Senate Bill Proposes Extending The Shuttle Program By Another Two Years

Blast Off, Cash Off? Courtesy of NASA

From Popular Science:

In an attempt to shorten the gap between the end of the Space Shuttle and the deployment of its replacement, Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison (R-Texas) has introduced a bill that would extend the life of the Shuttle by two years. The bill directly contradicts the White House's space policy, which favors a rapid decommissioning of the Shuttle, followed by an emphasis on the private sector to maintain support of the International Space Station (ISS).

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For A Long Life, Smile Like You Mean It

Duchenne or not Duchenne? (Image: Archive Holdings Inc./Getty)

From The New Scientist:

If you want to live to a grand old age, then smile – and make sure you mean it. Pro baseball players in the 1950s who genuinely beamed in their official photographs tended to outlive more sullen-looking sportsmen and those who put on fake smiles.

Players from the US major league with honest grins lived an average of seven years longer than players who didn't smile for the camera and five years longer than players who smiled unconvincingly, conclude Ernest Abel and Michael Kruger at Wayne State University in Detroit, Michigan.

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Why Do Nice Girls Fall For Bad Boys?

A touch of evil can bring fitness benefits. Daniel Craig as James Bond in Casino Royale (2006).
Photograph: Reuters

From The Guardian:

Carole Jahme shines the cold light of evolutionary psychology on readers' problems. This week: bad boys.

From a nice girl, aged 37
Dear Carole, Why do girls – even nice girls – fall for bad boys, even when the girls in question are 37 and should know much better? My friends and I don't understand ourselves.

Carole replies:
The "dark triad" of human behaviour consists of narcissism (or self-obsession), psychopathy (including callous, impulsive, thrill-seeking, risk-taking behaviour) and Machiavellianism (exploitative, manipulative and deceitful behaviour). Bad boys exhibit dark triad traits and their behaviour, according to one theory, is genetic, meaning they are unlikely to change their ways.

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Cheap DNA Sequencing Will Drive A Revolution In Health Care

Credit: Leonard Lessin / Photo Researchers, Inc.

From Technology Review:

The dream of personalized medicine was one of the driving forces behind the 13-year, $3 billion Human Genome Project. Researchers hoped that once the genetic blueprint was revealed, they could create DNA tests to gauge individuals' risk for conditions like diabetes and cancer, allowing for targeted screening or preëmptive intervention. Genetic information would help doctors select the right drugs to treat disease in a given patient. Such advances would dramatically improve medicine and simultaneously lower costs by eliminating pointless treatments and reducing adverse drug reactions.

Read more ....

Methane Escaping From Arctic Faster Than Expected And Could Stoke Global Warming, Warn Scientists

Photo: Researcher Katey Walter lights a pocket of methane on a lake in Siberia showing just how explosive the greenhouse gas is

From The Daily Mail:

The potent greenhouse gas methane, is bubbling out of the frozen Arctic much faster than expected and could stoke global warming.

Methane had become trapped in the permafrost over time and now 8million tonnes of it is seeping out due to rising temperatures, researchers said today.

'Subsea permafrost is losing its ability to be an impermeable cap,' Natalia Shakhova, a scientist at the University of Fairbanks, Alaska, said in a statement.

She co-led the study published in today's edition of the journal Science.

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The Growing Cyberterrorism Threat

FBI Director Warns Of 'Rapidly Expanding' Cyberterrorism Threat -- Washington Post

SAN FRANCISCO -- FBI Director Robert S. Mueller III warned Thursday that the cyberterrorism threat is "real and . . . rapidly expanding."

Terrorists have shown "a clear interest" in pursuing hacking skills, he told thousands of security professionals at the RSA Conference in San Francisco. "They will either train their own recruits or hire outsiders, with an eye toward combining physical attacks with cyberattacks," he said.

Read more ....

