WILLITS, Calif. (AP) — In this small logging town in Northern California's redwood country, small blue signs urging water conservation are almost everywhere you look.

Encouraging news about the job market and strong earnings from Disney helped drive U.S. stocks sharply higher in afternoon trading Thursday. The market was rebounding a day after posting small losses. Investors were looking ahead to the government's January employment survey, due out Friday, and what it will augur for the economy.

WELLINGTON, New Zealand (AP) — The story of a Salvadoran fisherman who says he survived more than a year adrift on the Pacific Ocean raises many medical questions. The Associated Press spoke with Claude Piantadosi, a professor of medicine at Duke University and author of the book "The Biology of Human Survival," to find out what is physically possible and for his view on the tale of Jose Salvador Alvarenga. This is an edited version of the interview:

WASHINGTON (AP) — Large food companies are trying to head off state efforts to enact mandatory labeling of genetically modified ingredients by proposing new voluntary labels nationwide.

SOCHI, Russia (AP) — Despite a temporary Russian ban on liquids in carry-on luggage, some air travelers heading to the Sochi Olympics through Moscow have brought toothpaste and other toiletries past security checkpoints without any problems.

WASHINGTON (AP) — To feel what you touch — that's the holy grail for artificial limbs. In a step toward that goal, European researchers created a robotic hand that let an amputee feel differences between a bottle, a baseball and a mandarin orange.

PHILADELPHIA (AP) — Utility crews were working feverishly to restore power to hundreds of thousands of homes and businesses in Pennsylvania and surrounding states that were still in the dark and cold on Thursday after an ice storm knocked out electricity to more than a million customers, damage one official likened to that from a hurricane.