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Submission + - Global warming? No, actually we're cooling, claim scientists (telegraph.co.uk) 1

Submitted by bricko
bricko writes: Global warming? No, actually we're cooling, claim scientists
A cold Arctic summer has led to a record increase in the ice cap, leading experts to predict a period of global cooling.

  There has been a 60 per cent increase in the amount of ocean covered with ice compared to this time last year, they equivalent of almost a million square miles.

In a rebound from 2012's record low an unbroken ice sheet more than half the size of Europe already stretches from the Canadian islands to Russia's northern shores, days before the annual re-freeze is even set to begin.

The Northwest Passage from the Atlantic to the Pacific has remained blocked by pack-ice all year, forcing some ships to change their routes.

A leaked report to the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) seen by the Mail on Sunday, has led some scientists to claim that the world is heading for a period of cooling that will not end until the middle of this century.

Submission + - MIT's inflatable antennae could boost small satellite communications (networkworld.com)

Submitted by coondoggie
coondoggie writes: Researchers at the Massachusetts's Institute of technology say they have developed an inflatable antenna for small satellites known as cubesats that can fold into a compact space and inflate when in orbit. The inflatable antenna lets a CubeSat transmit data back to Earth at a distance that can be covered by a satellite outfitted with an inflatable antenna is seven times farther than that of existing CubeSat communications

Submission + - Top Factor In Successful IT Projects: Speed (itworld.com)

Submitted by itwbennett
itwbennett writes: There's a new trend in CIO circles: The need for speed. Whether they achieve that speed by adopting Agile development, cloud computing, or predictive analytics, the fact is that, increasingly, the only way for IT to deliver business advantage is to be faster than the competition. Or maybe it's just that IT is finally realizing that in business it's better to be fast than to be perfect. As my piano teacher used to say, 'if you can't play it right, play it loud.'

Submission + - New Ship Will Remain Stable by Creating its Own Inner Waves (gizmag.com)

Submitted by Zothecula
Zothecula writes: When offshore oil drilling rigs are being installed, serviced or dismantled, the workers typically stay in cabins located on adjacent floating platforms. These semi-submersible platforms are towed into place (or travel under their own power) and then their hulls are partially filled with water, allowing them to remain somewhat stable in the pitching seas. Now, a ship is being built to serve the same purpose, but that will be a much more mobile alternative. It will keep from rolling with the waves by generating its own waves, inside its hull.

Submission + - HIV vaccine makers predict eradication of AIDS after successful trials (communications.uwo.ca)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: The Phase 1 clinical trial of the SAV001-H HIV vaccine has shown great promise. Sumagen Canada Inc and the University of Western Ontario have reported that the trial is now complete, with volunteers showing no adverse effect from their course of SAV001-H and recording boosts in the production of antibodies. The increase of antibodies is seen as especially encouraging as a predicate for the likely success of Phase 2, which will focus on immune response. Sumagen CEO Mr Jung-Gee Cho expects the progress will see the company be the first to hit the market with an HIV vaccine, and predicts they will, in time, eradicate HIV/AIDS altogethe http://now.msn.com/hiv-vaccine-trial-subjects-experience-no-adverse-effects

Submission + - Steadicam-Like Liftware Spoon Cancels Out Parkinson's-Caused Tremors (gizmag.com)

Submitted by Zothecula
Zothecula writes: While most of us take the lifting of a spoon to our mouth for granted, it can be a major challenge for people with Parkinson's Disease or other neurodegenerative conditions. It was with those people in mind that the engineers at San Francisco’s Lift Labs created the tremor-canceling Liftware Spoon.

Submission + - Japanese Ice Wall to Stop Radio Active Leaks. (denverpost.com)

Submitted by minstrelmike
minstrelmike writes: Japan is planning to install a 2 mile around the Fukushima nuclear plant. The technology has not been used to that extent nor for more than a couple years. "Plus the frozen wall won't be ready for another two years, which means contaminated water would continue to leak out." But at least they have a $470 million dollar plan ready to present to the Olympic committee choosing Madrid, Istanbul or Tokyo.

