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\n Mind Brain | Technology | Space & Physics

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Brain Cells With Alzheimer's Disease Grown in a Petri\nDish

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There’s a new tool for researchers in pursuit of a cure for\nAlzheimer’s disease: lab-grown brains. For the first time,\nneuroscientists from Massachusetts General Hospital have grown\nfunctioning human brain cells that develop Alzheimer’s disease in a\npetri dish. The breakthrough offers researchers a new method to\ntest cures and decipher the origins of the disease. Dishing up\nAlzheimer’s To be clear, a fully functioning brain is not what’s\ngrown in the lab. Rather, what results is a culture
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Will We Have Nuclear Fusion Reactors Within a Decade?

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Lockheed Martin Corp. on Wednesday said its engineers had\nmade a breakthrough in the race to build a nuclear fusion\nreactor. The company’s secretive research unit, Skunk Works, claims\nthat within a decade it’ll develop and deploy a nuclear fusion\nreactor that’s powerful enough to light over 80,000 homes, yet\nsmall enough to fit in the back of a truck. If the company\nsucceeds, it would mark a major milestone in mankind’s pursuit of a\nviable nuclear fusion power source. Nuclear Fusion’s Allure
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\“Good Enough\” Tanks Won WWII

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Sometimes a \"good enough\" military technology can achieve\nvictory over better military technologies. Such a fact probably\ngave very little comfort to the five-man crews of U.S. Sherman\ntanks who faced an uphill battle against more powerful German tanks\nduring World War II. British tank crews gave Sherman tanks the\nunflattering nickname \"Ronson\" — a grim reference to\nthe Ronson cigarette lighter's ad slogan \"lights first\nevery time\" and the unfortunate fact that Sherman tanks often\nburned aft
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Once-In-a-Lifetime Experiences Are Both Joyous and\nDepressing

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Skydiving, winning a sexy sports car or scaling Mt. Everest\nsure sound like extraordinary experiences that would fill us with\nboundless joy to last a lifetime. But a new study finds that's not\nalways so: extraordinary experiences can actually generate unhappy\nfeelings as well, because others in your ordinary social group are\nunable to relate to your stories. Extraordinarily Isolated To test\nthe effect of extraordinary experiences on social dynamics,\nresearchers set up a simple experiment
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For Disguise, Female Squid Turn On Fake Testes

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Did you know this week is International Cephalopod Awareness\nDays? I'll assume your gifts are in the mail. Today is dedicated to\nsquid, and you can't have total cephalopod awareness without\ndiscussing fake squid testes. This post was first published in\nSeptember 2013. The best way to stay out of trouble, if you're a\nshimmery, color-changing little squid, might be to paint on some\npretend testes. Scientists have found that certain female squid can\nswitch on and off a body pattern that make
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This Machine Gun Folds and Shoots Paper Airplanes

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The art of disrupting social studies class just went\nhigh-tech. A man in Germany has invented the world’s (unofficial)\nfirst paper airplane machine gun. This shotgun-sized apparatus is\nevery study hall supervisor’s nightmare. The gun self-folds each\nsheet of paper and launches the resultant paper airplanes into the\nair with assembly line efficiency. The man’s wordless\nairplane-shooting demonstration in this video makes sure all the\nattention is devoted to the beauty of his inventio
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Building Better Cyborg Horses

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Horses harnessed as technology enabled the rise of human\ncivilization by hauling heavy loads, opening new trade and\nmigration routes across vast distances, and carrying warriors into\nbattle on chariots and on horseback. But whenever horses broke down\nfrom leg injuries, equine biology usually dictated a death sentence\ndespite the best medical care — something that is still true\neven in the modern world where machines have largely replaced\nhorses in transportation, agriculture and warfare. Now a
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Invisible Hands, Peeping Toms, and the First Physics Nobel\nPrize

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Sometimes the Nobel prize in physics requires a fair bit of\ndecoding for the non-expert (such as last year's award for the\ntheory behind the Higgs boson, or the award the year before \"for\nground-breaking experimental methods that enable measuring and\nmanipulation of individual quantum systems\"). There's little room\nfor confusion about this year's prize, which recognizes the\ninventors of the blue LED, the crucial technology for\nenergy-efficient indoor LED lighting. But in terms of public\nacclaim,
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Conversation's Gender Gap

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New research reveals who really has the gift of gab.
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Steamy Solutions to Citrus Sickness

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From tarps to steam machines, more heat could save the\nnation's orange and grapefruit trees.
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A Skype Session From Mars

