News Article

Oct

2010

Digital Retouching Reaches a Whole New Level, and a New Cup Size

Discover, October 8 2010.

Dudes: are you looking to get that Baywatch body without all the pumping of iron? All you need is a little “MovieReshape” and you can be virtually buff! Just don’t let anyone see you in person. MovieReshape is a program created by Christian Theobalt at the Max Plank Institute in Germany.

The program will digitally alter your appearance (including height, weight, and muscle tone) in any movie clip. Women can even get a digital boob job or liposuction to automatically enhance body size and shape on the fly. Earlier approaches to body manipulation on film required retouching of every frame, a very laborious process when you’re talking about 30 frames per second. Read More >

Oct

2010

A New Exoskeleton Allows Paralyzed People to Walk Again

Discover, October 8 2010.

Hugging someone standing up. Going on a hike. Making eye contact with someone at their level, instead of always being looked down upon. These are simple things that people stuck in wheelchairs don’t have a chance to experience in daily life.

Berkeley Bionics is giving those experiences back to paraplegics with the introduction of an exoskeleton suit called eLEGS–a battery powered, artificially intelligent, wearable outer skeleton that gives these people back their freedom. People wearing these devices won’t be a common sight just yet–a suit is currently priced at about $100,000 a pop, and they’ll only be available for use in clinics at first–but it’s an exciting step forward. Read More >

Oct

2010

Tropical Animals May Get a Dangerous Metabolic Jolt From Climate Change

Discover, October 7 2010.

While the temperature effects of climate change are expected to be less dramatic in the equatorial regions, the cold-blooded tropical animals that live there may be in for a dramatic shock. A study published this week in Nature focused on these cold-blooded animals–including insects, amphibians, and lizards–whose body temperatures are not constant, but instead rise and fall with the temperature of their environment.

The researchers found that these creatures show great increases in their metabolism from slight changes in temperature; the metabolic increases were on the order of twice that of warm-blooded animals. Read More >

Oct

2010

Alcohol Makes You Think Everyone Is Out to Get You

Discover, October 7 2010.

Drunk fights are a typical occurrence at some bars–but why does drinking make us more likely to fight? Kate Shaw over at Ars Technica gives us a good example of a typical confrontation:

If you’ve ever had one (or ten) too many drinks at a bar, you’re probably familiar with this scenario: a drunk guy stumbles past you, spills a beer all over you, and you get angry. You’re convinced he did it on purpose, and you start fuming. Read More >

Oct

2010

Robo Tanks to Guard Nuclear Facility. What Could Possibly Go Wrong?

Discover, October 6 2010.

Who needs people to guard a nuclear weapons facility when you can build an autonomous robot to do it? Or, at least that’s what the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) was probably thinking when they ordered up three robo-tanks to take on the task of watching over the Nevada nuclear test site.

The first of the robots, named the Mobile Detection Assessment Response System (MDARS), just started working, according to Wired’s Danger Room, where we saw the story. Two more are scheduled to start their work in other remote locations on the Nevada National Security Site (NNSS, which is basically in the middle of the desert) within the next six months. Read More >

Oct

2010

Toxic Sludge Floods Hungarian Countryside, Threatens the Danube River

Discover, October 6 2010.

It was a deadly accident and an ecological disaster. On Monday, a reservoir at a Hungarian aluminum refinery ruptured, sending a wave of toxic sludge across three counties (click image to see a map of the area).

The spill sent 185 million gallons–a mini-tsunami–of caustic red mud flooding over 16 square miles of the countryside, killing four and sending 120 more to the hospital with chemical burns from the mud, which is an industrial waste product. Read More >

Oct

2010

Thrifty Brits Make Natural Gas out of Sewage and Beer-Brewing Leftovers

Discover, October 5 2010.

How to make natural gas? Flush the toilet, and wait three weeks. At least that’s the plan for homes involved in the Didcot Renewable Gas Project, which will be recycling residents’ waste into renewable natural gas, aka “biogas”.

Gearóid Lane, managing director of communities and new energy at British Gas, said: “This renewable gas project is a real milestone in Britain’s energy history, and will help customers and the environment alike. Renewable gas has the potential to make a significant contribution to meeting the UK’s energy needs. Gas from sewage is just one part of a bigger project, which will see us using brewery and food waste and farm slurry to generate gas to heat homes.” Read More >

Oct

2010

Climate Change Activists’ Head-Exploding Ad May Have Gone a Bit Far

Discover, October 5 2010.

In a move that some are calling a misguided publicity stunt, the environmental activist group 10:10 Climate Change Campaign produced and released a gory and disturbing short film, similar to Plane Stupid’s “Polar Bear” video, to promote the climate change action day scheduled for October 10, 2010 (or 10/10/10).

In the video, people who don’t pledge themselves to 10:10’s cause (including school children and Gillian Anderson) are exploded into red, chunky goo with the press of a button. It was released last week and has resulted in a media backlash, including Sony’s retraction of support of the cause. It even inspired a cartoon. Read More >

Oct

2010

It’s a Rat! It’s a Toy Car! It’s RatCar?

Discover, October 5 2010.

While this contraption looks similar to a doggy wheelchair or a pair of prosthetic legs for your favorite pet, it’s actually much more sophisticated. This rat is hooked up to a prototype of a thought-guided robot wheelchair.

The robot-rat setup, known as Ratcar, is guided by transmissions from the rat through mini-electrodes implanted in its brain. The animal-robot hybrid was developed by researchers at the University of Tokyo, who explained its purpose to IEEE Spectrum:

“We wanted to develop a brain-machine interface system aiming for future wheelchairs that paralyzed patients can control only with thought,” says Osamu Fukayama of the university’s Medical Engineering and Life Science Laboratory. Read More >

Oct

2010

Dr. James’s Fever Powder, circa 1746

The Scientist magazine, October 2010.

Dr. James’s fever powder, patented by English physician Robert James, claimed to cure fevers and various other maladies, from gout and scurvy to distemper in cattle. Though its efficacy was often questioned, the powder had “a long tradition of usage,” from its introduction in 1746 well into the 20th century, says John Crellin, a professor of medical humanities at Memorial University of Newfoundland. It was even prescribed to King George III when he was suffering from cataracts, rheumatism and dementia at the end of his life. Read More >