Italian offers cold fusion promise

A panel of researchers has released a paper confirming that a device made by a secretive Italian might be cold fusion.

The paper, penned by a team of independent scientists, has yet to receive a peer review, but appears to suggest that Andrea Rossi’s cold fusion device might be the business.

The cold fusion device being tested has roughly 10,000 times the energy density and 1,000 times the power density of gasoline. The paper said that even allowing for a massively conservative margin of error, the scientists say that the cold fusion device they tested is 10 times more powerful than petrol which is the best fuel readily available to mankind.

Italian offers cold fusion promise | TG Daily

Alicia Douvall: I’ve had so much plastic surgery I can’t smile at my baby

One remarkable operation was to have her TOES SHORTENED. She says: “It was so my feet would look good in sandals. But then I started bumping into things.

“When I asked the doctors about it they said it was because your toes help with spatial awareness. It’s funny — they didn’t tell me that before they took my money.” In one bungled operation a nerve was severed, leaving Alicia with a droop on the left side of her face.

Alicia Douvall: I’ve had so much plastic surgery I can’t smile at my baby | The Sun |Showbiz

Mirasol lives, 1.5-inch display is coming ‘soon’

E-ink displays are great. They can be used in direct sunlight, and they’re as easy on the eyes as real paper. Unfortunately, they’re also usually black and white, and they refresh far too slowly for anything besides basic e-reading.

Qualcomm’s Mirasol technology doesn’t have those disadvantages. We’ve been awaiting its arrival in real products since 2010, and now, it looks like the technology may finally be ready for prime time. Engadget came across a couple of Mirasol demos at the SID Display Week event in Vancouver, and it says Qualcomm expects a 1.5-inch Mirasol display will “soon show up in some third-party devices.”

Mirasol lives, 1.5-inch display is coming ‘soon’ – The Tech Report

Is pink lighting the future of farming?

Researchers claim artificial lighting in warehouses could produce year-round growing

Experiments being carried out using ‘pink’ lights – actually a mix of blue and red LEDs

Could be used to grow food all year round in giant warehouses dubbed ‘pinkhouses’

Is pink lighting the future of farming? Researchers reveal breakthrough in growing using artificial lights | Mail Online

Google’s Conversational Search Blows Apple’s Siri Away

Google as already said in the past that it will go towards “answers”  and away from “search”, so this should not come as a shocker. The end-game is that you should be able to ask anything to Google, and it should provide an answer, whether it is from a 3rd party site, or from Google itself. This is something that Google already does for a number of simple queries like weather, currency conversion or various “places”.

Google’s Conversational Search Blows Apple’s Siri Away | Ubergizmo

IBM Watson Smartphone Apps Coming Soon

We all know IBM Watson is the insanely popular and expensive supercomputer that beat two former winners of Jeopardy. IBM and its various partners will now be using the system as a customer service agent. The feature is called “Ask Watson,” it will be programmed to answer questions through a variety of mediums including but not limited to smartphone apps, email, web chats and SMS. This feature is also likely to be hooked up with voice recognition as well by some partners, which will definitely make it infinitely more powerful than Siri. IBM’s partners include Nielsen, IHS, Royal Bank of Canada, ANZ Bank etc.

Watson will be powering the customer service systems of these partners, who will all develop their own branding and interface. These “Ask Watson” enabled apps are expected to released in the next few months, though at first they’re likely to be internally tested. The fact remains though, this will actually be the first time many people will get to query the great IBM Watson. Wouldn’t it be amazingly cool to be able to ask a supercomputer questions?

IBM Watson Smartphone Apps Coming Soon | Ubergizmo

Xbox One: All The Official Details

The Xbox One features an 8-core CPU, 8GB of RAM, a 500GB hard drive, Blu-Ray drive, Wi-Fi (802.11n) / Wi-Fi Direct, USB 3.0 and an HDMI port.

The Xbox One will come with a new Kinect sensor that supports 1080p video at 30 frames per second and offers a wider field of view due to its improved data throughput of 2GB per second. When used as a two-way communicator, such as through Skype calls, video can be captured at 60 frames per second. The next Kinect sensor also works in a dark room and is more precise as it is able to read the user’s balance, transfer of weight and even measure your heartbeat.

