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Biotech

Training Bacteria To Deliver Drugs? 29

Posted by timothy from the please-don't-teach-them-to-fetch-the-paper dept.
Hugh Pickens writes "While it may seem unlikely that single-celled organisms could be trained to salivate like Pavlov's dog at the sound of a bell, researchers say that bacteria can 'learn' to associate one stimulus with another by employing molecular circuits. This raises the possibility that bioengineers could teach bacteria to act as sentinels for the human body, ready to spot and respond to signs of danger. As with Pavlov's dog, the bacteria in the model learn to build stronger associations between the two stimuli the more they occur together. Now called Hebbian learning, it's often expressed as a situation in which 'neurons that fire together wire together.'" (More below.)
Robotics

Ultra-Light Micro Air Vehicles 143

Posted by samzenpus from the eye-in-the-sky dept.
Roland Piquepaille writes "Dutch engineers have built the third generation of the DelFly autonomous air vehicle. The DelFly Micro made its first public flight earlier today in Delft. This micro air vehicle weighs only 3 grams and has a wingspan of 10 centimeters. This very small remote-controlled aircraft carries a 0.4 gram camera. The DelFly Micro, which looks like a dragonfly, can fly for 3 minutes at a maximum speed of 5 meters/second. It could be used for observation flights in difficult-to-reach or dangerous areas."
Music

Submission + - torman maxt releases album as "pay if you like

Submitted by Green Light
Green Light writes: From the band's website:
The Problem of Pain: Part 1 is the first of a two album set, with Part 2 scheduled for a 2008 release. It is a "rock opera" and was inspired by the albums: Rush "2112" and Queensryche's "Operation Mindcrime".

The band invites anyone to freely distribute the download link, not the music itself. If you like the music, they ask you to pay whatever you think it is worth.
Mozilla

Submission + - Firefox releases update to fix critical exploit

Submitted by
MGOB
MGOB writes: "Mozilla published releases 1.5.0.10/2.0.0.2 this morning to fix a critical security flaw in the Firefox web browser. The problem lies in how Firefox handles writes to the 'location.hostname' DOM property. The vulnerability allows malicious websites to manipulate authentication cookies for third-party sites. A demo/check of the issue can be found here."
Movies

Submission + - The Business Movie Oscars

Submitted by
vbelyavsky
vbelyavsky writes: "With the Oscars coming up this weekend, it's important to remember that stories of emerging businesses and entrepreneurs (http://www.inc.com/magazine/20070201/life-diversi ons.html?slashdot) offer a plethora of drama(Risk! Sacrifice! Heartbreak! Triumph!) but these movies are rarely recognized. Inc asked business owners to nominate their favorites and has put together a list of a half dozen movies that best reflect the entrepreneurial experience."
Announcements

Submission + - Samsung increases speeds of GDDR4 memory by 66%

Submitted by
Vinit
Vinit writes: "Samsung Electronics has increased the speed of world's fastest memory — the GDDR4 memory by two-third. The firm has increased the data transfer speed to 4Gb/s (2.0GHz) from current 2.4Gb/s. With the speed up by 66 percent, you'll get excellent performance from your system while playing games, animation or editing a video. The high-end applications requires good speed because they move huge volumes of video simultaneously; so as your memory speed increases, you get better performance. The new 4Gb/s graphics memory, offered in a 512Mb density, has a 32-bit data bus configuration. GDDR4 uses JEDEC-approved standards for signal noise reduction to help attain the highest possible speed. "Our new GDDR4 memory will add even more zip in video applications, making gaming, computer-aided design and video editing a lot faster than ever before," said Mueez Deen, marketing director, graphics memory, Samsung Semiconductor, Inc. "This will enable ultra-smooth movements in animation, making games incredibly realistic, resulting in a truly immersive experience," he added. The memory is ready for customer sampling this month. http://www.pclaunches.com/other_stuff/samsung_incr eases_speeds_of_gddr4_memory_by_66_percent.php"
The Internet

ICANN May Act Against RegisterFly 63

Posted by Zonk from the hold-it-together- dept.
1sockchuck writes "ICANN says it will terminate RegisterFly's accreditation as a domain registrar if the company can't fix its problems within 15 days. The edict comes with RegisterFly in chaos and current management blaming a departed executive for its woes. The situation is complicated by the fact that RegisterFly sold some of its domains through a reseller agreement with eNom, and others using its own accreditation."
Quake

Submission + - Indonesia to plug Volcano with Cement Balls

Submitted by
Anonymous from UCI
Anonymous from UCI writes: "CNN.com — "A team of geologists and engineers hope the plan, believed to have never been tried before, will reduce the amount of mud flowing from the geyser at a gas exploration site on Java island by up to 70 percent. The mud is now surging out at a rate equivalent to about a million oil drums a day." "Engineers will release five of the chained cement balls, each weighing up to 250 kilograms (550 pounds), and monitor the effect before gradually releasing more balls into the hole,..." http://www.cnn.com/2007/WORLD/asiapcf/02/23/indone sia.volcano.ap/index.html?eref=rss_topstories"
Nintendo

Submission + - Neo-Geo, MSX Games Coming To Virtual Console

Submitted by
oberondarksoul
oberondarksoul writes: "According to this page on Nintendo of Japan's website, games from SNK's famously-expensive Neo-Geo and the (relatively unheard of, outside of Japan) MSX are to be available on the Wii's Virtual Console. The page doesn't say when to expect them, or even to expect releases outside of Japan, but they join the PC Engine (TurboGraphx 16) as third party consoles to appear on the service. Now all we need is for Sega to release Dreamcast games through it..."
Businesses

Submission + - Meetings make you dumber

Submitted by Maximum Prophet
Maximum Prophet writes: Robert Heinlein said that the committee was the only life form in the universe with three or more bellies and no brain. Well, here's some proof:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/17279961/
So, is slashdot a group subject to this kind of groupthink, or are the participants isolated enough that the effect is minimized? Discuss...
Privacy

Submission + - Powdered sized RFIDs

Submitted by
WeAreTrackingYou
WeAreTrackingYou writes: "According to this AP Story scientist at Hitachi have built RFID tags that are the size of powder crystal i.e. 0.002 inches by 0.002. However the only problem is that these RFID tags need a external antenna. Next time you go to Mega Lo Mart you might get sprinkled with this pixie dust er powder-sized RFID tags so that they can serve (track) you better."

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