In spite of Apple's reported efforts to block apps with Flappy in the title from entering its App Store, around one third of new iOS games uploaded are clones of app phenomenon Flappy Bird.

The Guardian has reported that out of 300 games uploaded within 24 hours, 95 were clones of or heavily inspired by Flappy Bird, in an effort to capitalize on the game's removal from the App Store.

These include the imaginatively named Tappy Bieber, Annoying Flappy Fly, Flappy Monsters, Tappy Duck and Flappy Beard Hipster Quest.

The game's description urges players to "guide our hero hipster through the bizarre world of beer and coffee using the power of his amazing flapping beard! Can you withstand his barrage of pithy commentary and frequent requirement for smoke breaks?"

Jumpy Jack, in which a player has to navigate a small skateboarder through a series of familiar-looking pipe-like obstacles is currently number one in the free download chart, followed by Flappy Wings, a blatant Flappy Bird replication.

Recent desktop-based homages to Flappy Bird have included Flappy Doge, based on the lovable meme, Sesame Street's Flappy Bert, and the aforementioned Flappy Bieber.

The Flappy Bird app experienced an unprecedented level of success, before creator Dong Nguyen announced his decision to withdraw the game from app stores, saying unwanted attention generated by the phenomenally successful game had ruined his "simple life".

Mr Nguyen, who is based in Vietnam, said his decision was not related to legal issues, but that he "just cannot keep it anymore" [sic].

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From the outside it could be the Miami Beach mansion of any Versace-clad millionaire. Located on Palm Island, just off the Florida coast, it has shiny white walls, towering palm trees and the obligatory swimming pool. As well as the enormous main home, there is a two-story guesthouse and a pool cabana. It is easy to imagine the owners hosting parties for rappers and actors.

Yet 85 years ago, on February 14 1929, the property was the scene of a very different sort of party. Its owner, the mobster Al Capone, threw a lavish bash for his friends in the area. A thousand miles away, on the north side of Chicago, seven members of George “Bugs” Moran’s gang were lined up against the wall of a garage and shot dead with machine guns.

The Valentine’s Day Massacre would become one of the most notorious events of the mobster era. Capone had promised not to organize any further gang activity after he moved to Miami, and the party provided him with the perfect alibi. Nonetheless, in the wake of the incident, Capone doubled the number of his guards and added extra fortifications.

Now the mansion is for sale for $8.44m. Built in 1922, the house is part of a 30,000 sq ft waterfront estate. The seven-bedroom main house is 6,000 sq ft – room for you and plenty of your accomplices.

“Al Capone bought it in 1928,” explains Andrea Polo of LuxuryEstate.com a website that is listing the sale. “He chose it when he was sent out of Los Angeles and Chicago. During the Prohibition, Miami was one of the best places to be for smuggling. It was very close to the Caribbean and particularly Havana, where lots of alcohol came from.” Capone’s arrival caused a stir, even in a city famed for its organized crime.

He fell in love with the house, Polo explains, and spent much time and energy converting it to his rather specific needs.

“Capone basically transformed the house into a real castle, and a bunker for himself,” he says. “You can see from the structure of the place that it was very well fortified. The walls are high, and the doors are made from heavy iron. He had bodyguards and big, fierce dogs stationed along the perimeter. He also added a large swimming pool, white marble all around and the two-bedroom cabana.”

Capone’s stay in Miami was not trouble-free. In 1930 the authorities finally caught up with him and he was jailed. Not for smuggling, extortion, murder or any other of his nefarious gang work, but for the rather less glamorous crime of tax-evasion. He spent eight years in jail, including a stint on Alcatraz, off the coast of San Francisco. When Capone returned from prison to the home in 1939, he was not the same gangster. He suffered increasingly from dementia brought on by his syphilis. Towards the end of his life, his family even hired a nurse to pose as a chauffeur, in order to protect members of the public from Capone’s outbursts of violence.

The famous mobster died in 1947, and the house was inherited by Capone’s widow, Mae, and son Al Jr. They were unable to care for the property in the same way he had, and it fell into disrepair. The title deed vanished, only to reappear in 1971 when the property was bought by Hank Morrison, a retired airline pilot, for £42,000. By then the house was run down. Morrison spent a fortune doing it up, before renting it out as separate units. The home was again refurbished in 2011 and is now owned by a company run by a New York accountant.

There have been many changes to the property over the years, and Capone would not recognize many parts. But the general structure is similar, and some rooms – such as the black and gold Art Deco powder room – are unchanged since Capone’s day. The security features that once kept rival gang members and the police at bay now guarantee you privacy in the sunshine. Miami is a glamorous centre of art, music, culture and shopping, with plenty of festivals and fairs. And 80 years after prohibition, it still has an undercurrent of Caribbean-tinged mischief that makes it a mecca for party-seekers. The airport has frequent flights back to London and all over the world.

For a buyer seeking a gorgeous beachfront villa with an unusual – if slightly macabre – past, this could be an offer you can’t refuse.

*For sale for $8.44m through Sotheby’s (001 305 538 9711; sothebysrealty.com )

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Thanks to intriguing stories of quickly-made fortunes, online drug sales and financial scandals, everyone has heard of Bitcoin. Strangely, nobody knows who created it.

It all began with a paper written by "Satoshi Nakamoto" and quietly published via a cryptography mailing list in 2008. The author laid out a plan for an "electronic payment system based on cryptographic proof instead of trust". It was methodical, neat and sagely predicted future problems. It was also well-written in perfect English. Clearly this was no sketch on a napkin: it took intelligence, experience and time.

But Satoshi Nakamoto was a pseudonym - a male Japanese name that loosely translates as “wise”. No such person exists. The paper may have one author or many, but whoever it was has diligently kept it secret for years. And they left precious little in the way of clues.

There was an email address in the paper: satoshin@gmx.com. In the early days someone would reply and answer technical questions. It also pointed to a website, www.bitcoin.org, but the domain had been purchased through an anonymous service.

In some correspondence he had used the phrase “bloody hard”, steering us away from an American towards a Briton. Clever analysis of when he made appearances online suggested that he was usually asleep from 5am to 11am GMT, contradictorily suggesting an American - or a nocturnal programmer. At other times he claimed to be 37 and confirmed that he was Japanese, but this was met with skepticism because of his use of slang. Oddly, he once left a link to a Times article in the blockchain, possibly to add weight to its dating.

Satoshi was extremely active in the development of the open-source software which powers Bitcoin. But towards the end of 2010, perhaps sensing that the project had gathered enough momentum to survive his withdrawal, he started to fade away. The last thing anybody ever heard from him was in April 2011 when he emailed a Bitcoin contributor and said he had “moved on to other things”.

Because of his early involvement in bitcoin, Satoshi is thought to be extremely wealthy. New Bitcoins are "mined" by performing complex cryptographic calculations which also serve to authenticate transactions. In the early days Bitcoins were far easier to mine than they now are, and worth far less.