More News on The FBI's Concerns Over Cyberterrorism

FBI director warns of growing cyber threat -- Reuters
Mueller to Cybersecurity Experts: The FBI Wants You -- Tech News World
Mueller: cyberterrorism threat is real -- Federal News Radio
FBI Director on cyber threats: We can't do it alone -- ZDNet
Finger Pointing Begins In Cyber Attack Wars -- 24/7WallSt

Exotic Antimatter Detected at Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider: Heaviest Known Antinucleus Heralds New Frontier In Physics

The diagram above is known as the 3-D chart of the nuclides. The familiar Periodic Table arranges the elements according to their atomic number, Z, which determines the chemical properties of each element. Physicists are also concerned with the N axis, which gives the number of neutrons in the nucleus. The third axis represents strangeness, S, which is zero for all naturally occurring matter, but could be non-zero in the core of collapsed stars. Antinuclei lie at negative Z and N in the above chart, and the newly discovered antinucleus (magenta) now extends the 3-D chart into the new region of strange antimatter. (Credit: Image courtesy of DOE/Brookhaven National Laboratory)

From Science Daily:

ScienceDaily (Mar. 4, 2010) — An international team of scientists studying high-energy collisions of gold ions at the Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider (RHIC), a 2.4-mile-circumference particle accelerator located at the U.S. Department of Energy's (DOE) Brookhaven National Laboratory, has published evidence of the most massive antinucleus discovered to date.

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Runaway Toyotas: What's The Real Risk?

From Live Science:

Toyota, the world's top-selling automaker, recently announced a recall of up to ten million of its vehicles over reports of sudden uncontrollable acceleration. But it's not clear exactly what the problem is.

Some suspect sticking gas pedals, others believe it's a computer glitch. Whatever's causing it, the problem can be deadly. According to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, the Toyota recalls are linked to at least 50 reported fatalities.

Read more ....

Towns Go Gaga For Google

Watch CBS News Videos Online

New Era For Internet Security Amid Increased Attacks

From The BBC:

Internet security techniques must adapt to keep up with the rising tide of net attacks say officials.

The issue is top of the agenda at the world's biggest security conference hosted by vendor RSA.

Recent incidents such as the high-profile attacks on Google in China have highlighted the new challenges.

Read more ....

Massive Spanish Botnet Busted, But Hacker Mastermind Remains Unknown

From Discover Magazine:

Spanish authorities announced this week that they shut down what appears to be the largest botnet ever discovered.

The Mariposa botnet, which first appeared in 2008, was a network of nearly 13 million virus-infected PCs, remotely operated by thieves stealing private information from computers in half the Fortune 1000 companies and 190 countries. Though three men are now in custody, worries over the bot are far from over.

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The Future For UAVs In The U.S. Air Force

MQ-Mb multirole fighter prepped for a precision strike mission

From The Popular Mechanics:

When the Air Force recently mapped out a game plan to 2047, its report contained a big surprise: Fewer pilots and more robotic planes acting on their own. Will the airman-centric service accept a future with fewer cockpits? And are we ready for UAVs that can fire their weapons without human permission?

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With Artificial Photosynthesis, A Bottle of Water Could Produce Enough Energy To Power A House

Potential Energy Cells? shrff14, via Flickr.com

From Popular Science:

One of the interesting side effects of last year's stimulus bill was $400 million in funding for ARPA-E, the civilian, energy-focused cousin of DARPA. And in this week's first ever ARPA-E conference, MIT chemist Dan Nocera showed how well he put that stimulus money to use by highlighting his new photosynthetic process. Using a special catalyst, the process splits water into oxygen and hydrogen fuel efficiently enough to power a home using only sunlight and a bottle of water.

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Knowing The Mind Of God: Seven Theories Of Everything

Getting inside the mind of God (Image: John Lund/Getty)

From New Scientist:

The "theory of everything" is one of the most cherished dreams of science. If it is ever discovered, it will describe the workings of the universe at the most fundamental level and thus encompass our entire understanding of nature. It would also answer such enduring puzzles as what dark matter is, the reason time flows in only one direction and how gravity works. Small wonder that Stephen Hawking famously said that such a theory would be "the ultimate triumph of human reason – for then we should know the mind of God".

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Twitter Flies Past Its 10 Billionth Tweet

The growing number of tweets per day (Source: Twitter)

From The Guardian:

Twitter passed another milestone when a person unknown posted the system's 10 billionth tweet.

Overnight, Twitter flew past the 10bn tweet milestone, according to the GigaTweet site, which tracks the microblogging service. It has taken more than three years to get there. However, Twitter's rapid growth means that the next 10bn should be knocked off in 203 days.