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NASA's Deep Space Network will need an upgrade before\ncolonists on the Red Planet can use it to phone home.
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Protecting Crops From Birds, Using Sound

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A sonic shield could safely drive birds away from farm fields\nand tall buildings.
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A Skype Session From Mars

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NASA's Deep Space Network will need an upgrade before\ncolonists on the Red Planet can use it to phone home.
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The Cutting-Edge Telescopes On the Horizon

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New telescopes will offer an unprecedented look at the sky,\nwith exquisite resolution and a variety of instruments.
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20 Things You Didn't Know About... Galaxies

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The Milky Way rotates at 560,000 miles per hour, and makes a\nfull revolution every 200 million years.
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Step #11 in the Human Conquest of Space

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In my previous post I talked about the magical quality of an\norbit: Each time a spacecraft settles into a permanent path around\na new object, humanity has taken one more step in venturing off\nthis little blue world of ours and becoming colonizers of the\nuniverse. When the Rosetta reached Comet Churyumov-Gerasimenko on\nAugust 6 it marked the 11th celestial body we’ve orbited: Step #11\nin the human conquest of space. Going from zero to 11 has taken\njust under 57 years; the anniversary of Sp
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Welcome to Lovesick Cyborg

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I don’t obsess over the newest phones or tablets. What\nfascinates me is how technology shapes our human experience by\ntriggering powerful emotions, guiding our cognitive processes and\nfiltering our perceptions of the world. Why do some humanoid robots\nor animated film characters creep people out? Why have U.S.\nsoldiers risked their lives to save stranded battlefield robots\nunder enemy fire? Why do virtual reality headsets such as Oculus\nRift feel like a magical wonderland to some people and
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World's First 3-D Printed Car Takes to the Streets

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Henry Ford’s assembly line famously transformed the\nautomobile industry in the 20th century – and a new company is\nhoping to bring about a similar revolution in the 21st, with its\nrecently unveiled 3-D printed vehicle. The company is Local Motors,\ndesigners of the Strati. The car was printed in about 44 hours on\nsite earlier this month at the International Manufacturing\nTechnology Show in Chicago. In contrast to the thousands of\ncomponents in a traditional vehicle, the Strati consists of
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Wind Turbines Kill Bats by Impersonating Trees

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Survival tip: don't hang around machines that have giant\nspinning blades. It's a lesson bats have been slow to learn,\njudging by the large numbers of their corpses found beneath wind\nturbines. New video footage suggests some bats are attracted to\nwind farms because they can't tell turbines apart from trees. If\nit's true, this might help us find ways to keep them safer. \"I wish\nwe knew for sure\" how big a problem wind farms pose to bats, says\nUSGS research biologist Paul Cryan. Other resea
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11 Ideas for the Perfect Geeky Wedding

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From vows to volcanoes, here's how to make your big day truly\nunique.
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Taking Inspiration from India's Mars Probe, and from Mr.\nSulu

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To my mind, \"standard orbit, Mr. Sulu\" are more exciting\nwords than \"beam me up, Scotty.\" An orbit contains a promise of\nongoing excitement and adventure: When a spacecraft settles into\norbit around another world, that means we have come to stay and\nexplore, not just snap a few quick pictures and move on (maybe\npausing briefly to break the Prime Directive). Two recent historic\nachievements speak to the thrill of the orbit, and its importance\nin establishing humans as a truly space-faring species
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Cirque Du Soleil Choreographed a Dance For Drones

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Wherever you find science, you don’t have to look far for\nart. Whether it’s diatom arranging or turning algorithms into\nmurals, artists will always add a human twist to the fruits of\nscientific inquiry. And their latest medium? Drones. Aerial drones\nare already useful for scientists and hobbyists alike, but leave it\nto the folks at Cirque du Soleil to figure out a way to dance with\nthem. In the new short film \“Sparked,\” man and drone prove that\nstate-of-the-art technology can seamlessly b
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Walking Really Is Just Falling and Catching Yourself

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The flailing of a gymnast who's missed a step on the balance\nbeam might not be far off from what the rest of us experience every\nday. Each step we take is really a tiny fall, a mathematical model\nsuggests. The random-looking variation in our footfalls is actually\na series of corrections. Our strides are all screw-ups—but thanks\nto the fixes that happen without us knowing, our walking routines\nlook like a perfect ten. Manoj Srinivasan, who runs the Movement\nLab at Ohio State University, an
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Seat of Selflessness Found in Brains of Extreme\nAltruists

