Skin Cells Turned Into Brain Cells

Image: Cellular transformation: A cocktail of three genes can transform skin cells into neurons (shown here in red). Credit: Thomas Vierbuchen

From Technology Review:

A simple approach shows that cells might be more flexible than once thought.

Skin cells called fibroblasts can be transformed into neurons quickly and efficiently with just a few genetic tweaks, according to new research. The surprisingly simple conversion, which doesn't require the cells to be returned to an embryonic state, suggests that differentiated adult cells are much more flexible than previously thought.

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Apple Introduces The iPad And iBooks

From Scientific American:

What do you know? McGraw-Hill CEO Harold McGraw was on the money yesterday when he said Apple would announce a tablet on Wednesday. The iPad now has officially arrived, weighing in at less than a kilogram, with a 25-centimeter LED-backlit display that is just over a centimeter thick. It will be available by the end of March with a price tag starting at $499.

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NASA To Get More Money, But Must Scratch Moon Plan

From ABC News/AP:

Officials say Obama rules out NASA return to moon; budgets money for private space taxis.

President Barack Obama is essentially grounding plans to return astronauts to the moon and instead is sending NASA in new directions with roughly $6 billion more.

A White House official confirmed Thursday that when next week's budget is proposed, NASA will get an additional $5.9 billion over five years, as first reported in Florida newspapers. Some of that money will be used to extend the life of the International Space Station to 2020. The official said it also will be used to entice companies to build private spacecraft to ferry astronauts to the space station after the space shuttle retires.

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Monarch Butterflies Reveal a Novel Way in Which Animals Sense Earth's Magnetic Field

Monarch butterflies resting in a tree. (Credit: iStockphoto/Paul Tessier)

From Science Daily:

Science Daily (Jan. 27, 2010) — Building on prior investigation into the biological mechanisms through which monarch butterflies are able to migrate up to 2,000 miles from eastern North America to a particular forest in Mexico each year, neurobiologists at the University of Massachusetts Medical School (UMMS) have linked two related photoreceptor proteins found in butterflies to animal navigation using the Earth's magnetic field.

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Airports Could Get Mind-Reading Scanners

Passengers wait to check in at the Delta Air Lines ticket counter at O'Hare International Airport in Chicago yesterday, when American Airlines and Delta canceled hundreds of flights. (Frank Polich/Reuters)

From Live Science:

WeCU Technologies is building a mind-reading scanner that can tell if a given traveler is a potential danger - without the subject's knowledge. WeCU Technologies (pronounced "we see you") is creating a system that would essentially turn the public spaces in airports into vast screening grounds:.

"The system ... projects images onto airport screens, such as symbols associated with a certain terrorist group or some other image only a would-be terrorist would recognize, company CEO Ehud Givon said.

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Navy Says Video Games Can Boost "Fluid Intelligence" of Warfighters

America's Army Get your virtual warfare on U.S. Army

From Popular Science:

Military simulators that resemble video games have obvious training benefits for warfighters, but U.S. Navy scientists also say that video games can boost brainpower and produce cognitive improvements that last up to two and a half years.

The Office of Naval Research (ONR) hopes that video game-like training can help warfighters hone their "fluid intelligence," or ability to confront and solve new problems. Such research feeds into a new sense that the human brain can continue to adapt and improve itself beyond early adulthood, and may allow soldiers to better adjust to the changing tactics and environment of the modern-day battlefield.

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My Comment: Fluid intelligence?

With iPad, Apple Still Has A Fatal Attraction For AT&T

From Gadget Lab:

When Steve Jobs said Apple’s new iPad tablet would have 3G data service from AT&T during Wednesday’s press conference, sighs of disgust could be heard from the audience, presumably from disgruntled iPhone customers.

Prior to the unveiling of the 9.7-inch device Wednesday, a few vague rumors suggested Verizon would carry the tablet. Instead, Jobs announced two versions of the iPad: a Wi-Fi only model and an unlocked, Wi-Fi + 3G model for use on GSM networks. The Verizon network operates on the CDMA standard, meaning Verizon won’t be able to support the iPad.

