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Japan

Submission + - Fleeing nuke crisis takes deadly toll on elderly (yomiuri.co.jp)

Submitted by
mdsolar
mdsolar writes: "Nearly 80 elderly people who were evacuated from nursing homes near the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant died within three months of the accidents at the plant that forced them to move, according to a Yomiuri Shimbun survey.

The 77 deaths are more than triple the 25 recorded at the nursing homes during the corresponding period last year.

Officials at the homes believe many of this year's deaths resulted from a decline in physical strength caused by moving far from the nursing homes and living in an unfamiliar environment. Many of the people who died had struggled to adapt to their new living conditions, the officials said."
Cellphones

Droid X Gets Rooted 97

Posted by Soulskill from the root-root-root-for-the-home-team dept.
An anonymous reader writes "The Droid X forums have posted a procedure to root the new Motorola Droid X, putting to rest Andoid fans' fears that they would never gain access to the device's secrets due to a reported eFuse that would brick the phone if certain boot files were tampered with. Rooting the phone is the first step in gaining complete control over the device."
Idle

Sound As the New Illegal Narcotic? Screenshot-sm 561

Posted by samzenpus from the you-ever-see-the-back-of-a-$20-bill-on-sound? dept.
ehrichweiss writes "The Oklahoma Bureau of Narcotics is warning parents and teachers of a new threat to our children: sounds. Apparently kids are now discovering binaural beats and using them to get 'physiological effects.' The report goes on with everyone suggesting that such aural experiences will act as a gateway to drug usage and even has one student claiming there are 'demons' involved. Anyone who has used one of those light/sound machines knows all about the effects that these sounds will give and to state that they will lead kids to do drugs is nonsense at best. It seems the trend in scaring the citizens with a made-up problem has gone to the next level."
Medicine

High Fructose Corn Syrup Causes Bigger Weight Gain In Rats 542

Posted by timothy from the subsidies-cause-fatter-corn-farmers dept.
krou writes "In an experiment conducted by a Princeton University team, 'Rats with access to high-fructose corn syrup gained significantly more weight than those with access to table sugar, even when their overall caloric intake was the same.' Long-term consumption also 'led to abnormal increases in body fat, especially in the abdomen, and a rise in circulating blood fats called triglycerides.' Psychology professor Bart Hoebel commented that 'When rats are drinking high-fructose corn syrup at levels well below those in soda pop, they're becoming obese — every single one, across the board. Even when rats are fed a high-fat diet, you don't see this; they don't all gain extra weight.'"

Comment Re:sigh... (Score 1) 123

by segfault7375 (#28736997) Attached to: Court Appoints Pro Bono Counsel For RIAA Defendant
I agree it's frustrating, and that's a very good thing. The more and more people like you that decide you are done with the RIAA's shit, the less revenue they will have to pay their lawyers. And with judges (hopefully) beginning to see what the RIAA is up to and giving the defendant a better means to defend himself (the pro bono help), it's only going to speed up the downward spiral. I haven't bought (or downloaded) any music in years and I'm enjoying watching them flail a bit :)
Image

Broke Counties Turn Failing Roads To Gravel Screenshot-sm 717

Posted by samzenpus from the let-civilization-collapse-initiative dept.
To save money, more than 20 Michigan counties have decided to turn deteriorating paved roads back to gravel. Montcalm County estimates that repaving a road costs more than $100,000 a mile. Grinding the same mile of road up and turning it into gravel costs $10,000. At least 50 miles of road have been reverted to gravel in Michigan the past three years. I can't wait until we revert back to whale oil lighting and can finally be rid of this electricity fad.
Space

Mapping Planets and Moons In 3D With Stereophotoclinometry 23

Posted by Soulskill from the for-some-reason-that-word-isn't-in-the-spellchecker dept.
subcomdtaco writes with this snippet from a story in the NYTimes: "Dr. [Robert] Gaskell, with software he developed over a quarter-century of trial and error, can process hundreds of images in a few hours, slap them atop one another electronically like coats of paint and produce a topographical map so detailed that you often need a pair of 3-D glasses to appreciate what he has done. At 63, Dr. Gaskell has become the Captain Cook of space. Dr. Gaskell calls what he does 'stereophotoclinometry.' [PDF] Ideally he needs at least three images of the target landscape, usually taken by an orbiting spacecraft or a probe on a flyby to another destination. Only in rare cases can telescope images provide enough detail. The sun angle must be different for each exposure so each image shows different shadows. By comparing the shadows, the software calculates slopes, which yield the altitudes of target features. The computer solves the equation in three dimensions, producing a patchlike topographical maplet."

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