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Mars Spacecraft Breaks Through Data Download Milestone As It Beams 12,000 Amazing Pictures Back To Earth

This image shows dark sand dunes and inverted craters in the Arabia Terra region of Mars. The sand is dark because it was probably derived from basalt. The 'inverted' shape is found on Mars and Earth where erosion has stripped away surrounding topography

From The Daily Mail:

There crystal clear views of alien rock formations are just a few of the impressive images sent back from Nasa's Mars Reconnaisance Orbiter.

Captured by the onboard HiRise camera, they show dramatic landscapes including inverted craters, deep water-forged gullies and frost covered dunes. To date, scientists have released 11,762 such images to the public.

They were sent back to Earth from the spacecraft, which is circling the Red Planet 72million miles away.

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Asteroid Killed Off The Dinosaurs, Says International Scientific Panel

An artist's rendering of the moment of impact when an enormous space rock struck the Yucatán peninsula at the end of the Cretaceous Period. (Credit: Don Davis, NASA)

From Science Daily:

Science Daily (Mar. 4, 2010) — The Cretaceous-Tertiary mass extinction, which wiped out the dinosaurs and more than half of species on Earth, was caused by an asteroid colliding with Earth and not massive volcanic activity, according to a comprehensive review of all the available evidence, published in the journal Science.

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Happy People Talk More, And With More Substance

From Live Science:

Happy people tend to talk more than unhappy people, but when they do, it tends to be less small talk and more substance, a new study finds.

A group of psychologists from the University of Arizona and Washington University in St. Louis set out to find whether happy and unhappy people differ in the types of conversations they tend to have.

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Apple Patent Case 'Could Affect All Android Phones'

Photo: HTC was the first manufacturer to use Android in its phones

From The BBC:

Apple's legal action against HTC may have "wider implications" for all phone makers using Google's Android operating system, an analyst has warned.

Ian Fogg of Forrester Research said that the case against HTC, in which Apple alleges infringement of 20 of its patents, could be the first of many.

Although Apple has not named Google in the suits, many of the named patents relate to operating system processes.

Read more ....

Globe-Warning Methane Is Gushing From A Russian Ice Shelf

From Discover Magazine:

Behind the ongoing back-and-forth fights over climate change that usually focus on carbon, there has lingered the threat of the powerful greenhouse gas methane being released into the atmosphere and causing even worse trouble. In August we reported on a study that noted methane bubbling up from the seafloor near islands north of Norway, giving scientists a scare. This week in Science, another team reports seeing the same thing during thousands of observations of the East Siberian Arctic Shelf on Russia’s north coast, which is even more worrisome because it’s a huge methane deposit.

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How UAVs Will Replace The Air Force's Current Fleet

When unmanned aircraft can refuel one another, their time on a mission will be dramatically extended. The Air Force Research Laboratory is spending $49 million over the next four years to create a system that will allow UAVs to autonomously refuel in the air, as seen in this 2007 RQ-4 Global Hawk test.

From Popular Mechanics:

In its latest plans for the future, the Air Force envisions swapping its pilots for a fleet of versatile—and affordable—unmanned airplanes. A single UAV with interchangeable payloads could replace several legacy airplanes. Here's a look at some possible trades.

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Russia Will End Space Tourism Flights When Shuttle Retires

Charles Simonyi Prepares for Space Courtesy of Space Adventures and Charles Simonyi

From Popular Science:

Well, it looks like Charles Simonyi might have to wait a while for a third trip, because space tourism is going on hiatus. With the shuttle's cancellation leaving Russia as the only country able to service the International Space Station (ISS), the Russian government has announced it will no longer let civilians hitch a ride on Soyuz flights.

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Dark, Dangerous Asteroids Found Lurking Near Earth

Now you see it: a near-Earth object becomes visible in infrared
(Image: NASA/JPL-Caltech/UCLA)

From New Scientist:

An infrared space telescope has spotted several very dark asteroids that have been lurking unseen near Earth's orbit. Their obscurity and tilted orbits have kept them hidden from surveys designed to detect things that might hit our planet.

Called the Wide-Field Infrared Survey Explorer (WISE), the new NASA telescope launched on 14 December on a mission to map the entire sky at infrared wavelengths. It began its survey in mid-January.

