Washington, Nov 4 : Researchers at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in the US have developed a new antireflective coating that boosts the amount of sunlight captured by solar panels at all angles, which would make scientists realize the dream of high-efficiency, cost-effective solar power.

The nanoengineered coating solves two major hurdles facing solar energy.

It boosts the amount of sunlight captured by solar panels and allows those panels to absorb the entire solar spectrum from nearly any angle.

Washington, Nov 4 : Democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama confidently secured victory in the first official results announced early on Tuesday from two small towns in New Hampshire, where a tradition of casting the first votes on election day lives on.

Obama defeated McCain by a count of 15 to 6 in Dixville Notch, and the town of Hart’s Location reported 17 votes for the Democrat, 10 for the Republican and two for write-in Ron Paul. Both towns had favored George W Bush in the last two elections.

A local Shiv Sena leader was shot dead at Airoli in Navi Mumbai by unidentified assailants on Sunday.

He was identified as identified as deputy shakhapramukh, Nitin Prabhu.

While Prabhu along with one of his friends were returning from a hotel, two motorcycle-borne gunmen fired at him at about 12.30 in the night.

Prabhu was rushed to the near by hospital, where he was declared dead. His friend sustained minor injuries.

He was running Sai Siddhi Estate Agency in Airoli and having disturbances with Sanjay Jadhav, owner of SM Enterprises at the same. Even before few days ago Sanjay had threatened to finish Prabhu.

Police has registered a case in this regard.

Nairobi/Goma - A United Nations aid convoy taking supplies behind rebel lines in the east of the Democratic Republic of Congo is not enough to meed the needs of hordes of desperate refugees, aid organization Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) warned Tuesday.

Tens of thousands of civilians remain displaced after rebel Tutsi general Laurent Nkunda's forces routed the Congolese army and came on the brink of taking the city of Goma, the capital of North Kivu province, last week.

"Even with today's ... aid delivery, displaced people throughout North Kivu continue to be in urgent need of food, clean water, healthcare and basic items like blankets and shelter materials," MSF, also known as Doctors Without Borders in English, said in a statement.

Marseille - The Spanish port city of Barcelona is to be the seat of the headquarters of the Union for the Mediterranean, diplomatic sources said Tuesday in the French city of Marseille.

Agreement on what had been a bone of contention among the 40-plus members of the union was reached overnight during a meeting of foreign ministers from European Union members and their counterparts from Mediterranean states.

The decision to place the group's secretariat in Barcelona is in reference to the original EU Mediterranean initiative on which the Union for the Mediterranean was based, the Barcelona Process.

London/Frankfurt - Faced with a looming recession and rapidly falling inflation, Europe's two leading central banks are expected to cut rates this week as monetary authorities around the world step up efforts to slash the cost of money.

Indeed, analysts are predicting that the Bank of England (BoE) and the European Central Bank (ECB) will each announce on Thursday at least 50-basis-point reductions in borrowing costs in a fresh bid aimed at shoring up economic confidence in Europe.