Science

8 Things You Didn’t Know About Nikola Tesla

"Tesla had what's known as a photographic memory. He was known to memorize books and images and stockpile visions for inventions in his head. He also had a powerful imagination and the ability to visualize in three dimensions, which he used to control the terrifying vivid nightmares he suffered from as a child. It's in part what makes him such a mystical and eccentric character in popular culture, Carlson said. He was also known for having excessive hygiene habits, born out of a near-fatal bout of cholera as a teenager." Continue reading →

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Desktop Sized Atom Smasher Demonstrated

"Physicists at The University of Texas at Austin have built a tabletop particle accelerator that can generate energies and speeds previously reached only by major facilities that are hundreds of meters long and cost hundreds of millions of dollars to build. 'We have accelerated about half a billion electrons to 2 gigaelectronvolts over a distance of about 1 inch,' said Mike Downer, professor of physics in the College of Natural Sciences. 'Until now that degree of energy and focus has required a conventional accelerator that stretches more than the length of two football fields. It’s a downsizing of a factor of approximately 10,000.'" Continue reading →

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Wyoming teen builds nuclear reactor in dad’s garage, gets kicked out of science fair

"A Wyoming high school student who built a nuclear reactor in his dad's garage was disqualified from the International Science and Engineering Fair this month on a technicality. His crime: competing in too many science fairs. The infraction was reported by the former director of Wyoming State Science Fair, who later did not have her contract renewed. Officials at the University of Wyoming, the fair's sponsor, said the director acted outside her authority." Continue reading →

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Sticky Thoughts: The Market, Not The Government, Gave Us Super Glue

"It was the competitive market that finally gave the product life, but first it had to struggle through an incredible array of barriers, from disincentives to monopoly grants to regulatory restrictions. What might have helped people at daily life since the 1940s took a half a century. Part of that time passage is inherent in the market process, but much of the rest of it was due to intervention. It was not science as such that made the difference. It was science given flight by market forces. At each stage of its development, the market was there, encouraging, prodding, guiding, and leading to the light, despite all odds." Continue reading →

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Refined carbohydrates can trigger food cravings, study says

"Refined carbohydrates such as corn syrup could trigger food cravings not unlike the cravings that drug addicts experience, new research suggests. The findings, published last week in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, imply that the quick spike and subsequent crash in blood sugar that comes after eating highly processed carbs activates reward and addiction centers in the brain. The findings could suggest that avoiding refined carbohydrates might be a good weight-loss strategy because people would avoid not only the calories but also the strong cravings that the carbs they induce." Continue reading →

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Using Metadata to Find Paul Revere

"I have been asked by my superiors to give a brief demonstration of the surprising effectiveness of even the simplest techniques of the new-fangled Social Networke Analysis in the pursuit of those who would seek to undermine the liberty enjoyed by His Majesty’s subjects. This is in connection with the discussion of the role of 'metadata' in certain recent events and the assurances of various respectable parties that the government was merely 'sifting through this so-called metadata'. I will show how we can use this 'metadata' to find key persons involved in terrorist groups operating within the Colonies at the present time." Continue reading →

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Quantum Teleportation Between Atomic Systems Over Long Distances — New Reliable Technique

"A new milestone has been reached in the development of a practical quantum teleportation system — researchers have for the first time succeeded in the teleportation of information between two separate clouds of gas atoms, over long-distances. And not just once, the method is apparently already extremely reliable — working every single time that it’s been attempted. There are two glass containers, each containing a cloud of billions of caesium gas atoms. Both glass containers are enclosed in a chamber with a magnetic field. Information is teleported from the one glass cloud to the other by means of laser light." Continue reading →

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How close are we to getting superpowers?

"Next month, at a technology conference in Hong Kong, Dina Katabi, an MIT professor, will present her 'Wi-Vi' device, which uses a low-power wi-fi signal to track people moving behind walls. Last month, it was reported that scientists in Singapore have created a rudimentary invisibility cloak, which they illustrated with a video clearly designed to appeal to muggles as much as wizards – it showed a fluffy kitten entering the 'cloak' and disappearing so conclusively that a butterfly could be seen fluttering behind it. Essentially, if there’s a superpower you can think of, someone’s probably trying to develop it. Just remember: with great power comes great responsibility." Continue reading →

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16-year-old student in Turkey turns bananas into plastic

"There’s nothing slippery about Elif Bilgin’s idea of using banana peels as a substitute for old-school petroleum-based plastics. The 16-year-old student from Istanbul spent two years perfecting a way to make a bioplastic out of discarded banana peels that could, in turn, be used for the electrical insulation of cables. In her research, Bilgin — who says 'science is my calling' — determined that if starch and cellulose from such food waste as mango skins can be used to make bioplastics, then banana peels ought to do the trick, too." Continue reading →

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NY Fed: The Truth About the Job Market for Recent College Graduates

"We show that there are large differences in unemployment rates, underemployment rates, and average wages across majors. In particular, we show that those with degrees in majors that provide technical training, such as 'Engineering' and 'Math & Computers,' or in those that are geared toward growing parts of the economy, such as 'Education' and 'Health,' have tended to do pretty well when compared to the rest of the pack. At the other end of the spectrum, those with a 'Liberal Arts' or 'Leisure & Hospitality' major tend to have lower wages, higher unemployment, and higher underemployment." Continue reading →

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