Security researcher Sergio Demian Lerner believes - but can’t categorically prove - that Satoshi mined around 1,000,000BTC and has never spent any . At a price of $1,000 each, that would make him worth around a billion dollars - around the same as the GDP of the Seychelles.

Considering his immense wealth and integral role in launching one of the largest economic experiments ever conducted, it’s not surprising that lots of people have tried to uncover Satoshi's real identity.

The most recent of many theories comes from Josh Zerlan, chief operating officer of Butterfly Labs, the makers of specific hardware to mine bitcoins. Speaking to IBTimes UK at a bitcoin conference in India, he said: "One of the prevailing theories, I think has credibility, is that it was some group of people from financial sector that created this. They released it and stepped back and let it go. So, Satoshi Nakamoto is a group of people, I think, is a reasonable possibility." He names no names, or explains what their motivation would be.

The New Yorker published a piece pointing at two possible Satoshis, one of whom seemed particularly plausible: a cryptography graduate student from Trinity College, Dublin, who had gone on to work in currency-trading software for a bank and published a paper on peer-to-peer technology. The other was a Research Fellow at the Oxford Internet Institute, Vili Lehdonvirta. Both made denials.

Fast Company highighted an encryption patent application filed by three researchers - Charles Bry, Neal King and Vladimir Oks­man - and a circumstantial link involving textual analysis of it and the Satoshi paper which found the phrase "...computationally impractical to reverse" in both. Again, it was flatly denied.

All three men also collaborated on a second paper backed by a Munich-based firm called Lantiq. The company was founded in 2009, the same year that the Bitcoin paper was first published, but did not answer phone calls or reply to emails when I tried to ask if there was any link.

This year two Israeli mathematicians wrote a paper claiming that there was a link between Satoshi Nakamoto, the mythical creator of Bitcoin, and Ross Ulbricht, who has been arrested and charged with running the underground online drugs market Silk Road. They claimed, after analyzing the blockchain, that there was a financial link, but later issued a statement retracting it after their claims were debunked by a Reddit user.

But all of these accusations have gotten us no closer to the truth.

Jeff Garzick was one of the core of software engineers who latched on to Bitcoin when it emerged and helped to protect it from attacks, guided its future direction and released new versions of the client software. He was a developer for Linux distribution Red Hat when he was headhunted by Bitcoin processing firm BitPay this May. He now works on the crypto-currency full-time.

Speaking to CoinDesk he said: “Satoshi was a fantastic designer and architect. He spent a couple of years thinking about the system, and then according to what he said, he had to write the system to prove to himself that it would work.”

But he also said that the early version of Bitcoin was "a jumble of source code".

“He was the oracle to which we would go for questions about the system, but he rarely followed standard engineering practices, like writing unit or stress tests or any of the standard qualitative analysis that we’d perform on software. Several things had to be disabled almost immediately upon public release of Bitcoin because they were obviously exploitable.”

Sentiment in the more paranoid parts of the cryptography community is that the NSA is a potential creator, as the protocol leaves a permanent trail of transactions that could be a very useful tool for law enforcement.

Certainly, anonymity is one of the biggest myths about Bitcoin. In fact, there has never been a more easily traceable method of payment. Every single transaction is recorded and retained permanently in the public “blockchain”.

The idea that the NSA would create an anarchic, peer-to-peer crypto-currency in the hope that it would be adopted for nefarious industries and become easy to track would have been a lot more difficult to believe before the recent leaks by Edward Snowden and the revelation that billions of phone calls had been intercepted by the US security services. We are now in a world where we now know that the NSA was tracking the pornography habits of Islamic “radicalizes” in order to discredit them and making deals with some of the world’s largest internet firms to insert backdoors into their systems.

There are precedents, too. The Tor anonymous browsing tool was originally sponsored by the US Naval Research Laboratory and, as of last year, 80 per cent of the project's $2m annual budget comes from the US government.

And the SHA-2 cryptographic functions that are a core part of the Bitcoin network, as well as many others including the Transport Layer Security (TLS) protocols which encrypt much of the sensitive data you bounce back and forward online every day, were originally designed by the NSA.

In the interests of fair play, I asked the NSA: did they create bitcoin? A couple of weeks later I got a one-line reply: “Given the volume of media requests that we’re handling, I can’t assist you with your research at this time.” A second email the next day suggested that I speak to Tim Carver, a professor of computer science at Trine University, with no explanation as to why.

So I emailed him, and got a reply denying any link with the NSA, explaining that he was doing research on Bitcoin and offering his own thoughts on who Satoshi was: “I can only offer an opinion. Having read Satoshi’s original work, the paper has the voice of a single person.

“Some papers I have read over the years are obviously written by multiple people. Imagine an article written by Stephen Hawking and John Cleese. Both are very intelligent men, but with different presentation styles. Two different voices. Satoshi’s paper is, in my opinion, one voice. I don’t know who’s voice it is, but it has the sound of only one.”

Ultimately, we may never know who Satoshi was, but his legacy is a crypto-currency that doesn’t rely on us trusting him. Whether he was an anarchist, a security agency or a group of altruistic researchers, Bitcoin remains a valuable a tool.

But his possible wealth leaves us with a very strange problem: if he does have 1,000,000BTC - more than four per cent of all the coins that will ever exist - what does he plan to do with them? The market has come to the conclusion that these are no longer a factor: their creation and destruction just a necessary step in getting Bitcoin up and running. If one day he spends even just a tiny fraction of a single bitcoin - remember that all of these transactions are public - it will show the market that they are still in play. What will that do to the price, the market and the protocol?

Given that scenario, it suddenly feels even more important to know who Satoshi is and what his motivation was for creating a digital currency.

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Facebook is in negotiations to buy a drone manufacturer with the aim of using its high-altitude autonomous aircraft to beam internet connections to isolated communities in Africa, according to reports.

The social networking company is one of the main backers of the internet.org project, which aims to connect the large parts of the world which remain offline.

Today, only 2.7 billion people – just over one-third of the world's population – have access to the internet, according to Facebook . Other founding members include Ericsson, MediaTek, Nokia, Opera, Qualcomm and Samsung.

Now TechCrunch reports that Facebook intends to buy the maker of advanced solar-powered drones which can remain in the air for up to five years at a time, in the hope that they can be modified to provide internet connectivity for those on the ground.

Titan Aerospace's drones fly so high – up to 65,000 feet - that they can effectively operate as satellites with far lower operating costs, which the company calls "atmospheric parking". The Solara 50 and 60 models can carry up to 100kg of equipment.

TechCrunch reports that Facebook intends to build 11,000 of the drones to provide blanket internet coverage to parts of the world that currently have patchy or non-existent connections.

Neither Facebook or Titan Aerospace were available for comment.

The project would be in direct competition with Google’s Project Loon, which will see 30 balloons launched into the stratosphere where they would form a network and programmed to use varying wind currents at different altitudes to remain in a geostationary position.

If successful, the project would provide 3G-like speeds to isolated parts of the world. But the lifespan of the balloons would be just 100 days, after which they would return to Earth and have to be replaced.

