Science and Technology

Monday, 17 February 2020 05:12

Your sweat, tears, saliva can give away your secrets. Here’s how

Genes can tell tales about you, from who your ancestors were to how likely you are to develop a range of diseases. And it seems probable that in the future they will tell more: your personality type, perhaps, or your intelligence. For these reasons, many countries have laws limiting what use employers and insurance companies can make of such information. America, for example, has the Genetic Information Nondiscrimination Act, which makes it illegal for health insurers and employers to use genetic information to discriminate against customers and employees. There is much, however, that genes cannot reveal. They are blind to…

Sunday, 09 February 2020 05:05

Apps could soon predict when you'll die: The science of how

Predicting the lifespan of people, or their “Personal Life Expectancy” (PLE), would greatly alter our lives. When will I die? This question has endured across cultures and civilizations. It has given rise to a plethora of religions and spiritual paths over thousands of years, and more recently, some highly amusing apps. But this question now prompts a different response, as technology slowly brings us closer to accurately predicting the answer. Predicting the lifespan of people, or their “Personal Life Expectancy” (PLE), would greatly alter our lives. On one hand, it may have benefits for policymaking, and help optimize an individual’s…

Friday, 07 February 2020 05:15

US lets autonomous vehicle bypass human-driver safety rules

For the first time, the U.S. government’s highway safety agency has approved a company’s request to deploy a self-driving vehicle that doesn’t need to meet the same federal safety standards for cars and trucks driven by humans. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration granted temporary approval for Silicon Valley robotics company Nuro to run low-speed autonomous delivery vehicles that were designed without any accommodations for human drivers. That means no side and rear-view mirrors, windshield wipers, steering wheels or brake pedals. The vehicles previously were subject to federal standards for low-speed vehicles that travel under 25 miles per hour. Those…

Wednesday, 05 February 2020 05:44

Modern tomatoes are different from their wild ancestors – and we found missing links in their evolution

The Research Brief is a short take on interesting academic work. The Big Idea: The tomato’s path from wild plant to household staple is much more complex than researchers have long thought. For many years, scientists believed that humans domesticated the tomato in two major phases. First, native people in South America cultivated blueberry-sized wild tomatoes about 7,000 years ago to breed a plant with a cherry-sized fruit. Later, people in Mesoamerica bred this intermediate group further to form the large cultivated tomatoes that we eat today. But in a recent study, we show that the cherry-sized tomato likely originated…

Tuesday, 04 February 2020 05:42

Anti-solar panel can generate electricity at night, researchers say

In order to develop solar panels that generate electricity at night, you just need them to operate in the exact opposite way solar panels work during the day. One of the problems with solar panels is that they don't generate electricity at night, so we have to store the electricity they generate during the day to power things during the evening. That works fine, but what if we could develop solar panels that did generate electricity at night? It's possible, and the way it works is pretty surprising. Researchers from the University of California, Davis explain in a new paper…

Sunday, 02 February 2020 03:58

Apple's Lightning is out as EU votes for a common charger for all mobile devices

The European Parliament has voted to have one common charger for all mobile devices -- meaning the end of the line for Apple's Lightning charger in the EU. The measure passed by a vote of 582 to 40, with the guidelines to be adopted by July 2020. It's an effort to reduce e-waste being generated in Europe -- but Apple last week argued that being forced to change iPhones from Lighting to USB-C connectorswould cause "an unprecedented volume of electronic waste," as it would make the company's accessories obsolete. "More than 1 billion Apple devices have shipped using a Lightning…

Saturday, 01 February 2020 03:04

WhatsApp to stop working on millions of phones

Messaging service WhatsApp will no longer work on millions of smartphones from 1 February. Android and iPhone devices which only support outdated operating systems will no longer be able to run the Facebook-owned app. WhatsApp said the move was necessary in order to protect the security of its users. Smartphones using Android 2.3.7 and older, and iPhone iOS 8 or older, are those affected by the update. The operating systems that WhatsApp is dropping support for are legacy operating systems, which are no longer updated or installed on new devices. Most users will simply be able to update their operating…