Submission + - Amazon bundles ebooks with print copies for the first time (pcpro.co.uk)

Submitted by nk497
nk497 writes: Amazon is bundling ebooks with print copies for the first time, via its Kindle MatchBook programme, admitting that "bundling print and digital has been one of the most requested features from customers".

The digital copies won't all be free — as with AutoRip, which offers free MP3s for selected CDs and records — but Amazon promises to charge no more than $3 per digital copy. The programme will apply to books bought as far back as Amazon's 1995 launch. So far, only 10,000 books are listed as being part of Kindle MatchBook, but Amazon hopes to add more, telling publishers it "adds a new revenue stream".

Submission + - Scottish Academic: Mining the Moon for Helium 3 is Evil (yahoo.com)

Submitted by MarkWhittington
MarkWhittington writes: Tony Milligan is a teaching fellow of philosophy at the University of Aberdeen and is apparently concerned about helium 3 mining on the moon. In a recent paper he suggested that it should not be allowed for a number of reasons which include environmental objections, his belief that the moon is a cultural artifact, and that too much access to energy would be bad for the human race. The objections, on close examination, seem absurd.

Submission + - XPrize Pulls Plug on $10 Million Genomics Competition (sciencemag.org)

Submitted by sciencehabit
sciencehabit writes: The XPrize Foundation has scrapped its high-profile $10 million genomics challenge set for next month after attracting only two competitors to the sequencing contest.

The Archon Genomics XPRIZE began with much fanfare 7 years ago with the aim of boosting medical genomics by offering a $10 million award to the first team to sequence 100 human genomes in 10 days for no more than $10,000 each. After complaints about the tight deadline and unclear judging criteria, the foundation revised the rules in October 2011: The objective was to sequence the genomes of 100 centenarians with high accuracy and 98% completeness within 30 days for $1000 or less. Interest was tepid, however, and only two of the eight contenders in the original contest registered by the 31 May deadline—the company Ion Torrent, and George Church’s lab at Harvard University.

Submission + - Old electronics don't die, they pile up (networkworld.com)

Submitted by coondoggie
coondoggie writes: The electronic waste industry is booming and not necessarily in a good way. For example, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) says that the US federal government discards some 10,000 computers per week and Pike Research says the number of electronic devices at end-of-life will double from 2010 to 2025. It is estimated that as much as 60 million tons of e-waste could end up as landfill. There are many efforts to stem the tide of course — the European Commission recently said that by 2015 75% of e-waste must be recovered and 65% of it recycled (after 2020, 85% must be recycled). Here we take a look at where old electronics really go to die most of the time.

Submission + - How Much Should You Worry About an Arctic Methane Bomb? 1

Submitted by barlevg
barlevg writes: It was a stunning figure: $60 trillion.

Such could be the cost, according to a recent commentary in Nature, of "the release of methane from thawing permafrost beneath the East Siberian Sea, off northern Russiaa figure comparable to the size of the world economy in 2012." More specifically, the paper described a scenario in which rapid Arctic warming and sea ice retreat lead to a pulse of undersea methane being released into the atmosphere. How much methane? The paper modeled a release of 50 gigatons of this hard-hitting greenhouse gas (a gigaton is equal to a billion metric tons) between 2015 and 2025. This, in turn, would trigger still more warming and gargantuan damage and adaptation costs.

According to the Nature commentary, that methane "is likely to be emitted as the seabed warms, either steadily over 50 years or suddenly." Such are the scientific assumptions behind the paper's economic analysis. But are those assumptions realistic—and could that much methane really be released suddenly from the Arctic?

Submission + - Stop fixing all security vulnerabilities. (blog.risk.io)

Submitted by PMcGovern
PMcGovern writes: At BSidesLV in Las Vegas, Ed Bellis and Data Scientist Michael Roytman gave a talk explaining how security vulnerability statistics should be done. " Don't fix all security issues. Fix the security issues that matter, based on statistical relevance." They looked at 23,000,000 live vulnerabilities across 1,000,000 real assets, which belonged to 9,500 clients to explain their thesis.

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