Newspaper editors across the country are having a field day with the latest Department of Transportation regulation: airlines must "provide peanut-free buffer zones on request and with advance notice."

• A DOT spokesman explains that airlines must not serve peanuts to anyone seated in the same row or the rows in front or in back of someone who has requested a peanut-free zone in advance.

• The DOT issued the regulation after complaints from about a dozen peanut-allergy sufferers.

• Airlines that do not keep their peanuts in check will be in violation of federal law and could be fined.

One airline's public relations spokeswoman said her office had received so many calls on the matter that the staff was "going nuts."