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Altruism has posed a puzzle for psychologists and\nevolutionary biologists for centuries. Why is it that humans will\nhelp others even to their own detriment? A new study sheds light on\nthe answer to that question by studying the brains of extreme\naltruists – people on the extreme end of the caring continuum.\nIn this case researchers chose to study people who donated a kidney\nto a complete stranger. They found that not only are extreme\naltruists’ brains different from a normal person’s, they’
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This Robot Can Plug In a USB But I Still Can't

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Why is it that every time I try to insert a USB plug it's\nbackward? Shouldn't it be right at least half the time by dumb\nluck? Whatever my problem is, a dextrous new robot doesn't have it.\nThe robot's advantage is that its fingertips don't just feel—they\nsee, too. Researchers at Northeastern University and (where else?)\nMIT created the plug-savvy bot. They started with an existing\nfactory-worker robot called Baxter and gave it a pair of pinching\nfingers. Then on one finger, they added a shr
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Mice Become Smarter With Addition of Single Human Gene

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In an experiment that could explain the origin of the\nmaniacal mouse in \“Pinky and the Brain,\” researchers spliced a\nhuman brain gene into lab mice, and it made them smarter. These\nmice aren’t taking over the world any time soon, but they are\ncertainly adept at getting through mazes. Mice genetically modified\nto carry a human gene associated with speech and language, called\nFoxp2, learned how to find a reward in a maze significantly faster\nthan normal mice. While this is good news for the m
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Sticky Nanobeads Can Strip Bacteria, Viruses From\nBlood

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A new device uses magnetism to rid the bloodstream of\npathogens that are the source of deadly infections. Bioengineers at\nHarvard’s Wyss Institute have developed a blood filter that quickly\ngrabs toxins, such as E.coli or Ebola, from the bloodstream using\nprotein-coated nanobeads and magnets. In early tests, the\nbiomechanical treatment removed more than 90 percent of toxins from\ninfected human blood within a few hours. Cleansing the Blood When\nour immune system fights an infection, the
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Will the Higgs Boson Destroy the Universe?

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Improbable as it may seem, this question has been pinging\naround the Internet a lot this past week, because of a mix of\nStephen Hawking and shameless sensationalism. Life is short (with\nor without the help of the Higgs), so I'll answer it as succinctly\nas I can. No. If you want to get technical, a Higgs doomsday is\npossible. No device on Earth could trigger it, though, and in\nnature it probably wouldn't happen for 10100  years. So\nbasically, essentially, fundamentally: No. Now let's mo
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Researchers Unveil Exoskeleton That Fits Like Skinny\nJeans

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You heard it here first: robotic exoskeletons are poised to\nbecome 2014’s hottest fashion trend. Scientists are perfecting a\nprototype of the exoskeleton equivalent of skinny jeans. Robotic\nexoskeletons are certainly carving out useful niches in the real\nworld: from helping paralyzed people walk again to making\nshipbuilders stronger. But most of these devices are built of\nheavy, bulky materials. Now, researchers at Harvard’s Wyss\nInstitute have created an exoskeleton that uses soft mat
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Why We Explore: A Comet Tale Told in Four Pictures

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There are many ways to explain the reasons for space\nexploration: the technological spin-offs, the science-education\nvalue, the commercial potential of space, the pragmatic lessons\nback home in everything from space-weather forecasting to mineral\nexploration. I've seen plenty of evidence that all these things are\ntrue, yet they dance around the most essential and least tangible\nmotivation. We explore because it is what living things do.\nMovement and the acquisition of knowledge are integral t
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Your Fingertips Perform Brain-like Calculations

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Your brain has a lot to think about, so if there’s a way to\noutsource a few mental tasks to save bandwidth, it’s going to do\nit. Now researchers have discovered another such workaround: the\nneurons in your fingertips perform some computational tasks\nindependently of the brain. Researchers from Umeå University in\nSweden demonstrated that nerve endings in our fingertips encode\ninformation about touch intensity and shape before those signals\never travel to the brain. Their findings challenge t
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Hurricane-Proof Drones Are the Storm Chasers of\nTomorrow

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When Hurricane Katrina bore down on New Orleans in August of\n2005, federal officials couldn't predict how it would behave with\nany real certainty until two days before landfall. Next time, their\nfortune-telling is likely to be far more accurate, thanks to a new\ntype of hurricane-proof data-gathering drone now in development.\nCurrent hurricane-hunting planes gather data on winds, pressure,\nprecipitation and temperature, but they can't fly below about 5,000\nfeet because of extreme turbulenc
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Corals Engineer Their Own Currents

