Alt-week peels back the covers on some of the more curious sci-tech stories from the last seven days.
Seven days, 26,000 lightyears, 637 languages, two groups of terrorised rats and one computer that never, ever crashes. We're light on intro, heavy of the numbers. You know the drill by now, this is Alt-week.
Alt-week peels back the covers on some of the more curious sci-tech stories from the last seven days.
The lure of gold, the unpredictable weather and the power of invisibility. What do these three things have in common? We'd argue their almost universal appeal to the human race. Science makes headway in all three of these areas in this edition. On top of that there's a really, incredibly, massive prime number. This is alt-week.
Alt-week peels back the covers on some of the more curious sci-tech stories from the last seven days.
What's black and white, and read all over? This week's dose of sci-tech news, silly. What is less black and white, however, IS where reality ends, and the stuff of science fiction begins. Europe to Australia in 90 minutes? Automatically-melting military technology? A material that hosts multiple universes? It's all here, it's all alt-week.
Alt-week takes a look at the best science and alternative tech stories from the last seven days.
In isolation, this week's stories are all pretty notable, but if you put them together, it begins to sound a lot like the plot of a movie. Four-stranded DNA, a database of alien planets, a new super-chemical to kill hospital bugs and a byzantine gamma-radiation blast. You can almost picture the plucky heroine trying to unpick the galactic conspiracy before someone loses an eye -- and if you've already cast weepy Clare Danes in the role, then you've already passed the entry exam to read Alt-week.
NASA's Kepler observatory is designed to explore strange new worlds, seek out new life and civilizations traces of exoplanets and has clocked up around two thousand unconfirmed sightings. The team behind the program have decided to lessen the workload by opening up its findings and letting armchair astronomers worldwide participate. As well as being able to chip in with opinions about what constitutes a planet, the team are letting students develop data mining experiments, looking for patterns that could assist in the discovery of alien life -- or just look neat when graphed visually.
Scientists think that a blast of Gamma radiation might have hit our planet in the halcyon days of the year 775. Fusa Miyake discovered Carbon-14 and Beryllium-10 traces in tree rings from the era, which point to a gamma ray burst from a celestial body other than the Sun. Of course, the natural question is why we have no recorded instances of Dr. Brvce Banner turning green and smashing up Byzantine Constantinople? Well, it seems that astrophysicist Ralph Neuhauser has the unexciting answer -- most of the radiation would have been caught by the atmosphere, meaning that it's highly unlikely anyone succumbed to an accidental overdose.
Hospital bugs like MRSA are easy to kill when they're outside your body, just as long as you've got some alcohol nearby. If they get inside you, then there's always the option of taking an antibiotic or two to kill 'em off. If, however, they've hitched a ride on a catheter that's implanted into your body, then the bugs can grow a biofilm -- in short, a biological beachhead that will constantly reinfect you and is impenetrable to antibiotics. IBM, in partnership with the Singapore Institute of Bioengineering and Nanotechnology, has developed a hydrogel that can be smeared all over such implants, greatly reducing the risk of infection. Safe enough to go into the human body, the hydrogel prevents biofilms from growing and, thanks to its positive charge, attracts negatively charged microorganisms, which it then pops like water balloons. There's no word on if Big Blue plans to share the discovery with chemical corporations, but it certainly sounds better than downing a shot of Purell every time we venture in for a check-up.
DNA can only be found in a double helix, right? That fact seems destined for the biology section of Snopes after scientists found a quadruple helix. A team at Cambridge University used structure-specific markers to tag the G-Quadruplex, proving that these structures can exist in the human body as well as in petri dishes and in simple organisms. It transpires that they can form during cell division at the point where DNA is being replicated, and may have a hand in the development of some cancers -- meaning they're of great interest to oncologists.
Seen any other far-out articles that you'd like considered for Alt-week? Working on a project or research that's too cool to keep to yourself? Drop us a line at alt [at] engadget [dot] com.
[Image Credit: NASA / IBM / JP Rodriguez / G.Biffi]
Alt-week takes a look at the best science and alternative tech stories.
It's 2013 and yet somehow we haven't ascended into a creature made of pure energy, so we'd better put some clothes on and get back to work. We've got lasers that are made from gas, a team of student physicists that are determined to prove George Lucas wrong, the world's oldest underground railway celebrating its sesquicentennial and we'll learn how the NYPD wants to track drug addicts with GPS. If that doesn't sound like the Alt-weekiest Alt-week you ever did see, then we can't be friends.
