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Submission + - New Findings On Graphene As A Conductor With IC Components

Submitted by ClockEndGooner
ClockEndGooner writes: Philadelphia's NPR affiliate, WHYY FM, reported today on their Newsworks program that a research team at the University of Pennsylvania have released their preliminary findings on the use of graphene as a conductor in the next generation of computer chips. "It's very, very strong mechanically, and it is an excellent electronic material that might be used in future computer chips," said Charlie Johnson, a professor of physics and astronomy at the University of Pennsylvania. From the article: Future graphene transistors, Johnson said, are likely to be only tens of atoms across.

Comment Re:EVD (Score 1) 170

by Himmy32 (#47521805) Attached to: Ebola Outbreak Continues To Expand
Or a whole lot less, considering how many other TLA's there are for EVD. It takes to the third page of google for there to be a page on ebola when searching for EVD. But if you say Ebola everyone knows what you are talking about.

Now I can understand wanting to abbreviate "ebola hemorrhagic fever", which is way more descriptive.

Submission + - Finding life in space by looking for extraterrestrial pollution (networkworld.com)

Submitted by coondoggie
coondoggie writes: If what we know as advanced life exists anywhere other than Earth, then perhaps they are dirtying their atmosphere as much as we have and that we could use such pollution components to perhaps more easily spot such planets in the universe. That’s the basics of new research put for this week by researchers at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics that stated if we could spot the fingerprints of certain pollutants under ideal conditions, it would offer a new approach in the search for extraterrestrial intelligence.
Open Source

Submission + - OpenMW version 0.31.0 has been released! (openmw.org) 1

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: The OpenMW project has hit another milestone, and has released version 0.31.0 of their open source re-implementation of the The Elder Scrolls: Morrowind engine:

"The OpenMW team is proud to announce the release of version 0.31.0! Grab it from our Downloads Page for all operating systems. This release includes implementation of many smaller features that have been sorely missing, as well fixes for a ridiculous amount of bugs. Many thanks to our developers for their relentless attention to detail. Some optimization has made it into this release, let us know if you see any increased performance."

Submission + - 'Optical fibre' Made Out Of Thin Air 1

Submitted by Dave Knott
Dave Knott writes: Scientists from the University of Maryland say they have turned thin air into an "optical fibre" that can transmit and amplify light signals without the need for any cables. As described in the research, this was accomplished by generating a laser with its light split into a ring of multiple beams forming a pipe. Very short and powerful pulses from the laser are used to heat the air molecules along the beam extremely quickly. Such rapid heating produces sound waves that take about a microsecond to converge to the centre of the pipe, creating a high-density area surrounded by a low-density area left behind in the wake of the laser beams. The lower density region of air surrounding the centre of the air waveguide has a lower refractive index, keeping the light focused, and allowing the higher-density region (with its correspondingly higher index of refraction) to act like an optical fibre. The findings, reported in the journal Optica, have applications in long range laser communications, high-resolution topographic mapping, air pollution and climate change research, and could also be used by the military to make laser weapons.

Submission + - HARKEN System Monitors Drivers' Fatigue Levels Via Their Seat (gizmag.com)

Submitted by Zothecula
Zothecula writes: It was just last week that we heard about how researchers from Nottingham Trent University are looking at embedding heart rate sensors in car seats, to detect when drivers are nodding off. Well, it turns out that they're not the only ones. A consortium of European companies and institutes is developing a similar system known as HARKEN, which uses seat-located sensors to monitor both the driver's heart rate and their rate of respiration.

Submission + - Intel Launches Self-Encrypting SSD 2500 Pro Solid State Drive (hothardware.com)

Submitted by MojoKid
MojoKid writes: Intel just launched their new SSD 2500 Pro series solid state drive, the follow-up to last year's SSD 1500 Pro series, which targets corporate and small-business clients. The drive shares much of its DNA with some of Intel's consumer-class drives, but the Pro series cranks things up a few notches with support for advanced security and management features, low power states, and an extended management toolset. In terms of performance, the Intel SSD 2500 Pro isn't class-leading in light of many enthusiast-class drives but it's no slouch either. Intel differentiates the 2500 Pro series by adding support for vPro remote-management and hardware-based self-encryption. The 2500 Pro series supports TCG (Trusted Computing Group) Opal 2.0 features and is Microsoft eDrive capable as well. Intel also offers an administration tool for easy management of the drive. With the Intel administration tool, users can even reset the PSID (physical presence security ID), though the contents of the drive will be wiped. The SSD 2500 Pro series of solid state drives will be offered in both 2.5" SATA (7mm Z-Height) and M.2 "gumstick" form factors, with capacities ranging from 120GB on up to 480GB. Sequential reads are rated at up to 540MB/s, sequential writes at up to 480MB/s, with 45K – 80K random read / write IOps.

Submission + - China Censors Inflatable Toad After Internet Users Compare it to President (ibtimes.co.uk)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: China is blocking all reports of a huge inflatable toad seen in a park in Beijing after social media users started comparing it to one if its former Communist Party leaders.

The 22-metre (72ft) yellow toad was unveiled at Beijing's Yuyuantan Park, but its appearance was quickly compared to that of the country's former president Jiang Zemin.

