The "News" thread.

[Geo]

In my early twenties, I switched from a remnant-cursive based handwriting to a more printing alphabet-based handwriting.

[Buster's Uncle]

Two-Headed Ray Fetus Found in Australia
LiveScience.com
By Douglas Main, Staff Writer  8 hours ago



The two-headed fiddler ray fetus, as seen from the bottom.



They say two heads are better than one. That may or may not be true, but at the very least, two heads are more interesting.

While checking up on the pregnant female rays that he was caring for in an aquarium, Australian researcher Leonardo Guida saw that some of the animals had given birth, in April of this year. As he made note of the baby rays, an "oddly shaped, pale object in the water" caught his attention.

The object turned out to be a stillborn ray … with two heads. This is the first two-headed ray or shark discovered in Australia, and one of only a few examples worldwide of this rare birth defect found in sharks and rays, said Guida, who is a doctoral student at Monash University in Melbourne.

The defect arises when the neural tube (like a spinal cord) in a single fertilized egg is duplicated, which can happen as the result of a genetic defect or for other unknown reasons. It can also happen when an embryo begins to divide into two to form twins, but is stopped prematurely.

The cause in this case "is unknown but is likely to have been a developmental problem and not a genetic mutation per se," said Guida, co-author of a study describing the ray published Nov. 15 in the journal Marine and Freshwater Research. "Pollutants can potentially cause developmental issues, however we did not test for this nor were we able to determine the probable cause."

The researchers caught the southern fiddler rays (Trygonorrhina dumerilii) by hand while scuba diving in Swan Bay, a semi-enclosed section of Port Phillip Bay south of Melbourne, home to heavy ship traffic. The bay has recently undergone extensive dredging to enlarge shipping channels, re-suspending contaminated sediment into the ocean, according to the study. This developed, combined with the fact that rays eat bottom-dwelling creatures, may have exposed these animals to significant levels of pollutants. But whether or not they could've caused this birth defect is unknown, the study noted.



The two-headed fiddler ray fetus, as seen from the top.


Other similar findings include the discovery of a two-headed bull shark fetus off Florida.

"There have been a number of reports of deformed shark and ray embryos in recent years— two heads, one eye, etc.," said David Shiffman, a shark researcher and doctoral student at the University of Miami.  There's no evidence to suggest these defects represent a new phenomenon or that they are harmful to shark populations as a whole, said Shiffman, who wasn't involved in the ray study. 

"However, we're learning about the deformed embryos, because [in many cases] fishermen are killing the sharks," Shiffman said.

For instance, in 2011, a commercial fisherman in the Gulf of California discovered an albino fetal shark with one eye in the middle of its nose inside the belly of a pregnant dusky shark.

Many ray and shark species are being overfished, and one in six known species of skates, rays and sharks are considered threatened with extinction by the International Union for Conservation of Nature, an environmental group, he added.


http://news.yahoo.com/two-headed-ray-fetus-found-australia-154554974.html

[gwillybj]

Spies Infiltrate a Fantasy Realm of Online Games
By MARK MAZZETTI and JUSTIN ELLIOTT
Published: December 9, 2013

Not limiting their activities to the earthly realm, American and British spies have infiltrated the fantasy worlds of World of Warcraft and Second Life, conducting surveillance and scooping up data in the online games played by millions of people across the globe, according to newly disclosed classified documents.
Fearing that terrorist or criminal networks could use the games to communicate secretly, move money or plot attacks, the documents show, intelligence operatives have entered terrain populated by digital avatars that include elves, gnomes and supermodels.
...
3 pages at http://www.nytimes.com/2013/12/10/world/spies-dragnet-reaches-a-playing-field-of-elves-and-trolls.html

[Unorthodox]

I need to get that job...

[Unorthodox]

Taking pics rots your brain.

http://news.cnet.com/8301-17852_3-57615075-71/constantly-taking-photos-may-mess-with-your-memory/

All right, Apple. It's like this.