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A music teacher in Australia has been awarded $95,100 in damages for defamation on Twitter and Facebook after she was targeted by a former student who "bore a grudge".

Andrew Farley, 20, the son of the school’s head of the music and arts department, wrote defamatory messages about Christine Mickle, 58, who replaced Mr Farley’s father. He had never been taught by the popular teacher but posted the messages a year after graduating, suggesting she was responsible for the fate of his father, who stood down in 2008 for health reasons.

"For some reason it seems that the defendant bears a grudge against the plaintiff, apparently based on a belief that she had something to do with his father leaving the school," said district court judge Michael Elkaim.

"There is absolutely no evidence to substantiate that belief."

The case comes ahead of a separate defamation action in Australia brought by the Liberal party pollsters Mark Textor and Lynton Crosby, who also work as Tory advisers. The duo are suing a former Labor MP, Mike Kelly, over a tweet accusing them of introducing Australia to "push polling", or using loaded questions to sway poll outcomes.

In Britain, Sally Bercow, wife of the Commons Speaker, was last year forced to make a public apology and pay damages to Lord McAlpine after the High Court found a tweet by her which falsely linked him to allegations of child sexual abuse was defamatory. She was reportedly forced to pay about $25,000, plus costs.

In the latest case in Australia, the court ruled that the social media comments in late 2012 by Mr Farley, a former student at Orange High School, had a "devastating effect" on the teacher, who took sick leave before eventually returning to work on a limited basis.

"When defamatory publications are made on social media it is common knowledge that they spread," the judge said.

"They are spread easily by the simple manipulation of mobile phones and computers. Their evil lies in the grapevine effect that stems from the use of this type of communication."

Mr Farley ignored a letter from Ms Mickle's lawyers in November 2012 and only removed the comments and apologized "unreservedly" after he received another letter the following month.

The court questioned the sincerity of Mr Farley’s apology, noting he had tried to argue in his defence that the comments were true.

"The defence of truth when it is spurious is particularly hurtful to a person who has been the subject of such unsubstantiated allegations," Judge Elkaim said.

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Formula One supremo Bernie Ecclestone has given his strongest indication yet that he is preparing the way for his departure from the sport he has dominated for almost four decades ahead of his trial on allegations of bribery.

The 83-year-old, who will go on trial in Munich at the end of April, dramatically changed his line on his future on Monday, after insisting in recent months that despite multiple legal proceedings it was "business as usual".

Formula One's octogenarian chief executive admitted for the first time in a newspaper interview that the case in Germany has left him unable to devote what he "normally would do" to running F1.

Ecclestone also expressed his frustration with a High Court judge in London, who said he was an "untruthful witness", fearing it might affect his trial in Munich.

The judge said the 83-year-old was unreliable and had paid a bribe to a German banker working on the sale of Formula One to CVC Capital Partners in 2006.

When Ecclestone was indicted by German prosecutors in January, he stood down from Formula One's board but retained control on a "day-to-day basis", claiming: "Nothing has changed."

However his comments on Monday reveal the pressure of the trial is affecting his running of the sport.

"I've been spending time on this [civil] case and to spend time on Munich I am not able to give what I normally would do, 24/7, to the business", Ecclestone told the Financial Times.

"I've been looking, over the last few years, for somebody who can join me to assist with what I have to do. I will eventually be in a position, if I decide to retire - or unfortunately become dead - to have someone to step into my shoes."

Something of a campaign has emerged for current Red Bull team boss Christian Horner to be installed as his successor, one which has been vigorously supported by Ecclestone himself, but it is widely thought once the 83-year-old does move aside that the sport will have a more committee-style management structure.

Mr Justice Newey dismissed the civil action brought by German media group Constantin Medien last month.

But since his comments in which he said Ecclestone had paid a bribe, the board of CVC have come under pressure to sack the 83-year-old.

Donald Mackenzie, CVC's chief executive, who rarely makes any comments publicly, said last year that if Ecclestone was found guilty he would be fired. But a source close to the board told Telegraph Sport that Mr Justice Newey's "opinion" will not affect their decision and they await the outcome of the German trial, due to start on April 23. A spokesman for CVC declined to respond to Ecclestone's comments on Monday.

Ecclestone, for his part, expressed his frustration at the judge's comments.

"I was a little disappointed at the judge's remarks but I understand he was in a difficult position because of the lack of evidence in front of him", he said.

Some of the teams and senior figures on the board which runs Formula One have privately expressed concerns about Ecclestone's position, with some investors holding concerns over compliance issues.

Ecclestone's trial, which begins on April 23, after the Chinese Grand Prix and before the start of the European season in Spain, is scheduled to run until September and proceedings will run for two days a week. They will take place on Tuesdays and Wednesdays to allow Ecclestone to attend Formula One races as normal.

His future has been the subject of intense speculation since Mr Justice Newey handed down his judgment earlier this month in the $140 million damages claim.

The claim, which centred on allegations that the 83-year-old had made a "corrupt bargain" with Gribkowsky to steer the sale of the sport to London-based private equity firm CVC nine years ago, was dismissed on technical grounds.

Gribkowsky himself, formerly the chief risk officer at state-owned BayernLB, has already been jailed for 8 1/2 years for accepting corrupt payments, breach of fiduciary duties and tax evasion.

Ecclestone does not deny paying Gribkowsky but instead argues that he was "shaken down" by the banker, who was threatening to cause trouble for him with the UK tax authorities.

Ecclestone's comments mark his clearest public indication that both that the prospect of the trial is affecting his running of Formula One, and that he is contemplating a future beyond it.

The controversial chief executive has won many admirers for his stewardship of the sport over the decades - not to mention his ability to make a lot of people wealthy - but privately some teams speculate whether he continues to be a positive influence.

SEE ALSO: This Hunk Of Metal Is Jaguar's Answer To Fuel Economy Rules

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The number of people dying from dementia has being vastly underestimated with the disease potentially responsible for more deaths than cancer and heart disease combined, new research suggests.

A study from the US has found that Alzheimer’s and dementia is widely under-reported on death certificates and medical records.

The researchers estimate that figure could be six times higher than reported because doctors usually pick a disease that the person was suffering as the cause of death.

"Alzheimer's disease and other dementias are under-reported on death certificates and medical records," said study author Bryan D. James, PhD, of Rush University Medical Centre in Chicago.

"Death certificates often list the immediate cause of death, such as pneumonia, rather than listing dementia as an underlying cause."

Around 60,000 people a year die from dementia but if that figure was six times higher the disease would be killing more people than cancer (157,000) and heart disease (161,000) combined.

Previous reports have suggested that as many as two thirds of people who die of dementia do not have it recorded on their death certificate.

George McNamara, Head of Policy and Public Affairs at Alzheimer’s Society, said: “Previous studies have suggested a similar pattern to what we see in the US.

“This points to a massive under-reporting on death certificates, especially when we know one in three people over 65 will develop dementia before they die.

“It is very concerning that death certificates are not showing the whole story when it comes to cause of death."

Currently dementia accounts for seven per cent of all deaths in women and three per cent of all deaths in men.

