Archive for the 'Technology' Category
Critical Crypto Bug Leaves Several Linux Distributions, Hundreds of Apps Open to Eavesdropping
March 4th, 2014Via: Ars Technica: Hundreds of open source packages, including the Red Hat, Ubuntu, and Debian distributions of Linux, are susceptible to attacks that circumvent the most widely used technology to prevent eavesdropping on the Internet, thanks to an extremely critical vulnerability in a widely used cryptographic code library. The bug in the GnuTLS library makes […]
A Powerful New Way to Edit DNA
March 4th, 2014Via: New York Times: In the late 1980s, scientists at Osaka University in Japan noticed unusual repeated DNA sequences next to a gene they were studying in a common bacterium. They mentioned them in the final paragraph of a paper: “The biological significance of these sequences is not known.” Now their significance is known, and […]
Rapid Advances in Artificial Intelligence and Job Losses
March 4th, 2014Via: Financial Times: The impact of IT and automation on the world of work – and dire warnings about the job destruction they might cause – are as old as the technology itself. But the convergence of a number of tech trends has made the threat more immediate. As a result, 47 per cent of […]
Sleep Problems Plague Device-Dependent Children
March 4th, 2014Via: The Fiscal Times: Parents reported that nearly 75 percent of children ages 6 to 17 have at least one electronic device in their bedroom, with many using those devices right before bedtime. “To ensure a better night’s sleep for their children, parents may want to limit their [children’s use of] technology in the bedroom […]
Headband Could Help Brain Communicate with Computers
March 4th, 2014Via: Boston Globe: Computer scientist Robert Jacob and biomedical engineer Sergio Fantini are working on a headband to read brain activity, enabling a computer to determine whether the wearer is bored, fatigued, or sharp. In a tower full of air traffic controllers wearing headbands, the computer could automatically shift flight assignments, depending on which controllers […]
Dismantling Fukushima Will Require Robotic Technology That Has Not Been Invented Yet
March 2nd, 2014Via: IEEE: “At Fukushima you have wrecked infrastructure, three melted cores, and you have some core on the floor, ex-vessel,” Barrett says. Nothing like Fukushima, he declares, has ever happened before.
Britain: Perovskite Solar Panels
March 2nd, 2014Via: Guardian: Materials researchers in Oxford, led by Dr Henry Snaith, have recently shown that they can make simple perovskite solar cells with efficiencies pushing 20%. This is big news, because 20% makes them competitive with existing commercial silicon solar cells while being much cheaper to make in high volumes. They are also more suitable […]
World’s Largest Aircraft Unveiled; Can Stay Airborne for Weeks
March 2nd, 2014Via: Telegraph: The world’s largest aircraft which can stay airborne for up to three weeks and will be vital in delivering several tonnes of humanitarian aid as well as transporting heavy freight across the world, has been unveiled. The 300ft (91m) ship is part plane, airship and helicopter, and there are plans to eventually use […]
LAPD Spies on Millions
March 2nd, 2014Via: L.A. Weekly: Los Angeles and Southern California police, by contrast, are expanding their use of surveillance technology such as intelligent video analytics, digital biometric identification and military-pedigree software for analyzing and predicting crime. Information on the identity and movements of millions of Southern California residents is being collected and tracked. In fact, Los Angeles […]
Autonomous Drones Flock Like Birds
March 1st, 2014Via: Nature: A Hungarian team has created the first drones that can fly as a coordinated flock. The researchers watched as the ten autonomous robots took to the air in a field outside Budapest, zipping through the open sky, flying in formation or even following a leader, all without any central control. The aircraft, called […]