All reports on Chinese web portal Sina – which operates Sina Weibo – removed all mentions of the toad and a story on Chinese news agency Xinhua also deleted its report on the inflatable animal.

Comment Bias (Score 2) 58

by Himmy32 (#47514653) Attached to: Amazon Fire Phone Reviews: Solid But Overly Ambitious
If you don't want to listen to nerds or think this site has a bad bias, then the comment section probably isn't for you. Whenever you get a group of like minded individuals together, you are obviously going to get biased opinions reflecting their mindset. That isn't always a bad thing.

Submission + - Autonomous Sea-Robot Survives Massive Typhoon (itworld.com)

Submitted by jfruh
jfruh writes: Liquid Robotics and its Wave Glider line of autonomous seafaring robots became famous when Java inventor James Gosling left Google to join the company. Now one of its robots has passed an impressive real-world test, shrugging off a monster typhoon in the South China Sea that inflicted hundreds of millions of dollars of damage on the region.

Submission + - When Google Sells Your Data, It Might Be Illegally Killing Your Phone's Battery

Submitted by Jason Koebler
Jason Koebler writes: Personal information about you and your browsing, email, and app-using habits is regularly sent between apps on your Android phone, a potentially illegal practice that could be killing your battery life. A federal judge ruled that the claim, raised in a class action lawsuit against the company, "requires a heavily and inherently fact-bound inquiry."
That means that there's a good chance we're about to get a look into the ins and outs of Google's advertising backbone: what information is shared with who, and when.

Submission + - CNN iPhone App Sends iReporters' Passwords In The Clear (securityledger.com)

Submitted by chicksdaddy
chicksdaddy writes: The Security Ledger reports on newly published research from the firm zScaler that reveals CNN's iPhone application — one of the leading mobile news apps — transmits user login session information in clear text. (https://securityledger.com/2014/07/cnn-app-leaks-passwords-of-citizen-reporters/). The security flaw could leave users of the application vulnerable to having their login credential snooped by malicious actors on the same network or connected to the same insecure wifi hotspot. That's particularly bad news if you're one of CNN's iReporters — citizen journalists — who use the app to upload photos, video and other text as they report on breaking news events, zScaler warned in a blog post.

According to a zScaler analysis (http://research.zscaler.com/2014/07/cnn-app-for-iphone.html), CNN's app for iPhone exposes user credentials in the clear both during initial setup of the account and in subsequent mobile sessions. The iPad version of the CNN app is not affected, nor is the CNN mobile application for Android. A spokesman for CNN said the company had a fix ready and was working with Apple to have it approved and released to the iTunes AppStore.

The privacy of journalists' private communications has never been more a risk. Reporters find themselves in the crosshairs of sophisticated hacking crews, often working at the beck and call of anti-democratic regimes. They have infiltrated the networks of newspapers like The New York Times and The Washington Post — often in search of confidential communications between reporters and policy makers or human rights activists. (http://www.nytimes.com/2013/01/31/technology/chinese-hackers-infiltrate-new-york-times-computers.html) Here in the U.S., the Obama Administration is aggressively pursuing Pulitzer Prize winning journalist James Risen of The New York Times in order to uncover the source for a chapter in his book State of War concerning a covert US operation against Iran. (http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/2014/06/02/318214947/times-reporter-must-testify-about-source-court-decides)

Submission + - UK to use Open Document Format for government documents (themukt.com)

Submitted by sfcrazy
sfcrazy writes: UK has decided to use ‘open standards’ for sharing and viewing government documents. The announcement was made by the Minister for the Cabinet Office, Francis Maude. One of the primary objectives of this move is to create a level playing field for suppliers of all sizes. The move must put some pressure on Google to offer full support for ODF in Chrome, Android and Google Docs.

Submission + - Google Offers a Cool Million Bucks For a Better Inverter

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: With the Little Box Challenge, Google (and IEEE, and a few other sponsors like Cree and Rohm) is offering a $1 million prize to the team which can "design and build a kW-scale inverter with the highest power density (at least 50 Watts per cubic inch)." Going from cooler-sized to tablet sized, they say, would make whole lot of things better, and the prize is reserved for the best performing entrant.

"Our testing philosophy is to not look inside the box. You provide us with a box that has 5 wires coming out of it: two DC inputs, two AC outputs and grounding connection and we only monitor what goes into and comes out of those wires, along with the temperature of the outside of your box, over the course of 100 hours of testing. The inverter will be operating in an islanded more—that is, not tied or synced to an external grid. The loads will be dynamically changing throughout the course of the testing, similar to what you may expect to see in a residential setting." he application must be filled out in English, but any serious applicants can sign up, "regardless of approach suggested or team background, will be successful in registering." Registration runs though September.

#power #google #invertor #contest #ieee #technology

Submission + - Miscalculation may explain expansion of Antarctic sea ice (sciencemag.org)

Submitted by sciencehabit
sciencehabit writes: Despite global warming, the fringe of sea ice around Antarctica is expanding slightly, in contrast to the marked decline of sea ice in the Arctic. Scientists have blamed this curious fact on various forces, from shifting winds to smaller waves, but a new study suggests a more mundane culprit: an error in the way the satellite data have been processed. The miscalculation, the authors say, might be making the sea ice increase appear larger than it is.

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