You like to tell us that more people take pictures with the iPhone than any other camera.

You like to make ads in which, if you're not taking a picture of something, you can't be said to be living.

But just stop it. You might be messing with our memory.

That, at least, seems to be the conclusion from a depressingly modern piece of research performed by the Fairfield University in Connecticut.

Published in Psychological Science, this study took its subjects on a tour of an art museum, then tested their memory of the artifacts, period, and of the details of those artifacts.




The conclusion was that those who had photographed objects had far worse recollection of ever having seen the artifacts at all or, if they did remember seeing them, of details within those objects.

On the other hand, if the aim of their point-and-shoot was to capture one particular detail only, that detail was well remembered.

Linda Henkel, who led the study, described this phenomenon as a "photo-taking impairment effect."

Of course, it could be that the subjects' memories weren't directly affected by the photo-taking, but rather by their sheer interest in that particular work of art.

And then there's the problem that the 28 subjects were actually students. Can you really base research on those notoriously wayward beings?

More Technically Incorrect
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One woman's small nightmare with a demo iPad Air sold by AT&T
Viral genius Rebecca Black back with, um, 'Saturday'
Busboy's mom throws iPad in fire, customer buys him new one
Teacher suspended after stolen nude pics appear online
But as Henkel was quoted in the Telelgraph: "People so often whip out their cameras almost mindlessly to capture a moment, to the point that they are missing what is happening right in front of them."

She added: "When people rely on technology to remember for them -- counting on the camera to record the event and thus not needing to attend to it fully themselves -- it can have a negative impact on how well they remember their experiences."

Still, what are you supposed to do? Your smartphones have made it far too easy for you to capture everything.

It's quite natural, then, to shoot first and ask questions of your memory later.

Perhaps quite soon the only way we'll remember we were anywhere is by referring to our picture libraries.

What strange people we will then have become.

I can somewhat attest to this. 

I've used a camera as a coping mechanism before when I knew I was heading into uncomfortable situations, so it makes a lot of sense to me.  I could probably relatively easily be a crime scene photographer, or similar, being thrust into horrific situations, provided you allow me that camera to sperate myself from the reality. 

[Unorthodox]

http://www.seattlepi.com/local/komo/article/The-mystery-continues-What-is-blocking-tunneling-5054842.php

The Transportation Department and contractors building a highway tunnel under downtown Seattle are trying to identify the mystery object that has blocked their tunnel boring machine.

The machine called Bertha ran into something Friday and was shut down Saturday about 1,000 feet from the start. The $80 million machine is designed to break up boulders, so there's speculation about what it hit.

Engineers are considering drilling down 60 feet to the object as one of the ways to break up or remove the obstruction. A large crane equipped with a drill bit was seen at the site Wednesday morning.

The nearly two-mile tunnel is supposed to be completed by the end of 2015, creating a four-lane replacement for the Alaskan Way Viaduct on Highway 99.

But already it has experienced at least three delays - one caused by union picketing over work assignments, another by a sinkhole near Jackson Street and now the mystery object.

WSDOT says the latest trouble started Friday when Bertha's five-story tall cutter head felt some resistance, then stopped. WSDOT says engineers with Seattle Tunnel Partners, the company in charge of building the viaduct replacement tunnel, have been consulting with other experts to identify the obstruction - whether it's natural or manmade.

They say Bertha wasn't damaged in any way. They're keeping her idle until they decide whether crews need to dig the obstruction out from above or if Bertha can charge through it.

Bertha has dug 1,000 feet of tunnel since July. She's sitting 60-feet underground between South Jackson Street and South Main Street among a mix of native dirt and fill tossed into place from as early as the 1800s.

She has just 450 more feet to travel before leaving that fill behind. It will also mark the end of phase one in the $4 billion tunnel project that will stretch 1.7 miles from adjacent to Safeco Field to Battery Street.

