

Carolyn Porco, the head of the Cassini camera team and an astronomer who didn’t take part in Hansen’s research, said “the evidence in my mind is building on liquid water.” That moon, one of 60 circling Saturn, “has become the go-to place” for exploration in the outer planets, she said.

Europa, a moon of Jupiter, may have a liquid ocean beneath its frozen surface. But Enceladus, thought responsible for producing one of Saturn’s rings, is more accessible, Hansen said. “Enceladus is sort of helpfully spewing out its innards,” she said.