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There are few more monastic lives in the animal kingdom than\na coral’s. In adulthood it gives up swimming to settle on the ocean\nfloor, surround its spineless body with clones, and become a rock.\nMouth facing the ocean, it waits passively for whatever drifts\nby—or maybe not so passively. Taking a closer look at these\ncreatures, scientists have discovered that corals use their tiny\nbodies to create swirling currents that are relatively enormous. By\nforcing the ocean water to move molecules cl
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Skin Color Still Matters in Video Games

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Video games represent the ultimate in escapist technology for\nmillions of people — a way to spend a few enjoyable hours\nslaying fantasy monsters or exploring science fiction worlds. But\nthe dominant skin color of virtual avatars in a game can still have\na very real-world impact on the experience of minority gamers,\naccording to a recent study. The research, conducted by Jong-Eun\nRoselyn Lee at Ohio State University, used the online game \“Second\nLife\” to examine how diversity among virtual
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Your Car Looks Just Like You

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When someone compliments your sexy car, feel free to take it\npersonally. That’s because your face bears a striking resemblance\nto your car’s grille and headlights, according to a new study. It’s\nnot news that we tend to see faces in inanimate objects. (For proof\nlook no further than this Twitter account.) And studies years ago\nproved that we assign personalities to vehicles based on their\nfront profile. However, scientists from the University of Vienna\nhave now shown that a car's resemblanc
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How Advanced Are We Earthlings? Here's a Cosmic\nYardstick

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Updated 9/16/14 10:15am: Clarified calculations and added\nfootnote We humans like to think ourselves pretty advanced – and\nwith no other technology-bearing beings to compare ourselves to,\nour back-patting doesn’t have to take context into account. After\nall, we harnessed fire, invented stone tools and the wheel,\ndeveloped agriculture and writing, built cities, and learned to use\nmetals. Then, a mere few moments ago from the perspective of cosmic\ntime, we advanced even more rapidly, dev
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Like GPS? Thank Relativity

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In 1971—16 years after Einstein's death—the definitive\nexperiment to test Einstein's relativity was finally carried out.\nIt required not a rocket launch but eight round-the-world plane\ntickets that cost the United States Naval Observatory, funded by\ntaxpayers, a total of $7,600. The brainchild of Joseph Hafele\n(Washington University in St. Louis) and Richard Keating (United\nStates Naval Observatory) were \"Mr. Clocks,\" passengers on four\nround-the-world flights. (Since the Mr. Clocks were
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The Brain Basis of Extraordinary Feats of Will

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What makes some people capable of amazing\nperseverance?
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How to Better Teach Kids Science? Just Ask Them

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Neuroscientist Bob Knight started a kid-reviewed,\nkid-targeted online journal to inspire the next generation of\nresearchers on their own terms.
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You Sound Tall

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Listeners can determine if a person is tall or short based on\nvoice alone.
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Preparing for the Quantum Storm

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Whether or not they'll ever work, quantum computers pose a\nbig enough threat to online security that cryptographers are\nalready scrambling to adapt.
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The Chemistry Secrets in a Degrading Photograph

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Understanding how silver daguerreotypes corrode may help\nimprove today's industrial materials.
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Rewiring Nature With Synthetic Biology

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Bioengineer Drew Endy shares his vision to reprogram biology\nas a precision manufacturer — and possibly change civilization as\nwe know it.
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Artsy Amateurs Turn Space Data Into Stunning Images

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These artists scour NASA data for raw materials they can\ntransform into masterpieces with modern-day wizardry.
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Could Jupiter's Interior Ever Be Filled?

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Comets, meteors and other space rocks have been colliding\nwith planets for billions of years. Is there a limit?
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Sailing on Solar Winds

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NASA unfurls the Sunjammer, the agency's first solar sail\nmission to deep space.
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Beyond the Outer Limits

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Maps of radiation left over from the Big Bang may show traces\nof universes besides our own.
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Go Over to the Darker Side

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Head up to Alberta, Canada, to take part in this festival\ncelebrating all things astronomical.
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October's Double Play of Eclipses

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This month's two most intriguing events lurk in the\nshadows.
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Designing a Sexier Spacesuit

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Tomorrow's astronauts will have greater range of motion,\nprotection and even style if this spacesuit designer has her\nway.
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