“It is likely that many more people die with dementia every year in UK and yet worryingly this goes unreported,” said Mr McNamara.

“Urgent action needs to be taken to rectify this. There needs to be greater recognition of dementia as a terminal illness. This will raise awareness about the importance of care planning and end of life care; something that is still greatly overlooked.”

For the study researchers followed 2,566 people who received annual testing for dementia over an eight year period and recorded how many died from Alzheimer’s by carrying out an autopsy after death.

They found the percentage equated to five or six times higher than would have been expected in the normal population based on death certificate figures.

"The estimates generated by our analysis suggest that deaths from Alzheimer's disease far exceed the numbers reported," said Dr James.

"Determining the true effects of dementia is important for raising public awareness and identifying research priorities regarding this epidemic.”

The study was published in the journal Neurology.

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Chinese police have named and threatened some of the country's most influential journalists and commentators for questioning the party line on a terror attack in Kunming.

In recent months, the Chinese authorities have stepped beyond censorship to directly threaten people with large followings on the internet with grim repercussions, including jail time, if they do not stay on message. The strategy has had a chilling effect on public discourse, stopping most celebrities from speaking freely.

Yesterday marked another severe escalation of the trend, as Beijing's cybersecurity police posted screenshots of five accounts which they said had "ignored the facts [about the killings in Kunming], distorted the situation and hurt the feelings of the people".

Last Saturday, eight attackers dressed in black slashed 29 people to death at the south western city's railway station. The government said the attackers were ethnic Uighurs fighting for the independence of the far western region of Xinjiang.

Feng Xiang, a journalist for the Southern Weekend newspaper, posted a comment on his Weibo account in the wake of the attack that the authorities "never tell you what really happens".

"They just let you blindly hate each other, live in fear and confusion without reason and die in ignorance," he wrote.

His words were reposted by Li Chengpeng, a hugely influential commentator with seven million followers on Weibo, and by Luo Changping, an investigative journalist with 350,000 followers. Two other writers questioned whether the attacks had arisen because of China's repressive policies in Xinjiang.

"I think using force to keep stability is not the right way. We should find the root of their hatred and that would be the right way to solve the conflict," wrote Yan Ming, whose Weibo account has since been deleted.

"We must admit the imperfection of the society and its failure," wrote Cheng Meixin, another writer.

Beijing police's cybersecurity unit "seriously" warned all five men that "as public figures you need to be responsible for what you say". It added that if they violated the law, they would be punished. Last year, China introduced a regulation saying that internet users can be imprisoned if their posts go viral and prove to be "rumors".

The post by the police channeled a wave of public anger on the celebrities, with some calling for Li Chengpeng's "links to foreign terrorists" to be investigated.

Mr Li quickly responded that even the "inquisition" of writers during the Qing dynasty had been less pervasive. He added that his post had been deleted on the orders of the head of Weibo and that he was waiting for the police to act. "Shall I turn myself in or wait at home for you to come and get me?" he asked.

As well as threatening the five men, the authorities said they had rounded up 45 people after the Kunming attack for posting rumours that could have caused public unrest.

"Some individuals spread rumours that groups of terrorists had infiltrated other cities and that other attacks had happened. These rumours deliberately caused panic and disturbed social order," the police said, adding that some of the people had been warned and others detained.

The threats from the cybersecurity unit came one week after Xi Jinping, the Chinese president, named himself the head of a new Central Internet Security group that will enhance the government's control of cyberspace.

They also came as Xinjiang 's party secretary, Zhang Chunxian, blamed the violence in Kunming on "the fast spread of information".

He suggested that Muslim Uighurs are being radicalized by circumventing China's web controls to watch videos posted by Islamists on the web.

"By that I mean, 90 per cent of terrorism in Xinjiang comes from jumping the [Great Firewall]. Violence and terrorism keep happening due to the videos on the internet," he said.

Additional reporting by Adam Wu

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For decades it has seemed as if God has played a great joke on mankind, granting the best fuel reserves to the worst places. Iran, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Turkmenistan – all have been able to run fairly repressive regimes, feeling no need to become open, competitive democracies. As Vladimir Putin has found, if you own the gas which the rich world needs, then you can get away with murder.

Consider yesterday’s European Union summit. Leaders agreed, in effect, to be jolly annoyed about Putin’s annexation of Crimea. They may even cut up some oligarchs’ Harrods storecards. But to go much further? Difficult, when Russia is supplying a third of Europe’s gas. As Finland’s Europe minister candidly put it: “There isn’t that much that we could do, at the end of the day. And I think the Russians know that.”

Europe is a recession-struck continent dependent on a Kremlin-controlled energy price. Putin cleverly cut Gazprom tariffs to the region last year, ramping up its dependence on Russian gas to record levels. And in so doing, he effectively bought EU foreign policy.

He’d find it harder to buy America’s nowadays. As Barack Obama considers his options, he has a substantial new weapon that he is not sure how to deploy. In the last few years, the shale revolution has utterly transformed America’s energy fortunes. When Putin invaded Georgia, it seemed as if the US was running out of natural gas – and George W Bush meekly wondered whether to buy some from Russia. Since then, the shale bonanza has sent American crude output soaring by 60 per cent, taking the country into a thoroughly unexpected era of energy abundance. Its gas prices have fallen by two thirds; factories and jobs are flooding back to former rust belt states. By the end of this decade, America will be exporting more energy than it imports.

This is redrawing the global energy map, and the implications go way beyond the economic. If America doesn’t need Arabian oil, why should it spend billions having the US Fifth Fleet keep the peace in the Persian Gulf? Why spill so much blood and treasure in overseas entanglements where no national interest can be found? Why not let Europe sort out its own back yard – and let this debt-addled continent confront the consequences of its failure to pay for a proper military?

But events in the Crimea have now added another question: why shouldn’t America use its new-found energy reserves as a weapon? It would be easy enough to do. If Barack Obama were to export more of this gas, he could send world prices to the floor – hurting not just the Kremlin, but the oligarchs who support Putin. Of all the weapons in America’s arsenal, its new energy power is perhaps what the Kremlin fears most.

Russia is, in effect, a giant gas company with a military attached to it. Moscow’s interests are synonymous with that of its state-owned gas concerns, which explains much of its bizarre foreign policy. Why should Putin have protected Bashar Assad when he was gassing his own people? We were reminded of the answer on Christmas Day, when Russia signed a 25-year deal with the Assad regime, handing the state-controlled energy firm Soyuzneftegaz a chunk of the Levant Basin. In this way, Assad’s Syria has joined Putin’s virtual empire.

This is why hawks in Washington are not content with Obama deploying F-16 fighters to Poland, and are urging him to retaliate with robust pipeline politics. A Texan congressman, Ted Poe, yesterday introduced a Bill that would speed up the delivery of American gas to Ukraine and other threatened regions. John Boehner, the Republican Speaker of the House, is telling Obama his prevaricating over gas export licenses has helped Putin “to finance his geopolitical goals”. The fuel hawks are clear: energy has strategic value, and Obama’s failure to use it has emboldened the enemy.

