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Submission + - OnLive officially announces acquisition, name will remain OnLive (tech-stew.com)

Submitted by
techfun89
techfun89 writes: "The restructured OnLive has issued an press release and FAQ to attempt to clear up any rumors and misinformation on the companies recent changes.

Onlive is emphasizing that the streaming game service will go on uninterrupted and the "Newly formed company" will continue to use the OnLive name. The press release also outlines the Assignment for the Benefit of Creditors (ABC) process OnLive used to settle debts and that an affiliate of Lauder Partners, a technology investment firm, was the new OnLive's first investor. The firm talked about the necessity of laying off its staff, stating that "neither OnLive, Inc. shares nor OnLive staff could transfer under this type of transaction," and confirming that nearly have of the previous staff had been offered positions at the new company.

The new firm mentions that this acquisition holds hope for the future "of transforming the OnLive vision into reality."

This effectively means that OnLive was essentially bought out by OnLive, or rather, more specifically, one of their original investors in the company who backed the startup back in 2009."
Hardware

Submission + - OnLive is coming to the Ouya console (tech-stew.com)

Submitted by
techfun89
techfun89 writes: "The cloud gaming platform OnLive will be coming to the Kickstarter-Funded console Ouya in 2013 when Ouya debuts, according to both companies. In a post on the OnLive official blog today, OnLive general manager Bruce Grove stated that OnLive would be available on Ouya when the console hits the market in March of 2013.

General Manager of Ouya, Bruce Grove stated this about the merger: "OUYA is rethinking the console business, making waves by using standard technology to make gaming for your living room accessible, affordable and more innovative than ever, in OnLive's case, we pioneered a groundbreaking, cloud-based system that instantly delivers games to any device on demand.""
Mars

Submission + - BOLD plan to find Mars life for cheap (tech-stew.com)

Submitted by
techfun89
techfun89 writes: "There is a BOLD new plan for detecting signs of microbial life on Mars. The nickname is BOLD, which stands for Biological Oxidant and Life Detection Initiative, would be a follow-up to the 1976 Mars Viking life-detection experiments.

"We have much better technology that we could use," says BOLD lead scientist Dirk Schulze-Makuch, with Washington State University. He elaborates, "Our idea is to make a relatively cheap mission and go more directly to characterize and solve the big question about the soil properties on Mars and life detection."

To help figure out the life-detection mystery, Schulze-Makuch and his colleagues would fly a set of six pyramid-shaped probes that would crash land, pointy end down, so they embed themselves four to eight inches into the soil. One of the instruments includes a sensor that can detect a single molecule of DNA or other nucleotide."
Mars

Submission + - New study show Mars Viking robots found life (tech-stew.com)

Submitted by
techfun89
techfun89 writes: "New analysis of data, now 36 years old, from the Viking robots, shows that NASA had found life on Mars. This conclusion was published by an international team of mathematicians and scientists this week.

The Labeled Release experiment looked for signs of microbial metabolism in soil samples in 1976. The general thinking was that the experiment had found geological not biological activity

However, the new study approached things differently. Researchers broke the data into sets of numbers and analyzed the results for complexity. What they found were close correlations between the Viking results' complexity and those of terrestrial biological data sets. Based on this they concluded that the Viking results were more biological in nature than just geological processes."
Nintendo

Submission + - Fully functional Nintendo controller coffee table (tech-stew.com)

Submitted by
techfun89
techfun89 writes: "Ever wished that you could defeat Bowser literally right from your coffee table with giant built in buttons? Well, your dreams have come true with the fully-functional Nintendo Controller Coffee Table. This is the creation of Charles Lushear that has combined old school entertainment with maple wood and craftsmanship. Simply plug into an existing classic NES system and go to town. The table also features a removable glass top with retractable cord to use the furniture as just a table when you are done playing Mario. All for around $3500."
Mars

Submission + - Strange cloud formations on Mars, a mystery (tech-stew.com) 1

Submitted by
techfun89
techfun89 writes: "Mars has returned to our evening skies as it does every two years. This time it is getting even more attention and buzz than it normally would. Amateur astronomer Wayne Jaeschke of West Chester Pennsylvania noticed an unusual protrusion in the planet's southern hemisphere, preceding the sunrise terminator.

Several things may have contributed to this strange "cloud formation". One possibility is a meteoric impact event, where dust was spewed up into the atmosphere. Another could be a major dust storm, which are typical on Mars. While the other possibility is the more mundane, that these observations were caused by a mere optical illusion via a type of glint that occurred due to having just the right combination of lighting and atmospheric conditions. Some suggest volcanic activity, though this is unlikely given it has been 20 to 200 million years since lava has flowed on Mars."
Medicine

Submission + - Killing cancer with engineered viruses (tech-stew.com) 1

Submitted by techfun89
techfun89 writes: Those pesky viruses can make us all sick, but one day could be engineered to defeat cancer. Cancer cells have one trait that may leave them open to attack. They aren't good at killing off viral infections, hence, at least in theory, you could use a virus to kill cancer cells without affecting the patient.

Dr. Ian Mohr, a virologist at New York University, altered the herpes virus so that it isn't attacked by the immune system and kills cancer cells more efficiently.

Another virus that is proving effective for liver cancer is Vaccinia. Vaccinia is used to protect against smallpox and so far the results have been promising. Several groups of patients have had an increase in survival times. Meanwhile other viruses are being used for things like melanoma, bladder cancer, and head and neck cancer.

-via http://tech-stew.com/
Space

Submission + - Russia has sights set on manned moon landing by 2030 (tech-stew.com)

Submitted by techfun89
techfun89 writes: Russia plans on sending cosmonauts to the moon as well as unmanned spacecrafts to Mars, Jupiter and Venus by 2030. To date, the United States is still the only country who has successfully landed landers on Mars. Considering the recent launch failures in Russia, these plans seem very ambitious.

-via tech-stew.com
Science

Submission + - Jawless creature had the world's sharpest teeth (nature.com)

Submitted by ananyo
ananyo writes: An extinct primitive marine vertebrate had the sharpest dental structures ever known — with tips just one-twentieth of the width of a human hair, but able to apply pressures that could compete easily with those from human jaws (http://www.nature.com/news/jawless-vertebrate-had-world-s-sharpest-teeth-1.10211).

The razor-sharp teeth belonged to conodonts, jawless vertebrates that evolved some 500 million years ago in the Precambrian eon and went extinct during the Triassic period, around 200 million years ago. The creatures roamed the planet for longer than any other vertebrate so far–– and despite their lack of jaws, they were the first creatures to evolve teeth ( abstract http://dx.doi.org/10.1098/rspb.2012.0147).
Security

Submission + - Iran blamed for major cyberattack on BBC (techworld.com)

Submitted by Qedward
Qedward writes: Iran is privately being blamed for a major cyberattack on the BBC earlier this month that blocked access to its popular Persian TV service and disrupted the Corporation’s IT using denial-of-service.

The multi-pronged March 2 attack took down much of the BBC’s email, overloaded its telephone switchboard with automatic phone calls, and blocked a satellite feed for the BBC Persian station. BBC servers were also on the end of a DDoS.

In an unprecedented tactic, the BBC has trailed a speech to be given this week to the Royal Television Society in which Director General Mark Thompson will mention the attacks in some detail while stopping short of formally naming Iran as the perpetrator.

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