WSDOT doesn't know how long Bertha will remain stuck, but they say it's too early to say whether the delay will affect the project's bottom line or it's scheduled opening in late 2015.

quatermass and the pit was prophetic?

[Unorthodox]

http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2013/12/the-secret-underwater-world-of-dragons/

Look at how happy this little fellow is! That's because it's about to kill and eat something.

Dragonfly nymphs (immature stages) are aquatic predators. The "face" on this nymph is actually incredibly fast weaponized mouthparts.

Photo © Jan Hamrsky.

In this photo, you can see how the mask covering the face is actually a shovel for stuffing prey into the nymph's mouth. Which makes it slightly less cute.
The mask is made up the lower "lip", or Labium, of the dragonfly. At rest it is folded under the head and thorax between the legs.
Photo © Jan Hamrsky.

In this photo, the labium is extended. It's basically a pressurized hydraulic grabber.
The nymph clenches its anus (more about this below) and contracts its thoracic and abdominal muscles to increase its body cavity pressure and push out the labium. The mask shoots out within milliseconds and harpoons prey with the two sharp "fangs" on the edge of the labium.
The shape of the mask and the teeth on the edge are a key way to identify different species of dragonfly nymphs.
Photo © Jan Hamrsky.

This side view shows how the labium folds back under the body, but also is used in handling prey items while they are consumed.
Photo © Jan Hamrsky.

Even vertebrates need to fear freshwater dragons, as this tadpole learned too late. Larger species of dragonfly nymphs will eat minnows and tadpoles, as well as any other dragonfly nymphs they can latch onto.
Photo © Jan Hamrsky.

This Spiketail dragonfly nymph (Cordulegastridae) is an ambush predator. This series of photos shows how it buries itself to lie in wait for unsuspecting prey. You might notice it forgot to bury a part--its butt. That's because dragonflies breathe via anal gills. But wait! There's more!
The gills have a secret function: Jet propulsion. Water in the rectal chamber can be jetted out at high pressure, pushing the nymph forward through the water. The forward thrust generated has been measured as 1.5 g in 0.1 second, and up to 10cm/second.
Photo © Jan Hamrsky.

As dragonfly nymphs grow, their wings begin to develop. You can see the beginnings of 4 wings in this photo. Dragonflies have simple metamorphosis--they gradually change into their adult form. Dragonfly larvae molt varying numbers of times, and live from 1 to 6 years underwater before climbing onto land to assume their final form.
Insects like moths and flies have complete metamorphosis; there are distinct changes in shape and form between larvae (caterpillars and maggots) and adults with a pupal stage.
Photo © Jan Hamrsky.

As the dragonfly nymph prepares to make its final transformation, it crawls up out of the water onto nearby vegetation. This photo shows a newly emerged adult next to its split open, shed nymphal outer skin (exoskeleton). As the dragonfly rests, it once again uses hydraulic body pressure, this time to expand its new soft outer shell and inflate the wings.
You might notice two whitish strings extending out of the shed skin. Those are the remnants of the main tracheal trunks, a breathing system that runs through the entire insect. The inside of the respiratory system is also lined with exoskeleton, and is also shed when the insect molts.
Once the dragonfly dries off and the exoskeleton hardens, it's ready to fly off and begin terrorizing animals in the air instead of water. It has assumed its final form.
Photo © Jan Hamrsky.


Want to time travel? Stand at the edge of some fresh water. Dragonflies are ancient insects — they look remarkably unchanged from fossils of the Paleozoic Era (350 million years ago). They are sometimes described as “paleopterous“, or “old wings”. These antique predators of the sky are actually just the final form of a much stranger creature.

Right now, while much of the above-ground land in North America is chilly or frozen, life goes on in ponds, lakes, and streams all around you. Here be dragons. Predatory underwater dragons that breathe through their anus, use their rectum for jet propulsion, and have hydraulic-powered grabby mouthparts.