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NASA Chief Bolden Seeks 'Plan B' For The Space Agency

Astronaut Nicholas Patrick holds onto the International Space Station's cupola during a February spacewalk. Reuters

From Wall Street Journal:

NASA chief Charles Bolden has asked senior managers to draw up an alternate plan for the space agency after members of Congress indicated they wanted to reject a White House proposal to hire private companies to ferry U.S. astronauts into orbit and beyond.

In an internal National Aeronautics and Space Administration memo viewed by The Wall Street Journal, Mr. Bolden ordered officials to map out "what a potential compromise might look like" to satisfy critics on Capitol Hill. By calling for an alternative plan, Mr. Bolden threatened to undercut White House efforts to get its proposed NASA budget through Congress.

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Industry Challenges: Drowning In Data

Digital sequencing systems can capture vast amounts of genetic data, but interpretation has been difficult. Credit: Monty Rakusen/Getty Images

From Technology Review:

The personalized-medicine industry aims to convert information about an individual's genome into useful diagnostic tests and targeted drug treatments. Companies that deal with gathering the information--sequencing genomes and identifying genetic variations--have made impressive technical advances that have dramatically reduced the cost of analyzing DNA (see "Faster Tools to Scrutinize the Genome"). Now the biggest challenge lies in interpreting the huge volume of genetic data being generated. Studies have identified thousands of candidates for genes underlying common diseases, for example, but it's not clear how to make that information medically useful.

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Apple Sues Google Phone Manufacturer As Jobs Warns: Create Your Own Technology, Don't Steal Ours

An HTC smartphone (right) alongside an Apple iPhone. Apple are suing HTC Corp for infringing on hardware and software patents

From The Daily Mail:

Apple is suing the company which makes touchscreen smartphones using Google software.

Apple has accused Taiwan’s HTC Corp of infringing 20 hardware and software patents related to the iPhone.

Although the lawsuit does not name Google Inc as a defendant, Apple’s move is viewed by many as an indirect attack on the company, whose Nexus One smartphone is manufactured by HTC.

Read more ....

IPad Goes On Sale April 3; Pre-Orders Begin In A Week

From Gadget Lab:

Apple announced Friday that the first iPads will be available on April 3 and that the long-awaited device will be available for pre-order on March 12. The launch is for the Wi-Fi-only version, with the 3G-enabled device on sale later in the month.

The late-April release of the 3G version will also coincide with rollout of both models in Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Spain, Switzerland and the U.K., Apple said.

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Update: IPad to hit US stores April 3, then 9 more markets -- Reuters

First of Missing Primitive Stars Found

The newly discovered red giant star S1020549 dominates this artist's conception. The primitive star contains 6,000 times less heavy elements than our Sun, indicating that it formed very early in the Universe's history. Located in the dwarf galaxy Sculptor some 290,000 light-years away, the star's presence supports the theory that our galaxy underwent a "cannibal" phase, growing to its current size by swallowing dwarf galaxies and other galactic building blocks. (Credit: David A. Aguilar / CfA)

From Science Daily:

Science Daily (Mar. 4, 2010) — Astronomers have discovered a relic from the early universe -- a star that may have been among the second generation of stars to form after the Big Bang. Located in the dwarf galaxy Sculptor some 290,000 light-years away, the star has a remarkably similar chemical make-up to the Milky Way's oldest stars. Its presence supports the theory that our galaxy underwent a "cannibal" phase, growing to its current size by swallowing dwarf galaxies and other galactic building blocks.

Read more ....

Violent Planet: The Forces That Shape Earth

From Live Science:

Earth is a violent planet, and always has been. In fact it is much calmer today than in the past. As the planet continues to cool – 4.5 billion years after it formed – what was once likely a lava world has become a temperate planet that's two-thirds covered by water and hospitable to life.

But recent events and new research show that the geologic havoc is far from over.

Read more ....

Apple iPad's Store Debut Pushed Back

Watch CBS News Videos Online

From CBS News/AP:

(AP) The much-anticipated iPad tablet computer from Apple Inc. will start hitting U.S. store shelves on April 3, slightly later than originally planned.

When Apple unveiled the touch-screen device Jan. 27, the company said the first iPads would reach the market in "late March" worldwide, not just in the U.S.

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YouTube Adds Video Captions For Deaf

From The BBC:

YouTube is making the tens of millions of videos it hosts more accessible to the deaf and hard of hearing by putting automatic captions on them.