Another weapon the president might deploy is approving the Keystone XL pipeline, which would take oil to coastal refineries, ready for export. Then he could lift the ban on exporting crude oil, which has lingered since the crisis of the Seventies. He could fast-track the 15 gas export terminals still waiting for planning approval, to send supplies to America’s allies. All of these demands have been made, for years, in the name of cheaper energy. The Greens protested, as did those who feared exports would make fuel pricy again. But only now does exporting energy seem like an essential tool of American statecraft – a weapon in a new cold war.

It’s not hard to guess what Hillary Clinton, favourite to be the next US president, would do. When she was Obama’s secretary of state, she spotted early on the chance to exploit American oil. The word “energy” was mentioned 81 times in her Quadrennial Diplomacy and Development Review, which proposed building a Bureau of Energy Resources “to unite our diplomatic and programmatic efforts”. This bureau has been working away behind the scenes and is credited for helping Ukraine reduce its dependence on Russian energy – although not, as it turned out, fast enough.

The hawks can argue that America’s new weapon has already been used to great effect – on Iran. The recent sanctions, credited with forcing the ayatollahs to the negotiating table, only worked because the US had so much energy. Not so long ago, if 1.5 million barrels a day of Iranian oil were taken off the market, prices would spike – hurting everyone. But this time, America was able to persuade its allies that it would increase production, keeping prices stable. When the US threatened deeper cuts to Iranian exports, the ayatollahs blinked. Without the shale revolution, such a gambit would not have been possible.

So after Tehran, should Moscow be the next testing ground for America’s E-Bomb? Obama is a naturally cautious president, and here he has much to be cautious about. He is being asked, in effect, to behave like the Russians – and explicitly use energy as a diplomatic trump card. This risks making any future development of America’s energy industry look like a hostile act. Also, Putin would respond, which would hurt his European allies a lot more than it would hurt America. As yesterday’s summit showed, Germany has no appetite for confronting the Kremlin. Even conservative Die Welt declared that “the West should embrace Putin”.

The shale revolution, and its awesome implications, have taken most of Washington by surprise – it was unforeseen, even six years ago. And in six years’ time, America will have overtaken Saudi Arabia as the world’s top supplier of hydrocarbons, with all the extra clout that will bring. Ten years after that, it will be completely self-sufficient – a development that may transform world politics as profoundly as the collapse of the Berlin Wall.

But for now, the Ukraine crisis will have served to remind Obama that America is not – yet – ready to use its energy glut to full effect. It doesn’t have the export apparatus, and is only beginning to learn how to use the extra leverage. But it is, at least, far clearer now why America needs the ability to pump out far more gas when it’s needed – and this, in itself, should focus Russian minds. Like the Cold War, the principle will be that of deterrence. Putin will be less likely to strike if he realizes that, next time, America and its new energy industry will be ready for him.

Fraser Nelson is the Editor of 'The Spectator’

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The celibate Dalai Lama has thrown his considerable moral weight behind gay marriage, condemning homophobia and saying sex was fine as long as it was consensual.

The Buddhist monk offered his views on the issue during his latest tour of the United States, where he was welcomed on Thursday in Washington by top politicians and offered the customary prayer that opens each Senate session.

He said that gay marriage was up to each government and was ultimately "individual business".

"If two people – a couple – really feel that way is more practical, more sort of satisfaction, both sides fully agree, then OK," he told an online talk show by veteran radio and television host Larry King.

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US fruit supplier Chiquita has bought Irish rival Fyffes, creating the world's largest banana company.

The pair of fruit distributors has struck a stock-for-stock deal which will give Chiquita and Fyffes shareholders 50.7pc and 49.3pc of the new company respectively.

US-headquartered Chiquita and Dublin-based Fyffes said their boards voted unanimously in favour of the deal, in a joint announcement on Monday morning. Both the Chiquita and Fyffes brands will continue, they said.

The new company, ChiquitaFyffes, will be worth around $1bn (£600m). It will be listed in New York but based in Dublin. The pair said they hoped the merger would create $40m in pre-tax savings by the end of 2016.

Chiquita shareholders will get one share of the new company for each share held. Fyffes investors will get 0.1567 of a share in the new group for each existing share, which values it at a premium of 38pc over its Friday's closing price.

David McCann, executive chairman of Fyffes, will become the new company's chief executive, while Ed Lonergan, Chiquita's boss, will become chairman.

Chiquita is the larger of the two companies, valued at $507.7m (£303.7m) at Friday's closing price. This compares with Fyffe whose market capitalization stands at €264.7m (£220m).

Mr McCann hailed the deal as "transformative", while Mr Lonergan dubbed it a "milestone transaction".

"We know Fyffes well and our shared heritage will help to ensure a smooth integration as we work to bring best practices across geographies and business units to achieve substantial operating efficiencies," added Mr Lonergan.

Goldman Sachs and Wells Fargo Securities acted as financial advisers for Chiquita and its board and Lazard for Fyffes.

Fyffes shares climbed 29pc in early trading.

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Desperate Britons are turning to Facebook to advertise their organs for sale at up to £30,000 despite the medical and legal risks involved, according to a newspaper investigation.

In the UK it is an offense under the Human Tissue Act to buy or even advertise organs for sale. This means that anyone offering to sell their own organs – even if they intend to travel abroad to have the operation – could face prison.

The Sunday Post discovered that there are people willing to take that risk. A reporter posing as the brother of a woman in need of a transplant advertised on Facebook. Within a week he had received 11 offers, two of which were from people living in the UK.

One father-of-three from the north-east of England contacted the newspaper to say that it “would be a big thing to do but for the right amount I would be willing”. A fee of £30,000 was subsequently discussed.

A 22-year-old from Northampton offered a kidney for £20,000 as he needed to return to Hungary with his pregnant fiancé.

Reporters also found evidence that people were placing adverts and seeking potential buyers for their organs, including a 28-year-old chef from Aberdeenshire and a mother from Hampshire.

Alan Clamp, chief executive of the Human Tissue Authority which regulates live organ donations throughout the UK, said: “It is illegal to offer or seek payment for organs for sale under the Human Tissue Act, and no operation from a living donor can go ahead without our approval.

“Before a transplant from a living donor goes ahead, the hospital transplant team will assess if the donor is suitable and run several tests to ensure the transplant will be as successful as possible.

“An independent assessor, acting on behalf of the HTA, will then carry out interviews with both parties and report back.

“We need to satisfy ourselves that the donor knows the risks involved, that the donor has given consent freely and no reward has been offered or received."

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Hundreds of people have taken to the streets in Moscow to demand that Putin tighten his grip on Crimea.

Russian nationalist forces gathered in central Moscow on Monday to ask the Russian president, Vladimir Putin, to take more decisive measures in Crimea.

Several hundred people were holding Russian flags and banners reading "Sevastopol is a Russian city," while leaders of nationalist movements were pronouncing that Crimea would help Russia "to restore its lost glory."