Slow-mo dragonfly nymph labium (lower lip) in action. The actual strike only takes 10 milliseconds. From Bulanbeck.
The ability of a dragonfly nymph to successfully snatch and grab food is directly related to its anus. The mouth-grabber (labium) is hydraulically activated.  The dragonfly draws water in through the anus, clenches, then compresses its abdominal and thoracic muscles against the water-filled rectal chamber. This raises the internal body cavity pressure, and pushes the labium out –in a strike that takes 10 to 30 milliseconds.

The amount of internal pressure generated is about 6000 Pa, or 6 kPa; equivalent to 0.87 psi (pounds per square inch). That doesn’t seem like a lot, until you consider that big nymphs only weigh 100mg (0.0002 lbs), so generating almost a pound of pressure WITH THEIR BUTT is pretty impressive. A Camaro turbocharger produces 7 psi, so you could say this little insect has 1/7th of a Camaro in its ass.

The other amazing function of a dragonfly nymph rectum is jet-propulsion. By un-clenching their rectum, water in the rectal chamber can be jetted out at high pressure, pushing the nymph forward through the water. The forward thrust generated is 1.5 g in 0.1 second; nymphs’ top speed is 10cm/second. They can throttle their rectum back to produce varying amounts of thrust through the water.

But Wait! There’s More! The jet-propulsion butt-hydraulic system also is a gill. Dragonflies breathe through gills in their rectums; you can see some great photos of that above. Because dragonflies breathe through feathery gills, they are sensitive to lots of forms of aquatic pollution. Dragon and damselfly nymphs are used as important water quality indicators–when ponds and streams are impacted by heavy metals, high levels of agricultural runoff, and sewage, the numbers and kinds of dragons in the water decrease. If you are in North America, you can join a citizen science project to monitor dragonflies and dragonfly migration.

The amazing photos featured on this post are from Jan Hamrsky. He lives in Prague, where he works as a graphic designer in an online advertising company. Photographing this secret underwater world is Jan’s specialty. It’s incredibly challenging to take good macrophotography photos, and Jan takes macros of animals underwater and through glass. In an interview last year, he said:

“the aquariums are probably the most important gear in the process. I have several sizes from approximately 8 liters to really small ones, made of microscopic glass. It is often quite difficult to maintain suitable conditions in the aquarium but there is a reliable indicator of whether the environment is well prepared or not. If the insects start hunting or looking for food, conditions will be fine.”

Thank you so much for showing us this underwater world of dragons, Jan!

[Unorthodox]

http://www.dailystar.co.uk/news/latest-news/355582/School-children-weep-as-vicar-tells-them-Santa-not-real-and-will-turn-them-into-ham

Anglican Canon Simon Tatton-Brown also told a gruesome tale of the real Santa’s role in a plot to butcher kids and turn them into ham.

Furious parents at the school, have accused him of ruining their children’s Christmas.

And several have vowed to boycott a Christmas Carol concert at his church.

Linzi Merritt, whose son Levi, nine, attends the school in Chippenham, Wilts, said: “We wouldn’t just walk into the church during one of his services and tell everyone that Jesus isn’t real.”

Canon Tatton-Brown upset dozens of children at Charter Primary School when they were called in for assembly.

He said a pre-planned talk had to be scrapped because of technical difficulties and spoke about the festive season instead.

And he reduced youngsters to tears as he revealed that Santa was a fictional character based on the 4th Century St Nicholas.

He said a myth had built round St Nick as he used to hand out gifts to the poor.
 FURIOUS: Parents Linzi Merrit and Kerry Butler say Christmas has been ruined [SWNS]
The vicar recounted a gruesome legend about how three children were slaughtered by an evil butcher then put in a barrel to be cured and sold as ham.[/b]

But he added that St Nick used his prayers to bring the victims back to life.

Linzi added: “Loads of kids went home crying – it has ruined Christmas for them.”