The Google-owned company said this use of speech recognition technology is probably the biggest experiment of its kind online.

Previously captions were only on a small amount of content.

"A core part of YouTube's DNA is access to content," said the firm's product manager Hunter Walk.

Read more ....

Earth Raised Up Its Magnetic Shield Early, Protecting Water And Emerging Life

From Discover Magazine:

Here we are drinking coffee and tweeting and otherwise going about our lives, generally not giving much thought to the protection that the Earth’s magnetic field affords us from the solar wind. But that magnetic field is crucial for our existence. Now, new findings in Science say that this protective shield originated even 200 million years earlier than scientists had previously thought, perhaps protecting the planet’s water from evaporating away and aiding the rise of life on the early Earth.

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Shields Down! Earth's Mag Field May Drop In A Flash

There'll be little warning if Earth's magnetic field flips (Image: NASA/SPL)

From New Scientist:

EVEN if we knew precise details of Earth's core, we would not be able to predict a catastrophic flip in the polarity of its magnetic field more than a decade or two ahead.

Our planet's magnetic field has reversed polarity from time to time throughout its history. Some models suggest that a flip would be completed in a year or two, but if, as others predict, it lasted decades or longer we would be left exposed to space radiation. This could short-circuit satellites, pose a risk to aircraft passengers and play havoc with electrical equipment on the ground.

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Artificial Intelligence Brings Musicians Back From The Dead, Allowing All-Stars Of All Time To Jam

Rachmaninoff, Back at the Piano Where He Belongs Zenph

From Popular Science:

Want to know what a jam session between Jack White and Stevie Ray Vaughan might have sounded like, or how Billie Holliday would interpret the latest dreck from Avril Lavigne? Advances in artificial intelligence are resurrecting musical legends of the past, tapping into old recordings to establish a musician's style and personality, then applying those attributes to newer recordings of old songs, or even to songs the musician never played before.

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Money Sharing Comes To Facebook

Photo: 16,000 online traders accept payments via Buxter's parent company.

From The BBC:

Friends on social networking site Facebook can now send small payments directly to each other via an application called Buxter.

Buxter handles transactions in Euros or US dollars, with plans to launch in Sterling in the next four weeks.

Other currencies are subject to a 5% conversion fee at the point of upload to a Buxter account.

Read more ....

Early Cannabis Use Linked To Psychosis

From Cosmos/AFP:

WASHINGTON: The longer people use cannabis or marijuana, the more likely they are to experience hallucinations or delusions or to suffer psychosis, according to a study released Saturday.

The study found that people who first used cannabis when they were aged 15 or younger were twice as likely to develop a "non-affective psychosis" - which can include schizophrenia - than those who had never used the drug.

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Why Beer Needs Watering Down

From Times Online:

Brewers are teaming up with environmentalists to help to conserve water supplies — and ensure the pints keep flowing.

It’s enough to make beer drinkers cry into their pints. A combination of factors, including rapid population growth, expanding food needs and unpredictable weather patterns, is heralding a global water crisis. Chronic water shortages are already hitting many regions, particularly in developing countries. Industry, which accounts for about 22 per cent of global fresh water consumption, is increasingly concerned about what will happen when the taps run dry. Brewers are among the most vulnerable: a pint of beer is up to 95 per cent water. Drinkers have been warned that, as water supplies dry up, prices could rise and supplies could be threatened. The battle is on to keep the pumps open.

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Canine Morphology: Hunting For Genes And Tracking Mutations

Researchers studying the dog genome have a new understanding of why domestic dogs vary so much in size, shape, coat texture, color and patterning. (Credit: iStockphoto/Nataliya Kuznetsova)

From Science Daily:

Science Daily (Mar. 3, 2010) — Why do domestic dogs vary so much in size, shape, coat texture, color and patterning? Study of the dog genome has reached a point where the molecular mechanisms governing such variation across mammalian species are becoming understood.

In an essay published in the March 2, 2010 issue of PLoS Biology, National Human Genome Research Institute (NHGRI) researchers discuss advances in understanding the genomic mechanisms controlling canine morphology.

Read more ....