Since you’ll probably be doing a lot of gaming on the Xbox One, Microsoft is introducing a completely redesigned controller with the console that features 40 design changes. The Xbox One controller features a similar look to the Xbox 360 controller, but its analog sticks now have some noticeable texturing, it has a new dynamic impulse triggers, a newly-designed directional pad and an integrated battery. Communication between the controller and console has also been improved as it can now provide information 15% faster than the Xbox 360 controller.

Xbox One: All The Official Details | Ubergizmo

B vitamins may slow the advance of Alzheimer’s

They found that it was the areas of the brain most seriously affected by Alzheimer’s, including the hippocampus and cerebellum, that were protected in volunteers given the vitamins. For instance, in those with high homocysteine, the atrophy rate in these brain regions was 5.2 per cent in the placebo group but just 0.6 per cent in the vitamin group.

The reduction of atrophy seemed to translate into better brain function too: those given B vitamins performed better on cognitive tests.

“It demonstrates for the very first time that it is possible to modify the disease process in Alzheimer’s,” says Smith.

B vitamins may slow the advance of Alzheimer’s – health – 20 May 2013 – New Scientist

Stem-cell treatment restores sight to blind man

“There’s a guy walking around who was blind, but now can see,” says Gary Rabin, chief executive officer of Advanced Cell Technology, the company in Marlborough, Massachusetts that devised the treatment. “With that sort of vision, you can have a driver’s licence.”

Stem-cell treatment restores sight to blind man – health – 20 May 2013 – New Scientist

Australis – Barren Lands

Australis – Barren Lands – YouTube

Melina Aslanidou – The past remembered (Video Clip)

Melina Aslanidou – The past remembered (Video Clip)

Μελίνα Ασλανίδου – Το πάρελθον θυμήθηκα (Βίντεο Κλιπ) – YouTube

A shocking discovery: Zapping the brain with electricity during maths lessons can boost numerical skills by a THIRD

By zapping the brain during mathematical lessons, scientists have improved students¿ numerical skills by a third – and found they they also learned their arithmetic up to five times faster.

A shocking discovery: Zapping the brain with electricity during maths lessons can boost numerical skills by a THIRD | Mail Online

E-Ink Introduces 13.3” Flexible Electronic Paper Display

E Ink Holdings, this week announced the upcoming release of E Ink Mobius, a new flexible electronic paper display (EPD) technology. E Ink Mobius will be the first flexible display technology that will go into mass production for a large format digital paper product based on flexible Thin Film Transistor (TFT) technology developed by Sony Corp.

Mobius uses a TFT technology that will enable the development of much lighter and rugged products. Mobius displays can weigh less than 50% of the weight of an equivalent glass based TFT. This is particularly important for mobile products requiring larger display areas. A 13.3″ display weighs approximately 60 grams.

The ruggedness and lightweight characteristics of Mobius are due to the TFT being constructed on a plastic substrate rather than traditional glass. The technology was developed by Sony specifically for use with EPDs in cooperation with E Ink. Sony has now transferred the technology to E Ink for mass production. E Ink will start mass production of the world’s first 13.3” flexible EPD display in 2013.

“We have been working with Sony for over 10 years, and we are extremely happy to bring this technology to mass production. Development of this new digital paper product by Sony confirms our belief that the ePaper market is still strong,” said Giovanni Mancini, director of product management for E Ink Holdings.

The first product prototype to use Mobius is Sony’s digital paper product.

E-Ink Introduces 13.3” Flexible Electronic Paper Display – X-bit labs

Cloning fears as scientists create human embryos from SKIN in stem cell ‘milestone’

Human embryos have been cloned before but no one succeed in getting them to the stage at which healthy stem cells can be extracted.

Dr Mitalipov has spent many years refining the technique, paying particular attention to timing and, bizarrely, feeding the eggs on caffeine at a key point in the process.