Kerry Butler added: “All the parents here are very upset. He’s coming back to the school for the carol concert. After this I don’t understand why he is allowed back.”

Last night Canon Tatton-Brown apologised.

He said: “I didn’t intended to upset anyone or to dispel children’s beliefs in Santa Claus, but I accept I was wrong.

“I understand that people are disappointed. I got it wrong. It wasn’t intentional. I can’t undo it.”

Headteacher Sarah Flack said she had accepted his apology

How have I never heard this one?  Anyone have more info on it?

[Unorthodox]

http://www.spiegel.de/international/europe/romania-anti-semitic-christmas-song-causes-uproar-a-938703.html

Outrage has erupted among advocacy groups in Romania after the state channel TVR broadcast an anti-Semitic Christmas song calling for Jews to be burned in a chimney. According to the Jewish Telegraphic Agency (JTA), the song ran on a Dec. 5 broadcast by the rural-targeted TVR3 channel.


ANZEIGEIn the broadcast, a choir was shown singing a Christmas song that indirectly glorifies the Holocaust. The song, which rhymes and uses the word "jidovi," a pejorative word for a Jew, includes the lyrics, "only in the chimney as smoke, this is what the 'jidov' is good for."

On Wednesday, Romania's Foreign Minister Titus Corlatean harshly condemned the event and called on the public prosecutor's office and parliament to bring those responsible to justice. Israel's embassy said it was "concerned" about the broadcast.

Channel Shifts Responsibility

The channel said in a statement on Thursday that it was not responsible for selecting the Christmas songs, but merely broadcasting carols selected by a cultural center dedicated to preserving the traditional culture of the northwestern Cluj region. The YouTube video of the performance shows the host thanking both the singers and the director of the cultural center and asking him about local Cluj folklore values.

MCA Romania, a non-governmental organization dedicated to fighting anti-Semitism, said it was unacceptable for the channel to evade responsibility by blaming the local organization. According to the JTA, MCA sent a complaint to Romanian President Traian Basescu and Prime Minister Victor Ponta that said: "It is outrageous that members of the public weren't scandalized by an anti-Semitic song calling for people to burn Jews."

TVR's leadership is already in the process of being replaced as a result of an unrelated matter, after the parliament concluded on Tuesday that the station had been mismanaged. TVR head Claudiu Saftoiu and the rest of the management were relieved of their positions and replacements have yet to be found.

 tmr -- with wires and reporting by Keno Verseck

Now that's the christmas spirit. 

[Unorthodox]

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/southamerica/colombia/10512948/40-year-old-foetus-found-inside-an-elderly-woman.html

A 40-year-old foetus has been found in the body of an 82-year-old woman.

The Colombian woman went to hospital in Bogota suffering from abdominal pain.

It was only then that doctors discovered the calcified foetus or lithopaedian inside her body.

Lithopaedian, also known as stone baby, is a rare syndrome that can occur when the foetus implants outside the uterus.

If the baby becomes too large to be absorbed back into the body, it undergoes a process of mummification, with barriers of calcium protecting the mother from the decaying foetus.

Interesting google image search, Lithopaedian...

[Rusty Edge]

And I thought dragonflies were awesome before I read this...

I wonder if they were the inspiration  for the monster's jaws in "Alien".

[Unorthodox]

I so want a darkness beam for christmas.

https://medium.com/p/fd5386e20aee

Beams of light play a special role in our cultural heritage: World War II search lights picking out Nazi bombers, Gotham City’s Bat signal summoning help in times of distress and lighthouses warning unsuspecting shipping to stay away. Beams of light are beacons of safety.

Now film-makers and optical engineers have something much more sinister to play with. Chao Wan at the National University of Singapore and a few pals have built a “darkness” beam that bathes objects in the absence of light.

The new device hides macroscopic objects by beaming invisibility from a distance, an entirely different technique to the one used in conventional invisibility cloaks that have received much media coverage in recent years.