The well-known Russian nationalist Eduard Limonov said from the stage that Russia must return all its territories lost after the USSR collapse. And others agreed with him.

"Kiev is mother of Russian cities, Crimea is just a first step," said an activist of Velikoe Otechestvo party, while speaking from the stage.

More than a dozen of activists were explaining "what really was happening in Ukraine" and criticising actions of Western leaders there, saying the referendum in Crimea would be a historical moment for Russia.

"Blood, tears and economic crisis is what waiting Ukraine. The only choice is holding referendum not only in Crimea but in other parts of Ukraine as well," said Konstantin Babkin, leader of Partiya Dela, an officially-registered party, but one which is not represented in the Russian parliament.

He called the current Ukrainian authorities "fascists joined together by hatred towards everything Russian".

Other speakers said that if there was a need to invade Ukraine, Russia should do that.

Several attendees at the rally suggested they had been compelled to attend in order to create the impression there was strong support among Russians for Mr Putin's actions in Ukraine.

Roman Kuznetsov, who was holding an anti-American banner, said he came to the rally because he wanted to support Russian authorities. But when asked what he thought about current Ukrainian authorities, he said he liked them.

"I am not good at politics," he said eventually.

One of the protesters said she wanted to see Crimea as part of Russia, because historically it was Russian territory. She refused to give her name and joined the crowd shouting "Berkut," in support of Ukraine's police, which, she said, had suffered from the actions of the current Ukrainian authorities.

Several people speaking from the stage said that they were Ukrainian refugees in Russia and that it was dangerous for them to stay in Ukraine.

But human rights groups said earlier that there were no refugees from Ukraine in Russia.

Meanwhile, the Russian Foreign Ministry issued on Monday a high-pitched statement, urging Western politicians, rights activists and media to pay attention to violations of rights of Russians in Ukraine.

The statement said several demonstrators were injured in Kharkiv, after masked men – who Russia believed were Right Sector activists – started to shoot at people.

It also said that seven Russian journalists were arrested in Dnepropetrovsk and that Ukrainian authorities had closed the border for Russians going to Ukraine.

"We are surprised with shameful silence if our Western partners, human rights groups and foreign media. This poses the question where the infamous objectivity and devotion to democracy are," it said.

SEE ALSO: This Is An Actual Billboard In Crimea

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Syria's health care system is on the brink of collapse, with medics forced to engage in "brutal medical practices" in order to save lives: knocking out patients with metal bars because of lack of anesthesia, or amputating infants' limbs for lack of other ways to treat their injuries, an international charity organization said in a report published on Monday.

Newborns die in hospital incubators during power outages, while millions of children have been exposed to deadly diseases, some of which are preventable with vaccinations and basic medical equipment, Save the Children said.

The conflict has ravaged Syria for three years and has hit the country's heath facilities and health providers hard. Hospitals have been bombed by government forces in rebel-held areas. Armed men with the opposition have forced their way into clinics to have their fighters treated. Many doctors have fled the country to escape harassment from the warring sides.

"This humanitarian crisis has fast become a health crisis," Save the Children's regional director Roger Hearn said in a statement. "The desperate measures to which medical personnel are resorting to keep children alive are increasingly harrowing."

Simply finding a doctor is a matter of luck, Mr Hearn also said. Finding one with the necessary equipment and medication to provide proper treatment has become almost impossible, he added.

The report quotes a doctor saying that most children brought to his clinic suffer from burns and fractures. The doctor, who is not named in the report, says they need complicated operations that cannot be performed in his small facility.

"In some cases, we have to cut their limbs off to try to save their lives, because if we don't they will bleed to death," the doctor told Save the Children.

Also worrying is the re-emergence of deadly and disfiguring diseases such as polio and measles, which can permanently maim and paralyze, the charity said. It estimates that up to 80,000 children are likely to be infected by polio's most aggressive form, and are silently spreading the disease.

Most illnesses affecting children in war-torn Syria are treatable, the report says. Many like measles, diarrhea and respiratory illnesses would be preventable by a functioning health system.

The charity says a total of 26 measles cases were reported in Syria in 2010, before the war. In contrast, in the first week of 2014, 84 cases of measles in children under five were recorded in northern Syria alone.

Syria's crisis began as largely peaceful protests against President Bashar Assad's rule in March 2011. The revolt transformed into civil war in which more than 140,000 people have been killed. Millions of Syrians have fled from their homes, seeking shelter in neighboring countries or in safer parts of their homeland.

Edited by Steve Wilson

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The 16 unmanned submarines will explore the world's oceans as part of a research project by Rutgers University.

Each 2.2 meter-long glider will rely on the energy from buoyancy changes to propel it forwards at speeds of around 35 km per day as it navigates using altitude and depth sensors, a GPS receiver and altimeter.

The drones will continually collect data about the oceans' currents, temperature and salinity to improve the accuracy of current climate and weather forecasting. Levels of phytoplankton around the vehicles will also be monitored using sustainable optic sensors.

The data will be transmitted to the research time via a telecommunications link provided by Iridium satellites every time each submarine surfaces.

David Wigglesworth, vice president and general manager of Iridium, said: "The health of our oceans is truly an indicator of the health of our planet, and the Challenger Glider Mission will provide the kind of high-resolution data desperately needed by researchers to evaluate and assess the current ocean state."

Scott Glenn, Co-leader of the Challenger Glider Mission and Professor of Physical Oceanography at Rutgers University, said: "The technology underpinnings of this mission are truly enabling our researchers to gather more and better data than ever before, enhancing the basis of knowledge for future generations.

"Part of our goal with this mission is to increase global ocean literacy. This expanded dataset will enable students and researchers to focus on the science of their local waters, as well as be a part of a global research community, all working toward understanding the ocean's role in regulating the changing climate and weather."

The project is scheduled to last until 2016, during which each glider is expected to travel between 6,000 and 8,000 km.

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Is there a formula for lasting love?

The formula for the perfect first date, well that's easy; Candlelit dinner + kissing = a call back.

The perfect relationship? Timing + communication x mutual attraction – emotional baggage = intimacy.

Penis + pulse = One night stand. Relationships seem simple when you put them like that.

And yet we've all had those romances where the sums seem to add up, where the right boxes were ticked and the scores were even... but somehow it doesn't add up to love.

Love is frustrating, elusive, intangible. It starts in that sweet spot between intimacy and excitement which is impossible to manufacture and tiring to maintain. Can the algorithms of online dating sites or indeed the long odds of stumbling upon your perfect partner down the local pub ever predict where, when or for how long cupid will strike?

Whilst science has not yet manufactured the perfect partner, mathematicians are claiming to have found the formula that predicts how long love will last. Research commissioned by MSN has revealed a new love equation that determines the key ingredients to a successful, long-lasting relationship – with factors such as a good sense of humor ranking in importance alongside a person's number of previous sexual partners.

According to the 2,000 males and females surveyed, 25 per cent of both men and women believe their partner should have had four sexual partners before them (with one in five men clinging to the traditional belief that they should be their ideal woman’s “first”).