Other scientists have hailed the achievement, which is detailed in the journal Cell, as ‘remarkable’.

Dr Paul De Sousa, of Edinburgh University, said that improving our understanding of the genetics of women’s eggs, could help with new treatments for infertility.

Others fear that the US success brings us closer to babies being cloned to order for grieving parents.

In Britain, the law states that cloned embryos have to destroyed after 14 days and it is illegal to implant them in a woman.

However, there are some countries in which the law on so-called reproductive cloning is not so strict.

Cloning fears as scientists create human embryos from SKIN in stem cell ‘milestone’ | Mail Online

Sony Digital Paper Makes A Push For Flexible Displays

We are referring to the Sony Digital Paper, where in reality, it is a 13.3” flexible E Ink prototype that boasts of touchscreen capability, in addition to stylus input support, of course. This remains a prototype as at press time, but word has it that Sony intends to introduce trials of the device at 3 universities in the Land of the Rising Sun, that is, Japan. The whole idea would be to replace the need for paper by pushing a digital medium which makes life a whole lot more convenient for students. How does a 1600 x 1200 pixel flexible E Ink screen sound to you?

Sony Digital Paper Makes A Push For Flexible Displays | Ubergizmo

Hints of lightweight dark matter get even stronger

A strange light is shining near the centre of the Milky Way, and evidence is mounting that it is the spark of lightweight dark matter meeting a violent end. At the same time, a suite of sensitive detectors deep underground is seeing hints of similar particles.

Dark matter is thought to make up roughly 80 per cent of the matter in the universe. But aside from its gravitational tug on regular matter, the substance has proven tough to detect, and many of its fundamental properties remain unknown.

The leading theoretical candidates for dark matter are weakly interacting massive particles (WIMPs). It’s thought these particles annihilate when they meet, producing a shower of radiation, including gamma rays. Launched in 2008, NASA’s Fermi space telescope has been scanning for excess gamma rays emanating from the centre of our galaxy, where dark matter should be concentrated.

Hints of lightweight dark matter get even stronger – space – 10 May 2013 – New Scientist

Young blood reverses heart decline in old mice

Since all parts of the body appear to age at the same rate, it makes sense that there should be something in the blood that coordinates ageing, says Wagers. “The bloodstream is a logical conduit for the body to use,” she says.

After ruling out the effect of reduced blood pressure on the older mice, the team identified a potential candidate: a protein called GDF11, which was present in much higher quantities in the blood of the young mice.

To test the effect of GDF11, the researchers gave old mice with cardiac hypertrophy daily injections of it for 30 days. At the end of the treatment, their hearts were significantly smaller than those in a second group of mice of the same age and with the same condition, but that had been injected with saline. Heart cells shrank significantly in the first group of mice, the researchers found.

Young blood reverses heart decline in old mice – health – 09 May 2013 – New Scientist

The British engineer who really HAS reinvented the wheel: Loopwheels system abandons spokes for springs

Large springs give the Loopwheels built in suspension

44 year-old Nottingham inventor says it makes riding on a bumpy road ‘feel like velvet’

Set to go on sale in September for £600 and will fit existing bikes

The British engineer who really HAS reinvented the wheel: Loopwheels system abandons spokes for springs | Mail Online

D-Wave’s Quantum Computer Goes to the Races, Wins

Catherine McGeoch, a computer science professor at Amherst College, carried out the tests and will soon present her results in a peer reviewed paper at the International Conference on Computing Frontiers. Her verdict on D-Wave’s computer? “In some cases, really, really fast.”

D-Wave’s Quantum Computer Goes to the Races, Wins | MIT Technology Review

Scientists hope to implant microchips that generate memories in human brains in the next 2 years

The scientists from the University of Southern California, Wake Forest University, and others, have been looking into the hippocampus – the part of the brain that is vital in forming long-term memories – for around a decade.

They believe that they have worked out how memories are made, enabling the production of an implant that could aid people with localized brain injuries, stroke victims and, ultimately, Alzheimer’s.

Scientists hope to implant microchips that generate memories in human brains in the next 2 years | Mail Online