Science & TechnologyS


Alarm Clock

Building the first time travel machine

Hugh Langley
techradar
Tue, 03 Nov 2015 04:57 UTC
Ron Mallet
© techradar
It was a personal tragedy that started the timeline. After Boyd Mallett died of a sudden heart attack in 1955, his 10 year old son, Ronald, made a promise: he would find a way to travel back in time to warn his father of what was going to happen.

It was a mission inspired partly by a copy of H.G. Wells' The Time Machine, which Ron discovered a year after his father's passing.

The story follows the narrator's journey into the future, but one line in particular struck Ron: "Scientific people know very well that time is just a kind of space and we can move forward and backward in time just as we can in space." He believed that he could build a fully working time machine to go back in time and so he dedicated his future to proving it.

"For me the sun rose and set on him," says Mallett about his father, a television repairman who was just 33 when he died. Ron kept his research into time travel a secret for many years for fear he might damage his credibility. Sadly, that prevented him from reaching out to people who might have been able to help him.

Now aged 69, Ron Mallett, a physics professor at the University of Connecticut, is totally candid about his research, but he still hasn't reunited with his father and most likely never will. But he has an equation that he believes holds the key to building the first time machine and he might be close to a breakthrough.
Read More...
Bulb

Researchers develop smart glasses that translate images into sounds to help the blind navigate


New Scientist
Fri, 30 Oct 2015 00:00 UTC
smart glasses, glasses for blind
Blind people have long relied on sound as a substitution for sight, and some even use echolocation to navigate around objects. But it turns out that sound can be specifically designed to convey visual information. Now, that phenomenon is being used in an attempt to build better navigation aids for blind people.

Researchers from the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena have built smart glasses that translate images into sounds that can be intuitively understood without training.

The device, called vOICe (OIC stands for "Oh! I See"), is a pair of dark glasses with an attached camera, connected to a computer. It's based on an algorithm of the same name developed in 1992 by Dutch engineer Peter Meijer. The system converts pixels in the camera's video feed into sound, mapping brightness and vertical location to an associated pitch and volume.

A cluster of dark pixels at the bottom of the frame sounds quiet and has a low pitch, while a bright patch at the top would sound loud and high-pitched. The way a sound changes over time is governed by how the image looks when scanned left to right across the frame. Headphones sends the processed sound into the wearer's ear.
Read More...
Snakes in Suits

Our narcissistic politicians - should MRI brain scans be required of all candidates?

Hank Pellissier
Institute for Ethics and Emerging Technologies
Sat, 24 Oct 2015 23:46 UTC
female and male brain psychopathy
© Carla Harenski, et al.
We want our government officials to be brain-healthy, right? With sanity, integrity, and high moral values?

Sadly, the inverse seems true. Psychologists claim many of our politicians have Narcissist Personality Disorder.

What is a narcissist? What's the precise definition of this personality malfunction that afflicts 1 - 3% of the population? With huge percentiles on Wall Street and in Washington DC?

The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM) defines narcissism with the characteristics below. I have added a few that Leon F. Seltzer Ph.D. has additionally noted.

Comment:

Read More...
Arrow Up

Tractor beams and sound levitation now a reality

Will Dunham
Reuters
Tue, 27 Oct 2015 03:48 UTC
levitation
© REUTERS/ASIER MARZO, STUART ROBINSON, BRUCE DRINKWATER AND SRIRAM SUBRAMANIAN/HANDOUT VIA REUTERSA researcher holding a device composed of 64 miniature loudspeakers that generate an ultrasonic (40Khz) acoustic field that traps and levitates a polystyrene bead (3mm diameter).
The tractor beam, a staple of science fiction including Star Wars and Star Trek that is employed to grab spaceships and other things remotely, is entering the realm of reality. Researchers on Tuesday said they have developed a tractor beam that uses high-amplitude sound waves to levitate, move and rotate small objects without making contact with them. They envisioned medical and other applications for the device.

"As a mechanical wave, sound can exert significant forces on objects. Just remember the last time you were in a concert and your chest was vibrating with the music," said study lead author Asier Marzo of Britain's University of Bristol and Spain's Public University of Navarre.

Marzo said this sonic tractor beam has manipulated objects up to about one-seventh of an inch (4 mm) in diameter and can control the position and orientation of the levitated objects. The tractor beam uses ultrasound at a frequency of 40 kilohertz. People can hear only below 20 kilohertz.

fingers red ball
© www.independent.co.ukAcoustic holograms!
The researchers used sound waves from 64 miniature loudspeakers called transducers to create what they called "acoustic holograms" to control an object without touching it. These waves took the form of tweezers to lift an object, a vortex to hold a levitating object in place and a cage to surrounds an object and hold it in place. "A simple wave will just push the particle in the direction of propagation. However, multiple waves will interfere with each other and create complex, acoustic 3D shapes that exert forces from all directions and keep the particle in place," Marzo said.

Marzo said the largest object moved using the device was a 4 mm bead made of a light plastic called polystyrene. "With special high-power transducers it would be possible to levitate even steel balls," Marzo said.

Comment: "Make it so, Number One!"