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Publisher Axed From Apple iPad Launch After CEO Accidentally Leaks Details On TV

Spot the missing publisher: Steve Jobs (left) allegedly ordered Mcgraw-Hill's name be removed from this slide showing major publishing partners for the iPad

From The Daily Mail:

While Apple are riding high after generally favourable reviews for their tablet computer, the iPad, spare a thought for Harold McGraw III.

He is the chief executive of the 122-year-old publishing company McGraw-Hill, who accidentally leaked details of the device one day before the grand unveiling.

Apple boss Steve Jobs was said to be furious, after 61-year-old Mr McGraw spoke unguardedly about the product to U.S TV channel CNBC.

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Are The Chinese Google and YouTube Clones Any Good?

From Foreign Policy:

With Google threatening to pull out of China, immitation versions of the search engine and its video subsidiary YouTube have emerged to take their places on the Chinese internet:

YouTubecn.com offers videos from the real YouTube, which is blocked in China. The Google imitation is called Goojje and includes a plea for the U.S.-based Web giant not to leave China, after it threatened this month to do so in a dispute over Web censorship and cyberattacks.

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Bacteria Make Diesel From Biomass

Photo: Bacteria power: The E. coli bacteria in this microscopic image are excreting droplets of diesel fuel. The bacteria are the small dark rods clustered in the top corners and at the bottom of the image. Credit: Keasling lab

From Technology Review:

Newly engineered E. coli streamline the conversion of cellulose into fuel.

Engineered bacteria have been rewired with the genetic machinery necessary to convert cellulose into a range of chemicals, including diesel fuel. The bacteria, developed by South San Francisco company LS9 in collaboration with researchers at the University of California, Berkeley, make the necessary enzymes for every step along the synthesis pathway and can convert biomass into fuel without the need for additional processing. LS9 has demonstrated the bacteria in pilot-scale reactors and plans to scale the process to a commercial level later this year.

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What Might Cause A Gas Pedal To Become Stuck?

Photo: PEDAL PROBLEM: The 2009 RAV4 is one of millions of Toyota vehicles that the automaker is recalling because of the risk of a sticky accelerator. IFCAR/Wikipedia Commons

From Scientific American:

Toyota, the world's largest automaker, has suspended sales of certain models and recalled millions of older ones as its engineers search for the elusive source of a sticky—and dangerous—accelerator problem

During the past few days, Toyota Motor Corp., has taken the unprecedented step of halting sales in the U.S., Europe and China of some of its most popular car and truck models. The reason: potential defects that cause the vehicles to speed up without warning and run out of control. The move follows a huge (and growing) recall of older Toyota vehicles last week. Safety Research and Strategies, based in Rehoboth, Mass., has reportedly implicated the sudden unintended acceleration problem to 2,274 incidents in Toyota vehicles, causing 275 crashes and at least 18 fatalities since 1999.

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Remembering The Space Shuttle Challenger Explosion 24 Years Ago

The crew of the Space Shuttle Challenger were:

• Michael John Smith, pilot
• Christa McAuliffe, who would have been the first teacher in space
• Judith Resnik, the first Jewish American astronaut
  
• Dick Scobee, spacecraft commander
• Ronald McNair, a Phd. physicist who would have recorded the first saxophone solo in space
• Ellison Onizuka, the first Asian American in space
• Gregory Jarvis, engineer and payload specialist

My Comment: I will always remember that day. At that time I was in Sept-Iles Quebec, and when I turned on the TV to watch the news the first thing that I saw was the Challenger blowing up.

Sighhh ....

No Moon Trips: Obama's Space Vision A 'Paradigm Shift'

From Space.com:

President Obama's plan for America's space program, according to early reports, represents a fundamental shift for human spaceflight, some experts say.