Dog-Sized Creature Was Almost A Dinosaur

The newly identified dinosaur relative, called Asilisaurus kongwe, was about the size of a large dog. Here a skeletal reconstruction of the animal is compared with a 5'6" human for scale. Credit: Sterling Nesbitt.

From Live Science:

A four-legged animal about the size of a large dog with a long tail is now the oldest known relative of dinosaurs, dating back some 240 million years. Paleontologists recently examined the bones from at least 14 individuals of this proto-dinosaur that were discovered in southern Tanzania.

The dino-like animal was small, weighing about that of a young child, and likely munched on plants.

Read more ....

Tracing King Tut's Family Tree In London

A colossal statue of Amenhotep III - King Tut's only grandfather - can
be found at the British Museum, Room 4.

From The Independent:

Tutankhamun has always captured popular imagination, and been a major draw for museums.

The British Museum's 1972 exhibition of artefacts from his tomb smashed all expectations in the box office, drawing over 1.6 million visitors over its nine month duration. The pharaoh nicknamed 'King Tut' has been the source of more speculation, satire and popular culture references than any other male king of Egypt. Last week pathologists announced the results from their studies into the genetic relationship of eleven mummies from the Egyptian New Kingdom (mid 16th to early 11th centuries BC), including those of the legendary pharaoh Tutankhamun.

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Plans To Fight Cyberwar Are A 'Recipe For Disaster'

Michael Chertoff, former Secretary at the US Department of Homeland Security

From The Guardian:

Senior security experts have criticised the west's approach to online threats, suggesting that not enough is being done to stem the growing tide of cyberattacks.

Michael Chertoff, a former secretary at the US Department of Homeland Security, said on Wednesday that current cybersecurity policies were a "recipe for disaster" that could inadvertently encourage a virtual attack equivalent to "the next Pearl Harbour".

Read more ....

More News On Cyberwar

A New Age for US Cybersecurity -- Tech News World
Former Intelligence Chief: U.S. Would Lose Cyberwar -- Information Week
U.S. would lose a cyber war, former intell chief warns -- Government Computer News
Cyberwar Hype Intended to Destroy the Open Internet -- Threat Level
US cyber defense strategy details hit the Internet -- France 24
China's Hacker Army -- Foreign Policy
Is Iran's Cyberwar Sustainable? -- National Journal
The Real Meaning Of Cyberwarfare -- Forbes
Cyberwar hype was cooked up to sell Internet-breaking garbage to the military -- Boing Boing

A Measure For The Multiverse

Touching the multiverse (Image: Eoin Ryan)

From The New Scientist:

WHEN cosmologist George Ellis turned 70 last year, his friends held a party to celebrate. There were speeches and drinks and canapés aplenty to honour the theorist from the University of Cape Town, South Africa, who is regarded as one of the world's leading experts on general relativity. But there the similarity to most parties ends.

Read more ....

Japan's New Hovering Hummingbird Bot Has Four Wings, Weighs Under 3 Grams

Chiba University's Latest Hummingbird 'Bot Chiba University

From Popular Science:

Biomimicry isn't new, nor are robotic hummingbirds, but the latest 'bot to come out of Chiba University in Japan makes even the DARPA-inspired Nano Air Vehicle -- which is very cool, needless to say -- look like last year's robotics.

Read more ....

Dinosaur Extinction Link To Crater Confirmed

From The BBC:

An international panel of experts has strongly endorsed evidence that a space impact was behind the mass extinction event that killed off the dinosaurs.

They reached the consensus after conducting the most wide-ranging analysis yet of the evidence.

Writing in Science journal, they rule out alternative theories such as large-scale volcanism.

Read more ....

Shuttle Flights Would Continue Under New Proposal

From The Orlando Sentinel:

WASHINGTON — The space shuttle era could get a new lease on life under a bill filed today by U.S. Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison, R-Texas.

The measure would delay the shuttle’s planned retirement in 2010 until NASA is confident that a replacement spacecraft is ready or that the shuttle and its massive payload bay is no longer needed to keep the International Space Station afloat through 2020.

The 37-page bill also authorizes an additional $1.3 billion in NASA spending next year above President Barack Obama’s request of $19 billion. The extra money would help prepare NASA for as many as two additional shuttle flights per year after 2010, as well as fund new spacecraft development.

Read more ....

