Scientists have identified a reason why some are underweight.
Scientists have discovered a genetic cause of extreme thinness for the first time, in a study published August 30 in the journal Nature. The research shows that people with extra copies of certain genes are much more likely to be very skinny. In one in 2000 people, part of chromosome 16 is duplicated, making men 23 times and women five times more likely to be underweight…
Continue reading… “‘Gene Overdose’ causes extreme thinness”
All clicked up.
The Japanese design firm nendo and the electronics company Elecom came up with this innovative mouse design. The Kandenchi has three buttons and a scroll wheel. It connects to a computer through a wireless hookup…
Continue reading… “Cylindrical Mouse”
Scott Beale says: “Cornell Creative Machines Lab wanted to see what would happend if two Cleverbot AI ChatBots had a conversation with each other.”
I think I’ve just seen the beginning of the end…
Continue reading… “Two AI chatBots attempt to have a conversation with each other”
Cute but not sweaty.
Pigs don’t sweat much, so they wallow in the mud to cool off their bodies. So how did the English language expression “sweating like a pig” develop? It’s actually a reference to pig iron, which is form of iron smelting…
Continue reading… “The expression “Sweating Like a Pig” has nothing to do with pigs”
The first image of an electron’s path.
It was only two years ago that IBM showed us an image of a complete molecule, atomic bonds and all, but today’s news does that one infinitesimally-sized breakthrough better. Ladies and gents, behold the first image of an electron’s path.
Utterly amazing stuff! The IBM breakthrough was amazing enough, but now we have images of the electron’s orbital path around a nucleus! This is good, good news, because until now physicists only had models and hypotheses to work with…
Continue reading… “Fascinating first-ever images of an electron in orbit”
Dolphins are very smart creatures.
Researchers from Murdoch University have been watching bottlenose dolphins in Shark Bay, Australia develop an ingenious way to fish. First witnessed by researchers in 2007, a dolphin will use a conch shell to trap and scoop up fish. The dolphin will then proceed to pour the fishies into its mouth as if they were the bottoms of a chip bag. The remarkable part is that this behavior seems to be becoming more widespread, marking it as a trend learned…
Continue reading… “Dolphins now conch fishing”
An exotic planet that seems to be made of diamond discovered.
Astronomers have spotted an exotic planet that seems to be made of diamond racing around a tiny star in our galactic backyard.
Continue reading… “Diamond planet discovered by astronomers”
Tulane University has applied for a patent for a method to produce the biofuel butanol from organic material.
Scientists have found one way that old-fashioned newspaper beats the internet. Tulane University scientists have discovered a novel bacterial strain, dubbed “TU-103,” that can use paper to produce butanol, a biofuel that can serve as a substitute for gasoline. They are currently experimenting with old editions of the Times Picayune, New Orleans’ venerable daily newspaper, with great success.
Continue reading… “Scientists produce biofuel from recycled newspapers”
Brazil is set to start gathering oil in new places.
Want to get a feel for how crazy the post-peak oil fossil fuels industry is getting? Here’s as good an example as any: Brazil’s state-owned oil company Petrobras is about to embark on an unprecedented oil-gathering mission. It’s about to attempt to extract 30 billion barrels of oil from reserves that are locked in deepwater sub-salt fields at least 60 miles off the coast and up to five miles underwater. In order to get at the incredibly hard-to-get oily good stuff, Brazil is spending an estimated $226 billion — and $127 billion will be spent on exploration and production alone.
The product of that venture is already taking shape: a veritable floating “offshore city” has sprung up over 100 kilometers (62 miles) off the coast of Brazil, and it will lead the effort to drill into the deep sea sub-salt…
Continue reading… “Brazil builds $127 billion “Offshore City” to harvest oil in the deep sea”
Are anesthetics as safe as we think they are?
The majority of people reading this sentence will, at some point in their lives, undergo a medical treatment that requires general anesthesia. Doctors will inject them with a drug, or have them breathe it in. For several hours, they will be unconscious. And almost all of them will wake up happy and healthy.
We know that the general anesthetics we use today are safe. But we know that because they’ve proven themselves to be safe, not because we understand the mechanisms behind how they work. The truth is, at that level, anesthetics are a big, fat question mark. And that leaves room for a lot of unknowns. What if, in the long term, our anesthetics aren’t as safe for everyone as we think they are?
Continue reading… “Going Under: What we don’t know about anesthetics”
The PumpTire consists of an inner tube, the tire itself, and a special uni-directional air valve that screws into the stem of the inner tube. When the pump is active, it uses the tire’s rolling motion to draw in air from the atmosphere, through the one-way valve and into a lumen that runs along the outer edge of the tire. As the tire rolls, it squishes the lumen flat, forcing air into the main tube and when the weight of the tire is removed, the lumen re-inflates before it’s rolled over again. The system automatically shuts the valve when the desired pressure is reached. The doesn’t require any special modifications or rims…
Continue reading… “Self-Inflating bike tires promise a future free of hand pumps”
Filling without drilling.
Scientists claim to have found the secret of a “completely painless” filling by identifying a material that can repair decaying teeth within weeks.
Continue reading… “Painless tooth filling without drilling”
By delving into the futuring techniques of Futurist Thomas Frey, you’ll embark on an enlightening journey.
Learn More about this exciting program.