The $35 dongle, which plugs into the HDMI port of televisions and lets users stream content from multiple device platforms, is now listed as “coming soon” with no option to order it from Google’s online store. Shortly after sales went up, it was listed to ship between August 2 and August 7, down from the 1-2 days for initial orders. Related stories Chromecast for your TV Google’s new Nexus 7 Nexus devices first to get Android 4....
It took hard work, determination and some MacGyver-esque ingenuity for a pair of spacewalking astronauts to fix a key power system aboard the International Space Station Wednesday (Sept. 5). NASA spaceflyer Sunita Williams and Japanese astronaut Akihiko Hoshide spent nearly 6 1/2 hours yesterday outside in the vacuum of space to properly install a pair of bolts that had caused problems for the pair during a previous spacewalk last week....
Scientific American presents Savvy Psychologist by Quick & Dirty Tips. Scientific American and Quick & Dirty Tips are both Macmillan companies. Asking for help can turn the most self-assured, square-shouldered among us into a nail-biting mess. We may cast about vague wishes to no one in particular, blame others for our woes, or procrastinate until our problem has become an emergency. You’d think asking for help would be preferable to all this misery, but taking action is tough for almost everyone....
From Nature magazine A chemical in llama semen responsible for inducing ovulation in females has been identified and, surprisingly, it is a protein already known for its role in promoting the growth and survival of nerve cells in many species1. The protein — nerve growth factor (NGF) — is also found in human semen, suggesting that it may play a previously unsuspected role in human fertility. Whereas many animals, including humans, cattle and mice, produce eggs as part of a cycle of spontaneous ovulation, others — including llamas, camels, rabbits and koalas — are ‘induced ovulators’ that need a chemical stimulus....
Researchers have developed a new class of materials that can readily and efficiently absorb carbon dioxide from a smokestack or even directly from the atmosphere. The substances can help alleviate problems associated with carbon dioxide emissions, like climate change and ocean acidification. At the University of Southern California, scientists used a polymer called polyethylenimine (PEI) as the basis for their new materials, which offered several advantages over existing strategies to filter carbon....
By Daniel CresseyA study suggesting that organic agriculture gives better pest control and larger plants than conventional farming is sure to reignite longstanding debates about the merits of organic versus conventional agriculture. It also highlights an often-neglected aspect of biodiversity.“Organic agriculture promotes more balanced communities of predators,” says David Crowder, author of the new study published June 30 in Nature.“Our study does not tell farmers they should shift to organic agriculture....
The mystery surrounding a large structure built on a barge docked in San Francisco bay is deepening. Is it a floating Google data center? A floating Google Glass store? Or something else altogether? On Friday, I reported exclusively that a company, very likely Google, has set up shop on Treasure Island, located between San Francisco and Oakland, and has been building a large structure made from shipping, or cargo, containers on a barge....
By Kate Kelland LONDON (Reuters) - Scientists launched a global initiative on Friday to map out and describe every cell in the human body in a vast atlas that could transform researchers’ understanding of human development and disease. The atlas, which is likely to take more than a decade to complete, aims to chart the types and properties of all human cells across all tissues and organs and build a reference map of the healthy human body, the scientists said....
Dolly the cloned sheep was created there; the existence of the Higgs boson was predicted there. But soon Scotland could leave the United Kingdom, with potentially major repercussions for science. Ahead of a historic referendum on September 18, which the latest opinion polls suggest could go either way, researchers on both sides of the border are split over whether science in Scotland would flourish or founder should its people vote yes to independence....
Back in 1980, a woman named Maureen Wilcox played the Rhode Island and the Massachusetts lotteries at the same time. And she hit the correct numbers for both. Unfortunately, she picked all the correct Massachusetts numbers on her Rhode Island ticket and all the right Rhode Island numbers on her Massachusetts ticket. Shirley Jackson couldn’t write a more terrifying lottery story. Wilcox’s shenanigans bring to mind a short work by Woody Allen that lampoons numerology, the search for meaning in random numbers....