The reports suggest the Obama administration intends to move toward relying on commercially-built spacecraft, rather than NASA's own vehicles, to carry humans to low-Earth orbit. The plan would also involve extending the International Space Station's lifetime and abandoning current plans to send astronauts on moon missions in the 2020s.

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What Happens If NASA's Constellation Program Dies?

From Popular Mechanics:

It has been reported that the president's budget may not include any funds for the Constellation program, NASA's primary source of hardware for future space missions. Here's a breakdown of some questions to ask in the aftermath of the apparent collapse of the United State's human space flight program.

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Last Neanderthals In Europe Died Out 37,000 Years Ago

Teeth from Pego do Diabo, Portugal (Credit: Photo by courtesy of PLoS ONE)

From Science Daily:

Science Daily (Jan. 27, 2010) — The paper, by Professor João Zilhão and colleagues, builds on his earlier research which proposed that, south of the Cantabro-Pyrenean mountain chain, Neanderthals survived for several millennia after being replaced or assimilated by anatomically modern humans everywhere else in Europe.

Although the reality of this 'Ebro Frontier' pattern has gained wide acceptance since it was first proposed by Professor Zilhão some twenty years ago, two important aspects of the model have remained the object of unresolved controversy: the exact duration of the frontier; and the causes underlying the eventual disappearance of those refugial Neanderthal populations (ecology and climate, or competition with modern human immigrants).

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Levitating Magnet Brings Nuclear Fusion Closer To Reality

The Levitated Dipole Experiment (LDX) reactor is housed inside a 16-foot-diameter steel structure in a building on the MIT campus that also houses MIT’s other fusion reactor, a tokamak called Alcator C-mod. Credit: LDX team

From Live Science:

Physicists may be one step closer to achieving a form of clean energy known as nuclear fusion, which is what happens deep inside the cores of stars.

A recent experiment with a giant levitating magnet was able to coax matter in the lab to extremely high densities — a necessary step for nuclear fusion.

When the density is high enough, atomic nuclei — the protons and neutrons of atoms — literally fuse together, creating a heavier element. And if the conditions are right that fusion can release loads of energy.

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Setting Up A Tent City

People gather in a makeshift tent city across from the ruined presidential palace in Port-au-Prince. (Angela Naus/CBC)

From The CBC:

On Oct. 8, 2005, a 7.6-magnitude earthquake rocked parts of Pakistan, India and Afghanistan, killing more than 75,000 people and leaving hundreds of thousands homeless. Most of the damage occurred in the Pakistani-controlled region of Kashmir.

Almost a million tents were delivered and erected in the various emergency camps set up after the earthquake. A year later, there were still about 35,000 people living in temporary tent cities, the United Nations said.

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Apple iPad Hands On

Apple iPad Hands On from PopSci.com on Vimeo.

From Popular Science:

Our complete impressions and analysis of Apple's new tablet are here, with photos and video.

The iPad, one of the most anticipated gadgets in history, is here. And the stakes, clearly, are high: to my knowledge, this is the first time Apple has referred to one of their products as "magical." Here's what it's like to play with one.

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New Animations Take You Flying Over Mars

From Wired Science:

A space-loving animator has created stunning flyovers of Mars from data captured by NASA’s HiRISE imager, which is mounted on the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter satellite.

HiRISE creates detailed digital-elevation models. Crunch that data, add perspective and some cinematic effects, and you have the movies that Doug Ellison, founder of UnmannedSpaceflight.com, posted to YouTube this morning.

The video at the top shows the Mojave Crater. The one below takes you flying through Athabasca Valles. Ellison said that both animations are rendered accurately from the data with no exaggerated scaling.

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Has Twitter Peaked? New Web Figures Show Decline In Number Of Users Since The Summer

From The Daily Times:

It has revolutionalised social networking and brought the thoughts of our favourite celebrities - no matter how trivial - into our homes.

But, just a year after its peak, it seems that Twitter has already fallen out of favour.

Figures show that the number of visitors to the micro-blogging website has plunged since its height last summer.

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