A team of physicists from the Institut Non Linéaire de Nice have discovered how to produce a laser from a cloud of gas for the first time. Normally, Lasers amplify light by bouncing it around inside a confined space like a crystal, simulating the emission of radiation. While the phenomenon has been found on other planets, reproducing the effect on Earth has been difficult, because gas is less ordered and refined than your average crystal. The team succeeded by using a cloud of rubidium in a magneto-optical trap, and the discovery should help scientists understand more about gas lasers and help them to discover new forms of artificial light.
The world's oldest underground railway had its 150th birthday earlier in the month, and Google celebrated the moment with a Harry Beck-themed doodle. London's Metropolitan railway opened up on January 9th 1863 and has been serving customers ever since. London Underground will also be recreating the journey by pulling a steam locomotive between Paddington and Farringdon -- the hottest ticket in town, give or take the odd show.
The NYPD is working with pharmacies in New York to add GPS trackers to OxyContin bottles in order to track thieves across the city. Commissioner Ray Kelly is announcing a plan that'll give pharmacists "bait" bottles to hand over the next time they're robbed, letting the police know exactly where they end up. Commissioner Kelly is also asking researchers to develop trackers small enough to fit inside an individual pill -- which sounds great for law enforcement officials, but might make the ACLU wince a little.
From Star Wars to that Windows screensaver, everyone knows what Hyperspace looks like. As your vessel makes the jump, the stars instantly become streaks of light that zoom past your eyes. Except a quartet of students from Leicester think that the reality would be closer to staring into a light bulb. Thanks to Doppler blue-shift, visible light would shorten and shift into the X-ray spectrum, while cosmic background radiation would go the other way. The result would be a central disc of bright light that emits so much pressure that it'd feel like you were trapped at the bottom of the ocean. Riley Connors, one of the students determined to disprove George Lucas said that "sunglasses would certainly be advisable," as well as some lead-lined clothes to keep out all of those X-rays.
Seen any other far-out articles that you'd like considered for Alt-week? Working on a project or research that's too cool to keep to yourself? Drop us a line at alt [at] engadget [dot] com.
Filed under: Alt
Alt-week takes a look at the best science and alternative tech stories from the last seven days.
2012, we salute you. All in all, you've been a pretty good year. There's been highs, lows, and lots of inbetweens. Above all else, though, you've been generous in the alternative arena. Whether it's the discovery of certain particles, or activities in space, 2012 had it covered. What better way to finish it off, then, with a disease smelling dog, a plan to catch an asteroid and a growable hangover cure. This is alt-week.
Alt-week takes a look at the best science and alternative tech stories from the last seven days.
Despite all the bad press, the 14th baktun is actually turning out pretty good so far. Okay, we're barely a day into it, but it's a promising start. To celebrate we've got a stunning postcard from the sun at the exact moment of solstice, some curious Mexican skulls and an amateur codebreaker who thinks he beat British intelligence agencies at their own game. This is definitely alt-week.
Continue reading Alt-week 12.22.12: strange skulls, solar portraits and 17-minute code cracking
Alt-week takes a look at the best science and alternative tech stories from the last seven days.
Space, it's the final frontier, where no-one can hear you scream in frustration at not knowing who the villain of Star Trek: Into Darkness is, as well as where 50 percent of our stories take place this week. NASA's planning to crash satellites into the moon, someone's patented an electo-shock handcuff and there's a river on Titan that you wouldn't want to canoe-down. This is alt-week.
Continue reading Alt-week 12.15.12: rivers on Titan, electric handcuffs and crashing into the moon
Filed under: Alt
Alt-week takes a look at the best science and alternative tech stories from the last seven days.
While some refer to it as a lonely planet, we prefer to think of it as unique. Where else can you find such diverse biology that dates back millions of years, that also has a space station hovering delicately above it. A planet where several millennia of human evolution gave birth to the comedy animated gif? Precisely. One of a kind. This is alt-week.
Alt-week takes a look at the best science and alternative tech stories from the last seven days.
Science. We like to think of it as a force for good. But, in the wrong hands, this isn't always the case. Something we're reminded of all too well this week. As a counter to that negative vibe, we are also reminded that for every Yin, there is a Yang, and this comes in the form of some developments in med-science that could mean new technology options for the blind. Then there's the Bigfoot DNA and shape-shifting robots, of course. This is alt-week.
Continue reading Alt-week 12.01.12: Bigfoot DNA, bombs on the moon and shapeshifting robots