Google vs. Apple: An Epic Battle

By David Goldman, staff writer

From CNN:

NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- Let the smartphone smackdown begin.

In the blue corner, wearing black, weighing in at 4.8 ounces, the 31-month champion of the touch screen phones: Apple's iPhone!

In the red corner is the challenger, appearing on every carrier, a new entrant to the heavy-weight battle: Google's Android!

Read more ....

Millions Of YouTube Videos To Get Subtitles With 'Auto-Captioning'

From Times Online:

YouTube introduced a system today that will automatically create subtitles for all its English language videos.

The technology, called “auto-captioning”, uses complex algorithms to work out what is being said in a video and convert it into text. Once the feature is turned on, the words will appear on the bottom of the video screen just like subtitles in a film.

Read more ....

Volcano-Chaser Braves Some Of Earth's Most Dangerous SituationsTo Capture Amazing Photos Of Violent Eruptions

From The Daily Mail:

Most people would think themselves unlucky if they passed a volcano as it erupted, but this counts as a good day at the office for one photographer.

Martin Rietze is part of a select group of volcano-chasers who seek out the exploding phenomena, and braves huge electric storms and boiling lava to get the perfect shots.

The 45-year-old travels around the world's volcano hotspots, from Costa Rica to Italy, in his pursuit of Earth's greatest fiery spectacle.

Read more ....

'Missing Link' Fossil Was Not Human Ancestor As Claimed, Anthropologists Say

Radiographs of the type specimen of Darwinius masillae, new genus and species, from Messel in Germany. (Credit: Franzen JL, Gingerich PD, Habersetzer J, Hurum JH, von Koenigswald W, et al. Complete Primate Skeleton from the Middle Eocene of Messel in Germany: Morphology and Paleobiology. PLoS ONE, 2009; 4(5): e5723 DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0005723)

From Science Daily:

Science Daily (Mar. 3, 2010) — A fossil that was celebrated last year as a possible "missing link" between humans and early primates is actually a forebearer of modern-day lemurs and lorises, according to two papers by scientists at The University of Texas at Austin, Duke University and the University of Chicago.

Read more ....

Is Antarctica Falling Apart?

Antarctica's Ross Ice Shelf, like many of the fringes of the Antarctic continent, floats. That makes it fragile compared to ice on the continent, and this is where icebergs break off in a process called calving. Credit: Michael Van Woert, NOAA NESDIS, ORA

From Live Science:

Recent news of mammoth icebergs the size of small U.S. states breaking off Antarctica may sound dire. But those events mostly represent business as usual at the world's southernmost continent, scientists say.

A massive iceberg the size of the state of Rhode Island collided with Antarctica's Mertz Glacier in mid-February, and caused a huge new iceberg with an estimated mass of 860 billion metric tons to break off the glacial tongue. Scientists note that such dramatic examples have not been uncommon over the past decade.

Read more ....

Health Checkup: How to Live 100 Years

Six of the eight Hurlburt siblings live in New England, including Peggy (79), Helen (88), Millie (93), Peter (80), Agnes (96) and Muriel (89). Jason Grow for TIME

From Time Magazine:

A century of life was once a rare thing, but that is changing. Science is slowly unraveling the secrets of the centenarians
Don't write that down! Put your pencil away!" Agnes Buckley is trying in vain to head off an entertaining story her sisters are telling me about how she used to sneak out of the house as a teenager. (She favored boys with motorcycles.) When their father hid her shoes to keep her at home, Agnes simply bypassed the front door and leaped out the window.

"Everyone is going to think I was a troublemaker," she laments.

Read more ....

Ancient Queen's Burial Chamber Discovered At Saqqara

The Pyramid of Behenu at Saqqara. SCA

From The Independent:

A French archaeological team digging at Saqqara has discovered the burial chamber of 6th Dynasty Queen Behenu, wife of either Pepi I or Pepi II. The burial chamber was revealed while the team was cleaning the sand from Behenu's pyramid in the area of el-Shawaf in South Saqqara, west of the pyramid of King Pepi I.

The burial chamber uncovered by the French mission is badly damaged, apart from two inner walls which contain engraved Pyramid Texts. Those texts were widely used in royal tombs – carved on walls as well as sarcophagi - during the 5th and 6th Dynasties (circa 2465-2150BC).

Read more ....