The new device turns the conventional approach to optics on its head. Conventionally, optical engineers devise imaging system with the best resolving power possible.

The basic idea is that an imaging system focuses light into a pattern known as a point spreading function. This consists of a central region of high intensity surrounded by a concentric region of lower intensity light and a higher intensity lobe beyond this.

Engineers get the best resolution by narrowing and intensifying the central region while suppressing the outer lobe. (Indeed, one of the more exciting recent developments in imaging is in using this technique to resolve objects that are significantly smaller than the wavelength of the light being using to create the image, a technique known as super-resolution. )

Now Chao and co have taken exactly the opposite approach. Instead of narrowing and intensifying the central region at the expense of the lobes, these guys intensify the lobes while suppressing the central region.

The result is a central region where the field intensity of light is essentially zero. This is a region where objects cannot be resolved, hence the group’s name for this effect: anti-resolution.


The central region is surrounded by a region of high intensity light which acts like a kind of light capsule containing a 3D region of darkness. “A three-dimensional object placed in the optical capsule does not cause scattering and one can therefore see the scene behind the object,” they say.

In effect, it is an invisibility capsule. Chao and co say that the region of darkness can be as much as 8 orders of magnitude bigger than the wavelength of light used in the imaging process. That’s huge!

And the imaging system itself is simple. Chao and co demonstrate it using a laser beam passing through a “lens” consisting of concentric dielectric grooves that are straightforward to manufacture. In their test, they hide an object—a letter ‘N’—that is 40 micrometres in size. That’s significantly larger than conventional invisibility cloaks could do when they first hit the headlines.

Perhaps that’s not surprising given that the new device works in an entirely different way from conventional invisibility cloaks. These are built using bespoke metamaterials that steer light around an object placed inside them. By contrast, Chao and co can effectively beam invisibility from a distance.

There are some limitations, however. The current device works at a single frequency of light so an interesting challenge will be to make broadband lenses that work at a wide range of frequencies.

Beyond that, Chao and co will have to find a killer app for their new device. They say it has many potential applications such as in cloaking and surveillance but give little detail.

Perhaps imaginative readers of the Physics arXiv Blog can help out with suggestions of their in the comments section here.

Ref: arxiv.org/abs/1312.0057: Experimental Demonstration of Light Capsule Embracing Super-Sized Darkness Inside Via Anti-Resolution

[Unorthodox]

Soylent! 

http://www.cnn.com/2013/12/13/health/soylent-hunger/index.html?sr=fb121313soylenthunger8p

It's a thick, light beige goop. Depending on who you ask, its taste is described as "bland" or even similar to Play-Doh unless other flavorings are added.

Rob Rhinehart, who invented Soylent and now serves as the company's CEO, is working on the taste, but taste isn't why he created it. This product is for those who are only looking for sustenance and nutrition in a meal.

"We're trying to be pragmatic here. People aren't going to eat well all the time," he said. "You need a lot of knowledge -- all these details that go into eating healthily -- and we're trying to automate it."

Rhinehart created Soylent last year while working as a software engineer in Silicon Valley.

Tight on time and funds, he researched biochemistry within the human body and combined vitamins and nutrients to create what he now calls Soylent, named after the food made of people in the sci-fi film "Soylent Green."

Rhinehart ate only this powder mixture for 30 days and blogged about it. He now eats a mixed diet of Soylent and solid foods.

The product has gotten the attention of big investors who see a future for the product and customers who are tired of cooking and chewing.

The company announced late October that it raised $1.5 million in seed funding and $1.5 million in preorders since posting on a crowd funding site earlier this year. At around $3 per meal, the product could be a real money saver for some people.

CNNMoney: Is Soylent the food of the future?

With the attention, however, come questions: Is Soylent really nutritious enough to replace every meal? Who would want to give up eating? And could this be a solution to end world hunger?

What about nutrition?

