Persa

How Supercomputing Is Cracking The Mysteries Of Human Origins

The power of petaflops penetrates the mists of time<p>A Texas supercomputer capable of 9.6 quadrillion operations per second has solved a thorny problem in genetics, by looking at the bones of a young boy who died 24,000 years ago in Mal’ta in south-central Siberia.<p>Existing genetic models have …

Everything You Need To Know About The Internet Of Things

A few months ago I wrote a post called, A Simple Explanation Of The Internet Of Things where I tried to provide some clarity around what this new connected world means for all of us. In the article I mentioned some of the driving forces behind this.<p>“Broadband Internet is become more widely …

LG’s Crazy New Smartphone Screen Has Almost No Bezel

Tired of looking at all that extra space around your smartphone screen?<p>Let’s ignore for a second that that space serves a rather important function (giving you somewhere to put your thumb/fingers that isn’t on the screen) and just marvel at this thing.<p>Built by LG, that 5.3″, 1080p display up top …

See how a Brooklyn nonprofit is using the internet of things for environmental justice

Advertisement<p>4 Comments<p>Credit: HabitatMaps<p>HabitatMaps has launched a crowdfunding campaign for an air quality monitoring sensor that it wants people …

How a promising new drug may help combat baldness caused by alopecia

A cure for patchy baldness may be on the way, according to a new study published Sunday in the journal Nature Medicine.<p>Unfortunately, the treatment is expensive. It currently costs between $7,000 and $9,000 a month. And, it only treats hair loss caused by an autoimmune condition called alopecia …

Strange case of M82 X-1: A rare midsize black hole

A black hole candidate known as M82 X-1 appears to have a mass of about 400 suns, making it one of only half a dozen suspected midsize black …

The spooky sounds of space

Since the 1950s, probes sent into space have been sending back data that reveal eerie sounds from the vastness of the galaxy.<p>There is no sound in space. Sound is produced by the vibration of molecules; any time something moves, it causes a corresponding vibration in its medium -- whether water or …

The amateur geneticist who surprised science

Kim Goodsell is unlucky enough to have two very rare diseases. Her doctors blamed coincidence, but was it? She taught herself genetics to find out, and as she tells Ed Yong, no-one expected what she would discover.<p>Kim Goodsell was running along a mountain trail when her left ankle began turning …

Ant Fight Creates Liquid With Properties Never Before Seen In Nature

Well, at least (ant) war is good for something.<p>There are not many creatures that can stand up to fire ants, nor their famously painful sting. Besides causing discomfort in mammals like humans (I've been stung, and it doesn't feel great), this venom has potent insect-killing powers, with the ability …

Physicists create tractor beam made of water

A water-based tractor beam that could contain oil spills and manipulate floating objects cannot yet be explained by mathematical theory.<p>A surprising new technique created by a team of physicists led by Professor Michael Shats at the Australian National University reveals that simple wave generators …

Medical advances turn science fiction into science fact

Among the recent advances in treating degenerative retinal diseases is the so-called "bionic eye", which has restored rudimental vision to dozens of …

New 'Quantum Bounce' Theory Explains How Black Holes Become White

Some cosmologists speculate that black holes end their lives by transforming into their exact opposite — so-called 'white holes' that pour all the …

Mysterious signal from the center of the Perseus Cluster unexplained by known physics

<b>Astronomers using NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory to explore the Perseus Cluster, a swarm of galaxies approximately 250 million light years from</b> …

The Strongest Electrical Current in the Universe Spotted, 2 Billion Light Years From Here

Looking for a source of renewable electricity? Researchers at the University of Toronto have found some serious current emanating from a huge cosmic jet 2 billion light years from Earth. At 1018 amps, the current is the strongest current ever seen, equalling something like a trillion bolts of …

When all the jobs belong to robots, do we still need jobs?

Zeynep Tufekci's scathing response to the establishment consensus that tech will create new jobs to replace the ones we've automated away makes a lot …

temperature superconductivity

Physicists have identified the "quantum glue" that underlies a promising type of superconductivity—a crucial step towards the creation of energy …

Watch 2,600 years of culture spread across the world in 5 minutes

This video map of the journeys of creative people is mesmerizing<p>The personal journeys of world-changing thinkers such as Leonardo Da Vinci are fascinating enough in their own right, but what happens when you track the paths of thousands of similarly influential individuals across space and time? A …

NASA Telescope Observes Signal That Can’t Be Explained By Known Physics

NASA researchers have stumbled upon a signal in the Perseus Cluster—one of the most massive known objects in the universe—that they say can’t be …

How to enable the Internet of Things without batteries | Kurzweil

The basic Wi-Fi Backscatter system includes an ambient-RF-powered device (Wi-Fi Backscatter tag, attached to a temperature sensor, for example) that …

future

Artificial Intelligence will not turn into a Frankenstein monster

The doomsayers believe that humanity will be overwhelmed by creating machines that – like Terminator's Skynet – become ever-more clever and reach a singularity. They're wrong<p>The singularity – or, to give it its proper title, the technological singularity. It's an idea that has taken on a life of …

Hydrogen Bridge Is 20 Times Longer Than The Milky Way

A bridge of gas more than 20 times bigger than the Milky Way has been discovered linking distant galaxies, possibly after a catastrophic collision or near miss.<p>The cloud of atomic hydrogen is the largest known, massing more than all the gas in our own and the Andromeda galaxies combined. It amounts …

How Do Oysters Make Pearls?

What Is The Speed Of Dark?

The speed of light zips along at 299,792,458 m/s. But what about the speed of dark? Dark is really just the absence of photons, but dark shadows can …

Why is science fiction so hard to define?

A recent list of top science fiction films had some unusual choices and left out some well-regarded classics. But, says Quentin Cooper, that’s part of the problem – sci-fi is such a broad church it’s often very hard to define.<p>Time Out, the weekly listings magazine, recently ranked the 100 best …

Mass and Weight are (sort of) the SAME

Milky Way is about half as massive as Andromeda galaxy, say astronomers

Dark matter makes up 90% of the matter in both systems, the study finds.<p>Our Milky Way galaxy is less massive than astronomers previously thought, …

Consume, Consume, Consume With The False Promise Of Happiness!

Victor Lebow an economist, retail analyst and author, wrote a very pertinent account of modern consumerism in his 1955 paper, “Price Competition in …

Scientists reveal new vision of Earth 4 billion years ago

The Hadean and Eoarchean epochs were the real hell on Earth. For millions of years, our planet was heavily bombarded by millions of asteroids with …