The lives of the stars are nothing if not dramatic. Fresh observations will no doubt fuel their tempestuous reputation. Scientists have unveiled a striking image of a distant nebula showing infant stars trashing their nurseries–and promoting new star formation in the process. Astronomers made this discovery using NASA’s infrared Spitzer Space Telescope, which they trained on the Carina Nebula. Located some 10,000 light-years from Earth, the nebula houses what was once the second brightest star in the sky, Eta Carinae....
During the 30 minutes it will take you to read this article, 360 preschool children will die of hunger and malnutrition. Twelve a minute, around the clock; more than six million a year. But that is only the tip of the proverbial and ugly iceberg. One in four preschoolers in developing countries suffers from hunger and nutritional deficiencies. These children do not grow to their full potential, they have little resistance to disease, they learn less in school and they earn less as adults....
Waters, a tall, rumpled man in his mid-fifties with intense blue eyes and a slow, cautious way of talking, does not look or sound like a maverick. But his work is helping to topple an enduring model for the peopling of the New World. For decades scientists thought the first Americans were Asian big-game hunters who tracked mammoths and other large prey eastward across a now submerged landmass known as Beringia that joined northern Asia to Alaska....
We are 50 kilometers off the coast of San Diego in late February, holding station in 1,000 meters of water. Onboard our research vessel, the RV Sally Ride, are eight containers, each as large as a compact car, filled with sediment dredged from the deep Pacific Ocean floor. This morning we mixed the sediment with seawater in a huge tank, and over an hour we pumped the entire contents through a wide discharge hose that extended 60 meters down into the water from the side of the ship....
In the ongoing war on cancer, researchers have enlisted a new series of soldiers: roots and vegetables. New findings presented at the American Association for Cancer Research show that a grocery list of vegetables including ginger, hot peppers and cauliflower show promise as cancer-combating agents. Pharmacologist Shivendra Singh of the University of Pittsburgh and his colleagues showed that a chemical released when cruciferous vegetables–such as cauliflower, broccoli and cabbage–are chewed helps control human prostate tumors grafted into mice....
This week, Vermont passed a first-in-the-nation law that would facilitate the state’s importation of prescription drugs wholesale from Canada. It represents the state’s effort to tackle head-on the issue of constantly climbing drug prices. Other states, including Louisiana and Utah, have debated similar legislation and are watching Vermont’s progress closely. After all, the issue of drug importation polls well across the political spectrum and has been endorsed by politicians ranging from candidate Donald Trump, before he became president, to liberal firebrand Sen....
But the glittering new technology cannot be used by more than nine million people in the U.S. with voice disabilities like Mattes nor by stutterers or those afflicted with cerebral palsy and other disorders. “Speech recognizers are targeted at the vast majority of people at that center point on a bell curve. Everyone else is on the edges,” explained Todd Mozer, CEO of the Silicon Valley–based company Sensory, which has voice-recognition chips in a variety of consumer products like Samsung Galaxy phones and Bluetooth headsets....
As spring ends, maple trees begin to unfetter winged seeds that flutter and swirl from branches to land gently on the ground. Inspired by the aerodynamics of these helicoptering pods, as well as other gliding, spinning tree seeds, engineers claim to have crafted the smallest ever wind-borne machines, which they call “microfliers.” The largest versions of these winged devices, which the researchers sometimes refer to as “mesofliers” or “macrofliers,” are about two millimeters in length, roughly the size of a fruit fly....
Chemists and physicists have begun 2016 heavy with resolution—superheavy, in fact. Two days before 2015 came to end the guardians of the periodic table of the elements—the International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry—announced that it was okay to add four new ones, filling out the seventh row. Atoms of each new element are packed with protons in their nuclei, giving the four atomic numbers of 113, 115, 117 and 118....
Researchers at Tel Aviv University in Israel have demonstrated that neurons cultured outside the brain can be imprinted with multiple rudimentary memories that persist for days without interfering with or wiping out others. “The main achievement was the fact that we used the inhibition of the inhibitory neurons” to stimulate the memory patterns, says physicist Eshel Ben-Jacob, senior author of a paper on the findings published in the May issue of Physical Review E....
