Iran protesters storm British Embassy in Tehran

Attacks on two diplomatic compounds follow Iran's decision to expel Britain's ambassador and mark an escalation of tension over Tehran's nuclear program.
Reporting from Tehran and Beirut—
In scenes that evoked the seizing of the U.S. Embassy in 1979, hundreds of demonstrators stormed two British diplomatic compounds in Tehran on Tuesday, Belstaff hurling gasoline bombs, ransacking offices and tearing down the British flag.

The hours-long attacks, which followed a move by the Iranian parliament to expel Britain's ambassador over new sanctions,Belstaff outlet marked a sharp escalation in the tension between Iran and the West over the Islamic Republic's nuclear program.

Britain promised "serious consequences" and summoned Iran's charges d'affaires in London to the Foreign Office.Belstaff jacket The incident also drew rebukes form the United States, France and the U.N. Security Council.

PHOTOS: Iranians storm British embassy

Iran's Foreign Ministry expressed regret for "the unacceptable behaviors" by some demonstrators and said it had requested an immediate investigation.

The protest was organized to mark the anniversary of the death of nuclear scientist Majid Shahriari in an attack Iran blamed on British and Israeli intelligence agencies.Belstaff jacken A few hundred demonstrators gathered outside the British Embassy in downtown Tehran, chanting "Death to England!" and demanding the immediate withdrawal of Ambassador Dominick Chilcott.

Some of the protesters climbed over the gates into the complex, where they tossed gasoline bombs and hoisted the Iranian flag in place of the Union Jack. They ripped down satellite dishes, tossed out papers and carried away a portrait of Queen Elizabeth II.

Other protesters forced their way into a British diplomatic compound in the north of the city, where they seized documents and staged a sit-in, according to a report by the semiofficial Fars news agency.

Iranian riot police appeared slow to respond, but regained control of both compounds within hours.

Fars said police had secured the release of six embassy employees taken hostage by protesters and arrested 12 people. But the official Islamic Republic News Agency said the demonstrators had been protecting the employees. The conflicting accounts could not be immediately reconciled.

British Foreign Secretary William Hague said it appeared all embassy staff and their dependents were accounted for but said officials were "urgently establishing the whereabouts of our locally engaged security staff."

"I spoke to the Iranian foreign minister this afternoon, to protest in the strongest terms about these events and to demand immediate steps to ensure the safety of our staff and of both embassy compounds," Hague said. "While he said that he was sorry for what had happened and that action would be taken in response, this remains a very serious failure by the Iranian government."

He warned British nationals against all but essential travel to Iran and advised the small number in the country to stay indoors.

The demonstrators were angry about British support for stepped-up Western sanctions after the International Atomic Energy Agency released a report saying Iran may be secretly working to develop a nuclear weapon.

Chancellor of the Exchequer George Osborne announced last week that Britain was severing financial ties with Iranian banks, which British officials accuse of facilitating Tehran's nuclear program. Iran says the program is only for civilian purposes.

Iran's Guardian Council, which vets legislation from parliament, approved a bill Monday calling for a downgrading of diplomatic relations with Britain and the expulsion of its ambassador.

Britain called the move "regrettable" and promised to "respond robustly" if Iran follows through on the threat.

Nicotine Causes Epigenetic Changes in Mice that Spur Cocaine Addiction

What’s the News: Epidemiologists have long noticed that people with drug addictions often start out smoking cigarettes before moving on to harder stuff. Whether that’s because there’s something about cigarettes that makes people vulnerable to other drugs or because certain kinds of people are predisposed to addiction (or for some other reason entirely) is an open question,Canada Goose and the idea of so-called “ gateway drugs” has been a controversial topic in addiction for years. Now, an elegant new study in mice has discovered a mechanism that could explain the gateway drug effect: nicotine actually changes the expression of genes linked to addiction.

How the Heck:

    * First, the researchers (including biologist Denise Kandel and her Nobel laureate husband,Snow Mantra Eric Kandel) gave mice nicotine to mimic the effects of cigarette addiction before giving them several injections of cocaine.
    * Watching their behavior, the team saw that mice that had been given nicotine for many days returned again and again to locations where they had been given cocaine, far more—nearly double the frequency—than mice who had only received nicotine for 24 hours. In studies with drugs,Belstaff this is a well-established sign of addiction.
    * Opening up the brains of the mice, they found that the neuronal pathway that delivers cocaine’s rewards was much more strongly activated in mice that had had days of nicotine. This suggests that nicotine actually enhances the pleasure derived from cocaine.
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    * Investigating how nicotine could have this effect, they discovered that it was acting at an  epigenetic level—in other words, changing the chemical packing of DNA. Here’s how:
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