Elizabeth Mayer-Davis, department chair at the School of Public Health at UNC-Chapel Hill, said she is skeptical about Soylent as a sole substance of consumption and doesn't understand why anyone wouldn't want to eat food.

"There are parts of this product that are healthy, but claims of why to use this are overstated," Mayer-Davis said. "At the end of the day, relying on a single formula isn't good for your nutrition."

However, it would probably be fine as a meal every now and then, she said.

People's nutritional needs vary depending on their personal growth and development, genetic makeup, and other factors, she said.

The core fat, carbs and protein of Soylent come from agriculturally grown ingredients, such as maltodextrin, which stems from from corn, rice protein and oat powder, but the majority of the vitamins and minerals come from mining or industrial synthesis, Rhinehart said.

He wants the product to be even more synthetic in the future so as to reduce its environmental impact and not be affected by fluctuating crop seasons, he said.

Mario Ferruzzi, a nutritionist and food scientist at Purdue University, doesn't see how a more factory-made product is possible.

"I don't know how you can eat without agriculture," Ferruzzi said.

Ferruzzi has worked with Nestle and other companies to develop dietary supplements, and researches how phytochemicals and plant-derived compounds play a role in disease prevention, such as how red pigment in tomatoes can prevent prostate cancer.

He said Soylent is cheaper than supplements put out by national companies, but still looks like a nutritional shake.

"When you simplify something and make it a sole source of nutrition, my concern is that people might be able to sustain (themselves), but will they be optimally healthy?"

Who doesn't like food?

Rhinehart said the initial interest is coming from people in the same situation he was when experimenting with Soylent -- young, busy and broke.

People around the world have been trying their own Soylent recipes inspired by Rhinehart's and posting them on a DIY Soylent forum.

Ben Samuel, who works in Ireland, read about Soylent about a year-and-a-half ago and created his own Soylent based on Rhinehart's recipe shared on the forum. He used olive oil and chocolate-flavored whey concentrate as his base ingredients.

"It tastes mildly of chocolate pudding, and also a tiny bit like wood," Samuel said.

But, he added, it's easy to get used to, and he and other Soylent samplers aren't eating it for the taste.

Samuel is a security analyst for an online gaming company on the overnight shift, so when he's hungry on the clock, he can't buy food at the company cafeteria.

He never tried other meal substitutes because they were either incomplete or expensive, he told CNN in an e-mail, but he ordered his own ingredients and blogged about his experience consuming only this for a month.

During the first few days of eating his Soylent, he realized the formula wasn't perfect -- excess sulfur made him gassy and the taste needed tweaking -- but after adjustments, he said he had more energy, better sleep and found running easier.

"The rest of the month was the best I ever had," he wrote.

Still, he's since reverted back to food.

"I use Soylent maybe half the time, and the other half I eat as previously," he wrote.

Meal replacements are typically used for one of two situations: when dieting to break habits, or when physical conditions require certain nutrients and it's easier for a person to supplement a meal, Mayer-Davis said.

Soylent, on the other hand, appears to be marketed to healthy people looking for food alternatives, she said. It also appears to be targeting the temporary poor, she said, meaning graduate students who could qualify as living in poverty, but only for a few years.

But Mayer-Davis said she wouldn't recommend living on any kind of meal substitute for the true poor -- those working long hours in low-paying jobs to support their families. In such cases, a diverse diet is needed, she said.

Ending world hunger?

Rhinehart said using his product to end world hunger is several years out, but it's been on his mind from the start.

"Being able to produce calories very cheaply at scale, in a form that is very shelf-stable and comparatively easy to store and transport, alleviates many issues around food aid and security," Rhinehart said.

"I think we can focus on food security -- that's something that's been on my mind from the very beginning -- but we have to be profitable first."

Cost is a main driver in determining the products used for food aid, said Ferruzzi, who has worked with USAID to develop dietary supplements for food insecure countries.

Soylent is cheap. But feeding people, even starving people, is not as simple as handing them a powder, Ferruzzi said.