Friday, 24 January 2020 05:42

Here's exactly how the new coronavirus affects human body

The mysterious and deadly new strain of coronavirus that originated in China has infected close to 500 people. It initially has flu-like symptoms but can also permanently damage the lungs in severe cases. The new coronavirus is spreading fast. From a market in Wuhan, China, there are now close to 500 cases of infections globally, including in places like Hong Kong, South Korea, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, Japan, and the United States. The World Health Organization (WHO) said in a report on Monday, January 20, that there were 278 cases in China alone, with a high concentration in Hubei Province,…

Friday, 24 January 2020 05:35

Harvard scientists find people with more brain activity have shorter lives

The physiological activities that regulate metabolism also play a huge role in exciting our nervous system. According to the new paper prolonged hyper-activity bears the potential to shorten our lifespan. It’s good to always be thinking however new research shows you may want to give your brain a break sometimes. Healthy cognition is made possible by two opposing functions: neural excitation and neural inhibition. The former makes nerves more active while the latter achieves just the opposite. Up until very recently the effects of this counter-balance were relatively unknown but a preliminary new report published in the journal Nature motions…

Friday, 24 January 2020 05:34

No one should ever buy a car again. Here's why

Autonomous vehicles are coming faster than you think. But even today, it doesn't make sense to own your ride. Thanks to the miracle of CGI, our culture has become used to imagining some pretty wild things: vast superhero battles, space armadas, planet-killing lasers. But I'm willing to bet you still have difficulty picturing a much more likely future scene: your neighborhood with zero parked cars in it. Just imagine for a minute, how much visual clutter that would remove. No obnoxious SUVs at odd angles, half-on, half-off the sidewalk, squeezing out pedestrians. No driveways stuffed with vehicles in various states…

More...

Tuesday, 21 January 2020 06:11

Whoever leads in artificial intelligence in 2030 will rule the world until 2100

A couple of years ago, Vladimir Putin warned Russians that the country that led in technologies using artificial intelligence will dominate the globe. He was right to be worried. Russia is now a minor player, and the race seems now to be mainly between the United States and China. But don’t count out the European Union just yet; the EU is still a fifth of the world economy, and it has underappreciated strengths. Technological leadership will require big digital investments, rapid business process innovation, and efficient tax and transfer systems. China appears to have the edge in the first, the…

Tuesday, 21 January 2020 06:10

Android users should delete these 30 'dangerous' camera apps now, experts warn

A new report by experts at Cyber News has warned Android users about 30 ‘dangerous’ camera apps that have already been downloaded 1 .4 billion times From Instagram to Snapchat, camera apps are some of the most popular on both the App Store and Google Play Store. But a new report may encourage you to reassess which camera apps you have on your smartphone. The report, by experts at Cyber News, has warned Android users about 30 ‘dangerous’ camera apps that have already been downloaded 1 .4 billion times. In a blog about the findings, researchers Bernard Beyer explained: “When…

Friday, 17 January 2020 06:09

1st malaria vaccine tried out in babies in 3 African nations

A pinch in the leg, a squeal and a trickle of tears. One baby after another in Malawi is getting the first and only vaccine against malaria, one of history’s deadliest and most stubborn of diseases. The southern African nation is rolling out the shots in an unusual pilot program along with Kenya and Ghana. Unlike established vaccines that offer near-complete protection, this new one is only about 40% effective. But experts say it’s worth a try as progress against malaria stalls: Resistance to treatment is growing and the global drop in cases has leveled off. With the vaccine, the…

Monday, 13 January 2020 05:38

Lost or stolen Android phone? Here's how to get it back right now

It happens in the blink of an eye. You place your phone down on a counter at the cash register or feel a slight bump as you get off the subway, only to later realize your phone is gone. Regardless of how you lose it, be it from theft or a simple mistake, losing your phone is a stressful experience. What someone who finds a lost or stolen Android phone will see after you use Find My Device to lock it. Not only does it cut off your access to the rest of the world, but your phone is the…

Page 32 of 38

Science and Technology

More...

Search

Most Read

News

Business

Politics

Opinion

Features

Strangely

Crime

Wars

SCIENCE & TECH

SPECIAL REPORTS

Sports

VIDEOS