Read More...
Info

Industrial hemp sure to become NC's newest legal crop

Colin Campbell
The News and Observer
Thu, 29 Oct 2015 18:36 UTC
Image
© www.hempyreum.org
North Carolina Farmers Hold Their Breath: Industrial Hemp Cultivation Could Be Legal By Saturday Morning
Workers do final assembly of a decortification line at the Industrial Hemp Manufacturing Company in Spring Hope, NC, on Wednesday. The facility hopes to begin full-scale operations when a bill becomes law at midnight Friday, without Gov. Pat McCrory's signature. The law legalizes industrial hemp in North Carolina. Farmers are eager to grow the crop, which can be used in textiles, oil drilling fluid and other products. It has virtually no THC, the active ingredient in marijuana that is smoked. This group of machines separates the outer fibers from the inner core. The outer fibers are used in the textile industry, the core fibers are used by the oil and gas industry. The plant currently processes kanaf, a plant similar to hemp. It is used to make door panels in cars and trucks.

Comment: Hemp is a win-win for the economy and the environment.

Read More...
Info

New DNA repair enzyme discovered

Shayne Jacopian
RedOrbit
Sun, 01 Nov 2015 18:59 UTC
DNA Structure
© Thinkstock
Vanderbilt University researchers have discovered a new class of DNA repair enzyme, according to findings published in the journal Nature.

After originally discovering the structure of DNA, scientists thought that it was a chemically stable blueprint of traits that was difficult to alter. However, in the decades since, scientists have found that the double helix molecule is extremely reactive and subject to damage. Cells must constantly work to repair damaged DNA, and that's where DNA repair enzymes come in.

"It's a double-edged sword," said Brandt Eichman, an associate professor of biological sciences and biochemistry at Vanderbilt and the leader of the research team behind this discovery. "If DNA were too reactive then it wouldn't be capable of storing genetic information. But, if it were too stable, then it wouldn't allow organisms to evolve."
Read More...
Sun

G3-class geomagnetic storm likely today; sunspot quadruples in size


Space Weather
Mon, 02 Nov 2015 18:02 UTC
Image
© NOAA
Geomagnetic Storms Likely Today:

NOAA forecasters estimate a 90% chance of geomagnetic storms on Nov. 2nd-3rd when a fast-moving stream of solar wind is expected to hit Earth's magnetic field. Solar wind speeds could exceed 800 km/s and spark a strong G3-class geomagnetic storm. Sky watchers in the USA should be alert for Northern Lights as far south as, e.g., Oregon and Illinois.

Monster Sunspot:

So you thought Halloween was over? Think again. There is a monster spot on the sun. AR2443 has more than quadrupled in size since it first appeared on Oct. 29th, and it now stretches more than 175,000 km from end to end. Philippe Tosi took this picture of the active region on Nov. 1st from his backyard observatory in Nîmes, France:
Image
© Philippe Tosi
The sunspot has more than a dozen dark cores, many of which are as large as terrestrial continents--and a couple as large as Earth itself. These dimensions make it an easy target for backyard solar telecopes.

Of greater interest is the sunspot's potential for explosive activity. The spotty complex has a 'beta-gamma' magnetic field that harbors energy for strong M-classsolar flares. Any such explosions will be geoeffective as the sunspot turns squarely toward Earth in the days ahead.
Read More...
Moon

NASA explores Enceladus, Saturn's inhabitable ice volcano moon


Sputnik
Sat, 31 Oct 2015 09:08 UTC
Enceladus
© www.npr.orgNew research suggest warm oceans beneath Enceladus' icy crust.
Saturn's ice-covered ocean moon, Enceladus, may be able to support alien lifeforms under its ice volcanoes, according to new data released by NASA.

NASA's Cassini spacecraft transmitted photographs of Saturn's icy, volcano-covered moon, Enceladus.

The photographs show that the moon is still geologically active, meaning that NASA will consider the moon for further exploration as a habitable environment beyond Earth. The Cassini spacecraft will also send probes of the moon's gas and ice plume to analyze it for signs that the moon harbors signs of alien life.

Comment: See also:

Enceladus' electrical connection to Saturn
Freeze-thaw cycle may explain Saturn moon's odd activity

Read More...
Evil Rays

Orcas Island residents come together to invent own internet service


RT
Mon, 02 Nov 2015 13:24 UTC
Image
© WikipediaWest coast US view from Orcas Island
In a true show of community spirit, an American island too far from the mainland came together as one to build their own internet service powered by radios in trees. Orcas Island off Washington State has been transformed by its people's inventiveness.

For several years the residents of one of the San Juan Islands had suffered very weak internet from provider CenturyLink, located on the mainland. Despite promises of higher speeds and renewed infrastructure, nothing materialized.

Many couldn't log on to work from a distance, as outages lasted anywhere from one to 10 days, according to Ars Technica.

Private ISPs were expensive, demanding around $388,500 for setting things up.

Comment: It is amazing what communities can do when they work together!

Read More...
Bug

Scientists figure out what makes us scratch an itch

Harriet Dempsey-Jones
The Conversation
Mon, 02 Nov 2015 15:43 UTC
itch scratching
Having an itch can be incredibly annoying but it actually serves an important function, protecting us from damage to our skin. However, scientists have long struggled to explain what actually causes the sensation - in particular why some types of touch cause an itch whereas others do not.

Now a new study in mice has shed light on what actually happens in the body when we want to scratch an itch. The research, published in Science, could lead to treatments for many thousands of people suffering from chronic itch, a disorder causing an intense desire to scratch.

A hairy problem

The itching sensation usually occurs following a light touch on the hairy skin of our bodies. This triggers us to move our hand to the source of the insult and scratch away at it. While seemingly mindless, this simple behaviour is our body's neat way of attempting to protect us from damage to our skin from objects in the environment or nasty insects and parasites.
Read More...