The survey also found that men prioritize looks over intelligence and are twice as likely as women to believe that good sex is important for a happy, enduring relationship.

The biggest surprise for me was that the number one trait we're all apparently after is wit. So there you go, it's not sex-appeal but sparkling banter that'll make you a hit with the opposite sex.

It is claimed that the resulting formula (L = 8 + .5Y - .2P + .9Hm + .3Mf + J - .3G - .5(Sm - Sf)2 + I + 1.5C - see key below) can determine how long a potential or current relationship can be expected to last.

Does it really work? I decided to test the hypothesis through extremely scientific means (in other words, by broadcasting to the world, via Twitter, that I am single and ready to mingle in a mathematically-approved fashion). I applied the formula to various unsuspecting male friends and volunteers over the course of an afternoon, and eventually found a man with whom love would apparently last 12.9 years.

Only trouble is... I don't fancy him. And despite the 12.9 happy years I could offer him, he doesn't particularly fancy giving it a go either. That's science for you. Back to the drawing board.

The formula explained:

L = 8 + .5Y - .2P + .9Hm + .3Mf + J - .3G - .5(Sm - Sf)2 + I + 1.5C

L: The predicted length in years of the relationship

Y: The number of years the two people knew each other before the relationship became serious

P: The number of previous partners of both people added together

Hm: The importance the male partner attaches to honesty in the relationship

Mf : The importance the female attaches to money in the relationship

J: The importance both attach to humor (added together)

G: The importance both attach to good looks (added together)

Sm and Sf = The importance male and female attach to sex

I = The importance attached to having good in-laws (added together)

C= The importance attached to children in the relationship (added together)

Note: All 'importance' measures can be scaled from 1 to 5 where 1 is not important at all and 5 is very important.

Research findings for same sex couples differed slightly from heterosexual couples and so the formula changes slightly in light of this to L = 8 + .5Y - .2P + 2J - .3G - .5(S1 - S2)2 - I + 1.5C (where S1 and S2 are the two partner’s ratings for the importance of sex).

NOW WATCH: The Truth About 'The Most Interesting Man In The World'

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Contagious yawning is a phenomenon that most humans have experienced but its underlying cause still divides scientific opinion.

Far from being a sign of sleepiness or boredom, some researchers believe it is a mechanism to cool the brain which has been hardwired into our systems from ancient times when groups needed to stay awake and vigilant.

Others think it is a result of unconscious herding behavior which demonstrates empathy and signals that we are part of the group.

Now scientists have discovered that chimpanzees can also ‘catch’ the yawns of humans and other chimps in an intriguing glimpse into our shared ancestry.

And, in a hint that contagious yawning is important to group dynamics, researchers discovered they will not copy the yawns of an unfamiliar species, such as baboons or even chimps they do not know.

The researchers found chimpanzees showed contagious yawning when looking at familiar chimpanzees, familiar humans, and unfamiliar humans. But they ignored the signal from unfamiliar chimpanzees or an unfamiliar species (gelada baboons).

Dr Matthew Campbell of Yerkes National Primate Research Centre at Emory University, said: "Copying the facial expressions of others helps us to adopt and understand their current state.

"That humans known and unknown elicited empathy similarly to group members, and more than unknown chimpanzees, shows flexibility in engagement.”

In 2009 Dr Campbell and Frans de Waal published a study which showed contagious yawning in chimpanzees is not just a marker of sleepiness, but that it is a sign of a social connection between individuals.

A study by the University of Pisa in Italy in 2011 found that yawns are more contagious when they come from family or friends.

Humans are most likely to catch or pass on a yawn when interacting with close family members, followed on a decreasing scale by friends, then acquaintances and lastly strangers – the same pattern that is seen for other measures of empathy.

Children do not develop contagious yawning until the age of four or five– the same point at which they develop the ability to interpret other people's emotions properly.

They found that half of all yawns are contagious between family members, compared with about a quarter of those between friends, an eighth between acquaintances and fewer than one in ten between strangers.

The results also showed that the delay in which a yawn is passed on is longer between strangers than between people who know each other well.

Last year Lund University in Sweden showed that chimps can catch yawns from humans.

The study was published in Proceedings of the Royal Society B.

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The survivor of a serious motorbike crash has made surgical history after his entire face was rebuilt using 3D printed parts.

Stephen Power is thought to be one of the first trauma patients in the world to have 3D printing technology used at every stage of the medical procedure to restore his looks.

Doctors at Morriston Hospital, Swansea, had to break his cheekbones again before rebuilding his face in an eight-hour operation.

Despite wearing a crash helmet Mr Power, 29, suffered multiple trauma injuries in the accident in 2012, which left him in hospital for four months.

“I can't remember the accident - I remember five minutes before and then waking up in the hospital a few months later. I broke both cheek bones, top jaw, my nose and fractured my skull," he said.

Consultant maxillofacial surgeon Adrian Sugar said: “We were able to do a pretty good job with all his facial injuries, with the exception of his left cheek and eye socket.

“We fixed his facial fractures pretty well but he had damaged his left eye and the ophthalmologists did not want us to do anything that might damage his sight further.

“That was a good move because his eyesight has mostly recovered. But as a result we did not get his left cheekbone in the right place and we did not even try to reconstruct the very thin bones around his eye socket.

“So the result was that his cheekbone was too far out and his eye was sunk in and dropped.”

Last year, surgeons started planning the surgery to restore the symmetry to Mr Power’s face.

The project was the work of the Centre for Applied Reconstructive Technologies in Surgery, a partnership between Morriston Hospital’s Maxillofacial Unit and the National Centre for Product Design and Development Research (PDR) at Cardiff Metropolitan University.

The team used scanned 3D images of Mr Power’s face to design guides to cut and position the bones, as well as plates to hold the bones in place. All the models – along with the finished guides and medical-grade titanium implants – were produced by 3D printing.

Mr Sugar said: “Stephen had a very complex injury and correcting it involved bones having to be re-cut into several fragments.

“Being able to do that and to put them back in the right position was a complex three dimensional exercise. It made sense to plan it in three dimensions and that is why 3D printing came in – and successive 3D printing, as at every different stage we had a model.

Mr Power, from Cardiff, still has a long way to go with his overall physical recovery. But the success of his facial reconstruction has huge implications for others.

Looking at the results of the surgery, Mr Power says he feels transformed - with his face now much closer in shape to how it was before the accident.

"It is life changing," he said.

"I could see the difference straight away the day I woke up from the surgery."

Having used a hat and glasses to mask his injuries before the operation, Mr Power has said he already feels more confident.

"I'm hoping I won't have to disguise myself - I won't have to hide away," he said.

"I'll be able to do day-to-day things, go and see people, walk in the street, even go to any public areas."

Mr Sugar described it as an evolution of 3D technology, taking what had been done before not just one step but two or three steps further.

“Previous efforts elsewhere to take it to this step have failed and so we have had to learn from those experiences.

“This is really the first time we’ve taken it to this stage, where everything to the very last screws being inserted has been planned and modeled in advance – and worked sweetly.”