"Just because people are poor doesn't mean they aren't picky eaters," Ferruzzi said. "You have to think about the context of how people live and how they eat."

For example, when working on a cereal blend for USAID, he had to be sure that it could be made into both a thick and thin mixture, depending on the viscosity of the porridge the community typically ate.

In the end, whether a product is an alternative to Cheetos in your pantry or one of only a few caloric options in a war-torn region, it has to taste good enough for people to eat it.

As Ferruzzi puts it: "It isn't nutritious unless people eat it."

[Buster's Uncle]

Scientists send text message through evaporated vodka
By Eric Pfeiffer  December 19, 2013 4:22 PM



The future of wireless communication in a bottle? (Agence France-Presse)


How many people have sent a text message they later regretted, blaming alcohol as the catalyst for an ill-advised communication?

Well,  scientists at Canada’s York University have flipped the “message in a bottle” concept on its head, sending the world’s first text message through alcohol itself.

That’s right, a text message reading “O Canada,” was transmitted using the chemicals in evaporated vodka.

“We believe we have sent the world’s first text message to be transmitted entirely with molecular communication, controlling concentration levels of the alcohol molecules to encode the alphabet, with single spray representing bits and no spray representing the bit zero,” said Nariman Farsad, a York University doctoral candidate in charge of the experiment.

As the Voice of America explains, while the experiment was a first for humankind, it mirrors the communicative behavior exhibited by a number of other creatures, including bees, which use chemicals to transmit communications.

Another recent study found that  some plants use fungi as chemical conduits to send their own warning messages to other plants.

And the scientists responsible for the communication say it could help advance communications around the world, particularly in areas like underground tunnels that do not have access to traditional wireless communication.

“Chemical signals can offer a more efficient way of transmitting data inside tunnels, pipelines or deep underground structures,” York University professor Andrew Eckford said.

“For example, the recent massive clog in the London sewer system could have been detected earlier on, and without all the mess workers had to deal with, by sending robots equipped with a molecular communication system.”

The experiment’s findings were published in the latest issue of the scientific journal PLOS ONE.

Eckford and his team say the chemical communication worked transmitting the message four meters across their lab, using a simple tabletop fan to literally push the message forward. A receiver on the other end then picked up and translated the message.

The research could yield exciting results beyond personal communication. University of Warwick professor Weisi Guo, whose work helped launch the experiment, said it could have groundbreaking medical applications as well.

“They [molecular communication] can also be used to communicate on the nanoscale, for example in medicine where recent advances mean it’s possible to embed sensors into the organs of the body or create miniature robots to carry out a specific task such as targeting drugs to cancer cells.”

http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/sideshow/scientists-send-text-message-through-evaporated-vodka-212245979.html

[Buster's Uncle]

Hospital wraps newborns in Christmas stockings
Associated Press  December 24, 2013 7:33 PM



Newborns sleep in oversized red stockings in the nursery at Long Beach Memorial in Long Beach, Calif., on Monday, Dec. 23, 2013. For more than 50 years, babies born between Dec. 21-25 at Long Beach Memorial are placed in big red stockings to be presented to the new parents.(AP Photo/Daily Breeze, Scott Varley)



REDLANDS, Calif. (AP) — Southern California hospitals are spreading holiday cheer for new parents by delivering newborns in giant Christmas stockings.

The bright red stockings were provided this week for babies born at Long Beach Memorial Medical Center. The Long Beach Press-Telegram reports (http://bit.ly/1c3zlYE ) it's a half-century-old tradition.

The Redlands Community Hospital has been handing out stockings to parents of infants born this month.

The Riverside Press-Enterprise reports (http://bit.ly/1eCvBli) the tradition began in 1930, but lapsed before it was revived in 2005.

This year, 16 volunteers made 250 fleece stockings during a daylong sewing bee.

http://news.yahoo.com/hospital-wraps-newborns-christmas-stockings-184053877.html