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BMW Opens New Car Plant Where the Workforce is All Aged Over 50

February 19, 2011

An employee at BMW rests between shifts at the plant in Dingolfing.

Its name is a byword for providing drivers with every comfort – and now it seems BMW is taking the same approach with its workforce. A section of the luxury car manufacturer’s works at Dingolfing in Southern Bavaria has been nicknamed ‘Altstadt‘ – German for Old Town – by the grateful employees who say they might otherwise be on the job scrapheap. (Pics)

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Alternative Transportation, Brain, Great Videos, Science & Technology News

BrainDriver – Researchers Drive Car with Their Minds

February 19, 2011

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iDV_62QoHjY[/youtube]

It’s not quite Professor Xavier-level mind control, but researchers at AutoNOMOS Labs in Germany have developed a system that drives a vehicle by reading a person’s brain waves. So this is what it feels like to watch the future.

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Great New Product, New Inventions, Science & Technology News

New Invention Converts Plastic Grocery Bags Into Fuel at Home

February 19, 2011

Desktop machine turns plastic into fuel.

Plastic bags help you carry your groceries home, they make excellent liners for smaller-sized trash cans, and now they can help you to heat your home. A Japanese inventor has found a way to convert plastic grocery bags, bottles and caps into usable petroleum.

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Education, Science & Technology News

Kids Who Skip School in California Are Tracked by GPS

February 18, 2011

A student holds his hand-held GPS, which will help track his whereabouts and will help him stay in school.

Frustrated by students habitually skipping class, police and school officials in Anaheim are turning to GPS tracking to ensure they come to class.

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Art, Photo Perspectives, Science & Technology News

Amazing Images From the 2010 International Science and Engineering Visualization Challenge

February 18, 2011

The world’s most detailed 3D model of HIV.

We’re always suckers for a good art/science mashup, so perhaps it’s no surprise that we’re feeling pretty good about today’s release of the 2010 International Science and Engineering Visualization Challenge winners. This year’s winning entries included the most detailed 3-D model of the HIV virus ever made (above), a sweeping infographic primer on the many ways fungi impact our lives, and a non-interactive media project that tracked 3,000 pieces of garbage from their origins in Seattle to destinations across the U.S. (Pics)

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New Inventions, Science & Technology News

Scientists Invent World’s First Anti-Laser

February 18, 2011

Anti-lasing

The laser — a 50-year-old invention now used in everything from CDs to laser pointers — has met its match in the “antilaser,” the first device capable of trapping and canceling out laser beams.

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Great New Product, Health & Fitness, Science & Technology News

Handheld Scanner Will Check Your Health in 30 Seconds

February 18, 2011

Handheld device will gauge the damage from bad habits.

German scientists have developed a new handheld scanner which they say can tell accurately in less than 30 seconds how healthy or unhealthy you are.

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Big Problems, Crazy Stuff, Current Events, government, Health & Fitness, Hot Issues, Human Behavior, Latest News

TSA Screeners Stole Over $200K From Fliers’ Baggage

February 18, 2011

And to think the TSA is ‘protecting’ us.

Two TSA screeners from New York’s Kennedy airport were busted for stealing over $200,000 in cash from fliers. They targetted people they thought were drug dealers, since they didn’t think their victims would complain…

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Art, Breakthrough Thinking, Crazy Stuff, Entertainment, New Viewpoints

Billboard Swing Set

February 18, 2011

Billboards are good for more than advertising.

Architect Didier Faustino made Double Happiness out of an old billboard in New York City:

Double Happiness responds to the society of materialism where individual desires seem to be prevailing over all. This nomad piece of urban furniture allows the reactivation of different public spaces and enables inhabitants to reappropriate fragments of their city…

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Science & Technology News, Space

Official Teams Competing in the $30 Million Race to the Moon Announced by Google Lunar X Prize

February 18, 2011

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WRe79QxzxWY[/youtube]

The X PRIZE Foundation has announced the official roster of 29 registered teams competing for the $30 million Google Lunar X PRIZE, an unprecedented competition to send a robot to the Moon that travels at least 500 meters and transmit video, images, and data back to the Earth. This group of teams signifies this new era of exploration’s diverse and participatory nature as it includes a huge variety of groups ranging from non-profits to university consortia to billion dollar businesses representing 17 nations on four continents. The global competition, the largest in history, was announced in September 2007, with a winner projected by 2015.

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Breakthrough Thinking, Ecological Products, Great New Product, Green Friendly, New Inventions

Meet the Meguru, the Electric Rickshaw

February 18, 2011

Get motivated with the Meguru

Perhaps inspired by the Seinfeld episode where Kramer and Newman try to set up a business using homeless men to pull rickshaws through New York, a Japanese firm has designed an electric rickshaw. Called the “Meguru,” it’s a spin on the traditionally man-powered vehicle that first appeared in Japan at the end of the 19th century and that has since spread around the world.

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Animals, Historical Perspectives, Latest News, New Discoveries, New Viewpoints, Science & Technology News

Promiscuous Apes Make More Sperm

February 17, 2011

Promiscuous ape species have bigger testicles

Chimpanzees produce 200 times more sperm than gorillas, the world’s largest primates, and 14 times more than orangutans, scientists based in Japan reveal.

Promiscuous ape species have bigger testicles, and the latest discovery finally provides evidence that they also produce more sperm.
Scientists previously proposed that chimps have large testicles because several males mate with a single female, and so have to produce more sperm in order to compete.

For their research, published in the American Journal of Primatology, scientists studied chimpanzees, orangutans and gorillas from zoos in Japan and Indonesia.

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