Mr Sugar said the same techniques would be used to help many other patients in future.

Design engineer Sean Peel said the latest advance should encourage greater use of 3D printing within the NHS.

"It tends to be used for individual really complicated cases as it stands - in quite a convoluted, long-winded design process," he said.

"The next victory will be to get this process and technique used more widely as the costs fall and as the design tools improve."

Mr Power's operation is currently being featured in an exhibition at the Science Museum in London, called 3D Printing: The Future.

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Going on holiday is a great way to unwind and, let's be honest, indulge in all those vices we've denied ourselves in preparation for it. But after all the blood, sweat and tears we've put into our training in the weeks preceding the trip it would be a huge shame to let it all go in a week or two, nobody wants to start again from square one.

Business trips don't provide the same opportunities for rest and relaxation, but nor should they mean you have to forego your fitness plans until you're back on home soil.

Here are some simple tips you can implement into your travel-planning to make sure you keep your body ticking over when you're away. Damage control is the name of the game when forced to take time off from your regular routine.

Before you go: With some prior planning you can make things pretty simple and give yourself a great chance of staying in shape throughout your trip.

Book the right hotel: Searching for a hotel with a gym or swimming pool really helps make training on holiday or business trip a breeze. You don't need anything particularly fancy, I'll show you a great workout with minimal equipment later in this article. The great thing about staying in a hotel with a gym is that you can workout first thing in the morning. This maximizes your chances of getting your workout in before back-to-back meetings (or too many beers by the pool) rule it out.

Research the area: Before you depart, do a little research on the area you'll be visiting so you know where to find the best restaurants, health food stores and juice bars. Naturally this is a little easier when visiting countries like Australia and the USA as many of the brands will be recognizable and easy to assess for quality. When traveling to less well-known countries there are great online resources available to help. For example on a recent trip to Peru I used TripAdvisor to find healthy restaurants in Lima and Lonely Planet forums to locate a supplement shop. Incidentally, if you're planning an off-the-beaten-path adventure, locating a store where you can buy some whey protein and basic vitamins is a good idea for keeping your protein intake high and your immune system reinforced.

Exercise: Before we get into the actual workouts, never underestimate the value of a brisk walk or steady cycle for keeping your overall health and fitness in order; steady-state cardio of this kind is also great for fat burning. Furthermore, heading out for a walk or cycle is a wonderful way to explore the local area, you'll often discover hidden gems this way.

OK, now down to the workouts. While on any trip away from home you won't want to spend too long in the gym, so these maintenance workouts will get your body ticking over in minimal time.

Beginner/No Gym: This is a body weight regime designed to work your muscles even if you have no access to a gym. The circuit consists of 5 rounds each increasing in time increments so you would perform each exercise for 15, 30, 45, 60 and 90 second rounds respectively. Move from one exercise to the next with no break (do your best on the planks and pressups, take a break if you need to).

Here is the workout:reverse lunge vs plank vs jumping jacks vs press-up .

It's a very simple circuit. This workout will be over in less than 15 minutes but it'll spike your metabolism and get you sweating for sure.

Intermediate: For the intermediate workout, we're going to use some additional resistance, whether that be a kettle bell (some exercises may need to be one handed for this) barbell, medicine ball or dumbells. This workout uses basic compound movements to tax your entire body, though this time rather than increasing duration under strain we'll be decreasing reps.

Start with ten reps of each exercise, then perform another circuit of 8 reps, then drop by 2 reps until you hit 2 reps. Be sure to choose a moderate weight for this workout.

Here is the workout:squat vs bench press (can be done from floor with reduced range), upright row, shoulder press, bent over row .

If you only have very light weights available, you could always perform this circuit more than once. I seldom find this necessary myself, because the lack of rest between exercises makes this a short but intense circuit.

Advanced: For the more advanced trainer I would recommend splitting your training efforts between sprints or maximum exertion cardio and heavy strength training.

The sprint training is best done out on a track, playing field or beach. If going outside is not a good option, you could always swim. Front crawl at maximum exertion would be a great alternative.

With regard to weightlifting, Selecting a 3x5 program is enough to convey to your body that although you're away and not training as much, you still intend to keep your hard-earned muscle. By 3x5 we mean 3 sets of 5 reps with heavy weights. Remember this is only applicable to those who are already fairly seasoned with their weight training. You'll want to be certain that you can handle the kind of weight needed for such low rep ranges to be effective.

Here is the workout: squat, Romanian deadlift, bench press, military press, upright row, pull-ups / bent over row.

This workout requires a proper gym with heavy resistance so you'll probably need to do some prior planning with regard to your workout location. Its always a good idea to contact the facility ahead of time to negotiate a good guest rate; this reduces your exposure to extortionate non-member rates when you arrive.

Scott Laidler is a personal trainer and personal development coach based in London. Contact Scott at www.scottlaidler.com for personal training and online fitness coaching

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Britain’s most valuable company Royal Dutch Shell plans to cut its upstream spending in America by a fifth and reorganize its operations into smaller “performance units” in its first major shake up since Ben van Beurden took over as chief executive officer at the beginning of the year.

In terms of upstream operations in the Americas "Shell is shrinking this portfolio and cost base, with 2014 spending to be reduced by 20 pc compared to 2013, and redirecting onshore investment to the lowest cost gas acreage with the best integration potential, and into on-going exploration in liquids-rich shales,” the company said.

Shell is reshaping its business after the company surprised the market at the beginning of the year with a profits warning and revealed a 48pc drop in fourth-quarter earnings to $2.9bn, its worst three-month period for five years.

“With sharper accountability in the company, this approach will target growth investment more effectively, focus on areas of the business where performance improvement is most required, and drive asset sales from non-strategic positions,” said van Beurden.

The new organizational changes are part of a drive to cut capital spending at the Anglo-Dutch energy giant to $37bn this year, from $46bn in 2013 and prune its portfolio with about $15bn of asset sales.

The Telegraphrevealed last month that Shell had place three of its ageing operating platforms in the North Sea up for sale after it had raised $2.14bn from the sale of assets in Brazil and offshore Australia. More disposals are expected.

“This approach is driving hard choices on today’s asset base, new opportunities, and disposals plans, where we have recently announced exits from Australia and Italy downstream, Wheatstone LNG in Australia, and US gas-to-liquids,” said van Beurden.

Transforming its US business will be a key challenge for Shell, which is yet to benefit from the revolution in Shale oil and gas after its main prospect failed to deliver returns. The company is currently selling a 700,000 acre area across Texas and Kansas following a re-evaluation of its US shale assets last year.

“I am determined that, by focusing sharply on our three key priorities – better financial performance, in particular in our Upstream Americas and Downstream businesses, enhanced capital efficiency, and continuing strong project delivery, we will continue to grow our cash flow and improve our returns,” said van Beurden.

The company also plans to focus on “future opportunities” in some of the world’s richest resource basins in East Africa, Iraq and Kazakhstan after earnings from exploration and production activities last year were impacted “factors such as losses in North America and the security situation in Nigeria.”

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